"Midshipman" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sailor, mariner, navigator; seaman, seafarer, seafaring man; dock walloper [Slang]; tar, jack tar, salt, able seaman, A. B.; man-of-war's man, bluejacket, galiongee^, galionji^, marine, jolly, midshipman, middy; skipper; shipman^, boatman, ferryman, waterman^, lighterman^, bargeman, longshoreman; bargee^, gondolier; oar, oarsman; rower; boatswain, cockswain^; coxswain; steersman, pilot; crew. aerial ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... being servile, or even merely conservative, usually accompanies true independence of spirit. The young athlete, like the young race-horse, does not despise, but emulate, his sire; even though the old victor be long past his prime. The young soldier admires the old general; the young midshipman the old admiral, just in proportion as he himself is likely to be a daring and able officer hereafter. The son, when grown to man's estate, may say to his father, I look on you still with all respect and admiration. I have learnt, and desire always, to learn ...
— Lectures Delivered in America in 1874 • Charles Kingsley
... bright eye open," said a gay young midshipman, as he stepped into the boat which was to reconvey him to his vessel, "you may cut out one or two of them, for they sail wide apart, and the frigate keeps heaving ahead, and laying-to for the ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... death and wounds in its track. The shattered craft sunk, and was soon followed by four others. The order for retreat was given; and, leaving their dead and some wounded in the shattered barges that lay in the shallow water, the British fled to their ships. Midshipman Tatnall, who, many years later, served in the Confederate navy, waded out with several sailors, and, seizing the "Centipede," drew her ashore. He found several wounded men in her,—one a Frenchman, with both legs shot away. A small terrier ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... many children, but four were dead, and three daughters were married and living in Edinburgh and Lerwick, and two sons had emigrated to Canada; while the youngest of all, a boy of fifteen, was a midshipman on Her Majesty's man-of-war, Vixen, so that only one boy and one girl were with their parents. These were Boris, the eldest son, who was sailing his own ship on business ventures to French and Dutch ports, and Thora, the only unmarried daughter. ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... C., and sent in a letter-bag for mailing. That night there came on a terrible gale and the Grampus disappeared forever—no vestige of her ever having been seen. She was commanded by Lt.-Commander Albert E. Downes, a good man and a fine seaman, and who as a midshipman had sailed with me three years before in the Pacific. My brother was educated for the law, and studied his profession with the Hon. John Holmes, and, after completing his studies, became Mr. Holmes' law-partner. But he being my only ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... the father, with a sigh, Placed him in office—"Do, my Frederick, try: Confine thyself a few short months and then -" He tried a fortnight, and threw down the pen. Again demands were hush'd: "My son, you're free, But you're unsettled; take your chance at sea:" So in few days the midshipman, equipp'd Received the mother's blessing, and was shipp'd. Hard was her fortune! soon compell'd to meet The wretched stripling staggering through the street; For, rash, impetuous, insolent, and vain, The Captain sent him to his friends again: ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... as the frigate rounded to, to the leeward of us,—and the glorious stripes and stars blew out clear against the hot sky. A light dingey was in the water before the main yard had been well swung aback, and a midshipman was urging the men, who needed no urging, to give way strong. I didn't know how weak I had got, till they were lifting me aboard the boat. An hour after, when I had had something to eat and was a little restored ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... service in other frigates, during which he gained the personal familiarity with West Indian life of which his novels show many traces, he completed his time as a midshipman, and in 1812, returned home to pass. As a lieutenant his cruises were uneventful and, after being several times invalided, he was promoted Commander in 1815, just as the Great War was closing. He was now only ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... the West Point boys average a little older than the Annapolis boys," broke in Mrs. Dalzell pleasantly, though warmly. Even she, as the mother of a midshipman, felt her share in the rivalry between the nation's two great ...
— Dick Prescott's Third Year at West Point - Standing Firm for Flag and Honor • H. Irving Hancock
... back to Zay Crawford, who was a general favorite. She and a brother nine years older than herself, a passed midshipman had gone to Germany in the summer, where her mother had been taking treatment. The Major had accompanied her. Miss Crawford had taken over ...
— The Girls at Mount Morris • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... Branning letting down the bars and leading his pony out into the road. The only bridle-path through the woods led over the hill to the little house on the westerly slope, where lived Dame Ransom, Lucy's bowed and wrinkled grandmother. Mark wondered not a little where the midshipman had been; but as he still retained the memory of the old quarrel, he did not accost him, and presently thought no more of it. Reaching the house, he got some dry clothes and then went home with bounding steps. The earth was never so beautiful ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... but the army got both of the boys, as it turned out. Gregory was to be the midshipman; my poor brother intending him for a sailor from the first, and so giving him the name that was once borne by the unfortunate relative we lost by shipwreck. I wished him to call one of the lads James, after St. James; but, somehow, I never could persuade ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... prospects appear. In this great city you will be safe, for even your late gaoler would not recognize you in this dress. And perhaps some opportunity may offer by which you may return to your own country." He told Alonzo that his name was Jack Brown; that he was a midshipman on board the Severn; that he had a wife and four children, and owned the house in which they then were. "In order to prevent suspicion or discovery, said he, I shall consider you as a relation from the country ...
— Alonzo and Melissa - The Unfeeling Father • Daniel Jackson, Jr.
... till he says so. For when the sailing-master, whose duty it is to take the regular observation at noon, touches his hat, and reports twelve o'clock to the officer of the deck; that functionary orders a midshipman to repair to the captain's cabin, and humbly inform him of the ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... the deck, he found the mate of the watch had fallen asleep, and that the other midshipman was not to ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... who you're a-talkin to?" replied the boy, cold as the other was hot. "I'm a King's officer on King's business. Remove your face, please. Sit down. And don't shake so, or you'll spill us.—I'm a midshipman going ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... Royal Marine Light Infantry, who was left in command of the Naval Brigade with Lord Methuen's force after the action at Graspan, reported as follows: "It is with deep regret that I have to report the death of Midshipman Huddart, who behaved magnificently, and still advanced after he had been twice wounded, until he was finally struck down mortally wounded." A brother naval officer also wrote: "At the bottom of the hill Huddart ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... approach another reminiscence of this common human anxiety, of which I can not think without deep emotion. We had a young cousin, a fine lad full of spirit and ardor, a midshipman in the royal navy, who was our especial pride and delight. We had no brother, but he supplied the want to us, being, as a child, our constant playmate—as a youth, our merriest and best-loved correspondent. How full of ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... F.B.H., MIDSHIPMAN and W.H.E.—1. As there are but two schoolships in the United States, and none but New York and Pennsylvania boys are admitted on them, non-residents' applications for enlistment would not be considered under any circumstances. Boys desiring to ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XIII, Nov. 28, 1891 • Various
... been exercising commands which in any European government would have been assigned to an admiral. Perhaps no navy in the world had at that time abler officers than ours, while the rank and emolument, except for the lowest grades, was shamefully inadequate. The old navy had only the ranks of passed-midshipman, lieutenant, commander, and captain. The new law gave nine grades, —midshipman, ensign, master, lieutenant, lieutenant-commander, commander, captain, commodore, and rear-admiral. The effect of the increased rank was undoubtedly stimulating to the service and valuable to the government. ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... Master Clement Downing, midshipman aboard the Salisbury, wrote a book after his return from the cruise to Madagascar, whither the Salisbury had been ordered, to put an end to the piracy with which those waters were ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... Italian stamp and a Neapolitan postmark. Arthur Miles was a midshipman now, soon to be a second-lieutenant; his ship, the Indomitable, attached to the Mediterranean fleet. She broke the seal. . . . The letter was a boyish one, full of naval slang, impersonal, the sort of letter growing ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... course, the "croakers" say, if the floe had pressed a little more—if the ship had risen a little less—in fact, if Providence had been a little less watchful—disasters must have overtaken our ships; but when I hear these "dismal Jemmies" croak, it puts me much in mind of the midshipman, who, describing to his grandmamma the attack on Jean d'Acre, after recounting his prowess and narrow escapes, assured the old lady that Tom Tough, the boatswain's mate, had asserted with an oath, which put the fact beyond all doubt, that if one of those shot from the enemy had struck him, he never ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... remaining mutineers were a sailor named Alexander Smith, or, as he now called himself, John Adams, and a midshipman named Edward Young. The midshipman had been well educated, and had learnt above all, in his childhood, the blessed lessons of God's love, and of the grace of Christ. These lessons, too long unremembered, now came back to him. Perhaps he thought of the days when, a young ...
— Famous Islands and Memorable Voyages • Anonymous
... several weeks, is long before this entirely out of your regard,—not so much by reason of the six months' disparity of age, as from the fact, communicated quite confidentially by the travelled Nat, that she has had a desperate flirtation with a handsome midshipman. The conclusion is natural that she is an inconstant, cruel-hearted creature, with little appreciation of real worth; and furthermore, that all midshipmen are a very contemptible—not to say dangerous—set of men. She is consigned ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell
... (1792-1848).—Novelist, s. of a West India merchant, was b. in London. In 1806 he entered the navy as a midshipman under Lord Cochrane (afterwards Earl of Dundonald), and saw much service in the Mediterranean, at Walcheren, and in the Burmese War of 1824. He returned in 1830 as a Captain and C.B. The scenes and experiences through which he had passed were the preparation for and the foundation ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... his father for the army, in which he received a captain's commission. But his own predilections were in favour of a seaman's life, and accordingly, after brief schooling, he joined the Hind, as a midshipman, in June, 1793, when he was ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald
... was too frightened to sound a note, and the voices of the aids, who shouted the message to the gun deck, were imperfectly heard; but, above all, leaders were wanting. There was not on the upper deck an officer above the grade of midshipman; captain, first lieutenant, master, marine officer, and even the boatswain, had been mortally wounded before the ships touched. The second lieutenant was in charge of the first gun division, at the far end of the deck below, as yet ignorant how the fight was ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... amongst us that the captain was trying his hand at the great Circle course, but none of us knew much about it down in that gloomy, 'tween-decks, slush-flavoured cavern in which we youngsters lived. I was fourteen years old, homeward bound on my first voyage; a little bit of a midshipman, burnt dry by Pacific suns, with a mortal hatred and terror of the wild, inexpressibly bitter cold of the roaring ice-loaded parallels in whose Antarctic twilight our noble ship was plunging and rolling now under a fragment of maintopsail, now under ...
— The Honour of the Flag • W. Clark Russell
... began. Kellet, having reached Winter Harbor, found the paper left there by MacClure; having heard in that way of his position in Mercy Bay, he sent Lieutenant Pim to meet the captain. He was followed by a detachment of the men of the Herald, among whom was a midshipman of a French ship, M. de Bray, who was a volunteer aid of Captain Kellet. You don't doubt ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... the very first he disliked Captain Reid. He was second lieutenant in the ship—the Orion—in which Frederick sailed the very first time. Poor little fellow, how well he looked in his midshipman's dress, with his dirk in his hand, cutting open all the newspapers with it as if it were a paper-knife! But this Mr. Reid, as he was then, seemed to take a dislike to Frederick from the very beginning. And then—stay! these are the letters he wrote on board the Russell. When he was ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... [7] The midshipman of this voyage was Peter Chaplin, whose journal was deposited in the Naval College of the Admiralty, St. Petersburg. Berg gives a summary of this journal. A translation by Dall is to be found in Appendix 19, Coast ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... afterward ascertained, produced a terrible slaughter among the enemy, while our loss was as yet trifling. I happened to be looking for a moment toward the main deck, when a large shot came through our ship's side and killed a midshipman. At this moment a shot from one of our marines killed the man at the wheel of the enemy's ship, and, his place not being immediately supplied, she was brought alongside of us in such a manner as to bring her bowsprit ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... sails and the ship. "If you keep her on her present course, she's all right, but if you try and bring her up any more she begins to shake. And, by the way, Penelope wants to be called at 4.30." Bowers' 'snotty,' who is Oates, probably makes some ribald remarks, such as no midshipman should to a full lieutenant, and they both disappear below. Campbell's snotty, myself, appears about five minutes afterwards trying to look as though some important duty and not bed had kept him from making an earlier appearance. Meanwhile the leading hand musters the ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... Atlantic Ocean. My father was a sea-captain; my grandfather was a sea-captain; my great-grandfather had been a marine. Nobody could tell positively what occupation his father had followed; but my dear mother used to assert that he had been a midshipman, whose grandfather, on the mother's side, had been an admiral in the royal navy. At anyrate we knew that, as far back as our family could be traced, it had been intimately connected with the great watery waste. Indeed ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... lowered, and in five minutes its oars were tossed at the packet's lee-gangway, when the commander of the corvette ascended the ship's side, followed by a middle-aged man in the dress of a civilian, and a chubby-faced midshipman. ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... two songs immediately following, forms part of a characteristic series from the pen of this roving soldier-actor. Parker was born in 1732 at Green Street, near Canterbury and was 'early admitted', he says, 'to walk the quarterdeck as a midshipman on board the Falmouth and the Guernsey'. A series of youthful indiscretions in London obliged him to leave the navy, and in or about 1754 to enlist as a common soldier in the 2Oth regiment of foot, the second battalion ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... the dignity of a European to be seen walking on foot in a Chinese town. Our business with the Consul-General finished, we started on our tour of inspection, the party consisting of the Flag-Captain, the Flag-Lieutenant, the interpreter and myself, together with a small midshipman, who, being anxious to see Canton, had somehow managed to get three days' leave and to smuggle himself on board the destroyer. The Consul-General warned us that the smells in the native city would be unspeakably ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton
... re-reads out of Marryat's very respectably lengthy list of stories. Yet it is not without gaiety, and, as is ever the case with him, the man-of-war scenes are all alive. Captain Plumpton, and Mr. Markital the first lieutenant, and Edward Templemore the midshipman, are credible. Whenever Marryat has to introduce us to a man-of-war, he could draw on inexhaustible treasure of reminiscences, or of what is for the story-writer's purpose quite as good, of types and incidents which his imagination had made out ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... maintain him in his own rank of life, and she fretted at the thought that Jack would settle down for life as a Leigh fisherman, and that Lily would probably in time become a fisherman's wife. When therefore Mrs. Godstone told her that her husband was ready to place Jack on board one of his ships as midshipman, and that he would take care he had every chance of making his way up, Mrs. Robson thankfully accepted ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... 1844. In 1856 it was decided that the prince, in accordance with his own wishes, should enter the navy, and a separate establishment was accordingly assigned to him, with Lieutenant Sowell, R. E., as governor. He passed a most creditable examination for midshipman in August 1858, and being appointed to the "Euryalus,'' at once began to work hard at the practical part of his profession. In July 1860, while on this ship, he paid an official visit to the Cape, and made a very favourable impression both on the colonials and on the native ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... list of the killed and wounded of the 'Mars,' you saw the name of Bligh, a midshipman. I remember rejoicing at the time, that it was not a name I knew. Will you be surprised that the object of this letter is to require your assistance in raising some little sum for ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... Wilmet's chief care, though of that she did not speak. She was not happy at heart about her two boys. Kester was a soldier in India, not actually unsteady, but not what her own brothers had been, and Edward was a midshipman, too much of the careless, wild sailor. Easy-going John Harewood's lax discipline had not been successful with them in early youth, and still less had later severity and ...
— The Long Vacation • Charlotte M. Yonge
... each in charge of a midshipman and a petty officer. Twenty men were told off for each boat. Our instructions were, as soon as night fell, to put off for shore, land at two different points a mile apart, and approach the fort from opposite sides. The Diana, meanwhile, was to slip her ...
— Kilgorman - A Story of Ireland in 1798 • Talbot Baines Reed
... of unsealing the conning tower was then proceeded with in the presence of Admiral de Saint Vilquier, whose prowess as a midshipman is still remembered by British Crimean veterans—and of the Mayor of Falaise, M. ...
— Studies in love and in terror • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... serve his country, but not too young according to the standards of mankind to be a midshipman on the great steel monster keeping the leaden deep. It was the first time he had ever been away from home on Christmas day, too. The youngsters had all laughed and joked about it in the steerage ...
— And Thus He Came • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... nipping that idea in the bud, and keeping the power in their own hands. He then sent for the first lieutenant (Drayton), and inquired if there were among the officers on board any who had ever been in the Upper Bay, and learning that there was a midshipman (Whittaker) he was sent for. It so happened that this midshipman had been on a frolic on shore a few nights before, and was accordingly much frightened when summoned into the commodore's presence, but as soon as he was questioned as to his knowledge of the bay, he was sensibly relieved, ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... Sir William, that impudence had got such deep root in Wales. I send you the letter, as a curiosity; and to have the impudence to recommend a midshipman! ...
— The Letters of Lord Nelson to Lady Hamilton, Vol. I. - With A Supplement Of Interesting Letters By Distinguished Characters • Horatio Nelson
... routine, the slavery of civilisation, [166] man feels once more happy. The blood flows with the fast circulation of youth, excitement gives a new vigour to the muscles and a sense of sudden freedom adds an inch to the stature." Among the crew was a midshipman, C. R. Low, who became a life-long friend of Burton. Says Mr. Low, "We used to have bouts of single-stick in the pleasant evening sin the poop, and many's the time he has blacked my arms and legs with his weapons.... Though a dangerous enemy, he ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... made for battle. The commodore's journal shows how anxiously he and all on board were looking out for their expected prize. At last, just a month after the arrival of the Centurion at her station, a sail was discovered at sunrise in the south-east quarter, by a midshipman, Mr Charles Proby. The commodore had taken every means in his power to secure the victory. He had placed about thirty of his choicest marksmen in the tops, and as he had not hands enough remaining to quarter a sufficient number to each great gun in the usual manner, he placed on ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... Lieutenant of the Royal Navy and Commander. John Richardson, M.D., Surgeon of the Royal Navy. Mr. George Back, of the Royal Navy, Admiralty Midshipman. Mr. Robert Hood, of the Royal Navy, Admiralty Midshipman. Mr. Frederick Wentzel, Clerk to the North-West ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 1 • John Franklin
... blue-jackets rushed up from below that the French gave up the attempt. The musketry fire was still very hot from one ship to another; and the French snipers were as bad as ever. But those in the mizzentop from which Nelson was hit were all sniped by his signal midshipman, young Jack Pollard, who, being a dead shot, picked off the Frenchmen one by one as they leaned over to take aim. In this way Pollard must have hit ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... impossible, as they say on board of a man-of-war. It's not impossible to get an apology out of a midshipman, but it's the next thing ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... for a ship again directly, and go up to London with a letter to the Admiralty from the Commodore, to help things on. After a month or two I was appointed to a brig, lying at Spithead; and so I wrote off to the Commodore and he got his boy a midshipman's berth on board, and brought him to Portsmouth himself a day or two before we sailed for the Mediterranean. The old gentleman came on board to see the boy's hammock slung, and went below into the cockpit to make sure that all was right. He only left us ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... bad lot," he said to the young midshipman sitting by his side. "This pretty nearly makes up our complement; the press gang are sure to pick up the few hands we ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty
... London, and gave the name of the hostelry at which, many years ago, he had alighted from a West Country coach with his box and midshipman's kit . . . . A moment later he found himself wondering if it still existed as a house of entertainment. Well, he must ...
— News from the Duchy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... discovery come forward the moment that the death of any fresh victim to this pestilential country is announced. To the list of those who have already fallen, may be added young Park, the son of the late enterprising Mungo Park, and a midshipman of his majesty's ship Sybille. He went out in this ship with a full determination to proceed on foot, and alone, from the coast to the spot where his father perished, in the hope of hearing some ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 334 Saturday, October 4, 1828 • Various
... at the University of Pennsylvania. He afterward became clerk of the Supreme Court of Delaware for his native county. When about twenty-nine years old he entered the navy, and made his first cruises under Commodore Barry. He was a midshipman on board the frigate United States, when she bore to France Chief Justice Ellsworth and General Davie, as envoys extraordinary to the French Republic. He was next appointed to the Ganges as midshipman. ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 8 - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 19, 1850 • Various
... sole subject of dispute. The colonel, as is well known, a very elegant and generous young man, fell; and Captain Macnamara had thenceforwards a worm at his heart whose gnawings never died. He was a post-captain; and my brother afterwards sailed with him in quality of midshipman. From him I have often heard affecting instances of the degree in which the pangs of remorse had availed, to make one of the bravest men in the service a mere panic-haunted, and, in a moral sense, almost a paralytic ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... for years been employed on coast guard service. Charlie agreed that, although he should have liked of all things to go to sea, it was useless to think of it now, for he was past the age at which he could have entered as a midshipman. ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... shore, while two smaller villages, in the immediate vicinity, are concealed by the woods. The bar at this place has a bad reputation; several boats having been swamped in passing it. In 1836, ten persons, including a midshipman and purser's clerk, were drowned here, by the capsizing of a boat ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... same moment a fussy little steam pinnace—which had been keeping itself snugly out of harm's way since the first French cruiser had gone down—puffed busily out of the harbour, and the proudest midshipman in the British Navy—for the time being, at least—ran from transport to transport, crowded with furious and despairing Frenchmen, and told them, individually and collectively, the course to steer if they wanted to get safely into Folkestone ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... Tancock, who was then a midshipman stationed on the main-deck, says that the men had directions to fire at the rudder of their opponent, which was very soon disabled, while the main-topsail-yard and fore-yard were both shot away. The enemy fired so high that ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez, Vol. I • Sir John Ross
... fit out an expedition, under charge of Past Midshipman Woodworth, who had tendered his services for the purpose, he to act under instructions of the Military Governor and cooeperate with the ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... miles distant, which he reached just as a steamboat was passing. Waving his handkerchief, as a signal, the boat rounded to, and touching at the rude pier, took him on board. He arrived in New York that evening, and on the next morning started for Washington to see after his application for a midshipman's appointment in the navy. It was on this occasion that the young man became aware of the secret influence of his father against the application which had been made. His mind, already feverishly excited, lost its balance under this ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... this exorcised my devil, and he has rarely come to trouble me since. Some future day, perhaps, I may be able to call Faraday's attention more decidedly. Pergo modo! "wie das Gestirn, ohne Hast, ohne Rast" (Das Gestirn in a midshipman's berth!). ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... worst landlubbers I've ever seen," declared Cadet Midshipman Merriam, with severe dignity. "Rest, before ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies • Victor G. Durham
... a few minutes, and were near the skirt of the wood, when two spears were launched from a rising ground; one of which struck the hat of one of the seamen; and as no fire-arms had appeared, the natives showed themselves, to the number of between twenty and thirty; the midshipman and the sailors returned to the boat, and brought up a musquet loaded with ball, which the natives observing, all disappeared, except two, and the ball was fired at them; whether with or without effect we knew not, ...
— An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island • John Hunter
... fatal shot had been fired from The Redoutable that ship was captured, the man who killed Nelson having himself been shot by a midshipman on board ...
— Beneath the Banner • F. J. Cross
... provided; and an increase in the officers should be provided by making a large addition to the classes at Annapolis. There is one small matter which should be mentioned in connection with Annapolis. The pretentious and unmeaning title of "naval cadet" should be abolished; the title of "midshipman," full of historic association, should ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Supplemental Volume: Theodore Roosevelt, Supplement • Theodore Roosevelt
... we sent out our large cutter, manned with seven seamen, under the command of Mr. John Rowe, the first mate, accompanied by Mr. Woodhouse, midshipman, and James Tobias Swilley, the carpenter's servant. They were to proceed up the Sound to Grass Cove to gather greens and celery for the ship's company, with orders to return that evening; for the tents had been struck at two in the afternoon, and the ship made ready for sailing the ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle
... from Sydney, discovered that Australia and Van Diemen's Land were separate; the dividing straits between were then named after Bass. In 1802, during his second voyage in the Investigator, a vessel about the size of a modern ship's launch, Flinders had with him as a midshipman John Franklin, afterwards the celebrated Arctic navigator. On his return to England, Flinders, touching at the Isle of France, was made prisoner by the French governor and detained for nearly seven years, during which time a French navigator Nicolas Baudin, with whom came Perron and Lacepede ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... A midshipman, standing by the side of the officer of the watch, had been keeping the submarine under observation ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... you aware that the 147th section of the Merchant Shipping Act provides, that 'if any unauthorized person engages or supplies any mate, seaman, midshipman, or apprentice, to be entered on board any ship in the United Kingdom, he will be liable to be prosecuted; and if convicted, to a penalty of 20 for each offence?' I was not ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... East Tennessee, went into the United States Navy at the early age of eleven. He was the youngest midshipman in the service. "Before I had reached the age of sixteen," he says, "I prided myself on my profanity, and could drink with ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... the men, who were taken to the ships immediately and put under drill. Surgeon Usher of the Lawrence and a young midshipman rowed me to Gibraltar Island, well out in the harbor, where the surgeon presented me to Perry—a tall, shapely man, with dark hair and eyes, and ears hidden by heavy tufts of beard. He stood on a rocky point high above the water, a glass to his eye, looking seaward. His youth ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller
... the roof to come down. The sixth and fifth know that "brave Broke" of the Shannon was no sort of relation to our old Brooke. The fourth form are uncertain in their belief, but for the most part hold that old Brooke was a midshipman then on board his uncle's ship. And the lower school never doubt for a moment that it was our old Brooke who led the boarders, in what capacity they care not a straw. During the pauses the bottled-beer ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... Revenue work were not always as active as they might be. In one of his novels (The Three Cutters) Captain Marryat gives the reader a very plain hint that there was a good deal of slackness prevalent in this section of the service. Referring to the midshipman of the Revenue cutter Active, the author speaks of him as a lazy fellow, too inert even to mend his jacket which was out at elbows, and adds, "He has been turned out of half the ships in the service for laziness; but he was born so, and therefore it ...
— King's Cutters and Smugglers 1700-1855 • E. Keble Chatterton
... acquaintance with Philip Nolan began six or eight years after the English war, on my first voyage after I was appointed a midshipman. It was in the first days after our Slave-Trade treaty, while the Reigning House, which was still the House of Virginia, had still a sort of sentimentalism about the suppression of the horrors of the Middle ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... can you object without turning the sword of Liberty against herself? Have you never heard tell, by the way, of Captain Byng's midshipman?" ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... be their only chance; and the impetuous Terence had already unsheathed his midshipman's dirk, with the design of burying it in the ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid
... country. They have travelled, and have seen a good many other countries and peoples. From Osborne and Britannia days sincerity seems to have been inculcated into them. The discipline is inflexible, but kindly. The captain of a "Dreadnought" will take pains to ask a young midshipman to dine with him, and there exists a wonderful thoughtfulness on the part of the officers for the men. British naval officers are lovers of sports, and, having believed the Germans good sports before August, 1914, they cannot condone attacks on non-belligerents ...
— Some Naval Yarns • Mordaunt Hall
... and full of men. In the contest Lieut. Carruthers, the commanding officer, was once wounded by a ball in the loins; but after girding a handkerchief round his waist, he still kept the deck, till a ball entering his forehead, he fell. Mr. Salter, the midshipman on whom the command devolved, continued the fight with determined bravery, and after a stout resistance, beat them off, chased them some distance out to sea, and subsequently regained the anchorage ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... accordingly remained with her cousin, while Miss Agnes went down to meet Mrs. George Wyllys. This lady was still living at Longbridge, although every few months she talked of leaving the place. Her oldest boy had just received a midshipman's warrant, to which he was certainly justly entitled—his father having lost his life in the public service. The rest of her children were at home; and rather spoilt and troublesome ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... from the United States at large; and fifteen enlisted men of the navy are appointed each year on competitive examination. The academy is under the charge of a superintendent, appointed by the secretary of the navy. Each midshipman receives from the government an annual sum of money sufficient to pay all necessary expenses ...
— Elements of Civil Government • Alexander L. Peterman
... "exclusive set," not only on account of his athletic figure and handsome face, but for his winning manners and ability to dance, though but a boy, was Isaac Brock. Isaac—a distant descendant of bold Sir Hugh—was the eighth son of John Brock, formerly a midshipman in the Royal Navy, a man of much talent and, like his son, of great activity. Brock, the father, did not enjoy the fruit of his industry long, for in 1777, in his 49th year, he died in Brittany, leaving a family of fourteen children. Of ten sons, Isaac, destined to become "the hero and defender ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey
... ladies, of whom one was a dowager countess, but there were also a bishop and a midshipman. The last had a bad cold and kept on blowing his nose during the performance of the soprano, a lady of strange appearance, said to be a Serbian ...
— War-time Silhouettes • Stephen Hudson
... in skipper-like state, all alone with his nephew, Walter; a boy of fourteen, who looked quite enough like a midshipman to ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... the consequences, and resolved to try and play off the French for their clever finesse. He looked about for a match for the redoubtable French gamester, and soon got information of a party who might serve his turn. This was a midshipman at Moscow, named Cruckoff, who, he was assured, was without an equal in the MANAGEMENT of cards, and the knowledge of Quizze—then the fashionable court game—and that at which the Duke of Biran had lost his money. The chancellor immediately ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... be assigned, in the order of their numbers, to the Lieutenants or other Watch Officers, according to their rank, assigning the first division to the officer next in rank to the Executive Officer. In case of a deficiency of Watch Officers, the quarter-deck division may be assigned to an Ensign or Midshipman, who will act under the general supervision of the Executive Officer. When the number of officers on board of vessels having pivot-guns will permit, each pivot-gun will be placed under the special charge of a suitable officer ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN
... Marryat was an East Anglian, and have we not a right to be proud of Marryat's breezy stories of the sea? Our youth has found such plentiful stimulus in Peter Simple, Frank Mildmay, and Mr. Midshipman Easy; generations of boys have read them with delight, generations of boys will read them. And not only boys, but men. One recalls that Carlyle, in one of his deepest fits of depression, took refuge in Marryat's novels with infinite advantage ...
— Immortal Memories • Clement Shorter
... vacation days of our young sailor, whose training before-the-mast enabled his father to obtain for him a midshipman's commission in the United States Navy, for which James Cooper reported for duty at New York City, January 12, 1808. At the age of nineteen he first served aboard the Vesuvius. Thence he was ordered to Oswego, New York, to build the brig Oneida for ...
— James Fenimore Cooper • Mary E. Phillips
... {91}[104] ["A midshipman was appointed to guard the spirit-room, to repress that unhappy desire of a devoted crew to die in a state of intoxication. The sailors, though in other respects orderly in conduct, here pressed eagerly ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... unsuccessful attempt was made by one of the crew of the California to effect an exchange with one of our number. It was a lad, between fifteen and sixteen years of age, who went by the name of the "reefer," having been a midshipman in an East India Company's ship. His singular character and story had excited our interest ever since the ship came into the port. He was a delicate, slender little fellow, with a beautiful pearly complexion, regular ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... Admiral is usually he who has been sent from College the greatest number of times; the Vice-Admiral is the poorest scholar in the class; the Rear-Admiral the laziest fellow in the class; the Commodore, one addicted to boating; the Captain, a jolly blade; the Lieutenant and Midshipman, fellows of the same description; the Chaplain, the most profane; the Surgeon, a dabbler in surgery, or in medicine, or anything else; the Ensign, the tallest member of the class; the Boatswain, one most inclined to obscenity; the Drum Major, the most aristocratic, and his assistants, fellows of ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... and cut the noose asunder. Nichols did not thank him, nor notice him, nor speak: but, looking round at the other ships, in which there was the like insubordination, he went toward his cabin slow and silent. Finding it locked, he called to a midshipman: 'Tell that man with a knife to come down and open the door.' After a pause of a few minutes, it was done: but he was confined below until ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... cutlass in his fist, without waiting to see if his comrades were with him, and dropped to the forecastle of the Frolic. Lieutenant Biddle tried it by jumping on the bulwark and climbing to the other ship as they crashed together on the next heave of the sea, but a doughty midshipman, seeking a handy purchase, grabbed him by the coat tails and they fell back upon their own deck. Another attempt and Biddle joined Jack Lang by way of the bowsprit. These two thus captured the Frolic, for as they dashed aft the only living men on deck were the undaunted sailor at ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... Essex as she swung slowly out to sea, stood Captain Porter, and by his side stood the proudest boy in all America that day, David Farragut, a little midshipman in a shining uniform which boasted more brass buttons than the years of its wearer's life—for David was only ten years old, and this is how he came to be in such an important position on that ...
— Ten Boys from History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... boy goes to sea. At some point in his career he decides to give up his Irish name, and takes an English one, Denham. Several incidents in which he distinguishes himself occur, and he is given the chance of becoming a midshipman, from which rank he duly rises by examination to Lieutenant. Meanwhile the Earl has obtained a position in the West Indies of Lieutenant-Governor of one of the islands, since he had been finding it hard to make ends meet from the revenues of ...
— The Heir of Kilfinnan - A Tale of the Shore and Ocean • W.H.G. Kingston
... either engaged in plunder, or in rescuing some of those unfortunate individuals who hazarded themselves on pieces of wreck, to gain the land. Those on board baled and pumped without intermission; the cadets and passengers struggling with the rest. A midshipman was appointed to guard the spirit room. Some of the more disorderly sailors pressed upon him. "Give us some grog," they cried, "it will be all one an hour hence." "I know we must die," replied he, coolly, "but let us die like men;" and ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park
... army when young, but retired after having served some time in the Mediterranean. Frank was born on the 14th of February 1794, and was placed in the navy when about eleven years old. Hardly six months after he became a midshipman, he was present at the battle of Trafalgar on board the Neptune. An explosion of powder between the decks of the Neptune during the action, by which several men were killed and wounded, early directed his attention to the service of artillery on board ship; and the science ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... for us, an English sloop of war, the Hawk, was cruising in those parts, and had signalled the captain to bring to; but the signal not being promptly answered, a gun was fired from the sloop and a midshipman sent on board our vessel. He was a polite young man, and gave me hopes that the lancha, which was laden with cacao, would be given up, and that on the following day we might pursue our voyage. In the meantime he invited me to accompany him on board the sloop, assuring me that ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V3 • Alexander von Humboldt
... be gratified. In a short time after, George being then about fourteen years of age, a British man-of-war moved up the Potomac, and cast anchor in full view of Mount Vernon. On board of this vessel his brother Lawrence procured him a midshipman's warrant, after having by much persuasion gained the consent of his mother; which, however, she yielded with much reluctance, and many misgivings with respect to the profession her son was about to choose. ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... with John Byron to destroy the Louisburg fortifications. At the peace in 1763 Barrington had been almost continuously afloat for twenty-two years. He was next appointed in 1768 to the frigate "Venus" as governor to the duke of Cumberland, who remained with him in all ranks from midshipman to rear-admiral. In 1778 the duke's flag-captain became rear-admiral and went to the West Indies, while in conjunction with the army he took the island of Santa Lucia from the French, and repulsed the attempt of the Comte d'Estaing to retake it. Superseded after a time by Byron, he ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... I am not, my dear mother? Do you imagine that I would remain here when you were there, and my presence would be useful? No—no—I love the service, it is true, but I know my duty, which is, to assist my father and mother: in fact, I prefer it; a midshipman's ideas of independence are very great; and I had rather range the wilds of America free and independent, than remain in the service, and have to touch my hat to every junior lieutenant, perhaps ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... 'casualities' to 'casualties' 'Midshipmen's hitch' to 'Midshipman's hitch' Illustration for Timber Hitch is Fig. 38, not Fig. 32 ...
— Knots, Splices and Rope Work • A. Hyatt Verrill
... in a minister's study at Albany. At thirteen he entered Yale; but he was a self-willed lad and was presently dismissed from college. A little later, after receiving some scant nautical training on a merchantman, he entered the navy as midshipman; but after a brief experience in the service he married and resigned his commission. That was in 1811, and the date is significant. It was just before the second war with Great Britain. The author who wrote so much and so vividly of battles, Indian ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... the marines on board, who had talked a good deal to them upon the preceding day, came up to them. "I thought that you would be in a fix about clothes, my lads," he said. "You could not very well join in these midshipman's uniforms, so I set the tailor yesterday to cut down a couple of spare suits of my corps. The buttons will not be right, but you can easily alter that when you join. You had better go below at once and see if the things fit pretty well. I have told the tailor to take them to ...
— The Young Buglers • G.A. Henty
... that it was a buoy loose, and another that it was a black diver, and wanted to fire at it, which would not have been pleasant for the mayor: but just then such a yell came out of a great hole in the middle of it that the midshipman in charge guessed what it was, and bade pull up to it as fast as they could. So somehow or other the Jack-tars got the lobster out, and set the mayor free, and put him ashore at the Barbican. He never went lobster-catching again; and we will hope he put no more salt in the tobacco, ...
— The Water-Babies - A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby • Charles Kingsley
... me for having taken you for a Spaniard," the lieutenant said in surprise, as he handed the letter Terence held out to the midshipman, with a request to deliver it to the captain. "Your disguise is certainly excellent and, if you speak Spanish as well as you look the part, I can quite understand your getting safely ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... Accordingly in the fall of 1806 he sailed on a merchant ship, the Sterling, and for the next eleven months saw hard service before the mast. Soon after this apprenticeship he received a commission as a midshipman in the United States navy. Although it was a time of peace, and he saw no actual fighting, he gained considerable knowledge from his service on Lake Ontario and Lake Champlain that he put to good use later. Shortly before his resignation in May, 1811, he had married, ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... Midshipman C. Lyon re-examined and if not clearly inconsistent I shall be much obliged to ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... had cast anchor, says he, in the spot designated to us, I landed with midshipman Moor, the steersman, Chleb Nikow, four sailors, and Alexis, a native of the Kuriles, who acted as interpreter. So deceived were we by the apparent friendliness of the Japanese, that we took no arms with us, except our swords. In ...
— Hair Breadth Escapes - Perilous incidents in the lives of sailors and travelers - in Japan, Cuba, East Indies, etc., etc. • T. S. Arthur
... British frigate of forty guns, commanded by captain Hamilton, a gallant youth, who, notwithstanding the inequality of force, engaged her without hesitation; but in the heat of the action, his ship being set on fire by accident, was blown up, and-he perished with all his crew, except a midshipman and ten or eleven sailors, who were taken up alive by a privateer that happened to be in sight. Favourable as this accident may seem to the Glorioso, she did not escape. An English ship of eighty guns, under the command of captain Buckle, came up and obliged ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... happen with Lieutenant Commander Charles Augustus Chase in command! He was three classes up on me, but even though he was a First Classman at the time I crawled out of Beast Barracks, I knew him well. Every Midshipman in the Academy knew him—Rule-Book Charley—By-The-Numbers Chase—his nicknames were legion and not one of them was friendly. "Lieutenant Thomas Marsden reporting for ...
— A Question of Courage • Jesse Franklin Bone
... all as attaching infinitely greater consequence—(exactly as had been the case with him in the days of the Cowgate Port and the kittle nine steps)—to feats of personal agility and prowess. William Clerk's brother, James, a midshipman in the navy, happened to come home from a cruise in the Mediterranean shortly after this acquaintance began, and Scott and the sailor became almost at sight "sworn brothers." In order to complete his time under the late Sir ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... British parliament determined to set at rest for ever the myth of a passage, Cook was chosen to conduct the expedition. He was granted two ships—the Resolution and the Discovery; and among the crews was a young midshipman named Vancouver. The vessels left England in the summer of 1776, and sailed from the Sandwich Islands in 1778 for Drake's New Albion. The orders were to proceed from New Albion up to 65 deg. north latitude and search for a passage ...
— Pioneers of the Pacific Coast - A Chronicle of Sea Rovers and Fur Hunters • Agnes C. Laut
... served his time as a midshipman on board his father's flag-ship, but had left the navy and accepted a commission in the Buenos-Ayrean service during the political struggles in that province; he had commanded a sort of privateer under the government, to ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... was not so well-favored as her sister, she was more amiable and pleasant. She could sing sweetly in Yiddish and in English, and had once been a pantomime fairy at ten shillings a week, and had even flourished a cutlass as a midshipman. But she had long since given up the stage, to become her father's right hand woman in the workshop. She made coats from morning till midnight at a big machine with a massive treadle, and had pains in her chest even before she fell in ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... known to us all by the household name of Pink, who in his after years tilted up and down what might then be called his Britannic majesty's oceans (viz., the Atlantic and Pacific) in the quality of midshipman, until Waterloo in one day put an extinguisher on that whole generation of midshipmen, by extinguishing all further call for their services; 7. a second Jane; 8. Henry, a posthumous child, who ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... 11 o'clock, 13 February, 1778. "DEAREST OF FRIENDS, "I had not been twenty minutes in this house, before I had the happiness to see Captain Tucker and a midshipman coming for me. We will be soon on board, and may God prosper our voyage in every stage of it as much as at the beginning, and send to you, my dear children, and all my friends, the ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... young hero of this tale is Dick Delamere, who was already a midshipman, on leave, but who receives a letter from the Captain of the Europa, recalling him to join the ship at Portsmouth. The date of the events that ensue is ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... There's no pleasure in being slow and sluggish about doing a thing, and a great waste of time. Mr Merton soon attracted the notice of the officers, and they used to address him very differently to the way they spoke to the other men. There was in the top with us a young midshipman: he was a fine little lad—full of life, and fun, and daring. He was the son or heir of some great lord or other, and a relation of the captain's, who had promised especially to look after him. Well, one day the ship was running before the wind with studden sails set alow and aloft and every ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... worth of his mother than to his own. As was natural to so adventurous a spirit, George early manifested a predilection for the sea, and his elder brother encouraged him in thinking he might attain distinction as a gallant mariner. A midshipman's berth was procured for him, at the age of fifteen, on board of one of his majesty's ships, then off the coast of Virginia; and it seemed as if the ardent desire of his boyhood was about to be realized. But when all was ready, his mother gave expression to her disapproval ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster
... masquerades. Clive was greatly diverted at beholding Mr. Moss at one of these entertainments, dressed in a scarlet coat and top-boots, and calling out, "Yoicks! Hark forward!" fitfully to another Orientalist, his younger brother, attired like a midshipman. Once Clive bought a half-dozen of theatre tickets from Mr. Moss, which he distributed to the young fellows of the studio. But, when this nice young man tried further to tempt him on the next day, "Mr. Moss," Clive said to him with much dignity, ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Fox following me in full uniform, and with a young midshipman attending him. He came up to me, and, after a few ordinary ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... apple, {25d} containing a pulp which (as those who remember the delectable pages of Tom Cringle know) bears a startling likeness to brains. Bunches of grapes, at St. Kitts, lay among these: and at St. Lucia we saw with them, for the first time, Avocado, or Alligator pears, alias midshipman's butter; {26a} large round brown fruits, to be eaten with pepper and salt by those who list. With these, in open baskets, lay bright scarlet capsicums, green coconuts tinged with orange, great roots of yam {26b} and ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... the nature of the case allowed. It was so no longer. Two of the ships remained at Spithead; the rest had gone to St. Helen's. On May 7 all the crews again mutinied and most of the officers were sent ashore. A struggle took place on board the London; a mutineer was shot dead, and a midshipman and a marine officer were wounded. Pitt proposed a grant for the increase of pay on the 8th, and, as discussion might be mischievous, asked for a silent vote. To their shame, Fox and his friends used this crisis as an opportunity for a violent party ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... son. The poor lad thinks the same, I am sure, and he is half broken-hearted about it." We reached the beach soon after, where a couple of Jacks were in charge of the boat, and soon after we were pulled alongside of the lugger, to find that the men left on board, in charge of a midshipman of about my own age, had been busy repairing damages, fishing, as they called it, the broken spar, while the lugger's crew sat forward smoking and looking on, in company with their skipper, who rose ...
— Devon Boys - A Tale of the North Shore • George Manville Fenn
... his head, and grasping his dirk in his hand, he tottered to a rock, when, seating himself, he philosophically rocked to and fro. "Oh! vy vos I a midshipman," cried he, "to be wrecked on this desolate island? I vish I vos at home at Bloomsbury! Oh! that I had but to turn and embrace my kind, good, benevolent, and much respected grandmother." As he uttered this ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... did under the most advantageous circumstances, as "midshipman-apprentice" on board an Australian clipper belonging to the "Bruce" line, in which employ he was duly serving his time—very creditably, indeed, to himself and to the officers who had the training of him, if the report of the skipper, Captain ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... scowled and snorted. The girls looked sympathetic: more than one midshipman had found ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... salt-water twice or thrice the density of sea-water, and nearly dry, containing sea-shells in the same relative proportions as on the adjoining coast, it almost passes my belief. Could there have been a lively midshipman on board, who in the morning stocked the pool from the ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... lieutenant,—"there—shake the wind out of her sails for a moment, until the men get the canvas in"——whirl, a poor fellow pitched off the lee foreyardarm into the sea. "Up with the helm—heave him the bight of a rope." We kept away, but all was confusion, until an American midshipman, one of the prisoners on board, hove the bight of a rope at him. The man got it under his arms, and after hauling him along for a hundred yards at the least—and one may judge of the velocity with which he was dragged through the water, by the fact that it took the united strain of ten powerful ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... (o.s.). He belonged to a very ancient family of Morayshire, and was the second son of Sir Thomas Calder of Muirton. He was educated at the grammar school of Elgin, and at the age of fourteen entered the British navy as midshipman. In 1766 he was serving as lieutenant of the "Essex," under Captain the Hon. George Faulkner, in the West Indies. Promotion came slowly, and it was not till 1782 that he attained the rank of post-captain. He acquitted himself honourably in ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various |
