"Semaphore" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... suggested an alarm bell to call attention to the message. Lomond, of Paris, devised a telegraph with only one wire; the signals to be read by the peculiar movements of an attracted pith-ball, and Arthur Young witnessed his plan in action, as recorded in his diary. M. Chappe, the inventor of the semaphore, tried about the year 1790 to introduce a synchronous electric ...
— Heroes of the Telegraph • J. Munro
... mechanically and tactically, was expounded and practically demonstrated, together with that of the torpedo, the mine, mine laying and sweeping, and the peculiarities of various explosives. Rifle and revolver practice was encouraged, and morse and semaphore signalling formed part of the ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... her clutch and let out a cough of steam. They jerked and leaped forward. From the rear of the car an orange and black pennant—Votes for Women—stiffened out like a semaphore ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... of plenipotentiaries assembled at Vienna were not more thunderstruck when, on that very 19th of March, the semaphore brought them news of the legitimate King of France once more fled, and of his country once more abandoned to the hated usurper, than was Captain Jack as he watched the distant flagstaff in the sunrise, and saw, when the morning port gun had vomited forth its white cloud ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... pass tests in both sending and receiving in semaphore and Morse signalling by flag, not fewer than twenty-four letters per minute. He must be able to give and read signals by sound. To make correct smoke and flame signals with fires. To show the proper method ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... apparently unsupported. The range was about five miles. At 11.20 the Russians opened fire on them. Semenoff says that it was the result of a mistake. "The 'Orel' fired an accidental shot (which she immediately reported by semaphore). Unable, with smokeless powder, to tell by which of the leading ships it had been fired, the fleet took it as a signal from the 'Suvaroff' and opened fire. Of the whole fleet the fire of the 3rd Squadron was ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... However, it must be admitted that their attitude, as spectators of Lucia's delirium, left nothing to desire on the score of repose—the VERE DE VERES themselves could not have been calmer, or less concerned. Blue chins, and sympathy expressed by semaphore action, in the good old time-honoured fashion. The "Warriors of Ravenswood" in Lincoln green hunting costume, and the tombs of Edgardo's fathers under a marble colonnade—to give ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Nov. 1, 1890 • Various
... interrupted by the sound of a body being dragged or dragging itself with slow, swishing sound under the barn. The sound was too loud for safety. They rushed to the hole and began to semaphore until a shaggy head appeared with rolling ...
— The Little Regiment - And Other Episodes of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... gentleman's house in England, and has one or two fine reception-rooms; between it and the water a monument is being raised to Washington. I fear it will be a sad failure; the main shaft or column suggests the idea of a semaphore station, round the base whereof the goodly things of sculpture are to be clustered. As far as I could glean from conversation with Americans, they seem themselves ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... Crew, the stern arm of the semaphore never made the train pause even for an instant. There was always a clear track. It was great to see, far in the distance, a goods train whooping smokily for the north of England on one of the four tracks. The overtaking of such a train was ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... utmost importance that the enemy should not read the message, the signal books on board a vessel are protected with the greatest care, and are destroyed along with the cipher code whenever it is seen that capture is inevitable. The semaphore system in use in the British navy was tried for a time aboard some of our vessels, but it never became popular, and ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis
... touch on a button in a flagship is all that is now needed to initiate every tactical evolution in a fleet, and insure an almost automatic precision in the resulting movements of the ships. The flashing lantern is superseded at night, flags and the semaphore by day, or, if these are retained, it is for services purely auxiliary. The hideous and bewildering shrieks of the steam-siren need no longer be heard in a fog, and the uncertain system of gun signals will soon become a thing of the past." The interest of the naval and military ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various
... occupies a prominent position in the foreground of the town, and, like nearly all edifices at Nicolayevsk, is built of logs. Back of it is the chancellerie, or military and civil office, with a flag-staff and semaphore for signalling vessels in the harbor. Of other public buildings I might name the naval office, police office, telegraph ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... Oliver step out upon the ledge; cautiously did he advance each foot, until he was more than leg-deep, and wildly, like an insane semaphore, did he wave his arms, as well as the heavy rod, in his frantic efforts not to lose his balance! At last he planted his feet, with a cheer of triumph, on ...
— The Crew of the Water Wagtail • R.M. Ballantyne
... there himself, sittin' in a forked bough, an' watchin' me through his glass." Placing the telescope gently on the ground, Jake turned himself into a human semaphore, and gesticulated frantically with his arms. "That ought to fetch 'im," and he again placed his eye to the telescope. "Yes, he sees. He's wavin' his 'at. Good old Ben. It's better than a play. Comic ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... greyish hair and close-cut beard, but something very remarkable about his eyes, which sparkle with intelligence and energy; and something still more remarkable about the action of his arms, hands, and thin, wiry fingers, which suggests the idea of his being an animated semaphore worked by a galvanic battery, telegraphing signals against time at the rate of a hundred words a minute, the substantives being occasionally expressed, but mostly "understood,"—pronouns and prepositions being ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 22, 1891 • Various
... her way about city or country without any of the usual aids, using only the compass and her developed judgment of distance and direction. She must also be able to communicate and receive messages in two ways—by signalling in Semaphore and the General Service Codes which is the code used for telegraphing and wireless, and which can be used in several ways. She must have shown proficiency in Home Nursing, Child Care, and Housekeeping and in addition in either ...
— Girl Scouts - Their Works, Ways and Plays • Unknown
... a little and added, "Wherever he is, that long dark finger on the Hill of Pains will find him out—the remorseless Semaphore." ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... eight months of Saturday nights, each one of them a semaphore dropping out across the gray road of the week, Gertie Slayback and Jimmie Batch dined for one hour and sixty cents at the White Kitchen. Then arm and arm up the million-candle-power flare of Broadway, ...
— Gaslight Sonatas • Fannie Hurst
... forecastle were busy with their breakfast, I slipped over the side into the mizzen chains, where I could stand without being seen from inboard, and, removing my jacket, so that my white shirt-sleeves might show up clearly against the barque's black side, I forthwith began to semaphore with my arms, waving them up and down for about a minute to attract attention. Then, without knowing whether or not I had been successful, I proceeded to signal ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... there were the chutes for horses and mules; there, beyond them, the now abandoned office and waiting-room; and there, still glistening white and towering, the semaphore signal-mast of the railway; and then and there, sure and sudden, there dropped the black arm straight across and above their glistening path in the ...
— To The Front - A Sequel to Cadet Days • Charles King
... improvements so obvious, and at the same time so valuable, that it is extraordinary that they were not adopted. Signalling, for example, whether by heliograph or by flag-waving, would have made an immense difference in the Napoleonic campaigns. The principle of the semaphore was well known, and Belgium, with its numerous windmills, would seem to be furnished with natural semaphores. Yet in the four days during which the campaign of Waterloo was fought, the whole scheme of military operations on both sides was again and again imperilled, and finally in the case ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Algeria with an Arab guide, I put up for the night at an old semaphore station, where was a French soldier in charge. It was far from any houses, and on a high hill, and he had a visit only every fortnight from his friends, who brought him provisions on mules' backs. He willingly let me in, and spread a mattress for me on the ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... anybody could ever know enough to run a railroad." Hilda was looking up at the C. & S. C. right of way, where red and white semaphore lights were winking. ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... had nothing to do but stand at the open door of his car and gaze at what scenery the darkness disclosed. Now that he was beginning to comprehend their use, he was deeply interested in the bright red, green, and white lights of the semaphore signals that guarded every switch and siding. He knew that at night a white light displayed from the top of a post, or swung across the track in the form of a lantern, meant safety, a red light meant danger, and a green light meant caution. If it ...
— Cab and Caboose - The Story of a Railroad Boy • Kirk Munroe
... about six o'clock in the morning. Thorpe passed the boarding-house, the store, and the office, to take himself as far as the little open shed that served the primitive town as a railway station. There he set the semaphore to flag the east-bound train from Duluth. At six thirty-two, the train happening on time, he climbed aboard. He dropped heavily into a seat and stared straight in front of him until the conductor ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... cheaply and to drink the waters of a neighbouring mineral spring. That same year two French brothers of the name of Blanc arrived at Frankfort. They were men of a speculative turn, and a recent and somewhat daring speculation in France, connected with the old semaphore telegraph, had rendered it necessary for them to withdraw for a time from their native land. Their stock-in-trade consisted in a Roulette wheel, a few thousand francs, and an old and skilful croupier of Frascati, who knew a great deal about the properties of cards. ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... form," shrieked St. Clair, "I draw the awful circle of our solemn church! Set but one foot within that holy ground and on thy head—" Like a semaphore the left arm dropped, and the right arm, with the forefinger pointed, shot out at President Ham. "Yea, though it wore a CROWN—I launch ...
— Somewhere in France • Richard Harding Davis
... is signaled from ship to ship by semaphore flags by day. It is posted up in the guard room daily. The news that the Indian troops landed in France on the 29th of September was the chief item on the bulletin yesterday. We're short on things ...
— "Crumps", The Plain Story of a Canadian Who Went • Louis Keene
... the ship would forge ahead again. Worsley, Wild, and I, with three officers, kept three watches while we were working through the pack, so that we had two officers on deck all the time. The carpenter had rigged a six-foot wooden semaphore on the bridge to enable the navigating officer to give the seamen or scientists at the wheel the direction and the exact amount of helm required. This device saved time, as well as the effort of shouting. We were pushing through this loose ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... were no electric wires, and as the weather became thick and cloudy, the old-fashioned semaphore or telegraph was useless in giving notice to the Parisian police to stop the payment of a suspected draft, and arrest the ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... himself like a concertina, but rising amidships so high that he appeared to be giving an imitation of that peaceful beast, the dromedary. Such was not his purpose, however, for, having attained his greatest possible altitude, he partially sat down and elevated his right arm after the manner of a semaphore. This semaphore arm remained rigid for a second, threatening; then it vibrated with inconceivable rapidity, feinting. But it was the treacherous left that did the work. Seemingly this left gave Duke three lightning little pats upon the right ear; but the change in his voice indicated that these ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... not miss it, he would peer from behind his office shutters until the shapely legs of his patron could be seen between the twisted iron railing. Then appearing suddenly and with assumed surprise, he would lift his hat with so great a flourish that his long, thin arms and body were jerked into semaphore angles, his face meanwhile ...
— Kennedy Square • F. Hopkinson Smith
... June twenty-seventh, 1896. All about the lonely station the trees crowded down to the right of way, and rustled in a gentle evening breeze. Somewhere off in the wood, his ear discerned the faint hoot of an owl. Across the track in a pool under the shadow of the semaphore, he heard the full orchestra of the frogs, and saw reflected in the water the last exquisite glories of expiring day lamped by one bright star. Leaning back, he partly closed his eyelids, and wondered why so many rays came from the star—with the vague wonder of drowsiness, ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... the free-bosomed earth. Whereupon a neighbour's little girl, at the behest of her mother, duly craved and received permission from Bess to gather a few poppies for decorative purposes. But of this I was uninformed, and when I descried her in the midst of the field I waved my arms like a semaphore against the sky. ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... through him at the sound. There was the prospect of a lift. He stopped, and waited for the dog-cart—it sounded like a dog-cart—to arrive. Then he uttered a shout of rapture, and began to wave his arms like a semaphore. The man in ...
— Tales of St. Austin's • P. G. Wodehouse
... immediately, and there is no chance of the instruction being half-completed or of another being interspersed. Used esp. to convey that an operation cannot be screwed up by interrupts. "This routine locks the file and increments the file's semaphore atomically." 2. [primarily techspeak] Guaranteed to complete successfully or not at all, usu. refers to database transactions. If an error prevents a partially-performed transaction from proceeding to completion, it must be "backed out," as the database must not be ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... to the occasion, and calls to the reading signallers "Tell the fool to semaphore!" "He carn't," gasps the sergeant in a horrified whisper; "He's young, an' he don't know nothink but Morse." Lyte groans. This young lad was pressed into service a few days previously, on the strength of his boy scout record, to fill a gap caused by another youth who had suddenly felt the call of ...
— From the St. Lawrence to the Yser with the 1st Canadian brigade • Frederic C. Curry |
