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14 How Bosk Conducted Business Upon Thassa It must be understood that the ship itself it the weapon. The Dorna, a tarn ship, is not untypical of her class. Accordingly I shall, in brief, describe her. I mention, however, in passing, that a great variety of ramships ply Thassa, many of which, in their dimensions, their lines, their rigging and their rowing arrangements, differ from her considerably. The major difference, I would suppose, is that between the singly-banked and the most doubly- or trebly-banked vessel. The Dorna, like most other tarn ships, is singlebanked; and yet her oar power is not inferior to even the trebly-banked vessels; how this is I shall soon note. The Dorna, like most tarn ships, is a long, narrow vessel of shallow draft. She is carvel-built, and her planking is fastened with nails of bronze and Page 110 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html iron; in places, wooden pegs are also used; her planking, depending on placement, varies from two to six inches in thickness; also, to strengthen her against the shock of ramming, four-inch-thich wales run longitudinally about her sides. She carrieds a single, removable mast, with its long yard. It is lateen rigged. Her keep, one hundred and twenty-eight feet Gorean, and her beam, sixteen feet Gorean, mark her as heavy class. Her freeboard area, that between the water line and the deck, is five feet Gorean. She is long, low and swift. She has a rather straight keel, and this, with her shallow draft, even given her size, makes it possible to beach her at night, if one wishes. It is common among Gorean seamen to beach their craft in the evening, set watches, make camp, and launch again in the morning. The Dorna s ram, a heavy projection in the shape of a tarn s beak, shod with iron, rides just below the water line. Behind the ram, to prevent it from going too deeply into an enemy ship, pinning the attacker, is, shaped like the spread crest of a tarn, the shield. The entire ship is built in such a way that the combined strength of teh keel, stempost and strut-frames centeres itself at the ram, or spur. The ship is, thus, itself the weapon. The bow of the Dorna is concave, sloping down to meet the ram. Her stern describles what is almost a complete semicircle. She has two steering oars, or side rudders. The sternpost is high, and fanlike; it is carved to represent feathers; the actual tail feathers of a tarn, however, would be horizontal to the plane, not vertical; the prow of the tarn ship resembles the ram and shield, though it is made of painted wood; it is designed and painted to resemble the head of a tarn. Tarn ships are painted in a variety of colors; the Dorna, of course, was green. Besides her stem and stern castles the Dorna carried two movable turrets amidships, each about twenty feet high. She also carried, on leather- cushioned, swivel mounts, two lihgt catapults, two chain-sling onagers, and eight springals. Shearing blades, too, of course, were a portion of her equipment. These blades, mentioned before, are fixed on each side of the hull, abaft of the bow and forward of the oars. They resemble quarter moons of steel and are fastened into the frames of the ship itself. They are an invention of Tersites of Port Kar. They are now, however, found on most recent ram-ships, of whatever port of origin. Although the Dorna s true beam is sixteen feet Gorean, her deck width is twenty-one feet Gorean, due to the long rectangular rowing frame, which carrieds the thole ports: the rowing frame is slightly higher than the deck area and extends beyond it, two and one half feet Gorean on each side; it is supported by extensions of the hull beams; the rowing frame is placed somewhat nearer the stem that the sternpost; the extension of the rowing frame not only permits greater deck area but, because of the size of the oars used, is expedient because of matters of work space. The size and weight of the oars used will doubtless seem surprizing, but, in practice, they are effective and beautiful levers. The oars are set in groups [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |