"Poop" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Munychia and the ports receded. The panorama of Athens—plain, city, citadel, gray Hymettus, white Pentelicus—spread in a vista of surpassing beauty—so at least to the eyes of the outlaw when he clambered to the poop. As the ship ran down the low coast, land and sea seemed clothed with a robe of rainbow-woven light. Far, near,—islands, mountains, and deep were burning with saffron, violet, and rose, as the Sun-God's car climbed ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... colours. This and a second were disregarded; but a port was opened and a gun run out and brought to bear on the boat, which caused the officer to pull into her wake, when part of the crew of the brig commenced firing musketry, while the others got the gun on the poop, and ...
— Our Sailors - Gallant Deeds of the British Navy during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... faithfully paid the midshipman the two guineas for his assistance, was now on the poop keeping his watch, as midshipmen usually do; that is, stretched out on the signal lockers, and composing himself to sleep after the most approved fashion, answering the winks of the stars by blinks of his eyes, until at last he shut them to keep them warm. But, before he had quite ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat
... proceedings the Zinkstuk is so heavy that all the vessels, dragged by its weight, lean over, and their masts bend above it. But now the decisive moment approaches, and the foreman, standing on the poop of the largest boat, in the middle of the flotilla, on the side furthest from the shore, awaits the instant when the Zinkstuk shall come into precisely the foreordained position. At that instant he utters a shout and makes a signal; the ropes are cut, the raft plunges ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... the boat slipped away through the darkness, steering a course for the two great poop lanterns that were swinging rhythmically high up against the black background of the night. The elderly gentleman, huddled now in the stern-sheets, looked behind him—to look his last upon the England he had loved and served and ruled. The lanthorn, shedding its wheel of yellow light upon the ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... he said, whatever she grappled she would never let go till she heard the bones crack. They were excellent, new "snekrs," nearly eighty feet long each; with double banks for twelve oars a side in the waist, which was open, save a fighting gangway along the sides; with high poop and forecastle decks; and with one large sail apiece, embroidered by Sigtryg's Princess and the other ladies with a huge white bear, which Hereward had ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... distant. The hulls, which at first had seemed quite black, shone, as they drew closer, with the gay colors in which they were painted, the gorgeous sunlight playing vividly on the gilding of the prows, the streaks of red and white along the sides, and the splendid decorations of the poop lanterns. Noble and mighty ships they were—ships of size such as Nisida had never seen before, and in comparison with which all the merchant-vessels she had beheld at Leghorn were but mere boats. There was no need to raise a signal to invite them to approach—for that fleet ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... at all times a favourite spectacle, and with all observers,—the old "salt" who has seen them a thousand times, and the young sailor on his maiden voyage, who beholds them for the first time in his life. Many an hour of ennui occurring to the ship-traveller, as he sits upon the poop, restlessly scanning the monotonous surface of the sea, has been brought to a cheerful termination by the appearance of a shoal of flying-fish suddenly sparkling up out of ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... weather. The gentlemen have all turned boys. They play boyish games on the poop and quarter-deck. For instance: They lay a knife on the fife-rail of the mainmast—stand off three steps, shut one eye, walk up and strike at it with the fore-finger; (seldom hit it;) also they lay a knife on the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... overtaken, and, in sheering into her new position, the Aurora was compelled to shave close past the stranger's stern. Glancing up at her as they shot past, with a feeling of deep gratitude at their escape, George saw a little crowd of passengers huddled together upon her poop, like frightened sheep. They were all looking at the Aurora, evidently fully aware of the danger from which they had so narrowly escaped; and among them George suddenly recognised a face which he had ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... wore away: while I stood there on the galleon's poop with the soft pale flames flickering around me in the mist, and my fears rising and falling as I lost and regained control of myself; and I think that it is a wonder that I ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier
... back as they passed us. They went up the steps to the deck. Ducat paused at the break of the poop and stood there, speaking to McHenry. We could not hear his words. The schooner tossed idly, a faint creaking of the rigging came down to us in the cabin. The same question was in every eye. Then Ducat turned on his heel, and McHenry was ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... had the twofold effect of imparting great stiffness under canvas, and affording fine roomy decks. Her sides were as round as an apple—not an inch of "straight" anywhere in them—and, despite her unusual breadth, her lines were the finest and most beautiful that I had ever seen. She carried a full poop, the interior of which constituted the captain's quarters—roomy, light, and airy; and as I noted the length and solidity of her lower-masts the idea occurred to me that, if the remainder of her spars were ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... two boats to arrive at this unappointed rendezvous was one to catch the eye even in that river of strange craft. She had neither the raking bow nor the rising poop of the local mehala, but a tall incurving beak, not unlike those of certain Mesopotamian sculptures, with a windowed and curtained deck-house at the stern. Forward she carried a short mast. The lateen sail was furled, however, and the galley was propelled at ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... number of pieces in the reckoning of a sailor. For instance, in a ship or barque there are three which are called respectively the main, fore, and mizen-masts—the main-mast being near the middle of the ship, the fore-mast forward, towards the bows, and the mizen-mast "aft," near the stern or poop. But each one of these is divided into several pieces, which pieces have distinct names in the sailor's vocabulary. Thus, the "main-mast," to a sailor, is not the whole of that long straight stick which rises up out of the ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... raging post-mortem brutality, and gave her a dignity that was cold and superior to all the eternal powers could now do. She pitched helplessly head first into a hollow, and a door flew open under the break of her poop; it surprised and shocked us, for the dead might have signed to us then. She went astern of us fast, and a great comber ran at her, as if it had but just spied her, and thought she was escaping. There was a high white flash, and a concussion ...
— Old Junk • H. M. Tomlinson
... wooden barque, in ballast and towed by a paddle-tug, appeared in front of the windows. All her hands were forward busy setting up the headgear; and aft a woman in a red hood, quite alone with the man at the wheel, paced the length of the poop back and forth, with the grey wool of some knitting work in ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad
... into her by which fifty men were killed. Drawing off from this assailant, the galley found herself close to the Dutch admiral in the Half-moon, who, with all sail set, bore straight down upon her, struck her amidships with a mighty crash, carrying off her mainmast and her poop, and then, extricating himself with difficulty from the wreck, sent a tremendous volley of cannon-shot and lesser missiles straight into the waist where sat the chain-gang. A howl of pain and terror rang through the air, while oars and benches, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... breakwater, her brown, bare masts rising like spires from her black hull, and the morning sun glinting from a strip of brass on her taffrail. They could see busy figures aboard, and as they drew nearer Captain Jarrow appeared on the poop-deck smoking a cigar. He was all in white, his queer cockle-shell straw hat fastened to a button of his coat by ...
— Isle o' Dreams • Frederick F. Moore
... encounter, and especially at seeing Father Griffen, who, standing on the poop, attentively observed the maneuvers of the two ships, the chevalier said to the captain: "But how the devil do you find yourself here at a given point to receive me, coming out of that nutshell down there, floating away ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... the ship swiftly on her way, and Mr. Astor's alarm subsided. But even on the banks of Newfoundland, two thirds of the way across, when the captain went upon the poop to speak a ship bound for Liverpool, old Astor climbed up after him, saying, "Tell them I give tousand dollars if they ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... the hoarse signal was still vibrating through the ship, the junk swept past her quarter. The chief officer, joined now by the commander, looked down into the wretched craft. They could see her crew lashed in a bunch around the capstan on her elevated poop. She was laden with timber. Although water-logged, she could not sink ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... and sustained a desperate fight against three ships of the enemy. The officers and crew of the Buckingham exerted themselves with equal vigour and deliberation, and captain Troy, who commanded a detachment of marines on the poop, plied his small arms so effectually, as to drive the French from their quarters. At length, confusion, terror, and uproar, prevailing on board the Florissant, her firing ceased, and her colours were hauled down about twilight; ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... lee braces a bit, and haul in these to the weather-side!" said the captain, as soon as he had got back to his proper place on the poop again. "I think the wind is coming round more aft, and we can lay her on her course. Keep her steady. So!"—he added, to the man at the wheel. "But easy her off now and then, if ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... admitted of being held in partnership like merchandise or money. Which design being thwarted by the jealousy with which Alatiel was guarded by Marato, they chose a day and hour, when the ship was speeding amain under canvas, and Marato was on the poop looking out over the sea and quite off his guard; and going stealthily up behind him, they suddenly laid hands on him, and threw him into the sea, and were already more than a mile on their course before any perceived that Marato was overboard. Which when the lady learned, and knew ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... her well, as we drifted by: A strange old ship, with her poop built high, And with quarter-galleries wide, And a huge beaked prow, as no ships are builded now, And carvings all strange, beside: A Byzantine bark, and a ship of name and mark Long years and generations ago; Ere any mast or yard of ours was growing hard With the seasoning of long Norwegian ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... Mr. Annesley spent upon the poop, watching the mob with a certain scornful interest. On the third he did not appear, but was served with tiffin in his cabin. At about six o'clock, the second mate—a Mr. Orchard—sought the captain ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... carefully closed up the bung-hole and threw the cask into the sea, all the people fancying that it was some act of devotion. Apprehending that this might never be taken up, and the ship coming still nearer to Spain, I made another packet like the first, which I placed on the poop, that when the ship sunk the cask might float upon the water, and take its chance of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... directly on her side, the decks rising straight up from the rock bottom. Ahead and behind him there were projections from her decks, no doubt the forecastle and high poop of other days. She seemed to be split well asunder, for the opening was a good five feet across, and without hesitation ...
— The Pirate Shark • Elliott Whitney
... but we need a cat,' The Captain said. So when the painted ship Sailed through a golden sunrise down the Thames, A gray tail waved upon the misty poop, And Whittington had his venture on ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... ships. Pantagruel seemed metagrabolized, dozing, out of sorts, and as melancholic as a cat. Friar John, who soon perceived it, was inquiring of him whence should come this unusual sadness; when the master, whose watch it was, observing the fluttering of the ancient above the poop, and seeing that it began to overcast, judged that we should have wind; therefore he bid the boatswain call all hands upon deck, officers, sailors, foremast-men, swabbers, and cabin-boys, and even the passengers; made them first settle their topsails, take in their spritsail; ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... she sat in, like a burnish'd throne, Burn'd on the water; the poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails, and so perfumed that The winds were love-sick with them; the oars were silver, Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made The water which they beat to follow faster, ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... breeze behind her, the Golden Boar slipped through the sunlit waters of Plymouth Sound as gracefully as a fair swan might cleave the bosom of a lake. Somewhat narrow in build, moderately low in the waist, with bow and poop not too high-pitched, masts tall and sails ample, she was built with an eye to speed. And with carved posts and rails for her bulwarks, many-windowed cabins in the after part, tapering, artistic prow with the gilded boar rampant, her designer had had an eye to beauty also. Hull ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... his subordinates: whereas the man in whom the sense of duty is strong (or, perhaps, only the sense of self-importance), and who persists in airing on deck his moroseness all day—and perhaps half the night—becomes a grievous infliction. He walks the poop darting gloomy glances, as though he wished to poison the sea, and snaps your head off savagely whenever you happen to blunder within earshot. And these vagaries are the harder to bear patiently, as becomes a man and an officer, because no sailor is really good-tempered during ...
— The Mirror of the Sea • Joseph Conrad
... shoot off their pieces after the manner of war and of the sea, insomuch that the tops of the hills sounded therewith, the valleys and the waters gave an echo, and the mariners they shouted in such sort that the sky rang again with the noise thereof. One stood in the poop of the ship, and by his gesture bids farewell to his friends in the best manner he could. Another walks upon the hatches, another climbs the shrouds, another stands upon the main yard, and another in the top of the ship. To be short, it was a very triumph (after ...
— The Discovery of Muscovy etc. • Richard Hakluyt
... and the whole West Indies, and brought about by that single tremendous blow the honourable peace of 1783. On what a scene of crippled and sinking, shattered and triumphant ships, in what a sea, must the conquerors have looked round from the Formidable's poop, with De Grasse at luncheon with Rodney in the cabin below, and not, as he had boastfully promised, on board his own Fills de Paris. Truly, though cynically, wrote Sir Gilbert Blane, 'If superior beings make a sport of the quarrels of mortals, ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... quarry. Another day dawned, hot and windless, and the situation was unchanged. Other British ships had crawled or drifted nearer, but the Constitution was always just beyond range of their heavy guns. We may imagine Isaac Hull striding across the poop and back again, ruddy, solid, composed, wearing a cocked hat and a gold-laced coat, lifting an eye aloft, or squinting through his brass telescope, while he damned the enemy in the hearty language of the sea. He was a nephew of General William Hull, but ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... Commander Eden, superintendent of Woolwich Dockyard, led the van in his barge. Then came Vice-Admiral Elliot, Commander-in-chief at the Nore; next the Lord Mayor's bailiff in his craft, preceding the Lord Mayor in the City barge, "rearing its quaint gilded poop high in the air, and decked with richly emblazoned devices and floating ensigns.... Two royal gigs and two royal barges escorted the State barge, posted respectively on its port and starboard bow, and its port and starboard quarter. The ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler
... The Ughi, Catilini and Filippi, The Alberichi, Greci and Ormanni, Now in their wane, illustrious citizens: And great as ancient, of Sannella him, With him of Arca saw, and Soldanieri And Ardinghi, and Bostichi. At the poop, That now is laden with new felony, So cumb'rous it may speedily sink the bark, The Ravignani sat, of whom is sprung The County Guido, and whoso hath since His title from the fam'd Bellincione ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... capstans and donkey-engines and stanchions and chains and other unholy stumbling blocks and offences to the casual promenader. From the photographs and letters I learned that the dog-hole, intended by the Captain for Jaffery, but given over to Liosha, was away aft, beneath a kind of poop and immediately above the scrunch of the propeller; and that Jaffery, with singular lack of privacy, bunked in the stuffy, low cabin where the officers took their meals and relaxations. The more vividly did they present the details of their life, the more heartfelt were my thanksgivings to a merciful ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... the ship and guard her and all that is with her." The merchant agreed to this and abode with the King, who called his secretary and steward and said to them, "Go and pass the night in this man's ship and keep it safe, Inshallah!" So they went up into the ship and seating themselves, this on the poop and that on the bow, passed a part of the night in repeating the names of Allah (to whom belong Majesty and Might!). Then quoth one to the other, "Ho, such an one! The King bade us keep watch and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... the statement, just as the two men succeeded in reaching the top of the steeply-inclined ladder a deluge of water crashed thunderously down on the cruiser's poop, driving in a solid mass along her decks from end to end, and causing her to bump again heavily. Then came a terrific shock, accompanied by the heart-stopping sounds of rending and tearing iron, shearing rivets, jangling machinery, and, worse than all, ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... ain 't I? Was n't it me as nudged the Captain o' the Northern Star off his poop—when he were n't lookin'? Him with a pistol in his boot! Did n't I hit Bill, the bos'n, with a marline-spike—jest afore he woke up? Sweet dreams, I says, and I tapped him gentle. I got a lot o' spunk. Bill did n't wake up, he did n't. Was n't it me, Captain, ...
— Wappin' Wharf - A Frightful Comedy of Pirates • Charles S. Brooks
... possible. The cabin doors were fastened, and the Spanish officers fired their pistols at them through the window; the doors were soon forced, and the Spanish brigadier fell while retreating to the quarter-deck. Nelson pushed on, and found Berry in possession of the poop, and the Spanish ensign hauling down. He passed on to the forecastle, where he met two or three Spanish officers, and received their swords. The English were now in full possession of every part of the ship, when a fire of pistols and musketry opened upon them from ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... face, and I'll amend my life: thou art our admiral, thou bearest the lantern in the poop,—but 'tis in the nose of thee; thou art the ...
— King Henry IV, The First Part • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... "Good-morning!" to me cordially. I fancied him ashamed of his foolish falsehood; and I, on my side, was angry because of it. The pair were for ever strolling backwards and forwards on deck, or resting beneath the awning on the poop, and talking—always talking. I fancied the boy was delicate; he certainly had a bad cough during the first few days. But this went away as our voyage proceeded, and his colour was rich ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... been taken with reference to fighting on anchoring ground. These were particularized in a general order issued by the admiral, and to them he added special instructions, rendered necessary by the force of the current and its constancy in the same direction. "Mount one or two guns on the poop and top-gallant forecastle," he said; "in other words, be prepared to use as many guns as possible ahead and astern to protect yourself against the enemy's gunboats and batteries, bearing in mind that you will always have to ride head to the current, ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... it from good authority that the order was not given to the marines on the man-of-war's poop to fire at the plucky little craft who had so fairly out-manoeuvred the cruiser, for out-manoeuvred she was to all intents and purposes. The two or three guns that had been cast loose during the chase had been partially secured, and left so while the men had gone aloft ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha
... humming aeroplane; but even during the few seconds of Smith's hesitation the others gained the deck of the junk forward of the mast, and with fierce yells and sweeping strokes of their krises began to drive the Chinamen towards the poop. In a few minutes the whole crew would be butchered and thrown ...
— Round the World in Seven Days • Herbert Strang
... face looks inward through the lattice of his cell, And he finds his God forgotten, and he seeks no more a sign— (But Don John of Austria has burst the battle-line!) Don John pounding from the slaughter-painted poop, Purpling all the ocean like a bloody pirate's sloop, Scarlet running over on the silvers and the golds, Breaking of the hatches up and bursting of the holds, Thronging of the thousands up that labour under sea White ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... her lines from the wharf, Harry thought she would be both fast and a good sea-boat. She was not heavily laden, and stood boldly up in the water. Nodding to Bertie, who was working hard among the men, he went up on to the poop, from which Captain Peters was ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... her square counter, Eastern Star, St. John, New Brunswick. That was one of my father's finest models. Pitch pine he made her of, and she's beautiful yet, for all her disgrace. I climbed aboard of her while the Corcubion women were trotting to and fro with the coal baskets, and looked round the poop. There was the cuddy as good as ever, teak frames, maple panels, pine flooring. That old hulk brought my old father before me as no daguerreotype could do. There was his name cut on the beam, John Carville. It may seem absurd to you people, but do you know, ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... magnificence of that powerful republic. In the command of the world, the modest Augustus had never claimed such honors from his subjects as were paid to his feeble successor by an independent state. Seated on the poop on a lofty throne, he received the visit, or, in the Greek style, the adoration of the doge and senators. [54] They sailed in the Bucentaur, which was accompanied by twelve stately galleys: the sea was overspread with innumerable gondolas of pomp and pleasure; ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... smear Their unsound vessels; for th' inclement time Sea-faring men restrains, and in that while His bark one builds anew, another stops The ribs of his, that hath made many a voyage; One hammers at the prow, one at the poop; This shapeth oars, that other cables twirls, The mizen one repairs and main-sail rent So not by force of fire but art divine Boil'd here a glutinous thick mass, that round Lim'd all the shore beneath. I that beheld, ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... with a shudder, and walked aft. The wreck was unquestionably some Spanish or Portuguese carrack or galleon as old as I have stated; for you saw her shape when you stood on her deck, and her castellated stern rising into a tower from her poop and poop-royal, as it was called, proved her age as convincingly as if the date of her launch had been scored ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... cannon-glare and din to stir their blood, But, roused from dreams of home to find their boat Fast sinking, mustered on the deck they stood, Biding God's pleasure and their chief's command. Calm was the sea, but not less calm that band Close ranged upon the poop, with bated breath But flinching not though eye to ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... looked back and saw, as the moon shone full upon the wreck, a figure standing at the poop, leaning ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... upon the poop in his thick overcoat and drenched fur cap, with his trumpet under his arm, looking anxiously through the night-glass from time to time, and his voice sounded unusually stern. There lay before him in the dark, blustering, winter night a veritable David's choice. The strong ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... father was very distressing, and I was about to say a few kind words of sympathy when Andre himself made his appearance. M. Letourneur has- tened toward him and assisted him up the few steep steps that led to the poop. ...
— The Survivors of the Chancellor • Jules Verne
... ship's carpenter in his day, had constructed a little poop in the stern of his craft: thereon Malcolm had laid cushions and pillows and furs and blankets from the Psyche—a grafting of Cleopatra's galley upon the rude fishing-boat—and there Clementina was to repose in state. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... two he named were the "Duke of Monmouth" and the "Duke of Montrose." I called my first "Oliver Cromwell" and "John Fox." The poor "mon" had to have revenge, so the next ugly, scrawny little beast he called the "Poop of Roome." And it ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... meantime, the ship became more distinct to the naked eye: she was a stout, round Dutch-built vessel, with high bow and poop, and bearing Dutch colours. The evening sun gilded her bellying canvas, as she came riding over the long waving billows. The sentinel who had given notice of her approach, declared, that he first got sight of her when she was in the centre of the bay; and ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... wind blowing down the Liffey. "Open the dock-gates, Mr Thompson, and let her go. She'll find her own way to Jamaica and back again by herself, without a hand at the helm, she knows it so well," the captain, as he stood on the poop, sung out to the dock-master. I found that this was a standing joke ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... was determined by watching when the crest of the wave was on a level with the observer's eye (the height above the trough of the sea being known) either while standing on the poop or in the mizzen rigging; this must be reduced to one half to obtain the absolute height of the wave above the mean level of the sea. The length and velocity were found by noting the time taken by the wave to traverse the measured distance ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... mounted it, at great expense, with a couple of lifelike guns, R. and L., and for background the overhang of the quarter-deck, with rails and a mizzen-mast of real timber against a painted cloth representing the rise of the poop. ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... to the class named Snekiars, or cutters, which usually had from ten to twenty rowers on a side. To each oar three men were apportioned—one to row, one to shield the rower, and one to throw missiles and fight, so that her crew numbered over sixty men. The forecastle and poop were very high, and the appearance of height was still further increased by the figurehead—the neck and head of a swan—and by a tail that rose from the stern-post, over the steersman's head. Both head and tail were richly gilt; indeed, the whole vessel was gaudily painted. All round the gunwales, ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... sailors do on the stage. "About two months ago JEFF made a voyage with me. One night we were bowling along the canal under a very stiff breeze. The compass stood north-east and a half, the thermometer was chafing fearfully, and the jib-boom, only two-thirds reefed was lashing furiously against the poop-deck. Suddenly, that terrible cry, 'A man overboard!' I lost no time. I bore down on the taffrail threw the cook overboard, and soon had the satisfaction of seeing our noble craft lay over abaft the wind. Then, ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 35, November 26, 1870 • Various
... of 400 tons, and this is calculated to give a radius of action of 8,000 knots at a reduced speed of 10 knots. The armament of the ship will consist of two 6 in. breech-loading guns on central pivot stands, one mounted on the poop and another on the forecastle; six quick-firing 4.7 in. guns, mounted three on each broadside; eight quick-firing 6-pounder guns, four on each broadside; besides one 3-pounder Hotchkiss and four 5-barrel Nordenfeldt guns. In addition ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 832, December 12, 1891 • Various
... removed some of the superstructure from about the head of the mast, so as to allow passage for the rope, without putting a strain upon the superstructure itself. Then when I had made an end upon the poop, she led me down on to the main-deck, and here I was very greatly impressed by the prodigious size of the structure which they had built about the hulk, and the skill with which it had been carried out, the supports crossing from side to side and to the decks in a manner calculated to give great ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... fish-ball, which he held in his hand, and struck the Admiral a little below the left eye. The Admiral, nothing daunted, ran up the steps, his officers following close behind, and seized the Commodore by the hand, and gave him such a shaking as made him tremble again. General Gore, on reaching the 'poop,' was grossly insulted by the first lieutenant of the Princeton, who, in the most cool and deliberate manner, told him, if he would come below, he would give him ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... chained at the foot of the cliff, had warmed in the waters of the Gulf her bare, corrugated sides, warped by the frosts, stabbed by the ice of pitiless Northern winters! Where were the sallow, dark-bearded faces that had watched from her high poop the brief twilights die on that "unshadowed main," which a century ago was the scene of some of the wildest romances and blackest crimes in maritime history—the bright, restless bosom that warmed into ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... bearing Christ upon his shoulder in the centre of it. The breeze blew, the sail bellied, over heeled the portly vessel, and away she plunged through the smooth blue rollers, amid the clang of the minstrels on her poop and the shouting of the black crowd who fringed the yellow beach. To the left lay the green Island of Wight, with its long, low, curving hills peeping over each other's shoulders to the sky-line; to the right the wooded Hampshire coast as far as eye could reach; above a steel-blue heaven, with ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the verandah, the mission-boat was shooting for the mouth of the river. She was a long whale-boat painted white; a bit of an awning astern; a native pastor crouched on the wedge of the poop, steering; some four-and-twenty paddles flashing and dipping, true to the boat-song; and the missionary under the awning, in his white clothes, reading in a book, and set him up! It was pretty to see and hear; there’s no smarter sight in the islands than a missionary boat with a ...
— Island Nights' Entertainments • Robert Louis Stevenson
... ago, have become whitened with salt and dulled by fog and sun and driving spray. Across her stern, above the rudder of massive oaken plank clamped with iron, is painted the name "HALF MOON," in straggling letters. On her poop stands Henry Hudson, leaning against the tiller; beside him is a young man, his son; along the bulwark lounge the crew, half Englishmen, half Dutch; broad-beamed, salted tars, with pigtails and rugged visages, who are at home in Arctic fields and in ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... assembly.' Each watch falls in for inspection on its respective side of the deck—that is, the starboard watch on the right side, the port watch on the left. This being done, the band assembles on the poop, and the officers' call is sounded, in response to which they troop up from quarterdeck hatchways. "Attention!" shouts the instructor, at the same time saluting the inspecting officer. Every boy stands as erect as possible Then begins the inspection. ...
— From Lower Deck to Pulpit • Henry Cowling
... night in London he spent on board, and with pencil and paper sat down to work out the position of the Golden Cloud. He pictured her with snowy pinions outspread, passing down Channel. He pictured Poppy sitting on the poop in a deck-chair and Flower coming as near as his work would allow, exchanging glances with her. Then he went up on deck, and, lighting his pipe, thought of that never-to-be-forgotten night when Poppy had ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs
... flags and in flashing the electric light. He was unable to sleep and passed most of the night on deck with the sentries. It was noticed that he begged permission to "monkey" with the electric-light signalling apparatus aft on the poop. When we began the sail drill the following day, the attention of every man on the ship was focused on the captain of the foretop, and at the order—"Away aloft!" he sprang at the rigging like a cat. We stood from under. There was a breathless hush as the second order was given—"Bear out on the ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine
... throats, and in less than a minute the engines were silent, the vessel moving only with its headway. Then, with a blast of steam, they were reversed. Meanwhile, the after part of the hurricane deck, and the poop of the second saloon, were packed with eager souls scanning the surface of the water in the hope of catching sight ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... next morning Jack found himself alongside the Wild Wave, a fine barque-rigged ship of about eight hundred and fifty tons. A number of riggers were at work on board, and Captain Murchison was on the poop talking to an officer, whom Jack at once guessed ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... cabin and returned with binoculars. The men foregathered curiously about him as he scanned the vessel. He ran his eyes over the tub from stem to poop. She stood out with absolute distinctness in the glaring light. He could see her high prow, the swinging buffers along her side, the wide-mouthed ventilators. He could even make out her name in rusty letters under the wheel-house. Her small boats ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... for fresh meat and vegetables. They came back with their boats loaded, and the prospect seemed a little less gloomy. Suddenly, as the Duke and a group of officers were watching the English fleet from the San Martin's poop deck, a small smart pinnace, carrying a gun in her bow, shot out from Howard's lines, bore down on the San Martin, sailed round her, sending in a shot or two as she passed, and went off unhurt. The Spanish officers could not help admiring ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude
... wrapped in his confused thoughts. Then she flew to help Milo with his new engine of war which was to decide the day. From a corner of the apartment the giant dragged a brass culverin, mounted on a swivel, stolen from the poop-rail of some tall Indiaman in years gone by. This was charged with powder, and Milo searched for effective missiles for it. He brought a handful of musket balls to Dolores; she shook her head decidedly after a moment's ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... principle, and always poor. His red, pimply nose is an everlasting joke with sir John and others. Sir John in allusion thereto calls Bardolph "The Knight of the Burning Lamp." He says to him, "Thou art our admiral, and bearest the lantern in the poop." Elsewhere he tells the corporal he had saved him a "thousand marks in links and torches, walking with him in the ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... all morning from the window of our bedroom. I have seldom looked on the east-end of a church with more complete sympathy. As it flanges out in three wide terraces and settles down broadly on the earth, it looks like the poop of some great old battle-ship. Hollow-backed buttresses carry vases, which figure for the stern lanterns. There is a roll in the ground, and the towers just appear above the pitch of the roof, as though ...
— An Inland Voyage • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the pike pole again, cautiously hooked the barb into the dead man's clothing, and, assisted by the men, pulled him aft to the poop, where the professor had preceded, and was examining his ankle. There was a big, red wale around it, in the middle of which was a huge blood blister. He pricked it with his knife, then rearranged his stocking and joined us as ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... at once pulled up their lines, and took to the oars, and in a few minutes they were alongside the ship, and an officer leant over the side of the poop, and asked ...
— The Flemmings And "Flash Harry" Of Savait - From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other - Stories" - 1902 • Louis Becke
... the present day, like the mahaila and the goufa, is very much unchanged like everything else, and tells us faithfully what sort of ships there were in these waters some two thousand years ago or more. If this surmise be a correct one, then we can trace the poop tower of the Great Harry and the square windows and super-imposed galleries of the Victory's stern to this common ancestor. I wish I had been able to get an elevation of the details of one of these more ornate sterns. It would be interesting ...
— A Dweller in Mesopotamia - Being the Adventures of an Official Artist in the Garden of Eden • Donald Maxwell
... again, and four days elapsed before any Danish galleys were seen. At the end of that time six large Danish war-ships were perceived in the distance. Edmund and Egbert from the top of the lofty poop watched them coming. ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... the tears, groans, and perfumed handkerchiefs of the surrounding multitude; so heart-rending were our adieux, that three officers of the guards, overcome by the afflicting crisis, went into strong hysterics, and were obliged to have their stay-laces cut. Standing on the poop of the vessel with a white handkerchief in one glove, and a bottle of Eau de Cologne in the other, we waved farewell to our friends, and, as the last vestige of their whiskers disappeared from our sight, a sad presentiment filled our minds that it was for ever. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, No. - 287, December 15, 1827 • Various
... other side, about the break of the poop, some half a fathom of rope ladder trailed over the rail, and by this we ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... she was not, but Maitre Ranulph said "Pardi, I ought to know, Jean. Ship-building is my trade, to say nothing of guns—I wasn't two years in the artillery for nothing. See the low bowsprit and the high poop. She's bearing this way. She'll be ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... rudeness anywhere; then, as in a bear-garden," &c. The body of the house, according to Malone, was formerly lighted "by cressets or large open lanthorns of nearly the same size with those which are fixed in the poop of a ship." ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... through the water with just motion enough to tell us that the pulse of the great sea is beating. The temperature of the air is high, but the day is somewhat cloudy, and the sails throw a shadow on the deck. The only thing I regret is, that having no poop, the high bulwarks close us in and shut out both the air and prospect. One can only get these by climbing up on a sort of standing-place on the side.... Our departure from Singapore was very striking.... Not only were all the troops and volunteers under ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... imagination. For three nights, and three days that were as black as the nights, the water logged Sea Venture was scarcely kept afloat by bailing. We have a vivid picture of the stanch Somers sitting upon the poop of the ship, where he sat three days and three nights together, without much meat and little or no sleep, conning the ship to keep her as upright as he could, until he happily descried land. The ship went ashore and was wedged into the rocks so fast that ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... gaily-painted old rowboats were set about, half filled with loam in which fuchsias, geraniums, and mignonettes were flowering. A cat or two dozed upon the window-sills in the sun. Upon a sort of porch overhead, two of the crew paced up and down in a manner that at once suggested the poop. Here and there was a gleam of highly polished red copper or brass trimmings. The bay was within two steps of the front door, while a little further down the beach was the house where the surf-boat was kept, and the long runway leading down ...
— Blix • Frank Norris
... arranging them in my cabin filled up the remainder of the evening, save the time devoted to a couple of meditative pipes. The emigrants went to bed, and when, at about ten o'clock, I went up for a little time upon the poop, I heard no sound save the clanging of the clocks from the various churches of Gravesend, the pattering of rain upon the decks, and the rushing of the river as it gurgled against the ...
— A First Year in Canterbury Settlement • Samuel Butler
... the poop, and he overlooked the length of the ship. The brig Cohasset was before his eyes, as much of her as was above water. But, as a matter of fact, and as he was later informed, he did not look upon a brig at all; the Cohasset was a brig only by virtue ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... starting-point, a rock rose amid the restless waters. The galleys were to round this rock, on which AEneas had planted an oak-tree as a mark, and then return to the shore. The vessels were assigned their places by lot, and the captain of each took his place on the poop; while the rowers, stripped to the waist, their shoulders glistening with oil, sat with their arms stretched to the oars, eager for the signal. At the blast of a trumpet all the oars struck the sea at once, and beat it into foam, ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various
... boundless congregation, in the sweep of a strong oceanic current. I could hear it, in my slumbrous lassitude, struggling and gurgling at the tied rudder, and making wet sloppy noises under the sheer of the poop; and I was aware that the Speranza was gliding along pretty fast, drawn into that procession, probably at the rate of four to six knots: but I did not care, knowing very well that no land was within two hundred ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... decent middle-aged father who had come early with his boy to see him off, and stays all the morning, because he is interested in the windlass apparently, and stays too long, and has got to scramble ashore at last with no time at all to say good-bye. The mud pilot on the poop sings out to me in a drawl, "Hold her with the check line for a moment, Mister Mate. There's a gentleman wants to get ashore. . . . Up with you, sir. Nearly got carried off to Talcahuano, didn't you? Now's your time; easy does it. . . . All right. Slack away again forward there." The tugs, smoking ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... this fine, wholesome old ship with her two hundred passengers, her crew of thirty, and her valuable cargo. At all events, that was the condition of mind in which I found myself as I paced the spacious poop, hour after hour, sometimes accompanied by Polson, sometimes conversing with Tudsbery, and occasionally alone. As I walked, my glances travelled, with the regularity of clockwork, first to windward, then ahead, then aloft, and finally—as I reached the binnacle—into the compass bowl; then away ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... battlements of St. Elmo, you alight upon the deck of our ship, which you find to be white and clean, and, as seamen say, sheer—that is to say, without break, poop, or hurricane-house—forming on each side of the line of masts a smooth, unencumbered plane the entire length of the deck, inclining with a gentle curve from the bow and stern toward the waist. The ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... though not scientifically built for sailing, was admirably constructed for going ashore, with her extravagant poop that caught the wind, and her lines like a cocked hat reversed. To those on the beach that battered labouring frame of wood seemed alive, and struggling against death with a panting heart. But could they have been transferred to her deck they would have seen she had not ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... week passed, and one morning found George Dorety standing in the coach-house companionway at the for'ard end of the long poop, taking his first gaze around the deck. The Mary Rogers was reaching full-and-by, in a stiff breeze. Every sail was set and drawing, including the staysails. Captain Cullen strolled for'ard along the poop. He strolled carelessly, glancing at ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London
... pressure would be severest. In the after-hold these beams had to be raised a little to give room for the engine. The upper deck aft, therefore, was somewhat higher than the main deck, and the ship had a poop or half-deck, under which were the cabins for all the members of the expedition, and also the cooking-galley. Strong iron riders were worked in for the whole length of the ship in the spaces between the beams, extending in one ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... little ship, being a perfect model of an Elizabethan ship, built up high at bow and stern, "for," as Sebastian explained, "majesty and terror of the enemy", and with deck and orlop, waist and poop, hold and masts—all complete with forecastle and cabin, masts and spars, port-holes and guns, sails, anchor, and carved figure-head. The woodwork was painted in white and green and red, and at bow and stern was richly carved ...
— Harding's luck • E. [Edith] Nesbit
... sharpshooters ashore. During the day, after burying the dead, the Valley City dropped down below the fleet to arrange on her bows another torpedo-fender. About 2:20 p.m. we heard loud whistling from steam launch No. 5, which was bringing up the mail from Plymouth. I was standing on the poop-deck, and through the bushes on the flat on the inside of the bend I saw a regiment of rebels running towards the launch, at the same time keeping up a rapid fire at her. The Valley City dropped her torpedo-fender, steamed down, and after firing a few shots of grape at the rebels, they retreated. ...
— Reminiscences of Two Years in the United States Navy • John M. Batten
... to be launched, he found her with the keel set upon great planks of timber, the ship tied upright with cables, as if she were swimming; the planks upon which she stood lay shelving towards the water, and were all thick daubed with grease all along from the poop of the ship, and under her keel, to the water's side, which was within the ship's length of her head, and there the water was very deep. One strong cable held the ship from moving; and she lying thus shelving upon the planks, the cable which held her from ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke
... nigh empty by tomorrow night," Captain Martin said, as he led the way to his cabin in the poop. "The men have been working faster than usual, for it generally takes us three days ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... fond of Watson as I am of your own dear self." In his report of the battle of Mobile Bay, where Watson was wounded, Farragut wrote: "Lieutenant Watson has been brought to your attention in former times. He was on the poop attending to the signals and performed his duty, as might be expected, thoroughly. He is a scion worthy of the noble stock he springs from, and I ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... pondering the mystery that confronts all mankind in their first adventure in fatherhood. Would it be a boy or a girl? He was expressing to himself for perhaps the thousandth time the hope that it would be a boy, when from the poop he saw something he ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... ship pitching as you never saw a ship pitch—bowsprit under water. By two o'clock a gale came on; all ordered below. Captain left dinner, and, about six, a sea struck us on the weather side, and washed a good many unconsidered trifles overboard, and stove in three windows on the poop; nurse and four children in fits; Mrs. T- and babies afloat, but good- humoured as usual. Army-surgeon and I picked up children and bullied nurse, and helped to bale cabin. Cuddy window stove in, and we were wetted. Went to bed at nine; ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon
... her seamen paid no heed To what was called: they stood, a sullen group, Smoking and spitting, careless of her need, Mocking the orders given from the poop. ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... wild, sinister appeal for help, the voice of the disabled vessel proclaiming her need; and the answer seemed to come in a fiercer shriek of the gale, while the added fury of the blast brought a curling sea over the poop. The Kansas staggered and shook herself clear. The wave smashed its way onward; several iron stanchions snapped with reports like pistol-shots, and there was an intolerable rending of woodwork. But, whatever the damage, the powerful ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... before the poison gets hold of me! Soon it will be too late. . . . The evening before we sailed from Dunquerque, we were anchored out in the tide. It was my watch. I was leaning on the rail of the poop when I caught sight of her first. She was running for her life across the dunes—running for the waterside—she and her hound beside her. Away behind her, like ants dotted over the rises of the sand, were little figures running and pursuing. Down by the waterside one boat was waiting, ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... and then the thin embroideries that covered her neck and bosom rose and fell with a long, satisfied sigh. He rose to his feet and slowly paced the marble floor, up and down before her, as he would have paced the little poop-deck ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford |
