"Steersman" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... each well-known faithful head With liberal hand his poppies shed; Each head, by Dulness render'd fit Sleep and his empire to admit. Through the whole passage not a word, Not one faint, weak half-sound was heard; Sleep had prevail'd to overwhelm The steersman nodding o'er the helm; The rowers, without force or skill, Left the dull barge to drive at will; 1030 The sluggish oars suspended hung, And even Beardmore held his tongue. Commerce, regardful of a freight On which depended half her state, Stepp'd to ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... of the Coromantee, the Catamaran was fast coming round towards the wind,—and so shortening the distance between the swimmer and the craft,—when an object came under the eye of her steersman that caused him to drop the oar as if either his arm had become suddenly paralysed, or the piece of rounded ash grasped between his hands had become transformed into ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... the lugger; no one spoke, except when the steersman was relieved, or when the master wished something done among the rigging. The men settled down on the weather side with their pipes and quids, and all through the short summer night we lay there, huddled half asleep together, running to the south like ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... life, Mahomed!" I yelled. He was a skilful steersman, and well acquainted with the dangers of this most perilous coast, and I saw him grip the tiller, bend his heavy frame forward, and stare at the foaming terror till his big round eyes looked as though they would start out of his head. ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... that a fearful storm was raging, but we did not see the white boat flying like a bird over the seven great rollers, or there would have been no sleep for us that night. The crew never forgot it, nor the calm pluck of their steersman the Bishop. I must confess that an attack of fever was the result of all this exertion when he joined ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... stretcher, it must have gone through the bottom. There was a standing order that no man was to go into it with shoes on. She was to pull six oars, and her crew were the captains of the tops, the primest seamen in the ship, and the steersman, no less a character ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... of the boat, is firmly tied; the other end is fastened to the bottom of the boat. Thus prepared they row in profound silence, leaving the whole conduct of the enterprise to the harpooner and to the steersman, attentively following their directions. When the former judges himself to be near enough to the whale, that is, at the distance of about fifteen feet, he bids them stop; perhaps she has a calf, whose safety attracts all the attention of the ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... 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 order to destroy any distrust they might feel towards ...
— Hair Breadth Escapes - Perilous incidents in the lives of sailors and travelers - in Japan, Cuba, East Indies, etc., etc. • T. S. Arthur
... way. The captain was on duty on the bridge, with the steersman at the wheel. It was thickish weather then, much thicker than it is now—in fact, there'll soon be no breeze left, and look at the stars! Suddenly the lookout man shouted that there was a sail on the weather bow, ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett
... there instead of to Dungally, which was a lucky escape to them for that time.—Whilst residing at Sawyah the old priest carried Captain Woodward to an island in the bay of Sawyah, which he granted to him, and in compliment called it Steersman's Island, steersman being the appellation by which Captain Woodward was distinguished by the natives. After staying some time in Sawyah and making sago, which they bartered for fish and cocoa-nuts, they left the place and proceeded ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... up in her when the first canoe came under her hand. It was quite easy to manipulate the painter-rope. The stem had a notched knob provided for this very purpose, and there was a stern-post against which a steersman might press a paddle and thus swerve the canoe in any direction. But it was slow work. The craft were moored without any semblance of order, yet Suarez was forced to secure them in a definite sequence, or a string of ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... minutes later Lavinia saw his trim brown launch, with its awning and steersman in gleaming white, rushing ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... vain, endeavoured, by hoisting the sails, and by practising all possible manoeuvres, to preserve the ship from impending destruction; but all was of no avail, we were hard on a lee shore, to which the howling tempest was impelling us. About this time I was standing near the helm, and I asked the steersman if there was any hope of saving the vessel, or our lives. He replied, "Sir, it is a bad affair, no boat could live for a minute in this sea, and in less than an hour the ship will have her broadside on Finisterre, ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... vigorously after a while during which he had come to have confidence in the new steersman's knowledge and had been intrigued into conversation. "Don't I know? Black folks knows sooner'n white folks about ha'nts, Cap'n. Ain't I heered all the happenin's dat's done been an' gone an' transcribed on dis here deck? Ain't I seen nothin'? Ain't ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... danger from the fire, for, although smoke was oozing out by the binnacle, it would be a good while before this part could be ablaze. There was no one by the wheel. The perfect calm that had continued since near morning rendered a steersman superfluous, and the wheel stood idle and neglected. The compass was gone. It was it I had observed in the bottom of ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... the hatch joints. Each boat had three compartments, the middle one being about four feet long, about one-fifth the length of the boat, which was twenty-two feet over the top. Two places were left for the rowers, before and abaft the middle compartment, while the steersman with his long oar thrust behind was to sit on the deck of the after-cabin, all the decks being flush with the gunwale, except that of the forward cabin the deck of which was carried back in a straighter line than the sheer of the boat ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... the fire of the enemy was silenced. No other casualties occurred on board of the steamer, but many of the crew narrowly escaped harm, particularly those who were near the wheel house. The sailing master and the steersman had their clothes pierced by bullets, and the sides and decks of the steamer were similarly marked in many places. The river, becoming still narrower and more crooked above Gainesville, it was found entirely impossible to force the ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... critical emergency, when the implacable foe was in full force before her very gates, Charles of Anjou invaded the liberties which he had been called to protect. In the midst of the tempest, too, the assassin's hand tore the steersman from the helm, and with William of Orange the career of the infant republic was seemingly at an end, and all her guardian angels fled. But the ship continued to scud along before the storm, and the swelling canvas carried her ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various
... was soon launched in safety, but the Paul Pry, Mr. Walker's boat, was not so fortunate; the water in the bay deepened rapidly from the steepness of the bank, and the steersman, who was keeping her bow on whilst the crew were launching, got frightened from the depth of water and the violence of the surf, and let go his hold; when the next surf threw the boat broadside on to the sea and, there being nearly half ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey
... yo ee.—Whee yo ee." The steersman gave "Whee," and was followed by the other men with a repetition of "Whee ...
— Account of a Voyage of Discovery - to the West Coast of Corea, and the Great Loo-Choo Island • Captain Basil Hall
... choice voluntary full offerings to the Lord, like Abel son of Adam. A man with zealous entreaties to God, like Enoch son of Jared. A steersman full-sufficient for the ark of the Church among the waves of the world, like Noah son of Lamech. A true pilgrim with strength of faith and belief, like Abraham son of Terah. A man loving, gentle, forgiving of heart, like Moses ...
— The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran - Translations Of Christian Literature. Series V. Lives Of - The Celtic Saints • Anonymous
... miles off Point Venus the night before last, at eleven o'clock, we hoped for a bit of wind to reach port by morning. It was calm, and we were all asleep but the man at the wheel, when a waterspout came right out of the clear sky,—so the steersman said,—and struck us hard. We were swamped in a minute. The water fell on us like your Niagara. Christ! We gave up for gone, all of us, the other five all kanakas. We heeled over until the deck was under water,—of course we've got no freeboard ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... which women may rightly claim for their own. He really loved Etta. He was trying to gauge the meaning of a little change in her tone toward him—a change so subtle that few men could have detected it. But Claude de Chauxville —accomplished steersman through the shoals of human nature, especially through those very pronounced shoals who call themselves women of the world—Claude de Chauxville knew the value of the slightest change of manner, should that change manifest itself more ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman
... thin slats of wood and cement-covered canvas. Colonel Rondon, Fiala with his camera, and I went in this canoe, together with two paddlers. The paddlers were natives of the poorer class. They were good men. The bowsman was of nearly pure white blood; the steersman was of nearly pure negro blood, and was evidently the stronger character and better man of the two. The other canoes carried a couple of fazendeiros, ranchmen, who had come up from Caceres with their dogs. These dugouts were manned by Indian and half-caste paddlers, and the fazendeiros, ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... hope of safety; so they used to send out the ship with a black sail, as if it were going to a certain doom; but now Theseus so encouraged his father, and boasted that he would overcome the Minotaur, that he gave a second sail, a white one, to the steersman, and charged him on his return, if Theseus were safe, to hoist the white one, if not, the black one as a sign of mourning. But Simonides says that it was not a white sail which was given by AEgeus, but "a scarlet sail embrued in holm oak's juice," and that this was agreed ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... short voyage he entered into some conversation with the steersman, who was also owner of the boat, a jolly old man, who had occasionally been engaged in the smuggling trade, like most fishers on the coast. After talking about objects of less interest, Brown endeavoured to turn the discourse toward the Mannering family. The ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... out of his mouth, and replied, "As for me, friend, d'ye see, I have no objection to what you say; it may be either truth or false, for what I know; I meddle with nobody's affairs but my own; the gunner to his linstock, and the steersman to the helm, as the saying is. I trust to no creed but the compass, and do unto every man as I would be done by; so that I defy the Pope, the Devil, and the Pretender; and hope to be saved as well as another." This association of persons gave ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... no more. The launch split her way swiftly toward the north. By the vague, ghostly shimmer of light upon the waters, a tense smile appeared on the steersman's lips. In his dark eyes gleamed the joy which to some men ranks supreme above all other joys—that of bending others to his will, of dominating them, of making them the puppets of ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... A steersman who has captured a very curious specimen carries it off carefully to press between the leaves of his signal-book, like a flower. Another sailor, passing by, taking his small roast to the oven in a mess-bowl, looks at him quizzically ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... soon as Bert had steered over to the left his sled began to go faster, as the snow was packed better there. He was fast catching up to Danny, when one of the boys on that bob, looking back, saw it, and warned the steersman. ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at School • Laura Lee Hope
... in his wagon, we left the rest of our luggage for him to bring along. We boys walked the eleven miles up the canal to Lumberville, towing the barge. It was a tiresome task; but we divided the work into two-mile shifts, two boys towing at a time and then each taking a mile ride as steersman in the boat. It was about noon when we arrived at Lumberville, and then we had to unload our boat before we could haul it out of the canal and down to the river. The river on the Jersey side of the island was ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... an eye on the owner of those millions. His bards were awake to his anxiety, and celebrated John Mattock's doings with a trump and flourish somewhat displeasing to a quietly-disposed commoner. John's entry into Parliament as a Liberal was taken for a sign of steersman who knew where the tide ran. But your Liberals are sometimes Radicals in their youth, and his choice of parties might not be so much sagacity as an instance of unripe lightheadedness. A young conservative millionaire is less disturbing. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... delighted, and brought her to the ship; and the King, when he beheld her, saw that she was even more beautiful than her picture, and thought every moment that his heart would burst. She stepped on to the ship, and the King led her inside. But Trusty John remained behind with the steersman, and ordered the ship to push off. "Spread all sail, that we may fly on the ocean like a bird in the air." Meanwhile the King showed the Princess inside all his gold wares, every single bit of it—dishes, goblets, bowls, the birds and game, and all the wonderful beasts. ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various
... fall. At others, advantage is taken of the eddies which are found at the base, and huge rocks that intercept the stream. The Indians pass from rock to rock by leaping, wading, or swimming, and, by means of a hawser, haul the boat through the rushing water from one resting-point to another, the steersman keeping his seat, and—sometimes lashed to it—striving with his large paddle to guide in some degree her course. The roar of the water dashing and foaming against the surrounding rocks renders this operation as exciting as it is difficult. ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... quick for the rest of us. In half a minute we were seized, the spears were wrenched from our hands and we were thrown headlong into the canoe, all six of us, or rather seven including the Kalubi. A number of the soldiers, including Komba, who acted as steersman, also sprang into the canoe that was instantly pushed out from beneath the bridge or platform on which the Motombo sat and down the little creek into the still water of the canal or estuary, or whatever it may be, ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... unaccountable—something more than that which might be caused by any common scene of misery; it was a pang of deep pity and profound sympathy with this lonely sufferer, from whom the steamer's course was turned away, and whom the steersman had not regarded. He only had seen the sight, and the woman seemed to call to him out of her despair. The deep sea lay between; her presence was a mystery; but there seemed a sort of connection between ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... man, shipmate, why have I been dogged hither and yon across seas? Come into the coach and I'll tell ye a thing. Godby!" says he, coming where Godby stood beside the steersman, "lay her on her old course. 'Tis Merrilees takes next watch, I think—tell him to warn me as soon as we ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... time I saw him, and how I was startled at his eye, which was even then fixed upon me. He was standing at the ship's helm, being the first man that got there, when a steersman was called for by the pilot; for this Jackson was always on the alert for easy duties, and used to plead his delicate health as the reason for assuming them, as he did; though I used to think, that for a man in poor health, he was ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... even in early life accept the capture of the Portuguese carrack. Marryat drew on his recollections of the time when he was a midshipman with Cochrane in the Imperieuse, for the figure of the old steersman, who sticks to his post under the fire of the Avenger. He had seen the mate of a Spanish trading ship behaving in just that way when attacked by boats from the Imperieuse. When he was asked why he did not surrender, though he was mortally wounded and had no chance ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... and wider would the distance grow between them; higher and higher would swell the waves as they sped on their separate courses; the one light and buoyant with her freight of noble hopes and dauntless steersman at the helm, the other without sail or ballast, drifted about at the mercy of winds ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... was nearer still, floating slowly, slowly, like a gull over the sea; he could make out its smooth nose, its low parapet beyond, the steersman's head motionless; he could even hear now the soft winnowing of the screw—and then he saw that ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... now was bright golden again, and the air felt delicious; but I began to wish that we were at our journey's end, and pointing ahead I tried to learn from our steersman how much farther he ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn
... touch of the sentimental, Jack," replied Gascoigne; "but she is no more free than she was when at anchor, for she now is forced to act in obedience to her steersman, and go just where he pleases. You may just as well say that a horse, if taken out of the stable, is free, with the curb and ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat
... when the arrows were like hail on the deck, with one finger in the ring round his neck,—so": and Hubert thrust a tanned finger into a link of his chain, and lifted his chin, "just making little signs to the steersman, with his hand behind his back, to bring the ship nearer to the Spaniard; as cool, I tell you, as cool as if he were playing merelles. Oh! and then when we boarded, out came his finger from his ring; and there was none that struck so true and fierce; and all in silence too, without ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... the soul of good nature. "Well, only for five minutes, remember. I've a lot of lessons to-night." He sat down on the upturned table, his legs sprawling on the carpet, and hummed "Tom Bowling," but the Mhor leaned from his post as steersman and said gravely, "Don't dangle your legs, Jock; there are sharks in these waters." So Jock obediently crumpled his legs until his chin ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... Van Battenburg, and two Friesan nobles, Beima and Galama, with a hundred and twenty men and the booty they had taken from the monasteries, embarked near the town of Hoorne, intending to cross to Friesland, but through the treachery of the steersman, who ran the vessel on a sand-bank near Harlingen, they fell into the hands of one of Aremberg's captains, who took them all prisoners. The Count of Aremberg immediately pronounced sentence upon all the captives of plebeian rank, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... them a hurt might not arise? Stealthy, wary, and bold, he kept his distance about eight or ten feet from the canoe; and because he was behind he imagined himself unseen. As a matter of fact, however, the steersman of the canoe, wiser in woodcraft and cunninger even than he, had detected him and was watching him with interest from the corner of his eye. So large a mink, and one so daring in curiosity, was a phenomenon to be watched and studied with care. The canoeist did not take his comrade ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... Level, tore his shirt into shreds, and made a sling with them for the broken limb. They then collected five other seamen, by whose assistance they succeeded at length in getting the boat afloat; for it had grounded with the falling tide. Nisbet took one of the oars and ordered the steersman to go close under the guns of the battery, that they might be safe from its tremendous fire. Hearing his voice, Nelson roused himself, and desired to be lifted up in the boat that he might look about him. Nisbet raised him up; but nothing could ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... impetuous flies, The helm the attentive timoneer applies: As in pursuit along the aerial way, With ardent eye the falcon marks his prey, Each motion watches of the doubtful chase, Obliquely wheeling through the fluid space; So, govern'd by the steersman's GLOWING hands, The regent helm her motion ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... the officer made no rejoinder; but then approaching the steersman nearer still, he said, in a low voice, "Come, my man, I have something to tell you. We must alter our course very soon; I am not going to yon ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... was now heaved from the chest of the Indian, who stood calmly on the spot on which he had first rested, while Fuller prepared a coil of rope to throw to the active steersman. ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... give good notice indeed, you bell by the sea-reefs ringing, Ringing, ringing, to warn the ship from its wreck-place. For, as on the alert, O steersman, you mind the bell's admonition, The bows turn,—the freighted ship, tacking, speeds away under her grey sails; The beautiful and noble ship, with all her precious wealth, speeds away ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman
... The steersman, on hearing this, made a hasty signal to his men to back their oars, and hold off from the shore which they ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... nothing in the moon noteworthy? Nay: for if that moon could love a mortal, Use, to charm him (so to fit a fancy), All her magic ('tis the old sweet mythos), 160 She would turn a new side to her mortal, Side unseen of herdsman, huntsman, steersman— Blank to Zoroaster on his terrace, Blind to Galileo on his turret, Dumb to Homer, dumb to Keats—him, even! 165 Think, the wonder of the moonstruck mortal— When she turns round, comes again in heaven, Opens out anew for worse or better! Proves ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... consequently the course of a careful pilot, is to hold his way free through the channel between them. If a lands-*man may be permitted to make an observation on a nautical point, I would say that our steersman kept the peak of the Corbiere exactly on a level with the adjacent precipices, till we were directly abreast of the headland, and then stood abruptly in-shore till within a few fathoms of the cliffs, under the shadow of which he afterwards held a steady course ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 395, Saturday, October 24, 1829. • Various
... information with great joy. They descended the mountain, came to the flat land, and at last, after a wearisome journey, during which they had seen the sun rise and set seven times, they arrived at the sea-coast. A ship lay ready at anchor, and when they inquired its destination, the steersman answered, "We are going to Selandia to fetch a cargo of cinnamon." To Haschem's question where they came from, and what this land where they were was called, he received for answer, "that the ship belonged to a merchant ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... debauched, a holder of seventy-six benefices, M. de Tressan dreamed of the cardinal's hat, and aspired to obtain it from the Court of Rome at the cost of a persecution. The government was at that time drifting about, without compass or steersman, from the hands of Madame de Prie to those of Paris-Duverney. Little cared they for the fate of the Reformers. "This castaway of the regency," says M. Lemontey, "was adopted without memorial, without ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... again, and succeeded without undue faintness. He could not wait, but must know his fate immediately. He found the door was unlocked, and when he slipped out into the cabin, he found that there was only one man on board, the steersman, who was sitting in the engine pit, and steering with the rail wheel instead of ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... you are driving at, Bill. Next the steersman got down with the mumps, then you took the shingles, and another sailor got lumbago, while the third mate had to crawl around with a boil on his foot as large as a cabbage. I heard about that affair—read about it in the last ...
— The Rover Boys on Treasure Isle - or The Strange Cruise of the Steam Yacht. • Edward Stratemeyer (AKA Arthur M. Winfield)
... to excursions up the river. In a small canoe with two paddlers and the faithful Ali for a steersman he would disappear for a few days at a time. All his movements were no doubt closely watched by Lakamba and Abdulla, for the man once in the confidence of Rajah Laut was supposed to be in possession of valuable secrets. The coast population of Borneo believes implicitly in diamonds of fabulous ...
— Almayer's Folly - A Story of an Eastern River • Joseph Conrad
... flooded gutters. Here were rivers, lakes, and oceans for navigation; easy pilotage, for the steersman had but to wade beside his craft and guide it with a twig. Jane's timely boat was one of the first to reach ...
— Seventeen - A Tale Of Youth And Summer Time And The Baxter Family Especially William • Booth Tarkington
... speaking to him briefly and rapidly, and the sullen face of the Spaniard became alive. An order to the steersman and the course of the schooner was shifted more toward the west. It was evident to Robert that they were not running away from whatever it was out there. The slaver for the first time in a long ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... soon lowered, but it would only hold three persons besides the two men required to row it; and Duboscq, as steersman, who, after landing their passengers, would have to return to fetch off the remainder of the crew. The marquis, with Madame de Valricour and Perigord, at once stepped into the boat, and as the beach was not far off, they ...
— The King's Warrant - A Story of Old and New France • Alfred H. Engelbach
... on the island, of course) was already in the water and manned by his two sons, boys of eight and twelve respectively. I sat for'ard, the two youngsters amidships, the father took the post of honour as tautai or steersman, and with a chuckle of satisfaction from the boys, off we went in the wake of ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... independently of the rear sled, for a turn to the right or the left causes the "bob" to take the direction indicated by the front runners; but double-runners steered with a wheel, lever or yoke in front, are very dangerous, as the steersman, in case of an accident, is thrown against the steering apparatus, ...
— Healthful Sports for Boys • Alfred Rochefort
... Ghoole was taking on a cargo of potatoes and beets. Some barges laden with wood were being pulled through the locks by men harnessed to a long tow rope, and a savage dog on one of these barges menaced me with dripping fangs and bloodshot eyes when I stopped to talk to the steersman, who sat on the tiller smoking a short, evil-smelling pipe, while his "vrouwe" was hanging out a heavy wash of vari-colored garments on a line from the staff on the bow to a sweep fastened upright ...
— Vanished towers and chimes of Flanders • George Wharton Edwards
... extreme length was thirty-two feet six inches, including the bow and stern pieces, its greatest breadth was four feet ten inches, but it was only two feet nine inches forward where the bowman sat, and two feet four inches behind where the steersman was placed, and its depth was one foot eleven and a quarter inches. There were seventy-three hoops of thin cedar and a layer of slender laths of the same wood within the frame. These feeble vessels of bark ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... warning that, when a man dies with unpared nails, he supplies a large amount of materials for the building of this ship, which both gods and men wish may be finished as late as possible. But in this flood Naglfar gets afloat. The giant Hrym is its steersman. ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... stern, much as boats are rounded off towards the bows at the present day. It did not possess either mast or sail, but was propelled wholly by oars, which were of the same shape as those used anciently by the rowers in the round boats. In the steersman's hand is seen an oar of a different kind. It is much longer than the rowing oars, and terminates in an oval blade, which would have given it considerable power in the water. [PLATE CXXXIII., Fig. 4.] The helmsman steered with both hands; and it seems that his oar was ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson
... a Thames waterman, that he was quite able to manage the boat without a steersman, and Charley was nearly his equal. But there is some amusement in steering, and Katie was allowed ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... and I were on our way home from Troy, on good terms with one another. When we got to Sunium, which is the point of Athens, Apollo with his painless shafts killed Phrontis the steersman of Menelaus' ship (and never man knew better how to handle a vessel in rough weather) so that he died then and there with the helm in his hand, and Menelaus, though very anxious to press forward, had to wait in order to bury his comrade and give him his due funeral rites. Presently, ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... sing the roistering Norway lads; "Furl the sails! Anchor fast! Come along, steersman! No wind is there to fear nor adverse coast, and we mean to be right jolly. Each of us has a sweetheart on shore, excellent tobacco and superior brandy-wine. Rocks and storms are far outside, we laugh at rocks and storms! Steersman, come and drink!" They dance on ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... waters, and he who fights the sea must learn to conquer, not by passionate effort, but by consistent, cool resolve. Those who worked with him feared him, and in so doing learnt the habit of his ways. The steersman, with one eye on the binnacle, knew always where to find him with the other; for Luke hardly moved during his entire watch on deck. He took his station at the starboard end of the narrow bridge when he came on duty, and from that spot he rarely moved. These little things betray a man, if ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman
... comes home I will humbly suggest Orpheus singing at the stem, a following wind, a great bellying sail behind, and all around wet air and splashing grey sea, the stem ploughing it up silver and white and green, and away aft under the bend of the sail there would be Jason and the steersman, possibly Medea, with the curl out of her hair, and perhaps just a touch of the golden fleece, just a fleck of pale yellow to enliven the minor tints! Round the bows there would be men listening to the ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... spake, and donned his armour of war; and they cried aloud, wondrously eager. And he drew his sword from the sheath and cut the hawsers at the stern. And near the maiden he took his stand ready armed by the steersman Aneaeus, and with their rowing the ship sped on as they strained desperately to drive ...
— The Argonautica • Apollonius Rhodius
... through the water, which roared and broke over the bows. “It will be a short run,” said the steersman, “if the ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... put the bits into the horses' mouths[3:3], that they may obey us, we turn about also their whole body. (4)Behold also the ships, though they are so great, and driven by fierce winds, are turned about by a very small helm, whithersoever the steersman may desire. (5)So also the tongue is a little member, and boasts great things. Behold, how great a forest a little fire kindles! (6)And the tongue is a fire, that world of iniquity! The tongue among our members is that which defiles the whole body, and sets on fire ...
— The New Testament of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. • Various
... seemed to all of us to be out thus in the freedom of the night and the sea—not least to the great noble-headed hound sitting up on his haunches, keen and watchful by the steersman's side. What a strange waste of a life so short to be sleeping there on the land, when one might be out and away on such ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... was the answer of the steersman, "and I think we're catching up to the yellow car again. If we pass that I'm not so sure but what we can come in ...
— The Motor Boys on the Pacific • Clarence Young
... steersman of the Black Hawk, who was dividing his attention between managing the craft and firing ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton
... sailing-vessels, owned by traders residing in the remote towns and villages, who seldom came to Para themselves, but entrusted vessels and cargoes to the care of half-breeds or Portuguese cabos. Sometimes, indeed, they risked all in the hands of the Indian crew, making the pilot, who was also steersman, do duty as supercargo. Now and then, Portuguese and Brazilian merchants at Para furnished young Portuguese with merchandise, and dispatched them to the interior to exchange the goods for produce among the scattered population. The means of communication, in fact, with the ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... light. No need to tell him what might happen. A sailing vessel, probably a fishing smack, was crossing the steamer's course. He sprang to the telegraph, and signaled "Slow" to the engine-room. Simultaneously he shouted to the steersman to starboard the helm, and the siren trumpeted a single raucous blast into the silence. With the rattle of the chains and steering-rods in the gear-boxes came a yell from the ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... Colfax, born a Sims but living it down and feeling that never more than at this minute, when rudely the steersman's helm had been snatched from his grasp, was there greater need that he should be a Colfax through and through——"but, Mr. Lobel, it was my idea that up to this point anyway the action should be played with restraint to sort of ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... looked sideways up! Fear at my heart, as at a cup, My life-blood seemed to sip! The stars were dim, and thick the night, The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed white; From the sails the dew did drip— Till clomb above the eastern bar The horned Moon, with one bright star ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... necessary for this matter we must first give a general description of the virtues of a good citizen; for as a sailor is one of those who make up a community, so is a citizen, although the province of one sailor may be different from another's (for one is a rower, another a steersman, a third a boatswain, and so on, each having their several appointments), it is evident that the most accurate description of any one good sailor must refer to his peculiar abilities, yet there are some things in which the same description may be applied to the whole crew, as the safety ...
— Politics - A Treatise on Government • Aristotle
... shot the boat alongside, and the linen-clad steersman sprang up the ladder. "Welcome, Captain Scarrow!" he cried. "Have you heard ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... ride. It was a long double canoe, the canoes lashed together by timbers with an interval of water between, and the whole decorated with flowers and golden grasses. A dozen flower-crowned Amazons were at the paddles, while at the stern of each canoe was a strapping steersman. All were garlanded with gold and crimson and orange flowers, while each wore about the hips a scarlet pareu. There were flowers everywhere, flowers, flowers, flowers, without out end. The whole thing was an orgy ...
— The Cruise of the Snark • Jack London
... none more beautiful. It bears a striking resemblance to a passage in George Sand's diary describing a voyage with Chopin to the island of Majorca. "The night was warm and dark, illumined only by an extraordinary phosphorescence in the wake of the ship; everybody was asleep on board except the steersman, who, in order to keep himself awake, sang all night, but in a voice so soft and so subdued that one might have thought he feared to arouse the men of the watch. We did not weary of listening to him, for his singing was of the strangest kind. ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb
... that the dead steersman has been reverently removed from the place where he held his honourable watch and ward till death, a steadfastness as noble as that of the young Casabianca, and placed in the mortuary ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... transcendental advice given to him by the maker of the boat: "In paddling a canoe, all you have to do is to will that your boat shall go in any particular direction, and she will immediately take the course, as if imbued with the spirit of the steersman." Hawthorne then adds this sober postscript: "It may be so with you, but it is ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great Philosophers, Volume 8 • Elbert Hubbard
... morning dawned, the viking saw a goodly vessel making gallant headway. As she drew near the land with streamer flying and broad sails flapping in the wind, the viking saw that there was no soul on board of her; and yet, without steersman to guide her, the vessel avoided the shoals and held her way straight to the spot where ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... turns for a spell of two hours each at the helm. The sailor trusted Herbert as he would himself, and his confidence was justified by the coolness and judgment of the lad. Pencroft gave him his directions as a commander to his steersman, and Herbert never allowed the "Bonadventure" to swerve even a point. The night passed quickly, as did the day of the 12th of October. A south-easterly direction was strictly maintained. Unless the "Bonadventure" fell in with some unknown current she ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne
... in volume. The wind died rapidly. Yet there was no increase of light, and presently they heard afar a rushing sound. Great drops beat like hail upon their tarpaulin, and all except the man who was steering snuggled to cover. The steersman happened to be Shif'less Sol this time, and he wrapped one of the new Spanish blankets tightly around him ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the names of which in some cases indicate a military calling, as Dalai, from Dalpati, commander of an army, and Senapati, commander-in-chief; while others are occupational, as Maharana (painter), Dwari (gatekeeper) and Mangual (steersman of a boat). The latter names show, as might be expected, that the caste is partly of functional origin, while as regards the military names, the Hatwas say that they formerly fought against the Bhonslas, under ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell
... our hero stood near the binnacle talking to the steersman, a sturdy middle-aged sailor, whose breadth appeared to be ...
— The Battle and the Breeze • R.M. Ballantyne
... country with a range of more than a league of water. As soon as everything was snug on board, the boat was lowered, and we pulled ashore, our new officer, who had been several times in the port before, taking the place of steersman. As we drew in, we found the tide low, and the rocks and stones, covered with kelp and sea-weed, lying bare for the distance of nearly an eighth of a mile. Picking our way barefooted over these, we came to what is called ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... all we could command; The Boat was moor'd upon the strand, The midnight current, by her side, Was stealing down to meet the tide; The wakeful steersman ready lay, To rouse us at the break of day; It came—how soon! and what a sky, To cheer the bounding traveller's eye! To make him spurn his couch of rest, To shout upon the river's breast; Watching by turns the rosy hue Of early cloud, or sparkling dew; ...
— The Banks of Wye • Robert Bloomfield
... second time he hit the bird, and struck it to the deck.... This strange fact made him uneasy, and he thought it betokened danger; he went to the binnacle, saw the course he was steering, and without any particular reason he ordered the steersman to alter the course one point to ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... years have just ended, and Daland, a Norwegian captain, has been forced by a tempest to anchor his vessel in a sheltered bay within a few miles of his peaceful home, where Senta, his only daughter, awaits him. All on board are sleeping, and the steersman alone keeps watch over the anchored vessel, singing of the maiden he loves and of the gifts he is bringing her from foreign lands. In the midst of his song, the Flying Dutchman's black-masted vessel with its red sails enters the cove, and ...
— Stories of the Wagner Opera • H. A. Guerber
... of their lives while awake, with the exception of a few brief and insulated intervals, is spent in a passive state of the intellectual powers. Thoughts come and go, as chance, or some undefined power in nature may direct, uninterfered with by the sovereign will, the steersman of the mind. And often the understanding appears to be a blank, upon which if any impressions are then made, they are like figures drawn in the sand which the next tide obliterates, or are even lighter and more evanescent ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... the Indian tongue was shouted at them that they must not attempt to land. A shot was fired over their heads to emphasise the fact that the savages were in earnest, and with no alternative, and taken wholly by surprise, Shad at the steersman's paddle astern, swung the canoe out into the stream, still ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... there was great confusion. The steamer was right upon us, and I heard the order given to stop the paddles. In the same moment I saw the steersman of the galley lay his hand on the prisoner's shoulder, and the prisoner start up, lean across his captor, and pull the cloak from the neck of a shrinking man in the galley. Still in the same moment ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... heard he was back, he set to and built a vast ship, whence, as from a fortress, he could rain his missiles on the enemy. To manage this ship he enlisted Homod and Thole the rowers, the soils of Atyl the Skanian, one of whom was instructed to act as steersman, while the other was to command at the prow. Ring lacked neither skill nor dexterity to encounter them. For he showed only a small part of his forces, and caused the enemy to be attacked on the rear. Omund, when told of his strategy by ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... stern-post, his gray hair and beard rigid with ice. Beneath the horned helmet, the strong moody face turned right and left, peering into the darkness. Cappen felt smaller than usual when he approached the steersman. ...
— The Valor of Cappen Varra • Poul William Anderson
... not know that I ever felt more seriously alarmed than at this moment, thus to find myself exposed on an unknown sea, as it might well be termed, in an open boat, and at such an advanced period of the season, without any means of ascertaining what course to steer for land. It would appear our steersman had been napping at the helm in the course of the night, and thus allowed the boat to deviate from her course without noticing it; hence the awkwardness and even the danger of ...
— Notes of a Twenty-Five Years' Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory - Volume II. (of 2) • John M'lean
... while the others scrambled along the river bank, either to help haul upon a line, or, in the case of the younger children and the dogs, simply to walk in order to relieve the craft of their weight and also for safety's sake, should the canoe overturn. The greatest danger is for the steersman to lose control and allow the canoe to get out of line with the current, as the least headway in a wrong direction is ...
— The Drama of the Forests - Romance and Adventure • Arthur Heming
... quietly until after we had our midday meal. We were all amidships on the wide deck, except my father and Arngeir, who sat side by side on the steersman's bench on the high poop. There was no spray coming on board, for we were running, and the ship was very steady. Raven and I were forward with the men, busy with the many little things yet to be done to the rigging and such like that had been left in the haste at last, and there was no thought ...
— Havelok The Dane - A Legend of Old Grimsby and Lincoln • Charles Whistler
... supported by their respective shafts, which projected over the sides of the boat. The forward part was covered by a deck which afforded shelter for her hands. The after-part was fitted up in a rough manner for passengers. The entrance into the cabin was from the stern in front of the steersman, who worked a tiller as in an ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... not our design to give any description of the galatea's crew. There were nine of them,—all Indians,—four on each side acting as rowers, or more properly "paddlers," the ninth being the pilot or steersman, standing abaft ...
— Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No. 1 - An Illustrated Magazine • Various
... already submerged, only the tip of our conning staff being out of the water. But by an ingenious system of tiny mirrors the steersman was able to see his way as plainly as if he had been on deck above ...
— The International Spy - Being the Secret History of the Russo-Japanese War • Allen Upward
... my lads," said the old man, "a scow goes no faster than the river runs. Here's the great oar—twenty feet it is in length—made out of a young tree. The steersman uses that to straighten her up betimes. But there's nothing to make the boat run saving the ...
— Young Alaskans in the Far North • Emerson Hough
... not so old. If she must break up her bark on the rocks, he could take the place of steersman with pleasure. But he was a courteous gentleman and he said none of ...
— Beyond The Rocks - A Love Story • Elinor Glyn
... the bosom of my kindred. Well! the amiable conjecture does no harm, and may therefore be safely left uncontradicted. Far from saying nay, indeed, I will permit the reader to picture me, for the next eight years, as a bark slumbering through halcyon weather, in a harbour still as glass—the steersman stretched on the little deck, his face up to heaven, his eyes closed: buried, if you will, in a long prayer. A great many women and girls are supposed to pass their lives something in that fashion; why not I ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... one of them surpasses thee. Then thou, dear boy, exert thine ev'ry art, That so thou mayst not fail to gain a prize. By skill, far more than strength, the woodman fells The sturdy oak; by skill the steersman guides His flying ship across the dark-blue sea, Though shatter'd by the blast; 'twixt charioteer And charioteer 'tis skill that draws the line. One, vainly trusting to his coursers' speed, Drives reckless here and there; o'er all the course, His horses, unrestrain'd, at random ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... romantic dreams, I should be wise to stand aside. I felt that, after all, Miss Fraenkel's crystal-clear bromidity would be a delightful change after so much intense living and introspection. For that evening, after dinner, as I listened to the music of the Steersman's Song from the Flying Dutchman, it seemed only too likely that even after all these years, so deathless is passion in some hearts, the skilled hand of Frank Carville might set a woman's soul vibrating with some of ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... morning, Jack mounted the steersman's seat, and sent the Terror rolling to the place where the ...
— Jack Wright and His Electric Stage; - or, Leagued Against the James Boys • "Noname"
... leagues an hour when an effort to that end was made by the occupants. A large canoe, made from the straight trunk of a mahogany tree, is described as having been five feet in width and seventy-five feet long. This craft was propelled by twenty-five oarsmen on each side, a steersman in the stern, and a lookout at the prow. This was a cacique's barge, in which he made visits of state along ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... close upon him; now, in obedience to the steersman, the boat sheered out a bit and we were abreast 25 of his laboring flukes; now the mate hurls his quivering lance with such hearty good will that every inch of its slender shaft disappears ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... have slain the steersman. The axe goes first and Skallagrim follows after. Ha, ha! Ay, Swanhild, we'll mingle tears. Give me the cup. Why, what is this? Thou art afire, a glory glows about thee, and from thee floats a scent like the scent of the Iceland meads ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... ex-man-o'-war's man turns away from the door, and once more goes cruising along the streets. But now, having no definite point to steer for, he makes short tacks and turns, like a ship sailing under an unfavourable wind—or as one disregarding the guidance of the compass, without steersman ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... discern the blacker outlines of the craft and its occupants as it sped forth from the gloom of the forest into the starlit area of the tiny lake. The great canoe was low in the water; for heaped in the centre of it was what was evidently a pile of freight, with two men in front and two behind. The steersman swung the prow around and on they went up the Wolverine without a pause in the sweep of the paddles or the ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... a slight leak also, nothing dangerous in a stanch vessel, but an added straw, which might prove the last in this straining wrestle with wind and sea, and she did not answer her rudder as her steersman could ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... starn drift down stream, Jasper," said the man of the woods to the young mariner of the lake, who had dispossessed Arrowhead of his paddle and taken his own station as steersman; "let it go down with the current. Should any of these infarnals, the Mingos, strike our trail, or follow it to this point they will not fail to look for the signs in the mud; and if they discover that we have left the shore with the nose of the canoe up stream, it is a natural belief ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... because the very attitude of confident dependence takes the strain off a man. To feel that I am leaning hard upon a firm prop, to devolve responsibility, to put the reins into another's hand, to give the helm into another steersman's grasp, whilst I may lie down and rest, that is blessedness, though there be a storm. In the story of frontier warfare we read how, day by day, the battalion that had been in the post of danger, and therefore of honour, was withdrawn into the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... the helm, and at first made the usual miscalculations of an unexperienced steersman; but Fanny soon instructed him so that he steered very well, and she went forward to her couch. In a whisper she said the prayer which she never omitted, and covering herself with blankets, was soon ...
— Hope and Have - or, Fanny Grant Among the Indians, A Story for Young People • Oliver Optic
... Florette, Julia mounted to the deck with a painfully beating heart, but with a firm step. She handed the lantern to the steersman, who received it surlily, growling some rough oath, half to himself, at her delay, and leaning upon the tiller, proceeded to relight the binnacle-lamp. Julia fell back cautiously, and in another moment the light form of Florette filled ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... aboard a small boat with a lateen sail, and we followed and got under way. The deck was closely packed with donkeys and men; the two sailors had to climb over and under and through the wedged mass to work the sails, and the steersman had to crowd four or five donkeys out of the way when he wished to swing his tiller and put his helm hard-down. But what were their troubles to us? We had nothing to do; nothing to do but enjoy the trip; nothing to do but shove the donkeys off ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... No one who has not seen a rapid can realise the nerve this requires. Seats had been roughly put in for us to sit on, otherwise, as a rule, except for the oarsmen's bench and the barrels, these boats are absolutely empty. Our friend, the steersman, sat at the bow, and with a sort of oar, held in position by a rope of plaited straw fixed a little on one side, guided the fragile bark. First we had to go into a lock. Any one acquainted with a nice ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... to the steersman. What she said he did not know; his lack-luster gaze met hers. All dislike and disapproval seemed to have vanished from it; he saw her only as one sees a face in a daguerreotype of long ago, or looks at features limned by ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... Napolean Jenkins, the head pilot, stood with his hand on the spokes of the wheel, gazing with the eyes of a night-bird on the outlines of shore and hill. Mann Turpin, his steersman, stood at the right of the wheel. Jenkins knocked the ashes from his cigar, and the glow from the deep red circle of tobacco fire momentarily radiated the gloom of the pilot-house. The night was serene and clear, the full moon shining and shedding her ...
— Shawn of Skarrow • James Tandy Ellis
... our papers, instruments, medicine, and almost every article indispensable for the success of our enterprise. The canoe being under sail, a sudden squall of wind struck her obliquely and turned her considerably. The man at the helm, who was unluckily the worst steersman of the party, became alarmed, and, instead of putting her before the wind, luffed her up into it. The wind was so high that it forced the brace of the square-sail out of the hand of the man who was attending it, and instantly upset the canoe, which would have been turned bottom ...
— First Across the Continent • Noah Brooks
... The steersman whirled his wheel swiftly in the apparent endeavor to avert a collision. Unluckily, he whirled it the wrong way. Round swung the schooner's bow, directly toward the sloop. A few seconds more and she would be forced down beneath the larger vessel's ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman |
