Navigation, an arch of the horizon intercepted between the nearest meridian and any distinct object, either discovered by the eye or resulting from the spherical proportion; as, in the first case, at four p.m. Cape Spado, in the isle of Candia, bore S. by W. by the compass. In the second, the longitudes and latitudes of any two places being given, and consequently the difference of latitude and longitude between them, the bearing of one from the other is discovered by the following analogy: As the meridional difference of latitude is to the difference of longitude, so is the radius to the tangent of the bearing.

Bearing is also the situation of any distant object, estimated from some part of the ship according to her position. In this sense, an object so discovered must be either ahead, astern, abreast, on the bow, or on the quarter. These bearings, therefore, which may be termed mechanical, are on the beam, before the beam, abaft the beam, on the bow, on the quarter, ahead, or astern. If the ship sails with a side wind, it alters in some measure the names of such bearings, since a distant object on the beam is then said to be to leeward or to windward; on the lee-quarter or bow, and on the weather-quarter or bow.