"Aft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of mine on board an extremely small and extremely dirty little schooner, during a four days' passage between two places in the Gulf of Mexico whose names don't matter. For the most part he lay on deck aft as it were at my feet, and raising himself from time to time on his elbow would talk about himself and go on talking, not exactly to me or even at me (he would not even look up but kept his eyes fixed on the deck) but more as if ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... among three or four of the schooner's crew. "You must come along aft to the mate," said one ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... reputation to a man who cared nothing for it; and Barron's "Bathing Negresses" are only quoted here because they illustrate his method of work. He had painted from the sea in a boat moored fore and aft; he had kept the two women shivering and whining in the water for two hours at a time. They could not indeed refuse the gold he offered for their services, but one never lived to enjoy the money, for her prolonged ablutions in the cause of art killed her a ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... The following are among the best of his short stories: The Man Who Would be King, The Brushwood Boy, The Courting of Dinah Shadd, Drums of the Fore and Aft, Without Benefit of ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... passengers and John Mangles retired to their cabins. In the forepart of the yacht the man on watch was pacing the deck, while aft, there was no one but the man at ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... "is a submersible, not a diving, submarine. That is to say, the rudder guides it and changes the angle of the boat. But the hydroplanes pull it up and down, two pairs of them set fore and aft of the centre of gravity. They lift or lower the boat bodily on an even keel, not by plunging and diving. I will now set the hydroplanes at ten degrees down and the horizontal rudder two degrees up, and the boat ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... fitting time for a brawl. Despite me the fellow forced my hand. He planted himself squarely in our way and ogled my charge with impudent effrontery. Me he quite ignored, while his insulting eyes raked her fore and aft. My anger seethed, boiled over. Forward slid my foot behind his heel, my forearm under his chin. I threw my weight forward in a push. His head went back as though shot from a catapult, and next moment Sir ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... Aft on the hill at e'ens, I see him 'mang the ferns, The lover o' my teens, The father o' my bairns: For there his plaid I saw, As gloamin' aye drew near— But my a's now awa', Sin' the ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... canoe slipped out of the dense gloom of the ship's shadow, Elsie heard the wrathful chief officer interviewing the Chilean sailors on watch on the main deck fore and aft. That is to say, he stirred them up from the bridge with a ritual laid down for such extreme cases. Not yet had he realized the exceeding artifice which the girl displayed in throwing him and all the others off their guard. She had maneuvered Suarez into the canoe with the fierce ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... the helm, Jack; the anchor is free. That is enough. Keep her jib just full and no more till we have stowed all away here." When the chain was stowed below, and the anchor securely fastened, Tripper went aft and hauled in the main-sheet. "Up with the foresail, Tom. That is it. You keep the tiller, Jack." The two men now proceeded to coil down all the ropes, and get everything ship-shape and tidy. By the time they had finished, Harwich was fairly behind them, and they were ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... and right to the bulkheads of the fo'c'sle ran a lower deck reached by a hatch aft of the instrument room. Here were stowed the dredges and buoys and all the gear belonging to them, trawl nets and deep sea traps, cable and spare rope and sounding-wire, harpoons and grancs and a hundred ...
— The Beach of Dreams • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... been thus named from the pretty gold-fish which shone afore and aft on her prows, was Hendrik Shippe's best boat, and he had entrusted it to the care of Tobias Jeffers, his ablest boatman. There was not a smarter looking craft in Termonde, nor one better fitted for hard work. It was a pleasure to watch her glide along, her waist well ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Polish • Various
... find the water cold. It is always warmer at night. Thus the good God remembers poor fishermen. The seas will come over the bows when we round this corner; they will rise up and hit the abbe in the back, which is his affair; then they will wash aft into this well, and from that you must bale it out all the time. When the seas come in, you need not be alarmed, nor will it be necessary to ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... challenge her in English, the collector, standing up in the stern, touched his hat, and announced his rank. The gangway-ladder was immediately lowered, and three gentlemen ascended the ship's side and walked aft to the poop. I was standing near the bulwark at the time, watching the scene with intense interest. As General Humbert stood a little in advance of the rest, the collector, probably taking him for the captain, addressed him ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... Aft hae I roved by bonnie Doon To see the woodbine twine, And ilka bird sang o' its love; And ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... the Vermont shore, and appeared to be engaged in estimating the distance yet to be accomplished. The calculation was not satisfactory, and the bank director's wrath was on the increase. With hasty step he walked aft again. ...
— Haste and Waste • Oliver Optic
... thing. If you was in a ship, fighting that other ship, you wouldn't want just to blaze away at her broadside. No. You'd want to hit her so as your shot would rake all along her decks from the bow aft, or from the stern forrard. You wait a second, Master Jim, till the wind gives her bows a skew towards you, or till her stern swings round more. There she goes. Are you ready? Now, as she comes round; allow ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... day and night. Squalls is sca'ce some times o' the year; but when there is one, I tell you a feller hears thunder! The clouds settle right down onto the mast-head, black and thick, like the settlin's of an ink-bottle; the lightnin' hisses an' cuts fore and aft; and corposants come flightin' down onto the boom or the top, gret balls o' light; and the wind roars louder than the seas; and the rain comes down in spouts,—it don't fall fur enough to drop; you'd think heaven and earth was come together, with hell betwixt 'em;—and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... larger than the pilot-house, rose from the upper deck near its after-end. There were three doors on each side of the main house, a large one well forward, a small one nearly amidship, and another large one well aft. There were also six small windows on each side, and from three of those nearest Winn a cheerful light was streaming, while the other three were dark. There was a name painted on the boat's side in such large black letters that even in the fading twilight ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe
... down the ship's long quarter-deck, sheltered by the awning, when a young apprentice came aft and said a gentleman wished to speak to me. I saw a man standing in the gangway; he was a tall, soldierly person, about forty years of age, with iron-grey hair and spiked moustache, and an aquiline nose. His eyes were singularly bright ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 26, February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... but, even as I lay there, breathless and uncertain, he suddenly revealed his presence by lighting a lantern in the stern. The illumination was feeble enough, yet sufficient to expose to view the small, unprotected engine aft, and also the fact that all forward of the little cockpit in which it stood, the entire craft was decked over. The fellow was busily engaged in overhauling the machinery, leaning far forward, his body indistinct, the lantern swinging in one hand, with entire ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... was a hundred yards from the pier, and the spray and the splintered chips of ice flew back from the sharp bow, smiting the faces of the two men in the little boat dragging astern with three-quarters of her length out of water. Dan, kneeling aft, watched with eagle eye each quirk and turn of ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... ladder slipped, I know not which," answered Jeffrey gruffly, staring at the toe of his sea-boot. "At least he is safe enough in the boat now," and, turning, he vanished aft into the ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... those rosy lips I aft hae kissed sae fondly, And closed for aye the sparkling glance That dwelt on me sae kindly! And mouldering now in silent dust That heart that lo'ed me dearly! But still within my bosom's core ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... though ingenious plan that was frequently adopted in subsequent years by captains in the merchant service when racing, which always created excitement amongst the crew; the order was given to knock the wedges out of the deck coamings, ease the strain off the fore and aft stays, and when it was judicious to do it the pinch on the main rigging was also eased to give the masts more play. The windjammer seamen knew when this order was given that they were in for a time of "cracking on," and really ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... to inform your Lordship that being ready for sea early this morning, the foreigners refused heaving up the anchor in consequence of arrears of pay and prize-money, and to my great surprise many of the natives also came aft. ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... all sail was set on the Sea-horse, and with her yards braced tautly aft she laid her course south, close-hauled; a fresh breeze was now blowing, and she ploughed her way through the water at a rate that almost justified O'Grady's panegyrics upon her. In another three days she entered the port ...
— With Moore At Corunna • G. A. Henty
... Mousie, thou art no thy lane[2] In proving foresight may be bain: The best laid schemes o' mice and men Gang aft a-gley, And lea'e us nought but grief and vain, For ...
— Voices for the Speechless • Abraham Firth
... crossed, with the words "Bunker Hill" printed on a slip of paper fastened to them. On the opposite side of the room stands a bureau, the drawers of which are filled with clothing, and on the top are placed two beautiful specimens of Frank's handiwork. One is a model of a "fore-and-aft" schooner, with whose rigging or hull the most particular tar could not find fault. The other represents a "scene at sea." It is inclosed in a box about two feet long and a foot and a half in hight. One side of the box is glass, ...
— Frank, the Young Naturalist • Harry Castlemon
... can only kill wan thing, an' thot's me body, but me soul'll go on cussin' 'im till the ind av doom." He shook his fist again, becoming more derisive: "Look at his head, now! If 'tain't the shape av a rotten pear may I be shot for a spy!—mind ye how it slopes up to a p'int, both fore-and-aft, ...
— Where the Souls of Men are Calling • Credo Harris
... was partially cleared away, Captain Castle got spare sails and blankets aft to stop the leak, passing two hawsers round the stern, and setting them up. The troops were employed baling and pumping. This continued during the ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... got you here now and I don't mean to let you escape," laughed the other in response; "in my cabin—its aft there under the break in the poop, you'll find some more overalls, put them on and then I'll set you both to work ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... side under the engine-room dials, are the only machines in visible motion. The former sighs from time to time as the oil plunger rises and falls half an inch. The latter, cased and guarded like the U-tube aft, exhibits another Fleury Ray, but inverted and more green than violet. Its function is to shunt the lift out of the gas, and this it will do without watching. That is all! A tiny pump-rod wheezing and whining ...
— Actions and Reactions • Rudyard Kipling
... was fired; the white powder-smoke clouded the tailor's lawn; the thunder of the ordnance smote the ear of Joe Westlake, who, dilating his nostrils and directing his eyes at Sloper's villa, bawled out: "Peter! that's meant for us, my heart! Down hellum! slacken away fore and aft! pipe all ...
— The Honour of the Flag • W. Clark Russell
... 2, 1807, to pass another supplemental Act —to take effect January 1, 1808—still more stringent, and covering any such illicit traffic, whether to the United States or with other countries. Never was the adage that, "The best laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft agley," more painfully apparent. Slaves increased and multiplied within the land, and enriched their white owners to such a degree that, as the years rolled by, instead of compunctions of conscience on the subject of African Slavery in America, the Southern leaders ultimately ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... full view, in the second row of benches that night, and I began on him. I tried him with mild jokes, then with severe ones; I dosed him with bad jokes, and riddled him with good ones; I fired old, stale jokes into him, and peppered him fore and aft with red-hot new ones; I warmed up to my work, and assaulted him on the right and left, in front and behind; I fumed and sweated and charged and ranted till I was hoarse and sick, and frantic and furious; but I never moved him once—I never started a smile or a tear! Never a ghost of a smile, ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... adventurers approached they could see that the vessel was now a mass of flames. The wind was driving the fire toward the forecastle, and the crew had sought refuge aft. But this expedient could not last long, for, already the tongues of fire were licking the sides of the craft and coming nearer and nearer the seemingly doomed men. The vessel was a large one, ...
— Five Thousand Miles Underground • Roy Rockwood
... so we will say nothing more about it. I thought perhaps you would like to have him aft ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... generously supplied us before we left home. We had a dish of roast seal! Some cakes were made by the cook, and the steward produced his best stores. For the evening, the division between the fore and aft cabins was removed, and there was free intercourse between officers and men; many a toast was drunk to the memory of friends at home, and at midnight a polar ball was improvised by a dance on the ice. The boatswain, ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... dangerous to Louis Philippe's regime. His reward, therefore, took the form of practical banishment. The wily advisers of Louis Philippe used the gloved hand. But the best-laid schemes of mice and courtiers "gang aft agley." Cabet, in Corsica, joined the radical anti-administration forces, and became a thorn in the side of the government. Removed from office, he returned to Paris, whereupon the citizens of Dijon, his native town, elected him as their deputy to the lower ...
— Socialism - A Summary and Interpretation of Socialist Principles • John Spargo
... past four in the afternoon, whilst the passengers were assembled at lunch in the great saloon, a slight shock was felt on the hull of the Scotia, on her quarter, a little aft of the port-paddle. ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne
... as we were led aft, was that the ale was passing freely, and, as I should have thought, too often for good seamanship. That, however, was not my business, if it did seem to explain why Asbiorn separated us. Seven desperate men might do much among a helpless crowd, once ...
— A Sea Queen's Sailing • Charles Whistler
... retrospection, as vividly as painted on a canvas, a phantasmagoric procession of past events, and of those to come in the travail of the Negro; commencing with the sailing of the first "Slaver's Ship" for the shores of the "New World", jammed fore and aft, from deck to hold, with its cargo of human beings, to the conclusion of the great war in which, individually and in units he wrote his name in imperishable characters, and high on the scroll on which are inscribed the story of those, who, in their lives wrought for ...
— History of the American Negro in the Great World War • W. Allison Sweeney
... clear as quick as we could for Bordeaux to take on an excellent freight o' French goods," explained Mrs. Martin eagerly. "I heard that the Queen was goin' to a great review of her army, and would drive out o' her Buckin'ham Palace about ten o'clock in the mornin', and I run aft to Albert, my husband, and brother Horace where they was standin' together by the hatchway, and told 'em they must one of 'em take me. They laughed, I was in such a hurry, and said they could n't go; and I found they meant it and got sort of impatient when I began to talk, and I ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett
... Far aft, under the waving tricolor, stood the woman of our story. Her fingers twined carelessly through the glittering necklace thrust into her hand as Percy Reed clambered into his boat, and her eyes rested sadly on an ungainly transport, already freighting with its cargo ...
— Trifles for the Christmas Holidays • H. S. Armstrong
... gyahd, he cain't go; he willin' sen' de message, but cain't git nobody come nigh enough de place fer to tell 'em what it is. 'Sides, it 'leckshum-day, an' mos' folks hangin' 'roun' de polls. Well ma'am, dis aft'noon, I so'nter'n by, an' de gyahd holler out an' ask me do I want make a dollah, an' I say I do. I ain't 'fraid no smallpox, done had it two year' ago. So I say I take ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington
... light cotillon air warned four hundred holiday-people that the festive dance was about to begin on the wide floor between the engine-room and the saloon. Cotillons are a leading pastime among the people; and as the water was pretty smooth down the bay, and a splendid breeze rushed aft between-decks, many laughing girls and well-dressed matronly women now made their appearance on the floor. Dancing without noise is a luxury as yet uncalled for. Dancers must have music, we know,—and what is music, but wild noise caught and trained? But these cotillons ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various
... aft a few steps, and Bill followed slowly. Then I saw that Jem Dadd was leaning forward clumsily on the wheel, with his hands ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs
... of a smile dawned on Barzil's countenance. "I mind one hanging on our quarter by Formosa," he returned; "I trained a cannon aft and fired a shot, when she sheered off. That was in ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer
... was going on. Ricord's ship lay, idle and deserted, at anchor. Five pirate crafts surrounded Santoval's galley. Two of them were alongside of her; the others were raking her fore and aft with their shot. The young knights left the oars, sprang up to the poop and joined in the shout of encouragement raised by the others, and then, resuming their helmets and armour, stood ready to leap on board an ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty
... and they were scant enough—must surely have been there beforehand, and bidden him both sell it cheaply, so that Elias might get it, and stipulate besides that the boat should not be looked at too closely. In this way it escaped the usual tarring fore and aft. ...
— Weird Tales from Northern Seas • Jonas Lie
... second, fell again, grabbed the next yard, then a rope and so on down, grabbin' and pullin' all the way. First his shoe hit the deck, then his sheath knife, then a piece of rope, and finally himself, landin' right on top of the Irish cook who was goin' aft from ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Arrangements.—The shed is 8 feet long over all, 5 feet 6 inches high in front, 5 feet high at the back, 3 feet deep over all, under the roof, which projects 3 inches fore and aft, and 2 inches at each end. It consists of seven parts: two sides, roof, back, front frame and doors, and ...
— Things To Make • Archibald Williams
... the wind that follows ever aft, They greet not as a stranger on their ways; But this old friend, with whom they drank and laughed, Sits in the stern and talks of other days When they had held high bacchanalias still, Or dreamed among the ...
— Ships in Harbour • David Morton
... boat in this sound; the puffs come so violent that before anybody could take in her sail she would to a certainty be overset; even ships, in my opinion, would do well before they enter this sound to take in all their small sails and keep all hands at the braces fore and aft as well as hands by the top-sail halyards, and it is necessary to handle the yards quick otherwise a large vessel will be sure to rub sides with ye rocks if it has blown fresh outside all day...The kangaroo seems ...
— The Logbooks of the Lady Nelson - With The Journal Of Her First Commander Lieutenant James Grant, R.N • Ida Lee
... India ship, as he informs us in his "Sketch of my Life," belonging to the house of Hibbert, Purrier, and Horton, from which he returned to the Triumph at Chatham, a good practical seaman, but with a horror of the Royal Navy, and a firm belief in a saying then constant with the seamen, "Aft the most honour, forward the better man." The next situation we find him in, will probably shock the delicate feelings of tender mammas, who expect their sons to be admirals without any apprenticeship; for he is rated ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... Drums of the Fore and Aft" came back to him. Often he had quoted it, when some one in the service had suffered through the fault of others. It was the death-cry of the boy officer, Devlin. The knives of the Ghazi had cut him down, but it was his own people's abandoning him in terror that had killed ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis
... down the deck, and standing aft and conversing are two men, one of whom is the captain. The latter manifests no surprise at seeing me, and indicates my presence to his ...
— Facing the Flag • Jules Verne
... taking bearings can be had. The center line of the pelorus should also be directly over the keel line of the ship. The inner edge of the metallic ring is engraved in degrees—the 0 deg. or 360 deg. and the 180 deg. marks indicating a fore-and-aft line parallel to the keel of the ship. Within this ring a ground glass dial is pivoted. This ground glass dial has painted upon it a compass card divided into points and sub-divisions and into 360 deg.. This dial is capable of being moved ...
— Lectures in Navigation • Ernest Gallaudet Draper
... And she went aft in her boat and pushed along our side till she had brought the stern close to Dick's hand. He knelt down in our boat and she in hers, and the usual fumbling took place over hanging the rudder on its hooks; ...
— News from Nowhere - or An Epoch of Rest, being some chapters from A Utopian Romance • William Morris
... returned with the broth; and McClintock strode aft, convinced that he was going to have something far more interesting than ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... sordid and selfish character, and that he had warped further and further out of the straight with time. Not but what he was on his best behaviour with us, as everybody was; for we had no bickering among us, for'ard or aft. I only mean to say, he was not the man one would have chosen for a messmate. If choice there had been, one might even have gone a few points out of one's course, to say, "No! Not him!" But, there was one curious ...
— The Wreck of the Golden Mary • Charles Dickens
... we saw our game standing in for the bay with all the sail she could make, and she came innocently into our very mouths, for we lay still till we saw her almost within gunshot, when, our foremost gears being stretched fore and aft, we first ran up our yards, and then hauled home the topsail sheets, the rope-yarns that furled them giving way of themselves; the sails were set in a few minutes; at the same time slipping our cable, we ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe
... the saucy craft Lay calmed, old JASPER toddled aft. "My mind misgives me, sir, that we Were wrong about that selvagee - I should restore it." "Good," said the Captain, and that day Restored it to the maintop-stay. Well-practised sailors often make A much more serious mistake, ...
— Fifty Bab Ballads • William S. Gilbert
... the vessel was exchanged for a heavy regular wash along its stern quarters; for the bows were so much raised as that I felt a little strain on my knees as I went forward to satisfy my curiosity with a view of the icy mass into which we were penetrated. I waited, indeed, until the crew were come aft again from looking, and my friend crept timidly at my shoulder; but when we reached the stem, there was one of the hands, a little soberer than his fellows, sprawled over the bulwarks, and staring with all his eyes into the green lift of the ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... the cables outside the bow, so that he could find and recover the anchors on his return, then a very small jib was hoisted, and as it filled two blows with an axe severed the cables inboard. The logs attached to them were thrown over, and the skipper ran aft and put up the helm as the boat's head payed off before the wind. As she did so a wave struck her and threw tons of water on board, filling her deck nearly up to the rails. It was well Joe had shouted to the boys to hold on, for had they not done so ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... very early," observed Mr. Whitford, looking in the pilot house from the cabin, just aft of it. "But there is no use waiting around here any more, Tom. They gave us ...
— Tom Swift and his Great Searchlight • Victor Appleton
... appeared in sight, the wharf was black with people. As the steamer drew near and gave forth two raucous blasts, a band on board began to play the National Anthem. When this was ended, the scouts, crowding the bow, gave three cheers and a "tiger." Flags were flying fore and aft, and as the river was like a mirror, the River Queen presented a perfect picture of majestic gracefulness as if proud of the ...
— Rod of the Lone Patrol • H. A. Cody
... think of the early bridges over the Thames as wooden bridges. Aft older generation was accustomed to many that still remained. This was true of the later Middle Ages, and of the torpor and neglect in building which followed the Reformation. But it was not true of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. ...
— The Historic Thames • Hilaire Belloc
... remained awake nearly all the first part of the night from fear that I might not hear when I was called; and when I went on deck, so great were my ideas of the importance of my trust, that I walked regularly fore and aft the whole length of the vessel, looking out over the bows and taffrail at each turn, and was not a little surprised at the coolness of the old seaman whom I called to take my place, in stowing himself snugly away under the long-boat for a nap. That was a sufficient lookout, he thought, ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... a gondola by moonlight; one singer placed himself forwards and the other aft, and thus proceeded to St. Georgio. One began the song: when he had ended his strophe, the other took up the lay, and so continued the song alternately. Throughout the whole of it, the same notes invariably returned; but, according ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... Volunteers. When the guns were shipped to France all the Michigan men available were sent with them and formed the effective nucleus of every crew. They wore the marine uniform with naval insignia and were under naval discipline throughout; they went "fore" and "aft" on the great trains which accompanied each gun, pointed their pieces to "port" and "starboard" and were rated ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw
... "I hope she sticks the pin into your throat. It will take some of the brag out of you. Think because you've got picturesque gray hair and are as strong as a bull, that all the women are just pining for you. Say, let's go aft and hunt up the chap. I understand he's taken up quarters in ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... markers to indicate the positions for each company. At the signal the companies fell in; the regiments in quarter column. The companies then advanced successively, forming in line abreast their ship, between two gangways—one forward and one aft—along each of which was stretched a chain of men, who thus sent on board, one set the rifles, the other the sea kits and valises, which, passing from hand to {p.093} hand, reached certainly and without confusion the spot where their owner knew to seek them. The company then moved ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan
... he waked him, which put him in a main high passion, and he swore woundily at the lieutenant, and called him lousy Scotch son of a whore (for, I being then sentinel in the steerage, heard all), and swab, and lubber, whereby the lieutenant returned the salute, and they jawed together fore and aft a good spell, till at last the captain turned out, and, laying hold of a rattan, came athwart Mr. Bowling's quarter: whereby he told the captain that, if he was not his commander, he would heave him overboard, and demanded satisfaction ashore; whereby in the morning watch, the captain went ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... the while she crooned a broken song of the whaling days, concerning the "rolling Mississippi" and the "Black Ball line." Seventh Man Who Wallows in the Mire himself began to make concentric circles on my breast with his heavy hand, so that I was beset fore and aft by the most tender and friendly advances of the Marquesan race. Never was hapless guest ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... of Miles river for Baltimore early on a Saturday morning. I remember only the day of the week; for, at that time,{107} I had no knowledge of the days of the month, nor, indeed, of the months of the year. On setting sail, I walked aft, and gave to Col. Lloyd's plantation what I hoped would be the last look I should ever give to it, or to any place like it. My strong aversion to the great farm, was not owing to my own personal suffering, but the daily suffering ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... a spade, Captain. You mean he got red-mad and raked them all, fore and aft. They deserved it too—a pack of incapables. But what would you expect of a committee of men? That building committee held twenty-seven meetings, and at the end of the twenty-seventh weren't no nearer having a church than when they begun—not so near, for a fact, for in one fit of hurrying ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... and Fit Princess Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen-Auspach's Merthyr-Tydfilshire Own Royal Loyal Light Infantry, Regimental District 329A,' but the Army through all its barracks and canteens knows them now as the 'Fore and Aft.' They may in time do something that shall make their new title honourable, but at present they are bitterly ashamed, and the man who calls them 'Fore and Aft' does so at the risk of the head which is on ...
— Soldier Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... a routine by bugle-call on troopships, with a guard, police, and fatigues. The Tommies sleep on bales of forage in the after well-deck and all over the place. We have one end of the 1st class cabin forrard, and the officers have the 2nd class aft for sleeping and meals, but there is a sociable blend on deck all day. Two medical officers here were both in South Africa at No. 7 when I was (Captains in those days), and we have had great cracks on old times and all the ...
— Diary of a Nursing Sister on the Western Front, 1914-1915 • Anonymous
... I have the aft'noon off three weeks frum Wednesday?" Then, noticing an undecided look in her mistress's face, she added hastily—"I want to go to my ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... had got down to the sea shore we drew our ship into the water and got her mast and sails into her; we also put the sheep on board and took our places, weeping and in great distress of mind. Circe, that great and cunning goddess, sent us a fair wind that blew dead aft and staid steadily with us keeping our sails all the time well filled; so we did whatever wanted doing to the ship's gear and let her go as the wind and helmsman headed her. All day long her sails ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... in the bows was truly Nance, and she was standing and waving and calling to him. And the grey-headed man aft was surely Philip Guille, the Senechal, and the faces of the rest were ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... persons—thought it was a shame to let themselves be thus left astern by everybody. They had, indeed, no special advantage or profit to expect from the voyage, but at last the inaction became intolerable, and they conceived the daring resolve of sending a youth aft to beg the captain to fix a ...
— Norse Tales and Sketches • Alexander Lange Kielland
... than the life of, a photograph. Such, we presume, is the soldier, and such are his experiences and temptations and repentance. But nobody ever dreamed of telling us all this, till Mr. Kipling came. As for the soldier in action, the "Taking of Lungtung Pen," and the "Drums of the Fore and Aft," and that other tale of the battle with the Pathans in the gorge, are among the good fights of fiction. They stir the spirit, and they should be distributed (in addition, of course, to the "Soldier's Pocket Book") in the ranks of the British army. Mr. Kipling ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang
... a pannikin from the cask, with which they regaled themselves, while Newton stood at the helm. In half an hour Newton called the boy aft to steer the vessel, and lifted the trunk into the cabin below, where he found that Thompson had finished the major part of the contents of the mug, and was lying in a state ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... Delia had the sense to put a finger to her lip. The man wheel'd round without another word, led us aft over the blocks, cordage, and all manner of loose gear that encumber'd the deck, to a ladder that, toward the stern, led down into darkness. Here he sign'd to us to follow; and, descending first, threw open a door, letting out a faint stream of light in our faces. 'Twas the ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch
... running high, now swept over the deck. Brigond started aft, but Gaspard sprang before him. "Stand back!" he called. "Where ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... this news, Snowball at first hardly knew how to make use of it for the benefit of those the mutineers intended to abandon; for, the men were all hanging about the galley, where he pretended to be asleep, and if he attempted to go aft then, where nothing was stirring and when no one called him there, it would have at once aroused their suspicions and, probably, ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... what's the good of all this jaw? Get out of my Way, master Harlequin, and go aft: noble Captain, shall us lay 'em aboard?" So saying he turned his eye upon a young man near the hearse who had been pointed out to Bertram as young le Harnois and chief mourner. His hat was slouched over his eyes, and ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... shining metal; a V-pointed pilot-house—the same where the still figure had dropped over the sill of the open window—a high-raised rudder of artful curve, vast as the broadside of a barn; railed galleries running along the underbody of the fuselage, between the floats and far aft of them. ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... aft to a ribbon of freshly developed film hanging from the boom to dry and, as I gingerly raised it to the light, he ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... the foam from her bows; the spray breaking aft as far as the gangway. She was going at a prodigious rate. Still, everything held. Preventer braces were reeved and hauled taut; tackles got upon the backstays; and everything done to keep all snug ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... progress down the bay, honoured as no visiting sovereign had ever been. The great white man-of-war dressed ship as she passed, and the ensign at her fighting-top dipped and rose again. At once there was a movement aboard the little outbound ship; one of her crew ran aft and hauled sharply at the halyards, and then at her peak there was broken out not the brilliant tri-coloured banner, gay and brave and clean, but a little length of bunting, tattered and soiled, a faded breadth of stars ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris
... fair representation, I suspect, of what a ship was in those early days. She probably had another mast aft, and some more head sail of a square shape. What are called fore and aft sails were not generally used till comparatively modern times. She looks as if she really was fitted to cross the channel, to carry a number of men, and even to contend with heavy seas. The tall masts, ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston
... set sail, being now among the Celebes, where they found the water shoal and coasting very dangerous. The wind, too, was high and contrary, and their difficulties greater than anything they had found. On January the 9th the wind, however, came aft, and they appeared to have found a passage out of these dangers, sailing then ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... muttered Louis, lying heavily on her arm. "Aft' my blasted papers. Blast' German—even if you ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... more serious aft, where the doctor and first lieutenant were dining with the captain. It ended by the latter saying, "Well, Doctor, if what your friend Hassan said be true, we are likely enough to have our hands pretty full, and shall have to watch this fellow Sehi as sharply as ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... J. J., and haul her aft till you get a hold of the buoy. If we drift past we'll never get back again. There's barely steerage way on the ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... minute when in stepped a jaunty little man, certainly not more than five feet high, about three or four and twenty years of age, dressed with great care, with his trousers sticking to his legs, with a French chimney-pot hat on his head, very much peaked fore and aft and closely turned up at the sides. He had a bright-coloured silk handkerchief round his neck, and a white shirt, of which the collar and wristbands were rather larger and longer than suited the small dimensions of the man. He wore a white greatcoat tight buttoned round his waist, but so arranged ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... beach and there lay the Kawa as handy as you please. She had been considerably tidied up since our departure. Our blanket-sail had been stowed and between the dingey-oars, which were rigged fore-and-aft, stretched a rope of eva-eva from which, to our surprise, hung an undershirt and a dainty feminine rigolo. But no sign of William Henry Thomas. In vain we shouted, "Kawa ahoy!" and hurled lumps of ...
— The Cruise of the Kawa • Walter E. Traprock
... spreads along beneath the yard; To each yard-arm the head-rope they extend, And soon their ear-rings and their robans bend. That task perform'd, they first the braces slack, Then to the chess-tree drag the unwilling tack; And, while the lee clue-garnet's lower'd away, Taught aft the sheet they tally, ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... at the end of the deck. There was no stern cabin, then, to receive the passengers. She was obliged to be contented with Captain Hull's cabin, situated aft, which constituted his modest sea lodging. And still it had been necessary for the captain to insist, in order to make her accept it. There, in that narrow lodging, was installed Mrs. Weldon, with her child and old Nan. She took her meals there, ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... crater seemed to burst upward, reaching out angry fingers of shattered rock as they ripped by, rocking and bucking with the blasts. Tulan's viewer swivelled aft to hold the scene. Secondary blasts went off like strings of giant firecrackers. Great black-and-orange fungi-like clouds swirled upward, dissipating fast in the thin atmosphere. Then Tulan spotted what he was looking for: three small ships flashing ...
— Tulan • Carroll Mather Capps
... forgotten, seemed everywhere at once; he had even time to shout a word of encouragement to her, and she longed mightily to do something to help. Looking around, she saw her chance. The steersman's long sweep lay along the deck; running it aft through its ring in the sternpost, and pushing with all her strength against the stones astern, she added her mite to keep the boat headed off. Garth observing, shouted his approval; and Natalie's heart waxed ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... also, and the recoil in a nature so intense as his was sudden and violent. He who could not be a poet if he would, angrily resolved that he would not if he could. Full-sail verse was beyond his skill, but he could manage the simpler fore-and-aft rig of Butler's octosyllabics. As Cowleyism was a trick of seeing everything as it was not, and calling everything something else than it was, he would see things as they were—or as, in his sullen disgust, they seemed to be—and call them all by their right names with ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... full many a draught Of Phlegethon's black flood; By cupping, leeches, doctor's craft, And venesection, fore and aft, They took from him much blood. Full many a clyster was applied, And purging, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... instead of flying into a rage, smiled, and thrusting his hand into the voluminous shawl that encircled his waist, turned on his heel and walked aft, while ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... weather; in a cold climate probably the reverse would be the case. We were able to secure a thorough draught of air forward through the alleyway leading to the forecastle; it was difficult to get a good circulation aft, where they also had the warm proximity of the engine. The engineers, of course, had the hottest place, but the ever-inventive Sundbeck devised a means of improving the ventilation of the engine-room, so that even there they were not so badly off ...
— The South Pole, Volumes 1 and 2 • Roald Amundsen
... hae ye travell'd this road, Willie, Aft hae ye travell'd in sin; Ye ne'er said sae muckle for your saul As, ...
— Ballads of Mystery and Miracle and Fyttes of Mirth - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - Second Series • Frank Sidgwick
... Eric went aft to the helm and seized it. Now but a length ahead Ospakar's ship laboured on beneath her small sail, but the Gudruda rushed towards her with all canvas set and at every leap plunged her golden dragon beneath the surf and shook the water ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... gaed ower yon dowie knowe, As aft he'd dune before, O; Nine arm-ed men lay in a den, Upo' the ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various
... back again, and sought to tear apart her mighty timbers. Groaningly, agonizingly, pluckily, the Columbia bore all—and revenged herself on her passengers. She stood on her head, and sent them, so to speak, into her prow. She rose up on her stern, and scattered them aft. She stood still and shuddered. She lay down on her left side until she had imperilled the heart action of every person on board; she rolled over on her right side and started briskly toward the bottom of the sea. She recovered herself, leaped up and down a few times ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... within any distance to do execution. However we attempted both, especially the latter. While we were engaged with her, the breechings of all our lower-deck guns broke, and the guns flew fore and aft, which obliged us to shoot ahead, for our upper guns could not reach her." The breaking of the breechings—the heavy ropes which take the strain of the guns' recoil—was doubtless accelerated by the undue elevation necessitated by the extreme range. The collision with the Eagle was one ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... shoved into deepsleep. For aberration redrew the sky, crowding stars toward the bows, so that the ships plunged toward a cloud of Doppler hell-blue. The constellations lay thinly abeam, you looked out upon the dark. Aft, Sol was still the brightest object in heaven, but it had gained a sullen red tinge, as if already grown old, as if the prodigal would return from far places to find his home buried ...
— The Burning Bridge • Poul William Anderson
... over the wet decks to the nearest rail. He was very unhappy; but he saw the deck-steward lashing chairs together, and, since he had boasted before the man that he was never seasick, his pride made him go aft to the second-saloon deck at the stern, which was finished in a turtle-back. The deck was deserted, and he crawled to the extreme end of it, near the flag-pole. There he doubled up in limp agony, ...
— "Captains Courageous" • Rudyard Kipling
... such thing, then. I had her before matrimony, and I will have her after it. No, Tom, I am not ungrateful; fore or aft, she shall be retained. She shall never say that I acted unhandsomely by her, especially as she has become a good girl and repented. I know I did her injustice about the player-man. On that point she has thoroughly satisfied ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... passage till we were near the mouth of the Mississippi River, when, in the absence of a pilot boat or tug, our Captain thought he would try to get in alone, and as a consequence we were soon fast in the mud. The Captain now made all the passengers go aft, and worked the engine hard but could not move her at all. The tide was now low, and there was a prospect that we should have to wait full six hours to get away. We worked on, however, and after a few hours ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly
... to do he added; "My God! See the distance we must go." We had already on two or three occasions encountered sufficiently rough seas to give me great confidence in the seaworthiness of my canoe, which, though I had ribbed and decked fore and aft, every Indian who saw it thought unfit for the expedition, being, they said, too small, weak and cranky. I wished they could have seen her ride the great seas which come rolling in like mountains, before we reached land again. Ben Melin, a sailor ...
— Official report of the exploration of the Queen Charlotte Islands - for the government of British Columbia • Newton H. Chittenden
... "Aft I have ridden thro' Stirling town, In the wind but and the weet; But I ne'er rade thro' Stirling town ...
— The Book of Old English Ballads • George Wharton Edwards
... Walking aft, I seated myself among some bales and contemplated the town's frontage. Over one end of it rose, tapering like a walking-stick, a factory chimney, while at the other end, as well as in the middle, rose belfries, one of which had a gilded steeple, and the other one a ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... makes he with a lilac dove This Corsair desperate and daft? Behold the conning tower above The big stern chasers pointing aft! This is not he that saved mankind With pards and pigs from tempests blind, But rather he that forged a flood, And not of water but of blood, And filled with worse than wolves his ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 16, 1914 • Various
... So maritime, You'd never suppose the fact is, That with the Fleet In Regent Street, I'd precious little naval practice! There was saucy craft, Rigged fore an' aft, Inside o' Mr. CRE-MER'S. From Noah's Arks to Clipper-built ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 98, May 24, 1890 • Various
... the article a slap with his larboard-flipper, as sent it flying to leeward like a puff of smoke. "Keep off the quarter-deck, you lubber," says he, giving him a wheel down into the lee-scuppers—"it's well the captain didn't catch ye!" "Come aft here, some of ye," sings out the third mate again, "to brace up the main yard; and you, ye lazy beggar, clap on this moment and pull!" At this the greenhorn takes out a pair o' gloves, shoves his fingers ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, August 1850 - of Literature, Science and Art. • Various
... reported a small vessel three points on the starboard bow. In a few more minutes the "wolves" announced themselves by a few small shot rattled against the smoke stack. Orders were given to the second officer to go aft with a hatchet, and when the signal was given he had to snap the tow-rope of the last felucca. All hands were ordered to lie low—i.e., lie under shelter of the bulwarks. The captain and chief ...
— Looking Seaward Again • Walter Runciman
... We had strolled aft, and now stopped to watch a tall Jamaica negro—or so we thought him to be—asking Gates for a place in the crew. His clothing was too scant to hide the great muscles beneath, and ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... sea; now she sunk into the yawning trough below; and ever and anon as she dashed onward in spite of all opposition, a mass of water would strike her bows with a clap like that of thunder, and rising over her bulwarks, would deluge her deck fore and aft, and appear as if about to overwhelm her altogether. A portion of the officers and crew stood at their posts on deck, now and then shaking the water from their hats and coats, after they had been covered with a thicker shower than usual of rain or spray, or looking up aloft at ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston
... taught-rigged hermaphrodite, or brig forward and schooner aft. Her foremast and bowsprit were immensely strong and heavy, and her mainmast was so long and tapering, that the wonder was how the few shrouds and stays about it could support it; it was the handsomest stick we had ever seen. ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various
... two intruders stood breathlessly in the shadow of the awning, and waited and listened. They could hear a drone of voices forward. The monotonous sound kept going without a break, which seemed to prove that the slight noise aft had ...
— Owen Clancy's Happy Trail - or, The Motor Wizard in California • Burt L. Standish
... the ballast overboard, And stow the eatables in the aft locker.' 'Would not this keg be best a little lowered?' 75 'No, now all's right.' 'Those bottles of warm tea— (Give me some straw)—must be stowed tenderly; Such as we used, in summer after six, To cram in greatcoat pockets, and to mix Hard eggs and radishes and rolls ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... and the remarks of those who insisted on going all over the ship need not be here set down. However, the blubber tanks were withdrawn, the hold spaces got the thorough cleansing and whitewashing that they so badly needed. The bilges were washed out, the ship disinfected fore and aft, and a gang of men employed for some time to sweeten her up. Then came the fitting out, which was much ...
— South with Scott • Edward R. G. R. Evans
... is the largest of the gunboats (of which there are four) belonging to the Sarawak Government. She is about 200 tons, schooner rigged, and carries two 32-pounders, fore and aft. Her accommodation, state rooms and saloon, are forward, a good plan in the tropics, as the smell of steam and hot oil from the engine-room are thus avoided, and it is also cooler than aft when the vessel is under weigh. The quarters ...
— On the Equator • Harry de Windt
... their cargoes. They belonged to many owners, but their type was well nigh uniform. Each measured seventy feet in length, or a trifle over, with a beam of about seven; each was built with rounded bilges, and would carry from twenty-five to thirty tons of cargo; each provided, aft of its hold or cargo-well, a small cabin for the accommodation of its crew by day; and for five-sixths of its length each was black as a gondola of Venice. Only, where the business part of the boat ended and its cabin began, a painted ribbon of curious pattern ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... turning at once—for the cinder-sifter had given him a bright idea; and he went right aft to his comrades. By this time the Frenchmen were busy getting ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... a light breeze, however, the sail was hoisted, rather because it gave them steerage way than for any increase to their speed. As soon as the canoe shot out into the rougher water in the full force of the stream, Godfrey was still more delighted with the boat, the empty compartments fore and aft rendering her exceedingly buoyant. She had been built with somewhat higher sides than the canoes Godfrey had seen at home, and rose a good deal towards the ends; and she floated as lightly as a cork on the surface of the water. That afternoon ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... himself, to take service with him for that or any other quest. So they ballasted their ships with great pebbles, stowed under the thwarts, to be used as ammunition in case of boarding; and over them the barrels of ale and pork and meal, well covered with tarpaulins. They stowed in the cabins, fore and aft, their weapons,—swords, spears, axes, bows, chests of arrow-heads, leather bags of bowstrings, mail-shirts, and helmets, and fine clothes for holidays and fighting days. They hung their shields, after the old fashion, out-board along the gunwale, ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... twinkled for leagues under the faint northerly breeze, dazzling Myra's eyes. Tom Trevarthen grinned as he tugged at an enormous sweep with two other men, Methodists both, and sang with them and with Billy Daddo, who steered with another sweep, rigged aft upon a crutch— ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... in which you are the only waking soul. On a sudden eight bells rings out sharply from the forecastle head, and you spring back from your world of fancy as hurriedly as Cinderella returned to her rags when long-shore midnight chimed. The officer of the middle watch and a hand for the wheel come aft to relieve their companions, the illusion has passed, and you go below to turn in, feeling uncomfortably sure that your pretty thoughts will appear foolish and commonplace enough when regarded in the matter-of-fact light of the ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... hammocks and pass them upon the upper deck to be stowed away until night came round again, in order to make more room below. Several guards with loaded muskets and fixed bayonets constantly paced the upper deck; and aft, on the quarter-deck, were two carronades loaded to the muzzle and pointed forward. Two or three of the prisoners were permitted to come on deck at a time; but at night none were allowed on deck for any purpose whatever; the entrance being secured by strong gratings, and sentries stationed ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various
... was made when two Frenchmen were asleep in the cabin. 'I went softly aft into the cabin, and put my back against the bulkhead, and took the iron crow and held it with both my hands in the middle of it, and put my legs to shorten myself, because the cabin was very low. But he that being nighest to me, hearing me, opened his eyes, and perceiving my intent and upon what ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... to the fore and thought that their last hour was come. Fortunately the bear could make no further advance, because the noose that was thrown round his neck had fastened in the rudder. A sailor taking courage, now went aft and killed the bear with the stroke of an axe. The skin was sent to Amsterdam. On account of this occurrence the place ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... extend from the upper deck of the ship to her keel, and slope aft to facilitate release. Having completed with fuel at Bruges, we took in a store of provisions and Alten went up to the Commodore's office to get ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... twelve or fifteen miles a day is doing well—very well. From a slight eminence at one side of the way we may stand and see the slowly creeping line of wagons and stock, for many miles fore and aft, as they bend their way in and out, around and over the surface of knolls and flats, hillocks and gullies. From a distant view they seem not to be ...
— Crossing the Plains, Days of '57 - A Narrative of Early Emigrant Tavel to California by the Ox-team Method • William Audley Maxwell
... Pasquale Gallino licked the Semitic stuffings out of a fellow-pupil of his—by name Hyman Ginsburg. To be explicit about it, he made the Ginsburg boy's somewhat prominent nose to bleed extensively and swelled up Hyman's ear until for days thereafter Hyman's head, viewed fore or aft, had rather a lop-sided appearance, what with one ear being so much thicker than its mate. The object of this mishandlement was as good as whipped before he started by reason of the longer reach and quicker fist play of his squat and swarthy opponent. ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... on the oars and let the boat drift. It grew darker. Fragmentary thoughts drifted through his brain: a rudderless ship on the buffeting waves, an emperor in defeat, King Lear, thoughts and thoughts. He went aft and began to write on the back of some envelopes, verse upon verse. Thank God, nothing could rob him of his talent! And this thought sent a thrill of warm happiness coursing through ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... started hastily back. Just as she had fairly started in the reverse course an 8-inch shell from the Olympia struck her fairly in the stern and drove inward through every obstruction, wrecking the aft-boiler and blowing up the deck in its explosion. It was a fatal shot. Clouds of white smoke were soon followed by the red glare of flames. For half an hour longer the crew continued to work their guns. At the end of that time the fire was ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... was required of them, the girls moved aft, and perched on the flat, broad deck, while Betty went to start the motor and slip in the ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Florida - Or, Wintering in the Sunny South • Laura Lee Hope
... once a year. However, I can lend you books, and if you really want to pick up all the words of command you can study them when you have nothing else to do; and I can tell you there are plenty of times when one is rather glad to have something to amuse one; when one is running with a light wind aft, like this, for instance, we may go on for days without having to touch a sail. Well, we will begin at once. We won't go aloft till you have got your togs; a fellow going aloft in landsmen's clothes always looks rather a duffer. Now, let us see what you ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... of atmosphere, the sun had gone to rest. The first shadows of dusk were closing in, betokened by a thickening of the smoke-fog into which the Waterbug slowly plowed. To port a dimming shore line; to starboard, aft, and dead ahead, water and air merged in two boat lengths. Barlow leaned through the pilot-house window, one hand on the wheel, straining his eyes on their course. Suddenly he threw out the clutch, shut down his throttle control with one hand, and yanked with the other at the cord which loosed ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... through the cabin on the way to his stateroom and office. He gave Phil a significant glance, to which the Circus Boy did not respond. A few minutes later, however, Phil strolled out to the deck. Reaching it he turned quickly and hurried aft, entering the passageway there and going ...
— The Circus Boys On the Mississippi • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... war mare mast chart damp warp share cask lard hand warm spare mask arm land ward snare past yard sand warn game scar lake waft fray lame spar dale raft play name star gale chaff gray fame garb cape aft stay tame barb ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey
... side; and off that fatal ledge the boarders, thrust on by those behind, fell headlong between the beams to the maindeck below to be slaughtered helpless in that pit of destruction, by the double fire from the bulkheads fore and aft; while the few who kept their footing on the gangway, after vain attempts to force the stockades on poop and forecastle, leaped overboard again amid a shower of shot and arrows. The fire of the English was as steady as it was ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... I was standing aft, near a patriotic American and a wandering Irishman, and the patriotic American rashly declared that you couldn't see a sunrise like that anywhere in Europe, and this gave the Irishman his chance, and he said, 'Sure ye don't have 'em ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Mystic-Humorous Stories • Various
... is deepest hate and wrath, but they pay no heed to it. And even as their hands leave the gunwale, the girl goes to the mast, and with the skill and ease of long custom hoists the sail, and so making fast the halliard deftly, comes aft again to ship the steering oar, and seat herself as the breeze wakes the ripples at the bow and the land slips away from her. She has gone, and never ...
— A King's Comrade - A Story of Old Hereford • Charles Whistler
... now bore Bremilu, the strong, and Zangamon, most expert of all the fishermen. Slung in the baggage-crate aft lay a large seine, certain supplies of fish, weed and eggs, and—from time to time noisily squawking—some half-dozen of the strange sea-birds, in a ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... a good-sized boarded barn, well shingled on the roof, with hay-mows, and with room for two or three cows and a horse and a wagon, and with wide doors "fore and aft," as the neighbors put it; through its big front door you could look out to sea. Then there were twenty acres of land, including a wood-lot which could be thinned out every year to give one all his fire-wood, and what was cut would hardly ...
— Five Hundred Dollars - First published in the "Century Magazine" • Heman White Chaplin
... R." And yet during the voyage he worried more about his "trunk," and gave himself more airs about it, than all the rest of the passengers put together. If the ship was "down by the head," and would not steer, he would go and move his "trunk" further aft, and then watch the effect. If the ship was "by the stern," he would suggest to Columbus to detail some men to "shift that baggage." In storms he had to be gagged, because his wailings about his "trunk" made it impossible ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... stage under the ship's stern. The captain, who had just got into the boat alongside, for the purpose of going ashore, ordered the boy to let go the painter (the rope which makes fast the boat); the boy instantly went aft, and let go the rope by which the painter's stage was held. The captain, surprised at the boy's delay, cried out, "Heigh-ho, there, you lazy lubber, why don't you let go the painter?" The boy replied, "He's gone, sir, ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various
... the fright, an' as thin as a greyhound with the runnin' by the marnin; he'd addle the eggs so the cocks an' hens wouldn't know what they wis afther wid the chickens comin' out wid two heads on them, an' twinty-seven legs fore and aft. And you'd start to chase him, an' then it'd be main-sail haul, and away he'd go, you behint him, till you'd landed tail over snout in a ditch, an' he'd be ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... swinging round, swept away down the river at the modest rate of fourteen knots, that being her most economical speed, and the pace at which, in order to make her coal last out, it had been decided that she should cross the Atlantic. She sat very deep in the water, and her decks, fore and aft, were packed with coal, in sacks so closely stowed that there was only a narrow gangway left between them from the foot of the ladder abaft the deck-house to the companion, and a similar gangway from the fore ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... to hold the long tow-ropes. But tow-ropes were for the endless up-river journey, when a numerous crew strained day after day along the bank, chanting the voyageurs' songs. Now we were light-manned, two half-breeds and two Canadians to handle the oars in time of peril, and Captain Xavier, who stood aft on the cabin roof, leaning against the heavy beam of the long, curved tiller, watching hawklike for snag and eddy and bar. Within the cabin was a great fireplace of stones, where our cooking was done, and bunks set round for the men in cold weather and rainy. But in these ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... of defensive methods by such vessels. The Italians, in particular, displayed a resolute spirit. Diplomatic hints had no weight at Rome and one after another the Italian liners came into New York with trim three-inch pieces fore and aft. They had a most suggestive look and were manned by crews trained in the navy. Not since the days of open piracy had armed merchant ships been seen in American waters. Their presence recalled the time when every ship that sailed was prepared ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... lunch-time, and then enjoyed hugely the novelty of the first meal on shipboard. After this, the young people went aft to look down upon the steerage passengers, and forward to the bow of the noble ship, while Mrs. Douglas took her ...
— Barbara's Heritage - Young Americans Among the Old Italian Masters • Deristhe L. Hoyt
... broken when the 'watch' of the ship Vulcan, lying becalmed off the —— coast, was roused by a peculiar noise aft. Going to the spot he was surprised to find a much-bedraggled monkey rubbing itself on a pile of sail-cloth. The creature had evidently swum or drifted a long distance, and was now endeavouring to restore circulation. Jerry, being a humane man, got it some biscuit, and a saucer of grog, and waited ...
— The Monkey That Would Not Kill • Henry Drummond
... of the center boards, or other equivalent devices for the same specific purpose, in the extreme bow and stern of vessels, that is to say, the placing of the said boards forward of the foremast or aft of the mainmast, in two masted vessels, and forward of the foremast and aft of the mizzen mast in three masted vessels, substantially as shown and described, and for ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various
... Sangree came aft with a sudden rush, his face aflame, but whether with wind or sun, or with what he had heard, I cannot say. In my surprise I let the tiller slip and the cutter gave a great plunge as she came sharply into the wind and flung us all together in ...
— Three More John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... meantime the canoe had swung with great vigour and struck the big rock sideways, smashing her side and filling at once with water. All the baggage was swamped; only a portion of the canoe aft remained above the water, many of our ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... sing your praise of the bounding craft; And the merry sloops afloat, But for easy space, both fore and aft, ...
— Shawn of Skarrow • James Tandy Ellis |
