"Surf" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... which might be derived from a faithful study of the history of this strange and mighty city; a history which, in spite of the labor of countless chroniclers, remains in vague and disputable outline—barred with brightness and shade, like the far-away edge of her own ocean, where the surf and the sand-banks are ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various
... we helped each other toward the end," Graham replied. "We were both out of our heads for short spells and long spells. Sometimes it was one, sometimes the other, that was all in. We made the land at sunset—that is, a wall of iron coast, with the surf bursting sky-high. She took hold of me and clawed me in the water to get some sense in me. You see, I wanted to go in, which ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... was calm as glass, the sky cloudless azure; and the doubt was not whether we should be able to get on board through the surf, but whether, having got on board, we should not lie till ...
— Prose Idylls • Charles Kingsley
... May 12 was not managed according to Shirley's written instructions; nor was the siege. Shirley had been playing a little war game in his study, with all the inconvenient obstacles left out—the wind, the weather, the crashing surf in Gabarus Bay, the rocks and bogs of the surrounding country, the difficulties of entering a narrow-necked harbour under a combination of end-on and broadside fire, the terrible lee shore off the islands, reefs, and Lighthouse Point, the commonest vigilance of the most slovenly garrison, and ...
— The Great Fortress - A Chronicle of Louisbourg 1720-1760 • William Wood
... tobacco. Several hogsheads, which were saved from the wreck were brought round to Stillwill's landing upon Great Egg harbor; and amongst them some which had lost the headings of the cask, and the hoops and staves, were so much shattered by the beating of the surf, that it was not thought worth while to land them, and they were just tumbled out of the lighter upon the beach, and left to remain where the tide constantly flowed over them for several weeks, so that the outside was completely rotten, and they ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... of the ocean bearing him on, that even to draw his breath or turn his head was as impracticable as if he had been struggling in the surf at the South Sea, until he was landed in the outer courtyard of the Bastille. There, against an angle of a wall, he made a struggle to look about him. Jacques Three was nearly at his side; Madame Defarge, still heading some of her women, was visible in the inner distance, ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... undermine it, sweep away the pieces which tumble down, leaving the gold on the beach. The gold is in very fine particles, and it moves with the heavier sand, which alters its position frequently under the influence of the waves and surf. One day, the beach will have six feet depth of sand; the next, there will be nothing save bare rocks. The sand differs greatly in richness at various times: one day, it will be full of golden specks; a few days later, at the same place it will be barren. The ...
— Hittel on Gold Mines and Mining • John S. Hittell
... hastily, "tells me there is a most amusing place a few miles down the coast, Las Bocas, a sort of Coney Island, where the government people go for the summer. There's surf bathing and roulette and cafes chantants. He says there's ...
— My Buried Treasure • Richard Harding Davis
... master reached a point opposite the imperilled swimmers, he was obliged to wait a little for the life-line, but as soon as it reached him he tied one end of it around his waist and plunged into the surf. The men who had brought the line did not uncoil it nor even take it out of the box, and very soon it was seen that the bathing-master was not only making his way bravely through the breakers, but was towing after him the coil of rope, ...
— The Girl at Cobhurst • Frank Richard Stockton
... surf in the early morning that the officers and soldiers going ashore had to be carried from the rowboats to the beach on the backs of natives, but it fortunately calmed down enough before we women went over in the afternoon to allow of our entering ...
— A Woman's Journey through the Philippines - On a Cable Ship that Linked Together the Strange Lands Seen En Route • Florence Kimball Russel
... laugh loud in the surf over yonder. If one should dive deep, And rise not—no more need he suffer or ponder O'er losses, or weep, But sink low and sleep While ...
— Yesterdays • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... I was mistaken then," Steve explained, "but I could have sworn I heard surf." He leaned over the chart. "This doesn't show anything, though, nearer than the land. Toot ...
— The Adventure Club Afloat • Ralph Henry Barbour
... on shore, and, by ascending a hill, discover a place to lay the boat in. This I agreed to; and the quarter-master immediately threw off his clothes. I made a lead-line fast to him under his arms, that we might pull him in if we found him exhausted. He went over the surf with great ease, until he came to the breakers on the beach, through which he could not force his way; for the moment he touched the ground with his foot, the recoil of the sea, and what is called by sailors ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... strip of sandy beach, dazzlingly white in the blazing sunlight; heard the deep hoarse roar of the breakers, and saw the flashing of the snow-white foam as the rollers swept grandly on and dashed themselves into surf and diamond spray upon the strand. Then I saw the natives launching their light canoes and paddling off through the surf to the ship; or leapt eagerly into the boat alongside; reached the strip of dazzling beach—strewn now with beautiful shells; plunged into the grateful shade of ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... five minutes walk of the Pacific Ocean. I was born at Digby, Nova Scotia, and the first music I ever heard was the surf of the Bay of Fundy, and when I close my eyes forever I hope the surf of the Pacific will be the last sound ...
— Vanished Arizona - Recollections of the Army Life by a New England Woman • Martha Summerhayes
... the vessel. The time is, however, very much beguiled during this last day's sail by the sight of the land and the various objects which it presents to view—the green slopes, the castle-covered hills, the cliffs, the lines of beach, with surf and breakers rolling in upon them; and sometimes, when the ship approaches nearer to the shore than usual, the pretty little cottages, covered with thatch, and adorned ...
— Rollo on the Atlantic • Jacob Abbott
... there were, when Angel as Captain, I as mate, with The Seraph for a cabin boy, fought the bloody pirate gangs on those surf-washed shores, and gained the fight, though ...
— Explorers of the Dawn • Mazo de la Roche
... blowing the nose violently when there is secretion or fluid in the back of the nose, or the employment of the post-nasal syringe are one and all attended with this danger. Swimming on the back, diving, or surf bathing also endangers the ear, as cold water is forcibly driven not only into the external auditory canal, but, what is more frequently a source of damage, into the Eustachian tubes through the medium of the nose or throat. In this case ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume II (of VI) • Various
... fitful gusts between A sound came from the land: It was the sound of the trampling surf On the rocks ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... who sat down on a boulder with the water dripping from her skirt, looked ruefully at him and the dinghy, which was rolling over in the surf. ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss
... tide runs strongest, the cliff rises steep, Where the wild waters eddy, I've rock'd him to sleep: His sleep is so sound that the rush of the stream, When the winds are abroad, cannot waken his dream. And see you that rock, with its surf-beaten side, There the blood of my false love runs red with the tide; The sea-mew screams shrilly, the white breakers rave— In the foam of the billow I'll ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... fixed on a strip of waning light above the chimneys. From somewhere in the city came sounds like the distant beating of drums, and beyond, far beyond, a vague muttering, now growing, swelling, rumbling in the distance like the pounding of surf upon the rocks, now like the surf again, receding, growling, menacing. The cold had become intense, a bitter piercing cold which strained and snapped at joist and beam and turned the slush of yesterday to flint. From the street below every sound broke sharp and metallic—the ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... supplied the money both to carry on the traite and to put it down. Three miles south of the Gallinas the Sulayma River flows in. Here the scenery suggests a child's first attempt at colouring in horizontal lines; a dangerous surf ever foams white upon the yellow shore, bearing an eternal growth of green. Two holes in the bush and a few thatched roofs, separated by a few miles, showed the Harris factories, which caused frequent ...
— To The Gold Coast for Gold, Vol. II - A Personal Narrative • Richard Francis Burton and Verney Lovett Cameron
... supper. They would make a picnic cruise of the adventure. Handily Joe reeved a purchase and they hauled away until their raft slid off the sloping deck to leeward. With a gay hurrah to Captain Wellsby, they paddled around the stern of the ship and through the ruffle of surf that ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... he lay in the bow to her stern her decks were packed with men. She was steaming swiftly down a broad river. On either side the gray light that comes before the dawn showed low banks studded with stunted palmettos. Close ahead David heard the roar of the surf. ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... it yesterday 30 We heard the sweet bells over the bay? In the caverns where we lay, Through the surf and through the swell, The far-off sound of a silver bell? Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep, 35 Where the winds are all asleep; Where the spent lights quiver and gleam, Where the salt weed sways in the stream, Where the sea-beasts, ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold
... nothing but the presence of mind which was shown by Captain Savage could have saved the ship and her crew. We had chased a convoy of vessels to the bottom of the bay: the wind was very fresh when we hauled off, after running them on shore; and the surf on the beach even at that time was so great, that they were certain to go to pieces before they could be got afloat again. We were obliged to double-reef the topsails as soon as we hauled to the wind, and the weather looked very threatening. In an hour afterwards, ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... Earn—sixteen miles away. Further off, and only to be seen on rare days, when the sun's rays are dancing to be dry after rain, are sturdy, broad-shouldered Benmore, and slender, graceful Binnein, the twin guardians of the enchanted region beyond, where Beauty lies in the lap of Terror, and the Atlantic surf sings lullaby. There are the Monzievaird hills to the right, rising in Benchonzie to the height of 3048 feet, and to something under this figure in the Cairngorm or Blue Craig, upon which you see the stone-heap of Cainnechin—memorial, ...
— Chronicles of Strathearn • Various
... coast has heavy surf and no natural harbors; during the rainy season torrential flooding ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... she, her looks to all made known Her love for Timmaraj, the author brave Of all his country's good. Yet still she kept A seal upon her lips, until by chance An incident occurred which sealed her fate. As on the sand near by the water's edge One thoughtless stands to watch with eager eyes The surf that beats continuous on the shore, And suddenly when least expected flows A wave that reaches far beyond the rest, So stood the king and queen of Vijiapore In parents' place, tempting their daughter fair To marry whom she loved not, could not love, When Chandra ...
— Tales of Ind - And Other Poems • T. Ramakrishna
... serious business which had brought us to Crescent Beach. While we children disported ourselves like mermaids and mermen in the surf, our respective fathers dispensed cold lemonade, hot peanuts, and pink popcorn, and piled up our respective fortunes, nickel by nickel, penny by penny. I was very proud of my connection with the public life of the beach. ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... snow-house upon his lips. Though rather alarmed on tasting the salt, which could not proceed from a common spray, he kept quiet till the same dropping became more frequently repeated. Just as he was about to give the alarm, on a sudden a tremendous surf broke close to the house, discharging a quantity of water into it; a second soon followed, and earned away the slab of snow placed as a door before the entrance. The missionaries immediately called aloud to the sleeping Esquimaux to rise and quit the place. They jumped up in an instant. ...
— The Moravians in Labrador • Anonymous
... of Lissa, on the Dalmatian coast. Though Lissa is a strong position, the usual comparison of it with Gibraltar is exaggerated. It ought to have been possible to land the Italian troops which Persano had with him under cover of his guns, and to take the island before Tegethoff came up. The surf caused by the rough weather, to which he chiefly attributed his failure, would not have proved an insuperable obstacle had the ships' crews been exercised in landing troops ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... favourable for his departure, but the dry weather had made the river so shallow that it was impossible for the caravel left with the settlers to cross the bar, and as they had no boat strong enough to weather the surf, it seemed impossible for them to carry to him tidings of their condition. They were in despair; for if they were left, they knew that they were left to perish. The admiral, on his part, had become uneasy, ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps
... the steed with his nostril all wide, But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride: And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf, And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf. ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... them. At corners it struck so tumultuous a blow upon the chest of the pedestrians that for a moment it would halt them, and you could hear them gasping half-smothered "AHS" like bathers in a heavy surf. Yet there was a gayety in this eager gale; the crowds pressed anxiously, yet happily, up and down the street in their generous search for things to give away. It was not the rich who struggled through the storm to-night; these were people who carried their own bundles home. You saw them: ...
— Beasley's Christmas Party • Booth Tarkington
... the scurvy were evident among the men, and the captain well knew that in no way could the dread disease be kept away better than by constant exercise on the sands of the seashore. The sailors entered heartily into their captain's plans, and spent hours racing on the beach, swimming in the surf, and ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... had been already made. The surf was breaking over the ledges in all directions, and it was with the utmost difficulty that they succeeded in getting clear out into deep water. A breeze which had sprung up from the east, tended to raise the sea a little, but when they finally got ...
— The Lighthouse • Robert Ballantyne
... they, believing that he had been wrecked, had embarked in a skiff which he had left them, and had reached the main land, from which they were not far distant; but their skiff was shattered to pieces in the surf, and they had saved themselves by swimming. Believing that they were not far from the river Columbia, they had followed the shore, living, on the way, upon shell-fish and frogs; at last they arrived among strange Indians, who, far from receiving them kindly, ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... or at masthead or in lighthouse or on lightship a twinkling diamond point. A moon, apparently as big as a barrel-head, hung up in the east and below it a carpet of cold fire, of dancing, spangled silver spread upon the ocean. The sound of the surf, distant, soothing; and for the rest quiet and the fragrance of the summer ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... giant wreck, Fiercely blazed the riven deck; Thick and fast as falling stars, Crashed the flaming blocks and spars; Loud as surf, when winds are strong, Wailed the scorched and stricken throng, Gazing on a rugged shore, Fires behind, and ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 420, New Series, Jan. 17, 1852 • Various
... had been telling me as we came along, and then the parting when I didn't expect it, all I had of the man about me gave way somehow in a moment. And I sat alone, crying and sobbing on the sand-hillock, with the surf roaring miles out at sea behind me, and the great plain before, with Matthew walking over it alone on his ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... Cape. Here we had calms again, and the grass and barnacles grew very fast. Indeed, the ship's bottom was like a half-tide rock, and when the water washed up the sides, as she rolled, the noise made by the barnacles was like the surf on a sea-beach. We were followed for several days by a shoal of dolphins, which we caught in great numbers night and morning. Finally we got round the Cape, and to St. Helena, where we stayed four days, and employed men to assist us in chopping off grass and barnacles as far as we could ...
— Notes by the Way in A Sailor's Life • Arthur E. Knights
... barking or rushing out to fight back a wave that was sneaking too close. He loved the water, and the best time of all, he thought, was when his mistress took her swimming lesson and he could plough through the waves beside her. Often she would lie on her back in the hissing, white surf, holding to Jan's collar until they both landed on the warm sand. Sometimes the two of them would dig a big hole, and the dog would scrunch into it, while she buried him until only his nose and eyes could be seen. Jan was so happy that at ...
— Prince Jan, St. Bernard • Forrestine C. Hooker
... patrol outside. The skipper had already chosen his course. Because of the gale, he calculated that the blockaders would get a considerable offing, lest they flounder mid the shoal waters inshore. He knew too, even if it were not so dark, that a long, foamy line of surf curtained the bay from any watchful eye on the open sea. By the time she reached the beach channels, La Luz had full speed on. Then, knifing the higher and higher waves, she made a ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... been a pleasure to him since that day six months ago when his old schooner, dismasted and leaking in a gale, had foundered near the Wolves, two sharp-toothed islands near Grande Mignon. Four islanders had been lost that day, and he alone had lived through the surf. ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams
... tinge upon the shell washed in the surf, and planted a paradise of bloom in a child's cheek, let us leave it to the owl to hoot, and the frog to croak, and the ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou
... the captain to that old worthy, who was just poking his head up out of the forecastle,—"Trull, is that noise the surf?" ...
— Left on Labrador - or, The cruise of the Schooner-yacht 'Curlew.' as Recorded by 'Wash.' • Charles Asbury Stephens
... rounded at all, and diametrically opposed to the late Gothic conditions, 24 to 28, in which it advances gradually, like a wave preparing to break, and at last is actually seen curling over with the long-backed rush of surf upon the shore. Yet the Torcello base resembles these Gothic ones both in expansion beneath and in ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... dust, Aerial surf upon the shores of earth, Ethereal estuary, frith of light.... Bird of the ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... hard winter day, the wind shrill, black and silver clouds booming across the sky, everything in panicky motion during the brief light. They struggled against the surf of wind, through deep snow. Kennicott was cheerful. He hailed Loren Wheeler, "Behave yourself while I been away?" The editor bellowed, "B' gosh you stayed so long that all your patients have got well!" and importantly took notes for the Dauntless ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... his gray beard from the corner of his mouth;—he was dead! As I laid him back on the pillow and turned to restore some quiet to the ward, a Norther came sweeping down the Gulf like a rush of mad spirits; tore up the white crests of the sea and flung them on the beach in thundering surf; burst through the heavy fog that had trailed upon the moon's track and smothered the island in its soft pestilent brooding; and in one mighty pouring out of cold pure ether changed earth and sky from ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... on; and at day-break the next morning, I steered for the N.W., or lee-side of the island; and as we stood round its S. or S.W. part, we saw it every where guarded by a reef of coral rock, extending, in some places, a full mile from the land, and a high surf breaking upon it. Some thought that they saw land to the southward of this island; but, as that was to the windward, it was left undetermined. As we drew near, we saw people on different parts of the coast, walking, or running along the shore, and in a little time after we had reached the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... as he looked up at the sky where some stars showed through. "The clouds seem to be breaking away and the wind has died down a little. The surf doesn't sound so loud on the cliffs ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... a foreign shore. Weeks passed, and there came intelligence that the ill-fated vessel in which she embarked was a total wreck. Among the lost were his sister and her husband, who now slept quietly beneath the billowy surf ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes
... with a gentleman to the Ocean House, the other day, to see the sea horses, and also to listen to the roar of the surf, and watch the ships drifting about, here, and there, and far away at sea. When I stood on the beach and let the surf wet my feet, I recollected doing the same thing on the shores of the Atlantic—and then I had a proper appreciation of the vastness of this country—for I had traveled ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... him by past selves, other incarnations of himself, who had gleaned it in their lives, from days when the world was young. He had a thousand souls, which had known great sorrows and joys and adventures. His blood seemed to smoke gold, like spray on rushing surf in sunshine. Never had he admitted any one he had known (except the people his own mind created for inhabitants of that kingdom) into his land; but now the girl whose name he scarcely knew stood at the door ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... like prodigious amethysts,—and beyond them, to the left, the glorious spectre of Fuji, towering enormously above everything. Between sea-wall and sea there is no sand,—only a grey slope of stones, chiefly boulders; and these roll with the surf so that it is ugly work trying to pass the breakers on a rough day. If you once get struck by a stone-wave,—as I did several times,—you will ...
— In Ghostly Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... thistle lifts a purple crown Six foot out of the turf, And the harebell shakes on the windy hill— O the breath of the distant surf!— ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... Kinta appeared, a black shadow on a silver sea, roaring for a boat, but the surf was so heavy that it was some time before the police boat was got off; and then Mr. Maxwell, whose cheery, energetic voice precedes him, and Mr. Walker landed, bullying everybody, as people often do when they know that they are the delinquents! It was lovely in the white ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... intending to return at daylight. In a short time, however, it fell calm. The lead was hove. It was evident that a current and swell combined were drifting the ship fast towards the shore, on which the surf was breaking heavily. On this the captain ordered an anchor to be let go, which happily brought her up. Though there was scarcely a breath of air, every now and then heavy rollers came slowly in, lifting the ship gently, and then, passing on, broke with a terrific roar on the rocky coast. The ...
— The Voyages of the Ranger and Crusader - And what befell their Passengers and Crews. • W.H.G. Kingston
... a door had been swiftly and silently closed, the sound of the surf became suddenly less. The boat floated on an even keel; she opened her eyes ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... swell of the ocean burst in thunder, and flew to almost the height of the cliff in a very great and glorious fury of foam. In other parts, where I suspected a sort of beach, there was the silver tremble of surf; but in the main, the heave coming out of the north-east, the folds swept the base of the ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell
... food. Larvae. The early forms of many animals. Kinds of food in the earth. The bruang. The sun-bear of Malay. The bear and the honey pot. How it was tamed. The sport. The ocean. George and Harry at the beach. Bathing in the surf. The discovery of the wreck of an upturned boat. Finding the compartments belonging to their lost boat on Wonder Island. Sending for John. The skeleton beneath the upturned boat. The bound skeleton. The startling discovery of the same kinds of ropes found in their lost ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Adventures on Strange Islands • Roger Thompson Finlay
... exaggeration so long as the laws which nature observes in her increase be observed. Thus, for instance: the form and polished surface of a breaking ripple three inches high, are not representation of either the form or the surface of the surf of a storm, nodding ten feet above the beach; neither would the cutting ripple of a breeze upon a lake if simply exaggerated, represent the forms of Atlantic surges; but as nature increases her bulk, she diminishes the angles of ascent, and increases her divisions; and if ...
— Modern Painters Volume II (of V) • John Ruskin
... breakers that were rolling wildly upon (happily) a sandy beach beneath the cliffs. I told my men to be ready to jump out the moment that we should touch the sand, and to secure the canoe by hauling the head up the beach. All were ready, and we rushed through the surf, the native boatmen paddling like steam engines. "Here comes a wave; look out!" and just as we almost touched the beach, a heavy breaker broke over the black women who were sitting in the stern, and swamped the boat. My men jumped into the water like ducks, and the next moment we were all ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... 'Reo paddled past the schooner in a wretched old canoe, whose outrigger was so insecurely fastened that it threatened to come adrift every instant. The old man grinned as he recognised Denison; then, pipe in mouth, he went boldly out through the passage between the lines of roaring surf into ...
— The Colonial Mortuary Bard; "'Reo," The Fisherman; and The Black Bream Of Australia - 1901 • Louis Becke
... approach the stricken heart are closed and silent forever. And in such a crisis, let no counsel be taken of narrow, niggard sentiment. When in a sea-storm some human being is seen in the distant surf, clinging to a plank, that is sometimes driven nearer to the shore, and sometimes carried farther off; sometimes buried in the surge, and then rising again, as if itself struggling like the almost hopeless sufferer it supports, who looks sadly to the shore as he ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, June 1844 - Volume 23, Number 6 • Various
... is the pitch of the ground, and so narrow the shingly ledge at the bottom. And truly in bad weather and at high tides there is no shingle ledge at all, but the crest of the wave volleys up the incline, and the surf rushes on to the top of it. For the cove, though sheltered from other quarters, receives the full brunt of northeasterly gales, and offers no safe anchorage. But the hardy fishermen make the most of its scant convenience, ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... her face, keen, sweet, vibrant, thrilling. What he had heard that night at the monastery, the humming life of the land of white fire—the desert, the million looms of all the weavers of the world weaving, this she heard in the sunlight, with the sand rising like surf behind her horse's heels. The misery and the tyranny and the unrequited love were all behind her, the disillusion and the loss and the undeserved insult to her womanhood—all, all were sunk away into the unredeemable past. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... you hear. Only the musical plash of the fountains and the sonorous undertone of the organ, like the distant roar of surf upon the beach? Ah, me! ah, me! how materialistic you are, my children. Your old uncle hears in these myriad-voiced fountains the musical instruments which Boccaccio gave to the Satyrs; 'cymbals, pipes, and whistling reeds,' and the song of the nymphs. Did you note that startled cry? It ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... vegetable matter, is of so poisonous a nature that it is not only undrinkable, but absolutely kills the fish, which in stormy weather are driven in from the sea. As may be imagined, the furious tempests which beat upon this exposed coast create a strong surf-line. After a few days of north-west wind the waters of the Gordon will be found salt for twelve miles up from the bar. The head-quarters of the settlement were placed on an island not far from the mouth of this inhospitable river, called ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... of rock lie strewn in fantastic groupings upon the plain, you will often discover images as of the petrified forms of the Leviathan partly merged in grass, which of a windy day breaks against them in a surf of green surges. Then, again, in mountainous countries where the traveller is continually girdled by amphitheatrical heights; here and there from some lucky point of view you will catch passing glimpses of the profiles of whales defined along ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... it on the other side of Surf Avenue, nigh that long line of dashin' horses Serenus depicters, that go racin' and cavortin' round and round, bearin' the gay and ...
— Samantha at Coney Island - and a Thousand Other Islands • Marietta Holley
... guile of the fish, he sought to make the deeper part of the weir secure, and for an hour or so he laboured in the water with head, hands, and feet. While with deft fingers he weaved creepers and branches to the stakes, his feet beat the surface into surf and surge to the scaring of the fish to the remote limits of their retreat. But the tighter the weir became, the more the pressure was on it. Fast as repairs were made at one spot gaps appeared in another which demanded immediate attention. The quantity ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... made her talk. Kept asking her questions: If the wind had not gone down? If she heard the surf upon the beach? If she ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various
... now much more easy, for the high bank had broken the run of the surf. The water beyond it was much smoother, and they were able to swim, pushing ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... against the rampart that it could be mounted readily, if the assailants could but time their arrival at the right moment. This was not easy, as that rocky and tempestuous coast was often made inaccessible by fogs and surf; Shirley therefore preferred a plan of his own contriving. But nothing could be done without first persuading ...
— A Half-Century of Conflict, Volume II • Francis Parkman
... again in imagination the dark room where she had gone to be by herself, she heard the thunder of the surf on the rocks outside and the rumble of the thunder overhead. She saw once more the vision of Alien as she had seen it then. Allen stretched out cold and dead perhaps on some shell-ridden battlefield or perhaps, more terrible still, ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Wild Rose Lodge - or, The Hermit of Moonlight Falls • Laura Lee Hope
... thing instinct with life, walking the waters—and our feelings are not only excited for the safety of the crew, but for that of the vessel itself, to which we attach a degree of interest as for a friend. A gale was now up; the boat put off to their aid was in danger of being swamped by the surf, and found it impracticable to make way against a violent head-wind and tide united. Nothing short of a miracle could now save the ship; however the wind suddenly shifted a little, and I began ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 375, June 13, 1829 • Various
... Tenebrarum. A panorama more deplorably desolate no human imagination can conceive. To the right and left, as far as the eye could reach, there lay outstretched, like ramparts of the world, lines of horridly black and beetling cliff, whose character of gloom was but the more forcibly illustrated by the surf which reared high up against it its white and ghastly crest, howling and shrieking forever. Just opposite the promontory upon whose apex we were placed, and at a distance of some five or six miles out at sea, there was visible ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... pressure, of prodigious poetry and beauty and amazement. This was a strange jungle of life. Tall coasts of windows stood up into the pure brilliant sky: against their feet beat a dark surf of slums. In one foreign street, too deeply trenched for sunlight, oranges were the only gold. The water, reaching round in two arms, came close: there was a note of husky summons in the whistles of passing craft. Almost everywhere, sharp above many smells of oils and spices, the ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... closed his eyes again for a moment and became aware that the sound which had before seemed like the pounding of surf on the shore was the steady cheering of Brimfield's supporters. "I feel—all right," he answered, "and—and for the love of mud take that beastly sponge ...
— Left Tackle Thayer • Ralph Henry Barbour
... proved almost useless owing to shortage of rolling stock, and consequently supply depended almost entirely on motor lorry and camel from Railhead, or from the Wadi Sukharieh, where some supplies were being landed in surf boats. The question of supply had been most difficult, and water supply hardly less so, even for the one corps, and it looked as if we might come in for some scarcity when we got up nearer the front. In the pursuit of the ...
— The Fife and Forfar Yeomanry - and 14th (F. & F. Yeo.) Battn. R.H. 1914-1919 • D. D. Ogilvie
... be waiting and her father would be impatient. But she hesitated. Her thoughts were out there on the water where she loved to be. The twang of the wind as it swept through the trees along the shore, and the beat of the surf upon the gravelly beach were music ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... centre of Dorre Island, and stood in to within about two miles of the shore, which we found steep and rocky with a heavy surf breaking on it; we then tacked and stood off ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey
... they had sail-vessels there at the disposal of visitors. But Mr. Neale and Mr. John Simpkins, the present agent, can put you in the way of visiting the island, and you might carry my sweet daughter, Tabb, over and give her a surf bath. But do not let the mosquitoes annoy her. Give her much love from me. I am writing in Mildred's room, who is very grateful for your interest in her behalf. She is too weak to speak. I hope Rob had a pleasant trip. Tell me Custis's plans. ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son
... appearance of stone, and they are formed along the beach in a beautiful manner; they are built with piazzas and verandahs, and they extend about one mile along a sandy beach, while the natives parading along the shore, and the surf spraying upon the beach, gave the scene a very picturesque appearance. The surf beats here with so much violence that it is impossible for any ship's boats to land ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to India; of a Shipwreck on board the Lady Castlereagh; and a Description of New South Wales • W. B. Cramp
... that moment, was engaged in smoothing either paths or people. The private secretary was no worse off than his neighbors except in being called earlier into service. On April 13 the storm burst and rolled several hundred thousand young men like Henry Adams into the surf of a wild ocean, all helpless like himself, to be beaten about for four years by the waves of war. Adams still had time to watch the regiments form ranks before Boston State House in the April evenings and march southward, quietly enough, with the air of business ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... the hot sun as they broke into foam, and under its grateful coolness we glided comfortably along, with a flowing sheet. The bar at the mouth of the Macalister was eighteen miles distant, and we hoped to cross it about sunset, when the breeze would have dropped, and the passage through the surf would be readily distinguishable; but our plans were completely upset by one of the troopers espying smoke issuing from the scrub on a small creek, that entered the bay about half-way between the ...
— Australian Search Party • Charles Henry Eden
... Thursday with coach, horses, and William her coachman. That matter being finished, and the trunks being unpacked, she decided to take her first bath in the sea, expecting me to support her through the trying ordeal of the surf. As we were returning from the beach we met a carriage containing a number of persons ...
— Lemorne Versus Huell • Elizabeth Drew Stoddard
... frowningly overhead, its base all worn and furrowed by the furious surges that for ages had dashed against it. All around lay a chaos of huge boulders covered with seaweed. The tide was now at the lowest ebb. The surf here was moderate, for the seaweed on the rocks interfered with the swell of the waters, and the waves broke ...
— The Errand Boy • Horatio Alger
... their work and over the creak of the leather in the rowlocks the rumble and fume of the seven mile beach came mixed with the yelping and mewing of the gulls. The boat made slow progress, then a few yards from the surf line it hung for a moment till the rowers suddenly gave way and moving like a relieved arrow she came on the crest of a wave, then the oars came in with a crash and the two men tumbling out dragged her nose high and dry. They helped the girl out and ...
— The Beach of Dreams • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... Among the tall climbing roses, which hung a mantle of yellow flowers to the fretted baluster of the terrace, there stood out in the distance the illuminated fronts of the hotels and villas, and occasionally women's laughter was heard above the dull, monotonous sound of surf and the ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... people thought the longboat too must have overturned, and that all the women had perished. The Santiago, nearly sinking, had only just reached port. The beach above Point Pinos was thronged with people searching in the surf for the bodies of the victims, and the captain of the Idaho was broken hearted, if not well-nigh crazed. The news of the safety of the women flew from street to street, fast as the papers could speed their extras. Loving ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... pulled for the little cove about four miles distant, bearing west by north. For the first three miles the soundings did not show less than three fathoms, with an even sandy bottom, the last mile shoaling gradually to the beach; the landing being easily effected, as there now was but little surf. The shore was found to be generally very sandy, a low flat valley extending from the head of the cove across the isthmus about two miles to Mermaid Strait, where it terminated in a muddy mangrove ...
— Journals of Australian Explorations • A C and F T Gregory
... place they had reached was just outside the northern boundaries of Harlem, a sylvan spot still unspoiled by the rude invasion of the flat-house builder. The land, thickly wooded, sloped down sharply to the water, and the perfect quiet was broken only by the washing of the tiny surf against the river bank and the shrill notes of the birds ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... sang, the chimney coughed in its throat. One heard outside the whistle of the wind, the moan of the surf far off in the night, and the ...
— The Belted Seas • Arthur Colton
... it: I myself Have spoilt the emperor by indulging him. Nine years ago, during the Danish war, I raised him up a force, a mighty force, Forty or fifty thousand men, that cost him Of his own purse no doit. Through Saxony The fury goddess of the war marched on, E'en to the surf-rocks of the Baltic, bearing The terrors of his name. That was a time! In the whole imperial realm no name like mine Honored with festival and celebration— And Albrecht Wallenstein, it was the title Of the third jewel in his crown! But at the Diet, when the princes met At Regensburg, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... pausing or looking behind, he by and by heard the sea roaring at a distance. At this sound, he increased his speed, and soon came to a beach, where the great surf waves tumbled themselves upon the hard sand, in a long line of snowy foam. At one end of the beach, however, there was a pleasant spot, where some green shrubbery clambered up a cliff, making its rocky face look soft and beautiful. A carpet of verdant grass, largely ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... small veins of tin ore were discovered crossing each other in every direction. Although the surface was covered for about ten months in the year, and had at spring-tides nineteen feet of water over it, while a heavy surf often broke on the shore, a poor miner, named Thomas Curtis, about a century ago determined to attempt winning the ore. The work could only be carried on during the short time the rock appeared above water. Three summers were spent in sinking ...
— The Mines and its Wonders • W.H.G. Kingston
... the eyes of the ancient navigators, when, as they came coasting along from the north in their frail galleys, on their voyages to Greece and Italy, they saw it frowning defiance to them as they came, with threatening clouds hanging upon its summit, and the surges and surf of the AEgean perpetually thundering upon its base below. To make this stormy promontory the more terrible, it was believed to be the haunt of innumerable uncouth and misshapen monsters of the sea, that lived by devouring the hapless ...
— Xerxes - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... the smoke of turf, A heathery land and misty sky, And turned on rocks and raging surf His ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... go rushing on, on the car, past the Children's Hospital, past miles of sandhills, out to the very shore of the ocean, where the air was salt, and filled with the dull roaring of surf. Mary Lou, sharing with her mother a distaste for peanuts, crowds, tin-type men, and noisy pleasure-seekers, ignored Susan's hints that they walk down to the beach, and they went back on the ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... slippery things they couldn't see, cursing perhaps, or praying their prayers, or perhaps already sliding away, down and down, into the cold, black caves of the sea. And then the shadows seemed to be full of shades, and the surf-tongues were near to catching my ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... are drowned while bathing in the surf are said to experience but little pain. In fact, ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 11, June 11, 1870 • Various
... to a spot indicated by the lieutenant, and left as it had been taken from the surf. Everything in it was arranged in order, so that it could be hastily put into the water if circumstance demanded a hurried retreat from the scene of operations. Near the spot was a post set up in the sand, which might have been one of the corners of a shanty, or have been used years before by ...
— A Victorious Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... over my face and thin night-dress, then tore past up the hill. I looked and listened, but nothing could be seen or heard; no blue light, nor indeed any light at all; no cry, nor gun, nor signal of distress—nothing but the howling of the wind as it swept up from the sea, the thundering of the surf upon the beach below; and all around, black darkness and impenetrable night. The blast caught the lattice from my hand as I closed the window, and banged it furiously. I turned to look at my mother. She had fallen forward on her knees, with ...
— Dead Man's Rock • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... had run the dingy into the surf, had shipped oars, and were lustily pulling away—Cap'n Sproul in the stern roaring abuse at them in a way that drowned the howls of Mr. Butts, who ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day |
