e it is best to adopt.

If the ship be running before the wind, or be sailing large, and under
a press of sail, the officer must exercise his judgment in rounding
to, and take care in his anxiety to save the man, not to let the masts
go over the side, which will not advance, but defeat his object. If
the top-gallant-sheets, the topsail, and top-gallant-haulyards, be let
fly, and the head-yards braced quickly up, the ship when brought to
the wind will be nearly in the situation of reefing topsails. Under
these circumstances, it will hardly be possible to bring her about,
for, long before she can have come head to wind, her way will be so
much deadened that the rudder may have ceased to act. Still, however,
I am so strong an advocate for the principle of tacking, instead of
merely lying-to, when a man is overboard, that, even under the
circumstances above described, as soon as the boat is lowered down and
sent off, and the extra sail gathered in, I would fill, stand on till
the ship had gained head-way enough to render the evolution certain,
and then go about, so as to bring her head towards the boat. It must
be recollected, that when a ship is going well off the wind, in the
manner here supposed, it is impossible to round her so quickly as to
replace her on the spot where the man fell; to reach which a great
sweep must always be made. But there seems to me no doubt, that, in
every possible case, even when going right before it, the ship will
always drift nearer and nearer to that spot, if eventually brought to
the wind on the opposite tack from that on which she was luffed up.

It will conduce greatly to the success of these measures, if it be an
established rule, that, whenever the alarm is given of a man being
overboard, the people, without further orders, fly to their appointed
stations for tacking ship; and that only those persons who shall be
specifically selected to man and lower down the boats, and for other
duties, shall presume to quit the places assigned to them on going
about. It so happens that when the men are in their stations for
tacking, they are almost equally in their stations for shortening
sail, or for performing most other evolutions likely to become
necessary at such moments.

The excepted men should consist of at least two boats' crews in each
watch, and of others whose sole duty it should be to attend to the
operation of lowering the boats, into which no men but those expressly
appointed should