To preserve the stem from being shattered or bruised by direct blows from the ice, it is strengthened by an extra piece called the false, or ice-stem. On the side of this are placed the ice-knees, which are angular chocks, or blocks of wood, filling the concavity formed by the stem and bow planks, and extending from about the eight feet mark to the loading mark. In the best style, the ice-knees are twelve to fifteen inches in thickness at the stem, diminishing to, perhaps, six or eight inches thick at the distance of about eight feet from the stem, from thence gradually becoming thinner, until they fall into and incorporate with the common doubling, below the fore-part of the fore-chains. This makes a neat bow, and in point of strength is much preferable to the angular chocks or knees, which usually extend about five or six feet from the stem, and then terminate somewhat abruptly upon the doubling. Ice-knees not only strengthen the front of the bows, and prevent the main planks from being bruised or shattered, as far as they extend, but likewise protect the stem from the twisting effect of a side blow. The stem and the small part of the ice-knees adjoining, are still farther defended by plates of half-inch iron, called ice-plates, which are nailed upon the face of the ice-stem, and partly on the ice-knees, to prevent them being cut by the ice. For additional strength, as well as convenience, the hold-beams of a Greenland ship should be placed low, or at a greater distance from the deck-beams than is usual in other merchantmen, leaving a clear space of six or seven feet between decks. The strength thus derived is principally serviceable when the ship is squeezed between two sheets of ice; because the nearer the pressure acts on the extremities of the beams, the greater is the resistance they are calculated to offer. A large space between decks is found also, for many reasons, to be most convenient. Hammocks, as receptacles for sailors’ beds, being incommodious, the crew are lodged in cabins or berths, erected in the half-deck; these consist of twelve to twenty in number, each of which is calculated to contain two or three persons. When a ship is on fishing-stations, the boats are required to be always ready for use; as such they are suspended from cranes, fixed on the sides of the ship, and are usually so contrived that a boat can be lowered down into the water, manned, and pushed off from the ship, in the short space of a minute of time. Prior to the year 1813, a ship having seven boats carried one at each waist, that is, between the main-mast and fore-mast, two at each quarter, one above the other and one across the stern. An improvement on this plan, adopted in 1813, is to have the boats fixed in a line of three lengths of boats on each side.