"Bowsprit" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... which our interpreter pointed out as "Salt Junk." We had seen enough of that during our passage out, but this kind of junk interested us; for a more clumsy piece of naval architecture could hardly have been invented to annoy the eye of a sailor. With her perpendicular masts of one stick, no bowsprit, only an opening where it should be, to receive an anchor, made of part of a crooked tree; poop sticking up like a game fowl's tail, and immense red and white eyes painted on each bow:—for the Chinese sailor says: "No have eyes, how can see? no can see, how can walkee?"—make ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay
... space beyond the bowsprit of the anchored rum-runner, with Jack starting to climb in order to bank and swing around, so as to complete the job if his first endeavor ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb
... I should. I'd have my bowsprit always wet, and my quarter-deck always dry. But it is no use wishing for what we ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... Eastward.—Fruitless Attempts to regain the Land, and final Departure from the Ice.—Remarks upon the probable Existence and Practicability of a Northwest Passage, and upon the Whale Fishery.—Boisterous Weather in Crossing the Atlantic.—Loss of the Hecla's Bowsprit ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... hate myself, I was so full of poisonous suspicions. How did Mr. Gabriel know the schooner prepared to sail? And this man, could he tell boom from bowsprit? I didn't believe it; he had the hang of the up-river folks. But there stood Mr. Gabriel, so quiet and easy, his eyelids down, and he humming an underbreath of song; and there sat Faith, so pale ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various
... manned the gun Armorial. What cheerings did you share, Impulsive in the van, When down upon leagued France and Spain We English ran— The freshet at your bowsprit Like the foam upon the can. Bickering, your colors Licked up the Spanish air, You flapped with flames of battle-flags— Your challenge, Temeraire! The rear ones of our fleet They yearned to share your place, Still vying with ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville
... punctured, her bearings all red hot; She'd a lolling tongue, and her bowsprit sprung, and her running gear in a knot; And amid the sobs of her backers, Sir Robert loosened her girth And led her away to the knacker's. She had raced her last ...
— A Nonsense Anthology • Collected by Carolyn Wells
... evidence of his senses at the transformation that he beheld. Upon the main deck were eight twelve-pound carronade neatly covered with tarpaulin; in the bow a Long Tom, also snugly stowed away and covered, directed a veiled and muzzled snout out over the bowsprit. ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... the victuals, but they told me old bl—bl"——Again he hesitated, evidently afraid that some "unsonsy" thing was behind him. His voice sunk down to a tremulous whisper. "They said that old split-feet brought a whole bevy of little devilkins with him that cleared decks in the twinkling of a bowsprit." ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... seeing the captain. A big bright round moon was dancing over the vessel's bowsprit, and this, together with the tug thumping into the distance, and the land receding, gave ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... bolsters! Here is the cottage interior, the usual first flat, with the cloak upon the nail, the rosaries of onions, the gun and powder-horn and corner-cupboard; here is the inn (this drama must be nautical, I foresee Captain Luff and Bold Bob Bowsprit) with the red curtain, pipes, spittoons, and eight-day clock; and there again is that impressive dungeon with the chains, which was so dull to colour. England, the hedgerow elms, the thin brick houses, windmills, glimpses of the navigable Thames - England, when at last I came to visit ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Swallow was for an instant checked in her flight—certainly her prow appeared to lift itself from the water. Suddenly there was a sound of something snapping—a sound that could be heard even through the yell of terror from the soldiers in the boat. It was the bowsprit which had gone, leaving the jib flying loose like ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... of Malwa and Marwar (vast quantities of which are exported in this direction) chiefly found its way into Scinde and Beloochistan; or by country vessels of a peculiar build, with a disproportionately lofty poop, and an elongated bow instead of a bowsprit, which carried on an uncertain and desultory traffic with Bombay and some of the Malabar ports. To avoid the dangerous sandbanks at the mouths of the Indus, as well as the intricate navigation through the winding streams of the Delta, (the course ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. • Various
... they now entered was a very quiet one. The eye of any chance passer would have been at once drawn to a broad, heavy, white brick edifice on the lower side of the way, with a flag-pole standing out like a bowsprit from one of its great windows, and a pair of lamps hanging before a large closed entrance. It was a theatre, honey-combed with gambling-dens. At this morning hour all was still, and the only sign of life was a knot of little barefoot girls gathered within its narrow shade, ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... effect. They had in the mean time reached Leda Tanah, whence they were brought down again sulky enough, and did show a slight inclination to see whether the people on board the Swift were keeping watch; for several of their boats dropped close to her, and one directly under the bowsprit, as silently as death; but on being challenged, and a musket leveled near them, they sheered off, and the next day finally departed. The poor Dyaks in the interior, as well as the Chinese, were in the greatest state of alarm, and thence I gained some credit among them ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... slowly, and while she gathered way, was drifting straight down upon an Italian barque that two hours ago had lain more than a cable's length from us. . . . I thought our lower yard—we heeled so—would have smacked against her bowsprit-end; and from the outcries on board the Italian I rather fancy her crew expected it. But we shaved her by a yard or so, as Link pushed me away from the wheel and took charge. A moment later she had dropped behind us into the night, and we were ...
— News from the Duchy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... owner had predicted, the Seabird put her bowsprit under pretty frequently in the Solent; the wind was blowing half a gale, and as it met the tide it knocked up a short, angry sea, crested with white heads, and Jack Harvey agreed that she had quite as much sail on her as she wanted. The cabin doors were bolted, and all made snug to prevent the ...
— Tales of Daring and Danger • George Alfred Henty
... hot leagues o' the great sand sea," said he, patting her head. "Ah! thy neck shall be as the bowsprit; thy dust as the ...
— Darrel of the Blessed Isles • Irving Bacheller
... went to sea, and had many adventures. The English nautical terms were employed continually in describing his life on the ship, but the man seemed to feel that they were not in their place, and stopped short when one of them occurred to give me a poke with his finger and explain gib, topsail, and bowsprit, which were for me the most intelligible features of the poem. Again, when the scene changed to Dublin, 'glass of whiskey,' 'public-house,' and ...
— The Aran Islands • John M. Synge
... the Rio Negro, we had to wait four days while the custom-house officials at Barra, ten miles distant, made out the passports for our crew, and during this time the schooner lay close to the shore, with its bowsprit secured to the trees on the bank. Well, one morning, scarlet-face was missing, having made his escape into the forest. Two men were sent in search of him, but returned after several hours' absence without having caught sight of the runaway. We gave up the ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... Gani-diluar, about ten miles further north, where we understood there was a good harbour, and where we might get provisions and a few more rowers. Hitherto winds and currents load invariably opposed our passage southward, and we might have expected them to be favourable to us now we had turned our bowsprit in an opposite direction. But it immediately fell calm, and then after a time a westerly land breeze set in, which would not serve us, and we had to row again for hours, and when night came had not reached the village. We were so fortunate, however, as to find a deep ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... Edward Pellew, afterwards Lord Exmouth, remained fit for duty. The spring being shot away, she swung bows on to the enemy, and her fire was thus silenced. Captain Pringle signalled to her to withdraw; but she was unable to obey. To pay her head off the right way, Pellew himself had to get out on the bowsprit under a heavy fire of musketry, to bear the jib over to windward; but to make sail seems to have been impossible. Two artillery boats were sent to her assistance, "which towed her off through a very thick ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... landsman would hardly have recognized her. The treacherous figure "9," which Beardsley had caused to be painted on her sails, in the hope that merchant vessels would take her for a harmless pilot-boat, was not to be seen; all the black paint about her, from the heel of her bowsprit to the crosstrees, had given place to a bluish-white; and on both sides of her bow and over her cabin door the name Hattie ...
— Marcy The Blockade Runner • Harry Castlemon
... of islands where either the bowsprit or the boom was continually getting caught in the shrubbery and rocks, until he came to island No. 18. ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 24, September 10, 1870 • Various
... fastened to the stern to hold the steering oar. In place of lee boards we nailed a couple of thin boards over each runner, as shown in the drawing. We were in a hurry to finish this, as our vacation was short, so we used on the scooter canoe the sails that we had made for our ice boat. This required a bowsprit, but as we had little time to spare we used the jib-boom of the ice boat, nailing it to the deck beam of the canoe. We decided that the jib-sail could be used without a boom, as we had done with the scow. The mast was braced by stays ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... schooner slid past him he made a spring at her wire bobstay, caught it first with one hand, then with the other, pulled himself up and flung his legs over it, and then rapidly hauled himself up it to the bowsprit end, which he reached just as the schooner plunged into the water, swung himself astride the spar, and so worked his way inboard. But it was touch and go with him, for the moment he showed himself ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... to the eye of a seafaring man, this short view was sufficient. He perceived that it was a large ship, within a quarter of a mile of the land, pressed gunnel under with her reefed courses, chopping through the heavy seas—now pointing her bowsprit to the Heavens, as she rose over the impeding swell; now plunging deep into the trough encircled by the foam raised by her own exertions, like some huge monster of the deep, struggling in her toils, and lashing the seas around in her violent ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... said Ludar, "we maimed them in one of their masts in passing, and their bowsprit broke short when it touched our stern. I doubt if we shall find them ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... night, or, at latest, before noon of the morrow, we should sight the Treasure Island. We were heading S.S.W., and had a steady breeze abeam and a quiet sea. The Hispaniola rolled steadily, dipping her bowsprit now and then with a whiff of spray. All was drawing alow and aloft; every one was in the bravest spirits, because we were now so near an end of the first part of ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... we were sent on board the enemy's vessels. I was carried to the Royal George, but Mr. Trant was taken on board the Wolfe. The Growler had lost her bowsprit, and was otherwise damaged, and had been forced to strike also. She had a man killed, and I believe one or two wounded.[8] On board of us, not a man, besides myself, had been touched! We seemed to have been preserved by a miracle, for every ...
— Ned Myers • James Fenimore Cooper
... alongside, and there is not another craft outside her. The boat is fastened to her bowsprit, and I can take off my boots and get on board and drop into her, without difficulty; and push her along to the foot of some stairs which are but ten yards away. Of course, we will have the water and food and that bundle of old nets ready, at the top of the stairs, and we can ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... to back her, for she shoaled too rapidly for my nerves. I told the mate to light a Bengola on the heel of the bowsprit. When he did so the brilliant light enabled me to see the wreck very distinctly, and less than a hundred yards from the Sylvania. She was a large bark, with all her sails furled. Her captain had probably taken ...
— Up the River - or, Yachting on the Mississippi • Oliver Optic
... the signal for departure was given; four of the boats stood out to sea, the raft was still along side of the frigate, where it was moored: the captain's barge was under the bowsprit and the barge near our machine, on which it had just embarked some men. At length we were ordered to depart; but whether from a presentiment of what was to happen to us, or whether Mr. Correard entertained just ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to Senegal in 1816 • J. B. Henry Savigny and Alexander Correard
... we experienced a head wind and the gentle summer swell of the Atlantic. In spite of her deeply-laden condition the "Terra Nova" breasted each wave in splendid form, lifting her toy bowsprit proudly in the air till she reminded me, with her deck cargo, of a little mother with her child ...
— South with Scott • Edward R. G. R. Evans
... on the Neck was behind me now. There was nothing ahead of the sloop's fixed bowsprit. We were driving into a curtain of blackness that had been let down from the sky to the sea. It is seldom that there is not some little light playing over the surface of the water. This night a palpable cloud had settled upon the face of the waters ...
— Swept Out to Sea - Clint Webb Among the Whalers • W. Bertram Foster
... Ridgeway's side, and, with the instinct of a drowning man, he grasped for the object as it rushed away. A huge section of the bowsprit was in his grasp and a cry of hope arose in his soul. With this respite came the feeling, strong and enduring, that he was not to die. That ever-existing spirit of confidence, baffled in one moment, flashes back into the hearts of all men when the faintest sign of hope appears, ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... explained, 'In course, he has been to sea afore this, and weathered many a gale. But so has the cook. That don't make a man a sailor. You ask him how to send down a to'-gallant yard or gammon a bowsprit, or even mark a lead line, and he'll stare at ye like Old Nick, when the angel caught him with the red-hot tongs, and questioned him out of the Church Catechism. Ask Sam there if ye don't believe me. Sam, what do you think of this Wylie for ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... needed two hands, they were always the first to jump into the rigging; but that doesn't often happen on a fore-and-aft schooner. If it breezed up, and the jibtopsail was to be taken in, they never minded a wetting, and they would be out at the bowsprit end before there was a hand at the downhaul. The men liked them for that, and because they didn't blow about what they could do. I remember one day in a reefing job, the downhaul parted and came down on deck from the peak of the spanker. When the weather moderated, and we shook the ...
— Man Overboard! • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... Bowsprit shot away, to secure foremast; Port main rigging and main stays disabled, to secure mainmast; To fish a lower mast and yard; Steering apparatus disabled, what means of repairs ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN
... soon perceived it was a large vessel, and that she bore up to us; but could not at first know what to make of her, till, after coming a little nearer, we found she had lost her main-topmast, fore-mast, and bowsprit; and presently she fires a gun as a signal of distress. The weather was pretty good, wind at N.N.W. a fresh gale, and we soon came to speak ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... we started. It was a fearful moment; the wind freshened, and whistled through our rigging, and the night was so dark, that we could not see our bowsprit. We had only our foresail set; but with a strong flood-tide and a fair wind, with plenty of it, we passed between the advanced frigates like an arrow. It seemed to me like entering the gates of hell. ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... she had once been a full-rigged ship, and from the little that showed above water he judged her to be American-built. Her three masts were gone by the board, also her jib-booms, which were snapped close off by the bowsprit end. There was no sign of any floating wreckage alongside her, from which Leslie was led to surmise that her masts must have been cut away; a circumstance that, in its turn, pointed to the conclusion ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... unapproached seat Of peace, where rest the Christians whom the hate Of Moorish pride pursued? Whate'er it be, Zarco, thy holy courage bids thee on To burst the gloom, though dragons guard the shore,[184] Or beings more than mortal pace the sands. The favouring gales invite; the bowsprit bears Right onward to the fearful shade; more black The cloudy spectre towers; already fear 120 Shrinks at the view aghast and breathless. Hark! 'Twas more than the deep murmur of the surge That struck the ear; whilst through the lurid gloom Gigantic phantoms seem to lift in air ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... viewing the supineness of the men, who were totally regardless of his repeated injunctions to veer the cable quickly, began to be indignant; and when the master repeated, "If you do not veer away at once, we shall lose the bowsprit and all the masts," he called to the officers in the waist "to start the rascals down to the cable:" but, as it may be supposed, their unarmed endeavours would not have been successful, had he not, as the crisis approached, jumped down himself among the men, and, with ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... fire grew hotter, and their aim truer—down came our mizzen-topgallant-mast, and hung down over our quarter; away went our bowsprit—but we held on till we struck their line 'twixt the 'Santissima Trinidado' and the 'Beaucenture,' and, as we crossed the Spanisher's wake, so close that our yard-arms grazed her gilded starn, up flashed his ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... bowsprit sticking slantwise up from a whirl of creamy white, that was all they could see of the bark, at first glance. But occasionally, as the breakers drew back for another cruel blow, they caught glimpses of the tilted deck, smashed bare of ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... craft, but capable of being shifted from side to side, so that the enemy's marksmen may never know exactly what part of the object in sight is to be aimed at. The torpedo will be carried on a mast, which at the right moment can be lowered to form a projecting spar like a bowsprit; and the explosion that will take place on its impact with the enemy's hull will be enough to blow a fatal ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... steam if you can, sir. With your leave, I mean to post myself under the bowsprit, and, if we get within harpooning distance, ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne
... another moment the great ship bore down upon them with a crash, and the Kitty sunk beneath the waves. The bowsprit of the vessel projected across the deck, just at the point where William Gale was standing and, in a moment, he caught at the bob stay and quickly hauled himself on to the bowsprit. Climbing along this, he ...
— For Name and Fame - Or Through Afghan Passes • G. A. Henty
... your power! Then Curiosity comes swimming by, making signs to her companions to follow; they plunge into the current. Imagination sits dreaming on the bank. She follows the torrent with her eyes and transforms the fragments of straw and reed into masts and bowsprit. And scarcely has the transformation taken place, before Desire, holding in one hand her skirt drawn up even to her knees, appears, sees the vessel and takes possession of it. O ye drinkers of water, it is by means of that magic spring that you have so often ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... thinking to cripple the fugitive ship by bringing down her spars. But only a few inconsiderable ropes were shot away. Soon the ship was beyond the gun's range, steering broad out of the bay; the blacks thickly clustering round the bowsprit, one moment with taunting cries towards the whites, the next with upthrown gestures hailing the now dusky moors of ocean—cawing crows escaped from the hand of ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... sail instantly makes an acute silhouette against the monstrous disk,—rests there in the very middle of the vermilion sun. His face crimsons high above her top-masts,—broadens far beyond helm and bowsprit. Against this weird magnificence, her whole shape changes color: hull, masts, and sails turn ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... supported the deck had lost their stiffness and sunk downward; the masts, as before stated, had toppled over for the same reason, yielding to their own weight, which, as the vessel was slightly on one side, had gradually borne them down; the bowsprit also had fallen. The hatchways had yielded, and, giving way, had sunk down within the hold. The doors which led into the cabin in the lofty poop were lying prostrate on the deck. The large sky-light which once had stood there had ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... your pendant and your ordnance.' (Sloane MSS. 2682, f. 51.) The object of the order evidently was that they should conceal their character from the pirates, and at this time therefore the 'jack' carried at the end of the bowsprit and the pennant must have been the sign of a navy ship. Boteler however, who wrote his Sea Dialogues about 1625, does not mention the jack in his remarks about flags (pp. 327-334). The etymology ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett
... on the top of the windlass, at the foot of the spenser-mast, called out, "Lay out there and furl the jib!'' This was no agreeable or safe duty, yet it must be done. John, a Swede (the best sailor on board), who belonged on the forecastle, sprang out upon the bowsprit. Another one must go. It was a clear case of holding back. I was near the mate, but sprang past several, threw the downhaul over the windlass, and jumped between the knight-heads out upon the bowsprit. The crew stood abaft the windlass and ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... upon the vessel, making a clean breach over her. Those on shore fancied they heard the cries of help from on board, and could plainly descry the busy useless efforts made by the stranded crew. Now a wave came rolling onward, falling like a rock upon the bowsprit, and tearing it from the brig. The stern was lifted high above the flood. Two people were seen to embrace and plunge together into the sea; in a moment more, and one of the largest waves that rolled ...
— What the Moon Saw: and Other Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... bad breeding instead of merely inquiring about the existence of physical symptoms over which they admittedly had no control whatever. The security of a harbour, with a railway station not fifty yards from the yacht's bowsprit, had restored them, by dint of calming secret fears, to their customary condition of righteousness and rectitude. Several days of gusty rainstorms had elapsed at Ostend, and the passengers had had the opportunity ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... and gun after gun was fired in succession, the shot telling with fearful effect as they swept the deck of the French ship. The latter put down her helm in a vain attempt to avoid being raked, but her bowsprit catching in the mizen rigging of the Lily, Oliver, calling to Jack and several other men, securely lashed it there, in spite of the fire which the marines from the enemy's forecastle opened on ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston
... they chased, kept company with her all night, and took in the morning, with the loss of only their boatswain, and two or three men wounded. In taking this ship, they damaged their own so much, by springing their foremast, carrying away their bowsprit, and beating in part of their upper works that they did not think her longer fit for their use. They therefore filled her away with prisoners, gave them provision ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... the words of the First Consul, redoubled their zeal and the rapidity of their fire. One of them said, "Look at the frigate, General; her bowsprit is going to fall." He spoke truly, the bowsprit was cut in two by his ball. "Give twenty francs to that brave man," said the First Consul to the officers who were with him. Near the batteries of Wimereux there was a furnace to heat the cannon-balls; and the First Consul noticed ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... four days. During all this time the ship lay rolling in the trough of the sea, the heavy surges breaking over her, and the spars heaving and banging to and fro, bruising the half-drowned sailors that clung to the bowsprit and the stumps of the masts. The sufferings of these poor fellows were intolerable. They stood to their waists in water, in imminent peril of being washed off by every surge. In this position they dared not sleep, ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving
... substance, attached generally to pieces of the cement. After examining and puzzling myself over this strange scene for some time, my next care was to seek traces of the ship and of her crew; and before long I saw just outside the coral reef what had been her bowsprit, and presently, floating on the sea, one of her masts, with the sail attached. There could be little doubt that the shock had extended to her, had driven her off the reef where she had been fixed into the ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... everybody's slave, with not one moment to myself, except such as I can steal near the end of the second dog-watch. Let me pause for a minute to look out over the sea sparkling in the sun, or to gaze at a sailor going aloft to the gaff-topsails, or running out the bowsprit, and I am sure to hear the hateful voice, "'Ere, you, 'Ump, no sodgerin'. I've got my ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... on Fire Island head draws near, As, trumpet-winged, the pilot's shout From his post on the bowsprit's heel I hear, With the welcome call ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... completely decked, with a high poop and forecastle. Her length has been variously estimated. Two of her masts had square sails, the mizzen being lateen-rigged. The foremast had a square foresail, the mainmast a mainsail and maintopsail, and there was a spritsail on the bowsprit. The courses were enlarged, in fair weather, by lacing strips of canvas to their leeches, called bonetas. There appear to have been two boats, one with a sail, and the ship was armed with lombards. The rigs of these vessels were admirably adapted for their purpose. The large courses of the caravels ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... bolt rope of the jib was still attached, and hauling on this had got the block down and in readiness for fastening on the new jib. The sheets were hooked on, and then while one hand ran the sail out with the out haul to the bowsprit end, the other hoisted with the halliards. By this time the boat was close to the broken water. As the sail filled her head payed off towards it. The wind lay her right over, and before she could gather way there was ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... round before he went below. Away at some distance on either hand were white masses of foam where the sea was breaking on the sands. He went up to the bow and looked ahead through the darkness, then he went back to his uncle. "I caught sight of a light right over the bowsprit." ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... came to anchor in great peril, under the highlands of Sauble. Here we pitched terribly, and were momently in peril of being cast on shore. In the effort to work the ship, one of the men fell from the bowsprit, and passed under the vessel, and was lost. It was thought that our poor little craft must go to the bottom; it seemed like a chip on the ocean contending against the powers of the Almighty. It seemed as if, agreeably to Indian fable, Ishkwondameka himself was raising a tempest mountain high ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... noise under her bows, as she glided along, with her sails all still. It seemed a pity to go to work at such a time; and if we could only have sat in the windlass again; or if they would have let me go out on the bowsprit, and lay down between the manropes there, and look over at the fish in the water, and think of home, I should have been almost happy ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... condition to obey. In attempting to go about, being at the time near the shore, which was covered with the enemy's marksmen, she hung in stays, and Mr. Pellew, not regarding the danger of making himself so conspicuous, sprang out on the bowsprit to push the jib over. The artillery-boats now towed her out of action, under a very heavy fire from the enemy, who were enabled to bear their guns upon her with more effect, as she increased her distance. A shot cut ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... quite close to the pier-head, and goes into stays—(is that right?)—and her great sails flap and swing, and a person to whom caution is unknown, and who cares for nothing in heaven or earth, sits unconcerned on a string underneath her bowsprit, and gets wet through every time she plunges, doing something nautical in connexion with her foresail overhead. And then she leans over in the breeze, and the white sheets catch it full—so near you can hear the boom click as it swings, and the ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... the sky-sails excepted, have four sides, as have also the sprit-sails on the bowsprit, jib-boom, &c.; and all, except the sail last mentioned on the mizen, usually lie across the ship, or in planes forming considerable angles with the axis or central line of the ship. There are a number of sails which lie in the same plane with ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... nose, from its being the most projecting part of the human face, as the bowsprit is of ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... Cuddy Cove to save the life of a mother of seven—the Cuddy Cove men had without a moment's respite pulled twelve miles against a switch of wind from the north and were streaming sweat when they landed—once, when the doctor was thus about his beneficent business, a woman from Bowsprit Head brought her child to be cured, incredulous of the physician's power, but yet desperately seeking, as mothers will. She came timidly—her ailing child on her bosom, where, as it seemed to me, it had lain complaining since she gave ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... another wood called dongon, [45] which is very strong, and of a yellowish color. From it are made stringer-plates, chocks of the bowsprit, coamings of the hatchways, strakes and stanchions for the decks. If all these woods are cut at the conjunction and decrease of the moon, and seasoned, as above stated, for one year, the ship will last much longer; for if they ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVIII, 1617-1620 • Various
... rapidly approaching. Then they went to the bow of the vessel, where they found that she was anchored, though the chain had been hove short. The hawser by which she was to be towed to sea was made fast to the bowsprit bitts, and led to the stern of the steamer, where it was ...
— A Victorious Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... the way from Scarborough to Whitby the coast offers no shelter of any sort in heavy weather, and many vessels have been lost on the rocks. On one occasion a small sailing-ship was driven right into this bay at high tide, and the bowsprit smashed into a window of the little hotel that occupied the place ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home
... thus formed is a reverse [symbol: upside-down V], called a point, always, naturally, composed of the hardest rock, and not infrequently ending in a literal point so sharp that it is like a vast granite bowsprit thrust out into the green plains far below, terminating in a sheer precipice of several hundred feet. Roughly, then, you may visualize this section of the Cumberlands as a giant double-edged saw, a thousand feet ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton
... was not grieved or angry when it was declared, after a thorough survey by Captain Hazard, Coffin, and himself, to be absolutely necessary to procure a new foremast and bowsprit for the ship before she sailed—the first being rotten, and the other badly sprung. As Captain Hazard placed the most implicit confidence in Morton's capacity to purchase and superintend the making of the requisite spars, the ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... stagnant pools on either side, Where new-launch'd ships of infant-sailors ride: Rodneys in rags here British valour boast, And lisping Nelsons fright the Gallic coast. They fix the rudder, set the swelling sail, They point the bowsprit, and they blow the gale: True to her port, the frigate scuds away, And o'er that frowning ocean finds her bay: Her owner rigg'd her, and he knows her worth, And sees her, fearless, gunwale-deep go forth; Dreadless ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... permission to make a "jhu jhu," which is a superstitious rite performed by the natives in these rivers. The object of the ceremony is to propitiate their deity for a safe passage and a good trade; the operation consists of spilling a wine glass full of rum, twice on the bowsprit (upon which the operator stands), and once on each side of it, into the water. They practise a similar rite when they anchor, cutting some bread and meat into small pieces, scattering it in like manner on the bowsprit, into the river, ...
— A Voyage Round the World, Vol. I (of ?) • James Holman
... sprang at the last of them, giving him a hard shove as he was climbing over, so that he fell on the boat, upsetting it. They had business enough then for a little, and began hailing for help. I knew I had done a foolish thing, and ran forward, climbing out upon the bowsprit, and off with my coat and vest, and dived into the dark water. I swam under as long as I could hold my breath, and then came up quietly, turning on my back in the quick current, and floating so my face only was above water. It had grown dark, ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller
... out on the bowsprit, and, dropping down upon the foot-rope, was at the outer end of the flying-jib boom in an instant, clearing away ...
— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic
... gone mad, and the yielding water it turned up curled over and fell white with foam, as the ploughed soil, heavy and brown, rolls and falls in a ridge. At each wave they met—and there was a short, chopping sea—the Pearl shivered from the point of the bowsprit to the rudder, which trembled under Pierre's hand; when the wind blew harder in gusts, the swell rose to the gunwale as if it would overflow into the boat. A coal brig from Liverpool was lying at anchor, waiting for the tide; they made a sweep round her stern ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... the lust of blood seemed to grow upon them. It is a naked truth that there was no law for boys who lived on the high seas until very recent years. One fine, hardy seadog (that is the correct and robust way of talking) used to strip his apprentice, and make him go out to the bowsprit end when the vessel was dipping her stem in winter time. He was such a merry fellow, was this bold seadog, and I could make breezy, "robust" Britons laugh for hours by my narratives of his drolleries. ...
— The Chequers - Being the Natural History of a Public-House, Set Forth in - a Loafer's Diary • James Runciman
... on deck to relieve Hansen at eight bells, in the commencement of the forenoon watch, found Lund in the bows as he walked forward, waiting for the bell to be struck. The giant leaned by the bowsprit, his spectacled eyes seeming to gaze ahead into the gray of the northern sky, and it seemed to Rainey as if he were smelling the wind. The sun shone brightly enough, but it lacked heat-power, and the sea had gone ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... in the moonlight; upon mysterious coils of rope; upon the dew-wet roof of a deck-house; upon a wheel twinkling with brass-work, and behind it a white-painted taffrail. Her eyes were travelling forward to the bowsprit again, when, close by the foremast, they were arrested, and ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... two sloops rolled till the muzzles of their guns dipped in the sea; but both crews cheered heartily and fought on till, as the Wasp rubbed across the bow of the Frolic, her jib boom came in between the masts of the Wasp. A boarding party then leaped upon her bowsprit, and as they ran down the deck were amazed to see nobody save the man at the wheel and three wounded officers. As the British were not able to lower their flag, Lieutenant Biddle of the Wasp ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... had been obliged to put into Plymouth for repairs, and, on the 22nd Sept., 1796, was lying alongside of a sheer-hulk taking in her bowsprit, within a few yards of the dockyard jetty. The ship, being on the eve of sailing, was crowded with more than an hundred men, women, and children, above her usual complement. It was about four o'clock in the afternoon ...
— Narratives of Shipwrecks of the Royal Navy; between 1793 and 1849 • William O. S. Gilly
... would come a kind of lull in the wild sequence of rolling waters, and then I fancied for a moment that I saw how she rocked on the bottom. Her masts had all gone by the board, and a perfect chaos of cordage floated and swung in the waves that broke over her. But her bowsprit remained entire, and shot out into the foamy dark, crowded with human beings. The first rocket had missed. They were preparing to fire another. Roxton stood with his telescope in his hand, ready to watch ...
— The Seaboard Parish Vol. 3 • George MacDonald
... ship, set apart on the deck right under the lamps, stripped to the waist, tattooed like a cannibal chief all over his powerful chest and enormous biceps. Between the blue and red patterns his white skin gleamed like satin; his bare back was propped against the heel of the bowsprit, and he held a book at arm's length before his big, sunburnt face. With his spectacles and a venerable white beard, he resembled a learned and savage patriarch, the incarnation of barbarian wisdom serene in the blasphemous ...
— The Nigger Of The "Narcissus" - A Tale Of The Forecastle • Joseph Conrad
... silent for a time. The ship rolled easily; now and then she dipped her bowsprit with a soft swish of spray; a school of dolphins played astern, and the last of the land birds that had followed us out flew in circles ...
— The After House • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... had been objurgating straight ahead all this time, now weighed anchor and put the boat in towards shore. Silence fell upon the company. They seemed very shy of each other, and did not amalgamate at all. Mr. P. went out to the extreme end of the bowsprit and gazed down into the deep blue sea, wondering whether its color was really due to excess of salt, or the presence of cuprate of ammonia. HORACE climbed to the top of the mast, where he sat sadly, observing ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870 • Various
... When the bowsprit touched the rata-branches, which drooped like a curtain into the water, Mr. H—— made a signal to lower the mast, and parting the thick, blossom-covered foliage before us, with both hands, the way the boat had on her sent us gently through the screen of scarlet flowers ...
— Station Life in New Zealand • Lady Barker
... fore and aft, till the mariners come nigh to drowning while yet afloat. And ever, as the white moon shows .. her affrighted face from the steep gullies in the blackness overhead, aghast Jonah sees the rearing bowsprit pointing high upward, but soon beat downward again towards the tormented deep. Terrors upon terrors run shouting through his soul. In all his cringing attitudes, the God-fugitive is now too plainly known. The sailors mark him; more and more certain grow ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... abeam, like a motor-car smashing in the dark into an unlighted farm-waggon drawn across a country lane. Bows crumpled up; bowsprit snapped away; foremast, loosed from its stay, and forced back by the pressure of a half-gale on the close-hauled foresail, carried over to port in a tangle of rope and wire ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... reminded him of the pictures of the royal yacht in which Queen Victoria came to Ireland to open Kingstown harbour at the very beginning of her reign. She was a paddle steamer. She had an exaggerated form of fiddle bow, a long bowsprit and two tall masts on which sails ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... bumping a large Norwegian sailing vessel at anchor with her stem pointing down-stream. This ship they passed on the port side. Just as they got clear of her bowsprit the fat man cried out excitedly, 'There's her nose!' and he put the boat about and began to pull back against the tide. And surely the missing 'Squirm' was comfortably anchored on the starboard quarter of the Norwegian ship, hidden neatly between the ship ...
— The Grand Babylon Hotel • Arnold Bennett
... of shock as had been displayed in the encounter with the St. Philip and with the same result. The miserable, top-heavy monster galley was struck between mainmast and stern, with a blow which carried away the assailant's own bowsprit and fore-bulwarks, but which—completely demolished the stem of the galley, and crushed out of existence the greater portion of the live machinery sitting chained and rowing on the benches. And again, as the first enemy hauled off from its ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... three-fourths immerged; besides the three masts and the bowsprit, to which the whale-boat was suspended, the poop and the forecastle are the only por- tions that now are visible; and as the intervening section of the deck is quite below the water, these appear to be con- nected only by the framework of the netting that ...
— The Survivors of the Chancellor • Jules Verne
... word to go. With a creak, and a cant, and a swish of canvas, upon their light heels they flew round, and trembled with the eagerness of leaping on their way. The taper boom dipped toward the running hills of sea, and the jib-foreleech drew a white arc against the darkness of the sky to the bowsprit's plunge. Then, as each keen cut-water clove with the pressure of the wind upon the beam, and the glistening bends lay over, green hurry of surges streaked with gray began the quick dance along them. Away they went ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... driving the mules, and that's Bowsprit—the one all black from the coal. Cutwater's the girl leaning over the stern; Maintop, the one with the three pigtails; and Mizzen, the ...
— Half-Past Seven Stories • Robert Gordon Anderson
... is something like a boat," said Rap eagerly. "When it flies its wings are like sails in the air, and when it swims its feet row under the water, and the tail balances behind like a rudder and the head sticks out in front like the bowsprit." ...
— Citizen Bird • Mabel Osgood Wright and Elliott Coues
... business, he commenced his contemplated improvements upon the old boat. She was a very poor subject to work upon, but he got out the wood for building a half deck over her, which he fitted on as he had opportunity. A short bowsprit was added to her rig, and his mother made him a jib, which he cut out himself. Thus refitted, the old boat, though her main defects could not be remedied, was much improved, and worked better than before. She was far from coming up to the ...
— Little By Little - or, The Cruise of the Flyaway • William Taylor Adams
... not much of a bowsprit, and no sail spread. I see her first by the flash of her sweeps in the rising sun, as she was heading about sou'-sou'-east ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... shone Richly as a rainbow seen Where the moonlight floats upon Gossamers of gold and green: All the tiny spars were bright; Beaten gold the bowsprit was; But our pilot was the night, And our ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... into "Hobson, Jobson." That the practice of so altering words is not limited to the English is shown by two perhaps not very familiar instances in French, where "Aunt Sally" has become ane sale, "a dirty donkey," and "bowsprit" has become beau pre, though quite unconnected with "a beautiful meadow." The name "Pigeon English" is itself a good example. It has no connection with pigeon, the bird, but is an Oriental's attempt to pronounce the word "business." It hardly, however, seems necessary ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... boom ran out, and the foresail went up, the Osprey glided on with accelerated speed, and the end of the bowsprit was but a few yards from the starting line when ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty
... with unabated speed. The next moment they were under her bows; just as their oars flew into the air, we could hear a deep voice from the deck, sternly ordering them to "keep off," and I thought that I could distinguish Captain Erskine standing near the bowsprit. ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer
... hundred feet distant. Old Trull and Bonney caught up the pike-poles to fend off with. "The Curlew" drove on. The vast shadowy shape seemed to approach. A chill came with it. A few seconds more, and the bowsprit punched heavily against the ice-mountain. The shock sent the schooner staggering back like a pugilist with a "blimmer" between the eyes. Had we been sailing at our usual rate, it would have stove in the whole bow. The storm immediately forced us forward again; ...
— Left on Labrador - or, The cruise of the Schooner-yacht 'Curlew.' as Recorded by 'Wash.' • Charles Asbury Stephens
... acquaintance' sake; the current is so lazy, it seems incredible that the same waters are almost impassable at some seasons. I succeed in wrecking a whole armada of floating leaves with stems like a bowsprit. A few beetles take passage in these gilded ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... only successful on the rivers and Broads, but in the Yarmouth Roads. I was on her when she was beating the famous Thames twenty-tonner Vanessa, when the Red Rover carried away her bowsprit (a new stick) as she was beating on the sands to dodge the tide, and I remember how we were hooted all the way up Gorleston Harbour when Mr. William Hall's ...
— Edward FitzGerald and "Posh" - "Herring Merchants" • James Blyth
... thirty tons, very swift by the rake of her masts and the lines of her bow. She was coming up from the south under jib, foresail, and mainsail; but even as we watched her all her white canvas shut suddenly in, like a kittiwake closing her wings, and we saw the splash of her anchor just under her bowsprit. She may have been rather less than a quarter of a mile from the shore—so near that I could see a tall man with a peaked cap, who stood at the quarter with a telescope to his eye, sweeping it backwards ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... intelligence was decidedly in their favor. Was it not a distinct contradiction of the whole story told by their opponents? If Barbican and his friends were lying at the bottom of the Pacific, they were certainly not circumgyrating around the Moon. If it was the Projectile that had broken off the bowsprit of the Susquehanna, it could not certainly be the Projectile that Belfast had seen only the day previous doing the duty of a satellite. Did not the truth of one incident render the other an absolute ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne
... a dozen men sprang upon guns or other objects, to look for the vessel in question. The old salt forward, however, had much the best chance, for he stepped on the heel of the bowsprit, and walked as far out as the knight-heads, to command the whole view ahead of the brig. There he stood half a minute, looking first on one side of the head-gear, then the other, when he gave his ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... snout like an alligator, the nearest link, naturalists say, between the animal life of today and the animal life of the Reptilian Period. The shovel-nose cat, really a deformed kind of freshwater sturgeon, with a great fan-shaped membranous plate jutting out from his nose like a bowsprit, jumps all day in the quiet places with mighty splashing sounds, as though a horse had fallen into the water. On every stranded log the huge snapping turtles lie on sunny days in groups of four and six, baking their shells black in the sun, with their ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... yards the Arabella's forward guns, which had meanwhile been reloaded, fired again at the Milagrosa, and this time smashed her bowsprit into splinters; so that for a moment she yawed wildly to port. Don Miguel swore profanely, and then, as the helm was put over to swing her back to her course, his own prow replied. But the aim was too high, ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... cried the skipper; "Mr. Stewart, can it be one of the schooner's crew, who has saved himself by the bowsprit rigging?" ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... in the bows of the Emma an elevated grating over the heel of her bowsprit whence the eye could take in the whole range of her deck and see every movement of her crew. It was a spot safe from eaves-droppers, though, of course, exposed to view. The sun had just set on the supreme content of Carter when ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... her guns. The fog became more opaque than ever; the two ships had neared each other considerably, or it would have been impossible to distinguish. All that they could see from the deck of the Portsmouth was the jib-boom and cap of the bowsprit of the Frenchman, the rest of her bowsprit, and her whole hull, were lost in the impenetrable gloom; but that was sufficient for the men to direct their guns, and the fire from the Portsmouth was most rapid, although the extent of its execution was unknown. ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... our large cities. She was schooner-rigged, with a small cabin forward. Her masts, by an ingenious contrivance, could be lowered down aft, and, by means of a rope attached to the fore-top, and running through a block on the bowsprit, could be instantly restored to their original upright position. This arrangement the owner found necessary, on account of the overhanging trees, which nearly concealed the two openings of the ...
— Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue • Warren T. Ashton
... from the bit of timber; and then I made my way to the bow of the vessel on which I was. Looking upward, I found that our brig, which was resting on the tall poops of the two sunken vessels, was so suspended above me that her fore chains, which ran under her bowsprit, were almost ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... spare time, I used to lie in the net under the bowsprit, and read. From there I could look back on the entire ship as it sailed ahead, every ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... Unity, with her crew of untrained men, was now in full chase of a vessel well-armed and equipped. On swept the sloop, and a sudden volley of musketry from her deck astonished and confused the enemy. The gunboat swerved, and the bowsprit of the Unity plunged into her mainsail, holding the two vessels together for ...
— A Little Maid of Old Maine • Alice Turner Curtis
... millionaire's Christmas dinner, or the accident to the Scotch express. Personally, I do not care for any of these; my vote goes for the desert-island story. Proud Lady Julia has fallen off the deck of the liner, and Ronald, refused by her that morning, dives off the hurricane deck—or the bowsprit or wherever he happens to be—and seizes her as she is sinking for the third time. It is a foggy night and their absence is unnoticed. Dawn finds them together on a little coral reef. They are in no danger, for several liners are due to pass in a day or two and Ronald's pockets ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne
... rise to many reflections on the evils of divided responsibility. On the night in question some mysterious spell seemed to bind us to the shores of Prince Edward Island. In an attempt to get the steamer off she ran stern foremost upon the bowsprit of a schooner, then broke one of the piles of the wharf to pieces, crushing her fender to atoms at the same time. Some persons on the pier, compassionating our helplessness, attempted to stave the ship off with long poles, but this ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... I'm afloat, I'll stick to it that mine Beats yours into rope-yarn in spite of your bawling, Just as snuffy old Tiber is flogged by the brine; And he who the difference cannot discern Is a lob-sided lubber from bowsprit to stern. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... Behind, the perimeter of the horizon was broken to their eyes, only by the mainmast, carrying brigantine and fore-staff. That beacon hid from them a part of the sea and the sky. In the front, they saw the bowsprit stretching over the waves, with its three jibs, which were hauled tightly, spread out like three great unequal wings. Underneath rounded the foremast, and above, the little top-sail and the little gallant-sail, whose bolt-rope quivered with the ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... Hellgate, at the head of East River, New York. On the passage down Long Island Sound she met with an accident. She ran into the schooner Resurrection, which was lying becalmed across her course, carrying away most of the schooner's bowsprit, but doing no serious damage. This, however, was not the worst. On arriving in New York, it was found that one of the passengers was missing! He had fallen overboard during the night, possibly at the time of ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... above a thousand men on board his flag-ship. The vessel was illuminated with coloured lanterns. In the midst of the festivities, Constantine Kanaris, a Psarian captain, brought his fire-ship unobserved right up to the Turkish man-of-war, and drove his bowsprit firmly into one of her portholes; then, after setting fire to the combustibles, he stepped quietly into a row-boat, and made away. A breeze was blowing, and in a moment the Turkish crew were enveloped in a mass of ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... just as the French began to run out on their bowsprit, and, by the time six or eight were on the heel of the jib-boom, they were met by the hissing hot stream, which took them en echelon, as it might be, fairly raking the whole line. The effect was instantaneous. Physical nature cannot stand excessive heat, unless ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... but the waves from the open sea came roaring in and broke over the Daisy. The bowsprit dipped under the anchor chain, and the whole bulwark on the weatherside was carried away. The next sea swept into the open and now sinking boat. By frantic efforts they heaved up the anchor and the next wave swung the Daisy ...
— The Book of Missionary Heroes • Basil Mathews
... the early morning we had warped into dock at Hoboken, the Rotherhithe—and, in some respects, Rosherville—of New York, being situated on the opposite side of the river; and here, the Herzog von Gottingen lay, with her bowsprit jammed into a coal shed and her decks, aforetime so white and clean, all bespattered with dirt, and encumbered with hawsers and cables. These latter coiling and uncoiling themselves here, there, and everywhere, ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson
... oats. How cultivated. Budding, grafting and inarching. Seedless fruit. Conclude to utilize the wrecked part of the life-boat as part of the new boat. Size of the new vessel. Its size and weight What is a ship. A brig, a sloop. Single masters. The sails. Different parts of the masts. The bowsprit and boom. The ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Exploring the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... discovery was increased by the Bridgewater being perceived under sail, and though distant, that she was standing towards the reef. On the other side, the appearance of the poor Cato, with the people waving to us from the bowsprit and fore castle, the only parts above water, was ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... and stomach; sneaking Calais, prone behind its bar, invites emetically to despair. Even when it can no longer quite conceal itself in its muddy dock, it has an evil way of falling off, has Calais, which is more hopeless than its invisibility. The pier is all but on the bowsprit and you think you are there—roll, roar, wash!—Calais has retired miles inland, and Dover has burst out to look for it. It has a last dip and slide in its character, has Calais, to be specially commended to the infernal gods. Thrice accursed ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... the cause of progress, to haul us ahead; but in a tight place The Sheet Anchor was our recourse, and by it think I may say we—swore. I always mistrusted The Kedge Anchor after my researches into a mysterious sentence—"A celebrated master, now a commander, in the navy never served the bowsprit rigging all over." In the old-time frigates, of the days of Nelson and Hull, the master was at the head of the marling-spike division of the ship's economy, being, in fact, the descendant of the ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... Englishmen"—puff-puff—the volume of smoke was all right once more. "One Monday morning I ran out of the Navy Yard dock within sight of the wreck. I had been layin' up over Sunday to get out of the way of a norther, when I luffed a little too soon, and bang went my bowsprit and scraped off about three feet of red paint from the end of the dock. One of the watchmen was on the string-piece, and saw the whole thing. 'Come ashore,' he says, 'and go and see the Admiral; you can't scrape no paint off ...
— The Underdog • F. Hopkinson Smith
... dropped, the Irene rested in a solid mass of lily pads, with her bowsprit extending over the border of the Everglades, which stretched out eastward, a great, grassy, overflowed meadow, dotted with keys, to the horizon. A slough of clear water, deep enough to float the little power-boat, zigzagged out into the ...
— Dick in the Everglades • A. W. Dimock
... nuzzled at the endless line of docks, mast overspiring mast, and bowsprit overlapping bowsprit, till the eye was bewildered, as if by the confusion of branches in a leafless forest. In the distance the mass of rigging resolved itself into a solid gray blur against the sky. The great hulks, green and black ...
— Blix • Frank Norris
... and storm-jib. Even upon this small and stout spread of canvas the wind was working destruction, for just as Thurstane reached the deck the jib parted and went to leeward in ribbons. Sailors were seen now on the bowsprit fighting at once with sea and air, now buried in water, and now holding on against the storm, and slowly gathering in the flapping, snapping fragments. Next a new jib (a third one) was bent on, hoisted half-way, and blown out like a piece of wet paper. ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... was only a Dutchman, you know. But he had a bad dream that night, had Andreas. All the dead men came to fetch him, and he ran from them and got right out on the bowsprit, and there he sat and yelled, while the dead men stood on the forecastle. And the one with his broken thigh-bone in his hand was foremost, and he came crawling out, and wanted Andreas to put it together again. But ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... long, overhanging counter; and her spring, or sheer, was so great that, low as she sat, her bow stood high and dominant above the water. She was painted black from her rail to her copper, the top edge of which was about six inches above her load-line; and she had only her two lower-masts and her bowsprit standing. But her masts were magnificent sticks, lofty enough, apparently, to spread all the canvas that she could possibly carry, without any need of topmasts, and both spars were stepped well forward; the mainmast, indeed, seemed to be almost amidships, ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... to time. During the space of three bells, we have our hands pretty full, and then the mate bawls: 'For'ard there! In with jib; lay out, men!' The vessel is buried to her bight-heads every plunge she takes, and sometimes the solid sea pours over her bowsprit as far as the but-end of the flying jib-boom. But to hear is of course to obey; and while some of our messmates spring to the downhaul of the jib, and rattle it down the stay, we and another man get out along the bowsprit, and with our feet resting on the slippery, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 431 - Volume 17, New Series, April 3, 1852 • Various
... another story told of this foul-weather urchin, by Skipper Daniel Ouslesticker, of Fish-Hill, who was never known to tell a lie. He declared, that, in a severe squall, he saw him seated astride of his bowsprit, riding the sloop ashore, full butt against Antony's Nose; and that he was exorcised by Dominie Van Gieson, of Esopus, who happened to be on board, and who sung the hymn of St. Nicholas; whereupon the goblin threw himself up in the air like a ball, and went off in a whirlwind, ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... signal for engaging flying, and the signal for the line, hauled down. At three minutes past eleven the Admiral made the signal for the van to tack: saw one of the enemy's ships with all her masts and bowsprit shot away; Sir Samuel Hood's division and part of the centre still engaging the enemy's fleet: the rear, having been broke ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... the masts were cut away, Both main and mizen; first the mizen went, The main-mast follow'd: but the ship still lay Like a mere log, and baffled our intent. Foremast and bowsprit were cut down, and they Eased her at last (although we never meant To part with all till every hope was blighted), And then with ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... boarded the King's ship; now on the beak,[379-57] Now in the waist,[380-58] the deck, in every cabin, I flamed amazement: sometime I'd divide, And burn in many places; on the top-mast, The yards, and bowsprit, would I flame distinctly,[380-59] Then meet and join. Jove's lightnings, the precursors O' the dreadful thunder-claps, more momentary[380-60] And sight-outrunning were not: the fire, and cracks ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... need trouble himself little about an unsuccessful expedition. This is the talent which has made judges without law, and diplomatists without French, which has sent to the Admiralty men who did not know the stern of a ship from her bowsprit, and to the India Board men who did not know the difference between a rupee and a pagoda, which made a foreign secretary of Mr. Pitt, who, as George the Second said, had never opened Vattel, and which was very near making ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Shakspeare took a long slide, just clearing the bowsprit of the Coromandel. Breeze getting up from S.S.E. a little sea coming in. Our pilot, it seems, does not know when the tide is at its highest, but thinking we might slide over suddenly in the night, ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... and pledged himself to live for evermore up to the high reputation they had given him, which he was proud to believe he deserved. At ten p.m. the wind and sea had increased, and the vessel was plunging her jibboom and bowsprit under. The second officer intimated that all hands would have to be called to reef the topsails and haul the mainsail up and stow it, but his men were imbued with heroic dash, and would not hear of such unseamanlike weakness. They assured him that they could take the sail in without calling the ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... I battled round a point, I heard a rustle and a rush of something coming, and the bowsprit of a large sloop glided into view close by me. She was painted in stripes of all colors above her green bottom. The shimmer of the water shook the reflection of her hull, and made the edges of the stripes blend together. ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various
... the Captain. "Never mind, Dolly, don't give way to temper, and curl up that bowsprit of yours with such a confounded ugly twist. There may be a chance yet. Let me see. I don't think that you are fifty-four. My nurse, Betty Holt, was called an old maid for thirty ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie
... strong current caught our bow and carried us into the bank, causing us to collide with and considerably damage two schooners, as well as the balcony of one of the numerous wooden houses standing on piles in the river. The bowsprit of one of the schooners was completely interlaced with the stanchions, ropes, and railings of our gangway, and it must have been a good stick not to snap off short. The tide was now much higher than when we came up, but the ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey
... the moon was already rising bathed in silvery light, when Tonio Kroeger's ship reached the open sea. He stood by the bowsprit, his mantle shielding him from the steadily freshening breeze, and looked down into the dark roving and surging of the strong, smooth wave-bodies below him, as they rocked about each other, met each other with a splash, separated ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... been there before me. Strange to say, the spot was by no means worked out, though it was fairly good ground and easy working, and the shell large. We did good business for a while, until one day I got a proper start. The life-line fouled on something, and I found that it had taken a turn round the bowsprit of a wreck. I got on top pretty quick, and, having had a talk with my mate, went down again. Very soon I knew the boat. It was the ——, and she had belonged to a man I had known very well. The strange part about the business was that the ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... begun to die away, and as a large number of the convicts were already buried in a drunken sleep, Ayrton did not hesitate to venture onto the Speedy's deck, which the extinguished lanterns now left in total darkness. He hoisted himself onto the cutwater, and by the bowsprit arrived at the forecastle. Then, gliding among the convicts stretched here and there, he made the round of the ship, and found that the Speedy carried four guns, which would throw shot of from eight to ten ...
— The Secret of the Island • W.H.G. Kingston (translation from Jules Verne)
... bowsprit of the French Admiral's ship is stuck fast in the stern-gallery of the "Santisima Trinidad," the starboard side of the "Bucentaure" being shattered by shots from two English three- deckers which are pounding her on that hand. The poop is also ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... seamen are lost off the lee main-yardarm. A fearful storm greatly distresses the vessel and the captain gives command "to bear away." As she passes the island of St. George, the helmsman is struck blind by lightning. Bowsprit, foremast, and main-topmast being carried away, the officers try to save themselves on the wreck of the foremast. The ship splits on the projecting verge of Cape Colonna. The captain and all his crew are ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... heard it—that voice that seemed to mingle with the wailing tones of the deep! The little swinging lantern beneath the bowsprit played on his bearded face as he bent farther forward, and, with growing wonder not unmixed with fear, now made out something dark clinging to one of the steel lines that ran from the projecting timber to the ship. It took the ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... made a tolerably good beginning at thinking of all the mean actions I had wrought in the flesh, when I saw projecting beyond the crest of the wave a ship's bowsprit, with a man sitting on it, reading a newspaper! Thank ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... indeed—and quickly put up both his hands to his head, pressing them on the side of his temples. The old fisherman in the boat beyond noticed this strange movement, and forthwith caught a rope, hauled the boat across a stretch of water, and then came scrambling over bowsprit, lowered sails and nets to where Lavender ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... in our three jury lower-masts, we hoisted up the foreyard to the main, to act as our mainyard, and did likewise with the topsail-yard to the fore, and after that, we sent up the t'gallant-yard to the mizzen. Thus we had her sparred, all but a bowsprit and jibboom; yet this we managed by making a stumpy, spike bowsprit from one of the smaller spars which they had used to shore up the superstructure, and because we feared that it lacked strength to ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... he saw he was near the dock, where a big ship pushed its bowsprit out over the street. Men were unloading bags and boxes from the boat. He ran down and asked the mate if he could help. "Yes!" was the ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard
... Swings round the huge bowsprit, and slowly With motion majestic and free, The galleon, vast, gilded, and mighty, Passes on, passes forth, to ...
— Memories of Canada and Scotland - Speeches and Verses • John Douglas Sutherland Campbell
... pursued his voyage, and, on the 14th of January, 1769, entered the Strait of Le Maire, at which time the tide drove the ship out with so much violence, and raised such a sea off Cape St. Diego, that she frequently pitched, so that the bowsprit was under water. On the next day, the lieutenant anchored, first before a small cove, which was understood to be Port Maurice, and afterward in the Bay of Good Success. While the Endeavour was in this station, happened the memorable adventure of Mr. Banks, Dr. Solander, Mr. Monkhouse ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... and it seemed, as he looked at their meaningless gesticulations, that the bowsprit of the vessel now pointed higher than before. The appalling story thus told to him had barely got home when he saw a change in the conduct of the seamen. They ceased to cry and wave; they looked no longer at him but in the direction whence he had come, and turning, he saw the vessel's little boat ...
— Gilian The Dreamer - His Fancy, His Love and Adventure • Neil Munro
... Parlay's house was picked up, hurled into the lagoon, and blown out upon them. Passing the Malahini, it crashed into the Papara, lying a quarter of a mile astern. There was wild work for'ard on her, and in a quarter of an hour the house went clear, but it had taken the Papara's foremast and bowsprit ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London |
