"Steersman" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... The steersman in the lug-sailed boat altered his course slightly and reached down towards the derelict As he neared her he dropped his sail and got ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... the spear; the canoe whirls on its axis with an almost dizzing velocity, or the sudden dash of the spear, followed by the struggles of the transfixed fish, or perhaps the characteristic "Eh," from the Indian steersman. In this manner, sometimes fifty or sixty fish of three or four pounds are speared in the course of a night, consisting of black bass, white fish, and sometimes a noble maskimongi. A little practice soon enables the young settler to take an active part in this pursuit. The light seems to ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 541, Saturday, April 7, 1832 • Various
... below, but in a twinkling Jackson, the mate, appeared on deck in his pajamas, and after a swift glance toward the familiar shore turned to me with the same dumfounded look that had frozen upon the face of the steersman. ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... the south-west wind are widened; the breath of his fervent lips, More keen than a sword's edge, fiercer than fire, falls full on the plunging ships. The pilot is he of their northward flight, their stay and their steersman he; A helmsman clothed with the tempest, and girdled with strength to constrain the sea. And the host of them trembles and quails, caught fast in his hand as a bird in the toils; For the wrath and the joy that fulfil him are mightier than man's, whom he ...
— Poems and Ballads (Third Series) - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne—Vol. III • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... night. Pencroft and Herbert took turns for a spell of two hours each at the helm. The sailor trusted Herbert as he would himself, and his confidence was justified by the coolness and judgment of the lad. Pencroft gave him his directions as a commander to his steersman, and Herbert never allowed the "Bonadventure" to swerve even a point. The night passed quickly, as did the day of the 12th of October. A south-easterly direction was strictly maintained. Unless the "Bonadventure" fell ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne
... bank, either to help haul upon a line, or, in the case of the younger children and the dogs, simply to walk in order to relieve the craft of their weight and also for safety's sake, should the canoe overturn. The greatest danger is for the steersman to lose control and allow the canoe to get out of line with the current, as the least headway in a wrong direction is apt ...
— The Drama of the Forests - Romance and Adventure • Arthur Heming
... getting through fast water is not to lose your nerve," said Mr. Waterman. "Next you must have confidence in your steersman and do what he tells you just as ...
— Bob Hunt in Canada • George W. Orton
... excited voices break the silence on the shore. It won't do to hope too much, but surely all the boats are thickening to one spot.... No, it's nothing!... Yes, it is—it is something—one knows what—sighted abaft the Ellen Jane, whose steersman catches it with a boathook as the oars we on the beach saw suddenly drop back water—slowly, cautiously—and only wait for him to drag the light weight athwart the gunwale to row for the dear life towards the town. The ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... returned, and we observed that each of them carried between its talons stones, or rather rocks, of a monstrous size. When they came directly over my ship, they hovered, and one of them let fall a stone, but by the dexterity of the steersman it missed us, and falling into the sea, divided the water so that we could almost see the bottom. The other roe, to our misfortune, threw his messy burden so exactly upon the middle of the ship, as to ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... in Macbeth was ruthlessly struck out as containing an obvious allusion to the steersman of St. Peter's bark. Finally, bored and bothered by the political and theological Dogberrys of the day, with their inane prejudices, their solemn stupidity, and their entire ignorance of the conditions necessary for the growth of sane and healthy art, Madame ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... were driving into blankness which had shut down with that smothering density which mariners call "a dungeon fog." Saturday Cove's entrance was a distant and a small target. In spite of steersman and mate, ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... to bear, the thicket was cleared by discharges of canister and grape, and the fire of the enemy was silenced. No other casualties occurred on board of the steamer, but many of the crew narrowly escaped harm, particularly those who were near the wheel house. The sailing master and the steersman had their clothes pierced by bullets, and the sides and decks of the steamer were similarly marked in many places. The river, becoming still narrower and more crooked above Gainesville, it was found entirely impossible to force the Sachem higher ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... stepped onto the highest rock, bellowed loudly, and made wild motions with his arm. The flying-boat, which was only a few hundred yards distant, slightly altered its course, now heading toward them in a way that left no doubt that the steersman ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... watched in dismay, for it seemed to me that we could in no way take the town. As for Olaf, he said nought; and when we had come to anchor again he sat on the steersman's bench, looking at the bridge and saying no word to any of us. The Danes were crowding the bridge and jeering at us, ...
— King Olaf's Kinsman - A Story of the Last Saxon Struggle against the Danes in - the Days of Ironside and Cnut • Charles Whistler
... where they lay hauled out on the sand, he saw men and women, Kanakas, reclining languorously, like lotus-eaters, the women in white holokus; and against one such holoku he saw the dark head of the steersman of the canoe resting upon the woman's shoulder. Farther down, where the strip of sand widened at the entrance to the lagoon, he saw a man and woman walking side by side. As they drew near the light lanai, he saw the woman's hand go down to her ...
— The House of Pride • Jack London
... The steersman whirled his wheel swiftly in the apparent endeavor to avert a collision. Unluckily, he whirled it the wrong way. Round swung the schooner's bow, directly toward the sloop. A few seconds more and she would be forced down beneath the larger ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman
... thus knew by personal test that he was entirely capable of assisting his son Allen in the trading expedition to New Orleans. For Abraham, on the other hand, it was an event which must have opened up wide vistas of future hope and ambition. Allen Gentry probably was nominal supercargo and steersman, but we may easily surmise that Lincoln, as the "bow oar," carried his full half of general responsibility. For this service the elder Gentry paid him eight dollars a month and his passage home on a steamboat. It was the future President's first eager look into ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... sunshine only that I saw Dhu Heartach; and it was in sunshine, or the yet lovelier summer afterglow, that the steamer would return to Earraid, ploughing an enchanted sea; the obedient lighters, relieved of their deck cargo, riding in her wake more quietly; and the steersman upon each, as she rose on the long swell, standing tall and dark ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... clearer than usual, a circumstance I did not expect on it's rise. at 11 A.M. the wind became so hard that we were compelled to ly by for several hours, one of the small canoes by the bad management of the steersman filled with water and had very nearly sunk; we unloaded her and dryed the baggage; at one we proceed on the wind having in some measure abated. the country we passed today on the North side of the river is one of the most beautifull plains we have yet seen, it rises gradually from the river bottom ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... pilot. No one who has not seen a rapid can realise the nerve this requires. Seats had been roughly put in for us to sit on, otherwise, as a rule, except for the oarsmen's bench and the barrels, these boats are absolutely empty. Our friend, the steersman, sat at the bow, and with a sort of oar, held in position by a rope of plaited straw fixed a little on one side, guided the fragile bark. First we had to go into a lock. Any one acquainted with a nice wide shallow Thames lock may think he knows ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... cable another night. About midnight I struggled on deck, to get a breath of fresh air before turning in. The night was fine and clear, but the sea around black as ink, with great foaming white rollers. The decks, a foot deep in snow, were deserted save by Z—— and the steersman, whose silhouettes stood out black and distinct against the starlit sky as they paced the rickety-looking little bridge flanked by red and green lights. The Enzelli lighthouse was no longer visible. ...
— A Ride to India across Persia and Baluchistan • Harry De Windt
... we are discovered," exclaimed the steersman of the foremost boat, with a brutal oath. "Spring to your oars, lads! We must gain a footing before the guard turns out or it's all up with us. Pull for ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow
... The steersman is a six-foot weather-beaten sailor with a very red face, whose color on both cheeks comes from a network of veins with which the white of the eye is also transfused. He is always hoarse, and his voice knows only two variations, either a loud bellow or a low ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... to load and reserve fire," said the captain; "and hand me a musket, Fred. Load again as fast as I fire." So saying, the captain took aim and fired at the steersman of the largest boat, which pulled towards the stern. ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... intangible shifting of relations in his surroundings incident to the mere passage of time in the few days of his obliteration, now felt, as a blind man feels the mountain in his approach, or as the steersman in a Newfoundland fog apprehends the nearing of the iceberg, some subtle alteration in the attitude toward him of the young woman by his side. Instantly he was on guard ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... say that the dead steersman has been reverently removed from the place where he held his honourable watch and ward till death, a steadfastness as noble as that of the young Casabianca, and placed in the ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... they left him tongue-tied. Yes, by George, she was a beauty! Her carriage was regal, and there was about her an air of competence, of authority. She was not disturbed by her surroundings—she laughed. What had she called the storm? A puff! She seemed, by George, like a sprite of the storm! Like the steersman yonder, she seemed to belong to this setting of laboring ship and tumultuous sea. Here she came toward him ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... gentlemen," he said, turning to the passengers, "I shall rely upon you to pick off the steersman of the other vessel, and to prevent another taking his place. She steers badly now, and the moment her helm is free, she'll run up into the wind. As she does so, I shall bear off, run across her bow, and rake her deck with ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... that he knew well enough. Coming back to here and now, he looked and saw breakers upon a long sand bar. The making tide was at half, and that and the changed wind carried us toward the lines of foam. The boy cried, "Steersman! Steersman!" Ruiz sat up, holding his head in his hands. "Such a roaring in my ears!" But "Breakers! Breakers!" cried the boy. ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... the steersman of his boat in the morning, and hanged him in the evening of the same day. Fifty thousand people stood around the columns of the national capitol, shouting themselves hoarse at the presidential inaugural, ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... small schooner some little distance from them playing seesaw, as he closed his eyes to the heaving blue sea. Land was conspicuous by its absence, and with a groan he turned and looked about him—at the white scrubbed deck, the snowy canvas towering aloft on lazily creaking spars, and the steersman leaning against the wheel regarding the ...
— Lady of the Barge and Others, Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... bright golden again, and the air felt delicious; but I began to wish that we were at our journey's end, and pointing ahead I tried to learn from our steersman how much farther he was going ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn
... potatoes and beets. Some barges laden with wood were being pulled through the locks by men harnessed to a long tow rope, and a savage dog on one of these barges menaced me with dripping fangs and bloodshot eyes when I stopped to talk to the steersman, who sat on the tiller smoking a short, evil-smelling pipe, while his "vrouwe" was hanging out a heavy wash of vari-colored garments on a line from the staff on the bow to a sweep fastened upright ...
— Vanished towers and chimes of Flanders • George Wharton Edwards
... sails and oars. Aboard which boat she forthwith got, and being, like most of the women of the island, not altogether without nautical skill, she rowed some distance out to sea, and then hoisted sail, and cast away oars and tiller, and let the boat drift, deeming that a boat without lading or steersman would certainly be either capsized by the wind or dashed against some rock and broken in pieces, so that escape she could not, even if she would, but must perforce drown. And so, her head wrapped in a mantle, she ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... shaft of which the end of a cord of due length, coiled up with the utmost care in the middle of the boat, is firmly tied; the other end is fastened to the bottom of the boat. Thus prepared they row in profound silence, leaving the whole conduct of the enterprise to the harpooner and to the steersman, attentively following their directions. When the former judges himself to be near enough to the whale, that is, at the distance of about fifteen feet, he bids them stop; perhaps she has a calf, whose safety attracts all the attention of the dam, which is a favourable circumstance; ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... sideways up! Fear at my heart, as at a cup, My life-blood seemed to sip! The stars were dim, and thick the night, The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed white; From the sails the dew did drip— Till clomb above the eastern bar The horned Moon, with one bright star Within the ...
— Poems of Coleridge • Coleridge, ed Arthur Symons
... highest pace of the three-horse team, and the Boy's Town was out of sight. He could not sleep for excitement that night, and he came and spent the time talking on quite equal terms with the steersman, one of the canalers whom he had admired afar in earlier and simpler days. He found him a very amiable fellow, by no means haughty, who began to tell him funny stories, and who even let him take the helm for a while. The rudder-handle was of polished iron, very different ...
— Boy Life - Stories and Readings Selected From The Works of William Dean Howells • William Dean Howells
... here the ship Endraght of Amsterdam; the first merchant, Gilles Mibais, of Luyck; Captain Dirk Hartog; of Amsterdam; the 27th ditto set sail for Bantam; undermerchant Jan Stoyn, upper steersman, Pieter Dockes, ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... morning, Jack mounted the steersman's seat, and sent the Terror rolling to the place where the bandits ...
— Jack Wright and His Electric Stage; - or, Leagued Against the James Boys • "Noname"
... tell him what might happen. A sailing vessel, probably a fishing smack, was crossing the steamer's course. He sprang to the telegraph, and signaled "Slow" to the engine-room. Simultaneously he shouted to the steersman to starboard the helm, and the siren trumpeted a single raucous blast into the silence. With the rattle of the chains and steering-rods in the gear-boxes came a ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... him, encouraged by the hoarse objurgations of the mate, whose excitement was intense. After what seemed a terribly long chase, we found his speed slackening, and we redoubled our efforts. Now we were close upon him; now, in obedience to the steersman, the boat sheered out a bit, and we were abreast of his labouring flukes; now the mate hurls his quivering lance with such hearty good-will that every inch of its slender shaft disappears within the huge body. "Layoff! Off with her, Louey!" screamed the mate; and she gave a wide sheer ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... too valuable to be shot down for missing a man with a knife. Such a canoe-steersman as Rupe never was known before or since: he knew every rock in every rapid from the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... false last-century Chart! Though the conning may be smart, and the steersman play his part, Palinurus-like, Whilst they trust to your vain vellum, which is almost sure to sell 'em, even DAVY JONES can tell 'em, they may sink or strike. Hooray, King Death, hooray! Who says we've had our ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 103, December 10, 1892 • Various
... all our papers, instruments, medicine, and almost every article indispensible for the success of our enterprise. The canoe being under sail, a sudden squall of wind struck her obliquely, and turned her considerably. The man at the helm, who was unluckily the worst steersman of the party, became alarmed, and instead of putting her before the wind luffed her up into it. The wind was so high that it forced the brace of the squaresail out of the hand of the man who was attending it, and instantly upset the ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark
... at once, and Caesar took his post as steersman, while the three stalwart soldiers were leaping into the canoe for the purpose of fighting hand to hand the nine Indians opposed to them. As they shot out from the shore the savages on the bank delivered a fierce fire upon them, but fortunately ...
— The Big Brother - A Story of Indian War • George Cary Eggleston
... camp-followers took up the donkeys and tumbled them bodily aboard a small boat with a lateen sail, and we followed and got under way. The deck was closely packed with donkeys and men; the two sailors had to climb over and under and through the wedged mass to work the sails, and the steersman had to crowd four or five donkeys out of the way when he wished to swing his tiller and put his helm hard-down. But what were their troubles to us? We had nothing to do; nothing to do but enjoy the trip; nothing to do but shove the donkeys ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... captain, steersman, and ballaster of our vessel. We struck our bargain with him at once, and at once proceeded to make preparations. Chiefly we prepared by stripping ourselves bare of everything except "must-haves." A birch, besides three men, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... have slain the steersman. The axe goes first and Skallagrim follows after. Ha, ha! Ay, Swanhild, we'll mingle tears. Give me the cup. Why, what is this? Thou art afire, a glory glows about thee, and from thee floats a scent like the scent of the Iceland ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... that?" he asked, as a hissing, sharp-drawn voice seemed to whisper in his ear. The steersman smiled, and pointed with his foot to where a short heavy cross-bow quarrel stuck quivering in the boards. At the same instant the man stumbled forward upon his knees, and lay lifeless upon the deck, a blood-stained feather jutting out from his back. As Alleyne stooped to raise him, the air seemed ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... well-nigh miraculous skill of the steersman, came almost within sight of Ostend, when, not fifty paces from the shore, she was suddenly struck by a heavy sea and capsized. The stranger with the light about his head spoke to this little world of ...
— Christ in Flanders • Honore de Balzac
... within half pistol-shot, and her forward guns were beginning to bear. From his station on the quarter-deck Barney shouted to his steersman in stentorian tones,— ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... sweet sake : I loved—alas! our life is love : I met a traveller from an antique land : I mourn Adonis dead—loveliest Adonis : I pant for the music which is divine : I rode one evening with Count Maddalo : I sate beside a sage's bed : I sate beside the Steersman then, and gazing : I sing the glorious Power with azure eyes : I stood upon a heaven-cleaving turret : I stood within the City disinterred : I weep for Adonais—he is dead' : I went into the deserts of dim sleep : I would not be a king—enough : If gibbets, axes, confiscations, chains : If ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... his dinner. In his spare moments Frank, who wisely regarded it as the duty of every officer to acquaint himself with every part of the management of a vessel, had learned to handle the wheel, and he was an excellent steersman. He could make a landing or get a boat under way, as well as the most experienced pilot; and in the present instance he was fully capable of steering the boat, for as the water in the river was high, there was no danger of getting ...
— Frank on the Lower Mississippi • Harry Castlemon
... forward a slight sea sometimes came over with a crash, but the vessel was in no trouble, and she looked as if she could hold her own in a much worse breeze. I believe that only poets and landsmen are fond of bad weather; and the steersman occasionally threw a demure, quizzical glance at a young girl who was hanging on by one hand to the companion hatch. The wind had heightened her colour, and the chance gleams of the moon showed the girl's face as a flash of warm brightness in the chill ...
— A Dream of the North Sea • James Runciman
... The steersman lost his head. He put over the helm, but failed to cut Grenfell off, and the Doctor presently found himself a long way from the ship struggling for life in the icy cold ...
— The Story of Grenfell of the Labrador - A Boy's Life of Wilfred T. Grenfell • Dillon Wallace
... Indian canoes watching to pounce upon the immigrant boats coming down the Ohio. Whenever he saw the entrance of a tributary he always had the boat steered in toward the opposite shore, while all except the steersman sat with their rifles across their knees until the ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler
... paddles. Two enormous waves passed, leaving us undamaged; but a third approached, huge and threatening. Should we get to the shore before it? Would it rise upright and capsize us, or would it break on us and swamp us? Neither. It did reach us, indeed, but the old steersman had calculated well; it lifted us up unharmed and carried us on to the beach, where a hundred negroes laid hold of the canoe and dragged it high and dry. I was seized myself before I had time to collect my ideas, ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... boat off from the pier; whilst the others took the oars, which were muffled, and rowed with all precaution till they attained the middle of the river; they then ceased their efforts, lay upon their oars, and trusted to the steersman for keeping ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... man dies with unpared nails, he supplies a large amount of materials for the building of this ship, which both gods and men wish may be finished as late as possible. But in this flood Naglfar gets afloat. The giant Hrym is its steersman. ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... not have paddled herself across, two men were taking her over; and for the steersman she had Jaffir. Though he had assented to Jorgenson's plan Jaffir was anxious to accompany the ring as near as possible to its destination. Nothing but dire necessity had induced him to part with the talisman. Crouching in the stern and flourishing his paddle from side to side he glared at the ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... mile," said the designer to the steersman; and he pulled out his watch with exactly the same look of calm interest he showed when presiding over the trial ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... received the suggestion with approval. Usually—for the craft, though, sturdy, was a small one—he was his own steersman and engineer. Now, he could enjoy the luxury of a crew, and the driver, who was a fairly good mechanic, was quite competent to handle the ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... afoul of forty pirate ships under the coast of Seeland. He tried to steal past; forty against one were heavy odds. But it was moonlight and he was discovered. The pirates lay across his course and cut him off. Esbern made ready for a fight and steered straight into the middle of them. The steersman complained that he had no armor, and he gave him his own. He beat his pursuers off again and again, but the wind slackened and they were closing in once more, swearing by their heathen gods that they would have him dead or alive, for a Danish prisoner ...
— Hero Tales of the Far North • Jacob A. Riis
... afternoon; none of the boys felt any touches of seasickness now, and many of them were walking up and down the deck, some taking their comfort under awnings spread aft near the cabin companion, and some being on the bridge watching the steersman or looking out to sea in search of sails or noting the flight of the gulls and other seabirds or studying the movements of the dolphins playing around the bow, there being many of ...
— The Hilltop Boys on Lost Island • Cyril Burleigh
... along the deep, Like a mirror sleeps the ocean, And the anxious steersman sees Round him ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... the order to the steersman. The ship's bows swung around, and the little steamer was soon scuttling upcoast towards the headland, along the outer line of reefs, at a speed of ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... mainsail gave way, the head of the vessel fell to leeward; next moment she went crashing into the Lively Poll, and cut her down to the water's edge. The ironclad seemed to rebound and tremble for a moment, and then passed on. The steersman at once threw her up into the wind with the intention of rendering assistance, but in another minute the Lively Poll had sunk and disappeared for ever, carrying Peter Jay ...
— The Lively Poll - A Tale of the North Sea • R.M. Ballantyne
... to all of us to be out thus in the freedom of the night and the sea—not least to the great noble-headed hound sitting up on his haunches, keen and watchful by the steersman's side. What a strange waste of a life so short to be sleeping there on the land, when one might be out and away on ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... flat country with a range of more than a league of water. As soon as everything was snug on board, the boat was lowered, and we pulled ashore, our new officer, who had been several times in the port before, taking the place of steersman. As we drew in, we found the tide low, and the rocks and stones, covered with kelp and sea-weed, lying bare for the distance of nearly an eighth of a mile. Picking our way barefooted over these, we came to what is called the landing-place, at high-water mark. The soil was as it appeared ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... came from Iceland belonging to Icelanders, and loaded with skins and peltry. They sailed to Hardanger, where they heard the greatest number of people assembled; but when the folks came to deal with them, nobody would buy their skins. Then the steersman went to King Harald, whom he had been acquainted with before, and complained of his ill luck. The king promised to visit him, and did so. King Harald was very condescending, and full of fun. He came ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... choking dusk of the noisome mine, The northern blast o'er the beating brine, With dogged valour they coolly brave; So on rattling rail, or on wind-scourged wave, At engine lever, at furnace front, Or steersman's wheel, they must bear the brunt Of lonely vigil or lengthened strain. Man is in charge of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, October 4, 1890 • Various
... upon a plank, and grasping handles of rope, while a sailor swam behind. Here, too, Mrs. Hasty was the first to venture, under the guard of Davis. Once and again, during their passage, the plank was rolled wholly over, and once and again was righted, with its bearer, by the dauntless steersman; and when, at length, tossed by the surf upon the sands, the half-drowned woman still holding, as in a death-struggle, to the ropes, was about to be swept back by the undertow, he caught her in his arms, and, with the assistance of a bystander, placed her high ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... Addison sailed from Marseilles to Genoa in a tartane in December 1699: a storm arose, and the patron alarmed the passengers by confessing his sins (and such sins!) loudly to a Capuchin friar who happened to be aboard. Smollett finally decided on a gondola, with four rowers and a steersman, for which he had to pay nine sequins (4 1/2 louis). After adventures off Monaco, San Remo, Noli, and elsewhere, the party are glad to make the famous phones on the Torre della Lanterna, of which banker Rogers sings in his ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... question concerning Menelaus, he left Troy in my company, as I told thee, and we sailed together as far as Sunium. There Menelaus lost his steersman, who was visited by Apollo with sudden death, as he sat by the helm; so he remained there to bury his comrade. But his misfortunes were not yet over; for when he reached the steep headland at Malea a violent storm arose, and parted his fleet. Some of his ships ran into Crete for shelter, ...
— Stories from the Odyssey • H. L. Havell
... overturned, so that the father lost everything, and was able to save only the clothes on his back. Thus that boat, which withstood so many buffetings of the sea without any harm, happened to overturn four brazas from shore, through the carelessness of its steersman. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXIV, 1630-34 • Various
... forecastle, the sailors flung it not rudely down, as by day, .. but with some cautiousness dropt it to its place, for fear of disturbing their slumbering shipmates; when this sort of steady quietude would begin to prevail, habitually, the silent steersman would watch the cabin-scuttle; and ere long the old man would emerge, griping at the iron banister, to help his crippled way. Some considerating touch of humanity was in him; for at times like these, he usually abstained from patrolling the quarter-deck; because to his wearied mates, seeking ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... the lights of the little fishing hamlet of Lytham were passed, and they were fast entering upon the open sea. The stranger came out of the cabin, stationing himself by the steersman. They were evidently on the look-out for signals. It was not yet daybreak, and the wind was from the north, a bitter and a biting air, that made the jailer's teeth to chatter as he raised himself up to examine their course ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... arisen, and everything could be as plainly distinguished as during the day. A thin mist lay on the river, giving the few craft moving about in it a ghostly look. As they approached London Bridge, the thief-taker whispered Van Galgebrok, who acted as steersman, to make for a particular arch—near the Surrey shore. The skipper obeyed, and in another moment, they swept through the narrow lock. While the watermen were contending with the eddies occasioned by the fall below the bridge, Jonathan observed a perceptible shudder ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... know, my lads," said the old man, "a scow goes no faster than the river runs. Here's the great oar—twenty feet it is in length—made out of a young tree. The steersman uses that to straighten her up betimes. But there's nothing to make the boat run saving the current, do ...
— Young Alaskans in the Far North • Emerson Hough
... John stood by the steersman and conned the ship. He knew the passage like the palm of his hand, and though the man in the chains got everywhere more water than was down in the chart, ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... red carpet and all. Only the blare of the band followed them, and with the persistence of sound over water, followed them for some time. The Crown Prince put down the bouquet, and proceeded to stand near the steersman. ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... so that if one of the crew had slipped his foot off the stretcher, it must have gone through the bottom. There was a standing order that no man was to go into it with shoes on. She was to pull six oars, and her crew were the captains of the tops, the primest seamen in the ship, and the steersman no less a character ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 579 - Volume 20, No. 579, December 8, 1832 • Various
... afternoon have I rowed joyously with these same maidens beneath these steep and garlanded shores; many a time have they pulled the heavy four-oar, with me as coxswain at the helm,—the said patient steersman being oft-times insulted by classical allusions from rival boats, satirically comparing him to an indolent Venus drawn by doves, while the oarswomen in turn were likened to Minerva with her feet upon a tortoise. Many were the disasters in the earlier days of feminine training;—first ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... answered the steersman of the Black Hawk, who was dividing his attention between managing the craft and firing ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton
... extending five feet above the gunwale of the ship. The cabin had four windows on each side, a companionway fore and aft, and a sort of look-out or conning tower forward, which, the professor explained, was the place for the steersman. ...
— Through the Air to the North Pole - or The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch • Roy Rockwood
... boats of an amazing length, forty feet and upwards, which, manned with eight oars, move with great celerity. Every Saturday evening the scholars are permitted to assume fancy dresses; but the practice is now principally confined to the steersman; the rest simply adopting sailors' costume, except on the fourth of June, or election Saturday, when there is always a grand gala, a band of music, and fireworks, on the ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... the viking saw a goodly vessel making gallant headway. As she drew near the land with streamer flying and broad sails flapping in the wind, the viking saw that there was no soul on board of her; and yet, without steersman to guide her, the vessel avoided the shoals and held her way straight to the ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... the darkling day. If the wind in our eyes blow blood for spray, Be the spirit that breathes in us life more strong, Though the prow reel round and the helm point wrong, And sharp reefs whiten the shoreward way. 1290 For the steersman time sits hidden astern, [Ant. 1. With dark hand plying the rudder of doom, And the surf-smoke under it flies like fume As the blast shears off and the oar-blades churn The foam of our lives that to death return, Blown back as they break to the gulfing gloom. What cloud upon heaven ...
— Erechtheus - A Tragedy (New Edition) • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... What, there's nothing in the moon noteworthy? Nay: for if that moon could love a mortal, Use, to charm him (so to fit a fancy), All her magic ('tis the old sweet mythos), She would turn a new side to her mortal, Side unseen of herdsman, huntsman, steersman— Blank to Zoroaster on his terrace, Blind to Galileo on his turret, Dumb to Homer, dumb to Keats—him, even! Think, the wonder of the moonstruck mortal— When she turns round, comes again in heaven, ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... launched, not without great difficulty, in the face of such a sea. The men stoutly took their oars, casting a look forward at the rocks, then at the quay, and on the face of their young steersman. Little they guessed the intense emotion that swelled in his breast as he took the helm, to save life or to lose it; enjoying the enterprise, yet with the thought that his lot might be early death; glad it was right thus ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... flies with the wind astern, And through the boding twilight are blown the 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 ...
— Ballads of Lost Haven - A Book of the Sea • Bliss Carman
... affected Jewish travellers. Synesius uses a sarcastic tone, which must not be taken as seriously unfriendly. "His voyage homeward," says Mr. Glover, "was adventurous." It is a pity that space cannot be found for a full citation of Synesius's enthralling narrative. His Jewish steersman is an entertaining character. There were twelve members in the crew, the steersman making the thirteenth. More than half, including the steersman, were Jews. "It was," says Synesius, "the day which the Jews call the Preparation [Friday], and they reckon the night to the next day, on which they ...
— The Book of Delight and Other Papers • Israel Abrahams
... serviceable in hunting, gathering fuel, etc. In the "forecastle"—the bows of the large canoes which projected beyond our cabin—sat three Indians to paddle. The fourth, who was the governor of Santa Rosa, we honored with the post of steersman; and he was always to be seen on the poop behind the kitchen, standing bolt upright, on the alert and on the lookout. On approaching any human habitation, the Indians blew horns to indicate that they came as friends. These horns ...
— The Andes and the Amazon - Across the Continent of South America • James Orton
... blacker outlines of the craft and its occupants as it sped forth from the gloom of the forest into the starlit area of the tiny lake. The great canoe was low in the water; for heaped in the centre of it was what was evidently a pile of freight, with two men in front and two behind. The steersman swung the prow around and on they went up the Wolverine without a pause in the sweep of the paddles or the swing ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... the navigator, and the standard compass, owing to its remoteness from iron in this position, is placed on the top of the ice-house. The steersman, however, steers by a binnacle compass placed aft in front of his wheel. But these two compasses for various reasons do not read alike at a given moment, while the standard is the ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... protested Colfax, born a Sims but living it down and feeling that never more than at this minute, when rudely the steersman's helm had been snatched from his grasp, was there greater need that he should be a Colfax through and through——"but, Mr. Lobel, it was my idea that up to this point anyway the action should be played with restraint to sort of ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... soon launched in safety, but the Paul Pry, Mr. Walker's boat, was not so fortunate; the water in the bay deepened rapidly from the steepness of the bank, and the steersman, who was keeping her bow on whilst the crew were launching, got frightened from the depth of water and the violence of the surf, and let go his hold; when the next surf threw the boat broadside on to the sea and, there being nearly half a ton weight of stores ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey
... them, for the steersman at once began to slew her round, and then he too went down as a bullet from Tematau took him fair and square in the chest, and we saw the blood pouring from him as he fell across the gunwale. In another ten seconds they were paddling away from us, leaving ...
— The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton - 1902 • Louis Becke
... armament exactly when it was too late. Ere then Napoleon had encountered almost an equal hazard. A French ship of war had crossed his path; but the Emperor made all his soldiery lie flat on the decks, and the steersman of the Inconstant, who happened to be well acquainted with the commanding officer, had received and answered the usual challenge without exciting any suspicion. Thus narrowly escaped the flotilla which ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... there was a row there in January. One of our native boats laden with rice was coming up the river, on our side of the channel, when an armed Burmese boat came across and demanded duty. Of course, our fellows said they were in their own waters, whereupon the Burmese fired upon them and killed the steersman. There were reports, then, that bodies of Burmese troops were moving about on their side of the river, and that it was feared they would cross over and burn some of our villages. Accordingly, our guard at the mouth of the ...
— On the Irrawaddy - A Story of the First Burmese War • G. A. Henty
... and exulting "Ugh!" was now heaved from the chest of the Indian, who stood calmly on the spot on which he had first rested, while Fuller prepared a coil of rope to throw to the active steersman. ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... men would only let the Bible "coach them," they would be saved from many a blunder and defeat. It is important to have, as steersman, one who knows the currents, and just when to alter the course. The youngster who steers the University boat has been up and down the river many a time, till he has learned everything he needs to know. Let me ask you, "Who steers?" If SELF-WILL ...
— Broken Bread - from an Evangelist's Wallet • Thomas Champness
... multitude into the rapid stream, and thus perished. On the river, to the right and left, is seen a Portuguese coasting vessel, called Hyate; in the centre is a wine-boat of the Douro, with a raised platform for the steersman. The foreground of the view is the shore of Villa Nova, adjoining the quay. The chief article of export is wine;[5] and here is the grand depot for this commodity, which is stowed in long, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 559, July 28, 1832 • Various
... whence I augur ill. But though their horses have the speed of thine, In skill not one of them surpasses thee. Then thou, dear boy, exert thine ev'ry art, That so thou mayst not fail to gain a prize. By skill, far more than strength, the woodman fells The sturdy oak; by skill the steersman guides His flying ship across the dark-blue sea, Though shatter'd by the blast; 'twixt charioteer And charioteer 'tis skill that draws the line. One, vainly trusting to his coursers' speed, Drives reckless here and there; o'er all the course, His horses, unrestrain'd, ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... I were on our way home from Troy, on good terms with one another. When we got to Sunium, which is the point of Athens, Apollo with his painless shafts killed Phrontis the steersman of Menelaus' ship (and never man knew better how to handle a vessel in rough weather) so that he died then and there with the helm in his hand, and Menelaus, though very anxious to press forward, had to wait in order to bury his comrade and give him his due funeral ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... dreams, I should be wise to stand aside. I felt that, after all, Miss Fraenkel's crystal-clear bromidity would be a delightful change after so much intense living and introspection. For that evening, after dinner, as I listened to the music of the Steersman's Song from the Flying Dutchman, it seemed only too likely that even after all these years, so deathless is passion in some hearts, the skilled hand of Frank Carville might set a woman's soul vibrating with some ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... were tense before the wind, and up aloft the little ship seemed carrying every sail she had. The sky was clear, the sun midway down the western sky; long waves, capped by the breeze with froth, were running with us. We went past the steersman to the taffrail, and saw the water come foaming under the stern and the bubbles go dancing and vanishing in her wake. I turned and surveyed the unsavoury length of ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells
... numerous rapids, and here and there actual falls. The boat is usually propelled up a rapid by poling. Each member of the crew has beside him a stout pole some eight or nine feet long; and when the boat approaches a rapid, the crew at a shout from the captain, usually the steersman, spring to their feet, dropping their paddles and seizing their poles. Thrusting these against the stony bottom in perfect unison, the crew swings the boat up through the rushing water with a very pleasant motion. If the current proves too ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... became aware of a sudden swerve in the course of the submarine. The helmsman had, doubtless, noted the "water-mark," as Tom termed it, and as an automobilist on land might swing at the cross-roads, the steersman was changing ...
— Tom Swift and his Undersea Search - or, The Treasure on the Floor of the Atlantic • Victor Appleton
... put on the appearance of approaching storm; Lord Nelville counselled the sailors, restored confidence to the passengers, and when he himself assisted in working the ship, when he took for a moment the place of the steersman, there was in all he did, a skill and a power which could not be considered as merely the effect of the agility of the body,—there was soul in ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... the attention of all the natives. They called out Eige-ea Eige, and hastened to give place to the new-comers. The canoe, rowed by ten men, large and elegantly embellished with muscle-shells, soon approached us. The heads of the rowers and of the steersman were decorated with green boughs, probably ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue
... us go forward. These two doors form the entrance to the pilot-house; please, step in. Here is the steering wheel, and by means of these brass tubes the steersman communicates with the engineer. Look up to the ceiling. It is decorated with multitudinous charts and maps. Before we leave this room do not forget to glance at the mariner's compass in ...
— By Water to the Columbian Exposition • Johanna S. Wisthaler
... will humbly suggest Orpheus singing at the stem, a following wind, a great bellying sail behind, and all around wet air and splashing grey sea, the stem ploughing it up silver and white and green, and away aft under the bend of the sail there would be Jason and the steersman, possibly Medea, with the curl out of her hair, and perhaps just a touch of the golden fleece, just a fleck of pale yellow to enliven the minor tints! Round the bows there would be men listening ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... soon in the palace formerly Libo's and now the property of Rufius. He, on succeeding to his uncle's estate, at once rewarded with a huge donation the steersman of the boat in which we had been saved, saying that the other steersmen did their best, but that, if the others had been as dexterous as he, his aunt and uncle would not have perished by so deplorable and ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... thy soul a river flowing Swiftly, over golden sands, With the singing of the steersman ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair
... rose and was borne on the long swell so fast and so fearfully, that it appeared as if nothing could save it from dashing on the ledges of projecting rock; and then, before it reached them, it sank out of sight, to be lifted up and borne along as before. There were four rowers, a steersman, and two others, muffled in cloaks. Annie watched them till the boat disappeared in the windings of the harbour; and she was out on the hill-side, in the cold February wind, when she saw the whole party ascending from the shore, and ...
— The Billow and the Rock • Harriet Martineau
... mate, speaking to him briefly and rapidly, and the sullen face of the Spaniard became alive. An order to the steersman and the course of the schooner was shifted more toward the west. It was evident to Robert that they were not running away from whatever it was out there. The slaver for the first time in a long while took ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... he knew what a good steersman Dane was. He then took his post beside Giles and Steel, who were admitted on to the bridge, and thence directed the ship. Then The Firefly made a bee-line for ...
— A Coin of Edward VII - A Detective Story • Fergus Hume
... standing. Even this, however, was more than enough, for we did not dare to hoist a rag of sail on it. For five days the tempest raged in all its fury. Everything was swept off the decks except one small boat. The steersman was lashed to the wheel, lest he should be washed away, and we all gave ourselves up for lost. The captain said that he had no idea where we were, as we had been blown far out of our course; and we feared much that we might get among ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... nothing in the moon noteworthy? Nay: for if that moon could love a mortal, Use, to charm him (so to fit a fancy), All her magic ('tis the old sweet mythos), deg. deg.160 She would turn a new side to her mortal, Side unseen of herdsman, huntsman, steersman,— Blank to Zoroaster deg. on his terrace, deg.163 Blind to Galileo deg. on his turret. deg.164 Dumb to Homer, dumb to Keats deg.—him, even! deg.165 Think, the wonder of the moonstruck mortal— When she turns round, comes again in heaven, Opens out anew for worse or better! Proves ...
— Browning's Shorter Poems • Robert Browning
... received this information with great joy. They descended the mountain, came to the flat land, and at last, after a wearisome journey, during which they had seen the sun rise and set seven times, they arrived at the sea-coast. A ship lay ready at anchor, and when they inquired its destination, the steersman answered, "We are going to Selandia to fetch a cargo of cinnamon." To Haschem's question where they came from, and what this land where they were was called, he received for answer, "that the ship belonged to a merchant of Balsora, and that it had been cast on these unknown ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various |
