is sprung in or near the cap, the lower
piece is cut off, and a new fid-hole cut, by which the mast is reefed or
shortened.

REEFERS. A familiar term for midshipmen, because they have to attend in
the tops during the operation of taking in reefs.

REEF-KNOT. Is one in which the ends fall always in a line with the outer
parts; in fact, two loops, easy to untie, never jamming. That with the
second tie across, is termed a granny's knot.

REEF-LINE. Casual aids in bad weather to help the men at the earings.
When the vessel was going free, and the sail could not be "spilled," the
men were, if blowing hard, often aided by passing the studding-sail
halyards loosely round the sail, clewed up spirally from yard-arm to
bunt.

REEF-PENDANT. A rope going through a cringle in the after-leech of a
boom main-sail, and through a check sheave-hole in the boom, with a
tackle attached to its end to bowse the after-leech down to the boom by
which the sail is held reefed. On the lower yards it is a pendant for a
similar purpose as the reef-tackle.

REEF-POINTS. Small flat pieces of plaited cordage or soft rope, tapering
from the middle towards each end, whose length is nearly double the
circumference of the yard, and used for the purpose of tying up the
sail in the act of reefing; they are made fast by their eyes on each
side of the eyelet-holes.

REEF-TACKLES, are indeed pendants and tackles. The pendant is rove
through the sister-block, then a sheave in the yard-arm, and secured to
a strong cringle beneath the close reef, sometimes through a block, and
the end secured to the yard-arm. Within the sister-block it becomes a
gun-tackle purchase, with the fall leading on deck. The reef-tackles are
hauled out, and the other aids complete, before the men are sent aloft.

REEF-TACKLE SPAN. Two cringles in the bolt-rope, about a couple of feet
apart, when a block is used.

REELS. Well-known wheels moving round an axis, and serving to wind
various lines upon, as the log-reel for the log-line, deep-sea reel
(which contains the deep-sea line, amounting to 150 or 200 fathoms),
spun-yarn reel, &c. "She went 10 knots off the reel"--_i.e._ by the
log-line.

REEMING. A term used by caulkers for opening the seams of the plank with
reeming-irons, that the oakum may be more readily admitted. This may be
a corruption of _rimer_, for opening circular holes in metal.

REEMING-BEETLE. A caulker's largest mallet.

REEMING-IRON. The larger iron used