ZLE TO THE LEFT! The order given to trim the
gun to the object.

MUZZY. Half-drunk.

MYLKERE. The old English name for the milt of a fish.

MYOPARA. An ancient corsair's vessel.

MYRMIDON [from _mur-medon_, a sea-captain]. The Myrmidons were a people
of Thessaly, said to have first constructed ships.

MYSERECORD. A thin-bladed dagger with which a grievously wounded warrior
was despatched as an act of mercy.

MYTH. Obelisk, tower, land, or anything for directing the course by
sight.

N.

NAB. The bolt-toe, or cock of a gun-lock.

NABB. A cant term for the head. Also, a protuberance on the rocky summit
of a hill; a rocky ledge below water.

NACA, OR NACELLE. A French boat without mast or sail, used as early as
the twelfth century.

NACRE. The mother-of-pearl which lines some shells, both univalve and
bivalve.

NACTA. A small transport vessel of early times.

NADIR. The lower pole of the rational horizon, the other being the
zenith.

NAID. A northern term for a lamprey, or large eel.

NAIL, TO. Is colloquially used for binding a person to a bargain. In
weighing articles of food, a nail is 8 lbs.

NAILING A GUN. Synonymous with _cloying_ or _spiking_. When necessary to
abandon cannon, or when the enemy's artillery, though seized, cannot be
taken away, it is proper to spike it, which is done by driving a steel
or other spike into the vent. The best method sometimes to render a gun
serviceable again is to drill a new vent. (_See_ SPIKING.)

NAILS OF SORTS. Nails used in carpentry under the denominations of 4, 6,
8, 10, 24, 30, and 40 penny-nails, all of different lengths.

NAKE! The old word to unsheath swords, or make them naked.

NAKED. State of a ship's bottom without sheathing. Also, a place without
means of defence.

NAKHADAH, OR NACODAH. An Arab sea-captain.

NAME. The name of a merchant ship, as well as the port to which she
belongs, must be painted in a conspicuous manner on her stern. If
changed, she must be registered _de novo_, and the old certificate
cancelled.

NAME-BOARD. The arch-board, or part whereon the ship's name and port are
painted.

NAME-BOOK. The Anglo-Saxon _nom-boc_, a mustering list.

NANCY. An east-country term for a small lobster.

NANCY DAWSON. A popular air by which seamen were summoned to grog.

NANKIN. A light fawn-coloured or white cotton cloth, almost exclusively
worn at one time in our ships on the India station. It was supplied from
China, but is