"Half-mast" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at all that Sunday, possibly because it was the day after the assassination of the King of Portugal, and the flags were at half-mast everywhere. So we went, such of us as liked, to the parapet overlooking the Piazza del Popolo, and commanding one of those prospects of Rome which are equally incomparable from every elevation. I, for my part, made the dizzying circuit of the brief drive ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells
... Hath my insect never seen; But violets and bilberry bells, Maple-sap and daffodels, Grass with green flag half-mast high, Succory to match the sky, Columbine with horn of honey, Scented fern, and agrimony, Clover, catchfly, adder's-tongue And brier-roses, dwelt among; All beside was unknown waste, All was ...
— Selections From American Poetry • Various
... was already bent on to the peak-halyards, was promptly run up in response, whereupon the French ensign disappeared, to be instantly replaced by a string of signals. Our signal-book was at once produced, our answering pennant run half-mast up, and we then began to read off the ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... governor, nor President. The LL. D., which a university bestowed, did not stick to him. The word mister, as a prefix, or the word esquire, as a suffix, seemed a superfluity. He was, in all Christendom, plain Peter Cooper. Why, then, all the flags at half-mast, and the resolutions of common council, and the eulogium of legislatures, and the deep sighs from multitudes who have no adequate way ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... upon them, and our men roamed over it at will. The skulls of several of our slaughtered men were found at Hennean's door, trophies of his bloody prowess. These were now buried with the honours of war; the colours of the Antarctic were lowered half-mast, minute guns were fired, and dirges were played by our band, in honour of those who had fallen untimely on Massacre Island. This was all that feeling or affection could bestow. Those so inhumanly murdered had at last the rites of burial performed ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke
... heavy silence falls On all our streets, half-mast the standard hangs— The hearseless funeral passes to St. Paul's, And out of every steeple the ...
— A Celtic Psaltery • Alfred Perceval Graves
... South African war is raging. Hugh is there. I am told that Hugh is dead. He has been shot in a glorious but futile charge at Paardeberg. I can't realize it. I am an object of interest, of envy almost, to the whole school. The flag is half-mast because my brother is dead. Every one is kind, touched. I put on an air as ...
— A Student in Arms - Second Series • Donald Hankey
... upon deck he seized his glass, and, gazing intently through it for a moment, perceived that the faithful Shem had not deceived him. Flying at half-mast from a rude, roughly hewn pole set upon a rocky height was the black flag, emblem of piracy, and, as Artemus Ward put it, "with the second joints reversed." It was in very truth a signal ...
— The Pursuit of the House-Boat • John Kendrick Bangs
... 1855, Abbott Lawrence died. Nearly every business place in Boston was closed—in fact, Boston was in mourning; the military companies were out on solemn parade, flags were placed at half-mast, and minute-guns were fired. Thus passed away one of the ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... scholar he had been reluctant to succeed, represented the younger brethren; Lacroix, Micaiah Hill, and Gogerly, the London Missionary Society. Corrie and Dealtry do not seem to have reached the spot in time. The Danish Governor, his wife, and the members of council were there, and the flag drooped half-mast high as on the occasion of a Governor's death. The road was lined by the poor, Hindoo and Mohammedan, for whom he had done so much. When all, walking in the rain, had reached the open grave, the sun shone out, and Leechman led ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith
... never amount to much. Battles are not won with flags at half-mast. No, they are run up to the very tops of their standards and are waved as far toward the heavens as ...
— The Girl Wanted • Nixon Waterman
... we may say, set our flag at half-mast—is one which, if all we hear be true, should come easily to women in council, namely, talking. And talking we must have, even if, as in the social game called "Throwing Light," much of it is done at a venture. ...
— A Domestic Problem • Abby Morton Diaz
... picturesque in an artistic point of view; but treacherous-looking and full of peril to the wary nautical eye. Horrible jagged rocks, and sinister swirlings and foamings of the sea, seem to forbid the approach to them. The Tomtit is hove to—our ensign is run up half-mast high—and we fire our double-barrelled gun fiercely ...
— Rambles Beyond Railways; - or, Notes in Cornwall taken A-foot • Wilkie Collins
... casket was put on board the yacht "Hallena" at Rome, and Captain Hall with his flag at half-mast steamed towards America with the woman, who could never on earth accept the tribute of his heart. Leo, now Marquis Colonna, true chevalier that he was, insisted that he be permitted to accompany Colonel Harris to Amsterdam in search of ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... at half-mast, and, this being the signal of distress, it was hoped that the American steamer, perceiving it, would change her course a little, so as to ...
— Around the World in 80 Days • Jules Verne
... declared by those whose memories went back for half a century to have been unparalleled in Edinburgh since the funeral of Dr. Chalmers, in 1847. Along the whole of the three miles between the Synod Hall and Echo Bank Cemetery traffic was suspended, flags were at half-mast, and all the shops were closed. As the procession, which was itself fully a mile in length, made its slow way along, the crowds which lined the pavements, filled the windows, and covered the tops of the arrested tramway cars, reverently saluted the coffin. When the gates of the University ...
— Principal Cairns • John Cairns
... Jackson died at 3 P.M. yesterday. His remains will arrive in the city at 5 P.M. this afternoon. The flags are at half-mast, and all the government offices and even places of business are closed. A multitude of people, mostly women and children, are standing silently in the streets, awaiting the arrival of the hero, destined never again to defend their homes ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones
... suitable expression of national bereavement, I direct that the diplomatic representatives of the United States in all foreign countries display the flags over their embassies and legations at half-mast for ten days; that for a like period the flag of the United States be displayed at half-mast at all forts and military posts and at all naval stations and on all vessels of ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Volume 8, Section 2 (of 2): Grover Cleveland • Grover Cleveland
... the way For that wonderful coach of the Queen's to-day. Kings and Princes and Lords of the land Shall ride behind her, a humble band; And over the city and over the world Shall the Flags of all Nations be half-mast-furled, For the silent lady of royal birth Who is riding away from the Courts of earth, Riding away from the world's unrest To a mystical ...
— Poems of Power • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... conquered the hero of so many campaigns; our cities and towns and villages are decked with flags at half-mast; the muffled drum and the funeral cannon boom will resound over the land as his dead body passes to the final resting-place; and the American people stand mournfully gazing into the void left by the sudden ...
— Model Speeches for Practise • Grenville Kleiser
... ornamented with tri-colored flags, which formerly were placed on Notre Dame, were, it was remarked, suppressed. The flags on the Pont Neuf were, during the ceremony, only half-mast high, ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... raising the flag. Trying to sing the Star-Spangled Banner. The failure. Taking possession of the island in the name of the United States. Significance of the act of taking possession. Heraldry and the bending of the flag on the halliards. The banner and flag in ancient times. Leaving the flag at half-mast. The banner in the Bible. The necessity for making glass. Its early origin. The crystal of the ancients. What it is made of. The blowing process. An acid and an alkali. Sand as an acid. Lime, soda, and potash ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Exploring the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... day drew near, the Cape Town people were perplexed how to express adequately their feelings on the occasion. It was suggested that on the day he was to embark, the whole city should mourn with shops closed, flags half-mast high, and in profound silence. ...
— Native Races and the War • Josephine Elizabeth Butler
... rock-bound coast, with fierce suggestions of strife. But they knew that within their sheltered harbor their waiting galleys rode at anchor, ready to sail at a moment's notice—for Venice, for Rome, for Egypt—though the flags they bore were still at half-mast, with their King but a ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... ourselves among the breakers of the terrible bar of Findhorn. And shortly after, the poor Friendship took the ground right on the edge of the quicksands, for she would neither stay nor wear; and as she beat hard against the bottom, the surf came rolling over half-mast high. ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... as the Indians revered Brock. But how different the obsequies of the two heroes! For Brock flags floated at half-mast. He was borne to the grave to the sound of martial music, followed by a sorrowing multitude. His valour was the theme of orators. A stately monument perpetuates his memory and attracts pilgrims ...
— Tecumseh - A Chronicle of the Last Great Leader of His People; Vol. - 17 of Chronicles of Canada • Ethel T. Raymond
... on Ragnor's tower hung half-mast high Smote old and young with grief. A death it told. They long had watched her wither like a leaf; Her warm hands too had grown of late so cold. So young, so fair, so good. Alas! that ...
— Rowena & Harold - A Romance in Rhyme of an Olden Time, of Hastyngs and Normanhurst • Wm. Stephen Pryer
... had been held for Stephen Marshall many days, the university had been draped in black, with its flag at half-mast, the proper time, and its mourning folded away, ere Paul Courtland was able to return to ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... had filled all loyal hearts at the prospects of peace was sudden and profound. All business ceased, and gave way to mourning and lamentation. The flags, so lately unfurled in exultation, were now dropped at half-mast, and emblems of sorrow were hung from every door and window. Men walked with a dejected air. They gathered together in groups in the street, and spoke of the murder of the President as of a personal calamity. The nation's ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... see the pilgrims to the Springfield tomb— Be proud today, oh, portico of gloom!— Where lies the man in solitary state Who never caused a tear but when he died And set the flags around the world half-mast— The gentle Tribune and so grandly great That e'en the utter avarice of Death That claims the world, and will not be denied, Could only rob him of his mortal breath. How strange the splendor, though the man be past! His noblest inspiration ...
— The Poets' Lincoln - Tributes in Verse to the Martyred President • Various
... strikes an attitood, with fore paws danglin' at half-mast, to be admired by a dandifide lot of Tommynoodles of the opposite sects, the opinion of this ere cort is, that insted of Greshun bend, it had orter ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 16, July 16, 1870 • Various
... "Droop half-mast colors, bow, bareheaded crowds, As this plain coffin o'er the side is slung, To pass by woods of masts and ratlined shrouds, As erst by ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... losses had been depressing in the extreme. Boston had hung her flags at half-mast for the brave dead. But suddenly a report came that the Constitution had been victorious, and that the Guerriere after having been disabled beyond any power of restoration, had been sent ...
— A Little Girl in Old Boston • Amanda Millie Douglas
... piles from the mud shore you will see the white-painted factories and their great store-houses for oil; each factory likely enough with its flag at half-mast, which does not enliven the scenery either, for you know it is because somebody is "dead again." Throughout and over all is the torrential downpour of the wet-season rain, coming down night and day ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... honors be paid him at each of the navy-yards and on board each of the public vessels in commission by firing twenty-six minute guns, commencing at 12 o'clock m., on the day after the receipt of this order, and by wearing their flags at half-mast for one week. ...
— Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Harrison • James D. Richardson
... Chicago in the steamer, the other morning, all the vessels in the port had their flags displayed at half-mast in token of dissatisfaction with the fate of the harbor bill. You may not recollect that the bill set apart half a million of dollars for the construction or improvement of various harbors of the lakes, and authorized the ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant
... and the hour for which were fixed by Bonifacio for August twenty-sixth, 1896, at six o'clock sharp in the evening, since lack of precision in his magnificent programs was never a fault of that bold patriot, his logic being as severe as that of the Filipino policeman who put the flag at half-mast on Good Friday. ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... Half-mast upon her flagstaff hung her flag; Word went among us how the broken spar Had gored her captain like an angry stag, And killed her mate ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... flag flew half-mast from the Palace dome, and two others flew behind it; one the black and yellow banner of the hillsmen, the other the red and white pennant of the dead Dakoon. In the Palace yard a thousand men stood at attention, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... we won't row away and leave you. Forward, my lads, and get under cover of the boat's side. Hoist the sail half-mast, and keep behind it. They'll begin to shoot directly. We'll get on board first, gentlemen, to cover you from the boats. Stand fast till we're all in if you can, and then give 'em all four barrels and make a dash for it before ...
— Old Gold - The Cruise of the "Jason" Brig • George Manville Fenn
... right here," says Dan, but I kinder knew That underneath them snowdrifts we would find a thing or two; Fer he'd writ on that there paper, "Been lost fer hours,—all hope is past. You'll find me, boys, where my handkerchief is flyin' at half-mast." ...
— Flint and Feather • E. Pauline Johnson
... the death of Franklin. We have truly been expecting the news, but who can prepare for the final 'He is gone.' Congress will wear mourning for two months, I hear, and all good citizens who can possibly do so will follow their example. The flags are at half-mast, ...
— The Maid of Maiden Lane • Amelia E. Barr |
