BREAST-BACKSTAYS.--It is not usual, now, for merchant vessels to carry topmast breast-backstays. If they are carried, they are spread by out-riggers from the top. Topgallant and royal breast-backstays are used, and are of great assistance in sailing on the wind. There are various ways of rigging them out, of which the following is suggested as a neat and convenient one. Have a spar fitted for an out-rigger, about the size of one of the horns of the cross-trees, with three holes bored in it, two near to one end, and the third a little the other side of the middle. Place it upon the after horn of the cross-tree, with the last-mentioned hole over the hole in the end of the horn of the cross-tree, and let the after topgallant shroud reeve through it. Reeve the topgallant and royal breast-backstays through the outer holes, and set them up by a gun-tackle purchase, in the channels.[1] The inner end of the out-rigger should fit to a cleat, and be lashed to the cross-tree by a lanyard. When the breast-backstays are to be rigged in, cast off the lanyard, and let the out-rigger slue round the topgallant shroud for a pivot, the inner end going aft, and the outer end, with the backstays, resting against the forward shroud. One of these out-riggers should be fitted on each side, and all trouble of shifting over, and rigging out by purchase, will be avoided. [1] The royal breast-backstay may be used as the fall of the purchase. CHAPTER III. FITTING AND REEVING RUNNING RIGGING. Fore braces. Main braces. Cross-jack braces. Fore, main, and mizzen topsail braces. Fore, main, and mizzen topgallant and royal braces. Trusses. Topsail tyes and halyards. Topgallant and royal halyards. Peak and throat halyards. Spanker brails. Fore and main tacks and sheets. Topsail, topgallant and royal sheets and clewlines. Reef-tackles. Clew-garnets. Fore and main buntlines, leechlines, and slablines. Topsail clewlines and buntlines. Bowlines. To reeve a brace, begin on deck, and reeve to where the standing part is made fast. The _fore braces_ reeve _up_ through a block on the mainmast just below the rigging, _down_ or _in_ through the brace-block on the yard or at the end of the pennant, and the standing part is brought through the cheeks of the mast with a knot inside. The neatest way for reeving the _main brace_ is _out_ through a single block on the brace-bumpkin, _out_ through the brace-pennant-block, _in_ through an outer block on the bumpkin, and seized to the strap of the pennant. Another way is _out_ through the bumpkin block, _out_ or _down_ through the pennant block, and secure the end to the bumpkin or to the fashion-piece below. The _cross-jack braces_ reeve _up_ through blocks on the after shroud of the main rigging, _up_ through blocks on the yard, one third of the way in from the yard-arm, and are seized to a bolt in the mainmast, or to the after shroud again.