"Quarter-deck" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with an unblunted sense of my surroundings. I was never weary of calling up the image of that narrow causeway, on which I had my dwelling, lying coiled like a serpent, tail to mouth, in the outrageous ocean, and I was never weary of passing—a mere quarter-deck parade—from the one side to the other, from the shady, habitable shores of the lagoon to the blinding desert and uproarious breakers of the opposite beach. The sense of insecurity in such a thread of residence is more than fanciful. Hurricanes ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... them distinctly, but with perfect indifference. A long time after, with the same indifference, I looked over my shoulder. Castro had vanished from the quarter-deck. And I turned my face to the sea again as a man, feeling himself beaten in a fight with death, might turn ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... topgallantmast went over the side, dragging the maintopgallantmast with them. The cry of "A man overboard!" had hurried the crew on deck, and the crash of the falling spars, and the contradictory orders from the quarter-deck, at first puzzled and confused them; but the chief mate was a cool, active seaman, and the moment he made his appearance order and silence were restored; the quarter-boat was instantly lowered, numbers of the men ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various
... the most refined, intelligent, cultivated lady in the ship, and altogether the kindest and best. She sewed my buttons on, kept my clothing in presentable trim, fed me on Egyptian jam (when I behaved), lectured me awfully on the quarter-deck on moonlit promenading evenings, and cured me of several bad habits. I am under lasting obligations to her. She looks young because she is so good, but she has a grown son ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... kept up a racket and a row all the time, in spite of the taut rein which the first lieutenant, Mr. Bispham, kept over us. He wore gold-rimmed spectacles; and I can see him now, with the flat eagle-and-anchor buttons shining on his blue coat, as he would pace the quarter-deck, eyeing us young gentlemen of the watch, as demurely we planked up and down the lee side, tired enough, and waiting for eight bells to strike to rush below and call our relief. He was an austere man, and, unlike the brave old commodore, made no allowance for our pranks ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.
... you on the ship's books, not only for your father's sake, but also on account of your excellent behaviour while aboard the Colossus; and if, as I hope, you have sufficiently recovered to join, you will again meet one or two of your former shipmates on the quarter-deck ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... had guns (as I had goods) to work my Christian harm, I had run him up from his quarter-deck to trade with his own yard-arm; I had nailed his ears to my capstan-head, and ripped them off with a saw, And soused them in the bilgewater, and served them to him raw; I had flung him blind in a rudderless boat to rot in the rocking dark, I had ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... went up to the quarter-deck, saying, there he lived and there he would die. All the officers, sadly enough, concluded that there was not the least show of any hopes of preservation, but that they were all dead men, and that upon the return of the tide the ship would questionless be dashed ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke
... by the misconduct of the crew; for, standing on the quarter-deck, he could not distinguish between the intentional and the unintentional blunders of the crew, and therefore believed that the disaffection was much more extensive than was really the case. The zealous efforts of one ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... voice, the old quarter-deck voice which had been law aboard the Bluebird, "you march your boots to your room and pack up. We're goin' to Trumet and you're goin' along with us. March! or, by the everlastin', I'll carry you there and lock you in! You speak another word and I'll do ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... hold my hand or my handkerchief, or both, before my mouth; then pretend I could not bear the smell of the ship, or the closeness of the cabin. But that would have been only to remove into a clearer air upon the quarter-deck, where we should, with it, have had a clearer light too; and if I had pretended the smell of the ship, it would have served only to have carried us all on shore to the captain's house, which was hard by; for the ship lay so close to the shore, that we only walked over ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe
... the ship drove on through the water. Yet she could bear it well; and the captain sang out from the quarter-deck— "Another reef out of that fore topsail, and give it to her." Two hands sprang aloft; the frozen reef points and earings were cast adrift, the halyards manned, and the sail gave out her increased canvas to the gale. ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... in the heavens, and a flood of silver poured in a dazzling stream across the level surface of the sea. The quarter-deck, the white boats amidships, and all the brass work abaft the funnels reflected ...
— The Honorable Percival • Alice Hegan Rice
... her decks crowded with men, and guns protruding from her ports; while on the weather rail, clinging with one hand to the shrouds, stood a strange, demoniacal-looking figure, holding in his outstretched hand, above the water, a burning blue light. On the quarter-deck a little knot of men seemed standing, a short distance apart from them was a strikingly handsome man, who, from his air of superiority, Lane at once knew to be the commander. His perfectly poised and graceful attitude, and thorough composure, as he removed a cigar from his mouth ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... ordinary villain, and hardly thought it worth his while to take any particular notice of him, except to watch him in a general way. But Cigole, on the contrary, was very different. His eyes, which never met those of Brandon fairly, were constantly watching him. When moving about the quarter-deck or when sitting in the cabin he usually had the air of a man who was pretending to be intent on something else, but in reality watching Brandon's acts or listening to his words. To any other man the knowledge of this would have been in the highest degree irksome. But to ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... shirt-sleeves, the day being warm; but the shirt is of fine linen, ruffled at the breast, and gold-studded, while a costly Panama hat shades his somewhat sallow face from the sun. Besides, he is on the quarter-deck, seeming at home there. ...
— The Land of Fire - A Tale of Adventure • Mayne Reid
... flapping of the sails, the whistling and rushing of the wind, the bawling of the captain and crew, the shrieking of the passengers, all mingled with the rolling and bellowing of the thunder. In the midst of the uproar, the sloop righted; at the same time the mainsail shifted, the boom came sweeping the quarter-deck, and Dolph, who was gazing unguardedly at the clouds, found himself, in a ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... had hardly begun to deepen into pink when he was brought alongside, and climbed with some difficulty up the ladder. The captain had heard that the Governor was an eccentric, but he was hardly prepared for the curious figure who came limping feebly down his quarter-deck, his steps supported by a thick bamboo cane. He wore a Ramillies wig, all twisted into little tails like a poodle's coat, and cut so low across the brow that the large green glasses which covered his eyes looked as if they were hung from it. A fierce beak of a nose, very ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... his wounds Thus he said, thus he said, While the surgeon dressed his wounds thus he said: "Let my cradle now in haste On the quarter-deck be placed, That my enemies I may face Till I'm ...
— Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 • Evelyn Baring
... craft. Captain Taylor is an experienced sailor, and has brought many a ship safely into port in spite of wind and tide, and the devil's own whirlpools and hurricanes. If you want to see earnestness come aboard some Sunday when the Captain's on the quarter-deck, and take an observation. No danger of falling asleep there, no more than there is up aloft, 'when the stormy winds do blow.' Consciences get raked fore and aft, sins are blown clean out of the water, false colors are hauled down and true ones run up to the masthead, ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott
... himself for their sake, on account of these relentless persecutions; but he thinks them earnest and energetic. "From father to son, for above a hundred years, they followed the sea; a gray-headed ship-master, in each generation, retiring from the quarter-deck to the homestead, while a boy of fourteen took the hereditary place before the mast, confronting the salt spray and the gale, which had blustered against his sire and grand-sire. The boy also, in due time, passed from the forecastle to the cabin, ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... aback and nearly within hail. That I might be discovered, I swung my oar in the air, jumped from rock to rock, and was guilty of all manner of livelinesses of action, until I could see the officers on the quarter-deck looking at me through their spyglasses. They answered by pointing to the extreme westerly end of the island, whither I hastened and discovered their boat manned by half a dozen men. It seems, as I was to learn afterward, the ship had ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... reply from the quarter-deck, and the helm was shifted without inquiry, as it always is on board of a man-of-war; although, at the same time, it behoves people to be rather careful how they pass such an order, without being prepared with a subsequent and ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... it was described as "many stripes and no stars." Few measures were omitted to heighten the shock of contrast. No notice was taken of papers forwarded to Government, and the man who attempted to distinguish himself by higher views than quarter-deck duties, found himself marked out for the angry Commodore's red-hot displeasure. No place was allowed for charts and plans: valuable original surveys, of which no duplicates existed, lay tossed amongst the brick and mortar ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... packet came in, and a few minutes afterwards I had the honour of receiving on my quarter-deck a gentleman who seemed a cross between the German student and swell commercial gent. On his head he wore a queer kind of smoking-cap, with the peak cocked over his left ear; then came a green shooting-jacket, and flashy silk tartan waistcoat, set off by a gold ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... what Hazard and Green are about"—called out Roswell Gardiner to his owner, the first being on the quarter-deck of the Sea Lion, and the last on the wharf, while Watson was busy in the main-rigging; "they've been long enough on the main to ship a dozen crews for a craft of this size, and we are still short two hands, even if this man sign the papers, which he has not yet done. By the way, Watson, it's ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... moment to doubt whether there might not be some mistake: he had expected to see him cringe. But he took him by the collar behind, and pushed him along to the quarter-deck, where an elderly officer was pacing up and ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... away, a dozen of them, as smoothly and lazily as South Harniss years have always slipped. Captain Zelotes was past sixty now, but as vigorous as when forty, stubborn as ever, fond of using quarter-deck methods on shore and especially in town-meeting, and very often in trouble in consequence. He was a member of the Board of Selectmen and was in the habit of characterizing those whose opinions differed from ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... lot to sail in a small screw-steamer along the coast of Calabria. Of the four passengers one was a Neapolitan officer, who embarked in full uniform; and with light tight boots and spurs, and clanging sword, he stalked the quarter-deck, that is, he took three steps, and was at the ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... were made by Mr. James Saumarez,—afterwards the distinguished admiral, Lord de Saumarez, then a midshipman,—before the ship was relieved from this grave disadvantage. Her loss was 40 killed and 71 wounded; not a man escaping of those stationed on the quarter-deck at the beginning of the action. Among the injured was the Commodore himself, whose cool heroism must have been singularly conspicuous, from the notice it attracted in a service where such bearing was not rare. At one time when the quarter-deck was cleared and he stood alone upon the ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... everything was put into sea order. When we were called aft to be divided into watches, I had a good specimen of the manner of a sea-captain. After the division had been made, he gave a short characteristic speech, walking the quarter-deck with a cigar in his mouth, and dropping the words out between ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... Gunner, Gorblessim!" swelling his chest, and patting it. "And why?—because there wasn't a quarter-deck officer, not so much as a middy or mate, ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... thorough repairing of the same before he disposed of all but the big man-of-war, which continued to ornament his own room, with all sail set and a little red officer perpetually waving his sword on the quarter-deck. ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... no way of saving the ship?" asked Bob of the captain as he stood, calm, yet stern, on the quarter-deck. ...
— Bob the Castaway • Frank V. Webster
... had relinquished the sea for a country life: in the corner of his garden he reared an artificial mount with a level summit, resembling most accurately a quarter-deck, not only in shape, but in size; and here ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... my name as soon as you like," cried the admiral. "The enemies of old England know it, and I don't care if all the world knows it. I'm old Admiral Bell, something of a hulk now, but still able to head a quarter-deck if there was any need ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... a messmate,' he continued; 'William Cooley is his name. We call him Truthful Billy. He's as good a seaman as ever trod quarter-deck; but when he gets spinning yarns he ain't the sort of man as I could advise you to rely upon. Well, Billy, he's got a dog, and I've seen him sit and tell yarns before that dog that would make a cat squirm ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... enemies rightly read the lesson of Trafalgar. The false deductions therefore which grew up in our own service are all the more extraordinary, even as we find them in the new instructions and the current talk of the quarter-deck. But this is not the worst. It is not till we turn to the Signal Book itself that we get a full impression of the extent to which tactical thought had degenerated and Nelson's seed had been choked. The movements and formations for which signals ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett
... time all hands must turn out, lash up the hammocks and pass them upon the upper deck to be stowed away until night came round again, in order to make more room below. Several guards with loaded muskets and fixed bayonets constantly paced the upper deck; and aft, on the quarter-deck, were two carronades loaded to the muzzle and pointed forward. Two or three of the prisoners were permitted to come on deck at a time; but at night none were allowed on deck for any purpose whatever; the entrance being ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various
... affectionate care of his family and friends. By them it has been most carefully revised; and is now presented to the public, especially to his honoured profession, for the benefit of which he thought and worked during the long period which elapsed between his leaving the quarter-deck and his death; as his Charts (constructed from his numerous surveys), his twenty years' Essays in the United Service Journal, his efforts to render his astronomical researches ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... on the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings; and in a city of departed Doges and lost glories't is easy to moralise over earthly greatness. But kings are not always dead, and I daresay as William II. in his cocked hat gazed from the quarter-deck of the Hohenzollern at the marvellous but untenanted Palace of the ancient Bridegrooms of the Sea, he felt that a living lion is better than a dead Doge. And yet it is a strange life, a king's. What an unreal universe of flags and cannons and phrases must monarchs inhabit! Do they think that ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... ye was under the weather; was that so? Ye look spry 'nough now," he shouted in his best quarter-deck voice. ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... here, if you please, my dear reader, and get you to come with me on board his (I beg pardon, her) Majesty's ship Tartar for a few minutes, for on the quarter-deck of that noble sloop there are at this moment two men ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... end of the quarter-deck of Drake's ship, the "Revenge," was a group of three young officers, of whom two at least were not much more profitably employed than those who were playing cards in the "Ark Royal." They were all volunteers, and the eldest of the three was but two-and-twenty. One was seated ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt
... Opdam was driven back to the Texel with the loss of several ships. The Duke of York had behaved with courage and spirit during the fight, and was covered with splashes of the blood of officers killed beside him on the quarter-deck, where he himself was slightly wounded. But he showed slackness and irresolution in the pursuit, and failed to reap the full ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... a berth in the steam-boat Castor for Marseilles; the vessel was full to overflowing with passengers; the whole quarter-deck, even the best place, was occupied by travelling carriages; under one of these I had my bed laid; many people followed my example, and the quarter-deck was soon covered with mattresses and carpets. It blew strongly; the wind increased, and in the second and third night raged ...
— The True Story of My Life • Hans Christian Andersen
... Hudson came Passenger in the Vessel that arriv'd at Cape-Ann, mention'd in our last, which saw a Wreck in Lat: 36, he says, she was a Frigate built Ship of about 200 Tons burthen, had a Lion Head painted yellow, a short Topgal on Quarter-Deck, a small Tafrail painted yellow, Quarters and Stern painted blue, had a large Trophies painted on her Stern and gilt, full of Water, and no living ...
— The Olden Time Series: Vol. 2: The Days of the Spinning-Wheel in New England • Various
... wanted for the soups, if you please," Mr. Cavalcadour continued, not heeding this interruption, and as bold as a captain on his own quarter-deck: "for the stock of clear soup, you will get a leg of beef, a leg ...
— A Little Dinner at Timmins's • William Makepeace Thackeray
... at every doorway to let me go through first, he carried me off in his custody after all. As we crossed the quarter-deck two shabby individuals stepped forward and in mournful silence offered me business cards which I took from them without a word under his heavy eye. It was a useless and gloomy ceremony. They were the touts of the other ship-chandlers, ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... guess he'll come out right; but at any rate you can't help him now.' ... Mr. Lincoln always had a pleasant word to say the last thing at night and the first thing in the morning. He was always the first one to awake, although not the first to rise. The day-time was spent principally upon the quarter-deck, and the President entertained us with numerous anecdotes and incidents of his life, of the most interesting character. Few were aware of the physical strength possessed by Mr. Lincoln. In muscular power he ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... keel to masthead, from quarter-deck to forecastle, with a deadly shuddering as though invisible claws had just checked it at ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... Cavaliere Cesare Cavanglia. In various encounters with Turkish galleons and the barques of buccaneers, the young Medico proved himself no coward—indeed the Admiral reported of him most favourably. Well for his fame had Piero remained before the mast and upon the quarter-deck. ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... lost nearly 300 men, in addition to her former loss; the last, 350. Both at length struck; and Lieutenant Andrews, of the AGAMEMNON, brother to the lady to whom Nelson had become attached in France, and, in Nelson's own words, "as gallant an officer as ever stepped a quarter-deck," hoisted English colours on board them both. The rest of the enemy's ships' behaved very ill. As soon as these vessels had struck, Nelson went to Admiral Hotham and proposed that the two prizes ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... looked. A few sprightly Greek youths, in their picturesque costume were dispersed here and there in the waist and on the forecastle, while two or three persons wearing the same dress and evidently of that nation, were talking together in a group upon the weather-side of the quarter-deck. ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray
... must overwhelm us, instead of which it rushed grandly by, rolling and shaking us from stem to stern, and sending fountains of spray on board. Tom (Mr. Brassey) was looking at the stern compass, Allnutt being close to him. Mr. Bingham and Mr. Freer were smoking, half-way between the quarter-deck and the after-companion, where Captain Brown, Dr. Potter, Muriel, and I were standing. Captain Lecky, seated on a large coil of rope, placed on the box of the rudder, was spinning Mabelle a yarn. A new hand was steering, and just at the moment when ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams
... going to Lord Camperdown's house in Edinburgh with my mother, to see a very large painting, representing the quarter-deck of the "Venerable," Admiral Duncan, as large as life, standing upright, and the Dutch Admiral, De Winter, presenting his sword to my father. Another representation of the same scene may be seen among the numerous pictures of naval battles which decorate the walls of the great hall at Greenwich ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... expected visitors. As it was known that the strictness of Japanese etiquette would not allow the high commissioners to sit at the same table with their subordinates, the Commodore ordered two banquets, one to be spread in his cabin for the chief dignitaries, and another on the quarter-deck. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne
... the weather is, that I have only closed my cabin-window once during half of a very damp night; but no one else is so airy. The little goat was as rejoiced to be afloat again as her mistress, and is a regular pet on board, with the run of the quarter-deck. She still gives milk—a perfect Amalthaea. The butcher, who has the care of her, cockers her up with dainties, and she begs biscuit of the cook. I pay nothing for her fare. M-'s tortoises are in my cabin, and seem very happy. ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon
... the Tremendous kept out of the line, but on being ordered in by signal from the Admiral, she bore down after some time. A little before 11 our brave Admiral (Pasley) lost his leg by an 18-pound shot, which came through the barricading of the quarter-deck. It was now the heat of the action. The Caesar was not yet come close to his opponent, who in consequence of that fired all his after guns at us. Our own ship kept up a severe fire, and by keeping well astern to let the Caesar ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott
... the binnacle, and the ship's head at south (magnetic), gave the mean variation 1 deg. 12' east; but with the surveying compass alone it was 1 deg. 39' east, which is what I allowed in the survey. On the preceding day the two guns upon the quarter-deck, nearest to the binnacle, had been struck down into the after-hold, from a persuasion that the differences so often found in the variations and bearings when on different tacks must arise from some iron placed ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... as the skipper, Burr, and Otway paced the quarter-deck before going ashore to play a game or two of billiards and meet some friends, a boat came alongside, and a man stepped on deck and inquired for the captain. As he followed Robertson down the companion, Otway saw that he was ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... against the mizen shrouds, between the coils of rope. Nobody appeared to notice her, although the quarter-deck was fast filling with persons driven back by the fire, yet still shrinking from the terror and uncertainty of the sea. She thought: "It is but death—why should I fear? The waves are at hand, to save me from ...
— Beauty and The Beast, and Tales From Home • Bayard Taylor
... all the officers and most of the men. Nothing is said of any aversion he seemed to feel to the shocking repast. Nay, when, upon Cook's return on board, for he had been at this time absent on shore, another piece of the flesh was broiled and brought to the quarter-deck, that he also might be an eye-witness of what his officers had already seen, one of the New Zealanders, he tells us, "ate it with surprising avidity. This," he adds, "had such an effect on some of our people as ...
— John Rutherford, the White Chief • George Lillie Craik
... rolled emptily. Nevertheless, her rigging was taut and ship-shape, and her decks scrupulously clean. Indeed, in that uncertain light, the only moving figure besides the two motionless shadows at the wheel was engaged in scrubbing the quarter-deck—which, with its grated settees and stacked camp-chairs, seemed to indicate the presence of cabin passengers. For the barque Excelsior, from New York to San Francisco, had discharged the bulk of her cargo at Callao, and had extended ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... the point, and stood on her way down the Tappan Zee. Every outline of her hull now came clearer and clearer. There were her heavy quarter-davits, her hoisting gear, and whale-killing gear; her long, sharp boats, lashed so carefully, some to her davits, others athwart her quarter-deck frames; and about all of which there was a mysterious interest. These whale ships were at that day an object of distrust in the minds of the honest Dutchmen along the banks of the Hudson, who never saw them go to sea without shaking their ...
— The Von Toodleburgs - Or, The History of a Very Distinguished Family • F. Colburn Adams
... cried, slipping his arm through hers and pacing off with her. "Some day," he added, "I am coming here to settle down with you to enjoy it all, and when I do I mean to let four legs carry me whenever there is the least excuse for so doing. My own have done enough pacing of the quarter-deck to have ...
— Peggy Stewart: Navy Girl at Home • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... order. That the Cayuga was thus exposed arose from the amiable desire of the admiral to gratify Bailey's laudable wish to share in the battle, without compelling an officer of the same grade, and junior only in number, to accept a superior on his own quarter-deck in the day of battle, when the harvest of distinction is expected to repay the patient sowing of preparation. The commander of the Cayuga, who was only a lieutenant, had reconciled these conflicting claims by volunteering to carry Bailey's divisional ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... Estimates. Instantly Commodore HARCOURT appeared in offing; landed on Front Opposition Bench, diffusing unwonted smell of stale mussels and seaweed. Commodore looked very imposing pacing down quarter-deck towards Mace, with telescope under his arm, sou'wester pulled well over his ears, and unpolished square-toed boots rising above his knees. A blizzard outside; snow and wind; bitterly cold; but the Commodore soon ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, March 21, 1891 • Various
... down the river—for, being only in deep ballast trim, she towed light, and passed ahead of nearly all the inward-bound craft—and at length a great bluff-bowed, deeply-laden barque was overtaken, the quarter-deck occupants of which appeared to manifest not only admiration but quite a surprising amount of curiosity as the two vessels closed. For a little group of men and women had gathered aft on board this barque for the evidently express purpose of getting the longest and best possible view ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... England. A full round moon rose over the sandbanks behind them as Captain Barker sent the pilots ashore and stood easily out to sea, for the most of his merchant-ships were sluggish sailers, and not a few overladen. So clear was the night that, as he paced the quarter-deck with the dew falling steadily around him, he could not only count their thirty-six lanterns, but even discern their piled canvas glimmering as they stole like ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the appearance of the vessel differed in no wise from that of an ordinary transport. But in the waist a curious sight presented itself. It was as though one had built a cattle-pen there. At the foot of the foremast, and at the quarter-deck, a strong barricade, loop-holed and furnished with doors for ingress and egress, ran across the deck from bulwark to bulwark. Outside this cattle-pen an armed sentry stood on guard; inside, standing, sitting, or walking monotonously, ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... "You need not use any force!" And putting out his hands, the captain slipped the irons on, and sent him aft to the quarter-deck. ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... reports of his discovery, written upon parchment. Each of these he wrapped in a cloth and inclosed in the middle of a large cake of wax, which was then securely shut up in a barrel. One of the barrels was flung into the sea, the other remained standing on the little quarter-deck to await the fate of the caravel. The anxiety was not lessened by the sight of land on the 15th, for it was impossible to approach it so as to go ashore, and there was much danger of being ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... and Germany. At ten o'clock we weighed anchor again and steered southwards, between the groups of the Cyclades, under a cloudless sky and over a sea of the brightest blue. The days were endurable under the canvas awning of our quarter-deck, but the nights in our berths were sweat-baths, which left us so limp and exhausted that we were almost fit to vanish, ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... now ordered the men to get a spare boat from its cranes over the quarter-deck and ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... Americans may not eat their fish with silver forks, nor lave their fingers in the most approved style; yet they are by no means so contemptible a people as some of our small gentry affect to think. They may too, occasionally, be put down in political argument, by the dogmatical method of the quarter-deck; but I must confess that I never was so fortunate as to come in contact with any who reasoned so badly as the persons Captain Bazil ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall
... pistol-shot, when the two broadsides were let fly at almost exactly the same moment. With the first fire, both commanders fell. Capt. Blyth of the English vessel was almost cut in two by a round shot as he stood on his quarter-deck. He died instantly. Lieut. Burrows was struck by a canister-shot, which inflicted a mortal wound. He refused to be carried below, and was tenderly laid upon the deck, where he remained during the remainder of the battle, cheering on his men, and crying out ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... describe the earlier life-stages gone through by the author of this book. The experiences acquired in a field of operations, that includes all the seas and continents where commerce may move, live, and have its being, have enhanced in value and completed what came to him in his forecastle and quarter-deck times. He learned in his youth, from the lips of a race now extinct, what the nature and traditions of seamanship were before he and his contemporaries lived. He has seen that nature and those traditions change and die, whilst he and his generation ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman
... the other controller of the squadron, they prevailed on 48 men to join in the conspiracy under the command and direction of Francis de Porras, the captain of the Bermuda. Being all ready armed on the morning of the 2nd January 1504, Captain Francis de Porras came upon the quarter-deck of the admirals ship, and addressed the admiral saying, "My lord, what is the reason that you will not go to Hispaniola, and keep us all in this place to perish?" On hearing these unusually insolent words, and suspecting what might be hatching, the admiral calmly answered that he did not ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... to the other passengers. Only one man on board was aware of his guilt, Guy believed, and that one man he shunned accordingly as far as was possible within the narrow limits of the saloon and the quarter-deck. ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... the squire, and Doctor Livesey were talking together on the quarter-deck, and anxious as I was to tell them my story, I durst not interrupt them openly. While I was still casting about in my thoughts to find some probable excuse, Doctor Livesey called me to his side. He had left his pipe below, ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Chesapeake's foreign crew threw down their arms, and the triumphant enemy hauled down the Chesapeake's flag. A few days later, the two ships sailed into the harbor of Halifax, Lawrence's body, wrapped in his ship's flag, lying in state on the quarter-deck. He was buried with military honors, first at Halifax, and then at New York, where Hull, Stewart and Bainbridge were among those who carried the pall. His cry, "Don't give up the ship!" was to be the motto of another battle, far to the west, where Great Britain experienced ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... her, talking to himself,—'I've a great mind to leave the place;—and what food for scandal that piece of folly would give rise to!' Then he was silent for a time; his hands in his pockets, his eyes on the ground, as he continued his quarter-deck march. Suddenly he stopped close to Miss Browning's chair. 'I'm thoroughly ungrateful to you, for as true a mark of friendship as you've ever shown to me. True or false, it was right I should know the wretched scandal that was being circulated; and ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... with my saw, and cut a piece of a beam through, which I thought held some of the upper part or quarter-deck together, and when I had cut it through, I cleared away the sand as well as I could from the side which lay highest; but the tide coming in, I was obliged to give over for ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... confined below. The bullets, which constantly whistled over the deck, did no damage beyond cutting down the flag—which, however was promptly hoisted again—and battering up the officers' rooms on the quarter-deck, which were not iron-clad. Several attempts were made to dislodge the rebels, but, as usual, without success. On the third day, however, a heavy firing up the river, in the direction of Alexandria, announced ...
— Frank on the Lower Mississippi • Harry Castlemon
... Matthew, but he was commonly addressed as Matt. The dignity of Mr was never by any chance applied to chief officers of this class of vessel, though quarter-deck manners were always strictly sustained so far as the captain was concerned. He was the only person who claimed the right of being addressed as "Sir," and he would brook no violation of its use. Matt, as he was called, was made the ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... walked up and down the room for a few moments, as though he were pacing a quarter-deck. He looked very tall, and very, very slight and thin; older than his years, tanned and dried by the African sun, which had enhanced his natural darkness. Though he spoke as a boy, he looked like a man. His mother's heart yearned ...
— Peter's Mother • Mrs. Henry De La Pasture
... same fashion. Some were fair, and others very dark, being the sons of black women and white Moorish merchants who had for a long time been established in the country. A couch covered with a carpet for the Moors to sit upon, and chairs being placed on the quarter-deck, the Captains in their richest costumes stood ready to receive the Sheikh as he arrived alongside. The trumpets then sounded, and the sailors assisted him to ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... was of a destruction so far-reaching and of a world so altered that it seemed foolish to go in any direction and expect to find things as they had been before the war began. I sat on the quarter-deck with Mylius my engineer and Kemp and two others of the non-commissioned officers, and we consulted upon our line of action. We were foodless and aimless. We agreed that our fighting value was extremely small, and that our first duty was ...
— The World Set Free • Herbert George Wells
... enjoyed their pranks and sometimes suggested new ones. When other amusements failed, the quartet spent their time on the flat roof of the White House, which was perfectly safe, being surrounded by a strong balustrade. There they built a cabin, and the roof was in turn a quarter-deck, or a fort, and they used to raise and lower the flag with proper ceremony, and look off through a spy-glass for a "strange sail," and Budd's sister tells how one day when she ascended to the stronghold with a stern demand for ...
— Ten Boys from History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... he would be like; whether he would be agreeable, or disposed to look down upon me as a boy, I went back on deck, and stood about watching the busy scene, and learning which was the quarter-deck, steerage, forecastle, and the like. By virtue of being an officer, I found myself at liberty to go where I pleased, and noted which were passengers and which were ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... pacing quarter-deck, uttering lamentations over collapse of the Eastbourne stand against the Salvationists. Bill amending Eastbourne Improvement Act up for Third Reading. JEREMIAH had proposed to introduce Clause enabling inhabitants of town to protect themselves against the Sabbath incursions of a mob in red waistcoats ...
— Punch Volume 102, May 28, 1892 - or the London Charivari • Various
... of All Saints, where I hoped to have the governor's help, if need should require, for securing my ship from any such mutinous attempt; being forced to keep myself all the way upon my guard, and to lie with my officers, such as I could trust, and with small arms upon the quarter-deck; it scarce being safe for me to lie in my cabin by reason of the discontents ...
— A Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier
... of an hour's struggling with the waves, it reached the spot where the admiral's vessel was anchored, and from the side of which two boats had already been dispatched towards their aid. Upon the quarter-deck of the flagship, sheltered by a canopy of velvet and ermine, which was suspended by stout supports, Henrietta, the queen dowager, and the young princess—with the admiral, the Duke of Norfolk—standing beside them—watched with alarm this slender bark, at one moment ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... with the fists in right earnest. The officers of the ship did not interfere—in fact the mate drew near and looked on, rather as I thought with an interest in the combat, than with any desire to put an end to it, and the captain remained upon his quarter-deck, apparently not caring how it ended! I wondered at this want of discipline, but I had already begun to wonder at many other matters that occurred daily on board the Pandora, and ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... Land and Sea Winds. I had one Passenger aboard, a sad troublesome wicked Fellow, whose Behaviour was so bad, that I could hardly forbear using him ill. I forbid my Officers keeping Company with him; but Mr. B——s would do it at all Events. I turn'd him once off the Quarter-Deck for being with him there, yet that did not avail. I came out one Night about half an Hour past Ten, my second Mate's Watch, and this B——s's Turn to sleep; and seeing a Light in his Cabin, I sent Mr. Cuddon, the second Mate, to him, to know how he would ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various
... of thought. It is the one tie which links together their widely differing races. Let us give an illustration of our meaning. On an Austrian Lloyd's steamboat in the Levant a traveller from Beyrout will frequently see strange groups of men crowded together on the quarter-deck. In the morning the missal books of the Greek Church will be laid along the bulwarks of the ship, and a couple of Russian priests, coming from Jerusalem, will be busy muttering mass. A yard to right or left a Turkish pilgrim, returning from Mecca, ...
— Our Fathers Have Told Us - Part I. The Bible of Amiens • John Ruskin
... only, for a cloud of cloth-yard arrows whistled through the rigging, picking off a dozen or so of the men perched there, and grazing the polished breastplates of not a few of the bewildered grandees on the quarter-deck. ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... of one's internal workings is not unusual even in Britons who "go down to the sea in ships," but such genius as our family has displayed has, so history assures us, shone best on a quarter-deck; and on this occasion it pleased God ultimately to add another naval victory to our credit. It is generally admitted that an abnormal mentality accompanies this not uncommon experience of human life, and I found my lack of appreciation ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... there's nothing to keep up with, and I'm inclined to agree with him." The old spacehound's voice took on a quarter-deck rasp. "It's a combination of psionics, witchcraft and magic. None of it ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith
... Peters can hold more grog than any man I ever saw; he keeps right side up, but is as savage as a norther, and makes things lively all round. I've seen him knock a fellow down with a belaying pin, and couldn't lend a hand. Better luck now, I hope.' And Emil frowned as if he already trod the quarter-deck, ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... the group of officers who were standing on the quarter-deck a short distance away, waiting to hear the news when the major had given his report, he said: "You may as well come now and hear Major Harrison's story; it will save his telling it twice. You will be glad ...
— With Moore At Corunna • G. A. Henty
... This person was about fifty years old, and his air, as well as his attire, denoted a mariner; not a common seaman, nor yet altogether an officer; but one of those of a middle station, who in navies used to form a class by themselves; being of a rank that entitled them to the honours of the quarter-deck, though out of the regular line of promotion. In a word, he wore the unpretending uniform of a master. A century ago, the dress of the English naval officer was exceedingly simple, though more appropriate to the profession perhaps, than the more showy attire that ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... our decks were clean, our sails white, our masts well scraped; the brass-work about the quarter-deck was well polished, and the men looked tidy and clean. A few hours after our first whale had been secured alongside all this was changed. The cutting up of the huge carcass covered the decks with oil and blood, making them so slippery that they had to be covered with sand to enable ...
— Fighting the Whales • R. M. Ballantyne
... person on the 1st of July 1644. On that day the two fleets encountered off Kolberge Heath, S.E. of Kiel Bay, and Christian displayed a heroism which endeared him ever after to the Danish nation and made his name famous in song and story. As he stood on the quarter-deck of the "Trinity" a cannon close by was exploded by a Swedish bullet, and splinters of wood and metal wounded the king in thirteen places, blinding one eye and flinging him to the deck. But he was instantly on his feet again, cried with a loud voice that ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... who served on shipboard during the first revolutionary war, and saw some hard fighting, that at the close of a hot engagement, in which victory remained with the British, the captain of the vessel in which he sailed—a devout and brave man—called his crew together upon the quarter-deck, and offered up thanks to God in an impressive prayer. The noble ship in which he sailed was the property of the State, and he himself a State-paid official; but was there anything in either circumstance to justify a protest from even the most rabid Voluntary against the part which he ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller
... Heru, for so she was called, was resting one arm upon his knee at our approach and pulling a blue convolvulus bud to pieces—a charming picture of dainty idleness. Anything so soft, so silken as that little lady was never seen before. Who am I, a poor quarter-deck loafer, that I should attempt to describe what poet and painter alike would have failed to realise? I know, of course, your stock descriptives: the melting eye, the coral lip, the peachy cheek, the ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... whole thing was over, and he had the Englishman's sword, in the midst of the state and ceremony of the quarter-deck, he said: ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... growls of rough laughter, and by the emphatic way in which, during a pause, they squirted their tobacco-juice on the deck. What gave additional zest to this particular yarn, too, was the fact of its hero being no less than the captain himself, who was at this moment on the poop quarter-deck of the ship, pointing out something to a group of ladies by the round-house—a tall, handsome-looking man of about forty, with all the mingled gravity and frank good humor of a sailor in his firm, weather-tinted ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, August 1850 - of Literature, Science and Art. • Various
... as if it were 'Blackstone;' he indulged in reminiscences; he made digressions and told anecdotes; he spoke of the manoeuvres of the vessels, of the shifting of the wind, of the course of the fight, like one whose life had been passed on (p. 218) the quarter-deck. No greater evidence of self-reliance, of indifference to the opinion of the world, and to that of his countrymen in particular, of the rarest descriptive talent, of pertinacity, loyalty to personal conviction, and a manly, firm, yet not unkindly ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... of laughter greeted this speech, and in another minute Ted Flaggan stood bowing modestly on the quarter-deck of the flag-ship. ...
— The Pirate City - An Algerine Tale • R.M. Ballantyne
... becomes by custom so agreeable to a sailor that on shore he often hems himself within the same bounds. Lord Kames tells of a man who, having relinquished the sea for a country life, reared an artificial mount, with a level summit, resembling a quarter-deck not only in shape, but in size, where he generally walked. When Franklin was superintending the erection of some forts on the frontier, as a defense against the Indians, he slept at night in a blanket on a hard ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... more about it. Mr. Ernescliffe was as fine an officer as ever stepped a quarter-deck, and Mr. May here won't fall short of him; and was I to be after leaving the like of them to the mercy of the black fellows—that was not so bad neither? If it had only pleased God that we had brought them both back to ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... a hurried adieu to my friends, and went on board. The quarter-deck, which retained its awning day and night, was divided into two compartments, one of which was reserved for the promenade of the cabin passengers, the other for the bivouac of the Turks, who retained their camp habits with amusing minuteness, making the larboard quarter a vast tent ...
— Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family • Andrew Archibald Paton
... Lord Roberts also left the country, to take over the duties of Commander-in-Chief. High as his reputation stood when, in January, he landed at Cape Town, it is safe to say that it had been immensely enhanced when, ten months later, he saw from the quarter-deck of the 'Canada' the Table Mountain growing dimmer in the distance. He found a series of disconnected operations, in which we were uniformly worsted. He speedily converted them into a series of connected operations in which we were almost uniformly successful. Proceeding to the front at the ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... four o'clock in the afternoon, as I was walking on the quarter-deck, all the people upon the forecastle called out at once, "Land right a-head;" it was then very black almost round the horizon, and we had had much thunder and lightning; I looked forward under the fore-sail, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... The officers and most of the crew of the Epervier saw him depart, with tears in their eyes, and continued to cheer him as long as their voices could be heard. Captain Maitland received him respectfully, but without any salute or distinguished honours. Napoleon uncovered himself on reaching the quarter-deck, and said in a firm tone of voice, "I come to place myself under the protection of ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... reply only feebly from a few forward guns; then, the vessels being close together, and the British forging slowly ahead, threatening to cross the American's stern, the helm of the latter was put up. As the "Constitution" turned away, the bowsprit of the "Guerriere" lunged over her quarter-deck, and became entangled by her port mizzen-rigging; the result being that the two fell into the same line, the "Guerriere" astern and fastened to her antagonist as described. (5) In her crippled condition for manoeuvring, it was possible ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... act of piracy, committed under our very noses, too," commented the skipper to me as the smoke rose up into the clear atmosphere and hung like a great pall immediately over the doomed ship. We were walking together fore and aft upon the quarter-deck at the time, whistling most earnestly and devoutly for a wind, as indeed were all hands fore and aft. Suddenly Captain Vernon paused, and, wetting the back of his hand, held it ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... exhorting generals and soldiers to show themselves worthy of a cause which he had persuaded himself was holy. Fired by his eloquence and by the sight of the enemy, his hearers answered with eager shouts, while Don John returned to his ship; knelt upon the quarter-deck, and offered a prayer. He then ordered the trumpets to sound the assault, commanded his sailing-master to lay him alongside the Turkish Admiral, and the battle began. The Venetians, who were first attacked, destroyed ship after ship ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... said quietly, and proceeded to issue his orders as briskly as he had done, years before, on his own quarter-deck. ...
— On Land And Sea At The Dardanelles • Thomas Charles Bridges
... peace. She had no wonder how he came there: it was enough that he was there. He first thought of the destruction that was present with them. He was as calm and composed as if they sat beneath the thorn-tree on the still moorlands, far away. He took her, without a word, to the end of the quarter-deck. He lashed her to a piece of spar. ...
— The Moorland Cottage • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... isn't," declared the lieutenant, bluntly, offering his friend a cigarette and lighting one himself. "No, depend upon it, poor old Dick was a man of mystery. Many strange rumours were afloat concerning him. Yet, after all, he was a real fine fellow, and as smart an officer as ever trod a quarter-deck. He was a splendid linguist, and had fine prospects, for he has an uncle an admiral on the National Defence Committee. Yet he chucked it all and became a cosmopolitan wanderer, and—if there be any truth in the gossip I've ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... ideas, but he has an unconquerable belief in himself, and a very genuine pride in, and admiration of, GERALD. His grey hair is bald on the top, and he is clean-shaven except for a hint of whisker. He might pass for a retired Captain R. N., and he has something of the quarter-deck manner, so that even a remark on the weather is listened to with attention. Neither of his sons loves him, but GERALD is no longer afraid of him. LADY FARRINGDON is outwardly rather intimidating, but she never feels so. She worships GERALD; and would ...
— First Plays • A. A. Milne
... eight bells rang out in the morning air, the captain on the quarter-deck, with Mr. Webb and the professor, were engaged in angry talk with ...
— Crusoes of the Frozen North • Gordon Stables
... to lashing yards, blinded, soaked, benumbed, the gale above, death below. And yet even here there were some, no better indeed than he, who grasped the meager prizes that even the sea itself could not withhold; prizes that he could never hope to touch—the command of ships, the right to tread the quarter-deck, the handle to one's name. How did they do it, these favored ones of fortune? How did Hansen, that stinking Dutchman, ever rise to be the master of the Northern Light?—and that swine Bates, the mate, ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne
... comrades, one of whom was drowned. Thus, gradually, originated the traditional career of the men of this family,—"a gray-headed shipmaster in each generation," as the often-quoted passage puts it, "retiring from the quarter-deck to the homestead, while a boy of fourteen took the hereditary place before the mast." But the most eminent among these hardy skippers is Daniel, the son of farmer Joseph, and grandfather ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... the spearman and is armed with a light pole about eight or ten feet long, having a soft pad of rags, or better yet, of water-proof canvas duck to keep it from getting wet and soggy. If a flat-bottom boat is used, the spearman stands on one of the end seats. A quarter-deck or raised platform should be built on an ordinary boat or canoe. The battle is fought in rounds and by points. If you put your opponent back into the boat with one foot it counts you 5; two feet, 10. If he loses his spear you count 5 (except ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson
... been able to make out her flag with certainty. That she was a full-rigged ship was sure enough, and if Ned had been upon her deck instead of upon his own, he would have discovered that she was heavily armed and in apple-pie order. At this very moment a burly officer upon her quarter-deck was roaring, angrily, in response to some information which had ...
— Ahead of the Army • W. O. Stoddard
... name remains to describe the front part of every ship, and is now pronounced fo'c's'le or foxle. The same sort of top-hamper (that is, anything that makes the ship top-heavy) was cut down, bit by bit, as time went on, from the quarter-deck over the stern; till at last the big British men-of-war became more or less like the Victory, which was Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar, and which is still kept in Portsmouth Harbour, where Henry VIII's first promise ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... been made up regarding details, and he was reciting them for her guidance—"and take him straight to my house, and then come for you. You kin have it out together. Only one thing, Miss Jane"—here his voice changed and something of his old quarter-deck manner showed itself in his face and gestures—"if he's laid his course and wants to keep hold of the tiller I ain't goin' to block his way and he shall make his harbor, don't make no difference who or what gits in the channel. Ain't neither of us earned any extry ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... day, Sunday excepted, they were exercised at the guns; and on Tuesdays and Fridays the fleet cleared for action, when each ship fired six broadsides. On board the Queen Charlotte a twelve-pounder was secured at the after part of the quarter-deck, with which the first and second captains of the guns practised daily at a small target, hung at the fore topmast studding-sail boom. The target was a frame of laths, three feet square, crossed with rope-yarns so close ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... their hats in their hands. The Prince had had arranged on the deck a chapel, decked with flags and trophies of arms, the altar being placed at the foot of the mizzen-mast. The coffin, carried by our sailors, passed between two ranks of officers with drawn swords, and was placed on the quarter-deck. The absolution was pronounced by the Abbe Coquereau the same evening. Next day, at ten o'clock, a solemn mass was celebrated on the deck, in presence of the officers and part of the crews of the ships. His Royal ...
— The Second Funeral of Napoleon • William Makepeace Thackeray (AKA "Michael Angelo Titmarch")
... that it was the first duty of a sailor to assist a human being in distress, he was not sure that the same effort was required in behalf of one who had already ceased to live. Captain Cumberland, in command of the ship, who had been in the cabin when the excitement commenced, now appeared upon the quarter-deck, and relieved the officer of the responsibility of the moment. Judson reported the cause of the unwonted scene on deck, and as the captain discovered the little boat, just on the weather bow, he promptly directed the ship to be ...
— Up The Baltic - Young America in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark • Oliver Optic
... quarter-deck of the Ranger, deep in thought, paced the captain, John Paul Jones, a man of meagre build but of indomitable will, and as daring a fighter as roved the ocean {2} in this year 1778. He held a letter of marque ...
— The Red River Colony - A Chronicle of the Beginnings of Manitoba • Louis Aubrey Wood
... Oliver rose, glanced at Audrey and her mother, received some telepathic communication from them, and assumed his old quarter-deck manner. ...
— Scarhaven Keep • J. S. Fletcher |
