We rode it out with two anchors and 300 pounds of ballast down ahead, but it was only by judicious management, and the addition of a new mainsheet to our scanty length of cable.
When sailing in the dark or in bad weather make the end of your mainsheet fast; always keep a knot in it.
Both boys sat together on the cockpit deck, Jerry awkwardly steering and Sandy holding the mainsheet in his left hand.
The mainsheet hardly pulled at all in Sandy’s hand as the sail caught all the wind there was to catch.
In his right hand, the mainsheet felt light—too light—and he worried that he had so little control over it.
Sandy, the mainsheet wound tightly about his right hand, took the tiller in his left, while Jerry went forward to do his job.
This was the first time he had handled both the tiller and mainsheet and it was really the first time he had actually handled the boat.
Stirring out of his gloom, Jerry trimmed the mainsheet and then the jib.
Once again the genoa jib was held out wing-and-wing with the boat hook, and once again the mainsheet exercised only a light pull in his hand.
Leaning against the combing, feet braced upon the slippery and treacherous deck, he clung to tiller and mainsheet and peered ahead with anxious eyes, a pucker of daring graven deep between his brows.
But he was deflected by the crash of the mainsheet blocks on the stout deck-traveller, as the mainsail, emptied of the wind and feeling the wind on the other side, swung crazily across above him.
Skipper shouting loudly; also he heard the high note of the mainsheet screaming across the sheaves as Van Horn, bending braces in the dark, was swiftly slacking the sheet through his scorching palms with a single turn on the cleat.
He knew already the empty windiness of its threats, but he was careful of the mainsheet blocks, and walked around the traveller instead of over it.
If she steers hard trim your mainsheet aft and it will ease her.
AFT--Back or behind, as come aft, haul the mainsheet aft, meaning to pull it towards the stern.
If the mainsheet is well handled the mainsail never shakes.
Valkyrie' came over all standing just after passing the lightship, and unluckily for her the parts of the mainsheet got under the counter.
Reaching or going free you work the mainsheet and jibsheet alternately as best you can.
The mainsheet works on a horse on the cabin-top in front of the steersman, and with his back against the tiller he controls the great craft with ease.
The least rare is that of misjudging the rate at which a wherry is coming, and getting athwart her bows while tacking; but a direct collision is averted, and the yacht's bowsprit or mainsheet is the only thing which suffers.
Passing the mainsheet over to him, Tom picked up the bucket used as a bailer, stepped over the mast thwart to the bows, and began to strip, when Charlie sprang to his feet.
And then at last the anchor was got up, and the sails filled to the wind, and the mainsheet slackened out.
Hector of Moidart jumps to the mainsheet and slacks it out, and then, behold!
The hastily-seized mainsheet was hardly a scientifically-run guy for the leaning tower of his stressed frame, nor did the wreck of the barbed wire entanglement writhing over the rail offer the solidest of foundations.
A moment later he came aft and relieved the man at the wheel, ordering the latter to stand by to keep the mainsheet from fouling the nigger wire.
Standing by with a bight of the mainsheet gripped in his right hand to keep from overbalancing, he had sprung to the top of the rail as Rona jumped, leaning out at all of an angle of forty-five degrees, probably more.
The first thing Ranga did, as the dropped mainsheet gave him a free hand, was to reach to the knot of his sarong and satisfy himself that the little bamboo flute tucked in there had ridden out the storm.
Ranga was taking in the slack of the mainsheet when I looked again, and Bell, peering up at the flapping headsails, was grinding away at the wheel.
A similar doubling up of the right, with a sudden tug on the mainsheet at the end of it, did the rest.
As the vessel came up, the mainsheet was yanked in by all hands, and then the men ran to the stations.
He hauled the mainsheet taut, and kept it as the governor had told him, as flat as a board.
Then it was that he found that Oswald had acted with discretion as well as bravery, for before leaping he had taken a turn of the end of the mainsheet round his waist.
Frank let the mainsheet run and afterward leaned breathlessly upon the coaming with a thrill of relief as they drove out into the deeper water; but it appeared that his companion was not satisfied yet.
They let the jib fly, and jumping for the mainsheet hauled with all their might, while Jake helped them with one hand as the boat came up to the wind.
Then shouting to Frank, he dropped into the canoe and clutched the rail as the sloop forged ahead, but the boy was busy with the mainsheet and did not look up.
Stand by your lee jibsheet and tail on to the mainsheet the moment you let it run.
He was dragging at the mainsheet as the big boom tilted up into the darkness above his head, while the sloop rolled heavily.
Then they floundered aft and dragged in the mainsheet with all their might, after which Mr. Oliver jumped for the helm again, while the boys flattened in the jib.
Frank obeyed him and when they hauled on the mainsheet the sloop once more gathered speed, while Frank glancing astern saw a strip of slanted sail appear around the corner of the head.
Frank helped drag some more mainsheet and then looked around again with a very unpleasant thrill of apprehension.
The sails slat furiously; the air is filled with a sound as of the cracking of great whips; the sprit, swayed by the flacking sails, swings giddily from side to side; the mainsheet blocks rage on the horse.
The mainsail, half set, banged noisily and the mainsheet blocks lashed terrifically to and fro.
The tide was on the turn, the great topsail flacked in the wind, the brails were let go, and Sam and I sweated the mainsheet home and set the mizzen.
Then swinging slowly round she came head to wind, her mainsail and foresail flapping loudly, and the mainsheet blocks crashing backwards and forwards on the main horse.
At the last moment it was found that a new mainsheet was wanted, and this delayed us, but we still had just enough time.
In an instant he shook off the feeling which was oppressing him, and springing on deck, he ordered the helm to be kept up and the mainsheet eased off till we were standing after the supposed smuggler.
The mainsheet of the schooner had been eased off, the foreyards had been squared, and, with the now strengthening breeze, the schooner was running fast through the water.
Priscilla took the mainsheet in her hand and ordered Frank to luff a little.
Now and then, as a squall struck the sails, Priscilla let the mainsheet run out and allowed the Tortoise to right herself.
A reef pendant (earing) getting drawn into the mainsheet block, or a bit of bunting or spunyarn into the block of the peak halliards, may easily cause an accident.
Always see that your mainsheetis clear, and that it cannot get foul of anything in running out.
If the jib, throat, peak halliards, and mainsheet are new, or have seen the work of one season only, they will not require much overhauling.
A mainsheet horse and traveller with two quarter leading blocks are better than a double block shackled on to an eyebolt amidships, because a more direct up and down strain can be obtained when the boom is well in.
As Captain Jonas French hauled in his mainsheet and the sloop's sail filled, Pedro made obliquely for shore.
Throw off yourmainsheet and lie to, so that I can come alongside.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "mainsheet" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
