"Scud" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and the holidays were short. Everything seemed to urge her to break loose from her self-imposed martyrdom and go her way rejoicing; the crisp air that sang in her ears and filled her with a sense of glorious exhilaration; the shimmering sunlight on the ice that seemed to scud before her and invite her to join in the race; the knowledge that she was in reality doing Louie a doubtful service by staying beside her, and, last of all, the look of disappointment in John's eyes as he shot past them at intervals, and saw ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... Won't it make my boat scud," he said to himself exultantly, as he took his place, and pushed off ...
— Frank's Campaign - or the Farm and the Camp • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... cloak held the reins. Denry, in a coachman's furs, sat behind. They whirled past the Hotel Metropole. And shortly afterwards, on the wild road towards Attalens, Denry saw a pair of skis scudding as quickly as skis can scud in their rear. It was astonishing how the sleigh, with all the merry jingle of its bells, kept that pair of skis at a distance of about a hundred yards. It seemed to invite the skis to overtake it, and then to regret the invitation and flee further. Up the hills ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... cranberry-pie; and if the simile be an homely one, it is the best that comes to mind to convey an idea of those regimental stoves, with their seams and channels of fire, over which potatoes bubble, and roast and boiled scud forth a savory odor. And here and there, wistfully regarding this active scene, amid the green shrubbery, stands a sentinel before his sentry-box, built of spruce boughs, wrought into a mimic military temple, ...
— Acadia - or, A Month with the Blue Noses • Frederic S. Cozzens
... turned and crawled away from the wonderful, dying garden, oblivious to the pleadings floating, now weakly, in the torpid water. He scuffed up little motes of golden sand, leaving a low-lying scud along the bottom, back to the little black box in the garden. The plants, the box, all were forgotten by now. Cully crawled on, not knowing why. A rise appeared; surprise caught Cully unaware. A change in ...
— Cully • Jack Egan
... was complete. It was but a puff of silvery dust, powdering his mane with fresher brightness. Nothing would be left of bull but a little froth of all the foam displayed in the fierce onset. He too would turn and scud ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... her chance very narrowly for the hot mush; and after breakfast she caught a minute, when Phineas had gone to work, and Mrs. Polly was in the pantry, and Nabby down cellar. She had barely time to fill a bowl with mush, and scud. ...
— The Adventures of Ann - Stories of Colonial Times • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... compelled to get his little story told in thirty minutes... unless he wants to get himself collared and his accomplices nabbed. What a shock! What a bolt from the blue! Thirty minutes and not a minute more. In thirty minutes from now, you'll have to clear out, scud away like a hare and beat a disordered retreat. Ha, ha, ha, what fun! I say, Polonius, you really are unlucky, each time you come up against Bibi Daubrecq! For it was you who were hiding behind that curtain, wasn't it, my ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... the Channel, the white waves leaping, lashing, and tumbling together in that confusion of troubled waters, which nautical men call a "cross-sea." A dreary, dismal night on Calais sands: faint moonshine struggling through a low driving scud, the harbour-lights quenched and blurred in mist. Such a night as bids the trim French sentry hug himself in his watch-coat, calmly cursing the weather, while he hums the chorus of a comic opera, driving his thoughts by force of contrast to the lustrous glow of the wine-shop, the sparkling eyes ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... insecurity, of impending trouble, seemed to weigh upon us all that evening—a physical depression, which the sea-wind brought with its flying scud, wetting ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... high we go, The whistling winds that scud along, And surges roaring from below, Shall my signal be, To think on thee, And this shall be my song: Blow high, ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... fortune the approach of night has brought about a shifting of the wind, which has veered around to the west-north-west, making it possible for them to "scud," without nearer approach to the dreaded fire-like line. In their cockleshell of a boat, they know that to run before the wind is their safest plan, and so they speed on south-eastward. An ocean current setting from the north-west also helps them in ...
— The Land of Fire - A Tale of Adventure • Mayne Reid
... chaplain's former sea-farings. Between the marble cenotaphs on either hand of the pulpit, the wall which formed its back was adorned with a large painting representing a gallant ship beating against a terrible storm off a lee coast of black rocks and snowy breakers. But high above the flying scud and dark-rolling clouds, there floated a little isle of sunlight, from which beamed forth an angel's face; and this bright face shed a distinct spot of radiance upon the ship's tossed deck, something like that silver plate now inserted into the Victory's ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... and would gladly have been alone. A midday meal, with liberal supply of wine, helped them somewhat, and they sat down to smoke in their bedroom. It rained harder than ever; from the window they could see the old tower on the crag smitten with white scud. ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing
... the first that was springing from the mists of sleep to my conscious mind, and I was asking myself how it happened that I was feeling so glad, while I had so many causes for grief, then suddenly—suddenly as the sun streams through the cloud-scud over the sea—I knew that what had long been predestined had happened, that the wondrous new birth, the great revelation, the joyous mystery which comes to every happy woman in the world had come at ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... breezes and hazy weather. At half-past 3 saw a single rock bearing south-south-west distance 9 or 10 miles, and an island on our beam south-east...haze very thick and scud flying thick. At 4 P.M. saw a rock lying to north of Kent's Group about 3 miles...At half-past 4 saw easternmost island of Kent's Group bearing west by south distance 8 miles, by half-past 5 P.M. having come nearly up with ...
— The Logbooks of the Lady Nelson - With The Journal Of Her First Commander Lieutenant James Grant, R.N • Ida Lee
... scud passed from the east; in the morning we had some heavy showers without wind; it cleared up at ten o'clock, and we took advantage of four hours fair weather to travel on. We again passed the huts of the natives, and encamped about seven miles farther down the creek. We were, however, scarcely housed, ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... and breaking into fragments, blew off in masses of snowy whiteness to leeward. I scarcely thought that a fabric formed by human hands could have sustained the rude shocks we encountered till the ship was got on her course, and we were able to scud before the gale. Often the sea rose up like a dead wall, and seemed as if it must fall over our deck and send us to the bottom. The scene was trying in the daytime, but still more so when darkness covered the face of the deep, and it needed confidence in the qualities of our ship, ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... effort, easily kept up with the moving ship. Occasionally we saw a sea snake navigating the ocean all by himself. I did not understand how these fellows went to sea and lived so far from land. The flying fish seemed to be more plentiful as we went along, and would leave the water and scud along ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly
... out together into the clear morning air. The rain-clouds had broken, though when they had scrambled up out of the narrow little valley where the cottage stood, they found that the wind was still high and fierce, and that the sun was rising dimly through a yellow haze of driving scud. ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... ambition and the speedy dart! He, the fortune-reader, read poor Helen's heart; And a face created for the hearthstone's light— Fishers tell its ruin as they scud by night. ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... along briskly, the east wind blew in her face, she smelled the salt sea, and somehow it at once soothed and stimulated her. Without seeing the mighty waste of waters, she seemed to realize its presence; she gazed at the sky hanging low with a scud of gray clouds, which did not look unlike the ocean, and the sense of irresponsibility in the ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... Tammie; "but a body can now scarcely meet on the road wi' ony think waur than themsell. Mony a witch, de'il, and bogle, however, did my grannie see and hear tell of, that used to scud and scamper hereaway ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... the sea ran high, The dingy scud drove 'cross the sky, Down topsails, boys, the gale comes on, ...
— The Wreck on the Andamans • Joseph Darvall
... whenever warm events are happening.' There is a censor of the press, and apparently he is always on duty and hard at work. A copy of each morning paper is brought to him at five o'clock. His official wagons wait at the doors of the newspaper offices and scud to him with the first copies that come from the press. His company of assistants read every line in these papers, and mark everything which seems to have a dangerous look; then he passes final judgment upon these markings. Two things conspire to give to the results a capricious and unbalanced look: ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... along the hillside, all together, like a white scud. After them, galloping like a Waterloo winner, raced Red Wull. And last of all, leaping over the ground like a demoniac, making not for the two flags, but the plank-bridge, the white-haired figure ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... I thus pursu'd from place to place, Kept in the view, and cross'd at ev'ry turn? In vain I fly, and, like a hunted deer, Scud o'er the lawns, and hasten to the covert; E'er I can reach my safety, you o'ertake me With the swift malice of some keen reproach, And drive the winged shaft ...
— Jane Shore - A Tragedy • Nicholas Rowe
... surrounding soil less sombre by contrast. This was the mouth of a great pit; and he sat on the brink of it, with his face to seaward, and his ear in his hollowed hand, listening. Nothing was to be heard, however, but the occasional scud of the rain, and the ceaseless roar of the now distant waves. Far out to sea there was a round red light, which fell upon him at regular intervals, its absence making the place which it had filled more dark than elsewhere. It had a ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... worn out," continues Manhug. "I got to the College of Surgeons, and had a good mind to scud some oyster shells through the windows, only there were several people about—fellows coming home to chambers, and the like; so I pattered on until I found myself in Drury-lane, close to a coffee-shop that was open. There I saw ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... not calm down, rolling mountains high, as it seemed to us just down to its level in the jolly- boat! So it was the next night, there not being the slightest lull, we having to ride it out all the while; but, on the third morning, the gale moderated sufficiently for us to be able to scud before it in the direction of the Cape. It was lucky for us that the wind, by the way, did not shift once while we were lying-to, blowing steadily from the same quarter it began in, from the south-east. If it had changed at all, especially ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson
... Away we scud, passing ships that think they are going pretty fast, but, O Neptune! our fins and tails take us along at a spanking rate, which makes the ships ...
— Lord Dolphin • Harriet A. Cheever
... Atlantic, we met with a most violent gale, which lasted several days, and I fully expected every hour that the vessel would go down, buried as she was by the heavy sea. At last we had no chance but to scud before the wind, which we did for two days before a raging and following sea, that appeared determined upon our destruction. On the second night, as I was on deck, watching the breaking and tossing of the billows, and the swift career of the little bark, which enabled her to avoid ...
— The Privateer's-Man - One hundred Years Ago • Frederick Marryat
... is a hideous battle-ground, Where pots and weapons bang and scud, Where every dead man through some wound Doth vomit victuals up ...
— Enamels and Cameos and other Poems • Theophile Gautier
... requisite order when the second engineer reported that his senior was dead, the crown of two furnaces destroyed, and the engines clogged, if not irretrievably damaged, by fallen debris. None realized better than the young commander what a disastrous fate awaited his ship in the gloom of the flying scud ahead. There was a faint chance of encountering another steamship which would respond to his signals. Then he would risk all by laying the Kansas broadside on in the effort to take a tow-rope aboard. Meanwhile, it was best to bring her under some ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... scud of clouds thinned and broke, and in the dim glimmer of starlight loomed the jungle-clad coast. Ahead, and well on the lee-bow, appeared a jagged rock-point. ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London
... the Captain, rising, "we'll let match-makin' alone for the present. It's like tryin' to beat to wind'ard against a cyclone. The best way is to square the yards, furl the sails, and scud under bare poles till it's over. It's blowin' too hard just now for me to make headway, so I'll wear ship ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... it, and carried far to leeward. The heavens above were of a pitchy darkness, and the only light was from the creaming foam of the sea on every side. The shift of wind, which had been to the west-north-west, compelled them to alter the course of the vessel, for they had no chance but to scud, as they now did, under bare poles; but in consequence of the sea having taken its run from the former wind, which had been north-east, it was, as sailors call it, cross, and every minute the waves poured over the ship, sweeping ...
— Masterman Ready • Captain Marryat
... "Scud while you can, Mr. Faulkner, it's a true nautical rule. Some men will always heave a ship to if there is a cap ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... falls steadily. Sometimes, when there is a powerful wind in the cloud layer, the lower edges of the clouds are broken apart, or loose clouds are seen traveling fast under the overlying gray. Sailors call this scud." ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... perfect gale; we are lying under a long hill, and the narrow bay is scarcely rippled by the blast that rushes over us, thick with flying-scud. Captain resolves to await better weather; some of the boys go on shore, and wander out to a kind of reef at the mouth of the bay, where in a short time they succeed in gathering a fine mess of mussels; the rest of us, the stay-on-boards, rig up a net and catch fifteen large fat crabs; ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... tropics, have been christened by the Spaniard and Portuguese, the Corposant, the Pampero, the Tornado, the Hurricane. Then follows a host of words of which the derivation is doubtful,—such as sea, mist, foam, scud, rack. Their monosyllabic character may only be the result of that clipping and trimming which words get on shipboard. Your seaman's tongue is a true bed of Procrustes for the unhappy words that roll over it. They are docked without mercy, or, now and then, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... glimpse—for she was soon swallowed up by the murk astern, and we were driving on. The shift of wind came suddenly. Nearly at noon there was a heavier fall of rain, a shrieking squall that blew as it had never blown. The Old Man marked the signs—the scud of the upper clouds, a brightening low ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone
... storm of wind arises, and the great waves swell, We will scud along the billows like a blown foam-bell, When 'tis glassy calm beneath a sky without one fleck, I'll play a game of skittles on the calm ...
— Golden Moments - Bright Stories for Young Folks • Anonymous
... over the house, Scud the cloudlets, still as a mouse; Whiskum, whiskum, by-and-by They'll ...
— Mother Truth's Melodies - Common Sense For Children • Mrs. E. P. Miller
... good sea-room give me, And it ain't to a little I'll strike. Though the tempest topgallant-mast smack smooth should smite And shiver each splinter of wood, Clear the deck, stow the yards, and house everything tight, And under reef foresail we'll scud: Avast! nor don't think me a milksop so soft, To be taken for trifles aback; For they say there's a Providence sits up aloft, To keep watch for the life ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... thro' the portals past, Whose polish'd arms a glimmering splendor cast. No single breath the general stillness stirr'd; Their trampling feet alone the warder heard, And follow'd with his sight the dusty cloud, That in its mantle wrapp'd the marching crowd. O'er crackling bushes scud the warrior train And pass with haste the solitary plain; 'Till the broad sun discover'd from afar The dawning lustre of his golden car. Beneath the covert of a neighbouring wood They paus'd awhile, ...
— Gustavus Vasa - and other poems • W. S. Walker
... tumult, no voices could be heard had they shouted ever so loudly. Needham now called Tom and Gerald to take the helm while he tried to find a storm staysail, hoping with a couple of feet of it set to be able to scud before the hurricane. ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... tidy. He ran an eye down the port tunnel, where the shaft revolved so swiftly that it seemed to be standing still, to where at the after end came the racing of the screw as it lifted, bearded with scud, out of the water. ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... she cried as soon as she could speak; 'go home just as fast as you can scud; an' tell your folks,' she added with a gust of gratitude, 'that there's worse folks in the world ...
— Twilight Stories • Various
... dainty monarch of the flood, How often have I cast for you— How often sadly seen you scud Where weeds and pussy willows grew! How often have you filched my bait! How often have you snapped my treacherous line!— Yet here I have you on this plate. You shall swim ...
— John Smith, U.S.A. • Eugene Field
... flood the earth with streams of rosy light, And every foot of sea-line specked with twinklin' sails of white; I've woke ter find the sky a mess of scud and smoky wreath, A blind wind-devil overhead and hell let loose beneath. And then ter watch the rollers pound on ledges, bars and rips, And pray fer them that go, O Lord, down ter the sea in ships! Ter see the lamp, when darkness comes, throw out its shinin' track, And think of that one gleamin' ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... of disrepair. For a moment I paused, thinking that even the salt-marsh might perhaps be a safer resting-place for the night than the headquarters of some desperate smuggler, for such I conjectured that this lonely dwelling must be. The scud, however, had covered the moon once more, and the darkness was so pitchy black that I felt that I might reconnoitre a little more closely without fear of discovery. Walking on tiptoe I approached the little ...
— Uncle Bernac - A Memory of the Empire • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a breeze sprang up and dispelled the ominous fog. The moon showed her wan face through the driving scud, the sail was at last hoisted, and cold and hungry, and sick at heart, our voyagers once more returned ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie
... happy March, whose foot on earth Rings as the blast of martial mirth When trumpets fire men's hearts for fray. No race of wild things winged or finned May match the might that wings thy wind Through air and sea, through scud and spray. Strong joy and thou were powers twin-born Of ...
— Astrophel and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne, Vol. VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... opposite to her, and a man and woman, evidently husband and wife. Another shriek and roar, and the train started—as it began to race along, Innocent closed her eyes with a sickening sensation of faintness and terror—then, opening them, saw hedges, fields, trees and ponds all flying past her like scud in the wind, and sat watching in stupefied wonderment—one little hand grasping the satchel that held all her worldly possessions—the other hanging limply at her side. Now and then she looked at her companions—the husband and wife sat opposite each other and spoke occasionally ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... passing an orchard on their way from school, in which there were some plum trees, full of nice fruit. "Come, Thomas," said Henry, "let us jump over and get some plums. Nobody will see us. We can scud along through the tall corn, and come out on the other side." Thomas replied, "It is wrong. I don't like to try it. I would rather not have the plums than steal them, and I will run along home." "You are a coward," said Henry. "I always knew you was a coward; and ...
— Anecdotes for Boys • Harvey Newcomb
... rest—with some slight chance of being left undisturbed—was in some corner upon the deck; but there it was at times so cold I could not endure it, for I had no blanket—no covering but my scanty clothes; and these were nearly always wet from washing the decks and the scud of the sea. The cold compelled me to seek shelter below, where if I stretched my weary limbs along the lid of a chest, and closed my eyes in sleep, I was sure to be aroused by its surly owner, who would push me rudely to the floor, and sometimes ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... the anarchy at sea, Where fishes on each other prey; Where every trout can make as high rants O'er his inferiors, as our tyrants; And swagger while the coast is clear: But should a lordly pike appear, Away you see the varlet scud, Or hide his coward snout in mud. Thus, if a gudgeon meet a roach, He dares not venture to approach; Yet still has impudence to rise, And, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... suddenly tack up the aisle and clutch the unhappy Mr. Chubb by the collar, and scud down the aisle again to the accompaniment of "Home Sweet Home," and then incarcerate Henry in the upper portion of the steeple until after church. But the end came at last, and the miserable boy found peace. One day, while he was sitting in school, endeavoring to learn his multiplication ...
— Half-Hours with Great Story-Tellers • Various
... thus keep to the open plain and trust to their speed, they are safe; but they have a prurient curiosity that sometimes betrays them to their ruin. When they have scud for some distance and left their pursuer behind, they will suddenly stop and turn to gaze at the object of their alarm. If the pursuit is not followed up they will, after a time, yield to their inquisitive ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving
... be ponds," returned Bessie, "but they are deep enough to drown men, and cruel enough to tear vessels to pieces. I should feel safer on the ocean in a storm than on our lake, for there you can run away from it, or scud before it, but here there is no place to run to, no offing, ...
— The Old Stone House • Anne March
... pulse Gies now and then a wallop, What ragings must his veins convulse, That still eternal gallop: Wi' wind and tide fair i' your tail, Right on ye scud your sea-way; But in the teeth o' baith to sail, It makes ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... was shop only: household-stuff? What did he want with comforts there? "Walls, ceiling, floor, stay blank and rough, So goods on sale show rich and rare! 'Sell and scud home' be ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... Dogger can be ugly enough, and may be so perhaps before we are clear of it," he concluded, and leant back against the spar behind him to look up at the clouds. Some scud was driving at the ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... had risen as he pursued his lonely road and it shone clear through a gathering scud that threatened soon to overwhelm the silver light. Clouds flew fast and, above Brendon's head, telegraph wires hummed the song of a gathering storm. The man's thoughts proceeded as irregularly as the fitful and shouting wind. He weighed ...
— The Red Redmaynes • Eden Phillpotts
... arms, mending their clothes, repairing the rigging, and, when the sea was sufficiently calm, in fishing. Needham kept up his own spirits, and did his best to keep up that of his messmates. However, they were to be again severely tried. One evening, early in October, scud was seen flying rapidly across the sky, while thick masses of cloud banked up densely in the horizon. It was Adair's first watch; Murray had been about to turn in. ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... leaning on cabin-tables, while the swinging-lamp oscillated drearily overhead, and sent uncertain shadows into the state-room doors. There is the story which Vivian Grey told us of the beautiful clipper "Nighthawk,"—her who sailed with the "Bonita" and "Driving-Scud" and "Mazeppa," in the great Sea-Derby, whose course lay round the world. How, one Christmas-day, off the pitch of Cape Horn, he, standing on her deck, saw her dive bodily into a sea, and all of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... to the place of coronation he had never seen before. Notwithstanding the embroidered silk and velvet hangings decorating the fronts of the rich people's houses, he caught glimpses of filthy side streets, squalid alleys, and tumble-down tenements. He saw forlorn little children scud away like rats into their holes as he drew near, and wretched, vicious-looking men and women fighting with each other for places in the crowd. Sharp, miserable faces peered round corners at him, and nobody smiled because every one hated or distrusted ...
— The Land of the Blue Flower • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... at a place where many pleasure-boats are moored and ready for hire; and as I went along a stony path, between wood and water, a strong wind blew in gusts from the far end of the lake. The sky was covered with flying scud; and, as this was ragged, there was quite a wild chase of shadow and moon-glimpse over the surface of the shuddering water. I had to hold my hat on, and was growing rather tired, and inclined to go back in disgust, when a little incident occurred to break the tedium. A ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Finmark. He, trusting in the great skill of his archers, harassed with impunity the army of Ragnar, which was wintering in Permland. For the Finns, who are wont to glide on slippery timbers (snowskates), scud along at whatever pace they will, and are considered to be able to approach or depart very quickly; for as soon as they have damaged the enemy they fly away as speedily as they approach, nor is the retreat they make quicker ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... They said we would have a dirty night of it, and that it would not be worth while to turn into their hammocks. As the second mate was describing a gale he had encountered off Cape Race, Newfoundland, we were suddenly taken all aback, and the blast came upon us furiously. We continued to scud under a double-reefed mainsail and foretopsail till dusk; but, as the sea ran high, the captain thought it safest to bring her to. The watch on deck consisted of four men, one of whom was appointed to keep a lookout ahead, for the ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... ships, in sodden clouds which were suddenly obscured by mist and rain while the wind sighed in fitful gusts. It steadied into the southward and swiftly increased in force until the sea was whipped into foam and scud. ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... with perseverance on my part, can solve the mystery. And Philip's thoughts reverted to his Amine. He folded his arms and, entranced in meditation, with his eyes raised to the firmament, he appeared to watch the flying scud. ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... mischief, however, is done and cannot now be helped, so it is useless to worry any more about it. We must not, however, allow the ship to run further to leeward than we can help; so clew up the foresail, lads; we will let her scud under bare poles until daylight. Then we will see what can be done to mend matters. Now take your grog, men; and when you have clewed up and furled the foresail, go below. You, too, Chips. I have had a little rest, and can doubtless ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... sail that stretches wide, A sea that's running strong, A boat that dips its laving side, The forefoot's rippling song. A flaming sky, a crimson flood, Here's joy for body and mind, As in our canting crafts we scud With a spanking ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... In the midst of the tempest, too, the assassin's hand tore the steersman from the helm, and with William of Orange the career of the infant republic was seemingly at an end, and all her guardian angels fled. But the ship continued to scud along before the storm, and the swelling canvas carried her safe ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various
... mountain peak, that rears its head Where snow-clad Alps around are spread, By furious gale 'tis thrown. From the yawning abyss see the cloud scud away, And the glacier appears, with its multiform ray, The giant ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... year round. Cloud and sunshine alternate in bracing, cheering succession, and health and abundance follow the storms. The outer sea margin is sublimely dashed and drenched with ocean brine, the spicy scud sweeping at times far inland over the bending woods, the giant trees waving and chanting in hearty accord as if ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... still he goes. Whilst redder and redder the welkin glows, And the lowest clouds that scud in the sky Get crimson fringes in flitting by. Till lo! amid the lurid light, The darkest object intensely dark, Just where the bright is intensely bright, The Forge, the Forge itself is in sight, Like the pitch-black hull of a burning bark, With volleying smoke, and many a spark, ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... the car, and would probably continue to be for an hour or so at least. He reversed the seat in front of him, and put up his feet, leaving the telegraph-wires to scud and dodge unnoticed. He fixed his eyes upon the sweltering stove in the farther corner of the car. There was a roaring fire within, as he could tell by the vivid red that glowed through the draught-holes ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... once went off to a group of sailors, but these at first shook their heads, and looked toward the sky. Its aspect was threatening. The wind was getting up fast, and masses of scud flew rapidly across it. Leslie went ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty
... belaying-pins, the blocks rattling in sharp snappings like castanets. You could hear the hiss and seething of the sea alongside, and see it flash by in sudden white patches of phosphorescent foam, while all overhead was black with the flying scud. The English second-mate was stamping with vexation, and, with all his ills misplaced, storming at the men:—"'An'somely the weather main- brace,—'an'somely, I tell you!—'Alf a dozen of you clap on to the main sheet here,—down with 'im!—D'y'see 'ere's hall like a midshipman's bag,—heverythink ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various
... upon them with frightful violence. Their small and crazy vessels were little fitted for the wild storms of the Atlantic; all night they were obliged to scud under bare poles, at the mercy of the elements; as the morning dawned there was a transient pause and they made a little sail, but the wind rose with redoubled fury from the south and increased in the night, threatening each moment to overwhelm them ...
— Peter Parley's Tales About America and Australia • Samuel Griswold Goodrich
... nebulosity, rack; cirrus, cat's-tail, mare's-tail; cumulus, stratus, nimbus; cirro-cumulus, cirro-stratus, cumulo-stratus; storm scud, wane cloud; tarnish, blemish; eclipse, obscurity. Associated Words: nephology, meteorology, nubiferous, nephelodometer, nephelometer, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... have said quite coolly, 'In the devil's name, madam, leave me to myself!' It piqued him that, after all, he had not the moral courage to do this, so he turned a forbidding shoulder, pretending interest in the scud of sea. ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... sad piece of mis-chief, and, if I am right in my guess, Mad-am Puss, by the man-ner in which she is scud-ding out of the room is the au-thor of it. I sus-pect that, while the doll was ly-ing upon the stool, the cat be-gan to play with its long clothes, till she pull-ed it down on the floor, where it got broken as we see. Care might have spar-ed this loss. If ...
— Little Scenes for Little Folks - In Words Not Exceeding Two Syllables • Anonymous
... Freedom Whose chargers chew the cud, Whose wheels have braved a dozen years The gravel and the mud; Your glorious hawbucks yoke again To take another jag, And scud through the mud Where the heavy wheels do drag, Where the wagon creak is long and low And the ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... from want of breath than words, and a deep silence falls between them. Even through the bare and melancholy trees the wind has forgotten to shiver. Above, the clouds, rain-filled, scud hurriedly. A storm is in the air. Upon Philip's face a ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... antiphonally. Black as it was under the trees, there was a moon behind the night. No suggestion of it showed through the clouds, yet from the pond surface itself came a weird twilight, filtered no doubt through a mile of flying scud a mile above, reflected from the wind-swept surface and showing these distant pines lifting heads of murk against the murky sky. But their antiphonal shout was no pine-voiced song of the sea, it was the sea itself. Again and again I listened ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... one moment to another was in danger of being swamped. However, I was certain that, being provided with two large beams of bamboos, it could keep its position in the current between two waters and not capsize, if we had the precaution and strength to scud before the wind, and not turn the side to a wave, for in such case we should all have been drowned. What I foresaw, happened. A wave burst upon us; for a few minutes we were plunged in the deep, but when the wave passed over we came above water. Our canoe was swamped between the currents, but ...
— Adventures in the Philippine Islands • Paul P. de La Gironiere
... that Jeduthun Pettibone brought home in the 'Flying Scud,' 'bout the wreck o' the 'Monsoon'; it's an awful providence, that 'ar' is,—a'n't it? Why, Jeduthun says she jest crushed like an egg-shell";—and with that Amaziah illustrated the fact by crushing an egg in ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... straits to enter the Pacific by the Barbara Channel, one very little known, and which passes close to the foot of Mount Sarmiento (the highest mountain in the south, excepting Mt.!! Darwin!!). We then shall scud away for Concepcion in Chili. I believe the ship must once again steer southward, but if any one catches me there again, I will give him leave to hang me up as a scarecrow for all future naturalists. I long to be at work in the Cordilleras, the geology of this ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... Peter is a shoal sheet of water twenty-two miles long and nearly eight miles wide, a bad place to cross in a small boat in windy weather. We set our sail and sped merrily on, but the tempest pressed us sorely, compelling us to take in our sail and scud under bare poles until one o'clock, when we double-reefed and set the sail. We now flew over the short and swashy seas as blast after blast struck our little craft. At three o'clock the wind slackened, permitting us to shake out our ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop
... his dead son. In another lament a grieving mother is compared to the drooping fronds of the tree-fern. The maiden keeping tryst bids the light fleecy cloudlets, which in New Zealand so often scud across the sky before the sea-wind, to be messengers to her ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... lonely islets, mazed amid outer keys, I waked the palms to laughter—I tossed the scud in the breeze— Never was isle so little, never was sea so lone, But over the scud and the palm-trees an English ...
— Departmental Ditties and Barrack Room Ballads • Rudyard Kipling
... had a hint that it would be well to imitate the stranger's prudence. Though our vessel steered so much better than another, no ship can keep on a direct line, while running before the wind, in a heavy sea. The waves occasionally fly past a vessel, like the scud glancing through the air; then, they seem to pause, altogether, as if to permit the ship to overtake them. When a vessel is lifted aft by one of these torrents of rushing waters, the helm loses a portion of its power; and the part of ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... how we veer and whirl, yet must ever whirl round again, and scud before the wind. If, on the one hand, we re-admit the Protesting Seventy-Three, we, on the other hand, agree to consummate the Apotheosis of Marat; lift his body from the Cordeliers Church, and transport it to the Pantheon ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... edge of the quiet sky He watched a nosing lorry grinding on, And straggling files of men; when these were gone, A double limber and six mules went by, Hauling the rations up through ruts and mud To trench-lines digged two hundred years ago. Then darkness hid them with a rainy scud, And soon he saw the village ...
— The War Poems of Siegfried Sassoon • Siegfried Sassoon
... low-hanging clouds were closing in upon him. Away to the right, where the line of marshes was unbroken, the boom of the wind grew louder. A gust very nearly blew him down the bank. He was compelled to shelter for a moment on its lee side, whilst a scud of snow and sleet passed like an icy whirlwind. The roar of the sea was full in his ears now, and though he must still have been fully two hundred yards away from it, little ghostly specks of white ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... on the weather side, till, as he had anticipated, the breeze set full into the old quarter, and increased into a gale. And then, when all the rest of the fleet had no other choice left them than just to scud back again, he struck out into the Firth in a long tack, and, doubling Kinnaird's Head and the dreaded Buchan Ness, succeeded in making good his voyage south. Next morning the wind-bound vessels were crowding the harbour of refuge as before, and only his sloop was amissing. The first ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... another race may drive 230 Our conquerors to mourn as we do now. Have ye beheld the young God of the Seas, My dispossessor? Have ye seen his face? Have ye beheld his chariot, foam'd along By noble winged creatures he hath made? I saw him on the calmed waters scud, With such a glow of beauty in his eyes, That it enforc'd me to bid sad farewell To all my empire: farewell sad I took, And hither came, to see how dolorous fate 240 Had wrought upon ye; and how I might best Give consolation in this woe extreme. Receive ...
— Keats: Poems Published in 1820 • John Keats
... The sun, from topmost heaven precipitated, Like to a globe of iron which is tossed back fiery red Into the furnace stirred to fume, Shocking the cloudy surges, plashed from its impetuous ire, Even to the zenith spattereth in a flecking scud of fire The vaporous ...
— New Poems • Francis Thompson
... and with a good, heavy hook at the end of the line, the outfit is complete. The jugs, some twenty or thirty, are put out at the head of the channel, and are followed by the fishermen in a skiff or john-boat. When a channel-cat takes the bait, the jug stands on end and begins to scud through the water. The fisherman pursues in his boat, and coming up, pushes his dip-net under the fish as he draws him to the surface. It is the most exciting and fascinating method ...
— Shawn of Skarrow • James Tandy Ellis
... and veered and came again so that a weather-vane could not have shown which way it blew. At one moment the ship was jumping from wave to wave before the wind with a single tiny storms'l out. At another I had thought we must scud under ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... sun, in order to ascertain his longitude—an operation which would have been much more difficult in the hazy weather that had prevailed some few hours previous, with the zenith every now and then overcast by the fleecy storm wrack and flying scud that came drifting across the sky as the wind veered; but the ship was making good running, and everything bade fair for her soon crossing the boisterous Bay of Biscay, on whose troubled waters she had ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... early relaxation of their speed, the sailors ran along with them for fifty or sixty yards—belaboring them with exemplary vigor. The consequence of this sudden movement was—that five lost their balance and fell overboard: all the rest continued to scud along the road in the two heavy vessels on board which they had embarked themselves—repeatedly crossing and nearly running foul of each other—until at length, just as they approached a turn of the road which would have ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... at the present day. But what of Man, who weathered safely the storm of storms in that same Ark? Compare that venerated bark, as imagined by us from traditionary description, with the least eligible of the ferry-boats which scud across our crowded rivers, and we have answer enough for the present, so far as progress ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... fast away, He knowing it a fish of stubborn sway, Pulls up his rod, but soft, as having skill, Wherewith the hook fast holds the fish's gill; Then all his line he freely yieldeth him, Whilst furiously all up and down doth swim Th' insnared fish, here on the top doth scud, There underneath the banks, then in the mud, And with his frantic fits so scares the shoal, That each one takes his hide, or starting hole: By this the pike, clean wearied, ...
— Pastoral Poems by Nicholas Breton, - Selected Poetry by George Wither, and - Pastoral Poetry by William Browne (of Tavistock) • Nicholas Breton, George Wither, William Browne (of Tavistock)
... I had not a man with me sound enough to stand on his legs; so I hired three natives, and put to sea in the skiff. When out of sight of Pulo-way, it came on to blow a heavy storm, so that I had to scud before the wind and sea to save our lives; yet, thank God, we got sight of Ceram, and kept her right afore the sea, but clean from the place where our ship lay, and on nearing the shore the sea did break ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... then, no 18th Brumaire, no Consulate, no Empire, no conquest of Europe—but also, it may be added, no St. Helena. None of these, events would have ensued had not the English squadron, when it appeared off Corsica, obliged the Huiron to scud about at hazard, and to touch at the first land she ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... wind. The hills were drawn back behind thick sheets of glassy rain. Shining spears of rain dashed themselves against the west windows. Jets of rain rose up, whirling and spraying, from the terrace. Rain ran before the wind in a silver scud along the flagged ...
— Anne Severn and the Fieldings • May Sinclair
... celebrated heroic romances of the seventeenth century, the former (in ten volumes) written by Mdlle Scud'eri, the latter by the Sieur de la Calprende. One of the most constant and tiresome characteristics of the heroes and heroines of the romances of this school, is the readiness with which they seize every opportunity ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... about on its keel, instinct to the changing plane of the rudder. But the waves were running tremendously high, and the wind blowing with great force, the water rolling in great mountains of sickly greenish gray, topped with foam that blew in a level scud. ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... back to where the weary horses huddled beneath the bank, grouped about the man so helplessly swaddled in blankets on the ground. They were dim, pitiable objects, barely discernible through the flying scud, yet Hamlin was quick to perceive the advantage of their position—the overhanging bluff was complete protection from any attack except along the open bank of the river. Two armed men could defend the spot against ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... Beyond Newport the country grows wilder. There is less cultivation, and behind every little shanty rises the great brown shoulder of the neighbouring mountain covered with rough, bent grass—or sedge, as it is called here. Grey plover and curlew scud across the road, a sign of hard weather, and near the rarer homesteads towers the hawk, looking for his prey. Now and again come glimpses of the bay, of the great island of Innisturk, of Clare Island, and of Innisboffin. ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... the lawyer looked at his watch. "And now, Poole, let us get to ours," he said; and taking the poker under his arm, he led the way into the yard. The scud had banked over the moon, and it was now quite dark. The wind, which only broke in puffs and draughts into that deep well of building, tossed the light of the candle to and fro about their steps, until they came ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... o'er thy Thamis row the ribboned fair, Others along the safer turnpike fly; Some Richmond Hill ascend, some scud to Ware, And many to the steep of Highgate hie. Ask ye, Boeotian shades, the reason why? 'Tis to the worship of the solemn Horn, Grasped in the holy hand of Mystery, In whose dread name both men and maids are sworn, And consecrate the oath with ...
— Childe Harold's Pilgrimage • Lord Byron
... to charm, and, as thou strok'st mine ears With thy enchantment, melt me into tears. Then let thy active hand scud o'er thy lyre, And make my spirits frantic with the fire. That done, sink down into a silvery strain, And make me smooth as balm ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... had no thought, save that of compliance. She had that piquant imperiousness to which men are willing slaves when it is manifested graciously, and by a pretty woman. He was like a ship caught in a gale, and there was nothing to do but scud before it. At the same time, it seemed that she was driving him swiftly towards the haven and rest of ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... island, when such a hurricane broke over the St. Peter for seventeen days that the ship could only scud under bare poles before a tornado wind that seemed to be driving north-northwest. The ship was a chip in a maelstrom. There were only fifteen casks of water fit to drink. All food was exhausted but mouldy sea-biscuits. One sailor a day was ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... the clouds in the distance, it would rapidly increase in size, taking a funnel shape, and then a tornado would burst, like a tempest in miniature, lasting only three or four hours, but of extraordinary violence. During one of these the Belle-Poule had to scud along under bare poles at the rate of twelve knots an hour. The weather was excessively unhealthy, but in the whole course of this long cruise I never lost but one man, who was carried off by a violent ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... Business before pleasure. And, besides, you're like to get bowled over in the rush. Here, chauffeur!"—this to the driver of a big, black motor-car which swept round the angle of the bridge at that moment, and made as though to scud down the Embankment into the thick of the chase—"pull that thing up sharp! Stop where you are! Dead still! At once, at once, do you hear? We don't want you getting in the way. Now, then"—nodding his head in the direction of the running ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... march out on asphalte—tile, In orange groves his thoughts beguile; Where'er he be, the fate of Mole's To scud through ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... occasionally breaking, again lifting their heads too high in the effort, truncated as by a knife, and the liquid apex shattered to spray; an expanse of leaden sky showing between the rain-squalls, across which heavy background rushed the darker scud and storm-clouds; a passenger-steamer rolling helplessly in the trough, and a square-rigged vessel, hove to on the port tack, two miles to windward of the steamer, and drifting south toward the storm-center. This is the picture that the sea-birds saw at daybreak ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... Swift, storm-scud, raced the morning sky, As light along the road I fared; Stern was the way, yet glad was I, Though feet and breast and brow were bared; For fancy, like a happy child, Ran on before and turned ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... was less violent, and after looking for a moment at the angry sea and the grey, cloud-wrapped sky streaked with its wisps of flying white scud, the skipper nodded slowly. "You're right," he said. "It has gone down a bit. We're beginning to feel the lee of the land. Work her up gradually to twelve knots and see how ...
— Stand By! - Naval Sketches and Stories • Henry Taprell Dorling
... 16th of March they ran into another storm, of such violence that they were forced to strike their {268} topgallant masts and scud under double-reefed foresail. As they were nearing the coast, the ship was hove to at night. Early on the morning of the 22nd of March, they sighted land, one hundred and ninety-five days and twenty thousand ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... was but a scud of early autumn on the mountains—the sun came out with bright slanting beams before his setting, there was a soft south wind; and Hob, when he came in, growled out that the thaw had set in, and he should be able to take the maid back in the morning. He sat scowling and silent ...
— The Herd Boy and His Hermit • Charlotte M. Yonge
... of one of those old-fashioned, soft-pine, centerboard barkentines—three sticks the same length, you know—with the mainmast stepped on the port side of the keel to make room for the centerboard—a craft that would neither stay, nor wear, nor scud, nor heave to, like a ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... know, the man himself is for ever peering for'ard from the break of the poop, or glancing into the binnacle, or feeling and gauging the weight and direction of wind on his cheek, or watching the cloud-stuff in the sky adrift and a-scud across the stars and the moon. Always, always, there are ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... wind and "lay to," by which landsmen will understand that we tried to face the storm, and remain stationary. But the gale was so fierce that this was impossible. The last rag of sail was blown away, and then there was nothing left for us but to show our stern to the gale, and "scud ...
— Fighting the Whales • R. M. Ballantyne
... a sudden further fall, and a great mass of murky cloud began to bank up in the south-western quarter. This rapidly overspread the sky, until the whole of the visible heavens became obscured by a thick curtain of flying scud. The sea, inky black, suddenly became agitated, and formed itself into a confusion of irregular waves without any "run," but which reared themselves tremblingly aloft, and then subsided again, only to be instantly succeeded by others. The wind fell away to a dead calm, which continued for ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... three hours or so after he went down, and the weather got dirtier and dirtier, and the scud drove by, and the wind sang and hummed through the rigging—it made me melancholy to listen to it. I could think of nothing but the youngster down below, and what I should say to his poor old uncle if anything happened. ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes |
