BALESTILHA. The cross-staff of the early Portuguese navigators.

BALINGER, OR BALANGHA. A kind of small sloop or barge; small vessels of
war formerly without forecastles. The name was also given by some of the
early voyagers to a large trading-boat of the Philippines and Moluccas.

BALISTES. A fish with mailed skin. File-fish.

BALIZAS. Land and sea marks on Portuguese coasts.

BALK. Straight young trees after they are felled and squared; a beam or
timber used for temporary purposes, and under 8 inches square. Balks, of
timber of any squared size, as mahogany, intended for planks, or, when
very large, for booms or rafts.

BALKAR. A man placed on an eminence, like the ancient Olpis, to watch
the movements of shoals of fish. In our early statutes he is called
_balcor_.

BALL. In a general sense, implies a spherical and round body, whether
naturally so or formed into that figure by art. In a military view it
comprehends all sorts of bullets for fire-arms, from the cannon to the
pistol: also those pyrotechnic projectiles for guns or mortars, whether
intended to destroy, or only to give light, smoke, or stench.

BALLAHOU. A sharp-floored fast-sailing schooner, with taunt fore-and-aft
sails, and no top-sails, common in Bermuda and the West Indies. The
fore-mast of the ballahou rakes forward, the main-mast aft.

BALL-AND-SOCKET. A clever adaptation to give astronomical or surveying
instruments full play and motion every way by a brass ball fitted into a
spherical cell, and usually carried by an endless screw.

BALLARAG, TO. To abuse or bully. Thus Warton of the French king--

"You surely thought to _ballarag_ us
With your fine squadron off Cape Lagos."

BALLAST. A certain portion of stone, pig-iron, gravel, water, or such
like materials, deposited in a ship's hold when she either has no cargo
or too little to bring her sufficiently low in the water. It is used to
counter-balance the effect of the wind upon the masts, and give the ship
a proper stability, that she may be enabled to carry sail without
danger of overturning. The art of ballasting consists in placing the
centre of gravity, so as neither to be too high nor too low, too far
forward nor too far aft, and that the surface of the water may nearly
rise to the extreme breadth amidships, and thus the ship will be enabled
to carry a good sail, incline but little, and ply well to windward. A
want of true knowledge in this department has led to puttin