Word: compassing
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Second Circle. The story begins with the flight of seven political prisoners from the Westhofen Concentration Camp. Twenty minutes after the break, the camp lieutenant spread out his map, "stuck the point of his compass into the red dot marked CAMP WESTHOFEN and drew three concentric circles." Somewhere between the red dot and the second circle the fugitives must be. From this circumference bloodhounds padded out into the foggy evening, the camp sirens screamed incessantly, police began the precise combing of every tree and tussock...
Daring. Bomber pilots say that the most annoying gremlins are those which like to play seesaw on the automatic horizon or use the ship's compass for a merry-go-round while the pilots are trying to fly blind. The most dangerous gremlins are those which delight in covering bombers' wings with ice. These are a middle-aged breed of gremlin, called spandules, who never bother with planes flying lower than 10,000 feet...
...with the flotilla of amateur navigators who set out to rescue their beaten Expeditionary Force. The Nazi mentality becomes viciously and pathetically real when Mrs. Miniver disarms a wounded German flyer in her kitchen, then slaps his face for talking Aryan nonsense. World War II is reduced to the compass of an Anderson shelter when the Minivers and their well-scrubbed youngsters ride out an air raid in their own backyard. It is anybody's backyard, anywhere...
...canvas work, and all kinds, of hoisting with block and tackle. Know the rules of the road, distress, and other urgent signals. Be familiar with all light and buoyage signals. He able to handle either power or sail boats and know how to make landings through surf. Understand the compass and how to lay out a course. Be able to make all necessary knots and splices with either rope or wire. Be able to overhaul and handle anchor chain and know the regulations for such overhaul and for mooring ships. Be able to steer a ship and to know...
When it came, one of the sailors had already drifted away. The others righted the boat and bailed it out, found that they had eleven cans of condensed milk, some hardtack and chocolate, a compass and a small dictionary with a map of the Western Hemisphere. In good spirits, they headed west, helped along by an improvised sail made out of a lifeboat cover. On the fourth or fifth day, they sighted a tanker, but the quartermaster, who was senior man in the boat, was afraid to release a flare for fear of attracting a sub. He blinked...