"Boatswain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... officers of the ship, whether I might not have the liberty to send a letter on shore, to let my friends know where the ship lay, and to get some necessary things sent to me. This was, it seems, the boatswain, a very civil, courteous sort of man, who told me I should have that, or any other liberty that I desired, that he could allow me with safety. I told him I desired no other; and he answered that the ship's boat would ...
— The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c. • Daniel Defoe
... and carried off the arm of another of our men. The Hosiander[81] spent the whole of this day in firing against one of the ships that was aground, and received many shots from the enemy, one of which killed Richard Barker the boatswain. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr
... mate and carpenter were owners of the vessel. The crew of a boatswain and four picked men received food, mostly dried fish, but no wages. They were entitled to a certain share of the profits of the voyage, and thus were interested in its success, and on very different terms of intimacy with the captain to ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... of Jehu waited till he vanished in the darkness. Then putting the hollow of a key to his lips, he drew a long trembling sound from it like a boatswain's whistle. ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... his art, for instance. To say that the boy was consummate in the limited way of a ship's cook does not overstate his effectiveness. He did unheard-of things—even fruit and berry-pies, from preserves two years, at least, remote from vine and orchard. The two mates and boatswain, who also messed aft, bolted without speech, but marvelled between meals. To these three, the tension of the Captain's embarrassment became insupportable, beyond four or five minutes; so that Carreras, a discriminating, though not a valiant trencherman, was always the ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... duty; for every thing in a vessel of this description depends upon obedience; and to you, Captain Toplift, I have also advice to give, which is—to shoot the first man who behaves as that scoundrel did who is now in irons. Boatswain! ...
— The Privateer's-Man - One hundred Years Ago • Frederick Marryat
... for the Trial Rocks. Anchorage in Goose-Island Bay. Interment of the boatswain, and sickly state of the ship's company. Escape from the bay, and passage through Bass' Strait. Arrival at Port Jackson. Losses in men. Survey and condemnation of the ship. Plans for continuing the survey; but preparation finally made for returning ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... Joseph Porter, K.C.B. First Lord of the Admiralty. Captain Corcoran Commanding H.M.S. Pinafore. Ralph Rackstraw Able seaman. Dick Deadeye Able seaman. Bill Bobstay Boatswain's mate. Bob Becket Carpenter's mate. Tom Tucker Midshipmate. Sergeant of marines Josephine The Captain's daughter. Hebe Sir Joseph's first cousin. Little Buttercup A Portsmouth bumboat woman. First Lord's sisters, his cousins, his aunts, ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon
... sustained by each ship was severe. The Caesar had her master, Mr. William Grave, six seamen, and two marines, killed; her boatswain, G.W. Forster, seventeen seamen, one boy, and six marines, wounded; besides the capture of Lieutenant Janvarin, a volunteer, Mr. Richard Best, and seven seamen, who were taken by boarding the Hannibal when in possession of the enemy. Her masts, ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez, Vol. I • Sir John Ross
... The burly boatswain swung his way out of the crowd, planted his foot on the first step of the poop-ladder, and ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... smuggler who had sung of Captain Glen was the only occupant of the room when we entered: he sat half asleep in his chest, still clutching his pannikin, still muttering about the boatswain. He was an Italian by birth, so Marah told me. He was known as Gateo. When he was sober he was a good seaman, but when he was drunk he would do nothing but sing of Captain Glen until he dropped off to sleep. He had served in the Navy, Marah told ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... lowered, and several of us rowed about to look at the Hampshire from a little distance, while some bathed in a tropical sea. There was no danger of sharks, which keep away when several bathe together, or even one, if he splashes about enough. The boatswain caught a turtle, from which we had some capital soup. Turtles are very tenacious of life. A knife was thrust into its throat, and its jugular vein severed, but if it had not been cut up soon after it would have lived many hours. Indeed, the heart alone kept beating ...
— Six Letters From the Colonies • Robert Seaton
... himself. It was too dark to distinguish faces, and to one who had never been on board of a ship, too dark to move, so Jack stood where he was, which was not far from the main bitts; but he did not stay long; the boat had been hooked on to the quarter davits, and the boatswain had called ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... crowd that assembled on the wharf, a crowd content to wait an hour or more without a murmur after the ship had dropped anchor in midstream for the captain's gig to be lowered from the davits. The shrill falsetto of the boatswain's whistle suddenly informed those on shore of what was taking place on the starboard side, and in a few minutes the gig came sweeping across the blue water, with James Dutton seated in the stern-sheets and looking very pale. He sat there, ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... that while my Lords Douglas and Middleton do ride up and down upon single horses, my Lord Brouncker do go up and down with his hackney coach and six horses at the King's charge, and is not able to do so much good as a good boatswain ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... looked up to; the while his manners were not distinguished, and scarcely could be called polite, when a supper required to be paid for. In derision of this, and of his desire for mastery, they had taken to call him "Boatswain Jack," or "John Boatswain," and provoked him by a subscription to present him with a pig-whistle. For these were men who liked well enough to receive hard words from their betters who were masters of their ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... the house, Mrs. Eury, some natives sighted the two vessels to the north-east and I sent the boatswain and four men off in one of the whale-boats, little thinking that I was sending them to their death. Four canoes went with the boat. Just now two of the canoes came back with half of their number dead or wounded, ...
— "Old Mary" - 1901 • Louis Becke
... expedition should be carried out, offered to Captain Vila of the San Carlos sixteen men of his command to work the ship, that he might pursue the voyage to Monterey. As Vila had lost all his ship's officers, boatswain, storekeeper, coxswain of the launch, and there was not a sailor among the men offered by Portola, he declined to go to sea under such conditions. All the available sailors were therefore placed on board the San Antonio, ...
— The March of Portola - and, The Log of the San Carlos and Original Documents - Translated and Annotated • Zoeth S. Eldredge and E. J. Molera
... fond of this Life, and was resolved to be a compleat Sailor, which made him always one of the first on a Yard Arm, either to Hand or Reef, and very inquisitive in the different Methods of working a Ship: His Discourse was turn'd on no other Subject, and he would often get the Boatswain and Carpenter to teach him in their Cabbins the constituent Parts of a Ship's Hull, and how to rigg her, which he generously paid 'em for; and tho' he spent a great Part of his Time with these two Officers, yet he behaved himself with such Prudence that they never attempted at a Familiarity, ...
— Of Captain Mission • Daniel Defoe
... the boatswain of the NATURALISTE found this plate half buried in sand, lying near an oaken post to which it had been nailed. Captain Hamelin, with rare good taste, had a new post made, and the plate erected in the old spot. Another outward bound ship, the MAURITIUS, touched on the west coast ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... you got there, Ben?" asked Billy, pointing to the queer-looking boxes and packages the boatswain was carrying. ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... was the second lieutenant. Besides the master and two mates, there was an assistant-surveyor, the present Admiral Lort Stokes. There were also a surgeon, assistant-surgeon, two midshipmen, master's mate, a volunteer (1st class), purser, carpenter, clerk, boatswain, eight marines, thirty-four seamen, ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... lights at her mizen peak for him, and kept a sharp look out. But he did not come: he was having a very serious talk with the Chinese admiral; at daybreak, however, the gig was reported in sight: Sharpe told one of the midshipmen to call the boatswain and man the side. Soon the gig ran alongside; two of the ship's boys jumped like monkeys over the bulwarks, lighting, one on the main channels, the other on the midship port, and put the side ropes assiduously in the captain's hands; he bestowed a slight paternal smile on them, the first the ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... like this. At the time when we were to sail home in the brig from a town they called Halifax, we had to leave the boatswain behind in the hospital. So we had to engage an American instead. This new boatswain ...
— The Lady From The Sea • Henrik Ibsen
... hero only stayed his steps when he reached the brow of the great bluff of Palikaholo. The sea broke many hundred feet below where he stood. The gulls and screaming boatswain birds sailed in mid-air between his perch and the green waves. He looked up the coast to his right, and saw the lofty, wondrous sea columns of Honopu. He looked to the left, and beheld the crags of Kalulu, ...
— Hawaiian Folk Tales - A Collection of Native Legends • Various
... the ship was riding at anchor, but with insufficient slack-way, so in the afternoon, when the excitement had somewhat abated, Captain Bob decided to give the ship more chain, for a storm was imminent, and he gave the order accordingly. The boatswain, in his haste to execute the order, and overestimating the amount of chain in the locker, permitted all of it to run overboard. We were in a predicament, with the storm upon us, no anchor to hold the boat, and a savage, rocky shore on which we were in danger of being wrecked. There was ...
— A Negro Explorer at the North Pole • Matthew A. Henson
... the other being thirty-five tons, named the Moonshine, of Dartmouth. In the Sunshine we had twenty-three persons, whose names are these following: Master John Davis, captain; William Eston, master; Richard Pope, master's mate; John Jane, merchant; Henry Davie, gunner; William Crosse, boatswain; John Bagge, Walter Arthur, Luke Adams, Robert Coxworthie, John Ellis, John Kelly, Edward Helman, William Dicke, Andrew Maddocke, Thomas Hill, Robert Wats, carpenter, William Russell, Christopher Gorney, boy; James Cole, Francis ...
— Voyages in Search of the North-West Passage • Richard Hakluyt
... water, weighed anchor, ported her helm, ran up the jolly Roger, gave three times three, let the bullgine run, pushed off in their bumboat and put to sea to recover the main of America. Which was the occasion, says Mr Vincent, of the composing by a boatswain ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... found that he could not stand erect. It was his first experience of working aboard a ship, and he expected to find a scrupulous neatness, and hammocks in place of beds. Instead he looked on a double row of bunks heaped with swarthy quilts, and the boatswain with a silent gesture indicated that one of these belonged to Harrigan. He went to it without a word and sat down cross-legged to survey his new quarters. It was more like the bunkhouse of a western ranch than anything ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand
... two vessels, the Royal Sovereign and the Adventure, Captain Brand and Captain Malyoe swept the Mozambique Channel as clear as a boatswain's whistle, and after three years of piracy, having gained a great booty of gold and silver and pearls, sailed straight for the Americas, making first the island of Jamaica and the harbor of Port Royal, where they dropped anchor to wait ...
— Stolen Treasure • Howard Pyle
... large glistening fish, evidently, from its silvery skin, belonging to the mackerel family; and this so excited Ensign Long, who had been looking on rather contemptuously, that he borrowed a line of the boatswain, and was also soon at ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... quiet place, Devoted to a still and studious race, The noise was quite appalling! To seek a fitting simile, and spin it, Appropriate to his calling, His voice had all Lablache's body, in it; But oh! the scientific tone it lacked, And was in fact Only a forty-boatswain power of bawling! ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... over, and the negroes to tumble one against each other in the hold, the shrieks of the sufferers through the darkness of the night, rising above the noise of the winds and waves, seemed of all horrors in this unhappy vessel the saddest. Dysentery now attacked the crew, and the boatswain's mate died. We pass over the melancholy details of this miserable voyage, in which disgusts and distresses of every kind seemed to threaten all on board with death, every day bringing its mortality. At last on Sunday, May 28th, the welcome sight of Cape Agulhas cheered ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... message to the gun deck, were imperfectly heard; but, above all, leaders were wanting. There was not on the upper deck an officer above the grade of midshipman; captain, first lieutenant, master, marine officer, and even the boatswain, had been mortally wounded before the ships touched. The second lieutenant was in charge of the first gun division, at the far end of the deck below, as yet ignorant how the fight was going, and that the fate of his superiors had put him in command. Of the remaining lieutenants, also ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... the lads enjoy their summer vacation, radiant, happy, heedless of the future. Alas! it may yet overtake them soon enough! What care could contract their brow? Have they not fed for the day their rabbits, their pigeons, their guinea-pigs? Is not that faithful Newfoundland dog "Boatswain," who saved from drowning one of their school-mates, is he not as usual their companion on ship-board or ashore? There, now, they drop down the stream for a long day's cruise round the Island of Orleans. Next week, peradventure, you may hear of the Falcon ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... moment, as a boatswain's whistle shrilled close behind his ear, he was merely bewildered. He did not even know that the mouth sounding it was Mr. Jope's. It ought to have ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... boatswain's shrill pipe was heard, and a crowd of sturdy fellows in clean "whites" and bare feet came racing aft, and cleared away the wreck in a twinkling, not without a few rough-hewn jokes at "Yankee seamanship," which the ...
— Harper's Young People, May 4, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... Groups of black Coast Guardsmen, for example, were sent to the Pea Island Station after their recruit training for several weeks' training in beach duties. Similar groups of white recruits were also sent to the Pea Island Station for training under the black chief boatswain's mate in charge.[4-45] By August 1942 some three hundred Negroes had been recruited, trained, and assigned to general service duties under the new program. At the same time the Coast Guard continued to recruit hundreds of Negroes ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... related that night, on board Her Britannic Majesty's ship Coquette. The boatswain affirmed that, while piping below in order to overhaul the cables, he had heard a screaming in the air, that sounded as if a hundred devils were mocking him, and which he told the gunner, in confidence, he believed was no more than ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... Trigonometry." On the subject of the navy he wrote Robert Morris, at a later period: "The navy is in a wretched condition. It wants a man of ability at its head who could bring on a purgation, and distinguish between the abilities of a gentleman and those of a mere sailor or boatswain's mate." In still another letter: "If my feeble voice is heard when I return to Philadelphia, our navy matters will assume a better face." Again, as late as 1782, he wrote Captain O'Neill: "I am altogether in the dark about what has been done to reestablish the ...
— Paul Jones • Hutchins Hapgood
... the end of his days. I had forgotten Thompson completely, but he flashes before me as vividly as lightning. I can see him now. It was on the deck of the Batavia, in the dock. The ship was casting off, with that hubbub and confusion and rushing of sailors, and shouting of orders and shrieking of boatswain whistles, which marked the departure preparations in those days—an impressive contrast with the solemn silence which marks the departure preparations of the giant ships of the present day. Mrs. Clemens, Clara Spaulding, little Susy, and the nurse-maid were all properly garbed ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... came to this port. To this he answered, that the admirals of their Catholic majesties, one of whom he was, were not bound to obey any such summons, nor to quit their ships to give an account of themselves to any one, and that he was resolved to do his duty. The master then desired him to send his boatswain to make the report. To this the admiral replied that it was the some thing whether he sent even a grummet or went himself, and it was therefore in vain to desire him to send any person. Being sensible that the admiral was right, the master now requested to see ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... Sir,—Boatswain [1] is to be buried in a vault waiting for myself. I have also written an epitaph, which I would send, were it not for two reasons: one is, that it is too long for a letter; and the other, that I hope you will some day read it on the spot ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... secure of not being crossed in his way by any impediment. The oars were all placed in their regular positions, the whole crew was seated on the benches, and no one else was seen on foot in the whole galley but the boatswain, who had lashed himself strongly amidship for his greater security. The vessel flew so swiftly that in three days and nights, passing in sight of Trapani, Melazo, and Palermo, she entered the straits of Messina, to the dismay of all on board, and of the spectators ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... bride, Sam lifted up his voice. He was used to that sort of thing, for he had been a boatswain. 'Cap'n Abner Budlong,' he exclaimed, 'step ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... saloon yesterday, or another got drunk before dinner was over, or another was blinded with lobster-sauce spilt over him by the steward, or another had a fall on deck and fainted. The ship's cook was drunk yesterday morning (having got at some salt-water-damaged whiskey), and the captain ordered the boatswain to play upon him with the hose of the fire-engine until he roared for mercy—which he didn't get: for he was sentenced to look out, for four hours at a stretch for four nights running, without a great-coat, and to have his grog stopped. ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... a word I will shoot you as quickly as I would shoot a couple of dogs which disputed my right to use the highway," said he, in tones that could not have been steadier if he had been ordering the boatswain's mate of the Sumter to pipe sweepers. "Captain, drop that revolver on the floor without ...
— Marcy The Blockade Runner • Harry Castlemon
... traffic and trade of it, man and beast sweating in the splendid glare. Rattle of cranes, scream of winches, grind of wheels, and the bellowing of a big steamer, working her way cautiously through the packed shipping of the basin, to the blue freedom of the open sea.—Such was the scene which the boatswain and white-jacketed steward, leaning their folded arms on the bulwarks and smoking, ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... which he decided had been concerted with King. A former boatswain of King's, called Hart, had a ketch. Cottrell, apparently Ralegh's old Tower servant, who had once before borne witness against him, had found Hart for King. Before Ralegh reached London, King had arranged with Hart through Cottrell that ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... ropes, and, clasping to the masts, he endured a sea that almost split the deck.' 'When was this?' said Leonine. 'When I was born,' replied Marina: 'never were wind and waves more violent'; and then she described the storm, the action of the sailors, the boatswain's whistle, and the loud call of the master, 'which,' said she, 'trebled the confusion of the ship.' Lychorida had so often recounted to Marina the story of her hapless birth that these things seemed ever present to her imagination. ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... plain to every one that a naval officer, who goes to sea as a gentleman, "with his gloves on," (as the phrase is,) and who associated only with his fellow-officers, and hardly speaks to a sailor except through a boatswain's mate, must take a very different view of the whole matter from that which would be taken ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... Caulfield's positive instructions that no boatswain's mate, or other petty officer, should carry a cane, the usual emblem of their authority; and that he would not punish any man unless convicted by the testimony of two witnesses, while the man himself ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... left," said the boatswain, "let us take the boats, and pull out to sea. We can go where the ships are, and then we'll have some chance. They'll never find us here, leastways, ...
— Facing the World • Horatio Alger
... "Boatswain's Mate," said Dave, "as this launch belongs to the flagship, it will be better to take Mr. Jetson, ...
— Dave Darrin on Mediterranean Service - or, With Dan Dalzell on European Duty • H. Irving Hancock
... hearthside, sharing the dangers of the ruddy and tranquil sailors exempt from the temptation that contact with women provokes. On Sundays, under the tropic sun or in the ash-colored light of the northern heavens, the boatswain would read the Bible. The men would listen thoughtfully with uncovered heads. The women had dressed themselves in black with lace ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... at all to see clean to the back of a Scotch boiler," the boatswain had told the chief engineer. "I can give you that little squint-eyed feller." So, at the age of forty or thereabouts, Larry left the cool, wind-swept deck to take up work new to him in the superheated, gas-stifling air of the fire-room. Though entered on the ship's papers as a sailor, he had ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... Bird privateer, who had been enticed by some of the owners to leave us by making of them drunk. About 10 we saw their canoe going ashore with our hands in her, also Joseph Ferrow, whom we had brought from Rhode Island, and since given him clothes, but who had entered on board that sloop as boatswain. As soon as they had done watering, and were returning to the ship, we manned our pinnace, and, having boarded their canoe, took our three hands out of her, and brought them and Joseph Ferrow aboard. Some time after, the Humming Bird's canoe coming alongside, Ferrow jumpt into it, and they put ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... shall poor black pilot forget how you saved him from being seized up, when de gratings, boatswain's mates, and all, were ready at de gangway—never shall poor black ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various
... face, covered with hair, and his little eyes drawn up into the smallest passages for light,— like a man who had peered into hundreds of northeasters,— there was old "Sails'' of the Alert, clothed in all the honors of boatswain's-mate. We stood aside, out of the cun of the officers, and had a good talk over old times. I remember the contempt with which he turned on his heel to conceal his face, when the midshipman (who was a grown youth) could not tell the ladies the length of a fathom, ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... but a flogging at the captain's pleasure. Toward evening of the next day, they were startled by the dread summons of the boatswain and his mates at the principal hatchway,—a summons that sent a shudder through every ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... to illustrate and stick to truth. There is the boatswain's whistle! I must go and see what's up. Pentland Firth is ever restless and nobody minds that, but she gets into sudden passions which need close watching, and I wouldn't wonder if there was not now ...
— The Measure of a Man • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... swinging at a short hawser in the shelter of Stony beach. If you will stand on the tip of its gray rock prow and face the sea it is hard not to feel the rise and fall of surges under you, and in fancy you have one ear cocked for the boatswain's whistle and the call to the watch to bear a hand and get the anchor aboard. Just a moment and you will feel the pulse of the screw, hear the clink-clank of shovels and slice-bars, tinkling faintly up the ventilator; one bell will sound in the engine room and under slowest speed ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... made sure that the Florence was securely fixed in the gravel. The party walked down stream, embarked in the boat of which the captain had spoken. It was pulled by two men, and after they had gone about a mile, the captain began to blow a boatswain's whistle which ...
— Within The Enemy's Lines - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... wages to obtain them. We hadn't been there a day, when we engaged on board a ship bound out to the West Indies. As she was not likely to be long absent, this just suited us. Your father got a berth as third mate, for he was the best scholar, and I shipped as boatswain. ...
— Michael Penguyne - Fisher Life on the Cornish Coast • William H. G. Kingston
... looms through the fog, and they our works have spied, For the ruddy flash and round-shot part in thunder from her side; And the "Falcon" and the "Cerberus" make every bosom thrill, With gun and shell, and drum and bell, and boatswain's whistle shrill; But deep and wider grows the trench, as spade and mattock ply, For we have to cope with fearful odds, and the time is ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... respite, and leisure to collapse, a bubble at a time. You could see the prism-scale each had to itself, each of the millions, if you looked close enough. Collectively, their appearance was slovenly. A chestnut-coloured man a year old, who looked as if he meant some day to be a boatswain, was seated on a pavement that cannot have soothed his unprotected flesh—flint pebbles can't, however round—and enjoying the mysterious impalpable nature of this foam. However, even for such hands as his—and Sally wanted to kiss them badly—they couldn't stop. She got ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... where he proposed to give them a more public and formal trial. This was accordingly done. The prisoners were duly confronted with the witnesses. They denied nothing, but freely admitted their guilt. With the advice and concurrence of Pont Grave, the pilot, surgeon, mate, boatswain, and others, Champlain condemned the four conspirators to be hung; three of them, however, to be sent home for a confirmation or revision of their sentence by the authorities in France, while the sentence of Jean Du Val, the arch-plotter of the ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Vol. 1 • Samuel de Champlain
... the latter a piece of plate iron is attached, with which they make signals to each other, and the fatakie, when apart, by clinking the rings. This method of communication is very significant, and it is understood as well, and is as promptly answered or obeyed, as the boatswain's whistle on board a ship. The collision of the rings produces a harsh, grating noise, loud enough to be ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... others having submitted—at least at sea—to the indignity of European trousers. Only two sat on the spars. One, a man with a childlike, light yellow face, smiling with fatuous imbecility under the wisps of straight coarse hair dyed a mahogany tint, was the tindal of the crew—a kind of boatswain's or serang's mate. The other, sitting beside him on the booms, was a man nearly black, not much bigger than a large ape, and wearing on his wrinkled face that look of comical truculence which is often characteristic ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... said that the men was the roughest of the rough and the officers was worse, and that he 'ad hardly 'ad a day without a blow from one or the other since he'd been aboard. He'd been knocked down with a hand-spike by the second mate, and had 'ad a week in his bunk with a kick given 'im by the boatswain. He said 'e was now on the Rochester Castle, bound for Sydney, and he ...
— Odd Craft, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... armed, and in command of the second lieutenant. Among them was a man named Hallam, a boatswain's mate, a dark-faced, surly brute of about fifty. He was hated by nearly every one on board, but as he was a splendid seaman and rigidly exact in the performance of his duties, he was an especial favourite of the captain's, ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke
... of the stores were safely within the cave the boatswain blew his whistle as a signal that all was ready, and Chimp and the Captain of The Tattooed Quaker hurried back to ...
— The Flamp, The Ameliorator, and The Schoolboy's Apprentice • E. V. Lucas
... There were sad faces among those left behind to endure the perils, hardships and loneliness of pioneers. Jack Cockrell's heart beat high when he saw sweet Dorothy Stuart in the throng. He tarried ashore with her until the boatswain's pipe trilled from the Plymouth Adventure to summon the passengers on board. Colonel Stuart, blonde and bronzed and stalwart, escorted his winsome daughter and he praised Jack for his ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... all told," says Mrs. Brassey, the party then including her husband and herself and their four children, some friends, a sailing master, boatswain, carpenter, able-bodied seamen, engineers, firemen, stewards, cooks, nurse, stewardess, ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams
... for going before our ships at our getting to India. While we remained here, there died out of the Admiral, the master's mate, chaplain, and surgeon, with about ten of the common men; and out of the Vice-Admiral, the master and some two more. By very great mischance, the captain and boatswain's mate of the Ascension were slain: For, when the master's mate of the Admiral was to be buried, the captain of the Ascension took his boat to go on shore to his funeral; and as it is the rule of the sea to fire certain pieces of ordnance at the burial of an officer, the gunner ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... 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 prize, for the captain has a large sum of money on board to take out for the East India Company. ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... that part where we had seen the light. We now discerned through the fog the hull and tackling of a large vessel; and notwithstanding the noise of the waves, we were near enough to hear the whistle of the boatswain at the helm, and the shouts of the mariners. As soon as the Saint Geran perceived that we were enough to give her succour, she continued to fire guns regularly at the interval of three minutes. Monsieur de la Bourdonnais caused great fires to be lighted at certain distances upon ...
— Paul and Virginia • Bernardin de Saint Pierre
... perfect practical knowledge of ships and sailors; and the incidents of the story range from the broad humours of the fo'c's'le to the perils of flight from and fight with the pirates of the China Seas. The captain, the mate, the Irish boatswain, the Portuguese steward, and the Chinese cook, are fresh and cleverly-drawn characters, and the reader throughout has the sense that he is on a real voyage ...
— Tales of Daring and Danger • George Alfred Henty
... "big stranger," and deliberately laying down his glass, his eyes seemed to have catched FIRE! and his whole countenance lighted up; a new spirit seemed to possess him, while he preserved the utmost coolness: advancing deliberately to what is called the poop railing, and steadily looking forward—"Boatswain! Pipe to quarters." Muster roll called.—"Now, my men, we shall FIGHT! I know you will do it well!—Clear ship for action!" I have certainly but my brother's word and judgment upon the fact, who had never been ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... as they were alongside, the greater portion of the men went ashore and, in the evening, the boatswain landed with Terence and Ryan, and proceeded with them to a slop shop, where he bought them clothes similar to those worn by the crew. Beyond the fact that these were of nautical appearance, there was no distinctive dress. They then returned to the lugger and changed their clothes at once, ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... we noticed her," the boatswain in charge replied in answer to his question. "We saw her, as you say, on Tuesday afternoon, going east. We could not help noticing her, for she was something out of the way. We should not have thought so much of it, if she had not come back again just before dusk the next ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty
... officers swore that there were none. Of the crew of the Chesapeake, he says, "about 32" were British subjects, or about 10 per cent. One or two of these were afterward shot, and some 25, together with a Portuguese boatswain's mate, entered into the British service. So that of the vessels captured by the British, the Chesapeake had the largest number of British (about 10 per cent. of her crew) on board, the others ranging from that number down to none at all, as in the case of the Wasp. ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt
... I saw that though they had dug eight or nine feet deep, yet found no water. So I returned aboard that evening, and the next day, being September 1st, I sent my boatswain ashore to dig deeper, and sent the seine within him to catch fish. While I stayed aboard I observed the flowing of the tide, which runs very swift here, so that our nun-buoy would not bear above the water to be seen. It flows ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton
... fancy and lead it into the wilds of fairy story. The Arno rolled through the town, but no music trembled from balconies over its waters; it gave only the busy voices of sailors on board vessels just arrived from the Mediterranean; the melancholy heaving of the anchor, and the shrill boatswain's whistle;—sounds, which, since that period, have there sunk almost into silence. They then served to remind Du Pont, that it was probable he might hear of a vessel, sailing soon to France from this port, and thus be spared the trouble of going to Leghorn. ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... red lights on the starboard and port sides and the white light on the foremast now burned brightly. The boatswain's shrill whistle furled the sails snugly to every spar, leaving the sailors little time or spirit for their usual song, as barometer-like they too sensed the approaching storm. The ship's watch forward was ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... wounded, amongst whom five lost their limbs, and the other leg of one man was so much shattered as to be taken off some time after. Our brave Admiral was unfortunately in this list, as before observed. Captain Smith of the Marines and Mr. Chapman, boatswain, were amongst the wounded on the second day. Most of our spars were destroyed, and the boats severely injured. About noon we had still fine weather and the enemy standing away from us, except one ship, which did not seem injured, and paraded to windward, as if ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott
... cleared, watches set at noon, and then began the never-ending cleaning-up at which steamship sailors put in so much of their time. Headed by a six-foot boatswain, a gang came aft on the starboard side, with paint-buckets and brushes, and distributed ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... arranged to fire a rocket when the launch left the shore, in order that the captain of the yacht might run in closer to pick them up. As he hurried down the beach, he called to his boatswain to give the signal, and the man answered that he understood and stooped to light a match. King had jumped into the stern and lifted Madame Alvarez after him, leaving her late escort standing with uncovered heads on the ...
— Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... before Cleary had finished his sentence. Sure enough, he found a boatswain who was renowned as an artist, and without further parley he delivered himself into his hands. Cleary was consulted on the choice of designs, and the result was pronounced by all the connoisseurs on board—and there ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... besides his wife. He enjoyed the title of "Padre," because he had once been master of a small martingane that traded between Civita Vecchia and the south. In still earlier days he had been in deep water and had been boatswain of a square-rigger, yet there was nothing about his appearance now to show that he had been a sailor man. It was ten years since he had left the sea, and he had ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... answered the boatswain, giving Clare a shove, "this here's a stowaway in his majesty's ship, Panther. I found him snug in the cable-tier.—Salute ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... be no place in the service for me; I cannot decide what rating to select. To be a quartermaster one must know how to signal, and signaling always tires my arms. One must know how to blow a horrid shrill little whistle in order to become a boatswain mate, and my ears could never stand this. To be a yeoman, it is necessary to know how to rattle papers in an important manner and disseminate misinformation with a straight face, and this I could never do. ...
— Biltmore Oswald - The Diary of a Hapless Recruit • J. Thorne Smith, Jr.
... gauntlet is one of them. Each member of the crew is armed with three tarry rope-yarns, knotted at the ends. Then between the master-at-arms with a drawn sword and two corporals with drawn swords behind, the thief, stripped to the waist, is placed. The thing is started by a boatswain's mate givin' him a dozen lashes. Then he's slowly marched down the double line of men, who flog him as he passes, and at the end of the line he receives another dose of the cat from the boatswain's mate. The poor devil's body and head are flayed, and he's sent to hospital and ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... not apparently had any special experience of the sea, "advises" the sailors, and takes the helm during a storm on his passage from Harwich to Emden; while these English mariners, unworthy professional descendants of that admirable man, the boatswain of the opening scenes of The Tempest, are actually grateful to him, and when he goes 'ashore "press themselves round him" to take leave of him (that is to say, they do this in the book; what in all probability ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... the sailors continued to gaze at the Forward, which was now almost ready to depart; and there was no one of them who presumed to say that Johnson, the boatswain, had been making ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... support from the stock ticket-jingle Rousseau du ruisseau, which, though not without some real pertinency, is directly misleading. Another class, consisting of some at least, if not most, of those who have read him to some extent, may urge that Decency—taking her revenge for the axiom of the boatswain in Mr. Midshipman Easy—forbids Duty to let him in. And yet others, less under the control of any Mrs. Grundy, literary or moral, may ask why he is let in, and Choderlos de Laclos[418] and Louvet de Courray, with some more, kept out, as they ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... wild heath in mournful guise he stood, Ere the shrill boatswain gave the hated sign; He dropt a tear unseen into the flood, He stole ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... for you: nay, I would speak to our new ally, and your old acquaintance, Lord Sandwich, to assist in it; but I could have no hope of getting at his ear, for he has put on such a first-rate tie-wig, on his admission to the admiralty board, that nothing without the lungs of a boatswain can ever think to penetrate the thickness of the curls. I think, however, it does honour to the dignity of ministers: when he was but a patriot, his wig was not of half its present gravity. There are no more changes made: all is quiet yet; but next Thursday the Parliament ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... attention of the Americans was diverted from the signal-fires to the "Drake." An appearance of life and bustle was observable about the boat. The shrill notes of the boatswain's whistle, and the tramp of men about the capstan, came faintly over the waters. The rigging was full of sailors, and the sails were being quickly spread to catch the fresh breeze. Soon the ship began to move slowly from her anchorage; she heeled a little to one side, ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... strained their eyes in the endeavor to descry something beyond, but could see nothing. However, those nearest the point in question evidently could, and so they turned back and pulled against the wind with all their might, and in a few minutes the boatswain sung out, "A sail ahead"! causing their hearts to jump for joy. It was indeed a vessel which was rapidly coming towards them. It proved to be an American brig called "Frances Smith," which was bound for the Mediterranean, and the Captain no sooner sighted the signals of distress ...
— The Mysteries of Montreal - Being Recollections of a Female Physician • Charlotte Fuhrer
... of the American consul, the oldest ladies on the vessel, was given, at nightfall, the only sofa on board. The rest dropped asleep on boxes and bundles anywhere. For my couch the boatswain lent me his locker, and for a pillow a bag of something that felt like rope ends, and for three successive mornings ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable
... began to read from the first act of "The Tempest." Now chum was a Shakspeare enthusiast, and, withal, a very fine reader, as well as, from long study, quite pervaded with the Master's diction and style of thought. As he read on, he commented, in his brief, pointed way, upon the text, contrasting the Boatswain's practical usefulness with the shivering helplessness of the Courtiers. "Now this is your proper somatology," he added. "What our Bo's'un says to Gonzalo, the world will say to you, Clarian, when you propose ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... and controlled, but all felt anxiety. Master's-Mate Peter Williams suggested bailing, in the faint hope that in this way the vessel might be kept longer above water. A bailing party was organized by John Stocking, boatswain, who, brave man, at last went down. Paymaster Keeler led the way, in company with Stocking, Williams, and one or two others; and though the water was now waist-deep, and they knew the vessel was liable to go down at almost any moment, they worked on nobly, throwing out a constant stream of water ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various
... later, Blythe and her companion had passed on and up to the forward deck where, climbing a short ladder to the railing of the "crow's nest," they dropped lightly down into this most novel of elevators. There was a shrill whistle from the boatswain, the waving of white handkerchiefs where Mrs. Halliday and Mr. DeWitt stood, forward of the wheel-house, to watch the start; then the big windlass began to turn, the rope was "paid out," and the slow, rather creaky journey ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller
... first watch after the Fortuna had been made snug. He took the boatswain aside (an ancient sea-dog like himself), and he said in a gruff whisper: "My lad, this here ain't the island laid down in our sailing orders. See if mischief don't come of disobeying orders before we ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... lady," he shouted, as if his position recalled the action and induced the tones of a boatswain, "it'll do. A capital berth, with ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... seated in his chest, with his shroud for a sail, coming hard after the ship; and the sea breaking before him in great sprays like fire, and there they kept scudding day after day and night after night, expecting every moment to go to wreck; and every night they saw the dead boatswain in his sea-chest trying to get up with them, and they heard his whistle above the blasts of wind, and he seemed to send great seas mountain high after them, that would have swamped the ship if they had not put up the dead lights. And so it went ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... antiquity and seemed indissoluble from the green garden in which it stood, and that yet was a sea-traveller in its younger days, and had come round the Horn piecemeal in the belly of a ship, and might have heard the seamen stamping and shouting and the note of the boatswain's whistle. It will recall to you the nondescript inhabitants now so widely scattered:- the two horses, the dog, and the four cats, some of them still looking in your face as you read these lines; - the poor lady, so unfortunately ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... arm went up, so that it creaked in the old woodwork, and he touched his hat brim as he replied: "Rosenbom, by Your Majesty's leave. Once upon a time boatswain on the man-of-war, Dristigheten; after completed service, sexton at the Admiral's church—and, lately, carved in wood and exhibited in the churchyard as ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof
... strokes brought them close, Harold with a last effort raised the child in his arms as the boat drove down on them. The boatswain leaning over the bow grabbed the child, and with one sweep of his strong arm took her into the boat. The bow oarsman caught Harold by the wrist. The way of the boat took him for a moment under water; but the next man; pulling his oar across the boat, stooped over and caught ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... was over. But even to the moment of his coming here he had thought of going to sea and becoming a captain; perhaps a pirate, and acquiring enormous riches; now he gave up first the riches, then the pirate, then the captain, then the mate; he paused at sailor, at the utmost boatswain; indeed, it was possible that he would not go to sea at all, but would take a houseman's ...
— A Happy Boy • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... not shoot off at high water mark, and broke a hole in her not easily to be stopped; so that all the signals they gave for the boat to come on board were in vain. This obliged them to send another boat ashore, with ten men armed, whose faces the Captain plainly descried, the boatswain being the chief officer; but he said there were three honest lads among them, who were forced into the conspiracy. Hereupon I gave him fresh courage (for I had perceived he was in concern): In the mean while securing our prisoners, except ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe
... of cream, and still so much more, as in the case of Mr. Weller's weal pies, on the reputation of "the lady as makes it," that it will hardly serve the requirements of a severe scientific statement. Copper-color has an excess of red, and sepia is too brown; the tarry tawniness of an old boatswain's hand is nearer the mark, but even that is less among man-of-war's men than in the merchant-service, and is least in the revenue marine; it varies, also, with the habits of the individual, and the nature of his employment for the time being. The flipper of your legitimate shiver-my-timbery ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... and conjecture on every silent tongue. The captain was at his post with vigilant alacrity. 'How is she standing? what sail is she under?' was soon answered, and the orders, 'Get the steam up, lower the propeller,' echoed round the decks, mingled with the shrill pipes of the boatswain's mates. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 461 - Volume 18, New Series, October 30, 1852 • Various
... of the general and the statesman, contracted itself to the most minute details of naval architecture and naval discipline. The chief ambition of the great conqueror and legislator was to be a good boatswain and a good ship's carpenter. Holland and England therefore had for him an attraction which was wanting to the galleries and terraces of Versailles. He repaired to Amsterdam, took a lodging in the dockyard, assumed the garb of a pilot, put down his ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... turn up by the end of August, had found an admirable fellow for sailing master—a stiff man, which I regret, but, in all other respects, a treasure. Long John Silver unearthed a very competent man for a mate, a man named Arrow. I have a boatswain who pipes, Livesey; so things shall go man-o'-war fashion on board ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... won't do neither, now I think of it:—Thou art so homely, and so awkward a creature! Hast such a boatswain-like air!—People would think she had picked thee up in Wapping, or Rotherhithe; or in going to see some new ship launched, or to view the docks at Chatham, or Portsmouth. So gaudy and so clumsy! Thy tawdriness won't do ...
— Clarissa Harlowe, Volume 9 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... age, and pass an examination. After serving satisfactorily for one year under an acting appointment, they receive warrants that secure the permanency of their office. Ten years after appointment, boatswains, gunners, carpenters and sailmakers are eligible for examination for a commission as chief-boatswain, &c., and as such they rank with, but next after, ensigns. Mates are rated by the secretary from seamen or ordinary seamen. They have no relative rank, but take precedence of all petty officers. Their duties approximate to those of boatswains, though they seldom serve on large cruising vessels. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... boats' crew were to attempt to exercise such a species of tyranny." This address, records Kessler, satisfied them, as it implied his consent to their defending themselves. They resolved to do it at all hazards, and for that purpose put themselves under the command and direction of the boatswain and armed themselves with muskets, pistols and boarding pikes, and thus arrived within hailing distance of the "Confederacy." Her commander ordered the brig's maintopsail to be hove to the mast. Captain Barry answered that he could not without getting his vessel ashore. ...
— The Story of Commodore John Barry • Martin Griffin
... their ears and put them on their guard. There was hot work before us, I well knew, if they numbered forty, as I had reason to believe. I could not leave the brig wholly unguarded; yet I was loath to diminish my own little company; in the end I decided to leave a boatswain's mate in command of a party of five (three who had had a ducking and two who had received slight hurts in the fight) and to take Joe and the other ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... one of the sudden changes which so frequently occur in those countries, the cold became severe. The sea, however, remained free, the air was still, and drift wood floated about in large quantity. On the 14th of the same month, in 33 degrees 23 minutes, the master's mate and the boatswain of the vessel landed upon a shore which formed the northern part of Spitzbergen. Traces of musk oxen, and foxes, great abundance of aquatic birds, two streams of fresh water, one of them being warm, proved to our navigators that it was possible ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... of this island were not equally well disposed towards the Spaniards, for the boatswain's mate of the Almiranta was wounded in one cheek by an arrow: certain natives being envious of the friendship of the others, or being enraged because, when they called to the Spaniards, they did not care to stop and speak with them, shot off ...
— The First Discovery of Australia and New Guinea • George Collingridge
... the scud along the wave, And echoing thunders rend the sky; All hands aloft! to meet the storm, At midnight was the boatswain's cry. ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 6: Literary Curiosities - Gleanings Chiefly from Old Newspapers of Boston and Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... first Sunday at sea. Early in the morning I heard the captain order the boatswain to pipe all hands to prayers. I had noticed nothing of a religious nature in the man, and, full of curiosity, went on deck with the rest. Captain Burrows took off his hat at the foot of the ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... the Tower as "dunghill grooms" (Ib., Part 1, Act 1, Sc. 3), and Hamlet of the grave-digger as an "ass" and "rude knave." Valentine tells his servant, Speed, that he is born to be hanged (Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act 1, Sc. 1), and Gonzalo pays a like compliment to the boatswain who is doing his best to save the ship in the "Tempest" (Act 1, Sc. 1). This boatswain is not sufficiently impressed by the grandeur of his noble cargo, and for his pains is called a "brawling, blasphemous, uncharitable dog," a "cur," a "whoreson, insolent noise-maker," ...
— Tolstoy on Shakespeare - A Critical Essay on Shakespeare • Leo Tolstoy
... hearty,' said the big boatswain, 'ye've got under the old flag, and we'll soon make you see the difference. Cut out your poor tongue, have they, the rascals, and made a dummy of you? I wish my cat was about their ears! Come along with you, and you shall find what British grog is ...
— A Modern Telemachus • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the silent 'all-at-once' action of one hundred men. Immediately the rigging of the ships was black with sailors, but there was not a sound heard except an occasional command—sharp, short and imperative—or the shrill order of the boatswain's whistle. The next moment, the Queen's yacht shot past the fleet and literally led it out to sea. Near the Nab, the royal yacht hove to and the whole fleet sailed past her, carried swiftly out by ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... happy unless he was 'in hot water,' either with the passengers or crew. There were six mates, or more properly lieutenants, for all the officers were in uniform. There were also a dozen or more midshipmen, a boatswain and his two mates, gunners, quarter-masters, armorers, sail-makers, and carpenters in abundance. In short, we were fitted out in complete man-of-war fashion; not forgetting the cat-o'-nine-tails, which was used with great liberality. ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... are running up them to furl the sails, For there is a capful of wind to-day, And we are already well under way. The deck is aslant in the bubbling breeze. "Theodore, please. Oh, Dear, how you tease!" And the boatswain's whistle sounds again, And the men pull on the sheets: "My name is Hanging Johnny, Away-i-oh; They call me Hanging Johnny, So hang, boys, hang." The trees of the forest are masts, tall masts; They are swinging over Her and her lover. ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... captains, desisted, and measured back his course to Madras. On the side of the English, above three hundred men were killed in the engagement, including captain Miche, who commanded the Newcastle, captain Gore of the marines, two lieutenants, a master gunner, and boatswain: the captains Somerset and Brereton, with about two hundred and fifty men, were wounded; and many of the ships considerably damaged. The loss of the enemy must have been much more considerable, because the English in battle always fire at the body of the ship; because the French squadron was crowded ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... were so enthusiastic as to launch a similar undertaking. Among those who resolved to make a voyage to these parts was Oliver Daudtnord [21] a native of Nostradama [Amsterdam], one of the islands of Olanda and Xelanda [Holland and Zeeland]. Being persuaded and informed by the boatswain who sailed on the vessel that seized the ship "Sanctana"—to whom he gave title as captain and chief pilot—and being attracted to privateering, he asked permission of Mauricio, count of Nasao, and prince of Orange, [22] in whose dominions the above islands are located, to equip four ships. He ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume XI, 1599-1602 • Various
... the boatswain of the other boat came on board, and said that Claas Anderson would hold out ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... orchestra, for some unaccountable reason, had suddenly broken down. Yes, it must be the orchestra which disaster had overtaken, for a voice very certainly continued. No, not a voice, but voices—those of Vanstone the captain, and Price the first mate, and old Billy Tinn the boatswain—loud, imperative, violently remonstrant, but swept under and swamped at moments by cries and volleys of foulest, Neapolitan argot from hoarse, Neapolitan throats. And that abruptly silenced orchestra?—Richard came back to himself, came back to actualities ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... great man inhabited the huge white steamer; and they piped him fore and they piped him aft and they piped him over the side. Many a midnight star looked down at the glowing end of his black cigar; many a dawn shrilled with his boatswain's whistle. He was a very, very great man; none was greater in ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers
... north of Ireland, in a fine clear day succeeding one in which it had almost blown a hurricane. The master had just taken his meridian observation, the officer of the watch had reported the latitude, the captain had ordered it to be made twelve o'clock, and the boatswain, catching a word from the lieutenant, was in the full swing of his "Pipe to dinner!" when the captain ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... rose to his feet, he was first relieved of a bright revolver, which served to increase the moral front of the enemy, then led out to the booby-hatch, on which lay a newly broached coil of hambro-line and pile of thole-pins from the boatswain's locker. Here he was searched again for jack-knife or brass knuckles, bound with the hambro-line, gagged with a thole-pin, and marched forward, past the prostrate first mate, who lay quiet in the scuppers, and the erect but agonized second mate, gagged and bound to ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... broach-to a little. In a second the sea came pouring over the stern, above Allnutt's head. The boy was nearly washed overboard, but he managed to catch hold of the rail, and, with great presence of mind, stuck his knees into the bulwarks. Kindred, our boatswain, seeing his danger, rushed forward to save him, but was knocked down by the return wave, from which he emerged gasping. The coil of rope, on which Captain Lecky and Mabelle were seated, was completely floated by the sea. Providentially, ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... tenders would be well able to take the ground in the harbours which dried out. Such craft as the latter were of about 160 tons, mounted twelve to fourteen carriage guns, and were manned by a captain, second officer, two mates, two quartermasters, a gunner, a boatswain, carpenter, surgeon, ...
— King's Cutters and Smugglers 1700-1855 • E. Keble Chatterton
... the 20th of February in the evening late, when the mate, having the watch, came into the round-house and told us he saw a flash of fire, and heard a gun fired; and while he was telling us of it, a boy came in and told us the boatswain heard another. This made us all run out upon the quarter-deck, where for a while we heard nothing; but in a few minutes we saw a very great light, and found that there was some very terrible fire at a distance; immediately we had recourse to our reckonings, in which we all agreed that there ...
— The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... the great stronghold. The vast amount of business going forward caused no more excitement than the quiet sailing of a well-appointed ship in a smooth sea. No one spoke above his natural voice, save a boatswain's mate now and then. The Hon. Horatio J. Sprague, the venerable United States consul at Gibraltar, honored the Spray with a visit on Sunday, August 24, and was much pleased to find that our British cousins had been ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... leaped through a port into the sea his blonde side whiskers which were false falling off as he did so ha ha rang his mocking laughter from the ocean as he pulled shoreward with long strokes your ship is doomed my god said the senior boatswain what shall we do stop the clock ordered the captain but i had already done so i braced my head against the hour hand and my feet against the minute hand and stopped the mechanism the captain drew ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... cutting out sails, and of rigging masts and yards. Their dreams are of cringles and reef-tackles, of knots, splices, grummets, and dead-eyes. They can tell the length, to a fathom, of every rope in the boatswain's warrant, from the flying jib down-haul to the spanker-sheet; and the height of every spar, from the main-top-gallant truck to the heel of the lower mast. Their delight is in stowing the hold; dragging about kentlage is their joy; they are the very souls ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... reason against his adoption of the profession of a sea-robber, for he was an out-and-out landsman and knew nothing whatever of nautical matters. He had been at sea but very little, and if he had heard a boatswain order his man to furl the keel, to batten down the shrouds, or to hoist the forechains to the topmast yard, he would have seen nothing out of the way in these commands. He was very fond of history, and very well read in the literature of the day. He was accustomed to the habits of good ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... or whether he has left friends to mourn his death, are alike unknown. Dying, he kept his own counsel, and was content to vanish out of life, even as a speck of foam melts back into the ocean. At 11 A.M., for the first time, in a cruise likely to be fatal to many on board, the boatswain piped "all hands to bury the dead!" The sailor's corpse, covered with the union of his country's flag, was placed in the gangway. Two hundred and fifty officers and men stood around, uncovered, and reverently ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... the deck, To his mate in the mizzen hatch, While the boatswain bold, in the forward hold, Was winding ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... swabber, the boatswain and I, The gunner and his mate, Loved Mall, Meg, and Marian and Margary, But none of us cared for Kate. For she had a tongue with a twang, Would cry to a sailor, go hang! She loved not the savor of tar or of pitch,— Then to sea, boys, ...
— Daisy's Necklace - And What Came of It • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... as a boatswain's whistle shrilled close behind his ear, he was merely bewildered. He did not even know that the mouth sounding it was Mr. Jope's. It ought to have sounded on ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... landsman! Boatswain, hold that gang-plank a moment, or we'll be taking this youngster to ...
— Harper's Young People, March 9, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... board. Taken by surprise, and having no arms, we were beaten down below, and in a few minutes the vessel remained in the possession of our assailants. They held a short consultation, and then, opening the hatches, a boatswain pulled out his whistle, and in a tremendous voice roared out, "All hands ahoy!" which was followed by his crying out, "Tumble up there, tumble up!" As we understood this to be a signal for our appearance on deck, we obeyed the summons. When we all came up, we found ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... more shooting, and there was no need for it. By sheer weight of blows the whites kept the enemy from climbing through the windows, and so long as the windows were not stormed, the iron house was safe to them. And presently one of the head-men blew his boatswain's whistle, ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... boatswain consoled him, and he modified his opinions as the voyage went on. There was so much to see and to handle and ask questions about that Punch nearly forgot the ayah and Meeta and the hamal, and with difficulty remembered a few words of ...
— Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II • Rudyard Kipling
... course I does now," was the boatswain's hearty response. Then there followed, in lower tones, certain remarks of which we could only ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... of his chief mate, Mr Bowen, George was fortunate enough to pick up a very good crew, comprising a second mate—who acted also as boatswain—a carpenter, a steward, a black cook, two able-seamen, four ordinary ditto, and two well-grown lads, who had already been a voyage or two in a coaster. This constituted a complement of fourteen men, all told; just sufficient ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood |
