"Offing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the ebbing tide; and it was eight o'clock at night before they succeeded in launching her. Immediately after its return, for which we had been waiting four hours, we got underweigh, and were only just in time to save the breeze, which carried us out into the offing: after a short calm, the wind gradually freshened from South-South-West, and we steered on under easy sail towards ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... sat talking to Roylance for a time after going up to a point where on the one side they could see the lights of the ship as she lay to in the offing, and on the other, very dimly, the distant lamps of the town of Saint Jacques, or those at the head ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... before noon next morning four strange sails were seen in the offing, which, before long, were made out to be the dreaded Madagascar pirates, with the Cassandra, Victory, and two prizes they had just taken. The sight of them struck Brown with terror, though a little reflection would have shown ...
— The Pirates of Malabar, and An Englishwoman in India Two Hundred Years Ago • John Biddulph
... listened to that note of war; we could feel the railway carriages trembling and quivering, as if shaken by some rude giant's hand, when they halted at any exposed station; and, this morning, the pilots shake their wise, grizzled beads, and hint at worse weather yet in the offing. For forty-eight hours the storm-signals had never been lowered, nor changed, except to intimate the shifting of a point or two in the current of the gale, and few vessels, if any, had been found rash enough to ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... extended the snow-white cliffs, throwing in shadow part of the ocean, and bringing forward their own illumined walls in bold relief against the dark blue sea. Ships of every size, from the floating castle in the offing to the tiny pleasure boat, whose white sails shining in the sun caused her to be distinguished at some distance, skimming along the ocean as a bird of snowy plumage across the heavens, the merchant vessels, the ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar
... journey in a fast boat, is a large camp, and quite a town for Mesopotamia, captured from the Turks, early in the war, by sheer bluff. The Turkish commandant surrendered to a naval launch under the impression that about half the sea-power of the British Empire lay in the offing. As a matter of fact no other help of any kind arrived until the next day, and all the surrendered forces were kept on good behaviour by a Lieutenant and a marine—I think ...
— A Dweller in Mesopotamia - Being the Adventures of an Official Artist in the Garden of Eden • Donald Maxwell
... his steamer built of light draft especially, to profit by any outlet offering least danger from the vigilant patrol outside. The skipper had already chosen his course. Because of the gale, he calculated that the blockaders would get a considerable offing, lest they flounder mid the shoal waters inshore. He knew too, even if it were not so dark, that a long, foamy line of surf curtained the bay from any watchful eye on the open sea. By the time she reached the beach channels, La Luz had full speed on. ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... in omens, scented a row in the offing. Only in moments of emotion was Mr. Jackson in the ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... take my pen in hand to record? The battle-ship, perfect-modelled, majestic, that I saw pass the offing to- day under full sail? The splendours of the past day? Or the splendour of the night that envelops me? Or the vaunted glory and growth of the great city spread around me?—No; But I record of two simple men I saw to-day, on the pier, in the midst ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman
... immediately fired a gun and hauled our wind, and then fired a second to warn the ships astern of us of the danger. When we hauled off we could not clear them, and it was more than an hour before we got an offing. They were the "Double-headed shot" keys. Our signal was made for the captain and master to repair on board the admiral. The latter, we understood, was well hauled over the coals, and he came on board looking like a boy who ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman
... at this time regarded himself as a potential multi-millionaire. The type-setting machine which for years had been sapping his financial strength was believed to be perfected, and ship-loads of money were waiting in the offing. However, we shall come to ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... of this eventful day that the fleet hove in sight, and lay becalmed a few miles in the offing. Mustapha hastened to report it to the pacha, as he sat in his divan, hearing complaints, and giving judgment, although not justice. Now when the pacha heard that the fleet had returned, his heart misgave him, ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... the solid world. The shoreless river was, however, populous with craft of all rigs, for this is the highway to the great interior, and some of them were bound to Cuyab, 2,600 miles in the heart of the continent. During the night a ship on fire in the offing lit up with great vividness the silent waste of waters, and as the flames leaped up the rigging, the sight was very grand. Owing to calms and light winds, our passage was a slow one, and I was not sorry when at last I could say good-bye to the Italians and their oily food. ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray
... You read me about that there fellow as slaughtered the Camelites; I understands him better. By Gosh, he gave 'em a warm time of it, on my swow, didn't he! Not much use them Camelites showing their heads when Joshua was in the offing! He swept their decks ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... rock owes its name; and the sun set as we were bearing down in one long tack on the Small Isles. We passed the Isle of Muck, with its one low hill; saw the pyramidal mountains of Rum looming tall in the offing; and then, running along the Isle of Eigg, with its colossal Scuir rising between us and the sky, as if it were a piece of Babylonian wall, or of the great wall of China, only vastly larger, set down on the ridge of a mountain, we entered the channel ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... and went into Silver-rest in the morning light. Far as the eye could reach stretched the deep still waters of the bay; the white sails of his yacht and of the few fishing skiffs in the offing stood out distinct and glancing in the sun; over the bluffs and in all the clefts of rock the growing grass blew and flickered in the breeze; and as he crossed the sands the air was fragrant with the scent of the wild flowers that grew down to the water's edge. But to note these ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... offing, replied with a gesture. It was a gesture they had learned from the boot-and-knife boy, and they had once been spanked for practicing it on the piano-tuner. The boot-and-knife boy called it "cocking a snook," and it consisted in raising a thumb to one's nose and spreading the fingers ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... like the wings of white birds, were in the offing; to the right and left rose the high cliffs; a sort of cape interrupted the view on one side, while on the other the coast-line stretched out till it could no longer be distinguished, and a harbor and some houses could be seen in a bay ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... been holding forth on the beach. "Us ain't had no equinoctial gales thees year, not proper like us used to. This season's going to break up sudden and wi' thunder, an' when it du, look out! I'd rather be here now than out in the offing, for all the sea's so calm. Ah!" pointing to a dinghy that was shoving off the beach, "they bwoys 'ould laugh in me faace if I was to go an' say, 'Don' go. ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... down to the open sea, and polished boulders and streaked rocks lift up above the granulated snow. But all that is gone in a few weeks, and the wild winter locks down again on the land; while at sea the ice tears up and down the offing, jamming and ramming, and splitting and hitting, and pounding and grounding, till it all freezes together, ten feet thick, from the land ...
— The Second Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... the woods of Provence. Then came towns nestling under bluffs of red quarry-stones, towns upon wooded plains,—all with a white newness about them; and a brig, with horses on its deck, piled over with bales of hay, comes drifting lazily down with the tide, to catch an offing for the West Indies; and queer-shaped flat-boats, propelled by broad-bladed oars, surge slowly athwart the stream, ferrying over some traveller, or some fish-peddler bound to the "P'int" ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... went back to the bar-room, when, knowing not what else to do with myself, I resolved to spend the rest of the evening as a looker on. Presently a rioting noise was heard without. Starting up, the landlord cried, That's the Grampus's crew. I seed her reported in the offing this morning; a three years' voyage, and a full ship. Hurrah, boys; now we'll have the latest news from the Feegees. A tramping of sea boots was heard in the entry; the door was flung open, and in rolled a wild set of mariners enough. Enveloped ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... the entrance of Matanzas bay; the land wind blew gently, bearing to us the delicious perfumes of orange and coffee-blossoms, and crowds of vessels were coming from the bay, taking advantage of it to gain an offing before the setting in of the sea-breeze. Half a mile from us a brig lay motionless upon the water, her yards swarming with men loosing the sails, which in a moment fell together with a precision that would have plainly told a sailor that the brig was a man-of-war, even without ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... waited for the well-known signal in the offing,—daily walking to the shore, where kind old Uncle Shubael, now long superannuated, and idly busying himself about the fish-house, strove to cheer her fainting soul by store of well-chosen proverbs, and yarns of how, aforetimes, schooners not larger and not so stout as the "Miranda," ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... o' my sails entirely, you have," he replied at last; "an' you're right, young man, but I'm troubled about you. If you don't run into this here port you'll have to beat about in the offing all night, or cast anchor in the streets, for I don't know of another lodgin' in Portsm'uth w'ere you could hang out except them disrepitible grog-shops. In coorse, there's the big hotels; but I heerd you say to Sloper that you was bound to do things cheap, ...
— Blue Lights - Hot Work in the Soudan • R.M. Ballantyne
... sort of practical comment on the text above, there was sudden fall of the wind, and then a loud peal of thunder. Alert in a moment, we noticed, far away in the offing, the fishing boats dip their sails and reef them, so we knew there would soon be a blow, and we resolved to reef, too, and just in time. My life-belt, {55} therefore, was at once strapped on, and two reefs put in the mainsail, and one in the jib, and the storm mizen was ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... ship returned to England, leaving only a frigate and the "Venerable," commanded by Admiral Duncan, with my father as his flag-captain. To deceive the Dutch, they continued to make signals, as if the rest of the fleet were in the offing, till they could return to England; when, without delay, Admiral Duncan and my father went alone on board each ship, ordered the men to arrest the ringleaders, which was done, and the fleet immediately returned to its station ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... least to have sea-room, for the clouds began to grow thick in the western-board, and the wind was already there and began to blow fresh almost upon the shore, which at this place lies along north-north-west and south-south- east. By nine o'clock at night we got a pretty good offing, but the wind still increasing, I took in my main-top-sail, being able to carry no more sail than two courses and the mizen. At two in the morning, August 3rd, it blew very hard, and the sea was much raised, so that I furled all my sails but my mainsail, though the wind blew ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton
... formerly resided here, are conveniently situated on the southern banks of the river Buregreg, which divides Rabat from Salee. Ships of one hundred tons, that do not draw much water, may pass the bar and load close to these houses; but larger vessels must come to anchor in the offing, and take in their cargoes by boats. The country about Rabat and Salee is wonderfully abundant in all the finest grain, leguminous plants, fruits, vegetables, and cattle; the orange, lemon, Seville, or bitter orange, and citron plantations are here very extensive and extremely ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny
... our jailer's skull and off our boat did steer, And in the offing were picked up by a jolly privateer; We sailed in her the cruise, my boys, and prizes did take we, I'll be at Portsmouth soon, thinks I, with Susan ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... he departed before the watchful eye of Captain Scraggs observed Mr. Gibney and McGuffey in the offing, a block away. When they came aboard they found Captain Scraggs on top of the house, seated on an upturned fire bucket, smoking pensively and gazing across the bay with an assumption of lamblike ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... bow, in his sportsman's cap and waterproof, hugging his rod cases to his breast, watched while a heterogeneous fleet of canoes, skiffs, and sailboats came racing out from shore, for the steamer does not land here, but hangs in the offing and lighters its cargo ashore. Leading the lot was a sort of whaleboat propelled by two oars on one side and one on the other, and in the sternsheets sat a rosy-cheeked, good-natured looking man with a smooth-shaven face who Bennie ...
— The Man Who Rocked the Earth • Arthur Train
... while the sky holds a cloud or the locker a drop. Nothing here can shake their ships, except a violent east wind, against which they wet the other eye; lazy boats visit them with comfort and delight, while white waves are leaping, in the offing; they cherish their well-earned rest, and eat the lotus—or rather the onion—and drink ambrosial grog; they lean upon the bulwarks, and contemplate their shadows—the noblest possible employment for mankind—and lo! if they care to lift their eyes, in the south shines the quay ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... heat so intense and oppressive as in this river; the thermometer stood at 94 degrees, and the ground was so heated that we were obliged to beat a bush down to stand upon, whilst we were taking the bearings of some of the islets in the offing. ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... Mike, I'm not going to hang on the hook of suspicion. Maybe I can find out whose picture I sent," and away Matt went up town to the photograph gallery. When he returned ten minutes later Mr. Murphy, sighting him a block in the offing, knew the skipper of the barkentine Retriever for a broken man! Beyond doubt he had shipped ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne
... on board to steer while I conned I should have felt less of an ass. As it was, I knew I ought to be facing the music in the offing, and cursed myself for having broken my rule and gone blundering into this confounded short cut. It was giving myself away, doing just the very thing that you can't do in ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... through a letter from Flechier, that while the royal troops were busy in the mountains the Camisards had come down into the plain, swarmed over La Camargue, and had been seen in the neighbourhood of Saint-Gilles. At the same time word was sent him that two ships had been seen in the offing, from Cette, and that it was more than probable that they contained troops, that England and Holland were sending ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... brightly on the long line of Spanish transports that were moored below, stem on to the beach, and on the white sails of the armed craft that were still hovering under weigh in the offing, which, as the night wore on, stole in, one after another, like phantoms of the ocean, and letting go their anchors with a splash, and a hollow rattle of the cable, remained still and silent as ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 472 - Vol. XVII. No. 472., Saturday, January 22, 1831 • Various
... men could not have borne to live so, in such deadly insecurity. But probably they troubled their heads little about the pirates, kept the women and children at home, and set a retainer on the cliff in open weather, to scan the offing for the light-rigged barques, while poorer folk took their chance. We live among a different set of risks now, and think little of them, as ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson
... of the fleet, and the lightest and best sailers; but they must not move in rear of the fleet, because they would not see well what is passing so as to give timely succour, and therefore they ought always to keep an offing on that side or flank of the fleet where the flagship is, or on both sides if they are many; and if they are in one body they should work to station themselves to windward for ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett
... day I sot in the porthole of that cave I see a sail in the offing. I declare, I thought I should 'a' choked! I catched off my tappa cloth and h'isted it on a pole, but the ship kep' on stiddy out to sea. My heart beat up to my eyes, but I held on ag'inst hope, and I declare ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... The lack of bread enforces— The rail-cars snort from strand to strand, Like more of Death's White horses! The rich preach 'rights' and future days, And hear no angel scoffing: The poor die mute—with starving gaze On corn-ships in the offing. Be pitiful, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... her own heart, and when the three had taken seizin of the northern hill, eaten their manchets of saffron cake, and shared their canful of milk, she took up a post from which, while the others scanned the offing for Spaniards, she could watch and time the ebb of the ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... norther comes on to blow at Vera Cruz, all the vessels remaining near the city let go an extra anchor and batten down the hatches; or, wiser still, they let go their ground tackle and hasten to make an offing. The natives promptly haul their light boats well on shore; the citizens securely close their doors and windows; while the sky becomes darkened by clouds of sand driven by fierce gusts of wind. It is a fact that passengers ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... of war in the offing," he remarked to his lieutenant, Dominique You, standing beside him. "She has sent off a pinnace with a flag of truce. I go to meet ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... shrilling tern. The light is on the headland, the harbor gate is wide; But rolling in with ruin the fog is on the tide. Fate like a muffled steersman sails with that Norland gloom; The Snowflake in the offing is neck and neck with doom. Ha, ha, my saucy cruiser, crowd up your helm and run! There'll be a merrymaking to-morrow in the sun. A cloud of straining canvas, a roar of breaking foam, The Snowflake and the sea-drift are racing in for home. Her heart is dancing shoreward, but silently and pale ...
— Ballads of Lost Haven - A Book of the Sea • Bliss Carman
... worked without intermission, the stone was soon prepared, and sent off next day in one of the stone-lighters. On the 9th July the stone was placed in a praam-boat, decorated with colours for the occasion. Flags were also displayed upon the beacon and from the shipping in the offing. The stone was gently lowered into the water, which occupied the site of the building, amidst the cheering of all present. The stone was necessarily landed at high water, for want of a sufficient length of railway for conveying it along the rock at low water ...
— Smeaton and Lighthouses - A Popular Biography, with an Historical Introduction and Sequel • John Smeaton
... kindred, whereon lay the three long-ships, the Seamew, and the Osprey and the Erne. Heavy and huge they seemed to him as they lay there, black-sided, icy-cold with the washing of the March waves, their golden dragon-heads looking seaward wistfully. But first had he looked out into the offing, and it was only when he had let his eyes come back from where the sea and sky met, and they had beheld nothing but the waste of waters, that he beheld the Ship-stead closely; and therewith he saw where a little to the west of it lay a skiff, ...
— The Story of the Glittering Plain - or the Land of Living Men • William Morris
... sight of the Swallow, and never saw her afterwards.[48] At first I was inclined to have gone back into the streight; but a fog coming on, and the sea rising very fast, we were all of opinion that it was indispensably necessary to get an offing as soon as possible; for except we pressed the ship with sail, before the sea rose too high, it would be impracticable either to weather Terra del Fuego on one tack, or Cape Victory on the other. At noon, the Islands of Direction bore N. 21' W. distant three ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... on the 3rd of December, got on shore on one of the smaller islets on the 4th, found no water, and were driven to sea to seek an offing on the 5th by a gale. On the 6th they landed at Point Egmont on the West Falkland, and found a fine spring of fresh water. As it would take several days to fill the casks, all the passengers went ashore and camped on ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... excused for mentioning one scene that very much struck me, and of which I am now the only (white) one left who was present at it. We were paying a visit for the first time to an island, and—the vessel being safe in the offing—the Bishop asked me if I would go with them as he sometimes did on similar occasions. We pulled in to a small inner islet among a group, where a number of (say 200) natives were collected on the beach. Seeing they looked ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... So that among the younger officers the query was very natural, "Who the devil is Governor of California?" One day I was on board the Independence frigate, dining with the ward-room officers, when a war-vessel was reported in the offing, which in due time was made out to be the Cyane, Captain DuPont. After dinner we were all on deck to watch the new arrival, the ships meanwhile exchanging signals, which were interpreted that General Kearney was on board. As the Cyane approached, ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... I was a ship, and sail'd the boundless seas, Sailing and ever sailing—all seas and into every port, or out upon the offing, Saluting, cheerily hailing each mate, met or pass'd, little or big, "Ship ahoy!" thro' trumpet or by voice—if nothing more, some friendly merry word at least, For companionship and good will for ever to ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... in the afternoon, because we dared not pass between two large islands on account of possible shoals. The islands were round in form, like those we had seen farther back, but were of a good height. Now we held east again, with four biggish islands and two islets in the offing. On our other side we presently had a line of flat islands with steep shores. The channel was far from safe here. In the evening we suddenly noticed large stones standing up above the water among some ice-floes close on our port bow, and on our ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... might do on soundings, and in an offing where one knew the channel," returned old Cap; "but in an unknown region like this I think it unsafe to trust the pilot alone too far from the ship: so, with your leave, ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... sends his respects. He says that everything is ship-shape above and below, and the craft holding well on her way. He also prays you not to think of returning at present, and says that it would be as bad seamanship, as for a captain who has made a good offing in a gale, and has plenty of sea-room, to run down close to a rocky shore under the lee, before the storm ...
— When London Burned • G. A. Henty
... of his army that he had left on the Italian shore. The messages of encouragement and of urgency which he sent across to them did not bring them over, and at length, one dark and stormy night, when he thought that the inclemency of the skies and the heavy surging of the swell in the offing would drive his vigilant enemies into places of shelter, and put them off their guard, he determined to cross the sea himself and bring his hesitating army over. He ordered a galley to be prepared, and went on board of it disguised, and with his head muffled in his mantle, ...
— History of Julius Caesar • Jacob Abbott
... and its dip at sea, the gradual appearance and disappearance of ships in the offing, cannot fail to incline intelligent sailors to a belief in the globular figure of the earth. The writings of the Mohammedan astronomers and philosophers had given currency to that doctrine throughout Western Europe, but, as might be expected, ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper
... his forehead as though he were pondering the question deeply, "if she comes back she'll come in through the tickle and come to in the offing and blow her whistle, and we'll hear un, and be ready for she. If she don't come back, she'll not blow her whistle, and we'll not hear un. We'll be stayin' here as snug as a bear in his den and ...
— Left on the Labrador - A Tale of Adventure Down North • Dillon Wallace
... Radisson. He had the sailors lowering jolly-boats in a jiffy; and off seven of us went, round the ice-pans, ploughing, cutting, portaging a way till we had crossed the obstruction and were pulling for the French fort with the spars of three Company boats far in the offing. ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... after the wreck of the Sunshine, as described in a previous chapter, Captain Roy and his son stood on the coast of Java not far from the ruins of Anjer. A vessel was anchored in the offing, and a little boat ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... a steamer to go around them to break them loose. At last, cargo loaded and ice smashed, they sailed away from Ostend and pointed their bow towards the great fleets, not again to see land for two full months, save Heligoland and Terschelling in the far distant offing. ...
— The Story of Grenfell of the Labrador - A Boy's Life of Wilfred T. Grenfell • Dillon Wallace
... to the Russian-American Company's Establishment of New Archangel. This exhibited considerable signs of commerce. In the harbour were five sailing vessels from 250 to 350 tons; besides a large bark in the offing in tow of a steamer, which brought advices from St Petersburgh down to the end of April. An officer came off conveying Governor Etholine's compliments and welcome. The party landed, and were received in the residence ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 380, June, 1847 • Various
... attempts to convict him of smuggling or wrecking, the revenue officers came out from Bude to the Bristol Channel to hunt him down. He was seen last on the Gull Rock, off Hartland Point, signalling one evening to a ship which lay in the offing. He was taken off by a boat, but almost immediately a storm came up, the ship was blotted out from the sight of those watching from the cliffs, and when the squall passed she had totally disappeared. No one ever knew whether ...
— Lynton and Lynmouth - A Pageant of Cliff & Moorland • John Presland
... sometimes among the mountains of the interior, and sometimes near the margin of the shore. At some points, where the road approached so near to the cliffs as to afford a good view of the sea, the fleet of galleys were to be seen in the offing prosperously pursuing ...
— Richard I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... and the town, make themselves masters of that fort, and then send a summons to the governor. By midnight, the three frigates, having the force on board which was intended for this debarkation, approached within three miles of the place; but owing to a strong gale of wind in the offing, and a strong current against them in-shore, they were not able to get within a mile of the landing-place before daybreak; and then they were seen, and their intention discovered. Troubridge and Bowen, with Captain Oldfield, of the marines, went upon this to consult with the admiral what was to ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... to climb the nearest sand hill and to gaze out toward the offing where the pirate ship had been ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle
... The sea was in a white foam, the whole air filled with spray, and the wind blowing heavily. Not far from shore was a boat with a part of the exhausted crew from a vessel wrecked in the offing. The breakers made it impossible that the poor fellows should effect a landing. A terrible death seemed their inevitable fate. Just at the moment your grandfather reached the point, he saw his host leap into the sea, his object being to give the men a rope. It was at the peril ...
— Georgie's Present • Miss Brightwell
... took up Naval Estimates. Instantly Commodore HARCOURT appeared in offing; landed on Front Opposition Bench, diffusing unwonted smell of stale mussels and seaweed. Commodore looked very imposing pacing down quarter-deck towards Mace, with telescope under his arm, sou'wester pulled well over his ears, and unpolished square-toed boots rising above his knees. A blizzard ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, March 21, 1891 • Various
... me and dropped a letter. I picked it up, and the woman, seeing me in possession of the epistle, quietly went on. The letter had no address, and the seal represented a running knot. I stepped hurriedly into the gondola, and as soon as we were in the offing I broke the seal. I ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... succeeded in forcing their way into the great tower, and in establishing themselves in one part of it, in despite of all the resolution that could be opposed to them. At the same critical moment, there appeared in the offing a Turkish fleet, which was known to carry great reinforcements for the Pacha. Everything conspired to prompt Napoleon to finish his enterprise at whatever cost, and he ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... returned to his attendant yawl, in evident dudgeon and disgust; when the junior, being hailed by his comrades in the schooner on the opposite quarter, was advised to give up the Europe, since they had made out a second ship quite as large in the offing. ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... weren't going to let down a fine new man-of-war's boat to pick up three half-drowned rats. We accepted the invitation. We climbed—I, the engineer, and the ship's boy. About half an hour later the fog cleared entirely; except for the half of the boat away in the offing, there was neither stick nor string on the sea to show that the Hespa had been ...
— Soldiers Three • Rudyard Kipling
... was granted before the fall of the blow which, for a time, annihilated British authority on the frontier. On the third day after the reception of the evil tidings of the capture of York, Chauncey's fleet was seen in the offing; but for six days adverse winds prevented it from landing the American troops beneath the protection of the guns of Fort Niagara. Day after day they stood off and on, but were unable to make the land. "The stars in ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow
... teethers to dig in, and there was an effect of superior fashion in the gossipers on the piazza, one to every three of the three hundred feet of the piazza, rocking and talking, and guessing at the yachts in the offing, and then bathing and coming out to lie on the sand ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells
... the offing, in readiness to come to my assistance if needed. It became evident that we could not land without filling our boats with water, so we hauled off to sea, and took the trough easterly, until we had ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... wild Sea Rovers who gather at Cowes and Southampton. The Rover may always be recognised on shore—and, by-the-way, he stays ashore a good deal—for his nautical clothing is spick and span new, the rake of his glossy cap is unspeakably jaunty, and the dignity of his gesture when he scans the offing with a trusty telescope is without parallel in history. When the Rover walks, you observe a slight roll which no doubt is acquired during long experience of tempestuous weather. The tailors and bootmakers gaze on the gallant Rover with joy and ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... my attention to the flocks of swans which dotted the waters in the offing, and said: "It is hard work to get hold of a swan, though they are a large bird, and abundant in Currituck Sound. You must use a good rifle to bring one down. After a strong norther has been blowing, and the birds have worked well into the bight of the bay, near ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop
... Thy port assured in a happier land than mine. But for all I have given thee, beauty enough is thine, As thou, aslant with trim tackle and shrouding, From the proud nostril curve of a prow's line In the offing scatterest foam, thy ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... shore. They did not find one, however, and the next morning were excessively sulky, keeping together and evidently plotting mischief. They, with the rest of us, were aroused, however, soon after breakfast by the appearance of a sail in the offing. The more sanguine at once declared that she was standing towards us, and that our fears regarding a prolonged stay on the island were groundless; others thought that she would pass by and leave us to our fate. Every spyglass was in requisition, ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... a large stone, and then, according to his own ancient practice, he clambered with difficulty up to the venerable crag. Captain Brand had no spy-glass, and there was a good deal of rain falling, but yet he thought he saw a large ship, a brig, and a small schooner in the offing. ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... striking and dramatic in the passage from Europe to Asia. One steams slowly through a desert that comes up close to the ship; the sand stretches away, hillock and mound beyond hillock and mound; one sees camels in the offing stringing out to some ancient destination; one is manifestly passing across a barrier,—the canal has changed nothing of that. Suez is a first dab of tumultuous Orientalism, noisy and vivid. And then, after that ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... from the town meeting to the Whittaker place, felt lonesome likewise. Not for the Deacon's reason—he met no one on the main road, save a group of school children and Miss Phinney, and, sighting the latter in the offing, he dodged behind the trees by the schoolhouse pond and waited until she passed. But the captain, his trouble now heavy upon him, did feel the need of sympathy and congenial companionship. He knew he might count upon Dimick and ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... that the Polly had made offing at a lively pace during her wild gallop under the ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... with you," he cried, "and row these children and the passenger out a mile from the ship—two miles, three miles, make an offing." ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... be whirled into the air. As Wang Tun was watching the career of the chalice, Hsue disappeared and escaped. When he reached Lu-chiang K'ou, in Anhui, he boarded a boat, which two dragons towed into the offing and then raised into the air. In an instant they had borne it to the Lue Shan Mountains, to the south of Kiukiang, in Kiangsi. The perplexed boatman opened the window of his boat and took a furtive look out. Thereupon the dragons, finding themselves discovered by an infidel, ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... the old man standing outside his cottage, with his old spy-glass under his arm, waiting for them, and apparently he had been filling up the time by watching three or four vessels out in the offing. ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... the foot a desert plain, long and broad, over which I travelled for the space of a month till my course brought me to the brink of the briny sea.[FN227] After standing there awhile, I was ware of a ship in the offing which ran before a fair wind making for the shore. I hid myself behind a rock on the beach and waited till the ship drew near, when I leaped on board. I found her full of merchants and passengers and one of them ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... considered, it is no wonder, that upon the shore beyond Yarmouth there are no less than four lighthouses kept flaming every night, besides the lights at Castor, north of the town, and at Goulston S., all of which are to direct the sailors to keep a good offing in case of bad weather, and to prevent their running into Cromer Bay, which the seamen ...
— Tour through the Eastern Counties of England, 1722 • Daniel Defoe
... Sutors; and she was soon riding at anchor in the roadstead; but she had entered the bay alone; and when day broke, and for a brief interval the driving snow-rack cleared up towards the east, no second sail appeared in the offing. "Poor Miller!" exclaimed the master of the smack; "if he does not enter the Firth ere an hour, he will never enter it at all. Good sound vessel, and better sailor never stepped between stem and stern; but last night has, I fear, been too much for him. He should ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... am told, carry the art of petticoat wearing to a higher point than any of their sisters. The appearance of the homing fleet in the offing is a signal for as many as thirty of these garments to be put on as a mark of welcome ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... ship in the offing," I said to Thorgils presently, when we, with the Dane just astern of us, were some five miles from land and had ceased to look back to Tenby. Nona had gone into the cabin away from the wind, which came a little chill from the east ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... menacing to the boat. This would not have been the case had the rocks formed a lee; but they did not, running too near the direction of the trades to prevent the billows that got up a mile or so in the offing, from sending their swell quite home to the reef. It was this swell, indeed, which caused the line of white water along the northern margin of the coral, washing on the rocks by a sort of lateral effort, and breaking, as a ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... debates were at the hottest, sails were descried in the offing; for the archduke's forces already stood upon the edge of the downs. First one ship, then another and another, moved steadily along the coast, returning from Nieuport in the ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... our dry southwestern country is an Indian village; and in the offing is a high mountain, towering up out of the desert. It is considered a great feat to climb this mountain, so that all the boys of the village were eager to attempt it. One day the Chief said: "Now boys, you you ...
— Woodland Tales • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... plan, the monitors were to approach Ostend just after daybreak. In the offing a number of empty transports were to assemble, protected by a powerful flotilla of destroyers. The appearance of these transports would be taken by the Germans as an indication of an attempted landing of a British force, and troops would be hurriedly ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... the three chairs. Through the door he could see Collins, perched on a high stool before the shelf-like desk. From the open window came the clear, musical note of the circular saw, the fresh aromatic smell of new lumber, the bracing air from Superior sparkling in the offing. He felt tired. In rare moments such as these, when the muscles of his striving relaxed, his mind turned to the past. Old sorrows rose before him and looked at him with their sad eyes; the sorrows that had helped to make him what he was. He wondered ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... crew for their rescue of the previous day, and to say "Good-bye," as he was about to weigh and proceed to sea in chase of a large school of whales which had just been seen spouting at a distance of some twelve miles in the offing. The baronet was good- natured enough to offer to tow him to the scene of action; but this service he gratefully declined, saying that there was a fine fair wind blowing and that his anchor was already a-trip. The ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... distance; space &c 180; remoteness, farness^, far- cry to; longinquity^, elongation; offing, background; remote region; removedness^; parallax; reach, span, stride. outpost, outskirt; horizon; aphelion; foreign parts, ultima Thule [Lat.], ne plus ultra [Lat.], antipodes; long range, giant's stride. dispersion &c 73. [units of distance] length &c 200. cosmic distance, light-years. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... South, or Delaware river, upon which the Dutch governor had erected Fort Casimir. Gerrit Bikker was in command of the fort, with a garrison of twelve men. On the morning of the first of June, 1654, a strange sail was seen in the offing. A small party was sent out in a boat, to reconnoitre. They returned with the tidings that it was a Swedish ship full of people, with a new governor; and that they had come to take possession of the place, affirming that the ...
— Peter Stuyvesant, the Last Dutch Governor of New Amsterdam • John S. C. Abbott
... sailed in company, it has often happened that not every vessel has been actually engaged in the capture of the prize, though they may have been rendering valuable assistance in a variety of forms, such as watching in the offing, guarding an open outlet of escape to the intended prize. In the disputes arising from these joint captures, Sir William Scott was the first to establish a settled intelligible system, on principles that might become in future easily applicable to the ...
— The Laws Of War, Affecting Commerce And Shipping • H. Byerley Thomson
... last, 'I've been concerned in no such expedition before. An' it be the custom for single ships to engage, I'll stand to it alone. You shall come with me as consort, though, and stand to and fro in the offing, or sink me ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... on board a Charleston pilot, as well as one for Wilmington, I had not determined, on sailing, which port to attempt; but having made the land near Charleston bar during thick weather on the night of the 28th, our pilot was afraid to venture further. We made an offing, therefore, before daylight; and circumstances favoring Wilmington, we approached the western bar on the night of December 29th. We had been biding our time since twelve o'clock that day close in to the shore about forty miles southwest of the bar and ...
— The Narrative of a Blockade-Runner • John Wilkinson
... much coral, the soundings near the land are described by Admiral Roussin, in the "Pilote du Bresil", as siliceous sand, mingled with much finely comminuted particles of shells and coral. Further in the offing, for a space of 1,300 miles along the coast, from the Abrolhos Islands to Maranham, the bottom in many places is composed of "tuf blanc, mele ou forme de madrepores broyes." This white substance, probably, is analogous to that which occurs within the above-mentioned lagoons; it ...
— Coral Reefs • Charles Darwin
... morning of the 5th, assumed a very different aspect from that which we had experienced for the last two days; the wind gradually subsided, and with it the sea, and a favorable breeze now springing up, we were enabled to make a good offing. Fortunately no accident of consequence occurred, although several of our people were severely bruised by falls. Poor fellows! they certainly suffered enough; not a dry stitch, not a dry hammock have they had since we sailed. Happily, however, their misfortunes are soon ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park
... do I see?" cried Gerald, in tragic tones. "A vessel in the offing, headed in this direction. Now who do you suppose has the cheek to ...
— Hildegarde's Neighbors • Laura E. Richards
... the cloud-bank always strives for, but seldom wins, the middle of the gulf. The sun—as the sailors say—is eating it up. Unless perchance a sombre thunder-head breaks away from the main body to career all over the gulf till it escapes into the offing beyond Azuera, where it bursts suddenly into flame and crashes like a sinster pirate-ship of the air, hove-to above the ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... near the beach, a wrecker's machine. It was a cylinder with some holes at the side, made for the thrusting in of some long poles with strong leverage; and when there is a vessel in trouble or going to pieces out in the offing, the wreckers shoot a rope out to the suffering men. They grasp it, and the wreckers turn the cylinder, and the rope winds around the cylinder, and those who are shipwrecked are saved. So at your feet to-day there is an influence ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... mockery or malice have we here?" cries Herve Riel: "Are you mad, you Malouins? Are you cowards, fools, or rogues? Talk to me of rocks and shoals?—me, who took the soundings, tell On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every swell 'Twixt the offing here and Greve where the river disembogues? Are you bought by English gold? Is it love the lying's for? Morn and eve, night and day, Have I piloted your bay, Enter'd free and anchor'd fast at the foot of Solidor. Burn the fleet and ruin France? That were worse than fifty Hogues! ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... Randolph's astonishment, there was no sign or trace of any late occupation of the wharf, and the ship whose crossyards he had seen dimly through the darkness the night before was no longer there. She might have "warped out" in the early morning, but there was no trace of her in the stream or offing beyond. A bark and brig quite dismantled at an adjacent wharf seemed to accent the loneliness. Beyond, the open channel between him and Verba Buena Island was racing with white-maned seas and sparkling in the shifting sunbeams. The scudding clouds ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... anchorage while the War Council on the flagship was in progress, and had been sent on ahead to the mouth of the river as scouts. They were to run a distance of twenty miles out to sea, to ascertain whether there were any of the enemy's ships in the offing, and then to return with their report to the entrance of the Pei-ho, where the battle fleet would await their arrival under the guns of ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... was again left to my care, the masters of the ships having had previous orders from Captain Phillip to prepare for sea. On the 26th, I made the signal for the transports to get under way. We perceived this morning two large ships in the offing, standing in for the bay, under French colours: these ships had been observed two days before, but the wind blowing fresh from north-west, they were not able to get in with the land. I sent a boat with an officer to assist them in, and about an hour after, ...
— An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island • John Hunter |
