"Figurehead" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... He knows it, she knows it, and a few other people know it. He's the figurehead behind which she works. She's a rich woman, she loves the game—her father was the greatest diplomat of his time, you know—and she married Cortlandt so she could play it. Any other man would have served as well, though I've heard that he showed promise ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... appeared. A new personality; a plausible personality, deceptive because self-deceiving—yet not so thoroughly self-deceived that it was in danger of hindering its own ambition. David Hull—just the kind of respectable, popular figurehead and cloak the desperate ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips
... the scene closes with his whispered request to the doctor for poison to end his life. You remember Oswald Alving and his cry: "The sun, mother, give me the sun!" Act last shows the first scene, the beach, and a figurehead from a brig which had stranded during a storm some years before. This carved head and bust of a woman with streaming hair serves as a symbol. Gabriel is attracted by the wooden image, as is Lucie. The painter ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... to work incognito. I was taken on as a kind of go-between and, as I may say, figurehead, on the strength of being my father's son and a very self-confident young gentleman, and began to get my newspaper education in point of fact as a kind of fetch-and-carry for Major Heiss. He was a practical newspaper man who had started the Union at Nashville as well as ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... fictitious characters. We have made a great advance on that unsatisfactory and effete style. To satisfy the exacting palate of our reading people, we require a real flesh-and-blood detective, with a popular name and reputation, to pose as the figurehead, while an ingenious scribbler does the romancing. There is something thrilling and realistic in this method, and it carries an air of veracity which is irresistibly attractive and convincing. The French people did something ...
— Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations • William Howe
... a good deal of an exhibit, in his way. His togs were cut to fit his spars, and he carried 'em well—no wrinkles at the peak or sag along the boom. His figurehead was more'n average regular, and his hair was combed real nice—the part in the middle of it looked like it had been laid out with a plumb-line. Also, he had on white shoes and glory hallelujah stockings. Altogether, he was alone with the price of admission, and what ...
— Cape Cod Stories - The Old Home House • Joseph C. Lincoln
... may be dated, I believe, from that period. The Queen's long withdrawal from the public eye, consequent upon her widowhood, had led the multitude, ignorant of the manner in which she devoted herself to the heavy duties of her position, to regard her as being little more than a figurehead. Certain politicians, in the autumn of 1871, had taken advantage of this state of feeling to begin a crusade against the monarchy, and a section of the extreme Radicals really seemed to believe that the glorious Throne of England was about to ...
— Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 • Stuart J. Reid, ed.
... court affirming their right to do certain things which England, they knew, would be indisposed to permit. In brief, they claimed religious and civil independence, the latter in all but name, and left the king to be a figurehead without perquisites or power. They followed this intrepid statement by solemnly proclaiming Charles in Boston, and threw a sop to Cerberus in the shape of a letter couched in conciliating terms, feigning ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... more serious demands upon our loyalty than this he will be well served," he answered. "There is no one more fit to command than you, sir. The present admirable disposition of our forces is yours, not mine; so far I have been no more than a figurehead. Your plan of entrenchments has been a revelation to ...
— The Traitors • E. Phillips (Edward Phillips) Oppenheim
... a display of enthusiasm and promises to place the power about to be conferred on them by the people in the hands of those who will serve its antipathies and prejudices. Thus introduced into the municipal council, they constitute its majority and appoint a mayor who is their figurehead or creature, now the bold leader and again the docile instrument of their spite, their favors, and their headlong action, of their blunders and presumption, and of their meddlesome disposition and encroachments.—In the department, the council general, also elected by universal suffrage, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... long afterwards. "Two little rooms, enough for me; a poor civil woman pleased to have me in them." It fronts the sea, and is (or was) a small two-storeyed house, with a patch of grass before it, a summer-house, and a big white figurehead, belike of the shipwrecked Clare. So over the garden-gate FitzGerald leant one June morning, and asked me, a boy of eight, was my father at home. I remember him dimly then as a tall sea- browned man, who took ...
— Two Suffolk Friends • Francis Hindes Groome
... this doth reveal Most aptly how sweet concert for the time Doth work our purpose on this pliant soul. So long as he from contact with his kind We can prevent by flattery and guile; He, like to wax within the moulder's hand, May form a figurehead of brave design, But statue-like it were an empty house. 1st Gentleman: I have a thought, sweet Quezox, and must voice It in thine ear. Soon, from that distant land Where our oppressors dwell, others will hie Them to our shores; and they may ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)
... Had the battered figurehead of the Goddess of Liberty, which lay deeply embedded in the sand on the beach, suddenly appeared at the door demanding admittance, the occupants of the cabin could not have been more speechlessly ...
— Mrs. Skaggs's Husbands and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... disturbances, they will select a man of the type of Li Wang of Korea, who betrayed his country to Japan, and make him Emperor of China. Whether this man will be the deposed emperor or a member of the Imperial family or the leader of the rebel party, remains to be seen. In any event he will be a figurehead in whose hand will not be vested political, financial and military power, which will be controlled by foreigners. All the valuable mines, various kinds of industries and our abundant natural resources will likewise be developed by others. China will ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale
... you're in a fix.' Then I fancied I saw a gilt figure-head and three masts, belonging to a ship just about to start; so I darted on board, but speedily jumped on shore again, when I found that two of the masts belonged to another vessel, and the figurehead to a third! At last I caught sight of what I made sure was it,—a fine large vessel just casting off her moorings. The tafferel was green. Three masts,—yes, that must be it,—and the gilt figure-head of Hercules. To be sure it had a three-pronged pitchfork in its hand instead ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... Nummy Tangye, of the Touch-me-not, relinquished his command. Captain Tangye's baptismal name was Matthias, and Bideford, in Devon, his native town. But the Touch-me-not, which he had commanded for thirty-five years, happened to carry for figurehead a wooden Highlander holding a thistle close to his chest, and against his thigh a scroll with the motto, Noli Me Tangere, and this being, in popular belief, an effigy of the captain taken in the prime of life, Mr. Tangye cheerfully accepted the fiction with its implication of Scottish descent, ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... India Company. Macaulay, being the strongest man on the Board, was naturally chosen its secretary, just as the best man in a jury is chosen foreman. Here was a man who was not content to be a mere figurehead in office, trusting to paid clerks and underlings to secure him information and do the work—not he. Macaulay set himself the task of thoroughly acquainting himself with Indian affairs. He read every book of importance bearing on the subject; ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... nothing better to begin with, and the voyage would be long enough for me to try my sea legs, and, as he believed, to cure me of my fancy for a sea life. I was to visit the skipper at the Angel tavern that evening, and if he liked my figurehead, as Woodrow put it, the matter could be settled ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... to be the Dover Castle, a new and very fast ship of the Company's service, of which all traces had been lost since she left Bombay two years before. She was now painted entirely black, and a snake had been added for her figurehead. The original name, however, still remained upon the binnacle and ship's bell. Her former armament had been increased and she now carried thirty guns, of which ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... through he was by an idea both pregnant and ingenious, naturally bethought himself that if the enterprise failed, the blame must fall upon somebody. For which reason, it occurred to him to put forward a figurehead director in charge of his commercial machinery. At this day you know the secret of the firm of Claparon and Company, founded by du Tillet, ...
— The Firm of Nucingen • Honore de Balzac
... toiled at the oars; and in the morning, very early, every eye was turned to the fired East, where, in the sea-haze, lay the sacred places clothed (like the Sacrament) in that gauzy veil. First of them Trenchemer steered, the King's red galley, in whose prow, stiff and hieratic as a figurehead, was the King himself, watching for a sign. The great ships rolled and plunged, the tide came racing by them, blue-green water lipped with foam, carrying upon it unknown weeds, golden fruit floating, wreckage unfamiliar, a dead fish scarlet-rayed, ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... your own without complaint, while attending to our various lesser hurts and scratches. Wherefore, just because we feel you are above us in this and many other things, we have set you amongst us as a warning Figurehead, which cries shame upon us if we falter, and reminds us that you, a woman, can do, and probably will do, what we men cannot. Imagine it! You would bear all things for love's sake!—and, frankly speaking, we would bear nothing at all, except for our own ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... succeeded in retaining its republican form. Milan became a duchy. Florence fell under the sway of the Medici. In Venice a few rich families seized all authority, and while the fame and territory of the republic were extended, its dogeship became a mere figurehead. All real power was lodged in the dread and secret council of three.[11] Genoa was defeated and crushed in a great naval contest with her rival, Venice.[12] Everywhere tyrannies stood out triumphant. The first modern ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... workman with his sledge-hammer, bringing to mind the rougher side of industry. In the left corner a woman with her spindle - a lamb standing near - recalls the making of textiles. Commerce occupies the right corner, holding the prow of a vessel with its figurehead. ...
— Palaces and Courts of the Exposition • Juliet James
... sagged with the weight of his decorations. He appeared for the army at great functions, his picture was in the shop-windows. Hedworth Westerling, the new vice-chief of staff, was content with this arrangement. His years would not permit him the supreme honor. This was for a figurehead, while he had ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... you were, and smart, too," answered Silver, shaking hands so heartily that all the barrel shook, "and a finer figurehead for a gentleman of fortune I never clapped my ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... last ruler, whatever his nature might be. A child, a lunatic, a monster, a sage,—it was all the same to these unheeding centuries. The people could not follow those they understood or who understood them. They must trust all to the blind chance of heredity. Tyrant or figurehead, the mob, which from its own indifference creates the pomp of royalty, threw up its caps for the king, and blindly died for him in his courage or in his folly with the same unquestioning loyalty. ...
— The Call of the Twentieth Century • David Starr Jordan
... working quite as well now in my absence as they did in my presence. St. Timothy's is a great, strong society of the rich, and the man they engage to preach to them on Sundays has mighty little to do that any figurehead couldn't do as well. Down here—well, there is something to do which won't get done unless I do it. And if this neighbourhood, or any other similar one, needs me, there's no question that still more do I need ...
— The Brown Study • Grace S. Richmond
... faithful to the flag of T.M. Healy. Meanwhile Justin McCarthy, a man of excellent intention but of feeble grasp, occupied the chair of the Party, but did nothing to direct its policy. He was a decent figurehead, but not much else. William O'Brien lent all the support of his powerful personality to Mr Dillon in the hope that, by establishing his leadership and keeping the door open for reconciliation with the Parnellite minority, ...
— Ireland Since Parnell • Daniel Desmond Sheehan
... trust me for that, sir. I'll show my figurehead there first thing in the mornin'. No fears o' any one getting theer afore me, ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... Mr. Franklin Pierce. His sole recommendation for the exalted office was that he would carry one or two doubtful Northern states and with the solid South could thus be elected. The Whig convention in Baltimore had cast but thirty-two votes for Daniel Webster and had nominated a military figurehead, ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon
... authority to establish local courts subordinate to itself. There was no division of powers in the new frame of government. Legislative, executive, and judicial powers were thrown together in true Bourbon fashion. Apparently it was Colbert's plan to make of the governor a distinguished figurehead, with large military powers but without paramount influence in civil affairs. The bishop was to have no civil jurisdiction, and the intendant was to be the director of details. The Council, according to the edict of 1663, was to be the real pivot ...
— Crusaders of New France - A Chronicle of the Fleur-de-Lis in the Wilderness - Chronicles of America, Volume 4 • William Bennett Munro
... pass-parole; shibboleth. title, heading, docket. address card, visiting card; carte de visite[Fr]. insignia; banner, banneret[obs3], bannerol[obs3]; bandrol[obs3]; flag, colors, streamer, standard, eagle, labarum[obs3], oriflamb[obs3], oriflamme; figurehead; ensign; pennon, pennant, pendant; burgee[obs3], blue Peter, jack, ancient, gonfalon, union jack; banderole, " old glory " [U.S.], quarantine flag; vexillum[obs3]; yellow-flag, yellow jack; tricolor, stars and stripes; bunting. heraldry, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... a man of greater individuality and ability than is generally put to his credit by historians.... In the Cabinet of Jackson he was by no means a figurehead even there, for it was largely due to his skill that Jackson made the two brilliant strokes in his foreign policy.... Van Buren has been pronounced the cleverest political manager in American history, and no other man has ...
— The New York and Albany Post Road • Charles Gilbert Hine
... kindly face of the speaker proved the truth of her assertion, and both girls assented gladly. A few hours' acquaintance had proved Mrs Wolff to be a mere figurehead of a chaperon, and Ruth shrewdly suspected that her very weakness had been the attraction in Mr Farrell's eyes, since, in consequence, she would be less likely to hinder that display of character and self-will which it was his object to ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... the book-rest sat old Jolyon, the figurehead of his family and class and creed, with his white head and dome-like forehead, the representative of moderation, and order, and love of property. As lonely an old man as ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... FIGUREHEAD OF A SHIP.—A good omen for your future Welfare; this symbol predicts that you will be enabled to steer your course through ...
— Telling Fortunes By Tea Leaves • Cicely Kent
... of parchment found in the figurehead of an old vessel tells of a buried treasure. ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.
... the second war year. And anything to help it along. To-morrow, Franz Lipp the new foreign minister of the Soviets will telegraph to Berlin recalling the Bavarian ambassador; there is one, you know—a figurehead. And the good Franz will announce to the world that Bavaria has declared its independence of Prussia. This will be a politic move for the Soviets as well as England. For the bourgeoisie in Bavaria dislike Prussia as much as the communists dislike her. But I bore you ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... smuggled out of the Tower eight years before he was produced, and kept in concealment all through the interval, even while the Yorkist leaders had been reduced to setting up a supposititious Earl of Warwick for a figurehead. ...
— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes
... wide-spread and persistent clamour for 'responsible government,' but no one knew precisely what was meant by it. Who was to be 'responsible'? for what? and to whom? How was it possible to make the local government 'responsible' to the people of the colony without reducing the governor to a figurehead? If his authority were reduced to a shadow, what became of the 'prerogative' and British connection? Was not 'responsible government' simply the prelude to the absolute separation of the colony from ...
— The Winning of Popular Government - A Chronicle of the Union of 1841 • Archibald Macmechan
... mischances, that led up to this denouncement will show that it was not so strange a thing, after all. To take the Lady Barbara, first. Up to the time of her visit to London, Lord Farquhart had been to her something of a figurehead. She had considered him merely as a creature quite inanimate and impersonal, who was to be forced upon her by her father's will just as she was to be forced upon him. But Lord Farquhart in the flesh was a young ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... his call he succinctly outlined all the changes he wishes to see accomplished in this institution. HE forsooth! And what, may I ask, are the duties of a superintendent? Is she merely a figurehead to take ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... understood the place of women; all this nonsense of vows of fidelity and exaltation of sentiment in the home cramps a man's ambitions. It is perfectly natural that he should take a wife if his position calls for it, because the society in which we move has made a figurehead of that kind necessary. But that a woman should expect a man to be faithful to her, be she wife or mistress, is ...
— Halcyone • Elinor Glyn
... along the wall there, and your sofa by them. A clerk over there: it would be a sort of companion. You've plenty of capital to start with, and wouldn't have to lose your head at the first wrong deal. Of course you'd want someone the other end, a figurehead and mouthpiece, and someone to show you the lines, start you off; I'd be pleased to do it. We could make a partnership concern of ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... transformed into a 'sacred right.' Nebraska brings it forth, places it on the high road to extension and perpetuity, and with a pat on its back says to it: 'Go, and God speed you.' Henceforth it is to be the chief jewel of the nation, the very figurehead of the ship of state. Little by little, but steadily as man's march to the grave, we have been giving the old for the new faith. Nearly eighty years ago we began by declaring that all men are created equal; but now from that beginning we have run down to that other declaration, 'that for ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... which Mr. Lincoln's definition would fairly enough apply have existed, and now exist, in which, though the supreme authority reside in the people, yet they can act only indirectly on the national policy. This generation has seen a democracy with an imperial figurehead, and in all that have ever existed the body politic has never embraced all the inhabitants included within its territory, the right to share in the direction of affairs has been confined to citizens, and citizenship ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... accordance with the dictates of Spain. The young prince, Manco, a son of the great Inca Huayna Capac, named for the first Inca, Manco Ccapac, the founder of the dynasty, was selected as the most acceptable figurehead. He was a young man of ability and spirit. His induction into office in 1534 with appropriate ceremonies, the barbaric splendor of which only made the farce the more pitiful, did little to gratify his natural ambition. As might have been foreseen, he chafed ...
— Inca Land - Explorations in the Highlands of Peru • Hiram Bingham
... the choice of his successor, and also that the noble electors were able not only to secure liberal bribes but to wring from the elect such concessions as gradually reduced the kingship to an ornamental figurehead. Most of the later kings were foreigners who used what little power was left to them in furtherance of their native interests rather than of the welfare of Poland. Thus the kings in the first half of the eighteenth century were ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... She is supposed to have struck on a reef to the southward of the Palm Islands, as the bulk of her cargo was cast ashore in Ramsay Bay, Hinchinbrook Island. Portions of the wreckage were found on the Brook Islands; her figurehead—the spread eagle of the United States—and a seaman's chest were picked up on the beach here. Her windlass, with a child's pinafore entangled with it—for the skipper had taken his wife and two children to bear him company—drifted ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... be no question that Stephens never did anything which in his own mind was in the least disloyal. And yet it was Stephens who, in the autumn of 1864, was singled out by artful men as a possible figurehead in the conduct of a separate peace negotiation with Sherman. A critic very hostile to Stephens and his faction might here raise the question as to what was at bottom the motive of Governor Brown, in the autumn of 1864, in withdrawing the Georgia militia from Hood's command. ...
— The Day of the Confederacy - A Chronicle of the Embattled South, Volume 30 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Nathaniel W. Stephenson
... of a fly on the wall. At the end of the vestibule facing him was an old Roman image, the head and bust of an Emperor, which had been unearthed in the neighbourhood of the house when the foundations had been laid, and had been adopted forthwith as a family relic. If this old imperial figurehead had been an enemy, let us say the famous robber of the district, our marksman felt that he could easily have shattered his skull ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... the boats a gay appearance which was increased by the round shields which were hung outside the gunwale and which were also painted red, black, or white. At the prow there was usually a beautifully carved and gorgeously painted figurehead. The stem and stern of the ships were high. In the stern there was an upper deck, but in the forepart of the vessel there was nothing but loose planks on which the sailors could step. When a storm was raging or a battle was being fought, the loose planks did not, as you may imagine, offer ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... you?" she replied, as if she had been explaining most fully. "You are the figurehead, the goddess of the machine. You will see that all goes right, and give Lord Wolfer his breakfast, and preside at the dinner when I'm ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... they left the motor car in charge of Komatsu and went in to visit Shiba Temple in Shiba Park. These chapels are mostly the tombs of the Shoguns who for many years were powerful nobles and who really ruled Japan in place of the Emperor, a mere figurehead in those days. The magnificent tombs they built for themselves are now the very pride of Tokyo. Within the great red gates of the main temple, upheld with scarlet columns, wheeled flights of pigeons quite ...
— The Motor Maids in Fair Japan • Katherine Stokes
... the story of the Holy Grail, originally an altogether independent legend. Important changes necessarily developed. Arthur himself, in many of the romances, was degraded from his position of the bravest knight to be the inactive figurehead of a brilliant court; and the only really historical element in the story, his struggle against the Saxons, was thrust far into the background, while all the emphasis was laid on the romantic achievements of the ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... themselves, and some whom chance and the agreement of men have picked out as symbols and convenient indications of some particular group or temperament of opinions. To the latter it is that Sir Thomas More belongs. An age and a type of mind have found in him and his Utopia a figurehead and a token; and pleasant and honourable as his personality and household present themselves to the modern reader, it is doubtful if they would by this time have retained any peculiar distinction among ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... Alderson Construction Company and that we had been gathering up evidence for a graft exposure that would shock the country. I regret very much that the Honorable Milton Waring is involved in these charges, along with Blatchford Ferguson and Nickleby. Alderson himself is merely a figurehead of Nickleby's; for, as I told you before, the Alderson concern is ninety per cent. J. C. Nickleby. It was immediately after a secret meeting between these four men that the campaign fund contribution of fifty thousand dollars was made by the Alderson Construction Company. You know what ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... oddity he doted on. Fancy her teaching music of all things. It must be only scales and exercises. I think she's splendid to see the incongruity herself, and refuse to call it music when she dare be honest. What a grotesque figurehead she looks, chum, doesn't she? I thoroughly enjoyed ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... and their lords were in their thinking, they did not dare to trample openly on the old tradition. The emperor might in practice be a completely powerless figurehead, but he belonged nevertheless, according to tradition, to a family of divine origin, which had obtained its office not merely by the exercise of force but through a "divine mandate". Accordingly, if one of the feudal lords thought ...
— A history of China., [3d ed. rev. and enl.] • Wolfram Eberhard
... were different. When the French ambassador, therefore, asked Elizabeth when Alencon might come to see her, she refused to name a time, because she knew secretly that a great Huguenot movement in France was pending, and she wished Alencon to be there as figurehead at the time—the very thing that the official French Government wished to avoid. The projected movement was betrayed and suppressed, and Alencon's life was for a time in danger; but when Henry III. (Anjou) was seated on the throne, Alencon kept openly a rival court to that of his brother, and ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... which had set the wires to humming. On the sixth day it was noised about that Senator Duvall had transferred his controlling interest to Rumford—otherwise to the Universal Oil Company; that he had served only as a figurehead in the transaction, using his standing, social and political, to secure the charter which had been ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... recently deplored the want of vitality in the old religions of the country, and, regarding their reformation as hopeless, openly advocated the adoption of Christianity. To be independent of the foreigner it must, he said, be made a state church, with one of the princes for a figurehead, if not for pilot. ...
— The Awakening of China • W.A.P. Martin
... plank, are covered with rude yet characteristic figures. The high-peaked prows of their boats are ornamented with masses of open filagree work, cut out of solid blocks of wood, and often of very tasteful design, As a figurehead, or pinnacle, there is often a human figure, with a head of cassowary feathers to imitate the Papuan "mop." The floats of their fishing-lines, the wooden beaters used in tempering the clay for their pottery, ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... including Madame Caradori, Miss Paton, Miss Bacon, Henry Phillips (the veteran and popular singer of later days, but who was then only in his 25th year), Signor Curioni (said to have borne a wonderful resemblance to Shakespeare in his figurehead and features), Signor de Begius, Mr. John Baptiste Cramer, C.G. Kiesewetter (who died the following year), Charles Augustus de Beriot (who married Madame Malibran-Garcia), and quite a host of local instrumentalists who were long chief among ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell
... branch, as soon as it could speak distinctly; "cut me off! cut me off! and carve me into a figurehead ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... Kramenin, who was described as the "man behind Bolshevism" in Russia, and who had just arrived in London—some thought as an unofficial envoy. His career was sketched lightly, and it was firmly asserted that he, and not the figurehead leaders, had been the author of ...
— The Secret Adversary • Agatha Christie
... a figurehead in The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794). The change of title is significant. The two previous works have been romances, but it is now Mrs. Radcliffe's intention to let herself go further in the direction of wonder and suspense than she had hitherto ventured. She is like Scythrop ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... efficient, without regard to his politics. This is the course taken very generally by other great nations, and especially by our sister republic of Great Britain (for Great Britain is simply a republic with a monarchical figurehead lingering along on good behavior): she retains her representatives in these positions, and promotes them without any regard to their party relations. During my first official residence at Berlin, although the home government at London was of the Conservative party, ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... crystal dome in the air—the Celestial City—nearly washed away. You looked at these scenes through the arches of a ruined castle. A young man (on one blind) has just said farewell to his parents on the steps of the castle and is rowing away down the River of Life. At the prow of his boat is the figurehead of a winged woman holding ...
— The Mettle of the Pasture • James Lane Allen
... and a morbid passion for work. This Secretary was called Wonder—John Fennil Wonder. The Viceroy possessed no name—nothing but a string of counties and two-thirds of the alphabet after them. He said, in confidence, that he was the electro-plated figurehead of a golden administration, and he watched in a dreamy, amused way Wonder's attempts to draw matters which were entirely outside his province into his own hands. "When we are all cherubims together," said His Excellency once, "my dear, good friend Wonder will head ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... Service KING ALBERT AT THE HEAD OF THE HEROIC SOLDIERS OF BELGIUM It is universally agreed that the Belgian monarch was no figurehead general but a real leader of his troops. It was these men, facing annihilation, who astonished the world by opposing the German military machine successfully enough to allow France to get her armies into shape and ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... "obnoxious measures of national interference and futile attempts to control this great work." He would rely chiefly upon the publicity of accounts made by railway officers, as secured by the private publication of Poor's Railway Manual, for all needed regulation, but concedes the establishment of a figurehead commission, concluding his remarks upon the subject as follows: "A commission which may bring public opinion to bear upon railway corporations may well be established, and there the work of the legislator may well cease." When we consider the powerful agencies employed by railroads to create ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee
... frank a bargain driven with a king before? "Behold," says Norway in effect, "you may sit on a throne; but beware how you attempt to king it over us. We will give you a salary to transact our official business and act as official figurehead. But you must never overlook the fact that it was we who made you ...
— Norwegian Life • Ethlyn T. Clough
... to her, as if she was human. He scolds and coaxes her and this morning he promised to paint and gild her figurehead, if she got into Kirkwall before three. Then every sailor on board helped her and the wind changed a point or two and that helped her, and now and then Farquar pushed her on, with a good or bad word, and she saved herself by ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... time the Indians arrived with the head of the alligator, which they and Sambo proposed to preserve, in order, the latter said, to make a figurehead for ...
— The Wanderers - Adventures in the Wilds of Trinidad and Orinoco • W.H.G. Kingston
... alongside of her, and, when under quarter, examined her close. Never saw such a fine swell in the counter, and all so trim—no ropes towing overboard. Well, Mr Simple, I said to myself, 'D—n it, if her figurehead and bows be finished off by the same builder, she's perfect.' So I shot ahead, and yawed a little—caught a peep at her through her veil, and saw two black eyes—as bright as beads, and as large as damsons. I saw quite enough, and not ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... she's born to troubles and worries all the time. And she mostly gets through all the time. Why? Grit! She doesn't just care a darn. She's going to get through—and she does. Say, let's get along down and leave that wall-eyed old figurehead keeping guard. ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum
... extended On the grass the vessel's keel; High above it, gilt and splendid, Rose the figurehead ferocious With ...
— Told by the Northmen: - Stories from the Eddas and Sagas • E. M. [Ethel Mary] Wilmot-Buxton
... across the blaze, "And who be you? Stand and give a show o' your figurehead!" Obediently I stood with hands outspread to the flame, warming my shivering body at its ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... be,' said she; 'and you may suppose, sir, that a man had to have something to show for a figurehead before he could marry Madame de Merret, who, without any reflection on others, was the handsomest and richest heiress in our parts. She had about twenty thousand francs a year. All the town was at the wedding; the bride was pretty and sweet-looking, quite a gem of a ...
— La Grande Breteche • Honore de Balzac
... ends not being connected, but the bow is closed by a raised end-board fancifully carved and painted in front of which a crest-like wooden ornament fits into a groove running along the beak. This figurehead, called tabura, is elaborately cut into various devices, painted red and white, and decorated with white egg-shells and feathers of the cassowary and bird of paradise. The bow and stern also are more or less profusely ornamented with these shells, which besides are strung about other ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... only embargo that I lay upon you is—haul off, and mind you don't let your figurehead go by the board. Meanwhile, here comes the boat. Now, Nigel, none o' your courtin' till everything is settled and the wind fair—dead aft my lad, and blowin' stiff. You and the hermit are goin' off ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... of confusion was added to the already perplexing chronology of Japan. In administrative methods there was a difference. The Northern Court adhered to the camera system: that is to say, the actual occupant of the throne was a mere figurehead, the practical functions of Government being discharged by the cloistered sovereign. In the Southern Court the Emperor himself, nominally at all events, directed the business of administration. Further, the office of shogun in the Southern Court was held generally by ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... as she turned to face him and she seemed to spit the words at him in sudden, unexpected resentment. "I love the meaningless sound of my official figurehead title! It's so much better than being regarded as a living person with feelings that ...
— —And Devious the Line of Duty • Tom Godwin
... the boy. "Patty made them up herself. First we had the 'Landing of the Pilgrims,' and Waitstill made believe be the figurehead of the Mayflower. She stood on a ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... the border under the yew hedge? So they all went out together, and the captain had forgotten nothing and greeted Miss Jane as an old friend; there had been a ship in the squadron off the Spanish coast, he said, whose figurehead always reminded him of her. And he remembered the view from the paddock, and missed the big elm that had been blown down two winters ago, and said what a good thing it was the storm had spared Sir Godfrey's tree; it would be a misfortune indeed if anything happened ...
— Two Maiden Aunts • Mary H. Debenham
... slow dropping of Commines' bitter-hearted words there came a revulsion of feeling, and he was ashamed to find a gladness in such a cause of grief. For the loss to France he cared little. To him Louis had been but a name, the figurehead of state. If not Louis, then another, and France would still be France. But as Commines turned away and, following that other instinct of nature which, in the dumb animal, hides its wounds, covered his face with his arms as he leaned ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond
... beer casks. Looking closer it seemed to me that the man's nose, like the beak of a goshawk, and his glinting eyes with the lids only half-reefed, were known to me, but when I overheard him swearing to himself in good High Dutch, then his figurehead came back to me in a moment. I put out into the yard, and touched him on the shoulder. Zounds, lad! you should have seen him spring back and spit at me like a wildcat with every hair of his head in a bristle. He whipped a knife from ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... ashore is a very different craft from what he is with blue water under his keel. I had a long talk with Uncle last night and got my orders; I won't forget 'em nor all I owe him. As for you, I'll name my first ship as I say, and have your bust for the figurehead, see if I don't,' and Emil gave his aunt a hearty kiss to seal the vow, which proceeding much amused Nat, playing softly in the ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... 'Come out and run around the common.'" This they did and the speech was a success. There is a wooden statue of Daniel Webster that has stood for forty years in Hingham, Massachusetts. It is larger than life and called a good portrait. It was made more than sixty years ago as a figurehead for the ship Daniel Webster but never put on. That would have been appropriate if he was occasionally half seas over. Daniel's devotion to his only brother "Zeke" is pleasant to remember. By the way, there are many men who pay every ...
— Memories and Anecdotes • Kate Sanborn
... Persian, we had taken great pride in the modelling and finish of the old style of cutwater and figurehead, with bowsprit and jib-boom; but in urging the advantages of greater length of hull, we were met by the fact of its being simply impossible in certain docks to swing vessels of any greater length than those ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... other; the baronet, more by instinct than anything else, threw the engine lever still further forward, and before anyone had time even to draw a breath of relief, the apparently doomed vessel was dragged, with a foaming surge heaped up round her bows as high as the figurehead, out from the reopened portal and clear of all danger a single instant before the two gigantic masses of ice again closed in upon each other with a horrible grinding crunch which must have ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... harbor of Scarborough, lying half-hid amongst the narrow streets which run up towards the Castle Hill, a quaint and curious inn known as the Three Jolly Mariners. At its door stands a figure carved in wood, which at some time, no doubt, acted as figurehead to a ship, but whether it represents Venus or Diana, Hebe or Minerva, I do not know. Inside, the house more resembles the cabin of a vessel than the parlor of a tavern. On the walls are many curious things brought by mariners from foreign parts, together with relics of ships ...
— In the Days of Drake • J. S. Fletcher
... priest, Senor Pascual Reyes, has arrived here from Cebu, and says that in Leyte General Lucban is committing many abuses and that Colonel Mojica is only a mere figurehead. In Cebu, he says, things are also in a chaotic condition, because the military chief, Magsilum [Maxilom,—TR.], and the people ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester
... cannot describe. It was not of this world. And we knew her. We were her friends. She was our hostess. To the house she was the great artiste—a name to whisper, a figurehead to bow before. For us, we were listening to the song of a friend. As she had promised, she sang to us. There was no mistaking it. And the great charm of her welled out in that wonderful voice. All the spirit of melody danced ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... Horacista government, and there was no sympathy between him and his council. The Horacistas distrusted him and forced him to dismiss his friends from the cabinet and to make distasteful appointments. Seeing that he was being reduced to a figurehead, Morales secretly tried to form a party for himself or make arrangements with the Jimenistas who for months had been conspiring and threatening to rise. The friction became more severe until Morales, fearing that both his office and his life were in danger, ...
— Santo Domingo - A Country With A Future • Otto Schoenrich
... them of danger, but that now they never speak, and he supposes that their silence is due to the fact that his people have intermarried with other tribes. The Long Patas frequently carve a crocodile's head as the figurehead for ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... very worst I ever saw. These Cupids must have been erected in the time of the Dutch dynasty, as I judge from the immense posterior developments. Indeed the arts of the country are very low. The statues here, and the lions before the Prince of Orange's palace, would disgrace almost the figurehead of a ship. ...
— Little Travels and Roadside Sketches • William Makepeace Thackeray
... and to get rid of any ice crusts in front of the train, but after the winter of trial and probation, and difficulties of beginning are over, and the summer of success has come, his position, in regard to the artists, must be more like that of a figurehead. I have, however, great faith in the power of artists to make a figure-head useful as well as ornamental, although I do not know that they have shown a proof of this to-day by making their figure-head deliver a speech, ...
— Memories of Canada and Scotland - Speeches and Verses • John Douglas Sutherland Campbell
... house was clean, the meals as good and as nourishing as could be; I'd know that guests would be well cared for and that bills would be paid. Isn't a woman, the mistress of a house, supposed to do more than that? I don't want to be a mere figurehead." ...
— The Treasure • Kathleen Norris
... is the unshaken faith in our Board of Trustees. I doubt if such another board exists. It is made up of white men and black men, of men of the North and men of the South. There is not a figurehead among them. Though intensely engaged they go into the details of the workings of the school, getting close to the inner workings and to the lives of ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe
... Romano laughed outright. "You do not know how bad are some of the men around the arch rebel, capitan. He has some bad advisers, I can tell you that. To some of the worst of the crowd, Aguinaldo is but a figurehead." ...
— The Campaign of the Jungle - or, Under Lawton through Luzon • Edward Stratemeyer
... as if in the roughest water. As she drew nearer I was able to make her out better, and from her build—she carried two masts and was square-rigged forward and schooner-rigged aft—as well as from her tawdry gilt figurehead, concluded she was a hermaphrodite brig of, very possibly, Dutch nationality. She had evidently seen a great deal of rough weather, for her foretopmast and part of her starboard bulwarks were gone, and what added to my astonishment and filled me with fears and doubts was, that ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell
... "out-doo." At the beginning I have substituted "dummy" for "figure" because we are told that the figure is "put for" (that is, put instead of) Shakespeare. In modern English we frequently describe a chairman who is a mere dummy as a figurehead. Then "wit" in these lines means absolutely the same as "mind," which I have used in its place because I think it refers to the fact that upon the miniature of Bacon in his 18th year, which was painted by Hilliard in 1578, we read:—"Si tabula daretur digna animum mallem." ...
— Bacon is Shake-Speare • Sir Edwin Durning-Lawrence
... Roper, however, was a figurehead. The brains behind the formation of the Business Advisory Council were in the head of Sidney J. Weinberg, Senior Partner of the New York investment house of Goldman, Sachs & Co.—and also on the boards of directors of about thirty of the biggest corporations in America. ...
— The Invisible Government • Dan Smoot
... plunging along athwart our course as if she meant to give us the go-by, the sea foaming up at her bows in a big wave that curled up in front of her forefoot and broke over her figurehead as she dipped, sending the surf high in the air in a sheet ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... propose to linger over the perruque. The Restoration was a time of carnival when, if the men were overdressed, the ladies were underdressed; and the perruque was a part of the masquerade. In such a figurehead you could be as licentious as you chose—and you were; you could only be serious in satire. The perruque accounts for Dryden and his learned pomp, for Rochester and Sedley, and for Congreve, who told Voltaire that he desired ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett
... found to give the people full control. Baldwin found it in the British Cabinet system, which gave real power to ministers having the confidence of a majority in Parliament. The Governor would remain, but he would be only a figurehead, a constitutional monarch acting, like the King, only on the advice of his constitutional advisers. Responsible government was Baldwin's one and absorbing idea, and his persistence led to its ultimate adoption, along with a proposal for an elective Council, in the ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton
... much—two boilers and a plain twenty-eight by thirty-six double engine, and any amount of hoisting rigs, blubber boilers, and other paraphernalia. We refitted in San Francisco, and on a clear summer morning turned the white-painted figurehead of the "Champion" toward the north and stood out for Behring sea. But, while we lay at the mouth of the Yukon river, up in Alaska, getting ready for a sally into the realm of water above the Straits, a whaler, bound for San Francisco and home, dropped anchor near us, the ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... closing of the Great Council, the revolution of Tiepolo, the trials of Marino Faliero, Lorenzo Celsi, and the Foscari. The third period covers what remains of the Republic, from 1457 down to 1797. During this period the Doge was little other than the figurehead of the Republic; the point of least weight and greatest splendour; the brilliant apex to the ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various
... Irish party or parties as such—there was to be only the English party governing Ireland in the interests of England. It was the beginning of a government which led to the appointment of such a man as Primate Boulter, who simply ruled Ireland behind the Lord Lieutenant (who was but a figurehead) for and on behalf of the King of England's advisers. Irish institutions, Irish ideas, Irish traditions, the Irish Church, Irish schools, Irish language and literature, Irish trade, manufactures, commerce, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... proctor-hating philanthropist on the wall of the south transept of the Cathedral over the brass to Charles Dickens, surmounted by a very curious painted marble half-figure effigy with flowing beard, of "worthy Master Richard starting out of it, like a ship's figurehead." Underneath is the ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes
... days pass—the weeks—the months; the tide ebbs, and comes again; fair winds carry but trailing smoke-wrack to the rim of a far horizon; head winds blow the sea mist in on her—but she lies unheeding. Idle, unkempt, neglected; and the haughty figurehead of her is turned from the ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone
... to a sight of my craft," replied Gascoyne. "The only difference between the two is, that the figurehead of the pirate is a griffin's head, painted scarlet, that of my schooner is a female, painted white. There is also a red streak round the sides of the pirate; the hull of ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... while, colonel; Imperial pardons have to be by the Portfolio for the Interior. Your Sovereign is an impotent figurehead." ...
— The Unnecessary Man • Gordon Randall Garrett
... To-day I feel so very old! I am weary of being a king. I am weary of being weary, and for such there is no remedy. Truly I was not cut from the pattern of kings; no, no. I am handier with a book than with a scepter; I'd liever be a man than a puppet, and a puppet I am—a figurehead on the prow of the ship, but I do not guide it. Who care for me save those who have their ends to gain? None, save the archbishop, who yet dreams of making a king of me. And these are not my people who surround me; when I die, small care. I shall have left in the passing ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... home the figurehead of the old sloop Faith and Prudence. It is the image of a man, with a nose not unlike the one Master Lillie carries on his face. Let us saw the head off, nail it to a pole, and set it up in front of his shop with a ...
— Under the Liberty Tree - A Story of The 'Boston Massacre' • James Otis
... universally regarded as a power, though I, of course, knew that he, like so many other presidents of railways, of individual corporations, of banks, of insurance companies, and high political officials in cities, states and the nation, was little more than a figurehead put up and used by the inside financial ring. As he shifted from leg to leg, holding his hat and trying to steady his twitching upper lip, he looked as one of his smallest section-bosses would have looked, if called ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... letter, describing the situation, received since the departure of his wife. Apparently everything two clever crooks needed to know was in their possession. All they needed to do was pull the strings, using a figurehead to represent Philip Henley. That was the part for which I was chosen. They had to construct a lie in order to interest me, yet that was comparatively easy, and there was a strong probability of success but for peculiar conditions of ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish
... person who feels happy here is the governess, and the factory hands are working for her gratification. But that's only apparent: she is only the figurehead. The real person, for whom everything is being done, is ...
— The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... prevails in other countries that it is Queen Marie who is really the head of the Rumanian royal family and that the King is little more than a figurehead. With this estimate I do not agree. Rumania could have no better spokesman than Queen Marie, whose talents, beauty, and exceptional tact peculiarly fit her for the difficult role she has been called upon to play. But the King, though he is by nature quiet and retiring, is ...
— The New Frontiers of Freedom from the Alps to the AEgean • Edward Alexander Powell
... only hurt me, but almost destroyed my hope, though it did not alter my purpose. I wanted a figurehead for my petition, and the figurehead I had chosen I could not get. I began to wonder and doubt. I next approached a very different man, the late Professor Churton Collins, a great friend of mine, who, in spite of an almost pedantic rigour of mind and character, had in him ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... was often little more than a figurehead, equaled, or perhaps surpassed, in power by some of his own vassals. But in England, France, Spain, and other countries a series of astute and energetic sovereigns were able to strengthen their authority at the expense of the nobles. They formed permanent armies by insisting that all military ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... in order to find a place which could be forded. At the moment when I embarked, I saw at the prow of the boat of Youmaeale a kind of brown figure. I drew near; what did I see? My God! the head and arms dried to that of a mummy, forming the figurehead as an ornament for his canoe! We started on our voyage, the Caribbean silent, like the savage that he was, paddled without uttering a word. Arriving off the Caribbean Island, where a Spanish brigantine had stranded some months previous, ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... at the head of his miners, decided the question. The safety of his friend, the Duc de Christoval, was the reward of his interference. Between ourselves, the Emperor Iturbide, my master, is no more than a figurehead; the future of Mexico is entirely in the ...
— Vautrin • Honore de Balzac
... probably inspired by Field himself, "George M. Pullman has ever been deemed the dominant factor in that vast and profitable enterprise." This belief was declared an error, and the writer went on: "Field is, and for years has been, in almost absolute control. Pullman was little more than a figurehead. Such men as Robert T. Lincoln, the president of the company, and Norman B. Ream are but representatives of Marshall Field, whose name has never been identified with the property he so largely owns and controls." That fulsome writer, with the usual inaccuracies and turgid ...
— History of the Great American Fortunes, Vol. I - Conditions in Settlement and Colonial Times • Myers Gustavus
... the sluggishly creeping foams of waves; The seaman, poised in the bow, rises and falls As the deep forefoot finds a way through waves; And there below him, steadily gazing westward, Facing the wind, the sunset, the long cloud, The goddess of the ship, proud figurehead, Smiles inscrutably, plunges to crying waters, Emerges streaming, gleaming, with jewels falling Fierily from carved wings and golden breasts; Steadily glides a moment, then swoops again. Carved by the hand of man, grieved by the wind; Worn by the tumult of all the tragic seas, Yet smiling ...
— American Poetry, 1922 - A Miscellany • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... rendered necessary by the enormous length of the vessel. It will be seen that the distinctive type of the Inman line has not been departed from in respect to the old fashioned but still handsome profile, with clipper bow, figurehead, and bowsprit—which latter makes the Rome's length over all 600 feet. For the figurehead has been chosen a full length figure of one of the Roman Caesars, in the imperial purple. Altogether, the City of Rome ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 303 - October 22, 1881 • Various
... said Uncle Teddy, with a twinkle in his eye. "If there's a Mrs. Jason on board Jason himself won't have a word to say about the expedition. He'll be nothing but a figurehead. ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey
... the grassy slope outside the castle wall. Besides, there was the cathedral to be visited, and the tomb of Richard Watts, "with the effigy of worthy Master Richard starting out of it like a ship's figurehead." ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... had done so. For Fritz, there was a fishing-net and a ten-bladed knife; for Arthur a turning lathe with foot-power, and in addition a tall toy ship with a golden-haired nymph as figurehead. ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... from Boma, and at daybreak we tied up to the iron wharf. As the capital of the government Boma contains the residence and gardens of the governor, who is the personal representative of Leopold, both as a shopkeeper and as a king by divine right. He is a figurehead. The real administrator is M. Vandamme, the Secretaire-General, the ubiquitous, the mysterious, whose name before you leave Southampton is in the air, of whom all men, whether they speak in French or English, speak well. It is from Boma that M. Vandamme sends collectors of rubber, politely ...
— The Congo and Coasts of Africa • Richard Harding Davis
... themselves, and, failing of any satisfactory answer, they asked The Patriot in no uncertain terms. Receiving vague and pained replies, they even went to the length of holding a meeting and sending a committee to wait upon the desperate Haring, passing over the advertising manager who was a mere figurehead in The Patriot office. ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... to the teachings of their forefathers, sailed for the New World with the image of St. Nicholas for a figurehead on their vessel. They named the first church they built for the much-loved St. Nicholas and made him patron saint of the new city on Manhattan Island. Thanks, many many thanks, to these sturdy old Dutchmen with unpronounceable ...
— Yule-Tide in Many Lands • Mary P. Pringle and Clara A. Urann
... du guet [Fr.]; pass-parole; shibboleth. title, heading, docket. address card, visiting card; carte de visite [Fr.]. insignia; banner, banneret^, bannerol^; bandrol^; flag, colors, streamer, standard, eagle, labarum^, oriflamb^, oriflamme; figurehead; ensign; pennon, pennant, pendant; burgee^, blue Peter, jack, ancient, gonfalon, union jack; banderole, old glory [U.S.], quarantine flag; vexillum^; yellow-flag, yellow jack; tricolor, stars and stripes; bunting. heraldry, crest; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... Skinner. Follow all my leads and don't trump any of my aces; and just about the time Matt begins to get good and mad at my doggoned interference—you know, Skinner, my boy, I'm only a figurehead—you cut in and say: 'Well, for heaven's sake! You two still squabbling over a skipper for the Retriever? Matt, why don't you save the demurrage and take her out yourself—eh?'" And Cappy winked knowingly and prodded his general ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... by these Pandits while Rajendrahal fraudulently appropriated all the credit. Even to-day we very often find the tools arrogating to themselves the lion's share of the achievement, imagining the wielder to be a mere ornamental figurehead. If the poor pen had a mind it would as certainly have bemoaned the unfairness of its getting all the stain and the writer all ...
— My Reminiscences • Rabindranath Tagore
... madam," said the clerk, motioning her round the back of the jury box. And she swept ponderously into the offing like a full-rigged bark and came to anchor in the witness chair, her chin rising and falling upon her heaving bosom like the figurehead of a vessel ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train
... persisted. It took her two hours to examine thus, in detail, one half the island. But at last she discovered something. She saw at the eastern side of the reef a wooden figure of a woman, and, making her way to it, found the figurehead and a piece of the bow of the ship, with a sail on it, and a yard on that. This fragment was wedged into an angle of the reef, and the seaward edge of it shattered in a way that struck terror to Helen, for it showed her how omnipotent ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... the cities, and became a national disgrace. Less prominent than these but far from proper were Schenck and Fremont. The latter was arrested in France, charged with promoting a railroad on the strength of land grants that did not exist. He had been close to the old Republican organization, and the figurehead of the radicals in 1864, so that his notoriety was great. Schenck, while Minister in London, posed as director of a mining company, and borrowed from the promoters of the scheme the money with which he bought his shares. When the company proved insolvent, and perhaps fraudulent, Grant ...
— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson
... it was that, looking back on it now, getting it from the viewpoint of one stepping from it, he could see just how true was the statement: "Harvey Francis has been the real Governor of the State; John Morrison his mouthpiece and figurehead." ...
— Lifted Masks - Stories • Susan Glaspell
... had laid a course for his own moorings, and had been keeping a bright look-out, when suddenly he had been brought up all standing, and he thought he must have run bows on into some other craft, for he remembered no more than getting a crack over his figurehead. Morning was treading on the heels of night before Hislop and Wallace had got the damaged man home and had left him safely stowed in bed, and themselves were peacefully snoring, ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... to name her for me, and I am to be the figurehead; come to the carver's shop and see me," said Berinthia with sparkling eyes ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... at once to arrest Quilp at a dingy dwelling on a wharf in the river where he often slept with the object of terrifying his wife by his long absences. Here he had set up the battered figurehead of a wrecked ship and, imagining that its face resembled that of Kit whom he so fiendishly hated, he used to amuse himself by screwing gimlets into its breast, sticking forks into its eyes and ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... of Coleridge), and left in the clutch of the fatal fingers. But one of your own kindred, and very respectable, adding the claim of misfortune to his other claims upon you,—pachydermatous to slights, smilingly persuasive, gently persistent,—as imperturbable as a ship's wooden figurehead through all the ups and downs of the voyage of life, and as insensible to cold water;—in short, an uncle like my uncle, whom there was no getting rid of;—what the deuce ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various
... the people's man—this he knew. His name was cheered by the general voice. As he passed along the street bootblacks hurrahed! him. He had determined that the governorship should cease to represent a figurehead, and for right or wrong, he was ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... fifty feet in length, low amidships and curving upwards to high peaks at stem and stern, both of which converged to sharp edges. It resembled an enormous canoe rather than aught else to which we can compare it. On the stem was a carved and gilt dragon, the figurehead of the ship, which glittered in the bright rays of the sun. Along the bulwarks of the ship, fore and aft, hung rows of large painted wooden shields, which gave an Argus-eyed aspect to the craft. Between them was a double row of thole-pins for the great oars, which now lay at rest in ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... in truth, for Frank's suggestion. The old schooner whose name they now discerned in faded gilt as "Molly M," seemed like a ghost of other days. Her outthrust bow, her up-cocked stern and the figurehead of a simpering woman that might have been mermaid originally but was now so worn as to make it almost impossible to tell the original intent, was, indeed, suggestive of galleons of ancient days. This figurehead ...
— The Radio Boys with the Revenue Guards • Gerald Breckenridge
... words almost before they had fallen from the lips of the other. "Yes, I am the King. I am the miserable, gilded figurehead out on the prow, which serves no end and no purpose. I am the ornamental symbol of a system which the world is discarding! I am a medieval lay figure upon which to hang these ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... in which had been written the most unforgettable things of life. Besides well-remembered features, there were details which had been forgotten and which now set free currents of reminiscence—such as the battered figurehead of an old schooner raised on high over a front door and a wind-mill as antique of pattern as those to which ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... be done by a row of supermarionettes. There is a myth among socialists to which all are expected to subscribe, that initiative springs anonymously out of the mass of the people,—that there are no "leaders," that the conspicuous figures are no more influential than the figurehead on ...
— A Preface to Politics • Walter Lippmann
... the cook, as black as midnight and as inscrutable as a figurehead, who brought us to our senses. Silently observing all that had happened, he had stood by the galley, without lifting his hand or changing the expression of a single feature; but now, taking his pipe from his mouth, he roared, "Man ovehboa'd!" Then, snatching ...
— The Mutineers • Charles Boardman Hawes
... I just want to say I appreciate very much the honor that has been bestowed upon me. I appreciate the fact that the president is purely an emblem, a figurehead, but with the staff that's under him, it's the same as in the Post Office Department of the United States, the head receives all the salary and his understudies do all the work. So it's a very appropriate setting, and we should go ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 41st Annual Meeting • Various
... misunderstandings of his dicta brought the wrong notion about, and Virgil—that exquisite craftsman in verse and phrase, but otherwise, perhaps, not great poet and very dangerous pattern—had confirmed this notion by his deplorable figurehead. It is also fair to confess that all except morbid tastes do like to see the hero win. But if he is to be a ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... astonishing shape that arises from the patch of lawn in front of the cottage, and completely dominates the scene. Imagine yourself face to face with the last thing you would expect to see in a modest front dooryard,—the figurehead of a ship, heroic in size, gorgeous in colour, majestic in pose! A female personage it appears to be from the drapery, which is the only key the artist furnishes as to sex, and a queenly female withal, for she wears ...
— Penelope's Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... riding proudly at anchor, the beautiful curves of her swan-like prows made cannon proof with plates of shining steel,—and below, in lieu of figurehead to promise victory, those letters of dread omen, C.D.X.,—with thirty oars-men from the arsenal of Venice, to ensure her speed, each ready at his oar-lock to wield his oar, with a band of marksmen trained to finest tempered ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... Doc Linyard. "Confound you for a pair of landlubbers! Don't you know an honest figurehead when you see it? Look at him! 'Pears to me he looks more straightforward than those as ...
— Richard Dare's Venture • Edward Stratemeyer
... of a politician with a big name who was ever anything but a figurehead in a deal ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... an age of new ideas and changing forms, is a task which might test the powers of the most discerning critics, and in which perfection is hardly to be attained. Yet one may ask whether in the entire extent of Hazlitt's writing a great living genius has been turned into a mockery or a figurehead been set up for the admiration of posterity. Of his personal and political antipathies enough has been said, but against literary orthodoxy his only great sin is a harsh review of "Christabel."[96] If in general ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... That meant, of course, a fight against Rasputin as well. Whatever Trepov's motives might be in fighting Protopopov and Rasputin he was helping the opposition. But Trepov was no match for such opponents. It soon became evident that as Premier he was a mere figurehead and that Rasputin and Protopopov held the government in their hands. Protopopov openly defied the Premier and ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo
... indeed, she might easily have been mistaken, except for the fact that her sails were not big enough. She was painted all black from her rail to her copper, with the bust of a woman, painted white, for a figurehead, and the name Martha Brown, with the word Baltimore—her port of registry—painted in white letters on her stern. She appeared to be in little more than deep-ballast trim, and I began to wonder whither she was bound even before we got ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood |
