"Tack" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... pointed, it does not matter how well the lashing is put on; therefore it is an invariable rule that lashings must be pointed as carefully as possible. When I looked at this one, what do you think I saw? Why, the end of the lashing was nailed down with a little tack, such as one would use to fasten labels. "That would be a nice thing to take to the Pole!" This final observation of Hanssen's was doubtless the mildest expression of what he thought of the work. I saw how the new lashings ...
— The South Pole, Volumes 1 and 2 • Roald Amundsen
... labyrinth of furniture, boxes, and rolls of carpet to his humble couch set up behind the piano or in some other unlikely place, if marriage were a failure, while contact with the business end of a tack gave point to his thoughts. No, indeed! The spring and autumn of his discontent are made glorious summer now by the more civilized system which, beginning at the attic and working downward, cleans one room, or perhaps two at a time, as a day's work, restoring everything to order before ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... now blowing from the southwest, and they were northeast of the mouth of the stream they wished to enter. They stood out to sea in order to make a starboard tack, and it was a gratification to see the magnificent manner in which the vessel responded, and before six o'clock they found themselves sailing up the river, and safely ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: The Mysteries of the Caverns • Roger Thompson Finlay
... benches outside the store were curbed, and finally disappeared altogether. Fanny took charge of the window displays, and often came back to the store at night to spend the evening at work with Aloysius. They would tack a piece of muslin around the window to keep off the gaze of passers-by, and together evolve a window that more than made up for ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... The white sails of a ship caught it, and gleamed brilliant as sunny snow, the hull being scarcely visible, and the sea around dark; other smaller vessels too, so that they looked like heavenly-winged things, just alighting on a dismal world. Shifting their sails, perhaps, or going on another tack, they almost disappear at once in the obscure distance. Islands are seen in summer sunshine and green glory; their rocks also sunny and their beaches white; while other islands, for no apparent reason, are ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... intrepid adventure during this summer, it was nothing for her to unmoor a boat, enter it, and lift the oars, not pausing to observe that it was the Arrow. Just then, however, a little wind ruffled down and shook the sail, a wind not quite favorable, but in which she could tack across and back; she drew in the oars, put to the proof all her new boat-craft, and recklessly dashed through the dark element that curled and seethed about her. She had to make but two tacks in ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... Nothing on that tack. But there is a long leg and a short leg on the course, and I fancy Superintendent Snyder does the tacking on the long leg. Mr. Snyder builds New York's schools, and he does that which no other architect before his time ever did or tried; he "builds ...
— The Battle with the Slum • Jacob A. Riis
... I got clear of the current and was able to steer within a quarter of a mile of the beach, which indeed I might have approached still nearer by making another tack, but being an excellent swimmer, I deemed it best to leave the vessel, which was almost waterlogged, and to make the best of my way ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Nothing fits; nothing jibes. I get just so far in it and then I run up against a wall. Either there is a superhuman power of duplicity in the persons who contrived this murder or we are on the wrong tack altogether." ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... middle-aged man came in, carrying in one hand a tool-box, and in the other a two-story tin pail. Both girls watched him curiously as he set these down on the floor, and, taking tacks from his pocket and a hammer from his box, he proceeded to tack a piece of paper to the wall. Ester, from where she sat, could see that the paper was small, and that something was printed on it in close, fine type. It didn't look in the least like a handbill, or indeed like a notice ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... conceal, I don't doubt. Well, there they are,—with her still,—and the box is gone, and the people as is bringing the lawsuit, Mr. Camperdown and the rest of 'em, is off their tack. What's ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... the Essay on satire. Is that a sufficient reason for incorporating it with his works? Do we tack to the works of Pope the poems of Wycherly and Parnell? We have authority for stating that Pope revised the Essay on poetry. Is it to be added to the works of Pope? Be it as it may, the poem was published, in substance, six years before ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 70, March 1, 1851 • Various
... angel on such terms." At this point Guglielmi's eyes exhibited a succession of fireworks; his long teeth gleamed, and he smiled a stealthy smile. "But he must be tamed, this youth—he must be tamed. Let me see, I must take him on another tack—on the flank this time, and hit ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... May, affecting well-watered and jungle-clad valleys and ravines. They place their nests in thick bushes, at heights of from 2 to 8 feet from the ground, and either wedge them into some fork, tack them into three or four upright shoots between which they hang, or else suspend them like an Oriole's ...
— The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 • Allan O. Hume
... there were many: condensed foods—German erbswurst, or army rations of ground peas and meat; dried potatoes; eggs in powdered form; preserved and salt meats; hard tack; tea and coffee; flour; and evaporated fruits. The water was already arranged for and the wagon containing the casks was at ...
— The Air Ship Boys • H.L. Sayler
... that night as the hour of its convalescence. In consequence, every speech, even those from dry and desiccated lips, was coloured with the melody of hope. Even hoary jokes and ancestral stories, kept for tea-meetings as hard tack is kept for the army and navy, were disinfected by the kindly flavour which brooded like an ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... Jonson (like the former) was built far higher in learning, solid but slow in his performances. Shakespear, with the Englishman of war, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about, and take advantage of all winds by the quickness of his ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... would bring me to a cross street. On the other side of this street was a row of shops which I was to follow until they joined the iron railings of Hyde Park. I was to keep to the railings until I reached the gates at Hyde Park Corner, where I was to lay a diagonal course across Piccadilly, and tack in toward the railings of Green Park. At the end of these railings, going east, I would find the Walsingham, ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... 26th, heavy fog set in, so that the vessels could only keep in company by constant firing, and were obliged to tack about continually, at the risk of running foul of each other. Upon the 5th of December, although it would have appeared impossible, the fog increased in density to such an extent that those on board the Aigle could hear the movement of ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... settled that the bridge should be constructed between Calloo in Flanders and Ordain in Brabant. This spot was selected because the river is here narrowest, and bends a little to the right, and so detains vessels a while by compelling them to tack. To cover the bridge strong bastions were erected at both ends, of which the one on the Flanders side was named Fort St. Maria, the other, on the Brabant side, Fort St. Philip, in honor ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... discussing him floridly once with Querida at the Thumb-tack Club in the presence of a dozen others, characterised him as "one of those passively selfish snobs whose virtues are all negative and whose modesty is the mental ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... depict the bestiality of that day; and if I had I would think it sin to write of it. The helm was lashed on the port tack, the haulyards set taut, and all hands down to the lad who was the cook's scullion proceeded to get drunk. I took the precaution to have a hanger at my side and to slip one of Cockle's pistols within the band of my breeches. I was in an exquisite' agony of indecision as to what manner to ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... firmness and patience in a negotiator to any other qualities. Suppleness, no doubt, often supplies the place of patience, and the man who can tack and veer was formerly not without his value; but the time for using these small wares has now passed for ever. They have been worn threadbare by a politician of our day, and are foul in the nostrils of every civilized nation. In the middle ages, and in Italian courts, such tricks may have ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... this time painfully evident; also his condition in life, which is as of one looking back on better days. And now he is upon a new tack. Though here on the level it is still sultry and airless, an evening breeze is playing briskly along the slope where he stands, and one sleeve saws the air violently; the other is pointed stiffly heavenwards. It is all plain enough, my poor friend! The sins of the world are a heavy burden and ...
— Pagan Papers • Kenneth Grahame
... remove all rough marks. Then apply the stain you wish to use. To make the seat, first fit boards in the bottom and nail them to the side rails as shown. Fill the space with hair or elastic cotton felt to about 3 in. above the edge of the rails. Bind this down tightly with a piece of burlap and tack the edges to the rails. Cut out the corners of the burlap so that it will fit about the posts. Put the leather on over this and tack the edges to the bottoms of the rails. Then finish with the ornamental ...
— Mission Furniture - How to Make It, Part 3 • H. H. Windsor
... a shape, I wist! And still it near'd and near'd: As if it dodged a water-sprite, It plunged, and tack'd, and veer'd. ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... laths 14 inches long, 1/2 inch wide, out of wood 1/4 inch thick, and tack them along the upper inner edges of the two sides a quarter of an inch below the top. These will form two ledges. Now fasten the piece 12 inches by 6 inches to rest on these ledges, which will serve to support the hand. The upper portion remaining must be filled ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume XIII, No. 51: November 12, 1892 • Various
... spire, calculating that a few minutes' run, at two or three miles a minute, would bring them to their destination on the outskirts of Portsmouth. But a few miles south the baffling mist had made its appearance, and Smith found himself bereft of landmarks, and compelled to tack to and fro in utter uncertainty of his course. He was as much at a loss as if he were navigating a vessel in a sea-fog. To sail through the mist was to incur the risk of striking a tree, a chimney, or a church steeple; to pursue his flight above it in the deepening ...
— Round the World in Seven Days • Herbert Strang
... worm possesses no great talent as a navigator. To turn round, to tack about, to shift its place slightly by a backward movement is all that it can do; and even that it does very clumsily. The front part of the body, sticking out of the case, acts as a rudder. Three or four times over, it rises ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... is inverted, and the cloth put over, neatly folded, and fastened with a tack at the corners, and another in the middle. The tack is crowed in about two-thirds of its length, it then presents the head convenient to pull out. If the bees are to go a great distance, and require ...
— Mysteries of Bee-keeping Explained • M. Quinby
... One more tack through alder copse and juniper jungle—hard indeed, and terribly vexatious—and he saw with delight the great open slope, covered with an unbroken surface of glittering snow. The sun (which at midwinter is but a few hours above the horizon) had ...
— Boyhood in Norway • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... chance or change of peace or pain; For fortune's favor or her frown; For luck or glut, for loss or gain, I never dodge, nor up nor down: But swing what way the ship shall swim, Or tack about with ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... three or four leagues. The wind was now at E., and blew a fresh gale. With it I stood to the S., till half an hour past six o'clock the next morning, when a sudden squall, from the same direction, took our ship aback; and, before the sails could be trimmed on the other tack, the main-sail and the top-gallant sails were ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... bad off as the horses, pretty near," said Captain Devers, the other. "There isn't one of them that hasn't turned his saddle-bags inside out to-day for the last crumb of hard-tack. They're worn to skin and bone. Three of them broke down entirely back there at the creek crossing, and if there weren't Indians all round us, nothing would have fetched them along. There goes Davies, coddling 'em again, damn it! That man would spoil ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... of babyhood had sounded a precipitate retreat; the curly head had fallen over on the paternal shoulder; the tear-stained little face was almost calm in repose, when down went a naked heel square on an inverted tack. Over went the work table; down came the work basket, scissors and all; up went the heel with the tack sticking in it, and the hero of the daffodils and pansies, with a yell like the Indian war-whoop, and with his mother-hubbard ...
— Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales • Robert L. Taylor
... inserted an official statement in the Moniteur to the effect that, although public opinion had been agitated by alarming rumours, there was nothing in the foreign relations of France to justify the fears these rumours tended to create. He continued on this tack, with more or less consistency, to the very verge of the outbreak of hostilities. 'The Empire was peace,' as it was always announced to be in the intervals when it was not war; there was no more harmless dove in Europe than the person enthroned in the Tuileries. These ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... had been made, lay near the course Yaspard was on. If the Laulie could not intercept Yaspard before he reached the little island she would lose ground by being obliged to tack a good deal, while he, having the wind with him, ...
— Viking Boys • Jessie Margaret Edmondston Saxby
... it doesn't need improvement. A lot of third-rate fellows have tried that tack with me, as if they'd flatter me into giving them a job. The fools never seemed to realise that when they said the paper didn't need improvement they were giving the best reason that could be given why they shouldn't be employed on it. If you weren't ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... lying around in plain view somewhere. If you had dumped it out of the box into a sack, the box must be somewhere. You hadn't had time to burn it before the stage got back. I drifted back to your kindling pile, where all the old boxes from the store are lying. I happened to notice a brass tack in one near the end; then the marks of the tack heads where they had pressed against the wood. I figured you might have substituted one box for another, and inside of ten minutes I stumbled against your wash-stand and didn't budge it. Then I didn't ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine
... sacrifice, you must trust the might of His living love. You must trust Him with a trust which is self-distrust. You must trust Him out and out. The people with whom Paul is fighting, in this chapter, were quite willing to admit that faith was the thing that made Christians, but they wanted to tack on something besides. They wanted to tack on the rites of Judaism and obedience to the moral law. And ever since men have been going on in that erroneous rut. Sometimes it has been that people have sought to add a little of their own morality; sometimes to add ceremonies and sacraments. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... he come himself?' she asked somewhat inconsequently, and going off on another tack at once. 'I can't understand how a man of any spirit ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... and a able young feller, by the name of Graham, and he kep' her a-dancin' as well as the old man would have done. Constant she had everythin' put to her that she'd bear, and always were she kep' on the tack where she'd make the most westin', and so she struggled along till we was as far as thirty degrees west, we bein' thirty days out and not yet half way. Every day we asked the steward how old Wiggins were a-gittin' on, and every day he'd shake ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 9 • Various
... said. 'Afraid you can't spare it, can't you? A gentleman comes and asks you with tack and civility for a temp'y loan of about 'arf nothing, and all you do is to curse and swear at him. Do you know what I call you—you and your thousand quid? A tuppenny millionaire, that's what I call you. Keep your blooming money. That's all I ask. Keep it. Much ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... inopportune change in the direction of the wind, we had had an unprecedentedly quick passage. The distance from Copenhagen to Iceland, in a straight line, is reckoned at 1200 geographical miles; for a sailing vessel, which must tack now and then, and must go as much with the wind as possible, 1500 to 1600 miles. Had the strong wind, which was at first so favourable, instead of changing on the seventh day, held on for thirty or forty hours longer, we should have landed in Iceland on the eighth or ninth day—even the steamer ...
— Visit to Iceland - and the Scandinavian North • Ida Pfeiffer
... had imagined that White would disclaim any knowledge of the shooting until forced to admit it, took a new tack. ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... display them, even to the inhabitants of Sirius. His soul is like a lake swept by a gale of wind that would drive a man-of-war at the rate of twenty-five knots an hour; and on this lake Stephane sails his squadrons of nutshells, and he sees them come, go, tack, run around, and capsize. He keeps his log- book very accurately, pompously registers all the shipwrecks, and as these spectacles transport him with admiration, he is indignant to find that he alone is moved by them. This ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... sound of trumpets, now of bells, Tabors, or signals made from castled heights, And with inventions multiform, our own, Or introduc'd from foreign land; but ne'er To such a strange recorder I beheld, In evolution moving, horse nor foot, Nor ship, that tack'd by sign from land or star. With the ten demons on our way we went; Ah fearful company! but in the church With saints, with gluttons at the tavern's mess. Still earnest on the pitch I gaz'd, to mark All things whate'er the chasm contain'd, and those Who burn'd within. As dolphins, that, ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante
... she could by no possibility overtake his squadron before night, ordered his prizes to continue their course without regard to any lights or apparent signals from the "Alfred." When darkness fell upon the sea, the Yankees were scudding along on the starboard tack, with the Englishman coming bravely up astern. From the tops of the "Alfred" swung two burning lanterns, which the enemy doubtless pronounced a bit of beastly stupidity on the part of the Yankee, affording, as it did, an excellent guide for ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... explain, then, the abrupt change of tack that occurred the following day at Berlin, or rather, at Potsdam, and the peculiar language addressed by the Chancellor to Sir Edward Goschen on the evening of the 29th? In that nocturnal scene there was no longer any question of ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... votes you were na slack; Now stand as tightly by your tack; Ne'er claw your lug, an' fidge your back, An' hum an' haw; But raise your arm, an' tell your crack ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... or five pounds of fresh beef, thus prepared, will be mightily relished by a hungry man, but as it is easily digested he will soon become hungry again. It is the bread about which there is the trouble. Cavalry, doing such service as Morgan's did, can not carry hard tack about with them very well, nor was bread ready cooked generally found in any neighborhood (south of the Ohio) in sufficient quantities to supply a brigade of soldiers. Houses were not always conveniently near to the camps where they could have bread ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... sailing vessels, with its fringe of black cliffs and surge-swept reefs on which innumerable seamen have met their end. With a northerly breeze it lies placid and sheltered, inviting the storm-tossed craft to tack into it for ...
— The Adventure of the Devil's Foot • Arthur Conan Doyle
... upon the Rebels, but week after week passed by, spring became summer, and summer lengthened into autumn, and there was no movement of the troops. The ardor of their patriotism died out. It was a monotonous life, waking early in the morning to answer roll-call, to eat breakfast of salt pork and hard-tack, drilling by squads, by companies, by battalion, marching and countermarching, going through the same manoeuvres every day, shouldering, ordering, and presenting arms, making believe load and fire, standing on guard, putting out their lights at nine o'clock at night,—doing all this, week after ...
— Winning His Way • Charles Carleton Coffin
... a spurious article, however, what was one to think of a married man in company with such? "Oh no! it ain't that!" Mrs. Berry returned immediately on the charitable tack. "Belike it's some one of his acquaintance 've married her for her looks, and he've just met her.... Why it'd be as bad as my Berry!" the relinquished spouse of Berry ejaculated, in horror at the idea of a second ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... there, on breezy morns, they saw The fishing-schooners outward run, Their low-bent sails in tack and flaw Turned white or dark to shade and sun. Sometimes, in calms of closing day, They watched the spectral mirage play, Saw low, far islands looming tall and nigh, And ships, with upturned keels, sail like a sea ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... own, but for wages—and not feel so greatly abused or unhappy; that they will swing an axe all day in a forest and live on baked beans and bread without feeling like martyrs; that they will go to sea and grub on hard tack and salt pork and fish without complaint and then will turn Anarchists on the same fare in the East. It seems strange too that these men keep strong and healthy, and that our ancestors kept strong and healthy on even a still ...
— One Way Out - A Middle-class New-Englander Emigrates to America • William Carleton
... gasped. "They've only used them once before—can't have many. Gotta warn Hys." He plugged a throat mike into the transmitter on his tack and spoke quickly into it. There was a stirring below and Brion poured a rain of fire ...
— Planet of the Damned • Harry Harrison
... any noise, there is a tendency to group these separate sounds and measure them off regularly. The clock ticks with always the same force and with the same space of time between the ticks, yet we hear tick-tack, tick-tack; we can prove the difference to be in our ear, for it requires but little effort to hear tick-tack or tack-tick, tack-tick. The ticking has ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... as the sun shone full in their faces, which they considered might be of disadvantage to them, and stretched out a little, so that at last they got the wind as they wished. The Normans, who saw them tack, could not help wondering why they did so, and said they took good care to turn about, for they were afraid of meddling with them. They perceived, however, by his banner, that the King was on board, which gave them ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... sponge of time has obliterated for ever, and I behold again in memory those two noble frigates, the Imperieuse and the Chesapeake, straining tightly at their cables, with smoke-stacks too modest in proportions to impair to the critical nautical eye the tack and sheet suggestions of the graceful, exquisitely symmetrical fabric of spars and yards and rigging soaring triumphantly aloft to where the long whip or pennant at the main flickered like a delicate line of fire against the hard cold ...
— The Honour of the Flag • W. Clark Russell
... say," he cried cheerily. "Oh! Don't look like that. You're only a bit weak, messmate. Avast there! take a good grip o' the health tack; haul in your slack, and ahoy! you'll be full sail again in a week. I say, what do you think of that? I'm getting on with my nautical ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... served in cans, each man having a can of soup with a hole in the top, made by driving a nail through the tin, and we sucked the soup through the hole. The next course was fish, each man having a can of sardines, and we ate them with hard tack. Then we had a game course, consisting of fried elk, and then a salad of canned baked beans, and coffee with condensed milk, and a spoonful or two of condensed milk for ice cream. When the banquet was over the leader of the bandits rapped on the stone floor of the cave with the butt ...
— Peck's Bad Boy With the Cowboys • Hon. Geo. W. Peck
... not immediately find ready for use, just as though a multitude of fairies stood at his elbows to meet his every wish. In another locker he found a kid of cold potatoes, and there was an abundance of hard-tack in a keg on the transom. The slice of bacon hissed and sizzled in the pan on the stove, and the odor was delightful to the hungry boy. It was soon "done to a turn," and the fried potatoes were as brown and nice as those prepared by his mother. He might ...
— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic
... it, for the Laocoon's helm was put down, her great sails shivered and threshed, and she stood off on the other tack. As she stood away we saw an officer leap on to the taffrail, holding on by the mizen backstays. "Tar my wig," said Marah, "if he isn't bowing ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... out her shrillest laugh. "Behind the coffin as Chief Mourner, I suppose. And you'll tack on the orthodox black sleeve-band, and look out for Number Two. And choose the ordinary kind, who funks raw-head and all the rest of it, for the next venture. But I prophesy you'll be bored. It's settled about Sheila and ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... and eagerly bought all over Germany showing the Zeppelins bombing towns. When some German father sits by the hospital bed of his dying daughter, who sobs out her life torn with a fatal wound, let him tack one of these postcards over the bed and in looking on it remember that "he who lives by the sword shall perish by the sword," that it was at the command of the Kaiser and the Crown Prince when they thought only the German ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... four oars, and these, being on the same side, were absolutely useless during the greatest part of the voyage. The adventurers, however, assert that they made them work from eight to nine minutes with the greatest ease, making use of them to tack ...
— Wonderful Balloon Ascents - or, the Conquest of the Skies • Fulgence Marion
... At field headquarters, Major Nichols, who in the thick of the battle has arrived to relieve Major Young, orders every man at once to be made as comfortable as possible. Men build fires and warm and dry their clammy water-soaked feet, picture of which is shown in this volume. Bully and tea and hard tack revive a good many. It is well they do, for the fight is going against us and two detachments of volunteers from these men are soon, to be asked for to go forward ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... Sibley that we had gone on. He said we were reckless and sent George McLeod, Captain of the Mounted Rangers, with fifty men to overtake us and bring us back. However, we drove on so fast that McLeod got to St. Peter about the time we did. There we bought out a bakery and set them to baking hard tack, and purchased cattle and made other arrangements for the feeding of ...
— Old Rail Fence Corners - The A. B. C's. of Minnesota History • Various
... see you," he cried. "I thought I heard firing. They must have been pretty close—not much sea-way in your last tack, eh? But come below. You will find everything in my cabin. The owner said most particular that it was to be made all spick and span for you. Honoured I am to see you again on ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... composing 'poems.' He then walked with me to his home, and took me along its narrow ways to his room. A small room of about fifteen feet square, with a single window looking out on the barren solitudes of the island; a small cot; a wash-stand with a little looking-glass hung over it from a tack in the wall; a pine table with pen, ink, and paper on it; an old line-engraving representing Bacchus, hung on the wall, and opposite a similar one of Silenus: these constituted the visible environments of Walt Whitman. There was not, apparently, a single book ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman
... tack held freely in my hand - With ballast snug—I put about, and scudded for the land; Loud hissed the sea beneath her lee—my little boat flew fast, But faster still the rushing storm came borne upon ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley
... Tick-Tack! tick-tack! This way, that way, forward, back, Swings the pendulum to and fro, Always regular, always slow. Grave and solemn on the wall,— Hear it whisper! hear it call! Little Ginx knows naught of Time, ...
— On the Tree Top • Clara Doty Bates
... and Dorothy regretted that she had not made her statement of the case still stronger. Indeed, she was about to supplement it by a remark to the effect that people never thought of giving up yachting until they were turned of sixty, when, to her relief, her uncle slowly filled away on the right tack. His acceptance was expressed in highly ungracious terms; but, as has been said, Dorothy never troubled herself about forms, provided she compassed results. The moment that he had uttered the fatal words, Mr. Port fell to cursing himself in his own mind for being such a fool; but the ...
— The Uncle Of An Angel - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... turn the canoe over. Lay the canvas with the centre line along the keel. Stretch it well by pulling at each end, and tack it through the middle at the extreme ends with a few tacks in a temporary manner. Put in temporary tacks along the gunwale at moderate intervals, stretching slightly, and endeavor to get rid of ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume VIII, No 25: May 21, 1887 • Various
... taken forrard when the decks were washed, to give it a scrub. So, as there was no one on the poop, I left the wheel, and stepped aft to the taffrail. It was thus that I came to see something altogether unthought of—a full-rigged ship, close-hauled on the port tack, a few hundred yards on our starboard quarter. Her sails were scarcely filled by the light breeze, and flapped as she lifted to the swell of the sea. She appeared to have very little way through the water, ...
— The Ghost Pirates • William Hope Hodgson
... sailed away into this wonderful world of romance aboard our gallant vessel, which, like any other pirate ship that ever existed—in books or out of them—"luffed, and filling upon another tack, stood away in pursuit of the Spanish treasure galleon in ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... bay where he could still see the speck of white sail that showed his father hurrying landward on a long tack with the west wind abeam. The boy's loneliness was gone. He felt himself the lord of a great maritime province, which, from his high watchtower, he seemed ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... tree under which myself and staff were seated, drinking a cup of coffee and chewing "hard tack" when word of the surrender came, was torn down for mementoes. Meade and Wright did not escape, being almost dragged from their horses ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... quite on the wrong tack," continued Stark, brazenly. "Mr. Gibbon was just informing me that the safe had been opened and robbed. It is the first I ...
— Driven From Home - Carl Crawford's Experience • Horatio Alger
... head yards were swung, and braced sharp up for the other tack, and the little vessel had gathered way again, the mate came aft and stood by the captain, watching the light ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... last night, but you came up here by a track fit for a lady's pony-carriage. My predecessor engineered it to connect his two places of business. In its way, it's the most palatial thing in the Rockies—two long legs with a short tack between, gentle all the way—and it brings you out by the Necropolis gate. You can hitch the horse ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... held firmly up out of the way. One suggested that they drive a nail through both parts of the cord and into the wall. Another thought it would be better to put a loop of string around the cord and fasten the loop to the wall. A third suggested the use of a double-pointed carpet tack that would go across the wires, but not through them, and if driven tightly into the wall would hold the wire more firmly than ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne
... his mules down hill at a dangerous pace. He was requested to slacken speed; but suspecting his passengers to be afraid, he only flogged the brutes into a still more furious gallop. Observing this, Mr. Stephenson coolly said, "Let us try him on the other tack; tell him to show us the fastest pace at which Spanish mules can go." The rogue of a driver, when he found his tricks of no avail, pulled up and proceeded at a more moderate speed for the rest ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... sat down in a loud rocker and began to tell me a lot of things I didn't want to hear. Uncle Peter always intersperses his remarks on current topics with bits of parboiled philosophy that make one want to get up and drive him through the carpet with a tack hammer. When it comes to wise saws and proverbial stunts Uncle Peter has Solomon backed ...
— Back to the Woods • Hugh McHugh
... his men had finished what they had come to Sunkhaze to do. They climbed aboard the huge ice-craft. The sheet was paid off, and with dragging peavey-sticks instead of centerboard to hold the contrivance into the wind, the boat moved away on its tack across the lake. ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... spread and covered with blankets, and the improvised hospital was ready. One tent was taken for operating-tables, and the work of surgeons and nurses began. They worked night and day for forty-eight hours, with only brief intervals for coffee and hard-tack. ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton
... up the most of twenty minutes, yet after getting as far as Mr. Shylock's I remembered that I required what one's hatter (and no one else) calls a "boater," and back I went to order one in addition to the cap. And as the next tack fetches the buoy, so my next perambulation (in which, however, I was thinking seriously of a new bowler) brought me face to face with ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... medical personnel at that village. They were all at the front. Mess Sgt. Vincent of "F" Company went in to see how the wounded soldiers were getting along. He was just in time to see the British medical sergeant come in with a pitcher of tea, tin cups, hard tack, and margarine and jam. He put it on the floor and said; "Here is your supper; ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... use arguing on that tack, and I felt quite sure that he would forget all about it, though he looked so determined, and talked ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... at me; and taking advantage of this favorable current of sentiment, I put the Splash about on the other tack, so that she was again headed towards Cannondale. Bob looked anxiously from Kate to me, and from me to Kate again. He expected another storm of emotion from her, and so did I; but I had decided upon my course, ...
— Seek and Find - or The Adventures of a Smart Boy • Oliver Optic
... with an effort and, disregarding the allusion, decided to take another tack. "But doesn't your Excellency ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... Wapping, observing that most part of his audience were in the seafaring way, very naturally embellished his discourse with several nautical tropes and figures. Amongst other things, he advised them "to be ever on the watch, so that on whatsoever tack the evil one should bear down on them, he might be crippled in action." "Ay, master," said a son of Neptune, "but let me tell you, that will depend upon your having ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 529, January 14, 1832 • Various
... sales letters the writers have taken exactly the opposite tack. They have slung language in the fashion of a circus publicity agent, and by their verbal gymnastics have attracted attention. This sort of thing may do very well in some kinds of circular letters, but it is quite out of place ...
— How to Write Letters (Formerly The Book of Letters) - A Complete Guide to Correct Business and Personal Correspondence • Mary Owens Crowther
... like a dog at heel to the tack-room, where Farrel saddled him and carefully fitted the bridle with the snaffle-bit. Following a commanding slap on the fore leg, the intelligent animal knelt for Kay to mount him, after which, Farrel adjusted ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... can tell you flatly; for Lord James had promised him, in case he would be of his faction in these parts, an easy tack of the teindsheaves of his own Barony of Avenel, together with the lands of Cranberry-moor, which lie intersected with his own. And he will look for no ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... busy putting the boat about; but when he had it on the other tack, he said, "How do you ...
— Malbone - An Oldport Romance • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... not make the mistake of heading directly for the shore, but sought to make it by a long tack, moving half with the current and half against it. The lad had made up his mind that the cowboys would never reach them and that what was to be done must be done ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Texas - Or, The Veiled Riddle of the Plains • Frank Gee Patchin
... with the wounded on their return from the Kiowa village. A rest was had the next day, which was sadly needed, as the whole command had been marching and fighting about twenty-seven hours, on a few broken hard tack and a slice of salt pork each. The second day after the fight, Carson concluded to return to Fort Bascom, which post was reached in twenty-one days. Here the command remained until orders were received from General Carleton, commanding the department, and Company K ...
— Frontier service during the rebellion - or, A history of Company K, First Infantry, California Volunteers • George H. Pettis
... those horrid ambulances to the cars. 'We cried last night like children, some of us,' said a Lieutenant,'but we're all right now. This Hospital Train is a jolly thing. It goes like a cradle.' Seeing my sympathy wasted, I tried another tack. 'Did you know that Sherman was in Dalton?' 'No!' cried the Colonel and all the men who could, raised themselves up and stared at me with eager, questioning eyes. 'Is that so?' 'Yes,' I replied, 'It is true.' 'Then, I don't care for this little wound,' said one fellow, ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... I should explain, is the name we have, for our own purposes, given to what the Munichers prefer to call the Pinakothek. We could never pronounce Pinakothek properly. We called it "Pynniosec," "Pintactec," and the "Happy Tack." B. one day after dinner called it the "Penny Cock," and then we both got frightened, and agreed to fix up some sensible, practical name for it before any mischief was done. We finally decided on "Pantechnicon," which begins with a "P," and is a dignified, old-established ...
— Diary of a Pilgrimage • Jerome K. Jerome
... service is a strange career; The tiros love it, but the experts fear. You, while you're sailing on a prosperous tack, Look out for squalls which yet may drive you back. The gay dislike the grave, the staid the pert, The quick the slow, the lazy the alert; Hard drinkers hate the sober, though he swear Those bouts at night ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.—When the Republican party came into power in 1801, it was pledged to make reforms "to put the ship of state," as Jefferson said, "on the Republican tack." About a third of the important Federalist office-holders were accordingly removed from office, the annual speech at the opening of Congress was abolished, and the written message introduced—a custom followed ever since by our Presidents. Internal taxes were repealed, the army was reduced, ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... was as sudden as it was unexpected. Deborah flushed and trimmed her sails for this new tack, and insinuating gently, "Then you have heard—" waited for the enlightenment these words ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green
... "Tack up your shelf paper while I'm gone, Lilly—your cupboards look so bare—and then come over to lunch with me and we'll go to the euchre together. It's your first afternoon at the Junior Matrons and I want you to look your best. Wear ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... "that many people appear to like a drab-colored world, hung around with dusky shreds of philosophy"; but it is more obvious still that, whether they like it or not, the drapings grow a trifle dingier every year, and that no one seems to have the courage to tack up something gay. What is much worse, even those bits of wanton color which have rested generations of weary eyes are being rapidly obscured by somber and intricate scroll-work, warranted to oppress and fatigue. The great masterpieces of humor, which have kept men young by laughter, are being tried ...
— Masterpieces Of American Wit And Humor • Thomas L. Masson (Editor)
... cabin steward, but he'll stand watch and do his trick. My orders shall be obeyed smartly. You savvy, 'smartly'? There shall be no growling about the kaikai, which will be above allowance. You'll put a handle to the mate's name, and tack on 'sir' to every order I give you. If you're smart and quick, I'll make this ship comfortable for all hands." He took the cigar out of his mouth. "If you're not," he added, in a roaring voice, "I'll make it a floating hell.—Now, Mr. Hay, we'll pick watches, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of discovering more distinctly the isles in that quarter; but, presently after, we discovered a reef of rocks a-head, extending on each bow farther than we could see. As we could not weather them, it became necessary to tack and bear up to the south, to look for a passage that way. At noon the southernmost island bore S.W., distant four miles. North of this isle were three others, all connected by breakers, which we were not sure did not join to those we had seen in the morning, as some were observed in the intermediate ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... bal' dis tract' re flect' taint ca nal' ex pand' re fresh' trail cra vat' a bet' re lent' aim de camp' be deck' re ject' maim pro tract' be held' re quest' train re cant' be quest' re bel' strain re fract' de fect' re gress' chain re lax' e lect' re press' paint at tack' e rect' sub ject quaint at ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey
... one dose; but 'ow comes it, if you please, sir, that these 'ere Chancery chaps have changed their tack; be it they've tried 'onest men so long that they be gwine to 'ave a slap at the thieves ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... good enough for Linda. But so long as she thinks I am and I try to live up to that, why we've as good a chance to be happy as anybody. We all make breaks, us fellows that go at everything roughshod. Still, when we pull up and take a new tack, you shouldn't hold grudges. If we could go back to that fall and winter, I'd ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... As he spoke the snow-white pile lay over in the opposite direction, and the whole broadside of the vessel became visible to them, every sail standing out as though carved from ivory against the cold blue sky. "If we don't catch her on this tack we won't get her at all," the fisherman observed. "When they put about next they'll reach right out into ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... which the bottles rest in the washboiler, is made in this manner: Have two strips of wood measuring 1 inch high, 1 inch wide, and 2 inches shorter than the length of the boiler. On these pieces of wood tack thin strips of wood that are 1-1/2 inches shorter than the width of the boiler. These cross-strips should be about 1 inch wide, and there should be an inch between two strips. This rack will support the jars and will admit ...
— Canned Fruit, Preserves, and Jellies: Household Methods of Preparation - U.S. Department of Agriculture Farmers' Bulletin No. 203 • Maria Parloa
... battle, Sir J. Jervis, by carrying a press of sail, came up with them, passed through their fleet, then tacked, and thus cut off nine of their ships from the main body. These ships attempted to form on the larboard tack, either with a design of passing through the British line, or to leeward of it, and thus rejoining their friends. Only one of them succeeded in this attempt; and that only because she was so covered with smoke that her intention was not discovered ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... to train this exceptional man! We can do much, but the chief thing is to prevent anything being done. To sail against the wind we merely follow one tack and another; to keep our position in a stormy sea we must cast anchor. Beware, young pilot, lest your boat slip its cable or drag its anchor before ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... first bit of a wild beast's skin was hoisted by some pre-historic savage, thousands and thousands of years ago, nobody had learnt how to tack, that is, to sail against the wind. The only way any ship could go at all well was with the wind, that is, with the wind blowing from behind. So long as men had nothing but a single "wind-bag" of skin or cloth the best wind was a ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... traveling only by night, he had traversed one hundred miles with a rope round his neck, and without the prospect of special reward. For he was but a private, and received but a private's pay—thirteen dollars a month, a shoddy uniform, and hard-tack, when he ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... to stand by tack an' sheet when it's comin' on to blow; Never the roar of 'Rio Grande' to the watch's stamp-an'-go; An' the seagulls settin' along the rail an' callin' the long day through, Like the souls of old dead sailor-men as used to be ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Nov 21, 1917 • Various
... of pine or poplar. These pieces are made into two frames as shown in the drawing and held together with long screws or nails. Fasten with glue and screw short blocks on the inside of the couch rails for holding the two frames in place. Tack pieces of cheap burlap across the frame and cover with ordinary black cambric. This will give a strong, ...
— Mission Furniture - How to Make It, Part 2 • H. H. Windsor
... by the mercy of God, and come home, after being given over for dead, and told of all hands lost, I—I know a story, Heart's Delight," stammered the captain, "o' this natur', as was told to me once; and being on this here tack, and you and me sitting by the fire, maybe you'd like to hear me tell ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... moment all were at their stations. The helm was put on the yacht, and she payed off on the opposite tack to that on which she had before been sailing. As soon as the jib filled, Tom gave two vigorous blows with his hatchet on the hawser, and, as he lifted his hand for a third, it parted. Then came ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... rumpling their hair. "Pipe all hands to the galley. Here comes the salt horse and the hard tack." ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... made into -yer, -ger, as in Lockyer, Sawyer, Kidger (Chapter XIX), Woodger, [Footnote: Woodyer, Woodger, may also be for wood-hewer. See Stanier] and -or, -our, as in Taylor, Jenoure (Chapter III). The latter ending, corresponding to Modern Fr. -eur, represents Lat. -or, -orem, but we tack it onto English words as in "sailor," or substitute it for -er, -ier, as in Fermor, for Farmer, Fr. fermier. In the Privy Purse Expenses of that careful monarch ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... drift, carrying the boat along with her. Instantly those on board endeavoured to hoist the mainsail of the Smeaton, with the view of working her up to the buoy from which she had parted; but it blew so hard, that by the time she was got round to make a tack towards the rock, she had drifted at least ...
— The Lighthouse • Robert Ballantyne
... jumpy by nature," he observed. "I've seen dead men before. Still, next time you want to leave one in my office after dark, I wish you'd put a light with him, or tack up a sign, or even leave somebody to tell me about it. I'm sorry it's Starr and not that thoughtful old horned toad ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... anchored for the night off the snow-clad and inhospitable shores of Tierra del Fuego, to profusely sprinkle his cutter's deck with sharp tacks, and then calmly turn in and sleep the sleep of the just; for even the horny soles of the Fuegian foot is susceptible to the business end of a tack; and, as I read Slocum's story, I smiled, and thought of dear old Yorke and ...
— Yorke The Adventurer - 1901 • Louis Becke
... martinet with MacRae, he took another tack and became the very essence of affability toward me. (I'd have enjoyed punching his proud head, for all that; it was a dirty way to serve a man who ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... Gid handled the talk mighty kind-like. I think it's better to let folks always chaw their own hard tack instead of trying to grind it up friendly for them, cause the swalloring of the trouble has to come in the end; but Gid minced facts faithful for me, according to his lights. I didn't rightly make out just what he did expect, ...
— Rose of Old Harpeth • Maria Thompson Daviess
... forth Lancelot, adding, with his whimsical look: "There's rhyme, as well as reason. How on earth did we get on this tack?" ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... however, is, that the largest of the Spanish vessels would scarcely pass for third-rates in the present navy of England; yet were they so ill framed, or so ill governed, that they were quite unwieldy, and could not sail upon a wind, nor tack on occasion, nor be managed in stormy weather by the seamen. Neither the mechanics of ship-building, nor the experience of mariners, had attained so great perfection as could serve for the security and government of such bulky vessels; and the English, who had already had experience how unserviceable ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... fell off, and filled again upon another tack, sailed swiftly for a minute or so, and brought up once more dead in the wind's eye. Again and again was this repeated. To and fro, up and down, north, south, east, and west the Hispaniola sailed by swoops and dashes, and at ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... he, and at the same time you were yourself, going about with him. You loved him with a passionate, self-immolating love. There wasn't room for both of you on the raft, you sat cramped up, huddled together. Not enough hard tack. While he was sleeping you slipped off. A shark got you. It had a face like Dr. Charles. The lunatic was running after him like mad, with a revolver. You ran like mad. Morfe Bridge. When he raised his arm you jerked it up and the revolver went off ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... who has disgraced himself—some infernal cruelty which has forced the poor thing out on the world as a governess. Well, turning it over in my mind, it struck me that the major might be able to put me on the right tack. It is quite possible that he might have been informed of Miss Gwilt's family circumstances before ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... it was blowing (so I heard some one say) "half a cap." I privately wondered what a whole cap must be like; for it was all I could do, by leaning hard up against the wind, and holding on my hat—a chimney-pot hat, by the way—to tack up the platform and fetch round for the Belfast steamer, which lay snorting ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... and I doubt whether it will go round soon enough to save us. If it should go round a little more to the north, we must try and get her on the other tack; but I am afraid, in such a sea, she will not go about. Of course, our great aim is to reach Port Cornwallis; or, if we cannot get as far as that, I have just been having a look at the chart, and I see there are three narrow straits. How much water there is in them, ...
— At the Point of the Bayonet - A Tale of the Mahratta War • G. A. Henty
... you'll hatter gi' 'im credit fer, an' dat wuz keepin' his face an' han's clean, an' in takin' keer er his cloze. Nobody, not even his mammy, had ter patch his britches er tack buttons on his coat. See 'im whar you may an' when you mought, he wuz allers lookin' spick an' span des like he done come right out'n a ban'-box. You know what de riddle say 'bout 'im: when he stan' up he sets down, an' when he walks he ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... but he must learn not to try this trick again. Let him lie there until he wakes. Then give him some breakfast, hard tack and water, remember, and then give him the task I set for him. When the first fishing smack, bound for Eastville appears, start ...
— Princess Polly At Play • Amy Brooks
... you!" he chirped, as Dave worked the ailerons to counteract the leaning of the machine. A swing of the rudder had caused the biplane to bank, but quick as a flash Dave righted it by getting the warping control on the opposite tack, ...
— Dave Dashaway and his Hydroplane • Roy Rockwood
... a blouse, a gun, Call this a soldier just for fun. A dog tent, blanket, candle, match, His home is built with rare dispatch; With hard tack, bacon, army beans, Army life is not what it seems. A damp cold night, aching head, The next day fever-soldier dead. The story is brief (we know it well), And plain is moral—"War ...
— Rhymes of the Rookies • W. E. Christian
... meanings gone to her dump-pile, if there was a stranger there of course it knocked him groggy for a couple of minutes, then he would come to, and by that time she would be away down the wind on another tack, and not expecting anything; so when he'd hail and ask her to cash in, I (the only dog on the inside of her game) could see her canvas flicker a moment,—but only just a moment,—then it would belly out taut and full, and she would say, ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... suddenly gave orders to up anchor and away. The schooner was full of cargo, copra and pearl-shell and pearls, and was due to return to Papeete to discharge. But this amative mariner filled his jibs on another tack, and before his crew knew whither they were bound was well on ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... to be left behind," said the mouse. "I wanted to see what Africa was like—I have relatives there. So I hid in the baggage and was brought on to the ship with the hard-tack. When the ship sank I was terribly frightened—because I cannot swim far. I swam as long as I could, but I soon got all exhausted and thought I was going to sink. And then, just at that moment, the old man's ...
— The Story of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... slowly, tossed a bit by the heavy swell, the ponderous boom swinging, and permitting the loosened canvas to flap against the ropes, until the sloop finally steadied onto the new tack. The distance to be covered was not great, and in less than ten minutes, we were drawing in toward the high stern of the anchored vessel. She was larger than I had thought, a lumping craft for those days, bark rigged, ...
— Wolves of the Sea • Randall Parrish
... off on a wrong tack, my beloved fire-eater. Fallowfeild was quite right. The game was up, really it was; and he wanted me to walk out, like the gentlemanlike dog, so as to avoid being kicked out. I always knew the break was bound to come some time; and it's a long sight pleasanter to break than ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... innings started, William, all swagger and confidence, started on a new tack. "Fans and fan-esses," he said, addressing the crowd through the megaphone, "why don't you root? Make a noise like you meant it. The Torontos have simply gotter win this game; they need it, but you gotter help 'em. Now then, every-body—ROOT," and ...
— William Adolphus Turnpike • William Banks
... King of Corea now adopted another tack. He pleaded that the sea-route was beset with dangers to which it would be unseemly to expose the person of an imperial envoy, but he accommodatingly sent the Emperor's letter on to Japan by an envoy of his own. This Corean ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... somebody else must have. Who? That's the question. I wish I were an amateur detective, like the clever people one reads about in magazines. They just get a clue, and find it all out so easily, while the police are on quite a wrong tack. The chief thing seems to be to make a beginning, and I don't know in the least ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... negotiations. Progress was obviously unsatisfactory, the artist, after brief and chill consideration, reverting to his toil. Now, tact and discretion are essential in approaching the Mordaunt Estate, for he is a prickly institution. I was sure that the newcomers had taken the wrong tack with him. ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... windlass, busy in a way to spread sail after sail with a rapidity little short of that seen on board of a vessel of war. The rattling of the clew-garnet blocks, as twenty lusty fellows ran forward with the tack of the mainsail, and the hauling forward of braces, was the signal that the ship was clear of ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... bread, Valentin Ulrich manufactures saddles, and P. Loesch keeps a meat-market, with a sign representing one gentleman holding a mad bull by a bit of packthread tied to his horns, while an assistant leisurely strolls up to annihilate the creature with a tack-hammer. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... his pipe from his mouth, bent forward to shake the ashes out of it, and stared into the fire. Then he said, clearing his throat once or twice: "I've bothered her, 'trying,' I thought I'd start on a new tack." ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... to Genoa, under escort of four Genoese galleys, the boy next cautiously sailed; for all the coast swarmed with the armed galleys of Pisa, the staunch supporter of the discrowned Otho. With many a tack and many a turn the galleys headed north, while the watchful look-outs scanned the horizon for hostile prows. On the first of May, the peril of Pisa was past, and Genoa's gates were opened to receive him. Genoa was ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... have the disagreeable habit of introducing certain words or meaningless syllables into their speech, where these do not at all belong; or they tack on diminutive endings to their words. The syllables are often mere sounds, like eh, uh; in many cases they ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer
... newspapers was always saying how extraordinary it was that The Avenger chose such a peculiar time to do his deeds—I mean, the time when no one's about the streets. Now, doesn't it stand to reason that the fellow, reading all that, and seeing the sense of it, said to himself, 'I'll go on another tack this time'? Just listen to this!" He pulled a strip of paper, part of a column cut from a newspaper, out of ...
— The Lodger • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... carpet? Or can't you ride to Gallipoli? Here are some excellent white-tailed mules, good enough for Pindar, whom Colvocoressis has just brought in from the monastery. 'Transportation for one!' Is there anything to be brought back? Nitre, powder, lead, junk, hard-tack, mules, horses, pigs, polenta, or olla podrida, or other of the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... till the end of Old Time— Which, as I figure up, is a century hence: Then we'll all go abroad without any expense; We'll capture a comet—the smart Yankee race Will ride on his tail through the kingdom of Space, Tack their telegraph wires to Uranus and Mars; Yea, carry their arts to the ultimate stars, And flaunt the Old Flag at the suns as they pass, And astonish the Devil ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... Clerk, as you understand this tack-hammer language, and as I could see you've been following all the messages that's been sent, just tell me the whole lot of it, please, as ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... sorrow to anticipate the continuance of sorrow. That is an inevitable effect of temperament; but we must not give way helplessly to temperament, or allow ourselves to drift wherever the mind bears us. Just as the skilled sailor can tack up against the wind, and use ingenuity to compel a contrary breeze to bring him to the haven of his desire, so we must be wise in trimming our sails to the force of circumstance; while there is an eager delight in making adverse conditions help us ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson |
