Load-Line
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence · Benjamin Vaughan Abbott · 1879
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence
This word indicates the depth to which a ship is loaded so as to sink in salt-water. Section 6 of the merchant shipping act of 1876 (38 & 39 Vict, ch. 88) prescribes that every owner of a British ship, before entering his ship outwards from any port in the United Kingdom, shall mark, in white or yellow on a inches in length, drawn through its centre, and the centre of this disk is to indicate the maximum load-line in salt-water to which the owner intends to load the sliip for that voyage. Mozley ^ W.