"Merchantman" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... nationality and bound upon every sort of errand. Vessels of neutral ownership, even vessels of neutral ownership bound from neutral port to neutral port, have been destroyed along with vessels of belligerent ownership in constantly increasing numbers. Sometimes the merchantman attacked has been warned and summoned to surrender before being fired on or torpedoed; sometimes passengers or crews have been vouchsafed the poor security of being allowed to take to the ship's boats before ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson
... merchantman," said Paradise. "Look at her colors. A Company ship, probably, bound for Virginia, with a cargo of servants, gentlemen out at elbows, felons, children for apprentices, traders, French vignerons, glasswork Italians, returning Councilors ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... and he was about to question him, when the other, grasping his arm with an expressive touch, pointed to a dark object moving across the road. Gerald turned his head, and beheld the same figure that had so recently quitted the cabin of the merchantman. Following its movements, he saw it noiselessly enter into the grounds of a cottage, opposite an old tannery, ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... 400 English and Huguenot rovers in and about the Channel, and that they had taken 700 prizes between them. The Queen's own ships followed suit. Captain Cotton in the Phoenix captured an Antwerp merchantman in Flushing. The harbour-master protested. Cotton laughed, and sailed away with his prize. The Regent Margaret wrote in indignation to Elizabeth. Such insolence, she said, was not to be endured. She would have Captain Cotton chastised as an example to all others. Elizabeth measured the situation ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude
... the Chinese station, but had recently obtained information that war had been declared between England and the States. She was now making her way to the west by a circuitous route to avoid the British squadron, and, at the same time, with a view to pick up an English merchantman ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... good luck suddenly deserted him; for no sooner was he berthed, with sails stowed and anchors out, than he discovered that the French merchantman next him was none other than a vessel which on his last voyage out he had attempted to board in mid-channel, and, but for a sudden squall, would have captured and plundered. The captain of the merchantman had ...
— Kilgorman - A Story of Ireland in 1798 • Talbot Baines Reed
... eighteenth year found him master of a vessel. Those were hazardous days upon the sea, and more than once his ship was subjected to indignity and outrage incident to seafaring of that period. But throughout a long career as master of a merchantman the Stars and Stripes was never lowered from the masthead nor sullied by defeat or ...
— How the Flag Became Old Glory • Emma Look Scott
... great ships, the fisherman's sloop, the king's corvette, and the merchantman, all lay anchored in the basin and harbor, their prows boring into the gale, their crude hulls rising and falling, tossing and plunging, tugging like living things at their hempen cables. The snow fell upon them, changing them into phantoms, all seemingly ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... just as they were letting me down into the boat, a large vessel appeared in sight. I was immediately assisted to the mast-head, and commanded to report what vessel it was. I examined it for a quarter of an hour through my spy-glass, and was at last convinced that it was a large Dutch merchantman. The captain then had me brought down, and communicated my discovery to the crew, who received ...
— Hair Breadth Escapes - Perilous incidents in the lives of sailors and travelers - in Japan, Cuba, East Indies, etc., etc. • T. S. Arthur
... merchantman, having passed the protecting promontory, and swept around the tall ship of war, had gained an offing, about a half mile beyond, under the lee of a thickly-wooded, long, narrow island; and was now lying snugly at anchor, riding out the heavy ground-swell occasioned by the abated ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... stranger stood in, the English flag was seen flying at her peak, and from her appearance the boatswain pronounced her to be a merchantman, probably an Australian emigrant ship, and that if so she would probably ...
— The Voyages of the Ranger and Crusader - And what befell their Passengers and Crews. • W.H.G. Kingston
... hull is painted black, but there is abundance of scarlet, bright blue, and gilding upon her prow, stern, and upper works. The slim hull itself is about 140 feet long, 14 feet wide, and rides the harbor so lightly as to show it draws very little water; for the warship, even more perhaps than the merchantman, is built on the theory that her crew must drag her up upon the beach ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis
... American merchant marine, it was full of British seamen. Beyond doubt inducements were offered them at every American port to desert and ship under the Stars and Stripes. In the winter of 1801 every British ship visiting New York lost the greater part of its crew. At Norfolk the entire crew of a British merchantman deserted to an American sloop-of-war. A lively trade was done in forged papers of American citizenship, and the British naval officer who gave a boat-load of bluejackets shore leave at New York was liable to find them all Americans when their leave was up. Other nations looked covetously ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... pull down the black flag and turn myself into an honest merchantman, with children in the hold and a wife at the helm. You would remind me that grey hairs begin to show, that health falls into rags, that high spirits split like canvas, and that in the end the bright buccaneer drifts, an old ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... the south shore of Scotland, they fell in with a revenue wherry. It was the practice of such craft to board merchant vessels. The Ranger was disguised as a merchantman, presenting a broad drab-colored belt all round her hull; under the coat of a Quaker, concealing the intent of a Turk. It was expected that the chartered rover would come alongside the unchartered one. But the former took to flight, her two lug sails staggering under a heavy ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... Desmond, with a slight gesture to Bulger to restrain himself—he too had recognized the newcomers—"since when the Nawab has taken into his service the crew of an interloping English merchantman?" ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... this market for everything. Even what he already possesses; even what he bought and paid for but yesterday; even what everybody else would call absolutely the poor man's own, he throws it all back again upon God every day, and thus holds all he has as his instant purchase of the great Merchantman. The poor man's market is as far as possible from being a Vanity Fair, but the catalogues and the sale-lists of that fair may be taken as a specimen of the things that change hands continually in the poor man's market also. For ...
— Samuel Rutherford - and some of his correspondents • Alexander Whyte
... "Merchantman fitted out for privateersman, probably. That's the sort of craft Russia would be likeliest to send to a secret prison like this. ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... haunt British thought was the growing American navy. John Paul was a Scots sailor, who had been a slave trader and subsequently master of a West India merchantman, and on going to America had assumed the name of Jones. He was a man of boundless ambition, vanity, and vigor, and when he commanded American privateers he became a terror to the maritime people from whom he sprang. ...
— Washington and his Comrades in Arms - A Chronicle of the War of Independence • George Wrong
... his kind friend the captain, and the rest of his mates. The sailor who accompanied him patted him on the back, and spoke cheeringly to him in a foreign language; and he was soon between decks with the crew. Several of these could speak English, and Will found that he was on board a Dutch merchantman, bound ...
— For Name and Fame - Or Through Afghan Passes • G. A. Henty
... the night-glass of many a mystified merchantman searched the murk for those coruscations with which the crescent of forts had constellated the Atlantic, the mariner's sea-rent waiting ready, with his ship's-papers, in his cash box: but no galaxy of lights ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel
... England, after leaving Jamaica, the captain, mate, and all but five of the crew died of yellow fever, and the ship was taken by Paul into Whitehaven. For this he received a share in the cargo, and in 1768, when he was twenty-one years old, the owners of the John (a merchantman sailing from the same port) gave him command, and in her he made several voyages to America. Life on a merchantman is rough enough to-day, and was still rougher at that time. To maintain discipline at sea requires ...
— Paul Jones • Hutchins Hapgood
... fleets of commerce, With proud breasts cleaving the tide,— Like emmet or bug with its burden, the tug Hither and thither plied,— Where the quick paddles flashed, where the dropped anchor plashed, And rattled the running chain, Where the merchantman swung in the current, where sung The sailors ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... the owners of the merchantman Deliverance received news that the ship had touched at Plymouth to land passengers, and had then continued her homeward voyage to the Port of London. Five days later, the vessel was in the river, and was towed into the ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... blow up one and damage two; allied landing party suffers loss; Asia Minor ports are being shelled; one-third of the Dardanelles reported clear of Turkish mines; concentration of Turkish fleet reported; Germans state that a submarine, reported by the Captain of British merchantman Thordis to have been sunk by his vessel, escaped; German Embassy at Washington expresses regret over torpedo attack on British hospital ship Asturias in February, stating that the attack, which did no harm, ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... when in March, 1813, she gave chase to a sail off the Surinam River on the coast of South America. The stranger seemed to evince no great desire to escape; and the privateer soon gained sufficiently to discover that the supposed merchantman was a British sloop-of-war, whose long row of open ports showed that she carried twenty-seven guns. Champlin and his men found this a more ugly customer than they had expected; but it was too late to retreat, and to surrender ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... mind, and she was in fear of some complication; for in the course of the winter, while her boys were finishing their studies, each in his own line, she had made the acquaintance of a neighbor, Mme. Rosemilly, the widow of a captain of a merchantman who had died at sea two years before. The young widow—quite young, only three-and-twenty—a woman of strong intellect who knew life by instinct as the free animals do, as though she had seen, gone through, understood, and weighed every conceivable contingency, and ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... indeed, had he been able to send a larger craft, it would not have been so well suited for the purpose, for the pirates would hardly have ventured to attack her. We shall, after we have put out to sea, disguise the brig and rig her as a merchantman in order to tempt them out. We shall not do it until we are well away, for the pirates may have friends here who might send them information. We shall head for the south, and shall give out that we are to rejoin our commander off ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... that I was in the Spanish galley—for I remained on the same vessel all the time,—we, together with other vessels, made several attacks upon English ships, but we were beaten off with heavy loss in every case except one, and that was when we captured a small English merchantman called the Dainty, the unfortunate crew of which, I suppose, were put into the Inquisition, as I had been. These many conflicts were productive of heavy casualties among the slaves, many more, indeed, than ...
— Across the Spanish Main - A Tale of the Sea in the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... are we to do?" he asked. "The merchantman will flee us; the war-vessel will destroy us; neither will believe our colors or give us a chance to explain. We will meet even a worse reception if we go nosing around a British port—mines, nets and all of it. We ...
— The Land That Time Forgot • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Catholic crew had full Papal sanction for attacking every English crew that would not submit to Rome, no matter how Catholic its faith might be. Thus, in addition to danger from pirates, privateers, and men-of-war, an English merchantman had to risk attack by any one who was either passionately Roman or determined to use religion as a cloak. Raids and reprisals grew apace. The English were by no means always lambs in piteous contrast to the Papal wolves. Rather, it might ...
— Elizabethan Sea Dogs • William Wood
... base and can be seen from afar, in which many generations shall find their peace and inspiration. While other books are like the humble craft which ply from place to place along the coast, this book is as a stately merchantman which compasses the great waters and returns with a ...
— Books and Bookmen • Ian Maclaren
... now some years since this little story was set afloat on the sea of books. It is not a man-of-war, nor even a high-sided merchantman; only a small, peaceful sailing-vessel. Yet it has had rather an adventurous voyage. Twice it has fallen into the hands of pirates. The tides have carried it to far countries. It has been passed through the translator's ...
— The Story of the Other Wise Man • Henry Van Dyke
... the Royal Navy. But this is a merchantman; you don't think he will presume to break into the monopoly of the superior branch. He will only swear by the wind and weather. Thunder and squalls! Donner and blitzen! Handspikes and halyards! these are the innocent execrations of the ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... women and children are crammed down below, where the unhappy prisoners are likewise stowed away during an action. Their principal plan is boarding a vessel, if possible, and carrying her by numbers; and certainly if a merchantman fired ill, she would inevitably be taken; but with grape and canister fairly directed, the slaughter would be so great that they would be glad to sheer off before they neared a vessel. This is, of course, supposing a calm, for in a breeze they would never ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... commerce had practically ceased, owing to the perils and hazards of the mine-strewn waters of both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Just when submarine activities ended we do not know but the last vessel of this type sighted by a Pan-American merchantman was the huge Q 138, which discharged twenty-nine torpedoes at a Brazilian tank steamer off the Bermudas in the fall of 1972. A heavy sea and the excellent seamanship of the master of the Brazilian permitted the Pan-American to escape and report ...
— The Lost Continent • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Paul and his party had to tranship, for their vessel was probably of small tonnage, and only fit to run along the coast. In either port they would have no difficulty in finding some merchantman to take them across to Syria. Accordingly they shifted into one bound for Tyre, and apparently ready to sail. The second part of their voyage took them right out to sea, and their course lay to the west, and then to the south of Cyprus, which ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... of goods must be examined and long inventories made. At last the Captain decided things had gone too far. He himself apparently remained to watch over the linen; but at five o'clock on the Sunday morning, Aunt Anna, Fleeming, and his mother were rowed in a pour of rain on board an English merchantman, to suffer "nine mortal hours of agonising suspense." With the end of that time peace was restored. On Tuesday morning officers with white flags appeared on the bastions; then, regiment by regiment, the troops marched in, two hundred ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had now a long "spell" of fine weather, without any incident to break the monotony of our lives, there can be no better place to describe the duties, regulations, and customs of an American merchantman, of which ours was ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... beneath a crimson sunset and between misty purple shores. On one hand lay Africa, on the other the Moorish country, both shrouded in a soft haze and edged with snowy foam. Down below the soldiers of Italy were singing. A merchantman of belligerent nationality, our ship proudly flew its flag again. Indeed, had it failed to do so, the British patrol-boats would long since have ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... the French that they could defend themselves, and one of Moses Brown's ships, the Anne and Hope, sailed into Providence from a voyage to the West Indies, bearing in her rigging the marks of conflict with a French privateer, whom the merchantman had bravely repulsed. During the two years and a half of naval war with France eighty-four armed French vessels, nearly all of them privateers, were captured, and no vessel of our navy was taken by the enemy, ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann
... lay but lightly on the water, while their hulls were carried up to a prodigious height; and it is not too much to say that the portion of the Swanne, above water, was fully as large as the hull which we see of a merchantman of four times her tonnage. Still, even so, it was but a tiny craft to cross the Atlantic, and former voyages had been generally made ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... receiving, or even thinking of his share of prize-money. And he had to support existence with such mean mechanical employment as came in his way, till an opportunity was offered of engaging himself as seaman, again from sheer necessity, on a homeward-bound merchantman—an opportunity which he seized, if not eagerly, for there was no eagerness left in him, yet ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... illustrated precisely the business conception which attached to these enterprises in the minds of competent business men. This ship-rigged vessel of four hundred and seventy-three tons, built of course for a merchantman, was about eight years old when the war broke out, and had just returned from a voyage. Seeing that ordinary commerce was likely to be a very precarious undertaking, her owners spent the months of July and August in preparing ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... him. His next wish was for clothes to which he might have a better right than to the uniform of the senior midshipman of H.M.S. Calypso—a garb in which he did not like to appear before the French Consul. Mr. Thompson consulted his Greek clerk, and a chest belonging to a captured merchantman, which had been claimed as British property, but had not found an owner, was opened, and proved to contain a wardrobe sufficient to equip Arthur like other gentlemen of the day, in a dark crimson coat, with a little gold lace about it, and the rest of the dress white, a wide ...
— A Modern Telemachus • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the Trebizond merchantman took on board his cargo of young and lovely Circassians, and navigated the Black Sea with a flowing sheet and a flag flying at his peak, which told his business and the commerce that he was engaged in; now the trade is ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray
... am writing this in the hope that you will receive it in time to meet me at the steamer—the Columba, a merchantman. It sails at four from Pier 7, East Boston. If not, let me tell you again how much I thank you for what you have done—and would do. From time to time I shall write to you, if you wish, and you can write to me in care of Dr. Carl Sorez, the Metropole, Bogova, Carlina. When I come back ...
— The Web of the Golden Spider • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... letter ashore without making it necessary for any meddlesome custom-house officers to come aboard and ask questions. Accordingly, he decided to stop at Valparaiso. He thought it likely that if he did not meet a vessel going into port which would lay to and take his letter, he might find some merchantman, anchored in the roadstead, to which he could send a boat, and on which he was sure to find some one who would willingly ...
— The Adventures of Captain Horn • Frank Richard Stockton
... very properly clapped the door in the face of the lover. I was not disheartened, Excellency; no, not I. Women are plentiful while we are young. So, without a ducat in my pocket, or a crust for my teeth, I set out to seek my fortune on board of a Spanish merchantman. That was duller work than I expected: but luckily we were attacked by a pirate; half the crew were butchered, the rest captured. I was one of the last,—always in luck, you see, signor, monks' sons ...
— Zicci, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... in tow. Tacked as soon as she was on our beam. She had cast off her prize as soon as we fired at the brig. In passing, fired at and brought to a French corvette; but left her for the fleet to pick up. Passed to leeward of the ship the chase had in tow. She appeared to be a large merchantman and had up American colours. The frigates in chase picked her up soon after. At 10 the chase was nearly hull down, and gained upon us. Stood back to the fleet, being recalled by signal. Saw one of the prizes in flames, and found the three had been ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott
... driven off the sea, the privateers continued the naval war. At that time a merchantman could be turned into a capable fighting ship by adding strengthening timbers and providing the necessary guns. Such a ship, when commissioned as a privateer by the United States government, could capture the enemy's merchantmen and on occasion fight small ...
— The Mentor: The War of 1812 - Volume 4, Number 3, Serial Number 103; 15 March, 1916. • Albert Bushnell Hart
... after, began to tip the wink all round, and I overheard a fellow in a great flapping sou'wester cap say to another old tar in a shaggy monkey-jacket, "Twig his coat, d'ye see the buttons, that chap ain't going to sea in a merchantman, he's going to shoot whales. I say, maty—look here—how d'ye sell them ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... table where Ishmael sat there was no one present except the old retired merchantman, Captain Mountz, who sat on the opposite side, directly under the port lights. And with the rolling of the ship these two diners, holding desperately onto the edge of the table, were tossed up and down like boys on a ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... would take to tell, the Vulture, black sails spread, moved forward to head off the merchantman evidently homeward ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... the American blue-jacket, whaler, fisherman, merchantman, and foremast-hand, cabin boy, captain, commodore, and admiral. A grand book for all lovers of heroism ...
— John and Betty's History Visit • Margaret Williamson
... silver, the walls christall, with four eagles and four greyhounds standing up at the top to bear up a dish; which indeed is one of the neatest pieces of plate that ever I saw, and the case is very pretty also. [A salt-sellar answering this description is preserved at the Tower.] This evening come a merchantman in the harbour, which we hired at London to carry horses to Portugall; but Lord! what running, here was to the seaside to hear what news, thinking it had come ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... uneventful voyage. The foul winds prophesied never blew, the icebergs kept far away to the northward, the excitement of flight from Russian privateers was exchanged for the sight of one harmless merchantman; even the fogs off ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... the sight of a boat which was put off from the ship. In this we soon embarked, and, with a sensation of wild delight, found ourselves once more treading the deck of a good vessel. She was an English merchantman, bound for Canton. We made a quick passage to that port, where we found a vessel just ready to sail for Liverpool. In this I embarked, with my father, who still remained in the same sad state of mental derangement. No incident, worthy ...
— Lizzy Glenn - or, The Trials of a Seamstress • T. S. Arthur
... without an accident. The Belle Voyageuse met shipwreck, and I on board. That was anticipated, though, by all the world; for the night before we set sail,—it was a very murk, hot night, —we were all called out to see the likeness of a large merchantman transfigured in flames upon the sky,—spars and ropes and hull one net and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... captures, Captain Jones headed for the Isle of Man, his intention being to make a descent upon Whitehaven. A violent wind that night baffled him, and, hoping to prevent his presence in the section from being discovered, he kept his vessel disguised as a merchantman. Sailing hither and thither, generally capturing all vessels that he sighted, he finally turned across to the Irish coast and in the latter part of the month was off Carrickfergus, where he learned ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... treats a merchantman like gentlemen on the high seas, and I never knew one on 'em to turn their backs on friends or foes. What a pity they ever cut adrift from the Old Country! Howsoever, matey, it can't be helped, and you had better up with the port studding-sails, ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... borrowed by all personal appendages, so long as the owner's hand or eye is on them! If it announce the coming of one loved and longed for, how we delight to look at it, to sit down on it, to caress it in our fancies, as a lone exile walking out on a windy pier yearns towards the merchantman lying alongside, with the colors of his own native land at her peak, and the name of the port he sailed from long ago upon her stern! But if it tell the near approach of the undesired, inevitable guest, what sound short of the muffled noises ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... copy of the Vinaya-pitaka of the Mahisasakah (school);(1) the Dirghagama and Samyuktagama(2) (Sutras); and also the Samyukta-sanchaya-pitaka;(3)—all being works unknown in the land of Han. Having obtained these Sanskrit works, he took passage in a large merchantman, on board of which there were more than 200 men, and to which was attached by a rope a smaller vessel, as a provision against damage or injury to the large one from the perils of the navigation. With a favourable wind, they proceeded eastwards for three ...
— Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms • Fa-Hien
... to saw off no legs," the bluff old man had blurted out when he heard of it. "He wants to git ready to take a ship 'round Cape Horn. If I had my way I'd send him some'er's where he could learn navigation, and that's in the fo'c's'le of a merchantman. Give him a year or two before the mast. I made that mistake with Bart—he loafed round here too long and when he did git a chance he was ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... bustle on board a merchantman the canvas was at length set, the yards braced in the manner necessary for casting the ship, and the men returned to the windlass—Williams walking aft and standing by the wheel, whilst Rogers and Martin remained on the forecastle ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... the morning of February 11th, after disposing of Herlihy and eluding the watchfulness of Herlihy's assistants. Hummel was leading and by ten o'clock the next morning Dodge and his comrades were on board an English merchantman lying in the harbor of Galveston. Later in the same day the Hummel interests chartered from the Southern Pacific Railroad for the sum of three thousand dollars the sea-going tug Hughes, to which Dodge was now transferred for the purpose of being conveyed ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... ever spoke, and the guest, finding that his efforts brought no response, became alarmed at the echoes of his own voice. Lord Aberdeen and his son, Lord Haddo—an amiable but weak and eccentric man, father of the young earl who dropped his title and was drowned whilst working as mate of a merchantman—did not get on well together, and saw very little of each other for some years. At length a reconciliation was effected, and the son was invited to Haddo. Anxious to be pleasant and conciliatory, he faltered out admiringly, "The place looks nice, the trees are very ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... vessel," said Allan, in great excitement. "I heard my workmen talking of her yesterday. She drifted in here, on a pitch-dark night, when they couldn't see the lights; a poor old worn-out merchantman, Midwinter, that the ship-brokers have bought to break up. Let's run in and have a look ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... Venice. There he supplied himself with suits of the finest Milanese armor he could obtain, and a wardrobe consisting of costumes such as were in vogue with the gay gallants along the Grand Canal. Crossing to Tripoli, he boarded a Moorish merchantman, and made prisoners of the crew and rowers. The prize he gave to his Christian sailors, and sent them home. Summoning his prisoners on deck, he addressed them in Arabic, offering them high pay if they would serve him, and ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... Ship. — N. ship, vessel, sail; craft, bottom. navy, marine, fleet, flotilla; shipping. man of war &c. (combatant) 726; transport, tender, storeship[obs3]; merchant ship, merchantman; packet, liner; whaler, slaver, collier, coaster, lighter; fishing boat, pilot boat; trawler, hulk; yacht; baggala[obs3]; floating hotel, floating palace; ocean greyhound. ship, bark, barque, brig, snow, hermaphrodite ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... informed of any suspicious vessels on the coast. These cruisers were also to speak with all the ships with which they fell in, and to direct any ships subject to quarantine to proceed to quarantine stations. And if they came across some merchantman or other vessel, which they suspected of smuggling, the cruiser was to accompany such craft into port. And they were enjoined to be particularly careful to guard East India ships to their moorings, or until, the next station having been reached, they could ...
— King's Cutters and Smugglers 1700-1855 • E. Keble Chatterton
... look upon as foreigners, they boldly sailed up and down the coast, seeking for floating booty wherever they might find it, and when a pirate vessel commanded by an English captain and manned principally by an English crew, fell in with a big merchantman flying the English flag, they bore down upon that vessel, just as if it had been French, or Spanish, or Dutch, and if the crew were impertinent enough to offer any resistance, they were cut ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... These corsairs had banded themselves into a sort of government, and held possession of numerous strongholds—four hundred, it is said—in Cilicia, Crete, and other countries. With a full thousand swift ships they scoured the waters of the Mediterranean, so that no merchantman could spread her sails in safety. They formed a floating empire, which Michelet calls "a wandering Carthage, which no one knew where to seize, and which floated from ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... business takes a little lull, And gives the merchantman A chance to seek domestic scenes, To interview the magazines, Convoke his growing clan, The boys and girls almost unknown, And get acquainted with his own; As well the household budget scan, ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard
... Thisbe could carry was packed on her, and her course altered so as to cut off the stranger. As the sun rose, and its beams lighted up the white canvas of the latter, she was pronounced to be a full-rigged ship, either a man-of-war or privateer, or a large merchantman, but at the distance she was off it was difficult to determine whether she was a frigate or a flush-decked vessel. Captain Martin hoped that she would prove to be a frigate, and an antagonist worthy of engaging. She must have ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston
... returned at last into the English ports, having accomplished nothing, and having expended superfluously a considerable amount of money and trouble. Essex, with a few of the vessels, subsequently made a cruise towards the Azores, but, beyond the capture of a Spanish merchantman or two, gained no glory and ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... to meet came smoothly on until the pirate craft was well in range, when ports flew open along the stranger's sides, guns were run out, and a heavy broadside splintered through the planks of the robber galley. It was a man-of-war, not a merchantman, that had run Blackbeard down. The war-ship closed and grappled with the corsair, but while the sailors were standing at the chains ready to leap aboard and complete the subjugation of the outlaws a mass of flame burst from the pirate ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner
... enthusiasm which distinguished the land army; Ayscue had just returned from the reduction of Barbadoes with a powerful squadron; and fifty additional ships were ordered to be equipped, an object easily accomplished at a time when any merchantman capable of carrying guns could, with a few alterations, be converted into a man-of-war.[2] Ayscue with the smaller division of the fleet remained at home to scour the Channel.[a] Blake sailed to the north, captured the squadron ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc
... John. "We had sold all of them about two months before to a British merchantman who had lost her boats in a cyclone. One of the things our captain wanted to get to St. Thomas for was to buy some more boats. He heard he could get some cheap ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... stripped and rivelled by adverse blasts, gallantly struggling towards the shore. The vessel was not of English build, and resembled in its bulk and fashion those employed by the Easterlings in their trade, half merchantman, ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... alike the support of tyranny and oppression of innocence, carrying with them desolation and ruin wherever their masters please to send them? This is indeed too true; and however the ship of war may, in its bulk and equipment, exceed the honest merchantman, I heartily wish there was no necessity for it; for, though I must own the superior beauty of the object on one side, I am more pleased with the superior excellence of the idea which I can raise in my mind on the other, while I reflect on the art and industry of mankind ...
— Journal of A Voyage to Lisbon • Henry Fielding
... they took passage in a merchantman from Leghorn, the Elizabeth, the expense being one-half what a return by way of France would have been. The remonstrances of her acquaintance, founded on the fatigues of a two months' voyage—the comparative insecurity of such ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 438 - Volume 17, New Series, May 22, 1852 • Various
... am surprised at a lad of spirit like you thinking of such a thing. If you have learned a lot you will, if you are steady, be sure to get on in time, and may very well become a petty officer. No lad of spirit would take to the life of a merchantman who could enter the navy. I don't say that some of the Indiamen are not fine ships, but you would find it very hard to get a berth on one of them. Our lieutenant will be over here in a day or two, and I have no doubt that if I speak to ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty
... to make 'prompt and effectual reparation' if Berkeley had been wrong. Berkeley was wrong. The Right of Search did not include the right to search a foreign man-of-war, though, unlike the modern 'right of search,' which is confined to cargoes, it did include the right to search a neutral merchantman on the high seas for any 'national' who was 'wanted.' Canning, however, distinctly stated that the men's nationality would affect the consideration of restoring them or not. Monroe now had a good case. But he made the fatal mistake of writing officially to Canning before ...
— The War With the United States - A Chronicle of 1812 - Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • William Wood
... gentle breeze filled the sails. An unusual arrangement of the vessel attracted the attention of Albert. Soon he observed men at the guns, and Captain Templeton standing in a commanding position. The brig was bearing down upon a French merchantman. ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... down the mighty river were ships of all nations, craft of every description, from the three-decker East India merchantman, going or returning from her distant voyage, to the little schooner-rigged fishermen trading up and down the coast. These were the sights. The songs of birds, the low of cattle, the hum of bees, and the murmur of the water as it washed the sands—these ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... professional instruction. The youth had been powerfully recommended; and, as usual, he recommended himself still more powerfully. On his voyage to Jamaica, therefore, where he had before sailed, in a merchantman, with his early friend Mr. Rathbone, he was now a second time receiving nautical instruction; nor did he at present feel inclined to cherish, whatever he might formerly have done, the smallest dread of any professional disappointments ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison
... up to Pernambuco, we spoke with vessels every day, but they were all Portuguese. When near to St. Salvadore, we were in great danger of being captured by a British frigate, which we mistook for a large merchantman, until she came within half musket shot of us; but, luckily for us, it died away calm, when we out with our oars, which seamen call sweeps, and in spite of their round and grape shot, we got clear of her ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... sufficiently to tell us his story. The sunken ship was the "Melbourne," bound for Australia, and this was Charley's first voyage as a midshipman on board. During the darkness of the night she had been run into by a large homeward-bound merchantman of the same class. She sank within an hour of the collision. In the scramble for the boats Charley thought he had but little chance for finding a place; and as the ship filled and kept sinking deeper in the water, an instinct of self-preservation ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... of England should be broken, and her honour betrayed, is not regarded by the best authorities as an objection or even as a relevant fact. In the more sacred name of uniformity Ireland is swamped in the Westminster Parliament like a fishing-smack in the wash of a great merchantman. ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle
... Emerson's wisdom was justified by the fact that he was always at first on the unpopular, and ultimately on the winning, side. Casting his rote for the diffusion of popular literature, a wide suffrage, a mild penal code, he yet endorsed the saying of an old American author, "A monarchy is a merchantman which sails well but will sometimes strike on a rock and go to the bottom; whilst a republic is a raft that will never sink, but then your ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... a-pervertin' Scriptur' nor nuthin', but I can't help thinkin' of one passage, 'The kingdom of heaven is like a merchantman seeking goodly pearls, and when he hath found one pearl of great price, for joy thereof he goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that pearl.' Well, Mary, I've been and sold my brig last week," he said, ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... incident I witnessed, which happened within a few fathoms of the 'Blonde.' An opium clipper had drifted athwart the bow of a large merchantman, which in turn was almost foul of us. In less than five minutes the clipper sank. One man alone reappeared on the surface. He was so close, that from where I was holding on and crouching under the lee of the mainmast I could see ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... up and looked the man in the eye. "You've had your space papers suspended twice, Mr. Winters. Once for smuggling, and once for insubordination on a deep-space merchantman. Your application to go to Roald ...
— The Space Pioneers • Carey Rockwell
... strong crew; for although we were working with the port watch only, we had the whole of those studding sails set in less than half an hour; whereas, had we been manned after the rate of an ordinary merchantman of our tonnage, the job would have kept us busy during the entire watch. As soon as we were through with this work Mr Kennedy instructed me to ship and set the patent log, which I did, taking the ...
— The First Mate - The Story of a Strange Cruise • Harry Collingwood
... the deep afar Robin the brave was waging war, With other tarry desperadoes About the latitude of Barbadoes. He knew no touch of craven fear; His voice was thunder in the cheer; First, from the main-to'-gallan' high, The skulking merchantman to spy— The first to bound upon the deck, The last to leave the sinking wreck. His hand was steel, his word was law, His mates regarded him with awe. No pirate in the whole profession Held a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... vessels were British trawlers. There were four British and one French merchantman in the list. The others were vessels of ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... article provides. But the armed vessels of France have been also admitted to land and sell their prize-goods here for a consumption, in which case, it is as reasonable they should pay duties, as the goods of a merchantman landed and sold for consumption. They have however demanded, and as a matter of right, to sell them free of duty, a right, they say, given by this article of the treaty, though the article does not give the right to sell at ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... the Piraeus and see if any merchantman has come in from Ephesus. It worries me to have my son dilly-dallying there so long and ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius
... he was a mate of a merchantman, but when most of the officers of the former royal navy had emigrated or perished, he was, in 1793, made a captain of the republican navy, and in 1796 an admiral. During the battle of Aboukir he was the chief of the staff, under Admiral Brueys, and saved himself by swimming, ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith
... aside from these scenes and sayings which show the least amiable side of a nature essentially noble, and pass to one of the little incidents that are strikingly characteristic of the man. On board the Sterling, the merchantman on which Cooper's first voyage was made, was a boy younger than himself. His name was Ned Myers. This person had spent his life on the sea. He had belonged to seventy-two crafts, exclusive of prison-ships, transports, ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... ahead of us making toward the west. We changed our course so as to endeavor to head her off, but though we gained upon her considerably, could not overtake her before dark. On the 3d we saw a number of vessels, including one steamer, all, except one large merchantman, ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... never saw my dear master more. Perhaps he could "bear no rival near the throne;" perhaps, in his preoccupation, he forgot to reclaim me. Be that as it may, he sailed that night, in a Portuguese merchantman, for Lisbon; and I became the property of the representative of his British Majesty. After the first few days of favouritism, I sensibly lost ground with his excellency; for he was too deeply occupied, and had too many resources ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, Number 489, Saturday, May 14, 1831 • Various
... Lady Cochrane and his two children, he went first from Rye to Boulogne, and there, on the 15th of August, 1818, embarked in the Rose, a merchantman which had formerly been a warsloop. The long voyage was uninteresting until Cape Horn was reached. There, and in passing along the rugged coast-line of Tierra del Fuego, Lord Cochrane was struck by its wild scenery. He watched the lazy penguins that crowded on the rocks, among evergreens ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald
... de Clieu was a merchantman, and many were the trials that beset passengers and crew. Narrowly escaping capture by a corsair of Tunis, menaced by a violent tempest that threatened to annihilate them, they finally encountered a calm that proved more appalling than either. ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... North Berwick, with little escort—as there was a truce for the time between England and Scotland; and they were under no apprehension of meeting with any vessels, save those of the former nation. Notwithstanding this, the ship which carried the Prince was captured by an armed merchantman, and carried to London, where Henry IV., the usurping Bolingbroke, utterly regardless of treaties, committed him and his attendants ...
— Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers and Other Poems • W.E. Aytoun
... a native of Devonshire (Eng.), and at an early period sent to sea; advanced to the station of a mate in a merchantman, he performed several voyages. It happened previous to the peace of Ryswick, when there existed an alliance between Spain, England, Holland, and other powers, against France, that the French in Martinique carried on a smuggling trade with the Spaniards ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... to it—and mostly they had. Was it the two pounds ten a month that sent them there? They didn't think their pay half good enough. No; it was something in them, something inborn and subtle and everlasting. I don't say positively that the crew of a French or German merchantman wouldn't have done it, but I doubt whether it would have been done in the same way. There was a completeness in it, something solid like a principle, and masterful like an instinct—a disclosure of something secret—of that hidden something, that gift, of good or evil that makes racial ...
— Youth • Joseph Conrad
... merchantman run against a ferryboat, and wreck it, the master of the ship that was wrecked shall seek justice before God; the master of the merchantman, which wrecked the ferryboat, must compensate the owner for the boat ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... glide through the blue space between these and Ryde. Osborne basks in the sunshine with the "sailor Prince's" pleasure-boat by the shore. If there be a gap or two in the horizon it is soon filled up by some rich laden merchantman, with sails swelling full in the light, and gay signal flags flowing out bright colours; and all the scene is woven together, as it were, by swift steamers flitting to and fro like shuttles strung with a thread of foam across ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... thought the sailor. "She is following him as a pirate follows a merchantman. Then, when she has lost sight of him, she will be in despair at not knowing who it is she is in love with, and whether he is a marquis or a shopkeeper. Really these young heads need an old fogy like ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac
... of a merchantman is designed for a much smaller crew to get along with, and in many respects differs from that ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XIII, Nov. 28, 1891 • Various
... Commodore Perry, few efforts to intrude upon the Japanese had proceeded from the United States. An unsuccessful attempt was made in 1837, by an American merchantman, to return a party of Japanese who had been shipwrecked on our Western coast. In 1846, Commodore Biddle was deputed to open negotiations, and entered the Bay of Yedo with two ships of war. Receiving an unfavorable answer to his demands, he immediately sailed away. In 1849, Commodore Glynn, having ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... which of necessity would make the largest practical use of the Isthmian waterway. Now, it stands to reason that special precautions would be employed during the passage of a very large vessel, either merchantman or man-of-war, and even if necessity should demand the rapid passage of a fleet of vessels, say twenty or thirty, it is not conceivable that a condition would arise which could not be efficiently safeguarded against by those in actual charge and responsible ...
— The American Type of Isthmian Canal - Speech by Hon. John Fairfield Dryden in the Senate of the - United States, June 14, 1906 • John Fairfield Dryden
... and grappling-irons were tossed aboard the ill-fated merchantman. The Pirate Captain, standing in the stern of his vessel, surveyed them with ...
— The Merryweathers • Laura E. Richards
... to ram a merchantman, with all the law you get into," said the signal quartermaster, standing near the young women. "And if they hit ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... between Germany and Russia the Porte ordered the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles closed to every kind of shipping, at the same time barring the entrances of these channels with rows of mines. The first boat to suffer from this measure was a British merchantman, which was sunk outside the Bosphorus, while another had a narrow escape in the Dardanelles. A large number of steamers of every nationality are waiting outside the straits for the special pilot boats ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... for trouble, an' here I am in the nick o' time. Come with me an' you'll have no more of it, for my pocket's full to-night, and that's more than it'll be in the mornin' if you do n' take me in tow.' It was a sailor from a merchantman just in, and Rose looked at him for a moment. Then she took his arm and walked toward Roosevelt Street. It might be dishonor, but it was certainly food and warmth for the children, and what did ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks
... their ventures in the service of a Tudor King or Queen All the ships were just as like as they could be, For the merchantman gave battle, while the Royal ship was seen As a not too simple trader over-sea: Being heirs to ancient customs, when their upper sails came down As a token of respect in passing by, They would add the salutation in a language of their ...
— Mr. Punch's History of the Great War • Punch
... first place, the navigating officers of a merchantman are merely the employees of civilians—the shipowners. In the second place, the Board of Trade, by compelling shipowners to carry a certain number of navigators and engineers holding certificates of competency, have ...
— An Ocean Tramp • William McFee
... to-day's, and Sunday's for all the week. There is, as it were, a syncope in all things; nothing is doing; art, science, and business, are alike at a stand-still. The stage, the press, the easel, the loom, the rudder of the merchantman, and the helm of the state, all are alike in a most extraordinary negative condition. The world is in a catalepsy. It hears and sees, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 395, Saturday, October 24, 1829. • Various
... it is well known to all my short-jacketed readers, that it seldom has, in "sea dic." or nautical language, any reference to antiquity on the part of the bearer thereof; but is merely a familiar or affectionate distinction; as the commander of a merchantman, although perhaps under twenty years of age, is invariably called the "old man," by all hands ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... a large merchantman, off the coast of Spain, and engaged it in a terrible conflict. The merchantman carried twice as many people and heavier guns than the Sea Rover; but by the skilful management of his ship Captain Lane continued to rake her fore and aft until she was forced to strike her colors. When ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... transferred to the American flag, engaged in commerce between American ports and South American ports, or other places remotely removed from the Fatherland, Great Britain would make no difficulty. The Dacia, a merchantman of the Hamburg-America line, had been lying at her wharf in Port Arthur, Texas, since the outbreak of the war. In early January, 1915, she was purchased by Mr. E.N. Breitung, of Marquette, Michigan. Mr. Breitung ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... Clarice say that she must go to the Port the next day and learn what vessel had been lost, and if any passengers were saved; and by daybreak he set out on that errand. He returned early in the morning with the news that a merchantman, the "Gabriel," had gone down, and that cargo and crew were lost. While he was telling this to Clarice he observed the ring upon her finger, and he coupled the appearing of that token with the serenity of the girl's face, and hailed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... drizzling mists the moorlands drape, Rain whitens the dead sea, From headland dim to sullen cape Grey sails creep wearily. I know not how that merchantman Has found the heart; but 't is her plan Seaward ...
— Gloucester Moors and Other Poems • William Vaughn Moody
... boat, and make a home For Annie: and so prosper'd that at last A luckier or a bolder fisherman, A carefuller in peril, did not breathe For leagues along that breaker-beaten coast Than Enoch. Likewise had he served a year On board a merchantman, and made himself Full sailor; and he thrice had pluck'd a life From the dread sweep of the down-streaming seas: And all me look'd upon him favorably: And ere he touch'd his one-and-twentieth May He purchased his own boat, and made a home ...
— Enoch Arden, &c. • Alfred Tennyson
... The Prince has given a silver cup to be rowed for, which carried every body up the Thames. and afterwards there was a great ball at Carlton house. There have two good events happened at that court: the town was alarmed t'other morning by the firing of guns, which proved to be only from a large merchantman come into the river. The city construed it into the King's return, and the peace broke; but Chancellor Bootle and the Bishop of Oxford, who loves a tabour next to promoting the cause of it, concluded the Princess was brought to bed, and went to ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... pleasant to reflect upon what might have occurred (had not superiority stepped in) at the very outset if, for instance, we had sent several Dreadnoughts to catch the Emden. It was strongly suspected, mind you, that there were German armed vessels on the trade routes. As one merchantman after another was sunk there could no longer be any doubt about it. What if, in panic, we had suddenly dispersed our naval force to every part of the globe? What then? But we didn't. What again if it had been determined, in accordance with some ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, January 12, 1916 • Various
... Spaniard was not inclined to stop, and it required another shot before she would stop her engines. The Nashville sent an officer in a boat to inform the steamer that she was a prize to the United States. She was found to be a Spanish merchantman, the Buena Ventura, and was sent in charge of a prize-crew to Key West. During the next thirty days, many other Spanish ships, with cargoes worth millions of dollars, were captured by different vessels of the navy. A few were released, but the larger part were condemned by a prize-court ...
— Young Peoples' History of the War with Spain • Prescott Holmes
... in our direction. The distance was about five miles, and the men had a hard pull in the broiling heat. When they came on board, you should have seen how we all clustered about them. The ship was a merchantman from Bristol, bound to New York; she had been out eleven weeks, her provisions were beginning to run short, and the crew was on allowance. Our captain, who is a gentleman, furnished them with flour, tea, sugar, porter, cold tongue, ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... Merchant Brig in a dispute concerning some Bullocks they were shipping), he had turned Mussulman; and after living some time among the Buccaneers of the Riff, had come to Algiers, and been made Captain of a Merchantman trading to the Dardanelles, and doing a bit of Piracy when opportunity served. 'Twas full five-and-twenty years since he had Run from the King of Great Britain's service; and although his Blue Eyes and enormous Red Whiskers still gave him somewhat of a Saxon appearance, he ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... many foreign lands and islands, filling the whole sea and the whole earth with our name and power, nothing good has been our lot. In the first place we disputed in cliques at home and within our walls, and later we exported this plague to the camps. Therefore our city, like a great merchantman full of a crowd of every race borne without a pilot these many years through rough water, rolls and shoots hither and thither because it is without ballast. Do not, then, allow her to be longer exposed ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio
... been unshipped. The storm abating, he made for the first port, to repair the ship's damages, intending to return to Jamaica, to deliver her up to her captain; but, from a vessel they spoke at sea, he learned that Jemmison was gone to England in a merchantman. To England then Walsingham prepared ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... was one of great tumult and expectation in Bristol. The partisans of Monmouth knew that he was almost within sight of their city, and imagined that he would be among them before daybreak. About an hour after sunset a merchantman lying at the quay took fire. Such an occurrence, in a port crowded with shipping, could not but excite great alarm. The whole river was in commotion. The streets were crowded. Seditious cries were heard amidst the darkness and confusion. It was afterwards asserted, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... been doing! They have been doing great work. I cruised over there on one of our destroyers. She was five years old, yet one day during an 85-mile run to answer an S O S call she exceeded her builder's trial by half a knot. Incidentally, she saved a merchantman which had been shelled for four hours by a U-boat and her $3,000,000 cargo; also she ran the U-boat under—one of the new big U-boats with two 5.9 deck guns. On the same day two other destroyers of our group took from a sinking liner 503 passengers without ...
— The U-boat hunters • James B. Connolly
... with the Irish fleet, which her sons, Edmund and Godwin, were bringing against the West of England. How the fleet had never come, and they had starved for many days; and how she had bribed a passing merchantman to take her and her wretched train to the land of Baldwin the Debonnaire, who might have pity on her for the sake of his daughter Judith, and Tosti her husband who died ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... different would be the fate of an unarmed vessel, for the explosion of a torpedo would probably blow such a large hole in the thin steel plates that she would go to the bottom like a stone. To torpedo a merchantman simply means the cold-blooded murder of the crew, for their chances of escape would be almost negligible, whilst it is impossible to find words to describe the attempts which have been made to sink hospital ships. About the last there is a degree of callous inhumanity ...
— A Surgeon in Belgium • Henry Sessions Souttar
... be, as the commander had supposed, a large English merchantman, a prize to the French frigate. The prisoners were at once removed, and the second lieutenant sent with a prize crew on board, when the Lily took her in tow. The wind was light, but a heavy swell sent the prize several times almost aboard the corvette, ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston
... were inferior in size to those of modern times, and their tough oak sides were not easily pierced by the six- and nine-pound balls then in general use, and twelve-pounders were considered of unusual dimension. During the war between France and America, a merchantman, armed with nine-pounders, actually beat off a sloop-of-war and several Spanish privateers; but now frigates, and even sloops-of-war, are armed with Dahlgren guns of eight- to eleven-inch bore, which throw balls of sixty to one hundred pounds,—also with superior ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... safeguard in the sanctity of Marriage among us; and another thinks he has found it in our Calvinism. Fisher Ames expressed the popular security more wisely, when he compared a monarchy and a republic, saying that a monarchy is a merchantman, which sails well, but will sometimes strike on a rock and go to the bottom; whilst a republic is a raft, which would never sink, but then your feet are always in water. No forms can have any dangerous importance whilst we are befriended by the laws of things. It makes ...
— Essays, Second Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... xxviii. 11. "With regard to the dimensions of the ships of the ancients, some of them must have been quite equal to the largest merchantman of the present day. The ship of St Paul had, in passengers and crew, 276 persons on board, besides her cargo of wheat, and as they were carried on by another ship of the same class, she must also have been of great size. The ship in which Josephus was wrecked contained 600 ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... of misadventures and secret shames. Scotty wept over his poor old mother in Edinburgh—a lady, he insisted, gently born—who was in reduced circumstances, who had pinched herself to pay the lump sum to the ship-owners for his apprenticeship, whose sacrificing dream had been to see him a merchantman officer and a gentleman, and who was heartbroken because he had deserted his ship in Australia and joined another as a common sailor before the mast. And Scotty proved it. He drew her last sad letter from his pocket and wept over it as he read it aloud. The ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London
... the quay, to get a boat to take her out to the merchantman, she looked in at the post-office, where she found Marie Forstberg already up, and busy in the sitting-room in her morning dress. She was greatly astonished when Elizabeth told her of her ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... heavily laden merchantman, was the slowest sailer, it was decided that she should take the lead, the other two following. La Salle, with his brother, Father Membre, and some others, transferred their quarters from the Joli to the Aimable. This movement was also probably influenced by La Salle's ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... received going to establish the fact, that no craft resembling the lugger had been in that part of the Bay. The vessel's head was now laid to the southward and westward, in waiting for the zephyr, which might soon be expected. The gallant frigate, seen from the impending rocks, looked like a light merchantman, in all but her symmetry and warlike guise; nature being moulded on so grand a scale all along that coast, as to render objects of human art unusually diminutive to the eye. On the other hand, the country-houses, ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... simple form of deceptive paint-work that a special camouflage section of the naval service, with an eminent artist as its director, was formed, and all kinds of grotesque designs were painted on the broadsides and superstructures of almost every British merchantman operating in the submarine ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... exactly resembled the Saigon in all main points of build, and except for the fact that two guns were mounted fore and aft on her main deck above the line of steel bulwarks, and that her masts were fitted with small fighting tops, she might very well have passed for an ordinary merchantman. ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... it accidentally foundered, and being chained to the privateer, had, in sinking, like to have lost that too. Two or three of the hands got on shore, and came to The Hague; but how terribly I was alarmed any one may judge, when I heard the ship the privateer had was the Newfoundland merchantman, as I had bought two shares in out of four. About two months after news was current about The Hague of a privateer or merchantman, one of them of the town, though not known which, having an engagement ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe
... passed the vessel hove to, which we took it for granted was a merchantman, which the pirate had been plundering, the captain ordered one of the cutters to be lowered down with a midshipman and boat's crew to take possession of her. The men were all in the boat, but the midshipman had ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... if not tens of thousands. Their usual average of children has been half a score, and from their numerous progeny and great longevity, we may judge what vigor was in the race. One of them, William, son of Nathaniel, son of James, cruised over many seas, as commander of a merchantman, and becoming interested in a Boston maiden, Ann Holmes, settled about 1720 in the provincial capital, where among other offices he filled with credit to himself and his name was that for many years of warden of Trinity Church. He died before the Revolution, leaving many children; ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous
... the justice of this remark, and easily pardoned its familiarity for its truth. In these sealers the discipline is by no means of that distant and military or naval character that is found in even an ordinary merchantman. As every seaman has an interest in the result of the voyage, some excuse was made for this departure from the more general usage; and this familiarity itself never exceeded the bounds that were necessary to ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... under their batteries that it was impossible to get at them in that position. We, one morning at daybreak, captured a row-boat with twenty-two men, armed with swivels and muskets. We had disguised the ship so much that she took us for a merchantman, and before she discovered her mistake was within pistol-shot. Three months had now expired, which had been passed much in the same manner as the last cruise, when a cutter came out to order ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman
... seamen. The Senate hurried a bill through all its stages in a single day; and the House, by nearly two to one, accepted it. No foreign merchant vessel could leave an American port, except in ballast, or with a cargo then on board; no American merchantman could leave for a foreign port ...
— Formation of the Union • Albert Bushnell Hart
... conflict between affection and duty was at length decided in favour of my father, and the rejected lover set out in despair for Bristol. From thence, in a few days after his arrival, he took his passage in a merchantman for a distant part of the globe; and from that hour no intelligence ever arrived of his fate or fortune. I have often heard my mother speak of this gentleman ...
— Beaux and Belles of England • Mary Robinson
... no planter, no dealer in horses and fat cattle, no grower of sugar-cane! Instead of that," he yelled, drawing his sword and flourishing it above his head, "instead of that I am pirate Bonnet, the new terror of the sea! You, my men, my brave men, you are not the crew of the good merchantman, the Sarah Williams, you are pirates all. You are the pirate crew of the pirate ship Revenge. That is now the name of this vessel on which you sail, and you are all pirates, who henceforth ...
— Kate Bonnet - The Romance of a Pirate's Daughter • Frank R. Stockton
... of the year 18—, I was the only passenger on board the merchantman, Alceste, which was bound to the Brazils. One fine moonlight night, I stood on the deck, and gazed on the quiet ocean, on which the moon-beams danced. The wind was so still, that it scarcely agitated the sails, which were spread out to invite it. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 275, September 29, 1827 • Various
... none of their business. So, what between hard-hearted people, thoughtless people, busy people, humble people, and cheerfully minded people,—giddiness of youth, and preoccupations of age,—philosophies of faith, and cruelties of folly,—priest and Levite, masquer and merchantman, all agreeing to keep their own side of the way,—the evil that God sends to warn us gets to be forgotten, and the evil that He sends to be mended by us gets left unmended. And then, because people shut their eyes to the dark indisputableness of the facts in front of ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... of clumsy build; her elaborately ornamented prow, the shape of her decks, and her rigging all marked her as an old-fashioned merchantman. ...
— The Corsair King • Mor Jokai
... fro over that primitive home of commerce, the Mediterranean. Doubling the Cape, they must visit every part of the affluent East and of the broad Pacific. With restless energy they must plough every sea and explore every water where the hope of honest gain may entice the busy merchantman. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... beyond recognition for any normal palate, was always served to Aholibah. She loved "needles on her tongue," she asseverated if any one offered her weaker stuff. That July night she looked like a piratical craft that had captured a sleek merchantman for prize. She was all smoothness; Ambroise alone detected the retracted claws of the leopardess. She blazed in the electric illumination, and her large hat, with its swelling plumes, threw her dusky features into shadow—her ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... in any way, detract from her own native grace and loveliness? Were her eyes less bright, or was her conversation less cheery, or were her attitudes less picturesque and pleasing, because old Captain Barkstead, instead of still sailing a fleet merchantman, now mopingly cleaned his reflectors, and, when strangers came, hid himself in the lantern? Moreover, had she not brought with her from her former home, wherever that might be, a wit, and intellect, and intelligence which might adorn any position? What more could be needful in ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 9 • Various |
