But we found a use for it now; for, there being a reef in the
topsail, the studding-sail could not be set without one in it
also. To be sure, a studding-sail with reefed topsails was rather
a novelty; yet there was some reason in it, for if we carried that
away we should lose only a sail and a boom; but a whole topsail
might have carried away the mast and all.
While we were aloft the sail had been got out, bent to the yard,
reefed, and ready for hoisting. Waiting for a good opportunity,
the halyards were manned and the yard hoisted fairly up to the
block; but when the mate came to shake the catspaw out of the
downhaul, and we began to boom-end the sail, it shook the ship to
her centre. The boom buckled up and bent like a whip-stick, and we
looked every moment to see something go; but, being of the short,
tough upland spruce, it bent like whalebone, and nothing could
break it. The carpenter said it was the best stick he had ever
seen. The strength of all hands soon brought the tack to the
boom-end, and the sheet was trimmed down, and the preventer and
the weather brace hauled taut to take off the strain. Every
rope-yarn seemed stretched to the utmost, and every thread of
canvas; and with this sail added to her, the ship sprang through
the water like a thing possessed.
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