BILGE-BLOCKS. _See_ SLIDING BILGE-BLOCKS.
BILGE-COADS. In launching a ship, same with sliding-planks.
BILGE-FEVER. The illness occasioned by a foul hold.
BILGE-FREE. A cask so stowed as to rest entirely on its beds, keeping the lower part of the bilge at least the thickness of the hand clear of the bottom of the ship, or other place on which it is stowed.
BILGE-KEELS. Used for vessels of very light draught and flattish bottoms, to make them hold a better wind, also to support them upright when grounded. The _Warrior_ and other iron-clads are fitted with bilge-keels.
BILGE-KEELSONS. These are fitted inside of the bilge, to afford strength where iron, ores, and other heavy cargo are shipped. Otherwise they are the same as sister-keelsons.
BILGE-PIECES. Synonymous with _bilge-keels_.
BILGE-PLANKS. Certain thick strengthenings on the inner and outer lines of the bilge, to secure the _shiftings_ as well as bilge-keels.
BILGE-PUMP. A small pump used for carrying off the water which may lodge about the lee-bilge, so as not to be under the action of the main pumps. In a steamer it is worked by a single link off one of the levers.
BILGE-TREES. Another name for bilge-coads.
BILGE-WATER. The rain or sea-water which occasionally enters a vessel, and running down to her floor, remains in the bilge of the ship till pumped out, by reason of her flat bottom, which prevents it from going to the well of the pump; it is always (especially if the ship does not leak) of a dirty colour and disgusting penetrating smell. It seems to have been a sad nuisance in early voyages; and in the earliest sea-ballad known (_temp._ Hen. VI.) it is thus grumbled at:--
"A sak of strawe were there ryght good, For som must lyg theym in theyr hood, I had as lefe be in the wood W'out mete or drynk. For when that we shall go to bedde, The pumpe was nygh our bedde's hedde; A man were as good to be dede As smell thereof ye stynk."
The mixture of tar-water and the drainings of sugar cargo is about the worst perfume known.
BILL. A weapon or implement of war, a pike or halbert of the English infantry. It was formerly carried by sentinels, whence Shakspeare humorously made Dogberry tell the sleepy watchmen to have a care that their bills be not stolen. Also, the point or tapered extremity of the fluke at the arm of an anchor. Also a point of land, of which a familiar instance may be cited in the Bill of Portland.