The Malay swung aside; the holystonecrunched into the sack of eggs and slid to earth.
Scurlock’s answer was to bend, reach for a piece of holystone in a bucket by the rail, and catapult it at the vagabond who had made so bold as to interrupt his musings.
Jack was with us for three weeks; and as I made him holystone the whole place down twice a week until the boards were like a quarter deck, we got something out of him in return for his lodging.
So he had barely time to smoke the cigarette he made of shredded ship's tobacco rolled in a strip of newspaper before he had to go on deck again to holystone the spilled tar from the planks.
On his knees upon the deck aft, shoving his holystone to and fro laboriously and unhandily along the planks where the accident with the tar-pot had left its stain, the Dago still broke into little meaningless smiles.
It was about spillin' some tar on the deck, an' now the Dago's got to stop up this arternoon an' holystone it clean in his watch below.
The holystone is a large, soft stone, smooth on the bottom, with long ropes attached to each end, by which the crew keep it sliding fore and aft over the wet sanded decks.
Turn hands up; holystone or scrub upper deck; coil down ropes.
The holystone is a large piece of porous stone,(39) which is dragged in alternate ways by two sailors over the deck, sand being used to increase its effect.
They have a saying: 'Six days shalt thou labor as hard as thou art able; the seventh, holystone the main deck and chip the chain cable.
On deck, the men began to holystone the planks, polish up the brasswork, and make everything shipshape for port.
I need scarcely explain that holystone is a large soft stone, used with water, for scrubbing the dirt off the ship's decks.
He pointed to a man who with one hand was rubbing a smallholystone in a corner where a large one would not go.
This work was more back-breaking and chilly than ever, for one had to get down on one's knees and manipulate a heavy holystone in each hand.
On other mornings he was detailed to scrape and red-lead rusty plates on the ship's side, or to holystone a particularly obstinate section of deck which was not quite up to the mark.
