"Taffrail" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... carried: Three minimum registering thermometers; one aneroid barometer which was tested and set for me by the United States Weather Bureau; one clinometer; one pocket transit; three compasses; one pedometer; one taffrail log; one pair binoculars; three No. 3A folding pocket Kodaks, sixty rolls of films, each roll sealed in a tin can and waterproofed, and six "Vanguard" watches mounted in ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... Maine skipper and his crew, was turned loose in the North Sea. Astern towed a dingy; from the taffrail flew the American flag. Before long out popped a submarine. Aha! A lumber-laden vessel—American! The German commander, grinning broadly, stepped into a gig with a bombing crew; torpedoes were ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... was a vague mass which proved to be a few yards of canvas carefully tented on the floor. Some gimcrack belonging to the ship's ornamentation had been freshly gilded and left to dry, protected by an old sail-cloth. This, weighted down by a rusty marlinespike, spread couchwise along the taffrail, and offered to Jim just the ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... the unknown member of the crew, when the other made that flying leap over the side of the boat. Not that he wanted to take a bath just then, but his forward progress had been rapid, and he only saved himself by banging up against the taffrail, which was unusually high for so small a vessel, and holding ...
— The Aeroplane Boys on the Wing - Aeroplane Chums in the Tropics • John Luther Langworthy
... heedless of them, "God aboon kens what she is to me! But she hasna' been ower guid to me, laddie." And he walked to the taffrail, and stood looking astern that two men who had come aft to splice a haulyard might not perceive his disorder. I followed him, emboldened to speak at last what was ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... first sound of my voice, the man who had pointed us out to the woman rose stiffly to his feet and staggered aft to the taffrail, with his ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood
... to cheer her up. They might invite her on board, and have tea and perhaps a run up the river. He seemed to visualize the launch moving easily between the tree-clad banks, Hilliard attending to the engine and steering, he and the brown-eyed girl in the taffrail, or the cockpit, or the well, or whatever you sat in on a motor boat. He pictured a gloriously sunny afternoon, warm and delightful, with just enough air made by the movement to prevent it ...
— The Pit Prop Syndicate • Freeman Wills Crofts
... poop, we found the men removing a portion of the superstructure over the stern, and after that they took some of the stronger reeds, and proceeded to work at the weed that stretched away in a line with our taffrail. Yet that they anticipated danger, I perceived; for there stood by them two of the men and the second mate, all armed with muskets, and these three kept a very strict watch upon the weed, knowing, through much experience ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... surely, was falling off the wind; it would soon blow astern. The shelter of the after deck-house would serve for a while, perhaps until some vessel, attracted by the terrible light, would bring them succor. Dan placed the girl behind this steel structure and then, running to the taffrail, leaned far out and called to the boats. But the roar of the flames drowned his cries, and the boats, which had moved out to windward, could not see him. Foot by foot crept the fire; but the stiff wind which finally came over the stern did its work ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... from her taffrail Sent down his hopeful cry "Take heart! Hold on!" he shouted; "The Three Bells shall ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... lighted it; then leaning over the taffrail, he gazed placidly into the dark waters, which were so perfectly calm that every star in the vault above could be compared with its reflection ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... a ledge below the taffrail, and I spoke to him in Spanish, as I had heard it was his tongue. His buenos dias in reply was hearty, and his voice soft and rich. A handsome man was Padre Olivier, though in sad disorder. His black soutane, cut like the woolen gown of our grandmothers, was soaking wet, and ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... water, so that countless little jets of living fire seemed to flash and die away at the summit of every wavelet. A tall, spare man in a picturesque cloak, and with long, lank, white hair, leant over the taffrail, gazing at the numberless flashing lights of the surface. As he gazed, he talked on in his clear, rapt voice to a stranger by his side. The voice and the ring of enthusiasm were unmistakable. "Oh, no," he was saying, as we stole up behind him, "that hypothesis, I venture to ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... indeed that the poor "Pioneer" was in sad peril; the deck was arching with the pressure on her sides, the scupper-pieces were turning up out of the mortices, and a quiver of agony wrung my craft's frame from stem to taffrail, whilst the floe, as if impatient to overwhelm its victim, had piled up as high as the ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... Lass went down with a sickening swoop and the sound of thunder. A great, gray-and-white wall boiled and raced over her bows. Ellinwood leaped for the weather-rigging and the other two clutched the wheel as they stood waist-deep in the surge that roared over the taffrail and to leeward. ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams
... sitting on the main-hatch, overhauling the clock-work of the taffrail-log, which hadn't been registering very well of late, and I had got the cook to bring me a coffee-cup to hold the small screws as I took them out, and a saucer for the sperm-oil I was going to use. I noticed that ...
— Man Overboard! • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... was a rough one, but the Irish girl did not suffer from seasickness. She stood leaning over the taffrail chatting to the captain, who thought her one of the most charming passengers he ever had to cross in the Munster; and when they arrived at the opposite side, Mr. Hartrick was waiting for his niece. He often said since that he would never forget ...
— Light O' The Morning • L. T. Meade
... deck, groaning with anguish; huddled up in corners with a lemon-prophylactic against sea-sickness, apparently-pressed to faces which, by some subtle process of colour-adaptation, had acquired the complexion of the fruit; tottering to the taffrail. . . . ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... hold of the rope we gave them, they hauled close up, and a little thin shrivelled old man came scrambling over the taffrail: he was dressed in a long black serge coat, check shirt, and black trousers, and as soon as he had regained his breath, after the violent exertions he had made, presented me with a neat little basket containing some papers which he seemed very anxious I should examine. ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes
... not whom you expected, Captain Munson," said the stranger, in a low, quiet voice; "but if you have not forgotten the day when a very different flag from that emblem of tyranny that now hangs over yon taffrail was first spread to the wind, you may remember the ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... have been wronging them. A dark, tower-like object looms up against the horizon. It is the smoke of a steamer—sign of advanced civilisation—emblem of active life. She nears the shore. Ha! a foreign flag—the flag of another land trails over her taffrail; a foreign flag floats at her peak; foreign faces appear above her bulwarks, and foreign words issue from the lips of her commander. She is not of the land. ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid
... deck. The masts appeared to have been chopped away. The hatchways were gone. The hold appeared to be filled with sand, but there may have been only a layer of sand concealing something beneath. Part of the planking of the deck as well as most of the taffrail on the other side had been carried away. Astern there was a quarter-deck. There was no skylight, but only dead- lights set on the deck. The door of the cabin still ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... stood north-east and a half, the thermometer was chafing fearfully, and the jib-boom, only two-thirds reefed was lashing furiously against the poop-deck. Suddenly, that terrible cry, 'A man overboard!' I lost no time. I bore down on the taffrail threw the cook overboard, and soon had the satisfaction of seeing our noble craft lay over abaft the wind. Then, quick as thought, I belayed the windlass and lowered a gaff. It struck something soft. I heard JEFF cry: 'Don't hit my head again.' I was careful. The gaff slid along his back, and finally ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 35, November 26, 1870 • Various
... against the taffrail, his languid graceful figure supported by his elbows, his chin propped against his hand. As I approached the binnacle, he raised his eyes and motioned me to him. The insolence of it was so superb that for ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Martin suffered a sharp stab of disappointment. For nothing was changed. There, leaning over the taffrail, staring shoreward, was the Japanese mate, Asoki, in the exact attitude in which Martin had last seen him, when he entered the caves in Ichi's wake. The man seemed not to have budged since then. And forward, the guards were still at the hatches. He ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... and drawn out from under our fire. Mr Bang and Paul Gelid had all this time been firing with murderous precision, from where they had ensconced themselves under the shelter of the larboard bulwark, close to the taffrail, with their three black servants in the cabin, loading the six muskets, and little Wagtail, who was no great shot, sitting on the deck, handing ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... angles with his body. It had evidently seen much service, was battered, and the clack Japan worn off in most parts of it. As we said before, Mr Vanslyperken walked his quarter-deck. He was in a brown study, yet looked blue. Six strides brought him to the taffrail of the vessel, six more to the bows, such was the length of his tether—and he turned, and ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... inconveniences are legitimate subjects for sympathy which are endured in the pursuit of pleasure. There was just room on deck for me to sit on a box, and the obliging, gentlemanly master, who, with his son and myself, were the only whites on board, sat on the taffrail. ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... boozing now on by-gone years, My betters recall along with my peers. Recall them? Wife, but I see them plain: Alive, alert, every man stirs again. Ay, and again on the lee-side pacing, My spy-glass carrying, a truncheon in show, Turning at the taffrail, my footsteps retracing, Proud in my duty, again methinks I go. And Dave, Dainty Dave, I mark where he stands, Our trim sailing-master, to time the high-noon, That thingumbob sextant perplexing eyes and hands, Squinting ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville
... the wind came fresher and fresher, and now and then a damp puff and lull, that were too significant tokens for a seaman to disregard. Captain Ratlin jumped upon the inner braces of the taffrail, and shading his eyes with his hands for a moment, looked steadily to windward, then glanced at his well-filled sails as though he was loth to lose even a minute of such a fair wind. He delayed, however, but a second, when jumping down ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... was to be seen but sea and sky, yet both had their interest and beauty. The sunsets were lovely, and the phosphorescent light in the water at night especially so. The wake of the ship was luminous for a long distance, and the crests of the waves shone all around us. Once I was leaning over the taffrail late in the evening, when a shoal of fish passed. There were thousands of them, and each one was a living, moving centre of light. Bottle-nosed whales gambolled around us when we were within a few hundred miles ...
— With the Harmony to Labrador - Notes Of A Visit To The Moravian Mission Stations On The North-East - Coast Of Labrador • Benjamin La Trobe
... a kind of considerate qualifying humor, nevertheless greatly offended him. I do not think Greeley minded them much if at all. They were very effective; notably the "Pirate Ship," which represented Greeley leaning over the taffrail of a vessel carrying the Stars and Stripes and waving his handkerchief at the man-of-war Uncle Sam in the distance, the political leaders of the Confederacy dressed in true corsair costume crouched below ready to spring. Nothing did more to sectionalize Northern ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... rail, which kept all hands on the forecastle for an hour, though every now and then the seas broke over it, washing the rigging off to leeward, filling the lee scuppers breast-high, and washing chock aft to the taffrail. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... too, would have his stories to tell. The very rustle of the water around the prow of the good sloop Princess was full, of Sindbad echoes. Was it not remotely possible that he, too, like Captain Saul sitting there on the taffrail smoking his pipe, should have his vessel at command some day, and sail away wherever Fortune, with her iris-hued streamers, might beckon? Not much of sentiment in the boy as yet, beyond the taste of freedom, or—what is equivalent ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... awoke Captain Colenso, or this was left to the all but simultaneous voice of the guns, I know not. But as their smoke rolled between us I saw him drop his trumpet and run with a crazed face to the taffrail, where the halliards led. The traitor had forgotten to haul down ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... were heading down the river. As they cleared the old transport docks they made out the Nuestra well off the breakwater, her brown, bare masts rising like spires from her black hull, and the morning sun glinting from a strip of brass on her taffrail. They could see busy figures aboard, and as they drew nearer Captain Jarrow appeared on the poop-deck smoking a cigar. He was all in white, his queer cockle-shell straw hat fastened to a button of his ...
— Isle o' Dreams • Frederick F. Moore
... public who like to take their printer's ink with something more than a grain of sea-salt will welcome Sea-Spray and Spindrift (PEARSON), by their tried and trusted friend, TAFFRAIL, the creator of Pincher Martin, O.D. TAFFRAIL, it must be admitted, has a dashing briny way with him. He doesn't wait to describe sunsets and storm-clouds, but plunges at once into the thick of things. Consequently his stories go with a swing and a rush, for which the reader ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, October 31, 1917 • Various
... approaching the stern, where the expectant passengers had gathered together, the group were silent a minute, while he stood among them holding little Inez by the hand. A few minutes later the purser came aft, carrying a parcel in his hand, which he carefully placed upon the taffrail. Then he ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis
... the speakers. The wind had freshened and her hat was tied closely over her ears. She leaned against the taffrail, enjoying the cool breeze after hours of sultry heat. The sky was cloudless yet, but there was a queer tinge of burnished copper in the all-pervading sunshine. The sea was coldly blue. The life had gone out of it. It was no longer inviting and translucent. That morning, were such a thing ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... was rising as we steamed away. O'Connor leaned on the taffrail or rear balcony of the ship and gazed silently ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry
... lost 92 killed and 62 wounded, amongst the slain being the Chevrette's captain, her two lieutenants, and three midshipmen. Many stories are told of the daring displayed by British seamen in this attack. The boatswain of the Beaulieu, for example, boarded the Chevrette's taffrail; he took one glance along the crowded decks, waved his cutlass, shouted "Make a lane there!" and literally carved his way through to the forecastle, which he cleared of the French, and kept clear, ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... resistance. Great was their surprise, then, when they were permitted to take a raking position under the stern of the "Hope," and to board her without a shot being fired. But as Mugford, at the head of the boarders, clambered over the taffrail, he heard the captain of the "Hope" order the men to cut the topsail halliards and ties, with the intention of so crippling the ship that the British squadron might ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... bundles and boxes—on mats, on pillows, on quilts, on billets of wood, conversing of Island affairs. Upon my word, I heard the mutter of Almayer's name faintly at midnight, while making my way aft from the bridge to look at the patent taffrail-log tinkling its quarter miles in the great silence of the sea. I don't mean to say that our passengers dreamed aloud of Almayer, but it is indubitable that two of them at least, who could not sleep, apparently, and were trying to charm away the trouble of insomnia by a little ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... no question on the part of any of the three of Undine's returning with them; and after she had conveyed them to their steamer, and seen their vaguely relieved faces merged in the handkerchief-waving throng along the taffrail, she had returned alone to Paris and made her unsuccessful attempt to enlist the aid of ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... whispered the commander to him, as he was going over the side, "you know I'm stepping a bit beyond bounds, and I'm just a little anxious. If she turns out to be a slaver, as we suspect, step to the taffrail and ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... hopelessly through her cabin windows upon the busy street before her. But still a ship despite her transformation. The faintest line of contour yet left visible spoke of the buoyancy of another element; the balustrade of her roof was unmistakably a taffrail. The rain slipped from her swelling sides with a certain lingering touch of the sea; the soil around her was still treacherous with its suggestions, and even the wind whistled nautically over her ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... now and then. She was a little schooner of ninety tons or so, and for most of a week she scudded with the grey seas tumbling after her, white-topped, out of the snow and spume. They ranged high above her taffrail curling horribly, but one did not want to look at them. The one man on deck had a line about him, and he looked ahead, watching her screwing round with hove-up bows as she climbed the seas. If he'd let her fall off or claw up, the next one would have made an ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... the moment to be almost directly above the scene of the explosion. All hands felt the jar; the watch below frantically sprang on deck under the impression that they had collided with another vessel; and the skipper, who happened to be standing near the taffrail, was horrified beyond expression to see an immense cone of water some thirty feet high rise out of the sea just astern of his vessel, to fall next moment with a deafening splash and an accompanying surge which tossed the little vessel as helplessly ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... waxed poor," said Hamlet softly to himself, as he leaned over the taffrail, the third day out, spreading the trinkets in his palm, "being originally of but little worth. I fancy that that allusion to 'rich gifts' was a trifle malicious on the part of the fair Ophelia;" and he quietly dropped them into ...
— A Midnight Fantasy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... in a careless tone of command, but withal with frankness and civility. The captain led him aft toward the taffrail, but in crossing the deck the little tot of a boy followed closely in his wake, and getting hold of the officer's sword, which trailed along by its belt-straps on the deck, he got astride of it, and seized on to the coat-skirts of the wearer. The little tug ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... model their ships on the fair forms of their countrywomen. This vessel, whose beauteous model was declared to be the greatest belle in Amsterdam, had one hundred feet in the beam, one hundred feet in the keel, and one hundred feet from the bottom of the stern-post to the taffrail. Those illustrious adventurers who sailed in her landed on the Jersey flats, preferring a marshy ground, where they could drive piles and construct dykes. They made a settlement at the Indian village of Communipaw, the egg from which was ...
— Washington Irving • Charles Dudley Warner
... never been to Samos, famous for its wine and its women.... The wine cloyed the palate and no woman charmed him in the dance; and he sailed away wondering how he might relieve the tedium of life, until one day, after long voyaging, sufficiently recovered from his grief and himself, he leaned over the taffrail, this time lost in admiration of the rocks and summits above Syracuse, the Sicilian coasts carrying his thoughts out of the present into the past, to those valleys where ...
— Sister Teresa • George Moore
... Mike. I sent him a picture of an old pappy-guy sort of man, with long, mutton-chop whiskers, glasses and an old-fashioned collar as tall as the taffrail." ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne
... a weight underslung to keep it upright, and a tin can, painted white, set on a short spar in one end of the keg. A light line was attached to a bridle, and the mark lowered over the stern, where it rode, bobbing in the tail of the schooner's wake, thirty fathoms from the taffrail where the crowd gathered. ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... lovers might have been seen, but not on our boat, leaning over the taffrail,—if that is the name of the fence around the cabin-deck, looking at the moon in the western sky and the long track of light in the steamer's wake with unutterable tenderness. For the sea was perfectly smooth, so smooth as not to ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... not an American, neither was he an Englishman. He was a little bit of a man, of a swarthy complexion, and did not weigh perhaps more than an hundred pounds by the scale. During the firing, our little man stood upon the taffrail, swung his sword, d—d the English, and praised his own men. He had been long enough in the United States to acquire property and information, and credit enough to command a schooner of four guns and ninety men. The crew considered him a brave man, and a good sailor, but not over generous in ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... over the taffrail, sweeping Dolores from her feet; she met it with a ringing laugh, gripping the wheel as her safeguard, and the moment the ax severed the hawser she gave the vessel a sheer with the helm, and again her orders ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... my boy. We'll splice the spanker boom, and port the helm to starboard, and ship the taffrail on to the lee scuppers of the after hatch, and dance hornpipes on the mizzen peak. Hulloa, captain, here's my mate, up to all sorts of sea larks; he can box the compass and do logarithm sums, and work navigation by ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... southeaster, dead ahead and blowing harder every minute, was sending its seas further and further aft. He left his wet berth on the deck, reeled, or rather was flung, to the stern of the vessel, lodged himself between the little wheel-house and the taffrail, and watched a scene in consonance with his feelings. Innumerable twinklings of stars faintly illuminated a cloudless, serene heaven, and a foaming, plunging ocean. The slender, dark outlines of the sailless upper masts were leaning sharply over to leeward, and describing what seemed ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... brought into the service of Christ. What is that passage, "Ships of Tarshish shall bring presents"? That is what it means. Oh, what a goodly fleet when the vessels of the sea come into the service of God! No guns frowning through the port-holes, no pikes hung in the gangway, nothing from cut-water to taffrail to suggest atrocity. Those ships will come from all parts of the seas. Great flocks of ships that never met on the high sea but in wrath, will cry, "Ship ahoy!" and drop down beside each other in calmness, the flags of Emmanuel streaming ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... the foretop tall, "Land, land!" with a maddened scream, And the crew in glee from the taffrail see Where the island palm-trees dream? New heart, new eyes! For the morning skies Are a-chant with their green and gold! New, new, new, new—new through and through! New, new till ...
— Songs from Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey
... the onlookers knew that she did not belong to the merchant service. The simple people who inhabited this district were concerned about the intentions of what they regarded as a mysterious visitor, and the firing of a small cannon from the taffrail did not lessen their perplexity. At last the national flag was hauled up and down, and the squire, who had come from his mansion amongst the woods, told the fishermen that those aboard the cutter were really asking for a boat to be sent ...
— Looking Seaward Again • Walter Runciman
... the taffrail looking out over the water with one hand on the rail. He grinned at me whenever the sprays rose up and crashed down upon us. "Ha," he would say, "there she sprays; that beats your shower-baths," and he would laugh to ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... later the craft took the water, plunging deeply with the foam brimming to her taffrail; then, rising buoyantly, she shot far out toward the middle of the cove until, in obedience to my hail, Billy let go her anchor and brought her up. I then saw that I had underestimated the amount of ...
— The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn • Harry Collingwood
... the waters The tossing lights shone clear; All night from reeling taffrail The Three Bells sent ...
— Poems Every Child Should Know - The What-Every-Child-Should-Know-Library • Various
... dinner-bell began, and the captain moved towards the companion, pocketing the coins as he went. One fell on the deck, the noise of the bell preventing its fall being heard, and the captain did not see it. But Scotty did, and he watched it roll back towards the taffrail, assume a spiral motion, and lie down just aft of the quarter-bitt. The captain was now down in the cabin, but Scotty picked up the coin to hold for him until he came up. He should ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... gasped. 'Oh, my Gawd!' He flung out his arms and came over to me. I was smoking against the taffrail. 'There they was trying to cut one another's throats, and she calls ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... telescope, and thumbed his charts, and kicked his Cabin-boy, and swore his oaths, till, but for the fear of the Trinity House, I think the Skipper would have been mighty glad to fling him over the taffrail. But the reign of this Great Mogul of Lights and Points and Creeks soon came to an end. A River Pilot was the lesser evil, a Channel Pilot was the greater one; but both were got rid of at last. Then the Skipper was himself again. He would drink himself blind with Punch in the ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... leaving the "New York" an old catamaran had been thrown on the "Merrimac's" deck, as a possible aid to the crew in extremity. This float lay on the roof of the midship house, a rope fastening it to the taffrail, with enough slack to let it float loose after the ship had sunk. It was a fortunate thought for the crew, as it afforded them a temporary refuge in place of ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... swing on the hurricane deck, a band was discoursing dreamy melodies, and Jack with his back to the sea was leaning against the taffrail and glowering at the ship's doctor ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... from a hive, and the two broad promenades resembled, in color and life, the streets of a city. The watch was busy at the inevitable scrubbing, and Rowland, with a swab and bucket, was cleaning the white paint on the starboard taffrail, screened from view by the after deck-house, which shut off a narrow space at the stern. A little girl ran into the inclosure, laughing and screaming, and clung to his legs, while she jumped up and down in ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... boatswain's calls piping some order along her decks, she floated majestically across our path. But the only living being we saw was the red-coated marine on sentry by the lifebuoys, looking down at us over the taffrail. We passed so close to her that I could distinguish the whites of his eyes, and the tompions in the muzzles of her stern-chasers protruding out of the ports ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... our stormy, restless power, We rend them quickly, shuddering mast and sail; And with their, stalwart, gallant crews we hurl them Amid the hungry waves that for them wait, Nor leave one floating spar nor fragile taffrail To tell unto the world their ...
— The Poetical Works of Mrs. Leprohon (Mrs. R.E. Mullins) • Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon
... us slowly away - for the first time for many long months with our faces to the east. But it was not 'merry' England that filled my juvenile fancies. I leaned upon the taffrail and watched this lovely land of the 'flowery food' fade slowly from my sight. I had eaten of the Lotus, and knew no wish but to linger on, to roam no more, to return no more, to any home that was ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... transition, when with a fair wind the ship was rushing through the water with a vindictive sort of leaping and melancholy rapidity, that as I mounted to the deck at the call of the forenoon watch, so soon as I levelled my glance towards the taffrail, foreboding shivers ran over me. Reality outran apprehension; Captain Ahab stood upon his quarter-deck. There seemed no sign of common bodily illness about him, nor of the recovery from any. He looked like a man cut away from the stake, when the fire has overrunningly wasted ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... Lynch. The Nigger was at the wheel, she said. Fitzgibbon walked up to him and struck him—as he had struck him many, many times before. But this time Nigger did not submit—he whipped out his knife and stabbed the mate. More than that, he grasped the mate in his powerful arms, dragged him to the taffrail, and flung him overboard. It happened so quickly that neither Connolly, the tradesman, nor Lynch, both of whom were on the poop, could interfere. But Lynch took a shot at Nigger, and perhaps struck ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... was thus discussed near the taffrail, Mabel sat silently by the companion-way, Mr. Muir having gone below to look after his personal comforts, and Jasper standing a little aloof, with his arms crossed, and his eyes wandering from the ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... me, and I was aware of the hot breath of a reeling wind, and then of the hot wind itself, which deep-groaned the sound of the letter V, humming like a billion spinning-tops, and the Speranza was on her side, sea pouring over her port-bulwarks, and myself in the corner between deck and taffrail, drowning fast, but unable to stir; but all was soon past and the white hole in the sea, and the hot spinning-top of wind, ran wheeling beyond, to the southern horizon, and the Speranza righted herself: so that it was clear that someone ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... he knew by the motion of the vessel and the sounds he heard that she was under way. The Nancy was a craft of nearly a hundred tons, decked all over, with three short, stout masts, the after one leaning over the taffrail, with a long out-rigger. On each of the masts a large lug was carried, and above them could be set flying topsails, and when before the wind studding-sails could be rigged out. She could also hoist an enormous squaresail. To set these sails, she carried a numerous crew of tried seamen; ...
— The Rival Crusoes • W.H.G. Kingston
... work. They lifted me, as it were, to an upper floor removed from the treacherously sighing Priscilla. But I came down quickly with a crash; no dexterous management of my mental resources could save me from the hemp-like smell of the ship, nor would leaning over the taffrail, nor lying curled under a tarpaulin. The sailors heaped pilot-coats upon us. It was a bad ship, they said, to be sick on board of, for no such thing as brandy was allowed in the old Priscilla. Still I am sure I tasted some before I fell into a state of semi-insensibility. As in a trance I heard ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... she fell slowly off. A terrible fear of abandonment took possession of him; he tried to speak, but could not. The vessel moved further away, but the raft followed! He could see now it was being held by a boat-hook,—could see the odd, eager curiosity on two faces that were raised above the taffrail, and with that sense of relief his eyes again ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... the Columbia and Caledonia. She is built of wood and is 200 feet long from taffrail to fore edge of stem. Her beam is 34-1/2 feet. She has a gross tonnage of 520 tons. She can sail in favorable weather at a speed of 12 knots an hour. I laughed at all this when, something more than twenty years after, I crossed on the Persia, ...
— Children of the Market Place • Edgar Lee Masters
... heat. Bloody Bill, as the men invariably called him, was standing at the tiller; but his post for the present was a sinecure, and he whiled away the time by alternately gazing in dreamy abstraction at the compass in the binnacle, and by walking to the taffrail in order to spit into the sea. In one of these turns he came near to where I was standing, and, leaning over the side, looked long and earnestly down ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... taffrail was a low one, and the Spaniard was taken completely by surprise. Save for the splash he made as he struck the water, narrowly missing one of the crowded boats that waited under the counter, not a sound announced his misadventure. ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... lounged listlessly upon the wheel;—the captain was below taking a nap, to the great relief of men and boys;—some of the passengers were sitting on the poop, under an awning, drowsily perusing a book or old newspaper; some leaning on the taffrail, watching the many-colored dolphin, and those beautiful, but spiteful, little creatures, the Portuguese men-of-war, which look so splendid as they sail gently on the smooth surface of the blue ocean, every little ripple causing a change of color in ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... She came very near, and passed under our stern; and as she leaned over to the breeze, showed her decks fore and aft; and I saw the strange sailors grouped upon the forecastle, and the cook look-cook-house with a ladle in his hand, and the captain in a green jacket sitting on the taffrail ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... startled from a wet doze by the hoarse cry of a fellow who did the duty of a corporal at the after-end of my file. "Sleepers ahoy! stand by to slew round!" and, with a double shuffle, we all rolled in concert, and found ourselves facing the taffrail instead of the bowsprit. But, however you turned, your nose was sure to stick to one or other of the steaming backs on your two flanks. There was some little relief in the change of odour ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... afterwards recognized to be Mr. M'Donald, the first lieutenant, and the then commanding officer, called out that they had surrendered. I directed the marines and musketry men to cease firing, and, while on the taffrail asking if they had surrendered, I received a wound in the neck. The enemy had just then got clear of us, and his fore-mast and bowsprit being both gone, and perceiving us wearing to give a fresh broadside, he again called out that he had ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat
... the waist of the ship and on to the promenade-deck of the third-class passengers, where a huddle of stores, coiled ropes, and riff-raff prevented these poor from taking any pleasurable exercise. I stood at the taffrail and peered down at the welter of white water, the foam of the buffets of the whirling screws, and then at the wide wake, which in imagination went on and on in a luminous path to the place we had departed from, to the dock where we had left the debarred lover of nature. The deep was lit with the ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... I leaned upon the taffrail watching the distant coast line of my beloved France, whose soil meseemed I was not like to tread again for years, Yvonne came softly ...
— The Suitors of Yvonne • Raphael Sabatini
... sail to be crowded on, and had the satisfaction of seeing the schooner following his example. He then set the whole of the crew to shift the long-tom from the bow to the stern. Its muzzle was just high enough to project above the taffrail, and in order to hide it better he had hammocks and other material piled on each side of it so as to form a breastwork ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty
... enough mornings of the transition, when with a fair wind the ship was rushing through the water with a vindictive sort of leaping and melancholy rapidity, that as I mounted to the deck at the call of the forenoon watch, so soon as I levelled my glance towards the taffrail, foreboding shivers ran over me. Reality outran apprehension; Captain Ahab stood upon ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... sleeping Pacific when Edith and I stood looking over the taffrail as the Messenger of Light swept on her course. From nearby came the voice of Professor Herndon relating his experiences to a missionary who was returning from the Marquesas. A soft island melody was wafted from the fo'c'stle, and the night was alive with ...
— The White Waterfall • James Francis Dwyer
... and again became intent on their pastime. Pasquale rowed faster than before, and he passed close under the stern of the Greek vessel. The mate was leaning over the taffrail under the poop awning. He was dressed in baggy garments of spotless white, his big blue cap was stuck far back on his head, and his strong brown arms were bare to the elbow. He looked as broad as ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... in silence, and leaning over the taffrail (the two men were on deck) looked down for some time at the play of the eddies round the schooner's rudder. At last he said without ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... to jam at the point of junction of the tail with the body. When this is once fixed, the first act of the piece is held to be complete, and the vanquished enemy is afterwards easily drawn over the taffrail and flung on the deck, to the unspeakable delight of all hands. But, although the shark is out of his element, he has by no means lost his power of doing mischief; and I would advise no one to come within range of the tail, or thrust ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... flung themselves lightly over the bulwarks, and were quickly frolicking about the decks. Many of them went forward, perching upon the headrails or running out upon the bowsprit, while others seated themselves upon the taffrail, or reclined at full length upon the boats. What a sight for us bachelor sailors! How avoid so dire a temptation? For who could think of tumbling these artless creatures overboard, when they had swum miles ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... was fortunate, for, just then, a swerve of the oncoming torpedo boat revealed a small flag flying from the taffrail staff. It was the ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... open water-sky, but around the ship the prospect is dreary. The sun rose at 6.20 a.m. and set at 5.25 p.m. Ship's time eleven hours five minutes of sunlight and seventeen hours light. Three hours twilight morning and evening. The carpenter is dismantling the taffrail (to facilitate the landing and, if necessary, the boarding of the jury-rudder) and will ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... the lieutenant; "except that she should be Chilian from her colours. I can't see a soul aboard of her. Ah, yonder! Something shows over the taffrail! Looks like a man's head! ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... on, Teach, with fuses glowing under his hat, hailed him, and, standing on the taffrail, defied him and drank to his bloody end in a goblet of rum.... Teach, surrounded by his sullen and villainous gang, shrieked out the chorus of a sea song as the sloop drew near and, when she had drifted close enough, he pelted ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... sea broke most surprisingly all round us, and a large tumbling swell threatened to poop us; the long-boat, which was at this time moored astern, was on a sudden canted so high that it broke the transom of the Commodore's gallery, and would doubtless have risen as high as the taffrail had it not been for this stroke which stove the boat all to pieces; but the poor boat-keeper, though extremely bruised, was saved almost by miracle. About eight the tide slackened, but the wind did not abate; so that at eleven the best bower cable, ...
— Anson's Voyage Round the World - The Text Reduced • Richard Walter
... glasses showed him the length of her deck, cluttered with the wreck of houses torn up by the roots, while the fall of the spars had taken her starboard bulwarks with it. Her boats were gone; a davit stuck up at the end of the poop crumpled like a ram's horn; and by the taffrail her worn and sodden crew ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... of the Azores. The air is mild and warm; the sky is azure, and the sea intensely blue. How different from the weather in the English Channel only a short week ago! Bugs are now discarded, and winter clothing begins to feel almost oppressive. In the evenings, as we hang over the taffrail, we watch with interest the bluish-white sparks mingling with the light blue foam near the stern—the first indications of that phosphorescence which, I am told, we shall find ...
— A Boy's Voyage Round the World • The Son of Samuel Smiles
... of a steam-boat from Detroit to Buffalo, and entered into conversation with a young woman who was leaning over the taffrail. She had been in ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... second mate," she explained. "We had a succession of gales from the Falklands to the Evangelistas, and there the mate got her in irons and she took three big ones over the taffrail and cost us eight men. Working short-handed, we couldn't get any canvas on her to speak of—long voyage, you know, and the rest ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... all together aft, three of them, leaning over the taffrail, with their backs turned to me. One was short and stout—Bhme unquestionably; the panting and the thud on the planks had prepared me for that, though where he had sprung from I did not know. Two were tall, and one of these must be von Brning. There ought to be ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... both master and mate, and to give a new current to their thoughts. Spike had been on the point of walking up the wharf, but he now so far changed his purpose as actually to jump on board of the brig and spring up alongside of his mate, on the taffrail, in order to get a better look at the steamer. Mulford, who loathed so much in his commander, was actually glad of this, Spike's rare merit as a seaman forming a sort of attraction that held him, as it might be against his own will, bound to ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... porters, children, and abominations of every kind, holding each other's hands, and pressing damp handkerchiefs to their eyes. The delay, the lingering, upset even Gertrude, and brought her for a moment down to the usual level of leave-taking womanhood. Alaric, the meanwhile, stood leaning over the taffrail with Charley, as mute as the fishes ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... the after-part of the vessel, Allan walked straight to the stern, and looked out to sea over the taffrail. No such thing as a boat was in view anywhere on the quiet, moon-brightened waters. Knowing Midwinter's sight to be better than his own, he called out, "Come up here, and see if there's a fisherman within hail of us." Hearing no reply, he looked back. Midwinter had followed him as far as ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... all over, the boatswain roared out, "That job's done! Now, Mr Barber, swab up all this here blood, and be d——d to you! and recollect that you are one of us." I obeyed in fear and silence, and then returned to my former station near the taffrail. ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... kingdom with a regular stride. He stepped out from the hip, swinging his arms with the free motion of a man starting out for a fifteen-mile walk into open country; yet at every twelfth stride he had to turn about sharply and pace back the distance to the taffrail. ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... captain, after a few philosophical whiffs, "to go to America with yonder fellow on my weather beam is quite out of the question: he would be up with me, and in possession, before ten o'clock, and my only play is to bring the wind right over the taffrail, where, luckily, we have got it. I think we can bother him at this sport, for your sharp bottoms are not as good as your kettle-bottoms in ploughing a full furrow. As for bearing her canvas, the Montauk ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... and, where our craft showed polished brass, she long ago had resorted to white paint. At the same time, she gave the impression of aristocracy—broken-down aristocracy, if you choose. No bunting fluttered at her masthead, no country's emblem waved over her taffrail, and the only hint of nationality or ownership was a rather badly painted word Orchid on her name plate. Taken altogether, she was rather difficult ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... his mouth with the back of his hand, got up, clambered over the taffrail, and vanished. Others followed. One, on the point of going over, stopped short to drain his bottle, and with a great swing of his arm flung it at the fire. 'Take this!' ...
— Youth • Joseph Conrad |
