Crossword-Solution: LUFF 4 letters, 15 clues 🏆 scrabble score: 10

Tom stood amidships, gloomy-browed, and with folded arms, and gave his orders in a low, stern whisper: “Luff, and bring her to the wind!” “Aye-aye, sir!” “Steady, steady-y-y-y!” “Steady it is, sir!” “Let her go off a point!” “Point it is, sir!” As the boys steadily and monotonously drove the raft toward mid-stream it was no doubt understood that these orders were given only for “style,” and were not intended to mean anything in particular.

Several vessels he forced to luff and fall under his lee; until, about three o’clock of the afternoon, a great ship of three decks of ordnance took the wind out of his sails, and immediately boarded.

Our fraught is Grecians, Turks, and Afric Moors; For late upon the coast of Corsica, Because we vail'd not [62] to the Turkish [63] fleet, Their creeping galleys had us in the chase: But suddenly the wind began to rise, And then we luff'd and tack'd, [64] and fought at ease: Some have we fir'd, and many have we sunk; But one amongst the rest became our prize: The captain's slain; the rest remain our slaves, Of whom we would make sale in Malta here.

But they jeered defiantly, for they knew it was in my power to luff the helm and let go the main-sheet, so as to spill the wind and escape damage.

When the last luff was hooked on, all hands were called to the rope--cook, steward, and all--and ranging ourselves at the falls, one behind the other, sitting down on the hides, with our heads just even with the beams, we set taut upon the tackles, and striking up a song, and all lying back at the chorus, we bowsed the tackles home, and drove the large books chock in out of sight.