"Aft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that spoke so politely had travelled some distance aft, and found itself all mixed up on the deck amidships, which was a well-deck sunk between high bulwarks. One of the bulwark plates, which was hung on hinges to open outward, had swung out, and passed the bulk of the water back to the sea again with a ...
— Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II • Rudyard Kipling
... and foot, he stepped aft, and there was met by Don Benito's servant, who, with a pleasing expression, responsive to his own present feelings, informed him that his master had recovered from the effects of his coughing fit, and had just ordered ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... ship, where a clear view for taking bearings can be had. The center line of the pelorus should also be directly over the keel line of the ship. The inner edge of the metallic ring is engraved in degrees—the 0 deg. or 360 deg. and the 180 deg. marks indicating a fore-and-aft line parallel to the keel of the ship. Within this ring a ground glass dial is pivoted. This ground glass dial has painted upon it a compass card divided into points and sub-divisions and into 360 deg.. This ...
— Lectures in Navigation • Ernest Gallaudet Draper
... Gustav Stahl went aboard the steamship Lusitania at the City of New York, in the Southern District of New York, with one Neal J. Leach; that while on said steamship he saw four guns on one of the decks of said steamship, two forward and two aft; that the said guns were mounted on wooden blocks; that the said guns were covered ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... bonny loon," the gude wife answered, "When nane anither wod befriend me, Gainst mickle woes and muckle foes, Braw Donald Field did aft farfend me!" ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... would lose us. As I felt confident of my opinion, I turned abruptly from the disobedient mariners, and letting go the main brace, brought the vessel to with the topsail aback. Quickly, then, I ordered the watch as it rushed aft, to clew up the mainsail;—but alas! no one would obey; and, in the fracas, the captain, who rushed on deck ignorant of the facts or danger, ordered me back to my state-room with curses for my interference in his ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... coy, In time must either tire or cloy. Nor are their loudest clamours more, Than as they're relish'd, sweet or sour; 910 Like musick, that proves bad or good; According as 'tis understood. In all amours, a lover burns With frowns as well as smiles by turns; And hearts have been as aft with sullen 915 As charming looks surpriz'd and stolen. Then why should more bewitching clamour Some lovers not as much enamour? For discords make the sweetest airs And curses are a kind of pray'rs; 920 Too slight alloys for all those grand Felicities by marriage ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... has got some good lines, as you say, though you wouldn't hardly call him clipper built. Not much sheer for'ard an' a leetle too much aft, eh?" ...
— Horses Nine - Stories of Harness and Saddle • Sewell Ford
... gondola by moonlight; one singer placed himself forwards and the other aft, and thus proceeded to St. Georgio. One began the song: when he had ended his strophe, the other took up the lay, and so continued the song alternately. Throughout the whole of it, the same notes invariably returned; but, according to the subject-matter of the strophe, they laid a greater ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... lying on the bloody field of battle, all slaughtered to a man; our sailors, handcuffed and shackled, musing in a French prison on the bypast days of Camperdown, and of Lord Rodney breaking through the line; with all their fleets sunk to the bottom of the salt sea, after being raked fore and aft with chain-shot; and our timber, sugar, tea and treacle merchants, all fleeing for safety and succour down to lodgings in the Abbey Strand, with a yellow stocking on the ae leg and a black one on the other, like a wheen mountebanks. Little could ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... hand. The Spanish admiral now swung his ship around and started hastily back. Just as she had fairly started in the reverse course an 8-inch shell from the Olympia struck her fairly in the stern and drove inward through every obstruction, wrecking the aft-boiler and blowing up the deck in its explosion. It was a fatal shot. Clouds of white smoke were soon followed by the red glare of flames. For half an hour longer the crew continued to work their guns. At the end of that time the fire was master of ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... years ago. He don't approve of me. Pried into my private life, old Von Gerhard did, somethin' scand'lous. I had sort of went to pieces about that time, and I went t' him to be patched up. He thumps me fore 'an' aft, firing a volley of questions, lookin' up the roof of m' mouth, and squintin' at m' finger nails an' teeth like I was a prize horse for sale. Then he sits still, lookin' at me for about half a minute, till I begin t' feel uncomfortable. ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber
... quickly removed from bow to stern everything that had weight. Then he and the deck hand and the fireman, with some aid from the engineer, proceeded to shovel the coal supply from its bunkers forward of the fire room into the captain's cabin aft ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston
... think of the early bridges over the Thames as wooden bridges. Aft older generation was accustomed to many that still remained. This was true of the later Middle Ages, and of the torpor and neglect in building which followed the Reformation. But it was not true of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. ...
— The Historic Thames • Hilaire Belloc
... themselves: the regiment of soldiers whom we were transporting picturesquely breakfasted forward, and the second-cabin people came aft to our deck, while the English engineer (there are English engineers on all the Mediterranean steamers) planted a camp-stool in a sunny spot, and sat down to ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells
... at the schooner. Scrambling from his position at the starboard rail Jimmie made his way aft to a point beside the helmsman. Here he peered eagerly ...
— Boy Scouts in the North Sea - The Mystery of a Sub • G. Harvey Ralphson
... sing your praise of the bounding craft; And the merry sloops afloat, But for easy space, both fore and aft, I'll ...
— Shawn of Skarrow • James Tandy Ellis
... laughed, and went along through the opening on their right, which proved to be an arched passage very dimly lit by a series of little pipe-like holes sloping inward through the outer wall of the castle and opening about a foot above the moat. On their aft were doors of a row of cellars built beneath the old court-yard; and as Ben walked onward ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn
... the bustle, however, he managed to slip the book into the mate's hand, and the thing was done. The surgeon was sent for and they got him up on deck, where, while his hurts were being looked to, he had the satisfaction of seeing the mate go aft and then into the ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... English boatswain's shrill pipe was heard, and a crowd of sturdy fellows in clean "whites" and bare feet came racing aft, and cleared away the wreck in a twinkling, not without a few rough-hewn jokes at "Yankee seamanship," which the Arizona's men repaid ...
— Harper's Young People, May 4, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... already has been observed that the Charlotte, Captain Gilbert, was in company with the Scarborough; at this time she was some distance a-stern, and the canoes all went along-side her; several of them went on board the Charlotte, and ran fore and aft, stealing every thing that lay in their way; one of them in particular, got hold of the pump-break, and attempted to jump over-board with it, but was stopped by one of the sailors. They appeared to be very ...
— The Voyage Of Governor Phillip To Botany Bay • Arthur Phillip
... cheering fore and aft, and not until then did the captain send down to request that the noise might be discontinued. As soon as it was over, the grog was loudly called for in the midshipmen's berth, and ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... they are gude, and men they are ill, dears, You may get the leal or the lazy loon; A lover is aft like a gilded pill, dears, The bitter comes ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume XXIV. • Revised by Alexander Leighton
... betook himself to the big telescope. Right enough: Per was sitting aft, and he saw Madeleine jump down into the boat. On the forward thwart there sat a male creature, dressed in homespun, with a yellow sou'wester on ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland
... turned to the sea. 'Wreck! What nonsense! She's only reporting herself. Red rocket forward—there's a green light aft now, and two red ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... inmates of No. 11 as to the contemplated raid on the Charlotte Street rendezvous. Ultimately, he decided to say nothing definite that evening. It was better that the threatened people and their guards should not relax their vigilance. "The best-laid schemes o' mice and men gang aft a-gley," and if, perchance, the jute merchant's plan, whatever it might be, miscarried, and some of the desperadoes escaped, they would be ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... was no sooner down than he went up again,—and usually with a twist which threw him over to another hateful spot, from which he flung himself as if it were hot. And all the time the hooded stirrup flew about like a boot on a boneless leg and kicked him fore and aft. ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... came aft to execute the latter order, had to disturb some of the passengers, of whom there were several, seated on cloaks round the skylight, or standing up holding on to the weather rigging, or leaning against the main-boom. Clara Maynard, accustomed to yachting, promptly ...
— Clara Maynard - The True and the False - A Tale of the Times • W.H.G. Kingston
... bells, in accordance with the chief mate's instructions, and the lookout on the topgallant forecastle had responded with the usual cry of "All's well!" one of the forecastle hands came slouching along aft, and, ascending the poop ladder with a certain suggestion of haste and ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... soon as the confusion of the moment had subsided, it became evident that the shock had broken some of the iron plates, and that the ship was in a fair way of foundering. So frightened were the crew, that, after consultation with each other, they determined to take to the boats, and all hands came aft, to know whether there was anything the skipper would wish to carry off with him. Comprehending the madness of attempting to reach land in open boats at the distance of a thousand miles from any shore, Wyse pretended to go into the cabin ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... limbs seen through crystal-clear water. The picture brought reputation to a man who cared nothing for it; and Barron's "Bathing Negresses" are only quoted here because they illustrate his method of work. He had painted from the sea in a boat moored fore and aft; he had kept the two women shivering and whining in the water for two hours at a time. They could not indeed refuse the gold he offered for their services, but one never lived to enjoy the money, for her prolonged ablutions in the cause of art ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... and aft, mother," said the girl, smiling. "Yes, I saw the guns, too, but I don't imagine they would be much protection against a ...
— The Boy Allies with Uncle Sams Cruisers • Ensign Robert L. Drake
... Crouched aft of the engine hood was Sam Redding, who held the wheel. Jack Curtiss and Bill Bender were in the stern. They sat tandem-wise in the narrow ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol • Howard Payson
... head to foot in a scarlet suit of King Olaf's giving, Leif stood aft by the great steering oar. The wind blew out his long hair in a golden banner. The sun splintered its lances upon his gilded helm. Upon his breast shone the silver crucifix that had been Olaf's parting ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... The last I saw of it it was absolutely wrecked. It was a fuming inferno. But it had one gun forward and one aft still spitting forth fury and defiance like ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... the car when it stopped, glance carelessly fore and aft until their eyes rested on the vacant seats in our direction, and then they would see the stout lady sitting there, as graceful as the sunken ships which used to block the harbor ...
— Skiddoo! • Hugh McHugh
... sailor is to tar down the fore and aft stays. At any time and under any circumstances this was a precarious undertaking, and yet these fine young athletes would undertake it quite joyously, provided it was called for in the ordinary ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman
... parritch, chief of Scotia's food: [wholesome] The sowpe their only hawkie does afford, [milk, cow] That 'yont the hallan snugly chows her cood; [beyond, partition, The dame brings forth in complimental mood, cud] To grace the lad, her weel-hain'd kebbuck, fell; [well-saved cheese, And aft he's prest, and aft he ca's it good; strong] The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell How 'twas a towmond auld sin' lint was i' the bell. [twelve-month, flax, flower] The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face They round the ingle form a circle ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... above and shrieked as they passed through the pulley blocks, the new ropes and gear creaking under the strain of a boat laden with people, and the crew calling to the sailors above as the boat tilted slightly, now at one end, now at the other, "Lower aft!" "Lower stern!" and "Lower together!" as she came level again—but I do not think we felt much apprehension about reaching the water safely. It certainly was thrilling to see the black hull of the ship on one side and the sea, seventy feet below, on the other, or to pass ...
— The Loss of the SS. Titanic • Lawrence Beesley
... "The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft a-gley." So it was here; our plans went very much "a-gley," for I awoke on the morning of the match with a headache, which I knew would completely ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn
... 'at he's got a wab o' claith, and hes a new pair made in Muirtown aince in the twa year maybe, and keeps them in the garden till the new look wears aft. ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren
... is the largest of the gunboats (of which there are four) belonging to the Sarawak Government. She is about 200 tons, schooner rigged, and carries two 32-pounders, fore and aft. Her accommodation, state rooms and saloon, are forward, a good plan in the tropics, as the smell of steam and hot oil from the engine-room are thus avoided, and it is also cooler than aft when the vessel is under weigh. The quarters of the crew are aft; ...
— On the Equator • Harry de Windt
... He saw her coming. He had stolen a glance aft every time he turned in his walk at the end of the bridge. He leaned low and reached down his hand to assist ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... arm. "Do ye think, ye ungratefu' wretch, that I am gaun to let you sit doun upon my father's grave? The deil settle ye doun, if ye dinna rise and come into the Interpreter's house, that's the house of God, wi' me, but I'll rive every dud aft ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... both of you, do you not, Mr. Bonner? You and your friend will guard the aft companion-way, and help the Chief Engineer take care of the stokers and the steerage. I and the First Officer will fill ...
— A List To Starboard - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Far aft, under the waving tricolor, stood the woman of our story. Her fingers twined carelessly through the glittering necklace thrust into her hand as Percy Reed clambered into his boat, and her eyes rested ...
— Trifles for the Christmas Holidays • H. S. Armstrong
... crept over the wall, we might, if they became displaced, brush them to the outside of the wall. A few seconds more, and I was able to bring the machine to rest with the front of the platform jutting out beyond the Tower wall. Here I anchored her fore and aft with clamps ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... "'S all for 's aft'noon," he exploded to the servitor, who seemed not displeased to withdraw from this authoritative presence. Then he engaged a slice of bacon with ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... the admiral's cabin, and set fire to the papers or other inflammable materials that were lying there. Be this as it may, the flames burst through the poop before the fire was discovered, and, notwithstanding the united efforts of both officers and men, they soon wrapt the vessel in a blaze fore and aft. ...
— Narratives of Shipwrecks of the Royal Navy; between 1793 and 1849 • William O. S. Gilly
... all times be on the same vertical line as the centre of pressure. The latter varies with the angle of incidence. For square planes it moves approximately as expressed by Joessel's formula, C (0.2 0.3 sin a) L, in which C is the distance from the front edge, L the length fore and aft, and a the angle of incidence. The movement is different on concave surfaces. The term aeroplane is understood to apply to flat sustaining surfaces, but experiment indicates that arched surfaces are more efficient. S. P. Langley proposed ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... simple board, The healsome parritch, chief o' Scotia's food;[44] The soupe[45] their only hawkie[46] does afford, That 'yont the hallan snugly chows her cood;[47] The dame brings forth in complimental mood, 95 To grace the lad, her weel-hained kebbuck, fell;[48] And aft he's pressed, and aft he ca's it guid;[49] The frugal wine, garrulous, will tell, How 't was a towmond auld, sin' ...
— Selections from Five English Poets • Various
... burst into view, a gloomy, solid column tramp, tramp along the road—jaegers, with their stiff fore-and-aft shakos, dull-green tunics, and snuffy, red-striped trousers tucked into dusty half-boots. On they came, on, on—would they never pass? At last they were gone, somewhere into the flaming west, and now ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers
... evening. Neither I nor my brothers were admitted to this meeting, though aunt was. Nevertheless, we felt confident the picnic would be a grand success, for, to a late hour, men were hurrying fore and aft, and the stewards were up to their eyes packing baskets and making preparations, while from the cook's gally gleams of rosy light shot out every time the door was opened, to say nothing of odours so appetising that they would have ...
— Our Home in the Silver West - A Story of Struggle and Adventure • Gordon Stables
... later, made its difficult entry, pulled fore and pushed aft, was probably the only one in the whole history of Ham that was the medium of a kiss—located and indicated by means of a copying-ink pencil and a ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... thousand feet. Visibility poor. Bottom eight thousand," he said into the phone hung before his lips, and fifty feet aft, in a small cubby, a blue-clad figure monotonously repeated the observations and noted them down in ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... spring morning, not yet nine o'clock, but the sun stood high over Douglas Head, and the sunlight was glancing in the harbour from the little waves of the flowing tide. Oars were rattling up the pier, passengers were trooping down the gangways, and the decks fore and aft were becoming thronged. ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... to one of the men, saying I had a letter for the chief engineer. He took me round into a dark alleyway under the bridge-deck aft and shouted down: 'Here comes the Second,' he ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... crew inside the ship would investigate. Fate was offering the desperate men on the outside another chance. He turned and beckoned to the others and hurried aft toward the regular air-lock, which was operated only from inside the ship. Hastily he placed the men about the outer door. Then ...
— The Space Rover • Edwin K. Sloat
... recalled to Madrid in a grave crisis, and appointed to the administration of foreign affairs. Ferdinand VII. was apparently approaching the end of his reign and his life. The Apostolical party, exulting in their strength, and confiding in those well-laid plans which, with mice and men, 'gang aft agley,' imprudently showed their hand, and suffered their favorite project to transpire; which was, to set aside the ordinance by which the King had made null the Salic law, in favor of his infant daughter, and to support the pretensions ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... groups and halted at the river bank, where the work of rafting and wagon boating went methodically forward. Scores of individual craft, tipsy and risky, two or three logs lashed together, angled across and landed far below. Horsemen swam across with lines and larger rafts were steadied fore and aft with ropes snubbed around tree trunks on either bank. Once started, the resourceful pioneer found a dozen ways to skin his cat, as one man phrased it, and presently the falling waters permitted swimming and fording the stock. It all seemed ...
— The Covered Wagon • Emerson Hough
... I had her before matrimony, and I will have her after it. No, Tom, I am not ungrateful; fore or aft, she shall be retained. She shall never say that I acted unhandsomely by her, especially as she has become a good girl and repented. I know I did her injustice about the player-man. On that point she has thoroughly satisfied me, and I ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... captain stepped into the gig, which was carried over the stern above the cutter, and ordered it to be lowered; and though his officers urgently dissuaded him from so dangerous an attempt, he determined to hazard it. At this moment the ship made a deep plunge aft, the boat was stove, and the captain left in the water. He was much hurt, and bled profusely, for he was dashed violently against the rudder, and his nostril was torn up by the hook of one of the ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... Captain MacElrath turned and glanced aft, aloft and alow, and the pilot, following his gaze, saw the mute but convincing explanation of that loss of time. The smoke-stack, buff-coloured underneath, was white with salt, while the whistle- ...
— The Strength of the Strong • Jack London
... time the whole group disappeared from Marco's view, behind a boat which was hanging on the quarter of the steamer. Marco, who wished to watch the whole proceeding, left Forester, and ran aft, in hopes that he could get another view of the men in the boat. He found, however, that the steamboat was proceeding so rapidly up the river, that he was fast losing sight of them; and then he concluded to go forward to the bows of the steamboat, thinking that, ...
— Forests of Maine - Marco Paul's Adventures in Pursuit of Knowledge • Jacob S. Abbott
... given rise to much disputation and conjecture on the part of naturalists, but opinion mostly favours the supposition that these gigantic serpent-like appearances are caused by enormous cuttlefish swimming on the surface of the water, with their 20 ft. long tentacles elongated fore and aft. Other fishes which might also be mistaken for the sea-serpent are the barking-shark, ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... sleep saft, and I wake aft; It's lang since sleeping was fleyed frae me! Gie my service back to my wife and bairns, And a' gude fellows that ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... light very early," observed Mr. Whitford, looking in the pilot house from the cabin, just aft of it. "But there is no use waiting around here any more, Tom. They gave us a false clew, ...
— Tom Swift and his Great Searchlight • Victor Appleton
... volunteered stood braced and ready at the long sweeps with which, fore and aft, they would seek to ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... time arrived, the waiter went aft, to the cabin, and very soon returned, bringing the cage ...
— Rollo on the Atlantic • Jacob Abbott
... to the southward, before the North East Monsoon, between the mainland and the reef that for hundreds of miles fringes this perilous coast. The night is quiet, so quiet that a whisper can be heard fore and aft the dhow; so quiet that a faint booming sound rolls across the water to us from ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... ordinarily fitted by this firm in their torpedo boats, excepting where triple compounds are fitted. The general arrangement is shown by the sectional plan. As will be noticed, there are two boilers, one before and the other aft of the engines, and either boiler is arranged to supply either or both the engines. Yarrow's patent water tight ash pans are fitted to each boiler, to prevent the fire being extinguished by a sudden influx of water into the stokehold. There is an independent centrifugal pumping ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 598, June 18, 1887 • Various
... come on deck in my pink saut du lit, and there stands Bobby, the water running off him and the cup in his teeth. 'There's your bauble,' he says. (Of course he takes the cup out of his mouth when he speaks.) 'And here's your Nora,' I say, and the boatswain pipes all hands aft to witness the marriage ceremony. No, no, your eminence," she laughed, "it's too good to be true. Bobby will never steal the cup. He has never done anything in all his life but walk down Bond Street. He's a love, but he ...
— The Turquoise Cup, and, The Desert • Arthur Cosslett Smith
... fossa is altogether behind the cerebral fossa, or, in plainer terms, the division between the big brain (cerebrum) and the little one (cerebellum) is vertical, the two brains lying on a level plane fore and aft instead of overlapping. The brain itself is highly convoluted. The nasal aperture, or olfactory fossa, is very large, and is placed a little below the brain-case. Few people who are intimate with ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... it may be well to briefly describe her appearance, when fitted to carry seventeen Bowdoin men in her hold in place of the lime and coal to which she has been accustomed. Descending, then, the forward hatch, protected by a plain hatch house, the visitor turns around and facing aft, looks down the two sides of the immense centreboard box that occupies the centre of our wardroom from floor to deck. Fastened to it are the mess tables, nearly always lighted by some four or five great lamps, which serve to warm as well, as the ...
— Bowdoin Boys in Labrador • Jonathan Prince (Jr.) Cilley
... Covert—to plague me and prick me with your wit, like mosquitoes round a drowsy man. A fine family conference we shall have, with Sir John Johnson and the Butlers shooting one way, you and Sir George Covert firing t'other, and me betwixt you, singing psalms and getting all your arrows in me, fore and aft." ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... the best sailor who can steer within the fewest points of the wind, and extract a motive power out of the greatest obstacles. Most begin to veer and tack as soon as the wind changes from aft, and as within the tropics it does not blow from all points of the compass, there are some harbors which ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... to accomplish the last duty, that of binding the defences together by means of chains and cables. Two men leaped to the floating booms and moved her fore and aft. Orde and the Rough Red set about the task. Methodically they worked from either end toward the middle. When they met finally, Orde directed his assistant to ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... except half a dozen that were needed to decorate portions of the ship below, and in a short time the vessel assumed a holiday appearance. During the morning, meetings were held and all manner of committees set to work on the celebration ceremonies. In the afternoon the ship's company assembled aft, on deck, under the awnings; the flute, the asthmatic melodeon, and the consumptive clarinet crippled "The Star-Spangled Banner," the choir chased it to cover, and George came in with a peculiarly lacerating screech on the final note and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... and motors were carried in cars slung fore and aft. The ship was propelled by three engines, each of 170 horse-power. One engine was placed in the forward car, and the two others in the after car. To steer her to right or left, she had six vertical planes somewhat ...
— The Mastery of the Air • William J. Claxton
... (which now not a little resembles an Egyptian mummy) on a spare grating. Some portion of the bedding and clothes are always made up in the package—apparently to prevent the form being too much seen. It is then carried aft, and, being placed across the after-hatchway, the union jack is thrown over all. Sometimes it is placed between two of the guns, under the half deck; bat generally, I think, he is laid where I have mentioned, just abaft the mainmast. I should ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, No. - 488, May 7, 1831 • Various
... the order to Captain Boggs, who sulkily obeyed. The mate was permitted to go aft and to bring two swarthy deckhands out where ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Lieutenants - or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers • H. Irving Hancock
... dropped ye that note, tellin' ye to come here at three this aft'noon," Scammon continued. "I told ye I hoped ye'd find it convenient to come, an' hinted that if ye didn't, ye might wish later, that ...
— The High School Pitcher - Dick & Co. on the Gridley Diamond • H. Irving Hancock
... The thole pins were then fitted snugly in the notches. Two cleats, nailed to the side boards inside, 7 inches below the upper edge, served to support a seat board 1 inch thick and 2 feet 10-1/2 inches long. The aft edge of the seat was about 10 inches forward of the row locks. The boat was completed by nailing on a couple of deck boards at each end. The oars were made of 2-inch pine boards, 5 feet long and 5 inches wide. They were blocked out at Mr. Schreiner's sawmill and then shaped ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... cabin gentlemen had been long enough deprived of fresh meats to make them cast lickerish glances towards their hard-skinned friend, and there was a great smacking of lips the day before he was killed. As I walked aft occasionally, I heard them congratulating themselves on their prospective turtle soup and forcemeat balls; and one of them, to heighten the luxury of the feast, ate nothing but a dry biscuit for the twenty-four hours preceding, that he might be prepared to ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... any signal from the lookout, a squat, dark-faced steersman lounged against his crude rudder. Between these two the paddlers stood, each with one foot on the bottom of the long dugout and the other on the gunwale, swinging in nonchalant unison as their blades moved fore and aft. Under the curving roof of a rough-and-ready cabin, open at the sides to allow free play of air, Schwandorf lolled like some ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... and still out they rowed and drifted till the coast began to open up beyond the headlands on either side. There a light breeze was waiting them. Up then went three short masts, and three dark-brown sails shone red in the sun, and Malcolm came aft, over the great heap of brown nets, crept with apology across the poop, and got down into a little well behind, there to sit and steer the boat; for now, obedient to the wind in its sails, it went frolicking over ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... and the whole of her upper structure, except the masts and funnel, were also white, giving to her general features a certain flatness which masked her fine proportions. Her bridge, instead of being well forward, was placed so far aft that it was only a few feet from the funnel. The object of this departure from custom was to prevent any walking over Mr. Pulitzer's head when he sat in his library, which was situated under the spot, where the bridge would have been ...
— An Adventure With A Genius • Alleyne Ireland
... the tempest's roar: "Now, now's the tide!" He hoists his banner, red as gore, And plied his foemen aft and fore, Loud crying 'midst the tempest's roar: "Now, now's the tide!" "Fly each, who knows a refuge path, For who can Juul, ...
— Targum • George Borrow
... with a momentous air. "And I'll come. I may be a little late in gett'n' there, faw I've got to hitch up aft' a while and take Mother Tombs to spend the day, both of us, with our daughters, Mrs. Hamlet and Lazarus Graves. I don't reckon anybody else has noticed it but them, but, John, my son, Mother Tombs an' I will be married jess fifty years to-night! However that's neither here nor ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... bamboo, which, in some of the more difficult reaches, must be constantly changed. Some of these steamers plying on the Irrawaddy are very large, being over 300 feet long, and nearly 80 feet in width. Many of them carry upwards of 2,000 passengers, mostly deck passengers, who, in the aft part of the ship, conduct a travelling bazaar for the benefit of such towns and villages on the banks as have no regular shops of their own. At each landing-place crowds of people, again mostly women, are awaiting the arrival ...
— Burma - Peeps at Many Lands • R.Talbot Kelly
... On she came towards us. The wind now again increased, and the seas became more dangerous. Fearing that one might break over us, I sent Mary and Susan and the boys below again, and secured the hatches over them; which done, we passed life lines fore and aft, to give us a holdfast in case of accidents. The stranger drew nearer and nearer. We now saw how deep she was in the water, and how terribly she was labouring. I watched her with double anxiety, on her account as well as on our own. In another ten minutes she would be down upon us, and from the ...
— Peter Biddulph - The Story of an Australian Settler • W.H.G. Kingston
... orders to clear as quick as we could for Bordeaux to take on an excellent freight o' French goods," explained Mrs. Martin eagerly. "I heard that the Queen was goin' to a great review of her army, and would drive out o' her Buckin'ham Palace about ten o'clock in the mornin', and I run aft to Albert, my husband, and brother Horace where they was standin' together by the hatchway, and told 'em they must one of 'em take me. They laughed, I was in such a hurry, and said they could n't go; and I found they meant it and got sort of impatient when I began to talk, and I was ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett
... wooden vessels were eagerly watching for her appearance when she should come out of Gosport Harbor. Her powers and capacity were utterly unknown. She was made out of the former United States steam-frigate Merrimac, cut down so as to make her fore and aft decks nearly flat, and not much above the water, while the guns were mounted in a covered central battery, with sloping flanks. Her sides, deck, and battery were coated with iron, and she was armed with formidable rifle-guns, and, most important ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... been on board some time Mr. David Sproat, the British Commissary of prisoners, came on board; all the prisoners were ordered aft; the roll was called and as each man passed him Mr. Sproat would ask, 'Are you a seaman?' The answer was 'Landsman, landsman.' There were ten landsmen to one answer of half seaman. When the roll was finished Mr. Sproat said to our sea officers, 'Gentlemen, how do you make out at sea, for the most ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... defence; he was obliged to use his own crude weapons with the ever-growing conviction that they were worse than useless. Markham availed himself of no propitiation—he rushed his opponent into the open at the first onslaught, and thereafter he attacked him fore and aft mercilessly. ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... Coxswain. "There was a woman in our aft-scuppers when I went a-whalin in the little 'Grampus'—and Lord love you, Pumpo, you poor land-swab, she WAS as pretty a craft as ever dowsed a tarpauling—there was a woman on board the 'Grampus,' who before we'd struck our first fish, or biled our first blubber, set the whole ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... ascertained that the watch were quietly chatting and smoking forward, whereas the Baron's stateroom was situated aft. The delay enabled von Kerber to collect his thoughts. When he resumed the promised disclosure, his voice was under control, and he spoke with ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... under sail. It gradually increased until we had drifted through the Highlands, which is regarded as no small advantage whenever they wish to sail up or down the river; because, if they do not have a fresh breeze aft, they cannot have much favorable wind, as in blowing crosswise over the Highlands it blows above the vessel, and sometimes comes down in whirlwinds which are dangerous. In the evening we sailed before the Hysopus, where some of the passengers desired to be put ashore, but it blew too hard and ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... crazy and not be it. He used to keep a long pole by him on deck,—a pole with a sharp spike in one end,—and any man who'd get near enough to him to let him have a chance would feel that spike. I've known him to keep the cook up till midnight frying doughnuts; then he'd call all hands aft and range 'em on the quarter-deck, and go round with his hat off and a plate of doughnuts in his hand, saying, as polite as you please, 'Here, my man, won't you take a doughnut?—they won't hurt you; nice and light; had ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... later, a very singular thing happened. The mate—this one with the sharp eyes—is a quiet chap; seldom speaks to me except on business. He was standing aft that evening, and suddenly, without ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... combined with his sturdy independence of character, being rightly regarded as dangerous to Louis Philippe's regime. His reward, therefore, took the form of practical banishment. The wily advisers of Louis Philippe used the gloved hand. But the best-laid schemes of mice and courtiers "gang aft agley." Cabet, in Corsica, joined the radical anti-administration forces, and became a thorn in the side of the government. Removed from office, he returned to Paris, whereupon the citizens of Dijon, his native town, elected him as their deputy to the lower chamber ...
— Socialism - A Summary and Interpretation of Socialist Principles • John Spargo
... there to eat a gale up. How should a cat's-paw crawl then?" And I softly whistled, while he wetted his finger and held it up; but to no purpose; the draught was all between the rails, and they blew forward and aft with ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... be long going down," Harry said, "I reckon the stream is running ten miles an hour, and as we shall be paddling, it will take us through in ten minutes. We had all better sit farther aft, so as to take her bow right out of water. She will go through it ever so much ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... I was riding in a car, I guess. They're the blackest niggers you ever saw. Good-looking soldiers. Can't stand shelling but they're good on the cold steel end of the game. The Boche machine was a beauty. Its motor is excellent and she carries a machine gun aft and one forward. Same kind of a machine I attacked to-day. The German pilots must be mighty cold-footed, for if the Frenchmen had airplanes like that they surely would raise ...
— Flying for France • James R. McConnell
... third of a St. Bernard's. He had the finest head for adroit thinking that is known among dogs; and he had an athletic body, the forepart muffled and lost in a mass of corded black fleece, but the rest of him sharply clipped from the chest aft; and his trim, slim legs were clipped, though tufts were left at his ankles, and at the tip of his short tail, with two upon his hips, like fanciful buttons of an imaginary jacket; for thus have such dogs been clipped to a fashion proper and comfortable for them ever since (and no doubt ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... passengers, after the bustle of lunch and arranging their staterooms; had settled into their deck chairs and were telling each other how much they loved the ocean. Captain Scottie had taken his afternoon constitutional on his private strip of starboard deck just aft the bridge, and was sitting in his comfortable cabin expecting a cup of tea. He was a fine old sea-dog: squat, grizzled, severe, with wiry eyebrows, a short coarse beard, and watchful quick eyes. A characteristic Scot, beneath his reticent conscientious ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... It will take us the better part of four hours to get to Bay Shore, anyway, and I telephoned Wink yesterday that we'd be there by three. Every fellow into sea-togs as quick as he can make it. Joe and Phil and I bunk aft, the rest of you in the main cabin. Get your things put away neatly, fellows. Anyone caught being disorderly will be keel-hauled. Have a look at this thermometer, Joe. It's almost eighty-nine! Let's get out of ...
— The Adventure Club Afloat • Ralph Henry Barbour
... Eric went aft to the helm and seized it. Now but a length ahead Ospakar's ship laboured on beneath her small sail, but the Gudruda rushed towards her with all canvas set and at every leap plunged her golden dragon beneath the surf and shook ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... music and salutes with bell or steam-whistle, and, above all, their eager throngs of Sunday-school children or the liberated denizens of foul and narrow streets. At times the shipping along the docks and over the bay will blossom with the flags and streamers of all nations, hung fore and aft and extending in fluttering lines down the rigging, imparting a gala aspect to the scene and perhaps thrilling one with patriotic or historic memories. Perhaps we are crossing at the moment when the great Sound-steamers are pushing out from their piers. We feel quite humiliated on our ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... deck again and hurried aft, for the vessel's kedge had been laid out astern to prevent her swinging. There was a heavy hemp warp attached to it, and it cost them some time to heave most of it over, after which they proceeded to get the mainsail on to her. It was covered with ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... the rebel craft,— Our eyes not sadly turn And see the pirates huddling aft To drop their raft astern; Soon o'er the sea-worm's destined prey The lifted wave shall close,— So perish from the face of ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... watches set at noon, and then began the never-ending cleaning-up at which steamship sailors put in so much of their time. Headed by a six-foot boatswain, a gang came aft on the starboard side, with paint-buckets and brushes, and ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... the careless feller as nudged Humpty Dumpty off the wall. But it did n't do no good. There he was, broke all ter flinders. And all the King's horses and all the King's men could n't fix him. Humpty Dumpty is me, Betsy. Regularly all split up, fore and aft, rib and keel. I mopes all day fer you, Betsy. And I mopes all night. Last night I did n't get ter sleep, jest fidgettin', till way past 'leven o' clock. And I woke agin at seven, askin' meself, if I loves you hopeless. Yer is a lump o' sugar, Betsy, as would sweeten ol' Patch's ...
— Wappin' Wharf - A Frightful Comedy of Pirates • Charles S. Brooks
... Aft on the hill at e'ens, I see him 'mang the ferns, The lover o' my teens, The father o' my bairns: For there his plaid I saw, As gloamin' aye drew near— But my a's now awa', Sin' the ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... splash was in my ears and the echo of my own laugh, but with it there mingled a cry from Billy Priske, and shaking the water out of my eyes I saw him erect in the stern-sheets and astare at a vision parting the fog—the vision of a tall fore-and-aft sail, golden-grey against the sunlight, and above the sail a foot or two of a stout pole-mast, and above the mast a gilded truck and weather-vane with a tail of scarlet bunting. So closely the fog hung about her that for a second I took her to be a cutter; and then ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... now well beyond the three-mile limit. Ross and his fellow-passenger were standing aft, sheltering from the keen south-westerly wind. The mate of the vessel was with them, the ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... made him confess that he had served his term fully, and then told him to step down and out. His evidence was not needed. Mr. Rosenberg was raked fore and aft, but he stuck to his story. When the diminutive counsellor intimated that he was worse than the prisoner, the witness smiled serenely and winked at the magistrate as if it was a ...
— Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations • William Howe
... sitting upright, propped on her arms. Her mouth, with its slightly full under lip, was elevated, and an outrageous desire possessed him. His countenance slowly turned hotly red, and slowly a faint tide of color stained Rosemary Roselle's cheeks. She looked away; Elim looked away. He proceeded aft and learned that Bramant's Wharf lay only a few ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... unlike that of a butterfly or dragon fly, long and slender, consisting of a rectangular frame with canvas stretched over it, and a seat for two just aft of the engine and controlling levers. Back of the seat stretched out a long framework, and at the end was a curved plane, set at right angles to it. The ends of the plane terminated in flexible wings, to permit of their being bent up or down, so as to preserve the ...
— Tom Swift and his Wireless Message • Victor Appleton
... had Theriere known it he was very near death that moment when a summons from Skipper Simms called him aft and saved his life. Then the mucker, unseen by the officer, approached the girl. In his heart were rage and hatred, and as the girl turned at the sound of his step behind her she saw them mirrored in his ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... could see the hills and the harbour beyond the high stern, and on that Thorgils was steering, with his eyes on the vane at the masthead. His men were coiling down ropes, and Evan's two men were sitting under the weather gunwale aft, talking with the guards of the princess. She was in the after cabin, I suppose, out of the way of the wind, with her maidens. I ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... Story of the Fore and Aft Rig from the Earliest Times to the Present Day. Sq. ex. royal 8vo. With 150 Illustrations and Coloured Frontispiece by ...
— Astronomy of To-day - A Popular Introduction in Non-Technical Language • Cecil G. Dolmage
... garden, an old woman, between fifty and sixty, passed us, striding with sturdy intention if somewhat rickety action, with two bulky bundles, covered with sacking, slung fore and aft upon her. She was a woman tramp, a houseless soul, too independent to drag her failing carcass through the workhouse door. Like the snail, she carried her home with her. In the two sacking-covered bundles were her household goods, her wardrobe, ...
— The People of the Abyss • Jack London
... kep' the forecastle closed tight an' set a watch when we was in port; an' the forecastle was tight enough that day, but the second hand, whose watch it was, had t' help with the fish, for 'tis a poor harbour there, an' we was in haste t' get out. The folk was loafin' about the deck, fore an' aft, waitin' turns t' weigh fish or be served in the cabin. An' does you know what happened?" Docks asked, tensely. "Can't you see how 'twas? Believe me, sir, 'twas a cold, wet day, a bitter day; an' 'tis no wonder that one o' they folk went below t' warm hisself at the forecastle ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... bein' English,' says Hardenberg, 'is only half the hoe-handle. 'Tother half being the fact that the first-named gent is all American. No Yank ain't never took no dust from aft a Englisher, whether it ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... force from the north. Although under but a rag of canvas the brig was pressed down gunwale deep, and each wave as it struck her broadside seemed to heave her bodily to leeward. Malcolm on coming on deck made his way aft and glanced at the compass, and then took a long look over the foaming water towards where he knew the French coast must lie. The wind was two or three points east of north, and as the clumsy craft would ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... the ship, setting me down amidships while they got the bales of goods on board. She was a stout trading vessel, built for burden more than speed, but she seemed light in the water, as though she had little cargo for this voyage. She had raised decks fore and aft, and there were low doors in the bulkheads below them that seemed to lead to some sort of cabins. Under the forward of these decks the outlaws began to stow their bales, the man who had ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... pie went aft, or whether something else made the barge-master turn round and come forward, I do not know; but when we were encumbered with open clasp-knives, and full mouths, we saw him bearing down upon us, and in a hasty movement ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... the tip of the fore wings. There is a black scent-pouch on the hind wings. The caterpillar, which is bright yellow or greenish yellow, banded with shining black, is furnished with black fleshy 'horns' fore and aft." ...
— Wild Flowers Worth Knowing • Neltje Blanchan et al
... as bonny a river as we hae in a' the north country. There's mony a sweet sunny spot on its banks, an' mony a time an' aft hae I waded through its shallows, whan a boy, to set my little scautling-line for the trouts an' the eels, or to gather the big pearl-mussels that lie sae thick in the fords. But its bonny wooded ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous
... only willingly but gladly assented to his proposal, and promised to go aft when they were summoned. Although the master had not discovered that Cousin Giles was a seaman, they had, and knew him to be a true man. He then returned aft, and spoke to the passengers in the same strain, and but very few refused to join the service. Two said they ...
— Fred Markham in Russia - The Boy Travellers in the Land of the Czar • W. H. G. Kingston
... brute!" he had said; and the words had impelled me to invite him aft; for I cannot deny a certain admiration for him that had mysteriously grown up in me. It can only have been the admiration we all have for courage; for, certainly I cannot have suggested that he had ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... my lady fair, Nae harm shall thee befall; Aft times hae I water'd my steed Wi' the water o' ...
— Ballad Book • Katherine Lee Bates (ed.)
... did not wish me for a lover, she was not averse to my playing the devoted cavalier, who should give all, while she should give nothing. I knew that my punishment had already begun. We paced the deck in silence; and once, as we walked far aft, I saw, leaning upon the railing of the intermediate deck, and looking towards us—Boyd Madras; and the words of that letter which he wrote on the No ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... "Be back this aft," he said, and rode majestically away up the canyon, where he would be out of the way. For men, too, have their instincts and intuitions, and they are even willing to leave alone that which they cannot remedy ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... another form, indeed; Built for freight, and yet for speed, A beautiful and gallant craft; Broad in the beam, that the stress of the blast, Pressing down upon sail and mast, Might not the sharp bows overwhelm; Broad in the beam, but sloping aft With graceful curve and slow degrees, That she might be docile to the helm, And that the currents of parted seas, Closing behind, with mighty force, Might aid ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... into the water and got her mast and sails into her; we also put the sheep on board and took our places, weeping and in great distress of mind. Circe, that great and cunning goddess, sent us a fair wind that blew dead aft and staid steadily with us keeping our sails all the time well filled; so we did whatever wanted doing to the ship's gear and let her go as the wind and helmsman headed her. All day long her sails were full as she held her course over the sea, but when the sun went down and darkness ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... sail of some Ostend fishing-boat returning home after a night's trawling. Then the beat of paddles caught her ear, and a steamer blundered past, wallowing clumsily among the waves like a tortoise. It was the Swallow from London. She could see some of its passengers leaning curiously over the aft-rail. A girl in a mackintosh signalled to her, and mechanically she answered the salute with her arm. The officer of the bridge of the Swallow hailed the yacht, but the man at the wheel offered no reply. ...
— The Grand Babylon Hotel • Arnold Bennett
... Fore and aft the archers had cleared the galleys' decks, but from either side the rovers had poured down into the waist, where the seamen and bowmen were pushed back and so mingled with their foes that it was impossible for their comrades above ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... "Terrible'' and "Diadem'' classes of the British navy, the anchors, secured by chains, are stowed a-cock-bill, outside the ship, with their crowns resting on iron shoes secured to the ship's side and the flukes fore and aft. A difficulty is experienced in stowing the anchors when the ship is pitching or rolling heavily. Fig. 4 illustrates an anchor with cat davit or anchor crane used in the P. and O. Company's steamers ("India'' class, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... ye prideful queen, on a' aneath your ken, For he wha seems the farthest BUT aft wins the farthest BEN, And whiles the doubie of the schule tak's lead of a' the rest: The birdie sure to sing is the gorbal ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... spurs. No one wears spurs on shipboard. I presented myself and we exchanged several remarks, but I must have seemed somewhat strained for from the first moment I knew that he sensed something. Under some pretext he left the Captain, and led me aft near the great rudder wheel. There, I dared speak. Colonel, what did I say? How I must have stammered! He did not look at me. Leaning his elbows on the railing he let his eyes wander far off, smiling slightly. Then, of a sudden, when I was well tangled up in explanations, he looked ...
— Atlantida • Pierre Benoit
... from a somewhat higher horizon. Note the seven gill slits and the lappetlike paired fins. These fins seem to be remnants of the continuous fold of skin which, as embryology teaches, passed from fore to aft down each side ...
— The Elements of Geology • William Harmon Norton
... explain that he wanted a cup of tea for his sick wife. And when we were coming out of the harbour at Genoa, and it was necessary to order away that boat of music you remember, the chief officer (called 'aft' for the purpose, as 'knowing something of Italian') delivered himself in this explicit and clear Italian to the principal performer—'Now Signora, if you don't sheer off you'll be run down, so you had better trice up that guitar of ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... the river when they got red hot from chopping. Even in those days they had to watch out for forest fires. The axes were hung on long rope handles. Each axeman would march through the timber whirling his axe around him till the hum of it sounded like one of Paul's for-and-aft mosquitoes, and at every step a quarter-section of ...
— The Marvelous Exploits of Paul Bunyan • W.B. Laughead
... Crocodile River. This day we saw nothing of the enemy. Our horses have done well in the way of forage lately. Sometimes we get bundles of oat hay out of the barns we visit en route, and strap them, with armfuls of green oats pulled from the fields, fore and aft of our saddles, till we look like fonts at harvest festivals. Thus equipped, we would form good subjects for a picture called "The Harvest Home." Yet, in spite of all the feeding they have been getting, our horses are all nearly ...
— A Yeoman's Letters - Third Edition • P. T. Ross
... there has been systematic preparation in other parts of the auxiliary cruiser. Down in the sick bay aft, the surgeon and his assistants have made ready for their grewsome task. Cases of glittering instruments have been opened, lint and bandages and splints are in their proper places, and the apothecary and bayman are getting the cots in ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... her fellow-travellers; one taking exercise on the same deck as herself; the other, a family party, on the steerage deck, on which many persons in the first class paused to look down with sympathy as they reached the dividing rail aft. ...
— Marriage a la mode • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... The decks were cleared—the guns cast loose, and every man stood in eager expectation at his quarters. It is an awful moment, lady, and various conflicting emotions agitate the breast when, in the calm stillness that reigns fore and aft, the mind looks back upon the past, and contemplates the future. Home, wife, children, and every tender remembrance rush upon the soul. It is different in the heat of action: then every faculty is employed ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 272, Saturday, September 8, 1827 • Various
... tool." A piece of the rock was found wedged in the hole, and had greatly assisted in arresting the influx of water. The sheathing and false keel were very badly damaged, but it was believed that she was not much injured aft, as she made but little water when once ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson |
