"Topmast" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... raged the struggle, oft our foes had sought to land, But with shot and steel we met them, met and drove them from the strand, Though they owned them not defeated, and the stately Union Jack, Streaming from the slender topmast, seemed to wave them proudly back. Louder rose the din of combat, thicker rolled the battle smoke, Through whose murky folds the crimson tongues of thundering cannon broke, And the ensign sank and floated in the smoke-clouds on the breeze, As a wounded, fluttering ...
— Fleurs de lys and other poems • Arthur Weir
... gone wrong with that Seamew ever since she sail in the schooner?" demanded the girl. "An anchor chain breaks; a rope parts; you lost a topmast—yes? How about Tony? Has he not left and will not return aboard the schooner for a price? Do you not find calm where other schooners ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... not in the night, I sleep so soundly. The noise is beyond all belief; the creaking, trampling, shouting, clattering; it is an incessant storm. We have not yet got our masts quite safe; the new wire-rigging stretches more than was anticipated (of course), and our main-topmast is shaky. The crew have very hard work, as incessant tacking is added to all the extra work incident to a new ship. On Saturday morning, everybody was shouting for the carpenter. My cabin was flooded by a leak, and I superintended the baling and swabbing from my cot, and dressed sitting ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon
... about 5 A.M., came in a ship from Marblehead bound to S'o Carolina. She had lost her main mast, mizzen mast, & fore topmast. In Latitude 35 she met with a hard gale of wind which caused the disaster, and obliged her to put in to New York to refit. About 11 o'clock the Humming Bird weighed anchor for Philadelphia to get hands. At 4 P.M. the Lieu't and 2 sergeants ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... I can make myself very comfortable up here for a while," replied Dory, as he placed his feet on the foresail gaff, and passed his arm around the topmast. ...
— All Adrift - or The Goldwing Club • Oliver Optic
... her, but could not hide the shells and tropic flowers with which she played—but could not hide the lovely smiles by which she uttered her trust in the mighty cathedral, and in the cherubim that looked down upon her from the topmast shafts of its pillars. Face to face she was meeting us; face to face she rode, as if danger there were none. "Oh, baby!" I exclaimed, "shalt thou be the ransom for Waterloo? Must we, that carry tidings of great joy to every people, be messengers of ruin to thee?" In horror I rose ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... sit still and wish for what was not to be had; and this extremity roused my application. We had several spare yards, and two or three large spars of wood, and a spare topmast or two in the ship: I resolved to fall tp work with these, and I flung as many of them overboard as I could manage for their weight, tying every one with a rope, that they might not drive away. When this was done I went down the ship's side, and pulling them to me I tied ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... thus brought into the top, where they were made up. The fore-topmast and the lower studding sails were taken in by a similar routine, and the Young America then moved along ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic
... flapping sail, By hanging from the topmast-head; I've served the vilest slaves in jail, And pick'd the dunghill's spoil for bread; I've made the badger's hole my bed: I've wander'd with a gipsy crew; I've dreaded all the guilty dread, And done what they ...
— Miscellaneous Poems • George Crabbe
... in with (the) merchant ships riding in James river ... tacked alone upon them with Extra ordinary courage, and for at least one houre fought them all.... But, having all his greate maste and his fore topmast desperately wounded, and most of his rigging shot", he was at last forced to retire. "With as much courage as conduct (and beyond the hopes or expectation of those who saw that brave action) (he) disengaged himselfe ... and brought off all the Marylanders but one." The Virginia ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... the man, after a pause in ascending the topmast shrouds. "It is right ahead—low sand-hills, and the sea ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... discomforts, although his mast was sprung and his topmast blown overboard with extreme foul weather, continued his course toward the northwest, knowing that the sea at length must needs have an ending and that some land should have a beginning that way; and determined therefore at the least to bring true proof what land and sea the same might ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... port, while the men-of-war chased to the north-west. La Motte-Picquet's flagship, the Annibal, 74, got within range at 5 P.M., when a distant cannonade began, which lasted till past midnight, and was resumed on the following morning. From it the Janus was the chief sufferer, losing her mizzen topmast and foretopgallant mast. It falling nearly calm, the Bristol and Lion got out their boats and were towed by them to her support. The two other French ships of the line got up during the forenoon of the 21st, so that the ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... mast seemed to collapse into itself as though it were wrapping itself up in its own canvas. A huge loose clue of sail—the foresail's starboard leach—flew up into the air; the boom swung after it; the gaff toppled over from above; we saw the topmast dive like a lunging rapier into the sea. We had torn the foresail in two, and the shot passing on had smashed the foremast just below the cap. All her sails lay in a confused heap just ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... in the morning the wind abated considerably, but the ship labouring extremely, rolled the fore-topmast over on the larboard side, and, in the fall, the wreck went through the foresail, tearing it to pieces. At eleven the wind came to the westward, and the weather clearing up, the Berryhead was distinguishable, bearing north and by east, distant four or five leagues. Another ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... with her foremast the only stick left, and that—unsupported by backstays and the wind still pressing against the big sail—that was wabbling. Even as we looked it came down—lower and top parts—with a smash which snapped the topmast off and sent it twisting and gyrating to where, after a bound or two, it rolled down and pinned to the deck the two battling men in the stern. With it came a tangled mess of ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly
... her mainmast was so long and tapering, that the wonder was how the few shrouds and stays about it could support it; it was the handsomest stick we had ever seen. Her upper spars were on the same scale, tapering away through topmast, topgallant-mast, royal and skysail-masts, until they fined away into slender wands. The sails, that were loose to dry, were old, and patched, and evidently displayed to cloak the character of the vessel by an ostentatious show of their unserviceable ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various
... fit a strap round the main-topmast head for ringtail halyards, and had the strap and block, a coil of halyards, and a marlin spike about his neck. He fell, and not knowing how to swim, and being heavily dressed, with all those things around his neck, he probably ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... the planks of her hull. After the first collision, the galley situated before the fore-mast had broken its fastenings. The door between Captain Len Guy's and the mate's cabins was torn away from the hinges. The topmast and the topgallant-mast had come down after the back-stays parted, and fresh fractures could plainly be seen as high as the cap of ...
— An Antarctic Mystery • Jules Verne
... was a pirate ship! From the topmast flew the terrible black flag of the pirates of the ...
— The Firelight Fairy Book • Henry Beston
... behind him and a shadow from the doorway. He turned. A graceful stripling in turban and caftan of cloth of gold salaamed to him from the topmast step. And as he came upright and the light of the lanterns fell full upon his face the astonishingly white fairness of it was revealed—a woman's face it might have been, so softly rounded ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... November, putting to sea, the Desire and Content beat to and fro to windward off the head land of California; and that very morning one of the men in the admiral, going aloft to the topmast, espied a ship bearing in from seaward for the cape. Putting every thing in readiness for action, Candish gave chase, and coming up with her in the afternoon, gave her a broadside and a volley of small arms. This ship was the Santa Anna of 700 tons burden, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... happened, unluckily, to be on board my ship, to his great mortification; for we not only lost sight of his ship, but never saw her more till we came to Madagascar, where she was cast away. In short, after having in this tempest lost our fore-topmast, we were forced to put back to the isle of Tobago for shelter, and to repair our damage, which brought us all very ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe
... talking about. The wind blew a gale and the rain fell in torrents. Just before the storm reached them, Captain Beardsley thought it would be wise to shorten his canvas, but all he took in were the gaff-topsails and fore-topmast staysail. Shortly afterward it became necessary to reef the sails that were left, and when that had been done the captain declared that he wouldn't take in anything else, even if he knew that the wind would take the sticks out of the schooner by the roots. ...
— Marcy The Blockade Runner • Harry Castlemon
... gaed down, and farther down, Her love's ship for to see, And the topmast and the mainmast Shone like ...
— Ballads of Romance and Chivalry - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - First Series • Frank Sidgwick
... to be so with the wind rising out of the northeast; and ere long the Petrel's topmast was sent down, and a double reef put in her mainsail. Until midnight it blew hard with a fast rising sea, and a mist as thick as a hedge. After this, it was ugly weather all the way home, and as they passed Ailsa Craig the wind ...
— A Daughter of Fife • Amelia Edith Barr
... to sit still and wish for what was not to be had; and this extremity roused my application. We had several spare yards, and two or three large spars of wood, and a spare topmast or two in the ship; I resolved to fall to work with these, and I flung as many of them overboard as I could manage for their weight, tying every one with a rope, that they might not drive away. When this was done I went down the ship's side, and pulling them to me, ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... some interchange of commodities between us, and then we parted. I left him smoking his pipe, in a heavy sea with his fore-topmast over the side, his mizzenmast under his counter, and some six or seven holes in his bottom, that let in the water just as fast as the pumps discharged it. You see he was in a fair way to acquire his portion of the inheritance. ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper
... on us fast; we ran off free, she following. Pretty soon we made her out a frigate, a heavy frigate of thirty-six guns, and a fast one too, for she rapidly overhauled us. We cracked on sail, even setting the topmast stunsail, till it blew away. Then we cut away bulwarks and rails, flattened the sails by jiggers on the sheets and halliards until they set like boards, pumped her out, cast adrift the boats, cut away anchors, ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... as he was perfectly able to do. At the first volley from the artillery and arquebuses I swept the deck of the enemy, unrigged his main and mizzen masts, sent his yards and shrouds into the sea, burned his sails, and won and took into my power the flag at the topmast, the standard and flag at the stern, and the others which the ship bore. Then I sent on board of him a band of men with arms and a banner of infantry, who captured the poop and the cabin and took the shallop or long-boat which it had at the stern. All the enemy retired below ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume XI, 1599-1602 • Various
... therefore, in the commencement of our operations. The whole of the masts were dismantled except the lower ones and the Hecla's main-topmast; the lower yards were lashed fore and aft amidships, to support the planks of the housing intended to be erected over the ships; and the whole of this framework was afterward roofed over with a cloth. The boats, spars, running ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... gone plump through main and foresails, leaving round holes to mark the score. Another fairly struck the main topmast, and some splinters came rattling down, while the remnants of the top-sail flapped amid writhing ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... brak, and the topmast lap, It was sic a deadly storm: And the waves cam owre the broken ship Till a' her ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... answered the captain: "if you are on a ship, and you are looking even from the topmast of the vessel, the line of vision from the eye strikes the surface of the water at an angle. The result is that the surface of the water acts as a reflector, exactly the same as when the line of sight ...
— The Boy Volunteers with the Submarine Fleet • Kenneth Ward
... the ports. The whole were then discharged. The effect and crash were dreadful. Their decks were deserted. Three pistol-shots were the unequal return. With confidence I say that the frigate would have been lost to France, had not the unequal collision torn away our fore-topmast, jib-boom, fore and maintop-sails, spritsail-yards, bumpkin, cathead, chainplates, fore-rigging, foresail, and bower anchor, with which last I intended to hook on; but all proved insufficient. She would yet have been lost to France, had not the French admiral, seeing his frigate's foreyard ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald
... cheer, and then a cloud of white smoke burst from the Frenchman's fore deck, and our topmast and all its hamper came down with a crash, and our deck rumbled with ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... round and canister, swept the proud Don from stem to stern, while through the white cloud of smoke the musket-balls, and the still deadlier clothyard arrows, whistled and rushed upon their venomous errand. Down went the steersman, and every soul who manned the poop. Down went the mizzen topmast, in went the stern windows and quarter galleries; and as the smoke cleared away, the gorgeous painting of the Madre Dolorosa, with her heart full of seven swords, which, in a gilded frame, bedizened the Spanish stern, was shivered in splinters; while, most glorious ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... he spoke the English ship yawed and let fly at us with her fore-chase and mingled with their roar was the sharp crack of parting timbers and down came our main-topmast. ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol
... was celebrated in Adelie Land with a small display. At 2.30 P.M. the Union Jack was hoisted to the topmast and three cheers were given for the King. The wind blew at fifty miles an hour with light drift, temperature -3 degrees F. Empire greetings were sent to the Colonial Secretary, London, and to Mr Fisher, Prime Minister of Australia. These were warmly reciprocated ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... have to cross in order to reach the whaling-station on the other side of the island. We had passed several brooks and frozen tarns, and at a point where we had to take to the beach on the shore of the sound we found some wreckage—an 18-ft. pine-spar (probably part of a ship's topmast), several pieces of timber, and a little model of a ship's hull, evidently a child's toy. We wondered what tragedy that pitiful little plaything indicated. We encountered also some gentoo penguins and a ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... hours afterwards the Tudor came in and dropped her anchor close to the frigate. She had evidently suffered severely in the gale. Her fore-topsail-yard was so badly sprung that sail could not be carried on it. Her mizen-topmast was gone, her starboard bulwarks forward stove in, one of her boats carried away; besides which she had received other damages. The sea which had injured her bulwarks had swept along her deck, but everything had been secured, without doing further harm, and fortunately ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... with recruited strength and spirits, such articles being in the first place selected for putting on board as were essentially requisite for her re-equipment; for it was my full determination, could we succeed in completing this, not to wait even for rigging a topmast, or getting a lower yard up, in the event of the ice coming in, but to tow her out among the ice, and there put everything sufficiently to rights for carrying her to some place of security. At the same time, the end of the sea-cable was taken on board the Fury, by way of offering some ...
— Journal of the Third Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage • William Edward Parry
... in for the land, having a small boat laying upon the point of the shoal, the south point of which at noon bore north, distant one mile. The pumps gain'd upon the leak this 4 hours. Light airs and clear weather. Standing off the shore in for the main. Got up the main topmast and main-yard. Having got the sail ready for fothering the ship, we put it over under the starboard fore chains, where we suspected she suffer'd most, and soon after the leak decreas'd so much as to be kept clear with one pump with ease. This fortunate ...
— The Naval Pioneers of Australia • Louis Becke and Walter Jeffery
... three days; the fourth after our departure a most dreadful storm arose, which in a few hours destroyed all our sails, splintered our bowsprit, and brought down our topmast; it fell directly upon the box that enclosed our compass, which, with the compass, was broken to pieces. Every one who has been at sea knows the consequences of such a misfortune: we now were at a ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... heard—I go—but know, proud lord, Howe'er thou scorn'st the weakness of my sex, This feeble hand may find the means to reach thee, Howe'er sublime in pow'r and greatness plac'd, With royal favour guarded round and graced; On eagle's wings my rage shall urge her flight, And hurl thee headlong from thy topmast height; Then, like thy fate, superior will I sit, And view thee fall'n, and grov'ling at my feet; See thy last breath with indignation go, And tread thee sinking to ...
— Jane Shore - A Tragedy • Nicholas Rowe
... he said, "as if there was something afire over there. Here, you Tom," to a lad belonging to the relief-watch, who had just come on deck, "slip up as far as the fore-topmast cross-trees, and see if you can see anything out of the common away there on the ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... gale first broke and we parted company?" was the reply. "The Revenge lost her fore-topmast ere the swine could ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... any Dutch ships whatever. Father Ygnacio de Muxica of our Society, and a brother, were in the flagship, and a father of St. Francis in the other galleon. Both galleons suffered great troubles from whirlwinds, seas, and storms all the way to Macan. One day our flagship snapped the topmast of its mainmast and it fell down. Another day the mast sprang, and knocked the rudder out of place, and it had to be repaired. Another day they were all but wrecked on the reefs of La Plata. On another occasion they lost their rudder ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XXII, 1625-29 • Various
... that followed shook the old ship from keel to topmast, nor were the cheers for Lieutenant Hubbard any the ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... Santissima-Trinidad were also surrounded by the English. The struggle continued between Nelson and his courageous adversary; the flames were breaking out every moment upon the French vessel. "Hardy, this is too hot to last long," said Nelson to his flag- captain. Presently a ball from the topmast of the Redoutable struck the illustrious sailor in the loins. He fell, still supporting himself by one hand. "Hardy, they have done for me now," said he. "No! not yet," cried the captain, who sought to raise ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... for the surface of lakes, for rivers, and for the sea. On the opposite bank of the vast liquid plate, so wide that you did not see the ends of it, one vanishing in the Rhone, and the other in the Bourget, rose the high mountain, jagged like a crest up to the topmast peak of the "Cats's Tooth." On either side of the road, vines, trailing from tree to tree, choked under their leaves their slender supporting branches, and they extended in garlands through the fields, green, yellow, and red garlands, festooning from one trunk to the other, ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... of the pole cautiously. It was a high one, with a slim topmast spliced on with iron bands. He knew how to climb this like a sailor; careful to hold himself close in to the slender stick, and not throw his weight out, so as to put a strain on it that might cause it to snap and let him fall; careful not to ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... were the skipper of 'The Aquidneck,' were you? Well, well! no wonder you're laid up with a chill. We nearly burst our blood-vessels, laughing over Miss Fred's account of you, rising up like a ghost out of the eel-grass, and the topmast of your boat sticking up out of the water like a ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... occasional single shot. During their suspense a discharge is heard southward, and turning they behold COLLINGWOOD at the head of his column in the "Royal Sovereign," just engaging with the Spanish "Santa Ana." Meanwhile the "Victory's" mizzen-topmast, with spars and a quantity of rigging, is seen to have fallen, her wheel to be shot away, and her deck encumbered with dead and ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... 12th of January, 1893, I was seventeen, and the 20th of January I signed before the shipping commissioner the articles of the Sophie Sutherland, a three topmast sealing schooner bound on a voyage to the coast of Japan. And of course we had to drink on it. Joe Vigy cashed my advance note, and Pete Holt treated, and I treated, and Joe Vigy treated, and other hunters treated. Well, it was the way of men, and who ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London
... Thou art sailing fair at his stern if thy course was not changed to avoid me. His topmast is gone; ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... the outward edge of it, which I sounded on, lies 16 leagues off shore. When it was day we steered in east-north-east with a fine brisk gale; but did not see the land till 9 in the morning, when we saw it from our topmast-head, and were distant from it about 10 leagues; having then 40 fathom water, and clean sand. About 3 hours after we saw it on our quarter-deck, being by judgment about 6 leagues off, and we had then 40 fathom, clean sand. As we ran ...
— A Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier
... a fore-and-after, in the same trade, which, after all, was but a blind kind of sailing in the dark, where a man larns but little, excepting how to steer by the stars. Well, then, dye see, I larnt how a topmast should be slushed, and how a topgallant-sail was to be becketted; and then I did small jobs in the cabin, such as mixing the skippers grog. Twas there I got my taste, which, you must have often seen, is excel lent. Well, heres better acquaintance ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... gone under a cloud again, but there was light enough for me to catch a glimpse of some floating wreck on the crest of a wave above me; and then it came down right on top of me,—a lot of rigging and a spar or two,—our topmast and yard, which had gone over the side just before we foundered. I climbed on to it, and found my prospects hugely improving,—especially as clinging to the other end was the soldier left on board. As soon as I could persuade him I was no spook or mermaid, he was almost ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... trial comes,—when the volunteers are called to man the boat that is to venture through the wild seas to pick off the crew of a foundering wreck,—"when the jerking, slatting sail overhead must be got in somehow," though topmast and yard and sail may go any minute,—when the quailing mate or frightened captain dares not order men to all but certain death, and still less dares to lead,—then it is, when the lives of all hang on the heroism of one, that the good ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... slope. The roots of the trees are bare along the white edge; a foot or two nearer the sand buries the feet of the cedars: a few yards nearer still the bare trunks disappear; still nearer only the withered topmast twigs of the submerged forest are seen, and then far over the tree tops stands the sand range. Perpetual ice is found under the foot of this steep slope, the sand covering and consolidating the snows drifted over the hill during the winter months. There is something awe-inspiring, says ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 362, December 9, 1882 • Various
... among the weed. At that, as may be imagined, we were very greatly excited, and stood upon the thwarts that we might get better view of her. Thus I saw her a great way in from the edge of the weed, and I noted that her foremast was gone near to the deck, and she had no main topmast; though, strangely enough, her mizzen stood unharmed. And beyond this, I could make out but little, because of the distance; though the sun, which was upon our larboard side, gave me some sight of her hull, but not much, because of the weed in which she ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... impossible to save the little bower anchor, it was cut away at a whole cable, and the cable of the stream anchor was lost among the rocks; but in the situation of our people, these were trifles which scarcely attracted their notice. The fore topmast and fore yard were next erected, and there being a breeze from the sea, the Endeavour, at eleven o'clock, got once more under sail, and stood ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... one thing to do. Retaining my presence of mind, I made a desperate spring and caught hold of the topmast backstay, down which I was sliding to the rail, when I saw the first mate rushing forward to try and catch me as I fell, he having just recollected that he had sent me aloft. His countenance expressed ...
— The Two Whalers - Adventures in the Pacific • W.H.G. Kingston
... rig is that they have no boom to their mainsail, which in shape somewhat resembles a barge-sail, and, like it, can in a moment be brailed completely up. They carry a lofty topmast and large topsails, and these they seldom lower, even when obliged to have two reefs in the mainsail. They are capital sea-boats, fast, and very handy; and it requires a good yacht to beat a bawley with a brisk wind blowing. The men are keen sailors, and when the ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... all. Signals were made from ship to ship, fresh anchors were let down, and the topmast housed. By midnight it was blowing a tremendous gale, which continued for three days. Several of the transports dragged their anchors and were washed ashore, and messages arrived from different parts of the coast telling of the wreck of many of those which had sailed ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... was connected by a short stick to another spar tied to the mainsail about eighteen inches lower down. The sail was strengthened with an extra strip of cloth along the lower spar, and the tie strings were applied in the usual way. The connecting stick, or topmast we may call it, was hinged to the lower spar by means of a short piece of leather strap, which was passed round the spar in the form of a loop and its two ends nailed to the bottom of the topmast. The topmast extended above the upper spar a ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... wharf and watch his men unload the steamer. It was on one of these occasions that Captain Charley in conversation with one of his friends said, "I tell you, John, I'd give a fifty-dollar slug if I could get a Bear flag to fly from the topmast of my natty schooner. Nothing would please me more than to come up this slough with just such a flag. I won't rest, either, until I have Old Glory and the Bear Flag flying on my craft." When the captain's ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson
... vessels of every class, from the humble gondola to the bulky East Indianian and the first-rate ship of war, gaily bannered with the Orange colours and thronged from deck to topmast by enthusiastic multitudes, was waiting to receive their beloved stadholder. A deafening cannonade saluted him on his approach. The Prince was escorted to the Square or Dam, where on a high scaffolding covered with blue velvet in front of the stately mediaeval town-hall the burgomasters ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... The topmast studding-sail flapped and fluttered, the foresail shivered, and the jib filled as the frigate rounded to, narrowly missing the wreck, which was now under the bows, rocking so violently in the white foam of the agitated waters that it was with difficulty that Coco could, by clinging to ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... flower so he from land to land; The manners, customs, policy of all Pay contribution to the store he gleans, He sucks intelligence in every clime, And spreads the honey of his deep research At his return—a rich repast for me. He travels and I too. I tread his deck, Ascend his topmast, through his peering eyes Discover countries, with a kindred heart Suffer his woes and share in his escapes; While fancy, like the finger of a clock, Runs the great circuit, and is still ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... South-East. Upon reaching Cairncross Island, under which it was my intention to anchor, the sails were reduced; and, as we were in the act of letting go the anchor, Mr. Roe, who was at the masthead holding thoughtlessly by the fore-topmast staysail-halyards, whilst the sail was being hauled down, was precipitated from a height of fifty feet, and fell senseless on the deck. We were now close to the reef; and, in the hurry and confusion attending the accident, ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... was returned by both ships; and then they sped on their voyage of eight hundred miles to Manila. The captain gave out the course east by north half-north, and the French flag was hauled down from the topmast. The passengers of the Blanche had been sent on board of her, while those of the Guardian-Mother continued to promenade the deck. The commander noticed that some of them were gaping and yawning, and he remembered that they had had only three ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic
... practice and training. First the object had to be visualized, and the general structure memorized. Then the power had to be controlled carefully enough so that you moved just what you wanted to move and not, for instance, shift the Empire State Building while trying to lift a molecule out of its topmast. ...
— Sight Gag • Laurence Mark Janifer
... whale; the fence was of a most fanciful Chinese pattern; and directly in front of the house was erected that never-failing ornament of a sailor's dwelling, a tall flag-staff, with cap, cross-trees, and topmast, complete; the last, always being kept "housed," except upon the 4th of July, 22d of February, &c. At the foot of the flag-staff, "hushed in grim repose," was an iron six-pounder, mounted upon a ship gun-carriage, ready for service, whenever any national holyday required its voice. The house fronted ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames |
