"The halyard is made fast to this pole, as it is to the yard when the sail is square, at a point which will carry the upper end of the pole above the truck, thus allowing the sail to be larger than it could be if the halyard were attached to the head of the sail."
"What sort of a cart is the truck?" asked Archie.
"I forgot to mention it, I suppose. It is a round piece of wood, fixed on the end of the topmast, like a head upon a cane. It has a little sheave, or a couple of holes in it, through which the signal-halyards are passed. Now for the mainsail. I have already explained the throat and peak halyards, so that you know what and where they are."
"The main-sheet is the rope by which the position of the main-boom is controlled; in other words, by which the sail is trimmed. Dory has double blocks on his sheet, so that he handles it more easily than if it were done with a single block on the boom; though he has to handle twice as much rope in doing it. I do not think of any thing more to be said in regard to the standing or running rigging of a sloop. If any thing comes up, you will learn it while we are sailing. Now we will put two reefs in the mainsail."
"Don't you reef the other sails?" asked Ben Sinker.
"The Goldwing works very well under the mainsail only, so that we shorten sail by taking in the jib. The jib of this craft does not reef, but it has a bonnet instead. This is really an additional sail, laced on at the bottom of the jib. It can be taken off or put on at pleasure. In some craft, the jib is made bigger, and is provided with one or two rows of reef-points."
The Goldwing had three rows of reef-points on the mainsail. The skipper required the sail to be lowered enough to permit one reef to be taken.
"This is a reef-pennant," said he, producing a cord of several feet in length. "Sometimes it is called an earing. I pass it through this cringle, which is only a hole in the sail, and then I carry the line around the boom,--twice will make it strong enough. This I have done at the clew, and now I do the same thing at the luff. Now, all hands, take hold, and put in the reef by tying up the points."
"This one is not long enough," said Archie, when he had got hold of both ends of a point. "It won't go round the boom."