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Raft   Listen
verb
Raft  v.  obs. Imp. & p. p. of Reave.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Raft" Quotes from Famous Books



... raft. We'll do it to-morrow, you and I. Don't tell any of the others yet. Morvyth's been so nasty lately, I'm fed up with her, and Ardiune would only laugh. When we've got the thing really started, we'll take them over ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil

... of these lands are washed away and as farm lands they are entirely abandoned. Not only are the hillside lands unprotected from the beating rains and flowing streams, but the bottom or lowlands are not properly drained, and the sand washed down from the hill, the chaff and raft from previous rains soon fill the ditches and creeks and almost any ordinary rain will cause an overflow ...
— Twenty-Five Years in the Black Belt • William James Edwards

... little. The day had not yet broke, but I could see that we were on the brink of a deep and broad river, which we were preparing to cross, but how, I could not discover, for I could see no bridge, but only something like a raft moored by the margin of the stream. On this frail craft we embarked, horses, diligence, passengers, and all; and, launching out upon the impetuous current, we reached, after a short navigation, the opposite shore. The river we had crossed was the Po, and ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie

... the evening, however, it became apparent that the whole island would soon be submerged; and logs, driftwood, green trees, etc., were sweeping down the river at a tremendous speed. To rescue the wounded, sick, and attendants at the hospital seemed impossible. Various suggestions were made; a raft was proposed, but this was decided impracticable as, if made and launched, it would in such ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer

... various motives he was to employ; the motive of aspiration, or the woman motive, was repeated constantly on the horns during the building of the raft. St. Clare sang the motive. It was with this motive that he began the prelude. Then came two variations on the motive, and then the motive of jealousy. St. Clare was eager to explain the combinations of instruments he intended to employ, and the effect of ...
— Celibates • George Moore

... of nothing. Gaspard offered to take Veronique on his back and swim with her to a place of safety. Pierre suggested a raft. Cyprien ...
— The Flood • Emile Zola

... what a time I had of it at the start. First I tried a pontoon bridge, but the stones for the bottom course were so heavy that they sank the pontoons, and I lost a couple of hundred niggers before I saw that it couldn't be done. Then I tried a big raft, but in order to get her to float with the stones I had to use such big logs that she was unwieldy, and before I knew what had struck me I had lost six big dressed stones and another hundred niggers. I got the laugh, of course. Every numskull in Egypt wagged his beard over it; I could ...
— A Book of Burlesques • H. L. Mencken

... This water's running zwift, and we're making the boat move pretty fast. They can't zwim half as fast as we're going, and they've no horses, and the dogs can't smell on the river, even if they made a raft of the trees ...
— Nic Revel - A White Slave's Adventures in Alligator Land • George Manville Fenn

... me of how the poor people went down to a dirty inland river and had killed a hog, taken its heart; killed a dog, taken its heart; and then after putting them on a little raft, floated them off down the river to drive the cholera away. Then he told me of how the natives had, in their desperation, tied tight bands about their ankles to keep the evil spirits from coming up out of the earth ...
— Flash-lights from the Seven Seas • William L. Stidger

... the lands lying near the shores of the rivers, and the wood is floated down on rafts to Tombo, where ships come to take in their cargoes. The African oak is so heavy that the natives are obliged to raft it on wood of a much lighter specific gravity. This trade is of considerable benefit both to our colonists and the native tribes. It not only promotes a friendly intercourse between them, but affords ...
— A Voyage Round the World, Vol. I (of ?) • James Holman

... and speculate on what might be coming round either corner, and which would yield a vision first! Perhaps there would come along a sandolo rowed by a man standing at the back, his two oars crossed gracefully; perhaps a floating raft with barefooted boys bestriding it; perhaps a barca punted by men in blue blouses, one at front and two at the back, with a load of golden hay, or with provisions for the Ghetto—glowing fruit and picturesque vegetables, or bleating sheep and bellowing bulls, coming to be killed ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... wallowed just before him, the helpless body of the bowhead whale, the killers darting in a mad melee for its head. Then a figure was literally hurled upon the slippery mass of the mammal, its gray belly plain in the welter, a living raft against which the waves broke and tossed ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn

... and the embrace of night and storm resumes the sole possession of this confusion of corpses, stranded and cramped on a square of earth as on a raft. ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse

... rocks. A few weeks after, portions of the wreck were deposited on Dunk Island, and the beach of the mainland for miles was strewn with timber. That wreck was the greatest favour bestowed me in my profession of Beachcomber. Long and heavy pieces of angle-iron came bolted to raft-like sections of the deck; various kinds of timber proved useful in a variety of ways. What? was I to leave it all, unclaimed and unregarded—in excess of morality and modesty—on the beach, to be honey-combed ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield

... lost one, though he made it the entire business of his over-hours to stand about in by-streets in the hope of discovering her, and would start up in the night, saying, 'That rascal's torturing her to maintain him!' To which his wife would answer peevishly, 'Don't 'ee raft yourself so, Ned! You prevent my getting a bit o' rest! He won't hurt ...
— Life's Little Ironies - A set of tales with some colloquial sketches entitled A Few Crusted Characters • Thomas Hardy

... to me!" said the fox. "Come up to the surface of the water and form a raft that will reach from this island to the mainland. Then I can walk over all of you, and I shall be ...
— Story Hour Readers Book Three • Ida Coe and Alice J. Christie

... The ice raft, with its four prisoners, was driving faster now, caught by the swifter water. It was ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith

... handy, wigeons often raft up offshore until late afternoon when they move to marshes and ...
— Ducks at a Distance - A Waterfowl Identification Guide • Robert W. Hines

... who steer are obliged to exert the whole strength of the body in those places especially where the fall of water is steep, and the course winding; but the purchase of the scull is of so great power that they can move the raft bodily across the river when both ends are acted upon at the same time. But, notwithstanding their great dexterity and their judgment in choosing the channel, they are liable to meet with obstruction in large trees and rocks, which, from the violence of the stream, ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden

... fish the fishermen use hand-nets, which they throw into the sea from the shore; the larger species they kill with lances, one of which Ayd carried constantly with him as a weapon; there is not a single boat nor even a raft to be found on the whole of this coast, but the Bedouins of the eastern coast have a few boats, which may sometimes be seen in the gulf. We saw here a great number of porpoises playing in the water close to the shore. I wished to shoot at one of them, but was prevented ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt

... Teddy, briskly, "we'd be having our bully canoes and blankets, and tents, and all that raft of grub right now, instead of ...
— Boy Scouts on Hudson Bay - The Disappearing Fleet • G. Harvey Ralphson

... she steadily refused to be separated from Ossoli and Angelo. On a raft with them, she would have boldly encountered the surf, but alone she would not go. Probably, she had appeared to assent to the plan for escaping upon planks, with the view of inducing Mrs. Hasty to trust herself to the care of the best man on board; very possibly, also, she had never learned the ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... he had taught Emily in former days. It was the nature of the man to attach himself to something. When Emily was torn from him he took a substitute: as a man looks out for a crutch when he loses a leg; or lashes himself to a raft when he has suffered shipwreck. Latude had given his heart to a woman, no doubt, before he grew to be so fond of a mouse in the Bastille. There are people who in their youth have felt and inspired an heroic passion, and end by being happy in ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... around on a raft there, an' first thing you know Dick fell in, right into deep water, over by the dam. Couldn't swim a stroke, neither. And the Perfessor, who jest happened to be comin' along in that 'bus of his, heard the boys yell. Didn't he hop out o' the wagon as spry ...
— Parnassus on Wheels • Christopher Morley

... became very angry, and commanded her sons, saying, 'Throw him into the waters of Ganga!' And at the command of their mother, the wicked Gautama and his brothers, those slaves of covetousness and folly, exclaiming, 'Indeed, why should we support this old man?—'tied the Muni to a raft and committing him to the mercy of the stream returned home without compunction. The blind old man drifting along the stream on that raft, passed through the territories of many kings. One day a king named Vali conversant with every duty went to the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)

... the shrouds, took hold of the planks at his side, and they heaved the rude raft into the sea. In an instant she was seized and whirled over the side; she instinctively held her breath, felt a shock, felt herself swallowed up in an awful, fathomless coldness, and then found herself floating ...
— Beauty and The Beast, and Tales From Home • Bayard Taylor

... visitors. After passing, by the flare of torches, down long galleries of underground workings, we were plunged into darkness by a rush of wind over a subterranean river through which we had to shoulder our way on a raft. Then suddenly, no face being visible in that black tunnel under the earth, the Polish part of our company broke into a wild, fierce, frenzied singing of their national anthem which, in those days, they dare not sing on the surface and in the light: "Poland is not ...
— The Drama Of Three Hundred & Sixty-Five Days - Scenes In The Great War - 1915 • Hall Caine

... or four big ones, and Monsieur Delouche is in command; and then there is a great fire raft, as they call it—a lot of schooners, shallops, and such like, all chained together—a formidable-looking thing, for I got one of the sailors to show it me. I suppose they are all pretty much alike, crammed with explosives and combustibles; old swivels and guns loaded up to ...
— French and English - A Story of the Struggle in America • Evelyn Everett-Green

... be drawn. We read that at Mathura on the Jumna doles of food are provided by the piety of pilgrims for the sacred river-tortoises, which are so crowded when there is food going that their smooth carapaces form a more or less continuous raft across the river. On that unsteady slippery bridge the Langur monkeys (Semnopithecus entellus) venture out and in spite of vicious snaps secure a share of the booty. This picture of the monkeys securing a footing on the ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson

... all this raft ye'll be after wantin', Malcolm MacDonald?" he cried in alarm. "Sure, ye know I can't give ye a bite nor sup the day, man; the byes from ...
— The Silver Maple • Marian Keith

... the channel were too friable to bear the weight of a man. Ropes were thrown out to us. We caught hold of one of them with our four hands, but the sudden pull of the men in drawing us towards them cast our raft so suddenly against the ice edges that it broke in two, and we remained, full of fear this time, on one small part of our skiff. I laughed no longer, for we were beginning to travel somewhat fast, and the channel was opening out in width. ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt

... work to occupy him now. There were a few bolts behind the boom-sticks which he would raft to the mill at his leisure. He walked up to the chute mouth now and looked about. A few hundred yards up the hill the line of green timber ended against the black ruin of the fire. There the chute ended also. Hollister walked on across ...
— The Hidden Places • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... spirits of turpentine, or by a strew of quicklime, which combines with the formic acid. The different species are described in "Palm Land" and "Western Africa" (pp. 369-373), from which even the account of the "tubular bridge" is taken—Mr. Wilson less sensationally calls it what it is, a "live raft." The most common are the Nkazeze, a large reddish and fetid ant, which is harmless to man; the Njenge, a smaller red species, and the Ibimbizi, whose bite ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... agency of the infernal spirit, who must be subdued and caught. The pater, previous to the commencement of his operations, summons all the young men in the village, to assist him in constructing a small raft, of light wood. Three poles are fixed upon it, to represent masts, and some bamboos laid across like oars. The masts are hung with young white cocoa-leaves. This toy, which they call Hanmai, they place between two palongs, each rowed by a crew of stout young men, with a piece of ...
— Letters on the Nicobar islands, their natural productions, and the manners, customs, and superstitions of the natives • John Gottfried Haensel

... thanks to the natural rollers, not so hard as might have been anticipated. Ben and Frank managed the placing of the rollers, which were carried in front of the logs as fast as its hinder end cleared some of them. In this manner their "raft," if such it could be ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton

... gathering wood and planks from the wrecks, wrought of them the semblance of a boat [to wit, a raft,] and bound it fast with ropes, saying, 'I will embark thereon and fare with this water into the inward of the mountain. If it bring me to the mainland or to a place where I may find relief and safety, [well and good]; else I shall ...
— Tales from the Arabic Volumes 1-3 • John Payne

... months he struggled daily against the rapid stream, till he at last reached, in spite of rafts and dangerous eddies, its source at the Rocky Mountains. On his return, a singular and terrible adventure befel him: he was dragging his canoe over a raft, exactly opposite to where now stands his plantation, when, happening to hurt his foot, he lost hold of his canoe. It was on the very edge of the raft, near a ruffled eddy: the frail bark was ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat

... the rudder being shot away, went down lengthwise of the channel. When the firing ceased, the little crew, exhausted, but not one of the eight missing, clustered, only heads out of water, around their raft. A launch drew near. In charge was the Spanish admiral, who took them aboard with admiring kindness, and despatched a boat to notify the ...
— History of the United States, Volume 5 • E. Benjamin Andrews

... in again, and stepped upon the raft, which, although it sank down lower in the water and was all awash, still seemed buoyant. He also took Puck with him, and tried to incite some others of the boys to venture out ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson

... launched from the port side, but the Hawke at that moment heeled over before the boat could be got clear, and the cutter lurched against the cruiser's side and stove in one or two of her planks. As the Hawke went down a small pinnace and a raft which had been prepared for such an emergency floated free, but such was the onrush of men who had been thrown into the water that both were overcrowded. On the raft were about seventy men knee deep in water, and the pinnace ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various

... serve the chickens, in making Jenny go short to save to-day's baking of havre-bread, in skimping Tim's bowl of porridge—his appetite being a burden on her estate which she often declared would break her—she had more than once given a hundred pounds at a blow to build a raft for a poor drowning wretch who must otherwise have sunk. In fact, she was one of those people who are small with the small things of life and great with the great—who will grudge a daily dole of a few threshed-out stalks of straw, but who sometimes, when rightly touched, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XVII, No. 102. June, 1876. • Various

... cotton-wood bordering the river, dashed through it, and plunged into the stream. He swam to a neighboring island, against the upper end of which the driftwood had lodged in such quantities as to form a natural raft; under this he dived, and swam below water until he succeeded in getting a breathing place between the floating trunks of trees, whose branches and bushes formed a covert several feet above the level of the water. He had scarcely drawn breath after all his toils, when he heard his pursuers ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... incoherently, with hoarse voice and quaking lips. She tried with all her might to free herself from his convulsive clutch—but he clung to her like a dying man would cling to the last breath of life—like a drowning man would cling to the raft on which ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... the shadowed slopes and threw belts of light upon the water—and these illuminated spots finely relieved the otherwise sombre depth of colour. Our boat was slow, and we had between two and three hours of unsurpassed scenery before reaching our destination. An immense raft of timber, gathered from the loose logs which are floated down the Lougen Elv, lay at the head of the lake, which contracts into the famous Guldbrandsdal. On the brow of a steep hill on the right lay the little town of Lillehammer, where we were ere long quartered ...
— Northern Travel - Summer and Winter Pictures of Sweden, Denmark and Lapland • Bayard Taylor

... same at all times, whether it is moving with the scythe on the hill-slopes, or hewing the timber, or steering the raft down the river which is all effervescent with ice; whether it is drinking in the Gasthaus, or making love, or playing some mummer's part, or hating steadily and cruelly, or whether it is kneeling in spellbound subjection in the incense-filled church, or walking in the strange, ...
— Twilight in Italy • D.H. Lawrence

... and bring out the ultimate prosperous result, Jordan threw one-half of his land into market and forced the sale at five dollars an acre. The proceeds of this sale did not last him over six months. Then he got a raft afloat, containing about a thousand dollars' worth of lumber, and sent it off under charge of his overseer, who sold it at Cincinnati, ...
— Lessons in Life, For All Who Will Read Them • T. S. Arthur

... sea, scattered broadcast by the gale; so that by the time of deep night—while the snow still whipped past in clouds that stung and stifled us—our pan rode breaking water: which hissed and flashed on every hand, the while ravenously eating at our narrow raft of ice. Death waited at our feet.... We stood with our backs to the wind, my sister and I cowering, numb and silent, in the lee of the doctor.... Through the long night 'twas he that sheltered us.... By and by he drew my sister close. She sank ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan

... tool-chest. Be quick now." Kittie was off like a flash, and when she came back, there were three or four logs lying ready for use, with some planks and a long pole, and Mr. Bering with coat off, fell to work with a will and such speed, that in ten minutes, a small raft lay in the water, and Mr. Dering was making preparations for his voyage, by pulling off his boots and tucking ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving

... Trouble, but the Second time she Stuck fast; but this was of no consequence any farther than giving us a little trouble, and was no more than what I expected as we had the wind. While the Ship lay fast we got down the Foreyard, Foretopmast, booms, etc., overboard, and made a raft of them alongside. ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook

... strong and massive rafts were joined together until they extended two hundred feet into the river, being kept in their place by cables fastened to trees on the bank above them. At the end of this floating pier was placed another raft of immense size, capable of carrying four elephants at a time. A thick covering of earth was laid over the whole, and on this turf was placed. The elephants were then ...
— The Young Carthaginian - A Story of The Times of Hannibal • G.A. Henty

... finding a human being in a spot which he had at first deemed totally uninhabited, and filled with the hope that the stranger might be able to give him some information relative to the geographical position of the isle, and even perhaps aid him in forming a raft by which they might together escape from the oasis of the Mediterranean, Wagner proceeded toward the mountains. By degrees the wondrous beauty of the scene became wilder, more imposing, but less bewitching, ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds

... to Mrs. Patterson's hand like a drowning man to a raft. "Don't leave me," she whispered imploringly. "Please take me back with you. ...
— Honey-Sweet • Edna Turpin

... proceeded down the river several miles in this way, managing to keep the Indians at a safe distance with our guns, until the slough made a junction with the main Platte River. From there down, we found the river at times quite deep; and in order to carry the wounded man along with us, we constructed a raft of poles for his accommodation, and in this way he ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman

... although it swims so deeply immersed that it would appear to float with difficulty. An elephant shot dead within the water will float immediately, with a considerable portion of one flank raised so high above the surface that several men could be supported, as though upon a raft. The body of a hippopotamus will sink like a stone, and will not reappear upon the surface for about two hours, until the gas has to a certain degree distended the carcase: thus the hippopotamus is of a denser and heavier material than the elephant, although ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker

... struck one, the first boat emerged from the willows, and darting rapidly forward, headed for the middle of the stream; another and another in quick succession followed, and speedily were lost to us in the gloom; and now, two four-oared skiffs stood out together, having a raft, with two guns, in tow; by some mischance, however, they got entangled in a side current, and the raft swerving to one side, swept past the boats, carrying them down the stream along with it. Our attention was not suffered to ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various

... outline he had traced in his mind: he should appear very subdued and sad; should wear an air of condolence. But, after a while, should say, "And yet men have been lost like that, and escaped. A man was picked up on a raft in those very latitudes, and brought into Cape Town. A friend of mine saw him, months after, at the hospital. His memory was shaken—could not tell his name; but in other respects he was all ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade

... work of unloading the wreck. There was an inlet or mouth of a creek not far from the place where they first landed, and, constructing a raft on the wreck and loading it with arms, provisions, ammunition and tools, they took advantage of the tide to float it in to shore. This was repeated daily for weeks. Clothing, sails, provisions of all kinds, half a hundred guns and as many pistols and cutlasses, with ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick

... monasteries. Fired with missionary zeal, he left his native land to preach to the pagans of Scotland. Tradition says that the rock on which he stood detached itself from the Irish coast and became a raft to bear him across the waters to the island of Lismore, in Loch Linnhe, where he landed. St. Moluag converted the people of the island to Christianity, and then moved into Ross-shire, where he built many churches, dedicating them to the Mother ...
— A Calendar of Scottish Saints • Michael Barrett

... Plaice side by side, and it is plain that they live in very different ways. One is made to dart like an arrow, the other to lie flat. One is the shape of a torpedo, the other is flat like a raft. The shape and colour of the Plaice tell their own story of a life on the sandy, pebbly bed of the sea. And look at the eyes! Both are on the upper side of the head! What could be better for a fish that lies flat on the ...
— Within the Deep - Cassell's "Eyes And No Eyes" Series, Book VIII. • R. Cadwallader Smith

... hollowing the wood, and they, accordingly, would fell the trees upon the shore, cut the trunks of equal lengths, place them side by side in the water, and bolt or bind them together so as to form a raft. The form and fashion of their craft was of no consequence, they said, as it was for one passage only. Any thing would answer, if it would only float ...
— Hannibal - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... the vegetation of the teeming earth, where field and granary displayed profusely their abundant stores, the father and daughter now looked on each other, as helpless to replace their exhausted provision of food as if they had been abandoned on the raft of the shipwrecked in an unexplored sea, or banished to a lonely island whose inland products were withered by infected winds, and around whose arid shores ran such destroying waters as seethe over the 'Cities ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins

... it takes them, and they'll shoot a bit and fish a bit till they've used all the powder and lost their lines. So much for them. Let's talk about ourselves. Well, gentlemen, we might make a sort of raft thing of wood and bundles of rushes,—can't make a boat for want of an axe,—and we might float down the stream, but I'm afraid it would only be to drown ourselves, or be pulled off by the critters ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn

... here this morning in broad sunlight, which lit up the sea-girt buildings as we approached so that they seemed like a city of cork floating raft-like on the smooth, blue deep. But I only glanced from the carriage window at the lovely scene, and we were soon across the intervening water and inside the railway station. When we got to the front steps the row of black gondolas and the shouts of ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy

... two cabins was quite dry. Timar installed himself here, and then began the hard work. He tore up the deck, and with the help of a crane drew up one sack after the other. They were first piled near the cabin, that the water might drain away; then they were transferred to a raft, and taken ashore: there straw mats were laid, on which the grain was shaken and spread out. Timar bargained meanwhile with the millers for immediate grinding of the corn. The weather was favorable, there was a strong wind, and the ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai

... and Louise stood by without saying a word. At last the father kissed his little girl, and lifted her on to the raft again. ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... and Billy, he climb on a rock and reach out, but he fall in deep water and was carried far, so he had to swim for his life. I jump on rocks anoder mile to anoder point; I got ahead of de bag, den I get two logs, and hold dem between my legs for raft, and push out; but dat dam river he take dem logs very slow, and dat bag very fast, so it pass by. But Billy he swim ashore, and run some more, and he make a raft; but de raft he stick on rock, and de bag he never stick, ...
— The Arctic Prairies • Ernest Thompson Seton

... Nort. "Though how they can float a lot of sheep over on a raft made of a few bean poles is more than ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker

... Buddhist and Brahmin, accompanied by troops of players and musicians, come out to meet him, and conduct him with all the honors to his stable-palace. A great number of cords and ropes of all qualities and lengths are attached to the raft, those in the centre being of fine silk (figuratively, "spun from a spider's web"). These are for the king and his noble retinue, who with their own hands make them fast to their gilded barges; the rest are secured to the great fleet of ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens

... the old wreck was likely to be to him was in affording materials for a raft by which he might find his way ...
— Robert Coverdale's Struggle - Or, On The Wave Of Success • Horatio, Jr. Alger

... It was at the Three Forks that Colter and Potts, two of the Lewis and Clark men, were attacked by the Blackfeet, and Potts killed and Colter forced to run naked, six miles over the stones and cactus—till at last he killed his nearest pursuer with his own spear, and hid under a raft of driftwood in the ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Missouri • Emerson Hough

... free will; and therefore believe all things are from God and pre-ordained. Such being the case, the judgments or decisions I give are fixed to be thus or thus, whether I have exactly hit off all the circumstances or not. This is my raft, and on it I manage to float along, thanks to God, more or ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright

... dislike us quite so much as before, and he helped the girls into the boat, which was now in the water at the edge of a sort of floating, unsteady raft, with openings in it that you could see the water through. The water was very rough, just like real sea, and not like a river at all. And the boy rowed; he wouldn't let us, although I can, quite well. The boat tumbled and tossed just like a sea-boat. When we were ...
— New Treasure Seekers - or, The Bastable Children in Search of a Fortune • E. (Edith) Nesbit

... at the old Indian gardens; at eight went on; at ten reached the first portage, passed it in an hour; went on till one o'clock; afterwards passed two other portages of about three hundred yards each; and went on to the great raft of flood wood, being the fourth portage, where we encamped at three o'clock, at its head. Mosquitoes very annoying. Estimate our distance ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft

... words before the whole group rushed to the ruins, and began to pick up iron bolts, and screws, and pieces of wood and ropes, whatever materials they could find that were suitable for the construction of a raft. A score of soldiers and officers, who were armed, formed a guard, commanded by the major, to protect the workers against the desperate attacks which might be expected from the crowd, if their scheme was discovered. ...
— Adieu • Honore de Balzac

... case I have left a bit of a will addressed to you, and recommending to your kindness my mother, and the boy and the girl—in short, the whole raft." ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas

... try to knock together one or more rafts. Captain Wellsby discussed it with his officers and it was agreed that the able-bodied pirates should be left to build a raft for themselves, taking their own wounded with them. This was more mercy than they had any right to expect. The strapping young Devonshire boatswain, with his head tied up, was for leaving the blackguards to drown in the ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine

... sayin' yet," Kirby commented. "Splashin' 'round some in a little-bitty wadin' pool, an' gittin' out in this, don't balance none. Ain't every hoss takes kindly to water, neither. I'd say we'd better see what's the chances of knockin' together a raft or somethin'. 'Less we can find us ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton

... and dumb boy slumbered a good deal now, and that was the case with all the children. They caused very little trouble to any one. They seemed, in my eyes, to get more like one another, not only in quiet manner, but in the face, too. The motion of the raft was usually so much the same, the scene was usually so much the same, the sound of the soft wash and ripple of the water was usually so much the same, that they were made drowsy, as they might have been by the constant playing ...
— The Perils of Certain English Prisoners • Charles Dickens

... setting one day when Ten-teh reluctantly took up his propelling staff and began to urge his raft towards the shore. It was a season of parched crops and destitution in the villages, when disease could fondle the bones of even the most rotund and leprosy was the insidious condiment in every dish; yet never had the Imperial dues been higher, and each succeeding official had larger hands and ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah

... pleaded to deaf ears. But at length his promises of promotion and reward moved the man. "Come" he said "I will do my best," and, rising, led the way to his own house. Here in the inner room was a high machan—a huge bamboo shelf made like a raft and suspended from the roof and reached by a moveable ladder, used for storing ...
— Bengal Dacoits and Tigers • Maharanee Sunity Devee

... a few days since Mother had said, "Never go on the raft, Bobby, unless Father or John is at ...
— Bobby of Cloverfield Farm • Helen Fuller Orton

... tranquillity and rolled along in peace, but for the presence of an island, which, growing up in the centre of the expanse, consolidated by the roots of a thousand willows and other trees that delight in such humid soils, and, in times of flood, covered by a raft of drift timber entangled among its trees, presented a barrier, on either side of which the current swept with speed and fury, though, as it seemed, entirely unopposed by rocks. In such a current, as ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird

... followed one another with the ringing of bells and firing of pistols, unheeded. By the time the signal came to clear the course for the crews, the pleasure-craft pushed within the barriers formed a vast, softly undulating raft covering the whole surface of the water, so that you could have walked from the barrier to the shore without dipping foot in the flood. I have suggested that the situation might have had its perils. Any panic must have caused a commotion that would have overturned ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells

... his ship with sticks and ropes and blocks enough, might as well stay ashore, Mr. Dodge, and publish an hebdomadal. And so, my dear young lady, by looking along the land, the day after to-morrow, in the northern board here, you may expect to see a raft booming down upon you that will cheer your heart, and once more raise the hope of a Christmas dinner in New York, in ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper

... twice run the ship aground: The first time she went off without any trouble, but the second time she stuck fast. We now got down the fore-yard, fore top-masts, and booms, and taking them overboard, made a raft of them alongside of the ship. The tide was happily rising, and about one o'clock in the afternoon she floated. We soon warped her into the harbour, and having moored her alongside of a steep beach to the south, we got ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr

... very little difficulty, and embarked all our party, also without any difficulty whatever. In obedience to Lancelot's resolution, which he had privately communicated to me beforehand, we divided our forces into two parties. That is to say, half of the sailors were set on each raft, and with each raft half of our armed men; for though we had little or no apprehension now that there would be any trouble with the sailors, we still deemed it best to let them see very plainly that we were and meant to be the masters. I went on the one raft, Lancelot—and ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... graceful. Her hazel eyes were always dancing mischievously. She liked boys' games better than girls'. In her second week she induced several of the more daring girls to go with her to the pond below town and there engage in a raft-race with the boys. And when John Dumont, seeing that the girls' raft was about to win, thrust the one he was piloting into it and upset it, she was the only girl who did not scream at the shock of the sudden tumble ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips

... great quantities, and the narrow channel which swept round the bend was full of ice, piled one cake over another, thus forming a temporary barrier to the descending ice, which lodged, and formed a great undulating raft, filling up the whole river, and extending almost to the Kentucky shore. Eliza stood for a moment contemplating this unfavourable aspect of things, which she saw at once must prevent the usual ferry-boat from running, and then turned into a small public-house on the bank, to ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 453 - Volume 18, New Series, September 4, 1852 • Various

... cots so close together that the nurses could not walk between them. They lay on the wet decks, in the scuppers, and along the transoms and hatches. They were like shipwrecked mariners clinging to a raft, and they asked nothing more than that the ship's bow be turned toward home. Once satisfied as to that, they relaxed into a state of self-pity and miserable oblivion to their environment, from which hunger nor nausea nor aching bones could ...
— The Lion and the Unicorn and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis

... were incorruptible. It was not possible to starch the sea; and precisely as the stiffness fastened upon men, it vanished from ships. What had once been a mere raft, with rows of formal benches, pushed along by laborious flap of oars, and with infinite fluttering of flags and swelling of poops above, gradually began to lean more heavily into the deep water, to sustain a gloomy weight of guns, to draw ...
— The Harbours of England • John Ruskin

... child's hair is shaved for the first time. By the rich the hair is weighed against silver and this sum is distributed to beggars. It is then tied up in a piece of cloth and either buried or thrown into a river, or sometimes set afloat on a little toy raft in the name of a saint. Occasionally tufts of hair or even the whole head may be left unshaven in the name of a saint, and after one or more years the child is taken to the saint's tomb and the hair shaved there; or if this cannot ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell

... in the Goldsack rockets; but, in consequence of the treacherous handling of the Spanish soldiers who had filled them, they proved worse than useless, doing nearly as much injury to the men who fired them as to the enemy. Only one gunboat was sunk by the shells from a raft commanded by Major Miller, who also did some damage to the forts and shipping. On the night of the 4th, Lord Cochrane amused himself, while a fireship was being prepared, by causing a burning tar-barrel ...
— 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

... ago, when at Magungo, on the Albert N'yanza, I could not at first believe that the raft-choked entrance of the Victoria Nile in apparently dead water was indeed the mouth of that important river. My subsequent experience in the marshy and lacustrine Bahr Giraffe has confirmed my impressions of the extreme difficulty of deciding upon the non-existence ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker

... at Green River, Utah, and proceeded down the river. Soon after entering Cataract Canyon, they lost their boat and provisions. Finding a tent which had been washed down the river, they tore it into strips and constructed a raft out driftwood, tying the logs together with the strips of canvas. Days of hardship followed, and starvation stared them in the face; until finally Foote's partner gave up, said he would drown himself. With an oath Foote drew his revolver, saying ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb

... instinct he struck out through the welter of gasping, bobbing heads till he was clear of the clutching menace of the drowning. The Commander, clad simply in his wrist-watch and uniform cap, was standing on the balsa raft, with scores of men hanging to its support. "Get away from the ship!" he was bawling at the full strength of his lungs. "Get clear before ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie

... happen," said Haltren, reflectively, closing the breech of his gun. He had hauled his boat up an alligator-slide; now he shoved it off the same way, and pulling up his hip-boots, waded out, laid his gun in the stern, threw cartridge-sack and a dozen dead ducks after it, and embarked among the raft of wind-tossed ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers

... condemned human sacrifice and taught the nation agriculture, metal work and {130} mechanics. He fixed their calendar so that it was much more reliable than either the Greek or the Roman. There were various legends as to his departure, one of them being that he sailed away across the sea upon a raft composed of serpents, and was wafted into the unknown East whence ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... a less tranquil scene was occurring scarce ten miles from the spot; for it is scarce necessary to say that the light seen by the ruffians on the great raft—and which they had fancifully mistaken for a ship's galley-fire,—was the furnace fed by spermaceti on the ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid

... the windows in a kind of impassivity, as much as he could see of the method by which the racing-boat was attached by long, rigid rods to the steady floating raft that had risen from beneath. (He was even interested to observe that these rigid rods were of telescopic design, and were elongated from their own interiors. One of them pushed forward once to within a foot of the windows; then the tapering end ...
— Dawn of All • Robert Hugh Benson

... discovery, I came back to my raft, and fell to work to bring my cargo on shore, which took me up the rest of that day; and what to do with myself at night I knew not, nor indeed where to rest; for I was afraid to lie down on the ground, not knowing but ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan

... collect. While groping about in the hold, it appeared to them that the water was rising; if so, the ship must have sprung a serious leak. With the scanty supply of provisions they had obtained, they hurried on deck to report what they had remarked. Considerable progress had been made with the raft, but without food and water it could only tend to prolong their misery. Reuben, with three other men, were therefore ordered below, to get up any more provisions which they could find. They very soon returned with ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston

... but the swell was still very heavy. Equipped with everything necessary to float the launch, we marched along the beach, which was beaten hard by the waves. We had to cross a swollen river on an improvised raft; to our satisfaction we found the boat quite unhurt, not even the cargo being damaged; only a few copper plates were torn. Next day Mr. W. arrived, lamenting his loss; for his beautiful schooner was pierced in the middle by a sharp rock, and she hung, shaken by the waves that ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser

... successful, but one day, while the men were busy laying their bricks in cement one of them drove into the roof, and a deluge of water burst in on them, and although they tried to continue their work on a raft the water prevailed and at last drove them out. They escaped with difficulty up one of the air-shafts. The water having put an effectual stop to the work, the directors felt disposed to give it up, but Stephenson ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne

... cutting through density. And yet—I was not sure. I found myself staring through the black, shiny surface of the window, seeking relief in the obscuring dark. It gave little vision, except its own distorted reflections, but I could distinguish vaguely the outlines of the old mill with the shadowly raft in the high branches and the smudgy round spots that I knew to be the ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... himself in silence, and his burden falls in a white cloud, to leave a black-green patch upon the hillside, whitening again as the imperturbable fall continues. The stakes by the roadside are almost buried. No sound is audible. Nothing is seen but the snow-plough, a long raft of planks with a heavy stone at its stem and a sharp prow, drawn by four strong horses, and driven by a young man erect upon ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds

... as well as we are ourselves, from the boisterous state of the weather. Whilst on the creek in the morning, had there been much difficulty in getting the animals, we should have had to hoist the things up into trees, and constructed a raft of dead timber, and rafted them off to dry land, which would have been a great deal of trouble. Squally still; wind continues from same quarter. Towards evening a great portion of the flat is being covered with water from the creek, beyond the creek there is nothing ...
— McKinlay's Journal of Exploration in the Interior of Australia • John McKinlay

... find that the men who control circumstances, as it is called, are those who have learned to allow for the influence of their eddies, and have the nerve to turn them to account at the happy instant. Mr. Lincoln's perilous task has been to carry a rather shaky raft through the rapids, making fast the unrulier logs as he could snatch opportunity, and the country is to be congratulated that he did not think it his duty to run straight at all hazards, but cautiously to assure himself with his setting-pole ...
— Our American Holidays: Lincoln's Birthday • Various

... raft there are ten or twelve of these birds, ready to plunge the instant they receive a sign from their masters. It is curious to see them catch enormous fish, and carry them ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne

... an old raft, lying at one edge of the pond, under the willow tree. "I'll play on the raft," ...
— Bobby of Cloverfield Farm • Helen Fuller Orton

... bank of the river which ran into the great cave; where, considering the river with great attention, I said to myself, 'This river, which runs thus under ground, must come out somewhere or other. If I make a raft, and leave myself to the current, it will bring me to some inhabited country, or drown me. If I be drowned I lose nothing, but only change one kind of death for another; and if I get out of this fatal ...
— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon

... now the middle of March, and we had taken nothing; neither had we fired our cannon, excepting at a miserable sort of a half boat and half raft, called a catamaran: made of five light logs, with a triangular sail. From the men on this miserable vessel we got information of a good watering place, where we soon anchored. The commandant of this little settlement ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse

... the sea. Calypso found him there, sitting alone, weeping and longing for his home. She stood by him and said: "Odysseus, my unhappy friend, do not waste thy life any longer in sorrow. The end of thy grief has come. Arise and prepare to depart for thy home. Build thee a raft of the trunks of trees which thou shalt hew down. I will put bread and water and delicate wine on board; and I will clothe thee in comfortable garments, and send a favorable wind that thou mayest safely ...
— Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca - Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece • Homer

... about two feet across alone combated the white fields and the black trees .... At six o'clock a man's figure carrying a lantern crossed the field .... A raft of twig stayed upon a stone, suddenly detached itself, and floated towards the culvert .... A load of snow slipped and fell from a fir branch .... Later there was a mournful cry .... A motor car ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf

... the lake bottom selected for a feeding-ground lies at a depth of fifteen or twenty feet below the surface, and is covered with a short growth of algae and other aquatic plants,—facts I had previously determined while sailing over it on a raft. After alighting on the glassy surface, they occasionally indulged in a little play, chasing one another round about in small circles; then all three would suddenly dive together, and then come ...
— The Mountains of California • John Muir

... vicinity of English people, Mr. Carson decided not to go to Capri by the ordinary steamer that conveyed pleasure-seekers, but to secure passages in a cargo vessel which was crossing with supplies. To Lorna the mode of conveyance was immaterial; she would have sailed cheerfully on a raft if necessary. She rather enjoyed the picturesque Neapolitan tramp steamer with its cargo of wine barrels and packing cases, and its crew of bare-footed, red-capped seamen, talking and gesticulating with all the excitability of their Southern temperament. The voyage across the blue bay was longer ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil

... in the fall of 1816 to emigrate to Indiana, he at once began to build another boat, which he launched on the Rolling Fork, at the mouth of Knob Creek, about half a mile from his own cabin. He traded his farm for what movable property he could get, and loaded his raft with that and his carpenter tools. Waving good-bye to his wife and two children, he floated down the Rolling Fork, Salt River, and out into the Ohio River, which proved too rough for his shaky craft, and it ...
— The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln • Wayne Whipple

... boy in the neighborhood, paddling on a raft, fell into the water and was drowned. I watched the police boat go past, carrying his little cold body, and after that I was good for nothing. I went and sat with Peter on the stairs. The dog's conduct ...
— The Case of Jennie Brice • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... boat and the boat club, as means of instruction and discipline, as well as of amusement, were suggested by an accidental occurrence. The "Bunkers of Rippleton," a set of idle and dissolute boys, had constructed a rude raft, upon which they paddled about on the lake, and appeared to enjoy themselves very much. Captain Sedley, who had forbidden his son to venture upon the lake on the raft, or even in a boat, without permission, overheard Charles Hardy, the intimate friend of Frank, ...
— All Aboard; or, Life on the Lake - A Sequel to "The Boat Club" • Oliver Optic

... deepest water, there was a rude pier of logs built out, for the convenience of landing the parties. This loose structure suggested to me the means of reaching the main shore; and, without waiting for breakfast, I "piped" away my boatmen, and proceeded to build a raft. ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic

... at last, with a grim sort of humor; "I must do the best I can. It's the same as if I were on a desert island. I must tie together some sort of a raft in order to cross the gulf that separates us, for I never can stand it to stay here alone. Since I have not time to spare I may as well commence with that encyclopaedia, and learn a little about as many things as possible; then if he introduces ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe

... we were hungry. The roastingears looked tempting. We pulled off our clothes and launched into the turbid stream, and were soon on the other bank. Here was the field, and here were the roastingears; but where was the raft or canoe? ...
— "Co. Aytch" - Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment - or, A Side Show of the Big Show • Sam R. Watkins

... house, and he would remain beside it until the crack of doom, shells or no shells. He would stand off them fire-bugs and looters when they landed, and tell them officers what a plain American citizen thought of them. He wasn't afraid of the swine. By God! he would like to boot the raft of them. He shook his fist in their faces, he did; and as for that villainous launch rolling idly in the swell while the big bully fired on the defenseless town, he spat to express ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne

... encountered, the land-loving men lost their heads, and it was only through Argueello's presence of mind that the boat finally reached its destination. For the return trip, the services of an Indian chief were secured, a native who had been seen so often on the bay in his raft of rushes, that the Spaniards called him 'El Marino,' the Sailor, and this name, corrupted into Marin, still clings to the land where he lived. Many trips were made in this ferry, but the comandante's subordinates ...
— The Lure of San Francisco - A Romance Amid Old Landmarks • Elizabeth Gray Potter and Mabel Thayer Gray

... but Judge Twiddler, who is a Presbyterian, said that after examining the statutes carefully he could find no law allowing a Methodist meeting-house to be located in that place. In despair, the brethren ran the building down to the river-shore and fitted it on a huge raft of logs, concluding to tie it to the wharf until they could buy a lot. But as the owner of the wharf handed them on the third day a bill of twenty-five dollars for wharfage, they took the building out and anchored it in the stream. That night a tug-boat, ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)

... hinges on a fortune left to Sam Willett, the hero, and the fact that it will pass to a disreputable relative if the lad dies before he shall have reached his majority. The story of his father's peril and of Sam's desperate trip down the great canyon on a raft, and how the party finally escape from their perils is described in a graphic style that stamps Mr. Calhoun as a ...
— Slow and Sure - The Story of Paul Hoffman the Young Street-Merchant • Horatio Alger

... of Waldo Emerson, says "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 the water." Yes, that is comfortable; and though your raft cannot sink (being too worthless for that), it may go to pieces, I suppose, when the four winds (your only pilots) steer competitively from ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... it will not be exactly what you would call a vessel. For the present we must be content with a good and solid raft." ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne

... to drive the car by moonlight..." I was going on to defend my suggestion by pleading that such an impulse would, so far as I could judge, be quite in character, but no further argument was needed. I had created a sensation. My feeble straw had suddenly taken the form of a practicable seaworthy raft, big enough to accommodate all the family—with the one exception of Frank, who, as it were, grasped the edge of this life-saving apparatus of mine, and tested it suspiciously. His preliminary and perfectly futile opening to the effect that the moon had already set, ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford

... crowded together under the bridge, when suddenly one of the occupants of a boat near mine threw up his hands and fell overboard. We immediately began diving for him, but in vain; some hours later the body was found under a raft. ...
— Child of a Century, Complete • Alfred de Musset

... in fine weather, how he felt when he saw his stove "reared up on end." We inquired, in the north-east trade and on serene evenings, whether he had to stand on his head to put things right somewhat. We suggested he had used his bread-board for a raft, and from there comfortably had stoked his grate; and we did our best to conceal our admiration under the wit of fine irony. He affirmed not to know anything about it, rebuked our levity, declared himself, with solemn animation, to have ...
— The Nigger Of The "Narcissus" - A Tale Of The Forecastle • Joseph Conrad

... George's cross, but I believe thou art right, Dick Spritsail," cried the Captain. "It's some poor fellow, I warrant me, whose ship has gone down, and who made a raft to try his luck. Johnny Shark, do ye see, is no pleasant customer to become acquainted with, and so he took a venture on the spar for a Christian burial, instead of making ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams

... appealing look these pale cheeks and staring eyes had. Hungry! Yes, that's what they all were. She thought, fantastically, for a moment, of poor Mr. Magnus's Treasure Hunters, and she seemed to see the whole of this company in a raft drifting in mid-ocean, not a sail in sight and ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole

... foundered on her way down from New York to Fortress Monroe. Her underwater hull was shipshape enough; but her superstructure—a round iron tower resting on a very low deck—was not. Contemptuous eyewitnesses described her very well as looking like a tin can on a shingle or a cheesebox on a raft. She carried only two guns, eleven-inchers, both mounted inside her turret, which revolved by machinery; but their 180-pound shot were far more powerful than any aboard the Merrimac. In maneuvering the Monitor enjoyed an immense advantage, with her ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood

... terrible pass, save my kingdom, and save my race! If the holy Chyavana became angry, he would destroy the three worlds: what need I say them of my poor self who is destitute of penances and who depends only upon the might of his arm? O great Rishi, do thou become the raft unto us that have all fallen into a fathomless ocean with all our counsellors and our priest! Do thou settle what the price should be of ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... him, at midnight and in midwinter, thrown from a frail raft into the deep and angry waters of a wide and rushing Western river, thus separated from his only companion through the wilderness with no aid for miles and leagues about him, buffeting the rapid current and struggling through driving ...
— Washington's Birthday • Various

... until the Tennessee River was reached, a few miles below Kingston. The river was high and there was no means of crossing. A rude raft was constructed, and with the horses swimming, they commenced crossing. When about half were across a company of Federal cavalry appeared and attacked those who were still on the northern bank. On the frail raft, Morgan started to push across to ...
— Raiding with Morgan • Byron A. Dunn

... cities of Algeria they found themselves cut off on the east by a French fleet and on the west by an English fleet, but by a very clever bit of stratagem they escaped. The band of the Goeben was placed on a raft and ordered on a given moment to play the German national airs after an appreciable period. Meanwhile, under the cover of the night's darkness the two German ships steamed away. After they had a good start the band on the raft began to play. The British ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of 12) - The War Begins, Invasion of Belgium, Battle of the Marne • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan

... puzzle place of rivers that I don't quite understand. I can't find it, and the longer I live the more I feel, Brace Leigh, that we ought to have eaten our bread when it was ready buttered, and brought the stuff away upon a raft." ...
— Old Gold - The Cruise of the "Jason" Brig • George Manville Fenn

... by simplicity of manners. The kings and nobles did not consider it derogatory to their dignity to acquire skill in the manual arts. Ulysses is represented as building his own bed-chamber and constructing his own raft, and he boasts of being an excellent mower and ploughman. Like Esau, who made savoury meat for his father Isaac, the Heroic chiefs prepared their own meals and prided themselves on their skill in cookery. Kings ...
— A Smaller History of Greece • William Smith

... seem a far cry from the clash of armies to the romance of a honeymoon spent on a raft de luxe drifting lazily down a river of Burma. That is the theme of Love's Legend (CONSTABLE), by Mr. FIELDING HALL, author of The Soul of a People. But there may be a war of sex with sex scarcely less tragic than the wars of men with men (or brutes). The author shows ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 16, 1914 • Various



Words linked to "Raft" :   pilotage, large indefinite amount, large indefinite quantity, plenty, mickle, move, manufacture, haymow, wad, torrent, transport, heap, flock, stack, quite a little, life raft, mountain, deal, slew, navigation, fabricate, mess, tidy sum, hatful, spate, pot, raft foundation, balsa raft, rafter, good deal, go, batch, passel, mass, pile, deluge, muckle



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