"Astern" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... little before midnight; and the breeze being fresh at W. by S., the Lady Nelson was left astern, and we lay to for an hour next morning [FRIDAY 23 JULY 1802], to wait her coming up. The land was then scarcely visible, but a north course brought us in with the Three Brothers (Atlas Plate IX.); and at four in the afternoon, they bore from S. 56 deg. to 65 deg. W., ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... while, watching the lights of Three Rivers fade astern and the broad white wake of the paddles stream back across the glassy surface of the lake. The girl must have learned much of human failings since she left her sheltered home, but he thought the sweetness of character which could not be spoiled by knowledge of evil was greatly ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss
... Porpheero far astern, the spirits of the company rose. Once again, old Mohi serenely unbraided, and rebraided his beard; and sitting Turk- wise on his mat, my lord Media smoking his gonfalon, diverted himself with the wild songs of Yoomy, the wild chronicles of Mohi, ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... ships, and she fell far to their stern. By the time the action was on she was too distant to take part in it. No attempt was made to go together owing to the slowness of the battleship. The Canopus was never in the action at all, being 150 miles astern. Had Cradock not desired to he need not have taken on the action but retired in the Canopus. The setting of the sun also played its part; if daylight had continued some hours more the British squadron might have held out till the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... Darien to Hispaniola may be made in eight days or even less, if the wind is astern. Because of storms the envoys occupied a hundred days in crossing. They stopped some days at Hispaniola where they transacted their business with the Admiral and the other officials, after which they embarked on the merchant vessels which lay ready freighted ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... back. He slammed the pilot-house door in the face of the beast, and closed the windows with a bang that shook the pilot house. In his excitement the pilot rang in a signal to the engineer for full speed astern. ...
— The Circus Boys On the Mississippi • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... to the Cacafuego's one, and dreading that her speed might rouse suspicion, he filled his empty wine casks with water and trailed them astern. The chase meanwhile unsuspecting, and glad of company on a lonely voyage, slackened sail and waited for her slow pursuer. The sun sank low, and at last set into the ocean, and then, when both ships had become invisible from the land, the casks were hoisted in, the ...
— The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book • Various
... waited on us attentively, baiting our hooks and taking off our fish (a service of some danger to a tyro, as the sheepshead is armed with sharp spines), had a hook baited with mullet away astern of the boat. This line was now straightened out by something heavy, which he pulled in, hand over hand, and lifted on board a handsome fish, near two feet long, with darkly mottled sides and shaped like a cod-fish. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... only moderately dark, for while there was no moon there were plenty of those candle-like desert stars. The little twinkling lights of the Box Springs dropped astern like lamps on a shore. By and by I turned off the road and made a wide detour down the sacatone bottoms, for I had still some sense; and roads were a little too obvious. The reception committee that had taken charge of my little friend might be expecting ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... of the third day, there was some unusual activity on board the ship, which roused our hero from his torpor. The bell in the bows rang out... the heavy boots of the sailors could be heard running on the deck... "Engine ahead!... engine astern!." Shouted the hoarse voice of Captain Barbassou. ...
— Tartarin de Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet
... ship before the channel is left well behind, she may be driven back to Plymouth or Falmouth, and all the agony of bills, news, leave-taking, and letters, has to be endured over again. Whereas, if she once gets the Lizard Light some fifty leagues astern of her, all these worrying distractions may be considered at an end. A totally new world—the "world of waters"—is now entered upon, far beyond the reach even of those long-armed persons, the "gentlemen of the press," or the startling sound of the ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... somewhere out at sea hooting and heaving the lead, without daring to move. One could imagine the captain storming and the sailors hurrying here and there, lithe and agile as cats. Stop!—Half-speed ahead! Stop!—Half-speed astern! The first engineer would be at the engine himself, gray with nervous excitement. Down in the engine-room, where they knew nothing at all, they would strain their ears painfully for any sound, and all to no purpose. But up on deck ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... feet per sec is com. Not a bit. The ball bobbed unheeded on the wake of swells, floated under by the bridgepiers. Not such damn fools. Also the day I threw that stale cake out of the Erin's King picked it up in the wake fifty yards astern. Live by their ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... had risen and dissipated the morning mist. Some distance astern of the now fast-advancing schooner rose the streets and houses of the Havannah, and the forest of masts occupying its port; to the right frowned the castle of the Molo, whose threatening embrasures the vessel was rapidly approaching. The husband and wife stood upon the cabin stairs, gazing, with ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... keep my rifle close by, I tell you. And Bluff has his Gatling gun on the hooks, where he can get hold of it in a hurry. But I hope we don't have any need of them," continued Jerry as he assisted Frank to climb over into the little dinghy astern, where the light of the lantern did ...
— The Outdoor Chums on the Gulf • Captain Quincy Allen
... distance down the river, she ventured to look up stream, and saw that the little red shanty-boat had left its mooring, and that the man was coming down the current astern of her. It was a free river; any one could go whither he pleased, but the certainty that she had attracted the man's attention revealed to her the necessity of considering her position there alone and dependent on ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... sat the boat-steerer, grasping the steering oar firmly with both hands, his restless eyes on the alert—a glance at the schooner ahead, as we rose on a sea, another at the mainsheet, and then one astern where the dark ripple of the wind on the water told him of a coming puff or a large white-cap that threatened to overwhelm us. The waves were holding high carnival, performing the strangest antics, as with wild glee they danced along in fierce pursuit—now ...
— Dutch Courage and Other Stories • Jack London
... intervals a little bell was rung on the quarter-deck by the man at the wheel; and that as soon as it was heard, some one of the sailors forward struck a large bell which hung on the forecastle; and having observed that how many times soever the man astern rang his bell, the man forward struck his—tit for tat,—I inquired of this Floating Chapel sailor, what all this ringing meant; and whether, as the big bell hung right over the scuttle that went down to the place where the watch below ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... helpless fish; but the sucker, with great dexterity, made himself fast in a moment to the shark's back. Off darted the monster at full speed—the sucker holding on as fast as a limpet to a rock, and the billet towing astern. He then rolled over and over, tumbling about, when, wearied with his efforts, he lay quiet for a little. Seeing the float, the shark got it into his mouth, and disengaging the sucker by a tug on the line, made a bolt ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 432 - Volume 17, New Series, April 10, 1852 • Various
... gentlemen, sir, an' didn't they come aboard the Ghost as his guests, a-bringin' their wives along—wee an' pretty little bits of things like you see 'em painted on fans. An' as he was a-gettin' under way, didn't the fond husbands get left astern-like in their sampan, as it might be by accident? An' wasn't it a week later that the poor little ladies was put ashore on the other side of the island, with nothin' before 'em but to walk home acrost the mountains on their weeny-teeny little straw ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... into this floe and splitting it with iron-bound stem, overriding that and gnawing off a twenty ton lump, gliding south, east, west, through leads of open water, then charging an innocent-looking piece which brings the ship up all-standing, astern and ahead again, screwing and working the wonderful wooden ship steadily southward until perhaps two huge floes gradually narrow the lane and hold the little lady fast in their ...
— South with Scott • Edward R. G. R. Evans
... mangrove island, called Sanibel, when a squall from the eastward struck the schooner and almost laid her over on her beam-ends. The after-sails were quickly lowered, and as she righted away she flew before the gale, leaving the port for which we were bound far astern. The farther we got from the land, the heavier the sea became. At length the tossing and tumbling to which the old schooner was exposed began to tell on her hull, the seams opening and letting in the water at an unpleasant rate. The pumps and buckets were ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston
... amongst the mutineers as to the propriety of at once making sail, but Barker, who had been one of the pilot-boat crew, and knew the dangers of the Bar, vowed that he would not undertake to steer the brig through the Gates until morning; and so the boats being secured astern, a strict watch was set, lest the helpless Bates should attempt to rescue the vessel. During the evening—the excitement attendant upon the outbreak having passed away, and the magnitude of the task before them being more fully apparent to ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... the first armed American merchantman, the Campana, left port with a gun mounted astern, and a crew of qualified naval marksmen to man it. In the following October Secretary Daniels announced that his department had found guns and crews for every one of our merchant vessels designated for armament and that the guards consisted of from sixteen to thirty-two men ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... clearing decks for action. Overhauling La Clue near Lagos, off the coast of Portugal, he ranged up alongside, flagship to flagship. But the French, fighting with equal skill and courage, beat him off. Falling astern he came abreast of the gallant Centaure, which had already fought four British men-of-war. Being now a mere battered hulk she surrendered. Then Boscawen, his damage repaired, pushed ahead again. La Clue, whose fleet was the smaller, seeing ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... a cyclone," said the timid little skipper of the sailing vessel. "If it were striking us astern instead of ahead, it would not be so bad. As it is, the Roland at the utmost cannot make more than three miles an hour. Were I on my schooner and had the same storm blown up so suddenly, we should not have had time ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... unless we could rig up a sea-anchor. We were sure we would drown. We made one by rolling four blankets together tightly and tying around them a long rope with which our boat was made fast to the ship when we embarked. This we let drag astern about ninety-feet. It held the boat fairly steady, and kept the boat's head to the seas. We fastened it to the ring in the stern. We used this sea-anchor many times throughout our voyage, and without it we would have gone down sure. Of course we took in a great deal of water, anyhow; ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... The scene now shifts. On turning out of a lane, along which they have just rattled, a fence of this description appears: The bottom part is made of flints, and the upper part of mud, with gorse stuck along the top, and there is a gutter on each side. Jorrocks, seeing that a leap is likely, hangs astern, and "Swell," thinking to shake off his only opponent, and to have a rare laugh at the Surrey when he gets back to Melton, puts his nag at it most manfully, who, though somewhat blown, manages to get his long carcass over, but, unfortunately alighting on a bed of flints on the far ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... one more day, and left two companies of the regiment there. When we departed, I felt, somehow, as though we were saying good-bye to the world and civilization, and as our boat clattered and tugged away up river with its great wheel astern, I could not help looking back longingly to ...
— Vanished Arizona - Recollections of the Army Life by a New England Woman • Martha Summerhayes
... the other two Frenchmen were a little slower," the captain said to the first lieutenant. "They are only a little farther behind her than when we started, and are, I think, only about half a mile astern of her. If she continues to travel at her present rate she will be close up to us by sunset. She is just about our own size, and I make no doubt that we should give a good account of her, but we ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty
... lost sight of the Biddeford; and the frigate with which captain Kennedy was engaged bore away with all the sail she could carry. He pursued her till noon the next day, when she had left him so far astern, that he lost sight of her, and returned to Lisbon with the loss of fifteen men killed and wounded, including the lieutenant of marines, and considerable damage both in her hull and rigging. In three days he was joined by the Biddeford, which had also compelled ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... fond glance towards "the valley," and descended by a very steep and difficult path to the river Jhelum, which forms the boundary between the two territories. Here a couple of queerly-shaped, rudely-constructed boats, with two huge oars apiece, one astern and one at the side, formed the traveller's flying bridge. Into one of these the whole of our possessions and coolies, &c. were stowed, and we commenced the passage ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... sociable to have them hovering about us on this broad waste of water. It is sunny and pleasant, but blowing hard. Every rag about the ship is spread to the breeze and she is speeding over the sea like a bird. There is a large brig right astern of us with all her canvas set and chasing us at her best. She came up fast while the winds were light, but now it is hard to tell whether she gains or not. We can see the people on the forecastle with the glass. The race is exciting. I am sorry to know that we shall soon have to quit the vessel ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the officers clustered together on the forward bridge, the band of the Second Infantry played tune after tune, until on our quarter the glorious sun sunk in the red west, and, one by one, the lights blazed out on troop-ship and war-ship for miles ahead and astern, as they steamed onward through the ...
— Rough Riders • Theodore Roosevelt
... east-north-east in the morning, which, as the fleets were then heading, would be on the starboard side of the British, abreast and to windward, at 4 P.M. the French bore south-south-east, which would be somewhat on the port quarter, or nearly astern but to leeward. At this time their van was estimated by Howe to be two or three miles from the British rear, and, according to his reading of their manoeuvres, d'Estaing was forming his line for the same tack as the British, with a view of "engaging the British ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... kept still, as everything was lost, and they were few and not in sufficient force therefor. They waited for the morning, and when it began to dawn, they saw that the galley had already set its bastard, and was sailing, wind astern toward China, and they ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... all came up in a body astern of us, and so near that we could easily discern what they were, though we could not tell their design; and I easily found they were some of my old friends, the same sort of savages that I had been used to engage with. In a short time more they ...
— The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... the Texas, I saw the Merrimac steaming slowly in. It was only fairly dark then, and the shore was quite visible. We followed about three-quarters of a mile astern. The Merrimac stood about a mile to the westward of the harbor, and seemed a bit mixed, turning completely around; finally, heading to the east, she ran down, then turned in. We were then chasing him, because I thought Hobson had lost his bearings. ...
— Young Peoples' History of the War with Spain • Prescott Holmes
... through some light coloured water and, before we could extricate the brig, were in three and a half fathoms; the anchor was immediately dropped underfoot and, with the assistance of the sails, which were kept full, the vessel was retained whilst the whale-boat was veered astern, and ascertained that the shoalest part had been already passed; therefore the anchor was again weighed, and eventually dropped in the bay to the south of Point Cunningham in fourteen fathoms and three quarters, fine speckled sand ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... went crying and fishing round the ship, that she must have drifted pretty near the coast or one of the islands of the Hebrides; and at last, looking out of the door of the round-house, I saw the great stone hills of Skye on the right hand, and, a little more astern, ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... larger boat than he had anticipated seeing, yet he could not doubt her being the vessel sought. The name was plainly stencilled on the bow, as well as upon the dingy towing astern. Her deck lay almost even with the promenade, and he was able to trace her lines clearly from where he sat. The craft had evidently been constructed for comfort as well as speed. He noted two short masts unrigged, a bridge forward of the wheel-house, together with a decidedly ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... did Barny apostrophize each well-known point of his native shore, and when opposite the harbor of Kinsale, he spoke the hooker that was somewhat astern, and ordered Jemmy and Peter to put in there, and tell Molly immediately that he was come back, and would be with her as soon as he could, after piloting the ship into Cove. "But an your apperl don't tell Pether Kelly o' the big farm, nor, indeed, don't mintion to man or mortial about the navigation ...
— Stories of Comedy • Various
... attack was unusual, so the structure of their line was new; it formed a crescent convexing to leeward; so that in leading down to their centre I had both their van and rear abaft the beam before the fire opened; every alternate ship was about a cable's length to windward of her second ahead and astern, forming a kind of double line, and appeared, when on their beam, to leave a very little interval between them, and this without crowding their ships. Admiral Villeneuve was in the Bucentaure in the centre, and the Prince of Asturias ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... morning, Repeller No. 1, with her consort half a mile astern, and preceded by the two crabs, one on either bow, approached to within two miles of the harbour mouth. The crabs, a quarter of a mile ahead of the repeller, moved slowly; for between them they bore an immense ...
— The Great War Syndicate • Frank Stockton
... that for once our good fortune failed us. For we had had good fortune. Aeroplanes had bombed, and missed us by yards. Zeppelins had come down in flaming ruin before our astonished eyes. Islands had loomed under the very fore-foot of our ship in a fog, and we had gone astern in time. But this time it was our turn. We were, in the succinct phraseology of the ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... about findin' rest in Jesus, and one a askin' questions, all fa'r and squar', to know the way and whether it's a goin' to lead thar' straight or not, and the other answerin'. And he—he was a tinkerin', 'way up on the foremast, George Olver and the rest on us was astern,—and I'll hear to my dyin' day how his voice came a floatin' down to us thar'—chantin'-like it was—cl'ar and fearless and slow. So he asks, for findin' Jesus, ef thar's any marks to foller by; and George Olver, he answers about them bleedin' nail-prints, ...
— Cape Cod Folks • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... the sea-traps with a sledge hammer. Those on deck were to let fall the anchor and set the helm. Then Hobson would touch the electric button and fire the torpedoes, and all would leap overboard and swim to the dingy towing astern, in which they hoped to escape. Such were their plans; but chance, as it so often does, ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... could. At last, I could hold it no longer, I ran forward, let go the fore and jib haulyards and hauled down the sails; drag them into the boat I could not, and there I was, like a young bear adrift in a washing-tub. I looked all round me, and there were no vessels near; the bark had left me two miles astern, it was blowing a gale from the S.E., with a heavy sea; the gulls and sea birds wheeled and screamed in the storm; and as I thought, when they came close to me, looked at me with their keen eyes, ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat
... had seen us, too, and were getting up steam. Bright-colored signal flags were run up and down the masts of all the ships of the Federal fleet. The Congress shook out her topsails. Down came the clothes-line on the Cumberland, and boats were lowered and dropped astern. ...
— The Monitor and the Merrimac - Both sides of the story • J. L. Worden et al.
... extremely doubtful one. I knew perfectly well that no sane pilot would trust his steamboat for a single moment in the hands of a greenhorn unless he were standing by the greenhorn's side. Of course, by force of habit, when I grabbed the wheel, I had taken the steering marks ahead and astern, and I made up my mind to hold her on those marks to the hair; but I could feel myself getting old and gray. Then all at once I recognized where we were; we were in what is called the Grand Chain—a succession of hidden rocks, ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... She even imitated the manner of the soldiers, by turning to watch the flight of the shot, though she clasped her hands as she did so, and appeared to wait the result with trembling. The few seconds of suspense were soon past, when the ball was seen to strike the water fully a quarter of a mile astern of the lugger, and to skip along the placid sea for twice that distance further, when it sank to the bottom by ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Above clouds in Rhine Valley. No. 873 passed across and took up position ahead and about a mile to port. Continued to Schaffhausen, when suddenly lost sight of 873. No. 875 about two miles astern and ...
— The War in the Air; Vol. 1 - The Part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force • Walter Raleigh
... that, unless help speedily came, a calamity was imminent, which for me personally would be worse than the quenching of Quipai. And when we were at the last extremity, mad with thirst and feeble with fasting, help did come. One morning at daylight Yawl sighted a sail—a large vessel a few miles astern of us, but a point or two more to the west, and on the same tack as ourselves. We altered the sloop's course at once so as to bring her across the stranger's bows, for having neither ensign to reverse, nor gun wherewith to fire a signal of distress, it was a matter of life ...
— Mr. Fortescue • William Westall
... insinuating motion. Passengers in their staterooms saw at rhythmical intervals the spray racing fleetly past the portholes. The waves grappled hurriedly at the sides of the great flying steamer and boiled discomfited astern in a turmoil of green and white. From the tops of the enormous funnels streamed level masses of smoke which were immediately torn to nothing by the headlong wind. Meanwhile as the steamer rushed into the northeast, ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... and a fallacious rise in the glass; he stayed with the others, a misjudgment that was like to cost him dear. All were moored, as is the custom in Apia, with two anchors practically east and west, clear hawse to the north, and a kedge astern. Topmasts were struck, and the ships made snug. The night closed black, with sheets of rain. By midnight it blew a gale; and by the morning watch, a tempest. Through what remained of darkness, the captains impatiently expected day, doubtful if they were dragging, steaming ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... that followed the first cry. Like a flash the marine sentry had thrown his rifle to the deck. A single bound carried him to one of the night life buoys. This he released, and hurled far astern. ...
— Dave Darrin's Second Year at Annapolis - Or, Two Midshipmen as Naval Academy "Youngsters" • H. Irving Hancock
... Merrimac's gun-crews aft were struck down flat, with bleeding ears and noses. But in spite of this her boarders were called away; whereupon every man who could handle cutlass and revolver made ready and stood by. The Monitor, however, dropped astern too quickly; and the wallowing Merrimac had no chance of catching her. The fight had lasted all through that calm spring morning when the Monitor steamed off, across the shallows, still keeping carefully between the Merrimac and Minnesota. It was a drawn battle. But the effect ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood
... the edge of the wharf and looked over. The two gigs and the cutter of the Barracouta were lying alongside each other at a flight of steps about half a dozen fathoms away, the only other boat which I could see afloat lying just astern of them. But there were several boats hauled-up high and dry on the wharf, and these would need thinking about with reference to the scheme that I had in my mind. Slipping down the landing steps, I cast adrift three out of the four boats, and re- moored them in a string, one to the stern of another, ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... new boat, one whose first trip it was, sore battered, but battling gallantly for life, and making wonderful weather of it. Yet, even as hope told the flattering tale of her certain safety, there came racing up astern a sea, gigantic even in that giant sea, raced her, caught her, and, as it passed ahead, so tilted her bows that the ballast slid aft, and down she sank by the stern, so near to safety that betwixt ship and shore wife might recognise husband ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... springing and commanding, and stood still, when he saw Dan Cullen by the wheel. And big Dan Cullen puffed at his cigar and said nothing. Astern, and going astern fast, could be seen the sailor. He had caught the life-buoy and was clinging to it. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. The men aloft clung to the royal yards and watched with terror-stricken faces. And the Mary Rogers raced on, ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London
... of day, they raised anchor as ordered by the pilot, as the rising of the tide began to be felt. When it was fully light they saw astern of them, at the poop of the vessel, two French ships which during the night had been in search of them. The enemy arrived with the intention of making an attack upon them. The French made all haste in their ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... of time, that I thought he had actually drowned himself, and was surprised to see his wife behave with so much indifference upon the occasion; but my fears were over when he raised up his head astern of the canoe, and called for a rope. With this rope he dived a second time, and then got into the canoe, and ordered the boy to assist him in pulling. At length they brought up a large basket, about ten feet in diameter, containing two fine fish, which the fisherman (after returning the basket ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... have been as dangerous to return as to keep on, the boatmen plied their hardest to get across, but the stream carried them down near the Zafir. The boat was quite unnoticed, all eyes being intent upon the shore. She was passing about thirty yards astern of the gunboat, when a badly aimed shell from a Dervish battery struck her, and she sank ...
— With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman • G. A. Henty
... coming down the wind, with the galley in close pursuit. From the freshness of the wind and the quantity of sail she was able to carry, it was evident that the king's boat had little chance with her. As the chase came careering along, dropping the galley rapidly astern, the interest hinged on the apparent connexion between her and the boat which had just left Shorne Cove with its unknown freight. From their relative situations it was evident she must bring to for a short ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 579 - Volume 20, No. 579, December 8, 1832 • Various
... clap your eye on my beauties—here's guns, Mart'n, six culverins and t'others sakers, and yonder astern two basilisks as shall work ye death and destruction at two or three thousand paces; 'bove deck amidships I've divers goodly pieces as minions, falcons and patereros with murderers mounted aft to sweep the waist. For her size she's well armed is the 'Faithful ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... sailors, beating up against the wind in the Gulf of Finland, sometimes see a strange sail heave in sight astern and overhaul them hand over hand. On she comes with a cloud of canvas—all her studding-sails out—right in the teeth of the wind, forging her way through the foaming billows, dashing back the spray in sheets from her cutwater, every sail swollen to bursting, every ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... scuttles had been securely closed before the torpedoes left the ship. All mess stools and table shores and all available timber below and on deck had been previously got up and thrown overside for the saving of life. A second torpedo fired by the same submarine missed and passed about ten feet astern. ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... front door," replied Mr. Winslow, with unanswerable logic. "There he is now, comin' out from astern of that lilac bush. Soldier, ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... the three paddles the bark canoe sped rapidly over the water. When the moon was fairly above the edge of the hill they halted for a moment and looked back. The two columns of fire still blazed brightly on the island, which was now three miles astern, and two dark spots could be seen on the water about ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... the blackness astern; the cries were hushed by the clamor of the gale, and the steamship Titan swung back to her course. The first officer had not turned the lever ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... to a wave of the old whaler's hand, the boat went astern slowly and fifteen seconds later the great back appeared near the surface and the monster 'blew,' his pent-up breath escaping suddenly when he was still a foot below the surface, and driving up a column of mixed water and air, the ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... best pace over downs is calculated to try the mettle of anything; and, long before the leading hounds reached Cockthropple Dean, the field was choked by the pace. Sir Harry had long been tailed off; both the brothers Spangles had dropped astern; the horse of one had dropped too; Sawbones, the doctor's, had got a stiff neck; Willing, the road surveyor, and Mr. Lavender, the grocer, pulled up together. Muddyman, the farmer's four-year-old, had enough at the end of ten minutes; ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... natives plundering and wrecking the mission house and the dwellings of Schwartzkoff and Burrowes. A mile away, motionless upon the glassy waters of the harbour, lay the schooner, with her boat astern, and every now and then Blount would take a look at ...
— The Tapu Of Banderah - 1901 • Louis Becke
... good stature, well proportioned in body, {29} with broad faces and small eyes, wide mouths, for the most part unbearded, and with great lips. They were, so Davis said, 'very simple in their conversation, but marvellous thievish.' They made off with a boat that lay astern of the Moonshine, cut off pieces from clothes that were spread out to dry, and stole oars, spears, swords, and indeed anything within their reach. Articles made of iron seemed to offer an irresistible temptation: in ...
— Adventurers of the Far North - A Chronicle of the Frozen Seas • Stephen Leacock
... Tom turned. They saw, rushing up on them from astern, a powerful red motor boat, at the wheel of which sat a stout man, with a very florid ...
— Tom Swift and his Photo Telephone • Victor Appleton
... an incredibly short space of time, the proa came around, and, scarcely losing any headway, moved back toward the spot where the demented man had sprung into the sea, which was now a long distance astern. ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis
... zenith, and the only hits the Americans scored were a few lucky chances in a generally ineffectual rifle fire. Their column was now badly broken, the Susquehanna had gone, the Theodore Roosevelt had fallen astern out of the line, with her forward guns disabled, in a heap of wreckage, and the Monitor was in some grave trouble. These two had ceased fire altogether, and so had the Bremen and Weimar, all four ships ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... snort and strain, Two horses, strongly swimming, tow The ferry-boat, with woven ropes To either bow Firm harnessed by the mane:—a chief With shout and shaken spear Stands at the prow, and guides them; but astern, The cowering merchants, in long robes, Sit pale beside their wealth Of silk-bales and of balsam-drops, Of gold and ivory, Of turquoise-earth and amethyst, Jasper and chalcedony, And milk-barred onyx-stones. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 107, September, 1866 • Various
... whisper of a step behind me. I turned to find Maarda almost at my elbow. The rising tide was unbeaching the canoe, and as Maarda stepped in and the klootchman slipped astern, it drifted afloat. ...
— Legends of Vancouver • E. Pauline Johnson
... the engineers run to the turbine-valves and stand by; but the spectacled slave of the Ray in the U-tube never lifts his head. He must watch where he is. We are hard-braked and going astern; there is language ...
— Actions and Reactions • Rudyard Kipling
... not attempt to turn us, for we were afraid of those oncoming discs which took all our attention. They passed within five miles astern of us, but in a great curve they swung and now seemed heading across our bow. With what tremendous velocity they had been endowed by their firing mechanisms! Their elliptical curve swung them a mile or so ahead ...
— Wandl the Invader • Raymond King Cummings
... make it up in the Easter vacation," said Grey. "You'll have enough to do then," said Hardy; "but how is it you've dropped astern so?" ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... There was a dull, crunching sound as the yacht lurched round. A groaning shiver shook her, and, if I may be pardoned the illustration, it felt exactly as if the ship were going to be sick. There were hoarse cries from the men, and as the Fiona righted herself I looked astern. There was a frothy, many-coloured effervescence ...
— The Mystery of the Green Ray • William Le Queux
... caressingly together, again bending away, like two lovers coy to unite. The tight little boat of the Doctor would keep ahead, and the crimson and crossed flag of England would wave before me, and it seemed to say to the beautiful laggard astern, "Come on, come on; England leads the way." But was it not England's place to be in the front here? She won the right to it by discovering the Tanganika; ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... upon coming on deck at seven bells in the morning, we found the other watch aloft throwing water upon the sails; and, looking astern, we saw a small clipper-built brig with a black hull heading directly after us. We went to work immediately, and put all the canvas upon the brig which we could get upon her, rigging out oars for extra studding-sail yards, and continued wetting ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... water's edge. My portion of this floating residence was lined with a kind of reed-work formed of long culms of Saccharum. The crew and captain consisted of six naked Hindoos, one of whom steered by the huge rudder, sitting on a bamboo-stage astern; the others pulled four oars in the very bows opposite my door, or tracked the boat along ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... slackens, the thin dark column creeps nearer round the trees on the point in our wake; at last the steamer bursts into sight, not a pistol shot astern. ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... and full chests of them! Brave men they was, and bold men surely! We'd be sailing out, bound down round the Horn maybe. We'd be making sail in the dawn, with a fair breeze, singing a chanty song wid no care to it. And astern the land would be sinking low and dying out, but we'd give it no heed but a laugh, and never a look behind. For the day that was, was enough, for we was free men—and I'm thinking 'tis only slaves do be giving heed to the day that's gone or the day to come—until they're old like me. [With ...
— The Hairy Ape • Eugene O'Neill
... be seen on the deck, which was covered with snow. We hailed, and got no reply. I looked in through one of the circular glazed port-holes astern, and saw dimly the figure of a man seated at a table. I knocked on the thick glass, but he never moved. We got on deck, and opened the cabin hatchway, and went below. The man I had seen was before us, at the end of the cabin. I led the way, and ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... the watery world spread between America and Asia; and the monsters of the deep are absent. One day, about a thousand miles from California, a story spread of a porpoise at play, but the lonely creature passed astern like a bubble. Bryant sang of the water fowl that flew from zone to zone, guided in certain flight on the long way over which our steps are led aright, but the Pacific zones are too broad for even winged wanderers. The fish that swarm on our coast ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead
... Jack, "I have; but there's a fellow coming up astern must have had it worse than me. He was under bare poles, but I see he's got a suit of newspapers bent now, and ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman
... now, for the sands on either side were covered with breaking water. Joe Chambers shouted to the sailors to close-reef the mizzen and hoist it, so that he might have the boat better under control. The wind was not directly astern but somewhat on the quarter; and small as was the amount of sail shown, the boat lay over till her lee-rail was at times under water; the following waves yawing her about so much that it needed the most careful steering to prevent her from ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... and passed back the resinous brand to an Indian seated forward, who in turn handed it back over John's head toward Sergeant Barboux, but, seeing that he dozed, crawled aft over the wounded men and set it to the wick of a second lantern rigged on a stick astern. As the wick took fire, the Indian, who had been steering hitherto hour after hour, grunted out a syllable or two and handed his comrade the paddle. The pair changed places, and the ex-steersman—who seemed the elder by many years— crept cautiously forward; the lantern-light, as he ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... eleven of them, and on our informing the Esquimaux of the prize the boats were bringing them, they paddled off with great delight. When they arrived at the spot, and had civilly asked permission to eat some of it, they dropped their canoes astern to the whale's tail, from which they cut off enormous lumps of flesh and ravenously devoured it; after which they followed our boats in-shore, where the carcass was made fast to a mass of grounded ice for their ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... of traffic and the mountain of his speculations was lost astern, when another island came slanting swiftly up to meet them as their ship swept down from the heights. It was a tiny speck in the ocean's expanse, a speck that resolved itself into the squared fields of ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... bargaining with a waterman at Blackwall Stairs. Two stately Indiamen lay out on the river below, almost flank by flank; and, as it happened, the farther one was at that moment weighing her anchor, indeed had it tripped on the cathead. A cloud of boats hung about her, trailing astern as her head-sails drew and she began to gather ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... lay far astern, blushing faintly with their scarlet tamarisk blossoms. The strange purple glow of sunset upon Hymettus had long since faded. A hush grew over the sea, now a marvelous cobalt blue. The earth, gently sleeping, manifested dreamily. Into the subconscious state passed one ...
— The Centaur • Algernon Blackwood
... not far away. A tall Cape Horner that looked almost a twin sister of the ill-fated Northumberland was discharging iron, and astern of her, graceful as a dream, with snow-white decks, lay the Raratonga ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... The careless English soldier, with scarlet coat and pipe-clayed belt—priests and friars—Maltese women in national costume sat side by side. Occasionally, a gig, pulled by man of war's men, might be seen making towards the town, with one or more officers astern, whose glittering epaulettes announced them as either diners out, or amateurs of the opera. The scene to Delme was entirely novel; although it had previously been his lot to scan more ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... long line of islands which guards the entrance of our bay lay dim before use. Over the shoulder of one of them I could see the lighthouse, still a distinguishable patch of white against the looming grey of the land. The water rippled mournfully under our bows and a long pale wake stretched astern from our counter. "Fortune," banked money, good heifers and even enduringly fruitful fields seemed very little matters to me then. They must have seemed still less, far less, to Anthony O'Flaherty after he had seen those white sea-maidens ...
— Our Casualty And Other Stories - 1918 • James Owen Hannay, AKA George A. Birmingham
... for he sweeps triumphantly over all, swoops down, and with a scream scares off the timid little multitude; whilst high above his head he holds his arching wings; and now in pride and beauty he sits upon the waters and, drifting fast astern, gradually ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey
... the damp dripped off the awnings on to the deck as we listened for the reply. It seemed to be astern this time, but much ...
— The Kipling Reader - Selections from the Books of Rudyard Kipling • Rudyard Kipling
... presented the most delicate of lilac shadows. Beyond him stretched a level country intersected with low hedges, all a-dazzle under the morning beams. To the left the land sloped gently upward to a ridge crowned, a mile away, by a straggling line of houses and a single factory chimney. Right astern, over Mr. Bossom's shoulder, rose the clustered chimneys, tall stacks, church spires of the dreadful town, already wreathed in smoke. It seemed to Tilda, although here were meadows and clean waterflags growing by the brink, and a wide sky all around, that yet this ugly smoke ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... and cast anchor amid a group of little vessels. An exceedingly small boat shot out from the side of a yacht of rather diminutive proportions, but tautly rigged for her size, and bearing an outrigger astern. The water this evening was full of phosphoric matter, and it gleamed and sparkled around the little boat like a northern aurora around a dark cloudlet. There was just light enough to show that the oars were plied by a sailor-like man in a Guernsey ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... the Prize remained quietly hidden at their concealed guns throughout this punishment, which continued for forty minutes as the submarine closed, coming up from right astern, a position no doubt which she considered one of safety. When close to she sheered off and passed to the port beam at a distance of about one hundred yards. At this moment Lieutenant Sanders gave the order for "action." The guns were exposed and ...
— The Crisis of the Naval War • John Rushworth Jellicoe
... pirates o' the Sandarbands if they was lucky, and gettin' their weazands slit if they wasn't. They drew less water than us, and was generally handier in the river, which is uncommon full of shoals and sandbanks; but for all that I remember they was still maybe half a mile astern when we dropped anchor—anchors, I should say—for the night, some way below Diamond Harbor. But to us white men the way o' these Moors is always a bag o' mystery, and as seamen they en't anyway of much account. Well, it might be about seven bells, and my watch below, ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... the frigates, but, unfortunately, when within musket shot of them, she was struck by a round shot and foundered, causing complete failure in our object. The San Martin and the Lautaro keeping far astern, there was no alternative but to withdraw from further attack, leaving the explosion ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald |
