Posted by Ed Kiser on May 13, 2009 at 03:24:28 user Kisered.
In WD CH4, as they were first time sailing on Goblin, going down river to the harbour, then met a steamer coming up. It hooted once.
....
"One hoot," said Jim, putting down his pipe in a safe
corner. "She's going to starboard.
....
From this, I presume two hoots means turning to port.
Then I looked up another source for reference:
http://www.seascout.org/about/program/signaling.html
That site has some good stuff on naval flags for the alphabet, semaphone, and Morse. You all might want to check it out.
Under the signal flag for E (EASY) it explained that signal meant "altering course to starboard" and under I (INDIA) it says that it means "altering course to port".
Now I realize a signal flag is not a hoot, but that hoot could stand for the Morse signal, with one hoot (a dot) is Morse for E, and two hoots (dot dot) is Morse for I.
The signal flag description also says that U (UNIFORM) means "you are running into danger." This reminds me of a time in Swallowdale at the half way camp up Kanchenchunga when:
(SD CH26)
....
Very soon after supper Susan blew her mate's whistle, two
short puffs and a long one, which means, "You are standing into
danger, so look out." Titty and Roger, who had been doing a
little exploring in the dusk, knew what it meant and came
running back to the camp where the fire was already beginning
to look like a night fire, more flame that smoke, instead of like a
day fire, which, in bright sunlight, often looks as if it has no
flames at all.
"What danger?" asked Roger eagerly.
"Getting into trouble for going late to bed," said Susan.
....
Anyway, I found it interesting to see this agreement of the naval alphabet flags and their meanings with how our Ransome friends encountered these in "real life."
As a side note here: the naval flag description also defines C (CHARLIE) to mean "YES" and N(NOVEMBER) to mean "NO." At first, I thought that Y and N would be the appropriate letters for these two meanings, until I said the letters out loud: "C, N" and got the inspiration that it meant "Si, Non" which make me wonder how the Spanish language was selected for this definition instead of the more English Y, N. But then, I don't define these, I just try to know and use them.
If you look at the very bottom of the referenced site on signals, I also saw a note there about the use of a single flag to transmit Morse code, with the convention being, and I quote that source:
....
swung to the sender's left for a dash and to the sender's right for a dot
....
The method of distinguishing dash from dot with a single flag is not obvious from the description of the method used by Nancy and Peggy as they signaled from Wild Cat Island to the boat that day that the D's first saw them, but did not know who they were. (Winter Holiday - CH1)
However in GN CH20:
....
Right," said Nancy, and waved her handkerchief with two short
sweeps and then a long one from side to side as wide as she could
reach. Then again two short quick sweeps and a long slower one. Then
again. "Golly," she muttered, "my arm'll bust if they don't understand soon."
....
From this, it seems that a different technique was being used. But it does seem to be that "U" (you are running into danger) is the message she is waving to the others.
Ed Kiser, Kentucky