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Mizzen   Listen
Mizzen

noun
1.
Third mast from the bow in a vessel having three or more masts; the after and shorter mast of a yawl, ketch, or dandy.  Synonyms: mizen, mizenmast, mizzenmast.
2.
Fore-and-aft sail set on the mizzenmast.  Synonym: mizen.



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"Mizzen" Quotes from Famous Books



... mile, a third and larger vessel came sweeping into view, her two rows of ports showing her to be a line-of-battle ship. Barely was she clear of the land when a string of small flags broke out from her mizzen rigging, and almost as if by magic, the yard arms of all three vessels were alive with men, and royals, top gallants, and mainsails with machine-like precision were dewed up and furled, and each ship, stripped of all but its topsails, ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford

... see, father," Geoffrey said triumphantly; "she carries a big mizzen sail. That's what she is, you see; and he is going to show us London, and will take great care of us if you will let ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty

... commoner, made himself one of the passengers at once; but Byron held himself aloof, and sat on the rail, leaning on the mizzen shrouds, inhaling, as it were, poetical sympathy, from the gloomy Rock, then dark and stern in the twilight. There was in all about him that evening much waywardness; he spoke petulantly to Fletcher, his valet; and was evidently ill at ease ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt

... and Izzard, as well as the worse forms Zad and Uzzard, are now fairly superseded by the softer and better term Zee; and whoever will spell aloud, with each of these names, a few such words as dizzy, mizzen, gizzard, may easily perceive why none of the former can ever be brought again into use. The other two, Iz and Izzet, being localisms, and not authorized English, I give up all six; Zed to the French, and ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... extraordinary way, and feathers fixed in their heads. Although they appeared friendly, it was impossible to persuade any of them to come on board. However, as the vessels had cast anchor, the captain had the sails furled, took in the topmasts, and unrigged the mizzen mast of the Resolution, in order to allow of repairs. Barter with the Indians soon commenced, and the most rigorous honesty prevailed. The objects offered were bear and wolf skins, and those of foxes, deers, and polecats, weasels, and especially otters, ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne

... clewed up, Newman and I were ordered aloft on the mizzen. The stiffs were useless aloft on such a night, and the fore and main were given the handful of squareheads and ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer

... through the white cloud of smoke the musket-balls, and the still deadlier clothyard arrows, whistled and rushed upon their venomous errand. Down went the steersman, and every soul who manned the poop. Down went the mizzen topmast, in went the stern windows and quarter galleries; and as the smoke cleared away, the gorgeous painting of the Madre Dolorosa, with her heart full of seven swords, which, in a gilded frame, bedizened the Spanish stern, was shivered in splinters; while, most glorious ...
— The Junior Classics • Various

... Pomery found plenty of Water in the winding channel, every curve of which he knew to a hair, and steered for at its due moment, winking cheerfully at Billy and me, who stood ready to correct his pilotage. He had taken in his mainsail, and carried steerage way with mizzen and jib only; and thus, for close upon a mile, we rode up on the tide, scaring the herons and curlews before us, until drawing within sight of a grass-grown quay he let run down his remaining canvas and laid the ketch alongside, so gently that one of the seamen, who had cast a stout fender ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... kill the captain,' replied the wretch, 'and put his head at the main topgallant masthead—and we will put the first-mate's head at the mizzen, and the boatswain's at the fore. The other convicts who are not with us in the matter we shall put on shore at some island, and leave them to shift for themselves, they are worth nothing. The ship is a good ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton

... we were very greatly excited, and stood upon the thwarts that we might get better view of her. Thus I saw her a great way in from the edge of the weed, and I noted that her foremast was gone near to the deck, and she had no main topmast; though, strangely enough, her mizzen stood unharmed. And beyond this, I could make out but little, because of the distance; though the sun, which was upon our larboard side, gave me some sight of her hull, but not much, because of the weed in which she was deeply embedded; yet it seemed to me that ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson

... commander of a fleet, of which there are in Britain three grades—admirals, vice-admirals, and rear-admirals, the first displaying his flag on the main mast, the second on the fore, and the third on the mizzen. ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... coming on, with a strong tide and heavy swell against us, we drifted fast to leeward, and the weather being hazy, we soon lost sight of the ship. Struck our masts, and endeavored to pull; finding our efforts useless, set a reefed foresail and mizzen, and stood towards a country-ship at anchor under the land to leeward of Cabaretta-Point. When within a quarter of a mile of her she weighed and made sail, leaving us in a very critical situation, having no anchor, and drifting bodily on the rocks to leeward. ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various

... considerable part of her battery. Under these circumstances, it was the duty of the Dorsetshire, as it was the opportunity of her commander, by attacking the Hercules, to second, and support, the engaged ship; but she continued aloof. After two hours—by 3 P.M.—the main and mizzen masts were cut out of the Marlborough, and she lost her captain with forty-two men killed, and one hundred and twenty wounded, out of a crew of seven hundred and fifty. Thus disabled, the sails on the foremast turned her head towards the enemy, and ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan

... get across. We don't often let ourselves be weather bound, and I am not going to begin it today. We had better house the topmast at once, and get two reefs in the mainsail. We can get the other down when we get clear of the island. Get number three jib up, and the leg of mutton mizzen; put two reefs ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty

... power to fulfil his other prediction, by keeping Hotham in hot water during the winter. In the middle of November the "Agamemnon" had to go to Leghorn for extensive repairs, and remained there, shifting her main and mizzen masts, until the 21st of December. Nelson, who had endured with unyielding cheerfulness the dangers, exposure, and sickliness of Calvi, found himself unable to bear patiently the comfort of quiet nights in a friendly port, while hot work might chance outside. "Lying in port is misery to me. ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan

... about 5 A.M., came in a ship from Marblehead bound to S'o Carolina. She had lost her main mast, mizzen mast, & fore topmast. In Latitude 35 she met with a hard gale of wind which caused the disaster, and obliged her to put in to New York to refit. About 11 o'clock the Humming Bird weighed anchor for Philadelphia ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various

... charge. The unknown knight was so sensible of the seasonable interposition, that, riding up to our hero, "Brother," said he, "this is the second time you have holp me off, when I was bump ashore.—Bess Mizzen, I must say, is no more than a leaky bum-boat, in comparison of the glorious galley you want to man. I desire that henceforth we may cruise in the same latitudes, brother; and I'll be d—ned if I don't stand by you as long ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett

... "Guerriere," within pistol-shot, at 6 P.M., when the battle proper fairly began (3). For the moment manoeuvring ceased, and a square set-to at the guns followed, the ships running side by side. In twenty minutes the "Guerriere's" mizzen-mast[428] was shot away, falling overboard on the starboard side; while at nearly the same moment, so Hull reported, her main-yard went in the slings.[429] This double accident reduced her speed; but in addition the mast with all its hamper, dragging in the ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan

... likewise at Sea, and sawe no land: and the 16. day towards night, we looked for land, but we sawe none. But because we supposed our selues to be neere our port, we tooke in all our sailes except onely the foresaile and the mizzen, and so we remained all ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, - and Discoveries of The English Nation, Volume 9 - Asia, Part 2 • Richard Hakluyt

... vessel was a converted whaler, it had never fixed itself in his mind that the Bear was a sailing vessel with auxiliary steam, and that she was handled as a sailing vessel. Barkentine-rigged, with square sails on the foremast and fore-and-aft rig on her main and mizzen, Eric found later by experience that her sailing powers were first-class. His delight in the handling of the ship added to his popularity with his brother officers, all of whom, as older men, had been trained ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... coaster running in for shelter had crashed through a schooner at anchor, and one of the ship's instructors had seen the accident. A mob of boys clambered on the rails, clustered round the davits. 'Collision. Just ahead of us. Mr. Symons saw it.' A push made him stagger against the mizzen-mast, and he caught hold of a rope. The old training-ship chained to her moorings quivered all over, bowing gently head to wind, and with her scanty rigging humming in a deep bass the breathless song of her youth at sea. 'Lower away!' He saw the boat, manned, drop swiftly ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad

... For, by one o'clock p. m. the wind, which was at N.W., blew with such strength as obliged us to take in all our sails, to strike top-gallant-masts, and to get the spritsail-yard in. And I thought proper to wear, and lie-to, under a mizzen-stay-sail, with the ships' heads to the N.E. as they would bow the sea, which ran prodigiously ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr

... I found the ship driving fast down Channel, making an excellent passage. I took up my place by the mizzen-rigging, near which there were no seamen at work, so that I could puzzle out a new hiding-place for my letters. I noticed, as I stood there, that some men were getting a boat over the side. It seemed a queer thing to be doing in the Channel, so far from the port to which ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield

... still held on, however, and we saw no signs of its abating. The rigging was found to be ill-fitted, and greatly strained; and on the third day of the blow, about five in the afternoon, our mizzen-mast, in a heavy lurch to windward, went by the board. For an hour or more, we tried in vain to get rid of it, on account of the prodigious rolling of the ship; and, before we had succeeded, the carpenter came aft and announced four ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne

... the intervening space. Many still remained on board; more ropes were hove to them; of these several were officers. Warned by the fate of those who had failed to leap on board the Tornado, each of them, as he caught a rope, secured it round his waist; some springing into the main, others into the mizzen-rigging, thus attaining a greater height. Among them Jack observed one who wore a naval uniform, though he had as yet been unable to ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston

... possibly have been the one Cook encountered on the 28th off the north end of the island. They were blown out of sight of land on the 13th, the main topsail being split, and next day both fore and mizzen topsails were lost, but they managed to bring up under shelter of a small island off Knuckle Point. On the 15th the latitude was found to be 34 degrees 6 minutes South, with land visible to the south-west, and a ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson

... died of fever in the Levant, and of course he got the step, though all too young for the responsibility. We had met with some bad weather when south of Malta, and had had a heavy gale for three days, during which time we lost our main topmast, and badly strained the mizzen. The weather abated when we were off Pantellaria, which is a bare rock rising like a mountain peak out of the sea, and with only one place where a landing can be safely effected. As the gale had blown itself out, and it was likely we should have a spell of settled weather, I decided ...
— When London Burned • G. A. Henty

... to Bulger's. It had just been reloaded. He bade the gun captain, in a low tone, to move aside. Then, with a glance to see that the priming was in order, he took careful sight, and waiting until the grab's main, mizzen and foremasts opened to view altogether, he applied the match. The shot sped true, and a second later the grab's mainmast, with sails and rigging, went ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang

... of that day, a sailor at work on the mizzen-topsail yard of an English ship moored within the distance of a cable's length from the Dolphin, accidentally fell from the yard. As he fell he caught hold of the main brace, and was suspended for a minute over the water. There was quite a ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper

... the main and mizzen sheets!" ordered the captain, to bring the yacht round and get a leeward launch for Nos. ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg

... Flag—first, because the Alfred was in the port of Philadelphia, and we find from the record (American Archives, Vol. IV, page 179) that the day signal of the fleets on February 17, 1776, at the Capes of the Delaware were to be made by using the "Grand Union Flag at the mizzen peak," which was to be lowered or hoisted according to the information intended to be given under the code ...
— The True Story of the American Flag • John H. Fow

... shove off. The necessity for prompt obedience and exertion was urgent. The flames had now gained the lower rigging, and ascended to the tops; they darted furiously from the ports, flashing from the quarter gallery round the mizzen of the Intrepid, as her stern dropped clear of the ship. To estimate the perils of their position, it should be borne in mind, that the fire had been communicated by these fearless men to the near neighborhood of both magazines of the ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin

... whither our bowsprit pointed, a white-sailed clipper grew larger as we approached her. The Danish ensign flew at her mizzen; the familiar signal for a pilot streamed from her fore peak. My heart beat quicker, telling me who was aboard this fair vessel as nearer and nearer we drew. Now we could distinguish the tiny figures moving about her yards, ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton

... had a beautiful day and have been going slowly along and expect to be in the Cove of Cork by daylight in the morning. The deck of our ship presents a curious appearance just now; Between the main and mizzen masts is an immense coil of one hundred and thirty miles of the cable, the rest is in larger coils below decks. Abaft the mizzen mast is a ponderous mass of machinery for regulating the paying out of the cable, a steam-engine and boiler complete, and they have just been testing ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse

... favoring wind leave the craft. Where the dead whale lay seemed to be a belt of calm between the bark and the coming tornado. And this craft in which my hope was set was really a bark, by the way; I do not use the word poetically. Her fore and mainmasts were square rigged while her mizzen mast was rigged fore and aft like my ...
— Swept Out to Sea - Clint Webb Among the Whalers • W. Bertram Foster

... two miles distant, the stranger slackened sail and hove to, hoisting stars and stripes at her mizzen. The union jack went up the shrouds of the Springbok directly, and she pursued her course, ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade

... increased, and the seas rose up on either side as if they would overwhelm her. The night was coming on. The captain held a consultation with his mates. The first mate and one of the best hands went to the helm. The main and mizzen-topsails were furled, the helm was put up, and the ship was kept away before the wind. The huge seas followed close astern, roaring and hissing after us. Arthur and I had remained ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston

... of the cabin. O'Brien, the boy, who was only fifteen, took turns with Mahoney on the freezing perch. It was the boy, at three in the afternoon, who called down that he had sighted a sail. This did bring them from the cabin, and they crowded the poop rail and weather mizzen shrouds as they watched the strange ship. But its course did not lie near, and when it disappeared below the skyline, they returned shivering to the cabin, not one offering to relieve the watch ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London

... prolongation of the whole dark mass toward the heavens had a portentous look to those who gazed from below; and when the denser fog sometimes furled itself away from the topgallant masts, hitherto invisible, and showed them rising loftier yet, and the tricolor at the mizzen-mast-head looking down as if from the zenith, then they all seemed to appertain to something of more than human workmanship; a hundred wild tales of phantom vessels came up to the imagination, and it was as if that one gigantic ...
— Malbone - An Oldport Romance • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

... had reached the surface we could see the other vessel steaming towards us. A low boom greeted the Nautilus as its upper part showed above the water. Ned Land, aflame once more with hope of escape, made out the vessel to be a two-decker ram, but she showed no flag at her mizzen. It seemed for a moment there might just be some chance of escape for us three prisoners, and Ned declared he would jump into the sea if the man-o'-war came within a mile of us. Just then another gun boomed out. She ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... the Line, at four in the morning, is a fine time to see the stars, if one be but properly awake. Overhead, Orion has reached his height, and is now striding towards the western horizon. The Dog-star is high over the mizzen truck, and Canopus, clear of the weather backstays, is a friend to a drowsy helmsman. The Southern Cross is clearing the sea-line, and above it many-eyed Argus keeps watch over the Pole. Old friends, all of them, companions ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone

... a few ratlines in the mizzen rigging, and looked to windward, laughing all the time: but, all of a sudden, there was a great change in his manner. "Good ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade

... they descended. The first had her wheel carried away, and her hull much damaged, but escaped with the loss of only three men. A stone shot penetrated the second, between the poop and quarter deck, badly injured the mizzen-mast, carried away the wheel, and did other serious damage, killing and wounding twenty men. Two shot struck the third, carrying away her shrouds and injuring her masts; loss in killed and wounded, thirty. The fourth had her mainmast destroyed, ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck

... twenty-six feet long and eight feet beam. She was very deep, and carried three tons of stone ballast in her bottom. She drew about six feet of water. She had a lot of freeboard, and carried two lug-sails and a small mizzen. ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty

... account. Ship springing a-leak; men at the pumps; boats given up to the women and children. The good ship—well, never mind the name of ship; have forgotten it—lurches, gives one long roll, and sinks! Remaining passengers, headed by myself, swarm up the rigging to the mizzen-top. High sea, thunder and lightning. Great privations. Sun sinks in red, moon rises in green. All hope gone, when—hurrah, a sail! It is the life-boat! Slung on board by ropes. Rockets and coloured lights let off. The coxswain calls ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, May 3, 1890. • Various

... was worth moving, we very imprudently set her on fire before she was clear of the ship's side; and as we were on a wind, it was some minutes before we could get her clear. In the meantime the fire began to blaze up in a very alarming manner under the mizzen chains, where, by the attraction of the two floating bodies, she seemed resolved to continue; but on our putting the helm up, and giving the vessel a sheer the contrary way, as soon as we were before the wind, she parted from us, to our great joy, and was soon in a volume of flame. Our reason for ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat

... the mids; some of them began spinning tough yarns respecting the hardships of a sea life—what a horrible bore it was to keep night watches, or any watch at all, and you are sure, said one of them, to catch the fever and ague after you have been four hours walking under the draught of the mizzen stay-sail; and, added another, to be mast-headed for three hours with your face to windward by those tyrants, the second and third lieutenants. They both ought to be turned out of the Service for tyranny and oppression, and as to the last ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman

... too late, for the vessel had taken the ground, which evidently shoaled up with great abruptness. Her fore, main, and mizzen topmasts snapped like carrots with the sudden check to her speed, and came tumbling down with their attendant wreckage, thus adding to the already great confusion on deck, and, what was worse, killing two men, whom they could ill spare, and ...
— Across the Spanish Main - A Tale of the Sea in the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood

... weather, all their mischances were speedily rectified. In a heavy sea, all their unstable cargo surged about as though it had been liquid, but it always shifted back again before she quite capsized. The mizzen-mast went bodily overboard in one black rain-squall because they were too short-handed to get sail off it in time, but they found that the vessel sailed almost as well as a brig, and was much easier for ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne

... warrant of the navy of France was signed and sealed by the fight of Trafalgar. In the heat of the action, a ball, fired from the mizzen-top of the Redoubtable, struck Admiral Nelson on the left shoulder, when he instantly fell. "They have done for me, at last, Hardy," said he, ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park

... his flagship his broad pennant was flung to the breeze from the mainmast-head, the fleur-de-lis of France floated proudly from the mizzen, and amid the booming of cannon and the loud acclamations of the throngs assembled on the quay to bid them Godspeed, the ships moved slowly down the harbor towards the broad ocean and the ...
— The Flamingo Feather • Kirk Munroe

... white flag, inscribed with the words: 'Sailors' Rights and Free Trade,' with the idea, perhaps, that this favourite American motto would damp the energy of the 'Shannon's' men. The 'Shannon' had a Union Jack at the fore, an old rusty blue ensign at the mizzen peak, and two other flags rolled up, ready to be spread if either of these should be shot away. She stood much in need of paint, and her outward appearance hardly inspired much belief in the order and discipline ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang

... of her deck. I recognised her at once as being the same three-masted barque which I had observed in the Channel in the morning, and the Union Jack which was nailed upside down to the jagged slump of her mizzen proclaimed ...
— The Mystery of Cloomber • Arthur Conan Doyle



Words linked to "Mizzen" :   mizzenmast, mizenmast, mizzen course, mizen, fore-and-aft sail, mast



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