"Oarsman" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... own surplus flesh material as he wearily rowed himself across the Fjord towards Olaf Gueldmar's private pier. As the perspiration bedewed his brow, he felt that Heaven had dealt with him somewhat too liberally in the way of fat—he was provided too amply with it ever to excel as an oarsman. The sun was burning hot, the water was smooth as oil, and very weighty—it seemed to resist every stroke of his clumsily wielded blades. Altogether it was hard, uncongenial work,—and, being rendered somewhat flabby and nerveless by his previous evening's carouse with Macfarlane's whisky, ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... the two boats when this skilful manoeuvre was executed that the dripping bow oar of the pursuers was flourished almost in Jack's face as the sampan flew round. He seized it, but did not attempt to snatch it from the oarsman's clutch. He had no time for that, but he made splendid use of the chance afforded him. He gave it a tremendous push, and released it. The rower, caught by surprise, was flung over the opposite gunwale, and the skiff was nearly upset. As the sampan darted away on her new course, the ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore
... of his prowess as an oarsman had restored Frank's self-respect. He recollected the reason given by Jimmy Kinsella for not allowing Miss Rutherford ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... effective use is made in The Hillyars and the Burtons—and his boyhood was passed in that famous old suburb. He was educated at King's College School and Worcester College, Oxford, where he became a famous oarsman, rowing bow of his College boat; also bow of a famous light-weight University "four," which swept everything before it in its time. He wound up his racing career by winning the Diamond Sculls at Henley. From 1853 to 1858 his life was ...
— Adventures in Criticism • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... steering and a finer handling of the oars than Eric had ever seen before—and he was something of an oarsman himself—the boat from the lighthouse-tender neared the Rock. It was held immediately under the crane and a rope was lowered with a loop on the end of it. The inspector swung himself into this and went shooting ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... the obvious reason that the captain does not want one of his men to fail him at the last moment. It is about as probable that a man should go tiger shooting without looking to see if his rifle is loaded, as that the President of a University Boat Club should select an oarsman who is likely ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... have been helped by Brown-Sequard after other doctors had failed to help them. A sturdy New Hampshire farmer wounded his foot with an axe and was supposed to have split a nerve in it. The wound healed perfectly but he never was able to do a whole day's work afterward. An oarsman in the international regatta of 1869 who was a man of enormous physical strength, deranged his nerves in some way and shot himself rather than endure the kind of life that ...
— Sketches from Concord and Appledore • Frank Preston Stearns
... had a single tall mast carrying a large square lug-sail, and also possessed of powerful sweeps, which were worked by the men in standing positions, the rise of the oar after each stroke making the oarsman sink back upon the thwarts only to resume again his upright attitude for the next dip of ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler
... contentedly as peasants do in their heavy boots, but a lover of rowing wants a craft that he can move. This desire is quite independent of the merits of the craft itself, considered without reference to the man. A sailing yacht may he a beautiful vessel, but an Oxford oarsman would not desire to pull one ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... was to be made—One, two, three, and off! All was to go well at first, and when the interest of the spectators was at its height, every eye strained and every heart almost at a standstill with excitement, two of the boats were to "foul," and the oarsman of one, in the most tragic and thrilling manner, was to fall over into the astonished lake. Then, amid the screams of the girls and scenes of wild commotion, he was to be rescued, put into his empty ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... his oarsman's seat with temples heated by anger, with trembling hands—no—he is Gracieuse's brother; all would be lost if Ramuntcho fought with him; because of her he will bend the ...
— Ramuntcho • Pierre Loti
... with Miss Moncrief, who mention that every preparation had been made, that her wardrobe had been removed from her apartment, and that it was carried to those of Colonel Burr, and that they had been turned back in the harbor by a sentry-boat, when striving with a solitary oarsman to reach a British man-of-war, in the lower harbor of the bay of New York. There was never any proof of this, however, and I imagine it was only a gossiping ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... is not so wide above Quebec as it is at other places along its course, and in a quarter of an hour, the oarsman had reached his destination. As the keel of his boat grated on the sands, a man stepped forward to meet him. The officer sprang out and ...
— The Bastonnais - Tale of the American Invasion of Canada in 1775-76 • John Lesperance
... COLEMAN is a handsome, finely built man of about thirty-two. He is a West Pointer, is a good oarsman, a crack shot, and a good fellow all around. No finicking about him, no nerves. Just a sane, ...
— Her Own Way - A Play in Four Acts • Clyde Fitch
... however, that some one might have been watching me from the shore; some boy who was jealous of my prowess as an oarsman— and there were such in our village—and this boy or boys would have seen that I had started for the islet, would easily have divined my reasons for turning back, and would not fail to "twit" me with cowardice. Partly influenced by this thought, and partly because I still had a desire ...
— The Boy Tar • Mayne Reid
... oarsman, row, young oarsman, Into the crypt of the night we float: Fair, faint moonbeams wash and wander, Wash and wander about the boat. Not a fetter is here to bind us, Love and memory lose their spell; Friends that we have left behind us, Prisoners ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr
... Regular Army in morale, in fighting, and in every quality that goes to make up a fine body of soldiers. They were picked men; all classes were shown in that organization. The tennis champion was a private, the champion oarsman of Harvard a corporal. On the 2d of July a stock-broker of Wall Street who can sign his check for $3,000,000 was seen haggling with a cow-puncher from the Indian Territory over a piece of hardtack. Both were privates and both were fine soldiers. The whole regiment was just such a medley, ...
— The Gatlings at Santiago • John H. Parker
... congregate, apparently inextricably wedged between the twisted trees of this marine forest, although when the time comes—that is, when the gondolier is at last secured—easily enough detached. For there is a bewildering rule which seems to prevent the gondolier who hails you from being your oarsman, and if you think that the gondolier whom you hail is the one who is going to row you, you are greatly mistaken. It is always another. The wise traveller in Venice having chanced upon a good gondolier takes his name and number and makes further arrangements with him. This being done, ...
— A Wanderer in Venice • E.V. Lucas
... young oarsman kept in the middle of the great stream, and sometimes it seemed pleasanter to be near the shore. The midsummer flowers were coming into blossom, and the grass and trees had long since lost the brilliance of their greenness, and wore a look of maturity and completion, ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... present managed the works, and with a judgement and a temper which, in spite of keen competition and languid years, had kept their prosperity from dwindling. He had received the better part of his education at Harvard College, where, however, he had gained renown rather as a gymnast and an oarsman than as a gleaner of more dispersed knowledge. Later on he had learned that the finer intelligence too could vault and pull and strain—might even, breaking the record, treat itself to rare exploits. ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James
... the King kept hands from throats in the palace, but grooms were breaking each others' heads in the stables till towards morning. They fought about whether it were lawful to eat fish on a Friday, and just after daybreak a gentleman's oarsman from Sittingbourne had all his teeth to swallow for asserting that the sacrament should be administered in the two kinds. The horses were watered by ostlers who hummed the opprobrious song ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... his commendatory words and voice. "She's an odd little character. I invited her to luncheon the other day, and the courses and silver never disturbed her apparently. She watched me closely, however, and followed my moves as precisely as a second oarsman. By the way, she called you St. Mark. I know some people consider you and St. Mark's as synonymous, but I explained the difference. She tells me absorbingly interesting stories of theatre life—the life behind the scenes. You see the ...
— Amarilly of Clothes-line Alley • Belle K. Maniates
... coasters in the Hong-Kong and inter-island trade, a host of dirty little vapors (steamers) of light tonnage, and the innumerable cascos and bancas. The bancas are dug-out canoes, each paddled by a single oarsman. The casco is a lumbering hull covered over in the centre with a mat of plaited bamboo, which makes a cave-like cabin and a living room for the owner's family. Children are born, grow up, become engaged, marry, give birth to more children—in short, spend their lives ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... by this time heard from Bernard, as I heard him called on, as a good oarsman, to go in the first boat, and we saw Angela's bonnet. We—that is Wilfred, Nag, and the Bishop—are all safe here, with eight or nine others. Will will do well, I trust. He quite owes his life to Nag. This is how it was: We had not long been out of the Mersey before an impenetrable fog ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... sharp bow and a wide, square stern, and navigators say it will live in a sea which would swamp the ordinary Whitehall boat of our water-front. The Japanese oar is long and looks unwieldy, being spliced together in the middle. It is balanced on a short wooden peg on the gunwale and the oarsman works it like a sweep, standing up and bending over it at each stroke. The result is a sculling motion, which carries the boat forward very rapidly. In no Japanese harbor do the big steamships come up to the wharf. They drop anchor in the harbor, and they are always surrounded by small sampans, the ...
— The Critic in the Orient • George Hamlin Fitch
... children they had several of the crew who had come along to relieve any oarsman who might give under the great strain; the more sent in this load the less remaining for the next, and among these Abner had picked upon a certain husky fellow who seemed able to do his part if ...
— Darry the Life Saver - The Heroes of the Coast • Frank V. Webster
... The boy flushed. Tall, straight, handsome he sat in the boat, fingering the oar-handle nervously. In appearance he was the ideal oarsman. ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... strokes brought them close, Harold with a last effort raised the child in his arms as the boat drove down on them. The boatswain leaning over the bow grabbed the child, and with one sweep of his strong arm took her into the boat. The bow oarsman caught Harold by the wrist. The way of the boat took him for a moment under water; but the next man; pulling his oar across the boat, stooped over and caught him by the collar, and clung fast. A few seconds more and he was hauled abroad. A wild cheer from all on the Scoriac came, ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... he saw her was on the morning of the very day when all this happened; and if he is to be believed, he not only saw her but touched her hand. That, again, was by the lake; she was just stepping out of the ferry-boat. The obolus she had ready to pay the oarsman dropped on the ground, and Philip picked it up and returned it to her. Then his fingers touched hers. He could feel it still, he declared, and yet she had then ceased to walk among ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... dream-like at their posts behind the low earthwork, the opposite arm of the causeway stretched so invitingly from the Rebel main, the horizon glimmered so low around me,—for it always appears lower to a swimmer than even to an oarsman,—that I seemed floating in some concave globe, some magic crystal, of which I was the enchanted centre. With each little ripple of my steady progress all things hovered and changed; the stars danced ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... impossible to keep the 'Dudley Docker' from swamping. As it was we shipped several bad seas over the stern as well as abeam and over the bows, although we were 'on a wind.' Lees, who owned himself to be a rotten oarsman, made good here by strenuous baling, in which he was well seconded by Cheetham. Greenstreet, a splendid fellow, relieved me at the tiller and helped generally. He and Macklin were my right and left bowers as stroke-oars throughout. McLeod and ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... stepped from one of the romances of Paul de Kock—this athlete, this despot of bar-rooms and public-houses—performed simply and courageously, in these lowly rooms in the suburbs, the sublime duties of a sister of charity. This intrepid oarsman had never made a longer voyage than to conduct his mother to mass or vespers every Sunday. This billiard expert knew only how to play bezique. This trainer of bull-dogs was the submissive slave of a poodle. This Mauvaise-Philibert was ...
— Ten Tales • Francois Coppee
... width is required in a boat in order to work oars well. The oarsman must sit upon the seat, and extend the oar off upon one side of the boat, and there must be a certain distance between the part which he takes hold of, and the row-lock, in order to work to advantage. But it is no matter how narrow the boat is if he has a paddle, ...
— Marco Paul's Voyages and Travels; Vermont • Jacob Abbott
... about him. He is a plain man, of limited horizon and small gift of speech. Public affairs do not particularly interest him. He is a hardy mountaineer, with a strong trust in his own strength and resourcefulness; a good oarsman and a great shot with the crossbow; but he makes no fuss about these things. Let it be repeated that he is not foolhardy. The dangers of the mountain, which bulk so large in the imagination of his ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... unlucky comrade, and reseating him, they move on rapidly as before, cutting the blue water with their slender paddles and enlivening the scene by occasional songs. The presence of numerous sharks in these waters is the chief drawback to the pleasures of boating, and many an ill-fated oarsman pays the forfeit of life or limb for his temerity in venturing out too far. The nose of the shark is his most vulnerable part; and the natives, who eat this sea-monster as willingly as he eats them, often inflict a fatal wound by slinging a huge stone at his nose ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... now hear the strokes of the oarsman who was in the lead quite regularly and distinctly. Now and then he turned into crossheadings and chambers, as if to escape from their surveillance, but they kept steadily on after him, not taking into account the fact that they were leaving the light they had set at the shaft far ...
— The Call of the Beaver Patrol - or, A Break in the Glacier • V. T. Sherman
... [Slang]; tar, jack tar, salt, able seaman, A. B.; man-of-war's man, bluejacket, galiongee^, galionji^, marine, jolly, midshipman, middy; skipper; shipman^, boatman, ferryman, waterman^, lighterman^, bargeman, longshoreman; bargee^, gondolier; oar, oarsman; rower; boatswain, cockswain^; coxswain; steersman, pilot; crew. aerial navigator, aeronaut, balloonist, Icarus; aeroplanist^, airman, aviator, birdman, man-bird, wizard of the air, aviatrix, flier, pilot, test pilot, glider pilot, bush pilot, navigator, flight attendant, steward, stewardess, crew; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... one of the dormer windows and held the lantern out of it. Below the steep roof a boat was dashed by the swell, and Colonel Menard and his oarsman were trying to hold it off from the eaves. A lantern was fastened in ...
— Old Kaskaskia • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... and waved her hand with a merry laugh, then ran, fleet-footed as a deer, to the edge of the lake, and unfastening one of the little boats, was in it and rowing out upon the lake as dextrously as a professional oarsman, before those watching her could ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... may, we paddled gently on until the boat was so completely within the shadow of the land that we were in utter darkness, it being impossible to distinguish the face of the stroke oarsman from where I sat. A few more strokes, and Rawlings uttered in a low tone the word "oars!" they were noiselessly laid in, and in another moment the boat's bow grated upon the ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... of silver was to be the portion of him who showed the second-best dexterity and bottom. A mimic boat of less precious metal was the third prize. The gondolas were to be the usual light vehicles of the canals, and as the object was to display the peculiar skill of that city of islands, but one oarsman was allowed to each, on whom would necessarily fall the whole duty of guiding, while he impelled his little bark. Any of those who had been engaged in the previous trial were admitted to this; and ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper
... to listen, from it you will learn it as well. It knows everything, the river, everything can be learned from it. See, you've already learned this from the water too, that it is good to strive downwards, to sink, to seek depth. The rich and elegant Siddhartha is becoming an oarsman's servant, the learned Brahman Siddhartha becomes a ferryman: this has also been told to you by the river. You'll learn that other thing from it ...
— Siddhartha • Herman Hesse
... delighted the eye with a diversity of timber and foliage. In unison did the rowers ply their sculls, yet it was though of itself that the skiff shot forward, bird-like, over the glassy surface of the water; while at intervals the broad-shouldered young oarsman who was seated third from the bow would raise, as from a nightingale's throat, the opening staves of a boat song, and then be joined by five or six more, until the melody had come to pour forth in a volume as free and boundless as Russia herself. And Pietukh, too, would give ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... well dispose here of one other topic which seems appropriate to University days. Fitzjames cared nothing for the athletic sports which were so effectually popularised soon afterwards in the time of 'Tom Brown's School Days.' Athletes, indeed, cast longing eyes at his stalwart figure. One eminent oarsman persuaded my brother to take a seat in a pair-oared boat, and found that he could hardly hold his own against the strength of the neophyte. He tried to entice so promising a recruit by offers of a place in the 'Third Trinity' crew and ultimate hopes of a 'University ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... himself at the window, watching the swoop of the rain along the hurrying waters of the Canal. The tide was coming in and the wind was with it. One gondola at the ferry was struggling across the current, with difficulty held to its course by the efforts of its straining oarsman. The passengers had taken refuge under the felze, or gondola hood. Impatient of the slow progress of the boat, the Colonel looked down into the hotel-garden directly beneath his windows, which was drowned in a moist blur, that only seemed ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... fact, the commissioner being one of them. But Rollo did not pay any particular attention to this circumstance. He did not even observe that it was the same man that had come on board with him. Rollo could not talk to the oarsman on the way, but on landing he gave him a little money,—about what he thought was proper,—and then went up into the road with a view to go home. The commissioner, in order not to awaken any suspicions in Rollo's ...
— Rollo on the Rhine • Jacob Abbott
... not. A poor oarsman may beat a fair swimmer, and she had the start of me. Steadily out to sea she rowed, and I toiled behind. If her mood lasted—and hurt pride lasts long in disdainful ladies who are more wont to deal ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope
... drenching rain on the afternoon of the seventeenth, we carried our baggage to the Ingodah, which lay half a mile from shore. We reached the steamer after about twenty minutes pulling in a whale-boat and shipping a barrel of water through the carelessness of an oarsman. ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... other, a little larger than Gordon, was rowing and used the oars like an adept. In the bow was a flag, and Gordon was staring at it, when it came to him with a rush that it was a "Yankee" flag. He was conscious for half a moment that he took some pride in the superiority of the oarsman over the boys in the other boats. His next thought was that he had a little Confederate flag in his trunk. He had brought it from home among his other treasures. He would show his colors and not let the Yankee boys have all of the honors. So away he put as hard as his legs ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... do so, my angel; but, to tell the truth, I am a very inexperienced oarsman, and I can not swim at all," answered ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... toward a man rapidly paying out a net from the stern of his boat they were soon hailed by Mr. Marks, who with genial good-nature invited them to see the sport. He had begun throwing his net over in the middle of the river, his oarsman rowing eastward with a slight inclination toward the south, for the reason that the tide is swifter on the western side. The aim is to keep the net as straight as possible and at right angles with ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... said port, he did not see what passed with the king, but it is well known that the said king had the said Martin killed, and the said Magat imprisoned, as well as the other Indians who served as oarsmen. They brought one of the said Indians, who served as oarsman (who were from the port of this city [Manila]) to this witness, to be cured of a wound in the arm that had been inflicted upon him. This Indian is a slave of Don Agustin, chief of Tondo. The slayer ...
— The Philippine Islands 1493-1898, Vol. 4 of 55 - 1576-1582 • Edited by E. H. Blair and J. A. Robertson
... monotonous, because kept pretty much in one key, or in one average degree of pitch. It will perhaps be necessary to make the utterance for the time somewhat artificial. The voice is in the artificial stage, as is the work of an oarsman, for example, in learning the parts of the stroke, or that of a golfer in learning the "swing," although in the case of some students, when the vocal conditions are good and the tone is well balanced, very little of the ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter
... same objection that I have to the majority of the society young men of the present day. If I make inquiries about you, what do I find? That you are a noted oarsman—that you have no profession—that your honors at college consisted in being captain of ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr
... left Trinity at 6 A.M. in one big yawl and three skiffs. In my skiff were eight persons, besides a negro oarsman named "Tucker." We had to take it in turns to row with this worthy, and I soon discovered to my cost the inconvenience of sitting in close proximity with a perspiring darkie. This negro was a very powerful man, very vain, and susceptible of flattery. I won his heart by asking him if he wasn't ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle
... gamble." He had but two dollars in his pocket; but this was enough for his purpose. The Rhine was not far distant from his native village, and this part of his journey he easily accomplished on foot. Upon reaching the river, he is said to have secured a place as oarsman on a timber raft. The timber which is cut in the Black Forest for shipment is made up into rafts on the Rhine, but instead of being suffered to float down the stream, as in this country, is rowed by oarsmen, each ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... ended, the Conquerors were beaten by two goals to one. When chaffed on the "umbrella incident" ever afterwards Dixy was silent, and declared that in using it he did not hold his opponents too cheaply, but simply with a desire to save himself from a ducking. John was also a capital oarsman, and when he was suddenly cut away in the pride of his manhood, he was barely 30 years of age. He was greatly lamented, and his handsome figure is missed from the ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... sensation was this for the maiden! She had been rowed on the waters of Lake Malcolm; but the oar, handled ever so lightly by Harry, always betrayed effort on the part of the oarsman. Now, for the first time, Nell felt herself borne along with a gliding movement, like that of a balloon through the air. The water was smooth as a lake, and Nell reclined in the stern of the boat, enjoying its gentle rocking. Occasionally the effect of the moonlight on the ...
— The Underground City • Jules Verne
... like a gander's, and it looked as if his head would come off. The dentist threw his shoulders into it like a crack oarsman—there was a crack, a rip, a tear, and, like a young tree leaving the ground, two huge, ugly old teeth left Dad's jaw on the end of ...
— On Our Selection • Steele Rudd
... deep, and it seemed to him he knew how he should have to breast it and how he feared that when he rose to the surface she would have disappeared. Nevertheless he was going to plunge when a boat turned into the current from above and came swiftly toward them, guided by an oarsman who was sitting so that they couldn't see his face. He brought the boat to the bank where Longmore stood; the latter stepped in, and with a few strokes they touched the opposite shore. Longmore got out and, though he was sure he had crossed the stream, Madame de Mauves was not there. He ...
— Madame de Mauves • Henry James
... over the side, to which the boatman attached his valise, the young officer going up the line hand over hand as though he was used to that sort of thing. The oarsman secured his five-dollar bill, and Christy hauled up his valise. He felt that he had saved himself from the dishonor of failing to obey his orders, and he looked about him for some one who would be able to explain ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... stern had his back to me, and no face among the other five did I know. They were fast getting away, but the splashes came thick and close and presently one ball found its mark. The man at the stern hurriedly changed places with an oarsman; and as the relieved rower took his new seat he turned slowly upon his face as if in mortal pain, and I saw that the fresh hand at the oar was the brother of Major Harper. Just as I made the discovery "Boom!" ...
— The Cavalier • George Washington Cable
... shot the light skiff. The water splashed for a moment under the spasmodic strokes of the oarsman, and then the little boat streaked out into the river like a thing of life. Marjory sat in the stern and kept her eyes upon the bank they were leaving. Jack Barnes drove every vestige of his strength into the stroke; somehow he pulled like a man who had learned how ...
— The Daughter of Anderson Crow • George Barr McCutcheon
... modification of 1. 3. The Center-cycle. 4. The Tricycle, which includes five general types: (a.) Rear steerer of any sort. (b.) Coventry rotary. (c.) Front steerer of any sort (except e). (d.) Humber pattern. (e.) The Oarsman. 5. Double machines: sociables and tandems. 6. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 447, July 26, 1884 • Various
... be cheerfully and happily endured by the working classes. The continuous but rhythmed croon of the negro when at work, the yo-heave-o of the sailor straining at the cordage, the rowing songs of the oarsman, etc., etc., are all suggestive of what might be effected by judicious effort in this direction. But man, ever wiser than his Maker, neglects the intuitions of nature. Rendered conceited by a false education, and heartless by a constant craving for gold, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Volume V. Issue I • Various
... dense clump of bushes, growing in the very water's edge, because the wind was blowing like a hurricane and the waves were chasing one another on the Potomac, like the billows on a lake. He was a fair oarsman, but it would have taken greater skill than his to have kept his boat ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the boat, who had at last succeeded in beating off the towing sailors, and was now, with face turned aft, assisting the bowsman at his oar, suddenly called to Captain Delano, to see what the black was about; while a Portuguese oarsman shouted to him to give heed to ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... up, and it was as much as the single oarsman could do, in that heavy boat, to hold ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... craned into the darkness, and listened. We all heard it. The sound came as regularly as a heart-beat, and it was no muffled stroke. The oarsman was using his paddle openly and fast. The sound came from behind us, a little to the north, and, judging from its growing distinctness, it was following hard in our track. There was nothing for it but a race. I ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... paramount sense of moral justice; having for its object a power which is no longer sole nor principal, but secondary and ministerial; a power added to a power; a breeze which springs up unthought-of to assist the strenuous oarsman;—even this faith is subjugated in order to be exalted; and—instead of operating as a temptation to relax or to be remiss, as an encouragement to indolence or cowardice; instead of being a false stay, a necessary and definite dependence which may fail—it passes ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... of the man with the rope are as effective as Mrs. Partington's sweeping back of the Atlantic with a broom. Vigorous measures must be used, so a concerted movement is projected. At a given signal the boat is to be pushed off, the oarsman ply his oars with power, the man in the stern is to pull with energy, and a man at each flank of the animal is to push, while every other being is to do his or her part by a shout or a boost. One man swings a riata to ...
— The Grand Canyon of Arizona: How to See It, • George Wharton James
... morning. Breakfast over, they went on. We had camped at the head of the Soap Creek Rapids, and this party at the foot. In the first rapid below, which was one of five that we easily ran before stopping for dinner, Brown's boat was capsized. He and his oarsman McDonald, were thrown out on opposite sides, McDonald into the current and Brown unfortunately into the eddy, where he was drawn under by one of the whirlpools numerous in this locality, and was never seen again. A half-minute later ...
— The Romance of the Colorado River • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... the open air, the sweet slumbers that followed it at night in a well-ventilated apartment, a simple, unexciting life, the mental rest from vexatious business cares, all proved superior to any tonic a physician could prescribe, and I became more rugged as I grew accustomed to the duties of an oarsman, and gained several pounds avoirdupois by the time I ended the row of twenty-six hundred miles and landed on the sunny shores of the ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... late. The boat struck the bank full tilt. The dreamer, the joyous oarsman, lay on his back at the bottom of the boat, his heels in ...
— The Wind in the Willows • Kenneth Grahame
... be uneasy about that, Mr Vandean, sir," said the stroke oarsman; "me and my mates'll smuggle the young nigger gent aboard somehow, even if I has ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... on the water or banks is also producing the usual effect on the other birds and beasts. They are rapidly becoming tame, and the oarsman has the singular pleasure of floating down among all kinds of birds which do not regard him as an enemy. Young swallows sit fearlessly on the dead willow boughs to be fed by their parents; the reed-buntings and sedge-warblers scarcely move when the oar ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish
... referred was one to take place on the following Saturday. Silas Peters was considered the best single-shell oarsman on the lower side of the lake, and he had challenged Jerry as a representative ...
— The Young Oarsmen of Lakeview • Ralph Bonehill
... he himself doth urge and command us onwards." So spake he, and they set yet the fiercer on the Argives. And Aias no longer abode their onset, for he was driven back by the darts, but he withdrew a little,—thinking that now he should die,—on to the oarsman's bench of seven feet long, and he left the decks of the trim ship. There then he stood on the watch, and with his spear he ever drave the Trojans from the ships, whosoever brought unwearied fire, ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... necessary to keep, but the water seems to be only a few inches deep, and the rocks are as thick as plums in a Christmas pudding. Yet two Indians, standing erect, one in the bow and one in the stern of the canoe, pole you up the stream against these terrible odds as easily and surely as a Harvard oarsman might row you across Seneca Lake. Then they ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Old Series, Vol. 36—New Series, Vol. 10, July 1885 • Various
... The boat was got out; Hildebrand dropped into it and took the oars, "guessing he wouldn't mind going himself;" and Winthrop and Winnie sat close together in the stern. Not to steer; for Hildebrand was much too accustomed an oarsman to need any such help in coasting the river ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... ill, and you'll infect others. You must take some quinine." With these words Parrington climbed into his gig, the sailors gave way with the oars, and the boat rushed through the water and disappeared into the darkness, where the bow oarsman was silhouetted against the pale yellow light of the boat's lantern ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... the grebe-nest lay near land, but the little oarsman did not leave it, but sat huddled up between branches and straw. Jarro too held himself almost immovable. He was actually paralysed with fear lest ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof
... wide, so sharp that the roads must suffer from them. The oxen are small and, without exception, mouse-colored. The driver, and there is usually one to each pair, sits on the yoke between them, and, like the oarsman of a boat, with his back towards the point towards which he is going. Two huge blocks were chained upon one of these wagons, and behind, dragging upon the ground by a chain, was another. Three yoke of these small oxen, apparently without fatigue, drew the load thus constructed ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... back the Canadian oarsman; and the rowboats pass round within the shadow of the schooner. A moment later the American ships are boarded. A trampling on deck calls the sailors aloft; but Dobbs has mastered two vessels before the fort wakes to life with a rush ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... The solitary oarsman made no outcry—he offered no defense! Kneeling calmly in the prow of the little vessel, he merely ceased paddling and seemed to await with patience the ...
— Old Indian Days • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... I felt myself drawn to the sporting set, and, as I was always an adept at athletics, soon won repute as an oarsman, and was well satisfied to be looked upon as the Yankee champion sundry amateur rowing-and boxing-matches, as well as in the lecture-room. Of course, I was the mark for no end of good-natured chaff about my nationality, but was nearly always able, I ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various
... one of my novels that shortly after having been begun were laid aside for a few months. Starting impetuously like a sanguine oarsman setting forth in the early morning I came very soon to a fork in the stream and found it necessary to pause and reflect seriously upon the direction I would take. Either presented to me equal fascinations, at least on the surface, and for that very reason ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... races, for we have no other college to race against," said the senior. "The students sometimes get up contests between themselves, though. Dick Dawson used to be our best oarsman, but last June a fellow named Jerry Koswell ...
— The Rover Boys at College • Edward Stratemeyer
... pretty lady, who used to dress and undress me and place me in a soft little bed every night, and who in fact was very kind to me in every way. They used to talk to me in a foreign, sonorous language, and I also stammered several words of the same tongue after them. Whilst I was an oarsman my jealous rivals used to say I must be of German origin, from the colour of my hair and eyes, and from my general build. And this I believe myself, for the language which that man spoke (he must have been my father) was ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... line!" cried the steward to the tub oarsman. And as the man obeyed, the steward tightened the turn on the rope, and the boat shot ahead like ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... oarsman, Posin," remarked Glenn, the disclosure of Mary occurring to him—and then accosted Mary herself, who now joined them with her eyes cast down ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... come to land." Never a word Rahero replied, but urged the canoe. And a chill fell on the woman.—"Atta! speak! is it you? Speak! Why are you silent? Why do you bend aside? Wherefore steer to the seaward?" thus she panted and cried. Never a word from the oarsman, toiling there in the dark; But right for a gate of the reef he silently headed the bark, And wielding the single paddle with passionate sweep on sweep, Drove her, the little fitted, forth on the open deep. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... glided, bravely propelled by their nine-year-old oarsman, but when the bow of their skiff grated upon the bottom they were still some yards from ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... on account of ice; but on the fifth of April, a freshet broke it up and the voyager started from Hudson, accompanied by several representatives of the New York papers, who occupied a boat which was in charge of the famous oarsman, Wallace Ross assisted by George Whistler. The voyage was not of unusual interest, outside of the difficulty of forging ahead through the ice floes and considerable suffering from the cold. On that ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... of clear water, the oarsman got brave pulls and sent the boat on mightily. Then again in the thick porridge of brash ice they lost headway, or were baffled and stopped among the cakes. Slow work, slow and painful; and for many minutes they seemed to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... It would be considered monstrous to remove a boy who was a capital bowler from the cricket-field, and make him go in for fives or racquets; or, to use an Eton illustration, to take a 'wet bob' who was a promising oarsman and might row in the school eight at Henley, and turn him into the playing-fields to become an inferior ...
— The Curse of Education • Harold E. Gorst
... more than scenery to interest us here, for, moving quickly towards the Slide, was a boat with three people in it. They were evidently intending to attempt that treacherous passage, which culminated in a series of eddies, a menace to even the best oarsman ship. They certainly were not aware of their danger, for there came over the water the sound of a man's laughing voice, and the two women in the boat were in unconcerned attitudes. Roscoe shouted to them, and motioned them back, but they did not ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... strength is shown in the following case. In the summer of 1870, a single shell, while being rowed at full speed, with the current, on one of our principal rivers, was run into to the stone abutment of a bridge. The bow struck squarely on to obstacle, and such was the momentum of the mass that the oarsman was thrown directly through the flaring bow of the cockpit into the river. Witnesses of the accident who were familiar with wooden shells declared that the boat was ruined; but, after a careful examination, only the bow-tip was found to be twisted in a spiral form, and the washboard ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop
... skimmed those Wavelets Blue, While the Heroes who propelled 'em were comparatively seldom of a commonplace type, like you— In their strength and in their science they were positively giants, through the gorgeous days of old, Still an Admirable Crichton in those lieben alten Zeiten was the oarsman brave and bold: ...
— The Casual Ward - academic and other oddments • A. D. Godley
... large chip, was placed at the top, around which was bent a new section of birch bark, thus forming a rude semicircular reflector. Three candles placed within the circle completed the jack. With moss and boughs seats were arranged,—one in the bow for the marksman, and one in the stern for the oarsman. A meal of frogs and squirrels was a good preparation, and, when darkness came, all were keenly alive to the opportunity it brought. Though by no means an expert in the use of the gun,—adding the superlative degree of enthusiasm to only the positive ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... reception of the dogma of transubstantiation the conversion of a wheaten wafer into the infinite God by nearly three quarters of Christendom at this moment, must permit the paradox to pass unchallenged. Doubtless the closing eye of many an expiring Greek reflected the pitiless old oarsman plying his frost cold boat across the Stygian ferry, and his failing ear caught the rush of the Phlegethonian surge. It is equally certain that, at the same time, many another laughed at these things as childish fictions, fitted only to scare ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... long-walkers whom the Memoir notes as among the chief influences of those days was Leslie Stephen's pupil Romer, the Admirable Crichton of that moment—oarsman, cricketer, and Trinity Hall's hope in the Mathematical Tripos. The future Lord Justice of Appeal was then reading for the Tripos, in which he was to be Senior Wrangler; and, according to Cambridge custom, took a certain amount of coaching as part of his work. Charles ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... we have said, was strong. He was noted among his fellows as a splendid oarsman. The squall, therefore, did not disconcert him, though it checked his speed greatly. After one or two lulls the wind increased to a gale, and in half an hour the youth found, with some anxiety, that he was making ...
— The Middy and the Moors - An Algerine Story • R.M. Ballantyne
... of adaptation by which conditions affect an organism is simple and well known. It is that which callouses the palm of the oarsman, strengthens the waist of the wrestler, fits the back to its burden. It inexorably compels the organism to adapt itself to its conditions, to like them, and ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden
... want a pilot," by burning a blue light on the bridge, and bears down on the pilot schooner. The moon reveals enormous figures, with a heavy dot beneath, on the mainsail of the schooner. Over the rail goes the yawl, followed by the oarsman and pilot, whose turn it is to go ashore. The pilot carries a lantern, which in the egg-shaped yawl dances on the white wave crests up and down like a fire-fly. The yawl is soon under the steamer's ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... a queer fellow, Krometz, to let that girl make you so unhappy, but she's off now, and will probably bring up in some Turkish harem, where she will end her days. Not so bad a fate either," continued the oarsman. "Surrounded by every luxury the heart could wish or the imagination conceive, it's a better lot than either ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray
... bait-rod and a strong line. Fish from a boat, with a second man to handle the oars, if convenient. Let the oarsman lay the boat ten feet inside the edge of the lily-pads and make your cast, say, with thirty feet of line; land the bait neatly to the right, at the edge of the lily-pads, let it sink a few inches, and then with the tip well lowered, bring the bait around on a ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears
... Edward gravely, "that you have an efficient oarsman. You couldn't row and sleep at the ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... her way spoke Hope beneath her bulwark as she caught the wind. Then her dread that the Devil's craft ahead would make sail too, and overreach them after all, and the blessing in her heart for her hopeful oarsman, whose view was that the officer in charge would not spare his convicts any work he could inflict. "He'll see to it they arn their breaffastis, missis. He ain't going to unlock their wristis off of the oars for to catch a ha'porth o' blow. You may put your money on him for that." ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... he repent his folly and wickedness! When they were about to embark, he attempted to go over to Tim's party. Barney resented the attempt, and another fight ensued. Then he was kicked into the boat, for his chief could not spare so able an oarsman. ...
— All Aboard; or, Life on the Lake - A Sequel to "The Boat Club" • Oliver Optic
... give him a broken-down, battered-looking thing like an old chest, which was to be charged rather heavily for the time they meant to spend on the river. It looked far from safe, but it was all they could do. So they got in. Bruce meant to show his powers as an oarsman. He said Madame Frabelle must steer and asked her to trim ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... Switzerland, one might even say that of Zrich. Nature hardly ever speaks in herself, but only in her human relationship; not the field alone, but the field and the sower (121), the field and the reaper (118); not the lake alone, but the lake and the solitary oarsman (124). The poet loves the work of human hands and especially its highest form, that of art. Thus a Roman fountain (119), a picture, a statue become the subject of his verse. Of all the arts he loved sculpture most, and in its ...
— A Book Of German Lyrics • Various
... To weep and wail in secret; and the barge, On to the palace-doorway sliding, paused. There two stood armed, and kept the door; to whom, All up the marble stair, tier over tier, Were added mouths that gaped, and eyes that asked 'What is it?' but that oarsman's haggard face, As hard and still as is the face that men Shape to their fancy's eye from broken rocks On some cliff-side, appalled them, and they said 'He is enchanted, cannot speak—and she, Look how she sleeps—the Fairy Queen, ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson
... those with fire (24) He forces back, and though besieged he dares To storm th' assailants: and as lay the ships Joined rank to rank, bids drop upon their sides Lamps drenched with reeking tar. Nor slow the fire To seize the hempen cables and the decks Oozing with melting pitch; the oarsman's bench All in one moment, and the topmost yards Burst into flame: half merged the vessels lay While swam the foemen, all in arms, the wave; Nor fell the blaze upon the ships alone, But seized with writhing tongues the neighbouring ...
— Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars • Lucan
... much zest as in Great Britain, and the fresh-water facilities are perhaps better. Except as a means to an end, however, this mechanical form of sport has never appealed to me. The more nearly a man can approximate to a triple-expansion engine the better oarsman he is; no machine can be imagined that could play cricket, golf, ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... each boat, it was light work for the oarsman; and as rowing was something Maurice could do, and as the girls liked to take their turn, it often happened that Mr. Whittredge had nothing to do ...
— Mr. Pat's Little Girl - A Story of the Arden Foresters • Mary F. Leonard
... into the awful chaos, and the shudder-engendering ideas connected with the fierce fish waiting to attack and literally devour them alive, changed his position so as to kneel down in the bottom of the boat, facing the second oarsman, lay his hands upon the oar, and help every pull with a good push. Briscoe followed his example, and the strength of six was thus brought ...
— Old Gold - The Cruise of the "Jason" Brig • George Manville Fenn
... are severely tested by Fairbanks's scales and stop-watches. It is wonderful how many persons, in the remoter districts, assure the newspaper-editors of their ability to lift twelve hundred pounds; and many a young oarsman can prove to you that he has pulled his mile faster than Ward or Clark, if you will only let him give his own ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various
... cried the young man. "If you wanted to go out in the boat, why didn't you come to me for the key? You've got no right to pull up the stakes we've driven down. That's the same thing as stealing the boat. What's the matter? Did you tumble overboard? You must be a pretty sort of an oarsman! If the ladies want to go out in the boat, I am here to take them. I'd like you to ...
— The Associate Hermits • Frank R. Stockton
... oarsman was glad to be relieved from his exhausting task, and promptly obeyed the order. Shuffles had put two reefs in the sail; but without the most skilful handling, the boat could not carry even this short canvas in such a fierce tempest. ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... to human agency, was neither farther nor nearer, neither slower nor more rapid than at first. Albert hallooed again and again at it, but the mysterious cause of this dipping and dashing was deaf to all cries for help. Or if not deaf, this oarsman seemed as incapable of giving reply as the "dumb old man" that rowed the "lily maid of Astolat" to the palace ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston |
