United States or Haiti ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
"All together! In she comes! Now ... heave! Now ... heave! Now ... heave!" Their strength doubled by the realization that life hung on their efforts, the boys swayed at the line until at last they grasped the end of the hawser. To it was attached another smaller rope for pulling in a boatswain's chair. Working rapidly, they made the hawser fast round an upright boulder.
Murray said nothing, but his countenance was very sad. The midshipmen were aroused by the cry of "All hands shorten sail!" The boatswain's whistle had not ceased sounding along the decks before Jack and Murray were on their way aloft, the first to the fore, the other to the maintop, where they were stationed.
Between breakfast and divisions, some captains occupy themselves in examining the weekly reports of the expenditure of boatswain's, gunner's, and carpenter's stores; and in going over with the purser the account of the remains of provisions, fuel, and slop-clothing on board.
The boatswain's shrill whistle furled the sails snugly to every spar, leaving the sailors little time or spirit for their usual song, as barometer-like they too sensed the approaching storm. The ship's watch forward was increased as the wind grew strong, and the weather ahead had become thick and hazy.
In the latter assertion he was somewhat premature, for the French crew, now rallying amidships, made a desperate attack on the forecastle, but the boatswain's flashing weapon literally cut them down like corn before the reaper's scythe, as they came on. Still they pressed round us. Most of our men were occupied in making sail.
In an instant the orderly ship was a babel of apparently hopeless confusion; the men running hastily to and fro about their various duties, the sharp commands of the officers, the shrill piping of the whistles, and the deep voices of the gun captains and the boatswain's mates, made the usually quiet deck a pandemonium.
Half way over he had stopped to take a shot at Sam. I fired from my hip without waiting to take aim. It was the luckiest shot of my life. The boatswain's shoulders sagged, his fingers relaxed so that the weapon clattered on the floor, and slowly his figure swayed outward. There was no grip to his knees. He toppled overboard, head first. I heard the plop as his body dived into the sea.
The boatswain grinned amiably, and thrust his finger into the barrel of the piece. 'By the holy, we've spiked your gun, Captain! he said. Evan pulled the trigger. The cap snapped and nothing more, and now, worked into an ungovernable passion, he clubbed his gun, and bringing the stock down upon the boatswain's head, stretched him upon the deck with a cracked skull.
In this condition I lay for three weeks in the ship, not knowing whether I should have my husband with me or no, and therefore not resolving how or in what manner to receive the honest boatswain's proposal, which indeed he thought a little strange at first. At the end of this time, behold my husband came on board.
Now, this Douglas was a huge, raw-boned boatswain's mate that flogged left handed, and had also a peculiar jerk in his manner of laying on the cat-o'-nine-tails, and that always brought away with it little knobs of flesh wherever the knots fell, and so neatly, that blood would, at every blow, spout from the wounds, as from the puncture of a lancet.
Word Of The Day