brim v also bream. EDD brime v Co (1854); cp OED bream v¹ 'to clear (a ship's bottom) of shells [&c] by singeing' (1626-1875). To make the hull of a boat or small vessel watertight by melting and spreading pitch on the exterior surface.
   [1626 Capt. SMITH 3 'For calking, breaming, stopping leakes.' OED.] 1832 MOSS MS Diary 23 May Let the 2 large Boats down on their sides in order to brim them tomorrow, and got the Pots in order to begin boiling bark. 25 May Brimmed the boats and got them in order for tanning. 1863 MORETON 36 Bream. pronounced brim. A nautical term of correct use. To bream a boat is to broom or brush its bottom. 1937 DEVINE 11 Bream. To heat, with a birch-rind lighted mop, the bottom of a boat hauled up and turned over on the shore or beach, melt the tar already on it and spread it all over anew with a tar mop. P 316-79 Years ago they used to use everything [to paint their boats], what they used to call brimmin' her. Used to make a mop, take a mop and get [it] full of tar and set it afire and go all over the bottom of her. That's what they used to call brimmin' her. 1983 Evening Telegram 14 Feb, p. 6 He made one observation...about some of the boats being brimmed up to the gunnels, which produced a tar-covered and consequently a black boat, a 'black punt' was [his] term.

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