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Oar   Listen
verb
Oar  v. t. & v. i.  (past & past part. oared; pres. part. oaring)  To row. "Oared himself." "Oared with laboring arms."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Oar" Quotes from Famous Books



... lose countenance, but went on hammering at his boat as if he cared not at all, till observing that one of the soldiers was looking hard at Edmund, he called out, "I say, Ned, what's the use of loitering there, listening to what's no concern of yours? Fetch the oar out of yon shed. I never lit on such a lazy comrade ...
— The Pigeon Pie • Charlotte M. Yonge

... falls on the stage and his misadventures as an actor. "This personage of comic romance," said he, "who has leapt from the trestles of Punch to the tribune of the Jacobins, rushes at me, as though to strike me with the oar the Swiss have brought ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine

... Highlands which he had once taken with Dr. Dohrn, when, on a rough day, they were being rowed across Loch Leven to Mary Stuart's castle. The boatman, unable to make head single-handed against the wind, asked them each to take an oar; but when they landed and Huxley tendered the fare, the honest fellow gave him back two sixpences, saying, "I canna tak' it: you have wrocht as hard as I." Each took a coin; and Huxley remarked that this was the first sixpence he had earned by manual labour. Dr. ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2 • Leonard Huxley

... but the whale yanked again and Pa began to pull him in. I hung on, and let the line out a little at a time, just zackly like a fish, and he pulled, and sweat, and the bald spot on his head was getting sun burnt, and the line cut my hand, so I wound it around the oar-lock, and Pa pulled hard enough to tip the boat over. He thought he had a forty pound musculunger, and he stood up in the boat and pulled on that oar-lock as hard as he could. I ought not to have done it, but I loosened the line from the oar-lock, and when it slacked ...
— Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa - 1883 • George W. Peck

... The old, old story was evidently being rehearsed under there, but the occasional splashing of the ice-cold water made it seem like very chilling business; still we all know it is not. Our decoys had not been brought in, and I distinctly heard some ducks splash in among them. The sound of oar-locks in the distance next caught my ears. They were so far away that it took some time to decide whether or not they were approaching. But they finally grew more distinct,—the steady, measured beat of an oar in a wooden lock, a very pleasing sound coming over still, moonlit waters. It was an ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs

... Sara opened her eyes they were almost dazzled by the rays of the sun. The high towers of a great city rose before her, and Dumb William, with his oar upright, was standing in the boat, pushing and guiding it through the lively confusion of many vessels, gay with their pennons and streamers, whose crews were either gazing idly at passers-by, or else ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... had struck before I got into the air, that was scented, not disagreeably, by the chips and shavings of the long-shore boat-builders, and mast, oar, and block makers. All that water-side region of the upper and lower Pool below Bridge was unknown ground to me; and when I struck down by the river, I found that the spot I wanted was not where I had supposed it to be, and was anything but easy to find. It was called Mill Pond Bank, ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... as places could not be spared for more than two, or at most three seamen to each boat, who were always stationed, one at the bow, to use the boat-hook in fending or pushing off, and the other at the aftermost oar, to give the proper time in rowing, while the middle oars were double- banked, and rowed by ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson

... delight in it, is a slavery, a bondage, not a business: the shop is a bridewell, and the warehouse a house of correction to the tradesman, if he does not delight in his trade. While he is bound, as we say, to keep his shop, he is like the galley-slave chained down to the oar; he tugs and labours indeed, and exerts the utmost of his strength, for fear of the strapado, and because he is obliged to do it; but when he is on shore, and is out from the bank, he abhors the labour, and hates to ...
— The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.) • Daniel Defoe

... quarries, panted in the vapour-baths, shrieked under torture, passed through the hands of many masters, and experienced every frenzy. At last, one day, in despair, he had flung himself into the sea from the top of a trireme where he was working at the oar. Some of Hamilcar's sailors had picked him up when at the point of death, and had brought him to the ergastulum of Megara, at Carthage. But, as fugitives were to be given back to the Romans, he had taken advantage of the confusion to ...
— Salammbo • Gustave Flaubert

... literature, the highest and most spiritual art, the forms are often confused. The lyrical form is in fact the simplest verbal vesture of an instant of emotion, a rhythmical cry such as ages ago cheered on the man who pulled at the oar or dragged stones up a slope. He who utters it is more conscious of the instant of emotion than of himself as feeling emotion. The simplest epical form is seen emerging out of lyrical literature when the artist prolongs and broods upon himself as the centre of an epical event and ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce

... Pennsylvania House of Representatives]; the more remarkable as I was always in a party minority. I was indebted for it to my great industry and to the facility with which I could understand and carry on the current business. The laboring oar was left almost exclusively to me. In the session of 1791-1792, I was put on thirty-five committees, prepared all their reports, and drew all their bills. Absorbed by those details, my attention was turned exclusively to administrative laws, and not to legislation properly so called.... ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens

... They revile Our "Ruskinismo," do these souls of dust, Who care not for their sumptuous marble pile, Oh, sons unworthy of their splendid trust! With his oar broken, and his dry keel thrust, Unused ashore, the Gondolier recalls Gay days and nights of glory, such as must Too oft remind him who his land enthrals, And flings a sordid cloud ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 93, September 3, 1887 • Various

... travelers have come suddenly upon alligators crawling amid prairies or woods, in the most unexpected manner. The alligator as a rule is very wary, but at times sleeps quite soundly. I saw one struck twice with an oar before ...
— Southern Stories - Retold from St. Nicholas • Various

... the weight in the boat with judgment. Although there seemed to be no real danger, he knew very well the nature of the treacherous current. Ruth slipped into the bow seat with her oar, and Uncle ...
— Ruth Fielding and the Gypsies - The Missing Pearl Necklace • Alice B. Emerson

... soldiers reached the shore and began to fire upon the occupants of the boat. Marguerite crept under the seat, while the men tried to dodge the bullets. One bullet pierced the Count's hat, two pierced Richard's oar. The little boat, which was scarcely an inch above the water, rocked and rolled and almost capsized, but the occupants escaped without injury and finally reached the opposite shore ...
— After Long Years and Other Stories • Translated from the German by Sophie A. Miller and Agnes M. Dunne

... an ace of exposure. As for the Cigarette, who has rowed races in the heat of his blood, but now disowns these slips of his wanton youth, his case was still more desperate; for the Royal Nautical proposed that he should take an oar in one of their eights on the morrow, to compare the English with the Belgian stroke. I could see my friend perspiring in his chair whenever that particular topic came up. And there was yet another proposal which had the same effect on both of us. It appeared that the champion canoeist ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... "Why shouldn't I, in the name of goodness? Let me tell you I can pull a good oar still. If only I had had my flannels! You seem to think I'm fit ...
— Enter Bridget • Thomas Cobb

... way through the trees of the opening; evidently the splash of his oar was caught by the owner of the noisy voice, for before he could see any one a silence succeeded to the noise, a sudden absolute silence, ...
— The Zeit-Geist • Lily Dougall

... fair, and when he reaches her side, and lifts her veil, eager to embrace the tempter, a hideous skeleton grins and gibbers at him. The siren voices sing to you from the smiling island, and their white arms and golden harps and the flowery grass draw you from the wet boat and the weary oar; but when a man lands he sees the fair form end in a slimy fish, and she slays him and gnaws his bones. 'He knows not that the dead are there, and that her guests are in the depths of hell.' Yes! every sin is a mistake, and the epitaph for the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... short, they persuade him to shut his eyes, that he may with greater perspicuity distinguish the road he is to travel: once arrived at this influence, they indelibly fix their lessons; irrevocably chain him to the oar; by holding up to his view the punishments intended for him by these imaginary beings, in case he refuses to accredit, in the most liberal manner, their marvellous inventions; this argument, although it only supposes the thing in question, serves to close his mouth—to ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach

... have thrown the line for her, in his distraction let her drop her oar and throw the line herself, and then we scrambled aboard without hearing any more of ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells

... heavy rapids, over which it was necessary to track, and in some places to double the crews. Each boat had a tow line of fifty feet, and in tracking the end was taken ashore by one of the crew of two, while the boat was kept off the bank by the other man with an oar. At the Horseshoe Rapids, ten miles above Gull Island Lake, an accident happened which threatened to put a stop to further progress of the expedition. While tracking around a steep point in crossing these ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 822 - Volume XXXII, Number 822. Issue Date October 3, 1891 • Various

... The Arms they use are long spears or Lances, a Staff about 5 feet long. Some of these are pointed at one end like a Serjeant's Halberd, others are round and Sharp; the other ends are broad, something like the blade of an Oar. They have another sort about 4 1/2 feet long; these are shaped at one End like an Axe, and the other is made with a Sharp point. They have short Truncheons about a foot long, which they call Pattoo Pattoas; some made of wood, some of bone, and ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook

... brigantines were now afloat on the lake, fully equipped, and manned by expert sailors, and were found to obey both sail and oar to a wish. When Montezuma learnt this, he requested to go a-hunting to a certain district which was full of game, all other persons being prohibited from hunting there under pain of death. Cortes granted permission, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr

... no country, in the nineteenth century, interfere with the speculations of a philosopher in his closet, but it might, and must, steady the weak and wavering opinions of the multitude. There is something really pitiable in the effect produced by the want of this rudder oar. I knew a family where one was a Methodist, one a Presbyterian, and a third a Baptist; and another, where one was a Quaker, one a declared Atheist, and another an Universalist. These are all females, and all moving in the best society that ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope

... sinks low; For the barge, the eight, the Isis, and the coach's whoop and shout, For the minute-gun, the counting and the long dishevelled rout, For the howl along the tow-path and a fate that's still in doubt, For a roughened oar to handle and a race to think about In the land where the dead ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes

... of a Fijian canoe that has been bundled over the Barrier, a wooden spoon such as Kanakas use, or the dusky globe of an incandescent lamp that has glowed out its life in the state-room of some ocean liner, or a broom of Japanese make, a coal-basket, a "fender," a tiger nautilus shell, an oar or a rudder, a tiller, a bottle cast away fat out from land to determine the strength and direction of ocean currents, the spinnaker boom of a yacht, the jib-boom of a staunch cutter. Once there was a goodly hammer cemented ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield

... took hundreds of gallons of rum and egg (at my expense) at the various houses of note above and below bridge; not by any means because he liked it, but to cure a weakness in his liver, for which the faculty had particularly recommended it - may be explained as rowed by three men, two pulling an oar each, and ...
— Reprinted Pieces • Charles Dickens

... shock. And here I feel it just to pay a tribute of admiration to the cook, who on these occasions never failed to exhibit an immense amount of misdirected energy, breaking—I remember—at the same moment, both the cabin sky-light, and an oar, in single combat with a large berg that was doing no particular harm to us, but against which he seemed suddenly to have conceived a violent spite. Luckily a considerable quantity of snow overlaid the ice, which, acting as a buffer, in some measure mitigated the violence of the concussion; while ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)

... own course," said the old man. "Miss Amory is a dev'lish wide-awake girl, sir, and must play her own cards; and I'm doosid glad you are out of it—doosid glad, begad. Who's this smoking? Oh, it's Mr. Strong again. He wants to put in his oar, I suppose. I tell you, don't meddle in ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... life under its roof was indeed an ideal existence. I was their constant guest and although it was a simple life it teemed with beauty and interest. Our days were spent principally out of doors and the sources of amusement were always near at hand. As all of the Kembles were experts with the oar, we frequently spent many hours on the Hudson. Another unfailing source of pleasure was a frequent visit to West Point to witness the evening parade. As we knew many of the cadets they frequently crossed the river to take ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur

... chorus of which was 'Hatyin foam foam eri', with words of his own[486]. The tune resembled 'Owr the muir amang the heather'. The boatmen and Mr. M'Queen chorused, and all went well. At length Malcolm himself took an oar, and rowed vigorously. We sailed along the coast of Scalpa, a rugged island, about four miles in length. Dr. Johnson proposed that he and I should buy it, and found a good school, and an episcopal church, (Malcolm[487] said, he would come to it,) and have a printing-press, where ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell

... shall see. Well, I won't put my oar in—isn't that kind of me? But, indeed, your Captain Duchesne looks thoroughly ripe for a flirtation, and it will be as much as I can do to keep ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... the lake; His oars a softened click-clack make; On all that water bright and blue, His boat is the only one in view; So, when he hears another oar Click-clack along the farthest shore, "Heigh-ho," he cries, "out for a row! Echo is out! heigh-ho—heigh-ho!" "Heigh-ho, heigh-ho!" Sounds from the distance, faint ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various

... in his preparatory school and college in several lines of athletics. But a boy in his position would scarcely become a professional baseball player or pull an oar for a living. To tell the truth, Tom had never shown much aptitude for his father's business. Dry goods ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson

... weight less, feels the irksomeness of the burden more than the old bowed one. With strength goes the wild love of movement, and the cross that prevents the free play of a single muscle is felt grievous as the fetter that chains a man to the oar. But this day—and what man has to do with yesterday or tomorrow? —the sun shone as if he knew nothing, or as if he knew all, and knew it to be well; and Cosmo was going home, and the love of his father was a deep gladness, ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... {446} Daughter of Pelias, in the realms below, Immortal pleasures round thee flow, Though never there the sun's bright beams shall shine. Be the black-brow'd Pluto told, And the Stygian boatman old, Whose rude hands grasp the oar, the rudder guide, The dead conveying o'er the tide,— Let him be told, so rich a freight before His light skiff never bore; Tell him that o'er the joyless lakes The noblest of her sex her ...
— Story of Orestes - A Condensation of the Trilogy • Richard G. Moulton

... distance. Two boats were lying in a small stream which emptied itself into the lake, so I pressed one of them into my service, and was soon out upon the water. The boat was old, badly built, and rickety. The starboard oar was cracked, and the port oar had been broken in two and mended with bands of iron. The bottom was several inches deep in water, the thwarts were not securely fastened, nor were they at right angles to the keel. Out in the loch the ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al

... chieftain of the West Coast. Presently she made her appearance, a sprightly young woman about 26, and we all started in their canoe for their home at Skidegate, where I had been invited. En route while passing a pipe from the chief to his wife, my oar caught in the water, giving the canoe a sudden lurch which would have been quite alarming to most feminine nerves, but not to the Princess for she laughed so heartily over the mishap, that I saw a smile spread over the big face of the old chief. An hour brought us ...
— Official report of the exploration of the Queen Charlotte Islands - for the government of British Columbia • Newton H. Chittenden

... to aid the progress of the passenger. This gave an air of singularity and wildness to the place, which was aided by the boldness of the surrounding scenery. The street bore all the marks of the occupation of the inhabitants—nets hanging to dry—strings of fish—an old oar—or a "fisher's wife" broiling fish for her husband's breakfast—met the eye on ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 547, May 19, 1832 • Various

... English gentleman, Karl used a small wharf at which sloops loaded and unloaded their cargoes. Ashburner said something of this to Karl, and Karl said something of ice in the spring, freshets in the fall, and low water in the summer; but Harry Benson, as usual, put in his oar, and explained the matter more fully, and no doubt more truly: "You see, Ashburner," said he, "the fact is, we are not a sporting people; our gentlemen rarely ride, and our ladies never walk. In England, every one knows, or pretends to know, ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various

... despatched to convey us on shore. These Indian canoes consist of long narrow stumps of trees, hollowed longitudinally. On either side is nailed a palo de balzas, viz., a beam of a very porous kind of wood. One Indian sits forward, another more backward, each having a short wooden shovel-shaped oar, with which they strike the water right and left, and thus scull the boat onward. The passengers must crouch or kneel down in the middle, and dare not stir, for the least irregularity in the motion would upset the boat. We landed safely, and amused ourselves ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi

... to my indolent and careless disposition, and to following without regularity the impulse of the moment. When the weather was calm, I frequently went immediately after I rose from dinner, and alone got into the boat. The receiver had taught me to row with one oar; I rowed out into the middle of the lake. The moment I withdrew from the bank, I felt a secret joy which almost made me leap, and of which it is impossible for me to tell or even comprehend the cause, if it were not a secret congratulation on my being out of the reach of the wicked. ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau

... stinkpots at her mastheads and boarding-nets hung round her. Of course he was to escape in the end, but so narrowly that all possible sail had to be crowded on to his little ship, and the whole crew set to work the big oar at the stern, while every soul on board shivered and shook as men should when pirates are ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon

... time I had kept my temper, and refrained as far as might be from any interference, for I saw (in our friend's mulish humour) he always contrived to twist it to our disadvantage. But now came the acute point. Young Frank now took an oar. He was a little fellow, near as frail as myself, and very short; if he weighed nine stone, it was the outside; but his blood was up. He took stroke, moved the big Samoan forward to bow, and set to work to pull him round in fine style. Instantly, a kind of race competition—almost race ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... toward the north. The sea-breeze blew her hair into her face. Perhaps on the ocean whence it came the high waves would, in a few hours, be tossing the ship on which her father and brother, seated at the oar, would be toiling as disgraced galley-slaves. That must not, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... to quarantine this fellow, in the long run, Bluewater! I do believe if I were to take him to Lambeth Palace, or even to St. James's, he'd thrust his oar into the archbishop's benedictions, or the ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper

... had been sent to cover the bank in both directions were now coming in. Through the stillness of the night there sounded the thump of oar-locks. Seeing that the stranger did not seem to take his hint, Lewis raised ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach

... again pass to the open canal we would watch the boats. I did not know there were so many boats in all the world. They floated slowly past us— big boats, little boats, those that went by sail, and those that went by oar. There were the boats of mandarins and merchants, those for passengers, and great unwieldy boats for rice. We saw the fishing-boats with their hungry, fierce-eyed cormorants sitting quietly in their places, waiting for the master to send ...
— My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard • Elizabeth Cooper

... a short time ago," said Emery. "Let's return to our mutton. Thornton was kicking because Merriwell has made a try for the eight, and seems to stand a good show of getting there. I don't see where Thornton's growl comes in. He can't pull an oar." ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish

... shines on the stream, And as soft music breathes around, The feathering oar returns the gleam, And dips in concert ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore

... ballasted so that its lid, or deck, was almost awash; and near its stern was a box containing clock movements that would go for about ten minutes, upon the withdrawal of a peg outside, and then would draw a trigger and explode the charge. This wondrous creature had neither oar nor sail, but demanded to be towed to the tideward of the enemy, then have the death-watch set going, and be cast adrift within hail of the enemy's line. Then as soon as it came across their mooring cables, its duty was to slide for a little way along them in a friendly manner, lay hold ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore

... their way out to us. In the fortnight following the last bombardment of the city I enlisted no less than nine such recruits, six being from Harvard, Yale, or Princeton; and Bull, the former Harvard oar, who had been back to the States crippled after the first fight, actually got back to us as a stowaway on one of the transports, bound to share the luck of the regiment, even if ...
— Rough Riders • Theodore Roosevelt

... and thy son—that thou leave not my body unburied in the palace halls, lest I bring on thee the anger of the gods. But on thy return to Circe's isle burn my body, together with my armor, and pile up a mound of earth over my ashes. Plant my oar upon my tomb—the oar with which I used to row while ...
— Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca - Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece • Homer

... my oar once more, when the sea was calm, I was amused by disturbing the innumerable young star fish which floated just below the surface; I had never observed them before, for they have not a hard shell like those which I have seen on the seashore. They look like thickened water with a ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft

... he wished to see her under all aspects, and travelled incessantly, first in his native province, amid the meadows and waters of Normandy, then on the banks of the Seine along which he coasted, bending to the oar. Then Brittany with its beaches, where high waves rolled in beneath low and dreary skies, then Auvergne, with its scattered huts amid the sour grass, beneath rocks of basalt; and, finally, Corsica, Italy, Sicily, not with artistic enthusiasm, but simply to enjoy the delight of grand, pure ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant

... replied the old man, "because he who shows pity to others deserves their help when in need of it. But take the oar and row to whatever ...
— Fairy Tales of the Slav Peasants and Herdsmen • Alexander Chodsko

... oar, for rowing. ought, should. ore, unrefined metal. wry, crooked. o'er, over. rye, a kind of grain. ow'er, one who owes. lead, a metal. adds, joins to. led, did lead. adz, a joiner's tool. read, perused. ale, a liquor. red, a color. ail, to feel pain. read, to peruse. ate, did eat. reed, a plant. eight, ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey

... wished again to occupy the excellent villa we had. Not knowing what answer to make to the first question, we had passed to the second—somewhat illogically. The second had proved more heatedly disputable than the first. Finally Jill had looked up from a letter to Piers and put in her oar ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates

... eighteen months they had been constantly together, and it was the sailor's companionship and cheerfulness that had lightened the first days of his captivity; and had it not been for his advice and support he might now have been tugging at an oar in the bey's corsair galley. Ever since they had been at Cadiz he had daily spent an hour or two in his society; for when work was done they generally went for a walk together on the fortifications, and talked of England and discussed the possibility ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty

... pieces of cord with him, but neither powder nor shot. Of the cord he made nooses and caught eider-ducks, by which, and their eggs, he kept himself alive; in the night, he crept under an overhanging rock to sleep. At length he discovered a piece of wood floating to the shore; of this he made an oar, and, getting on a flake of ice, rowed himself to an island nearer the main land, whence he reached two more islands nearer still. About the beginning of August, he observed two boats steering towards the south, and made signals: these were not noticed by the first, which ...
— The Moravians in Labrador • Anonymous

... of a little skiff, half hidden among the bulrushes that fringed the lake; and leaping into the boat, without aid of oar, he was wafted out into the middle of the lake, to the place where, out of the water, rose the arm and sword. And leaning from the skiff, he took the sword from the hand, which forthwith vanished, and immediately thereafter the skiff ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay

... night they were coasting inside the Rhoeteian shore, with the land of Ida on their right. And leaving Dardania they directed their course to Abydus, and after it they sailed past Percote and the sandy beach of Abarnis and divine Pityeia. And in that night, as the ship sped on by sail and oar, they passed right through the Hellespont dark-gleaming ...
— The Argonautica • Apollonius Rhodius

... usually towed, but are sometimes fitted with some kind of engine; the men in charge of them are known as bargees. On tidal rivers barges are often provided with masts and sails ("sailing barges"), or in default of being towed, they drift with the current, guided by a long oar or oars ("dumb-barges"). Barges used for unloading, or loading, the cargo of ships in harbours are sometimes called "lighters" (from the verb "to light" to relieve of a load). A state barge was a heavy, often highly ornamented vessel used for carrying passengers on occasions ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various

... Goldees make canoes of birch bark, quite broad in the middle and coming to a point at both ends. In general appearance these canoes resemble those of the Penobscot and Canadian Indians. The native sits in the middle of his canoe and propels himself with a double-bladed oar, which he dips into the water with regular alternations from one side to the other. The canoes are flat bottomed and very easy to overturn. A canoe is designed to carry but one man, though two can be taken in an emergency. When a native sitting in one of them spears a fish he moves only his ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox

... he said, "that nothing is impossible—to have you here beside me. I said, that day at Surbiton, 'There's many good things in life, but there's only one best, and that's the wild-haired girl who's pulling away at that oar. I will make her my Grail, and some day, perhaps, if God wills, she ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells

... roared the Squire, as usual relieving his feelings on his retainer. "You are always shoving your oar in ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard

... one loop of rope over his shoulders, put the other looped rope into his hand, then laid an oar on the mud. "Now, go; the rushes will hold you when you get ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant

... the stern of the boat, another splintered the end of an oar, and then the rifleman's nerves must have got the better of him. The succeeding shots fell wide, and I whooped like a madman as I drove the boat on to the green tongue of land. Springing out hastily I made a dash across ...
— The White Waterfall • James Francis Dwyer

... the day our whole household, old and young, set forth for a boating excursion on the lake. Dividing our party in two boats, we pulled about a mile up the left shore. Lake Leman was before us in all its loveliness; and we were dipping our oar where Byron had floated past scenes which scarce need to become classic to possess a superior charm. The sun was just gone behind the Jura, leaving a glorious sky. Mont Blanc stood afar behind a hazy veil, like a spirit half revealed. We saw it pass before our eyes as we moved. "It stood ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... curving of the rays of light caused by their entering the earth's atmosphere, which is a denser medium than the very light ether of the outer sky. The effect of refraction is seen when an oar is thrust into the water and looks as if it were bent. Refraction always causes a celestial object to appear higher than it really is. This refraction is greatest at the horizon and diminishes toward the zenith, where it disappears. Table 20A in Bowditch gives the correction ...
— Lectures in Navigation • Ernest Gallaudet Draper

... that hails them from the nearer shore: 'Lads, have ye any meat?' And they answer it with a half surly and wholly disappointed monosyllabic 'No!' It is an emblem for us all; weary and wet, tugging at the oar in the dark, and often seeming to fail. What then? If the last cast has brought nothing, try another. Out with the nets once more! Never mind the darkness, and the cold, and the wetting spray, and the weariness. You cannot expect ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren

... three inches, and there was water enough and to spare on the flats, the sea-weed, growing thick as grain in the harvest-field, and half floating where the depth was three or four feet, collecting round the sharp bow as a long tress of hay gathers round a tooth of a rake, and burying the oar-blade, impeded all progress, and obliged me to pull almost double the distance against the rapid tide-set of the circuitous channels. I worked through the bends and reaches, till the deep, strong current of Shirley Gut was to be stemmed, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various

... reading a very famous book, which all children know and love; and the name of which I'll tell you by and by. So busily was I reading, that I never minded the tide; and presently discovered that I was floating out to sea, with neither sail nor oar. At first I was very much frightened; for there was no one in sight on land or sea, and I didn't know where I might drift to. But the water was calm, the sky clear, and the wind blew balmily; so I waited ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott

... boat, which at once pushed off. The men rowed easily, for they were anxious to hear the particulars of the report which had circulated through the ship. Bill Hardy was rowing the stroke oar, ...
— A Final Reckoning - A Tale of Bush Life in Australia • G. A. Henty

... evidently already taken leave of the people over at the house, for he descended the steps and went to join Beaudelet, who was out there with an oar across his shoulder waiting for Robert. They walked away in the darkness. She could only hear Beaudelet's voice; Robert had apparently not even spoken a word of ...
— The Awakening and Selected Short Stories • Kate Chopin

... as a continuous oar. Such a wheel is shown in Fig. 33. As the wheel goes around the paddle dips into the water and pushes the boat forward. If the direction of the boat is to be reversed, the rotation of ...
— Boys' Book of Model Boats • Raymond Francis Yates

... you took the bow and arrows. This being done, the sea will swell and rise up to the foot of the dome that stands upon the top of the mountain; when it is come up so high, thou shalt see a boat with one man and an oar in each hand. This man is also of metal, different from that thou hast thrown down; step on board to him without mentioning the name of God, and let him conduct thee. He will in ten days time bring thee into another sea, where thou shalt find an opportunity to get home to thy country ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous

... house again, and rock while the old man finishes his coffee, sure of a greeting, confident in a sense of entire good-fellowship, until the meal is finished, and James Parsons is ready to take his coat and a red-bladed oar, and set out. Then the boy is like a setter off for a walk,—all sorts of whimsical expressions in his face, of absolute delight; every form of extravagance in his bearing. The only trouble is, one has to laugh too much; but with all this, ...
— By The Sea - 1887 • Heman White Chaplin

... lived for half a century, he begins to think that he may possibly grow old some day, and I would provide myself with a young partner, who may take the laboring oar in my business when age compels me ...
— Evenings at Donaldson Manor - Or, The Christmas Guest • Maria J. McIntosh

... artful confederates were at work. The same day, about an hour before daylight, two men, dressed as foreigners, landed from a six-oar galley, and called on a gentleman of Northfleet, and handed him a letter from an old friend, begging him to take the bearers to London, as they had great public news to communicate; they were accordingly taken. About twelve or one the same afternoon, three persons (two of whom ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... memorable incidents of the cold; but the most singular adventure was that of the old man employed at the Armenian Convent to bring milk from the island of San Lazzaro to the city. One night, shortly after the coldest weather set in, he lost his oar as he was returning to the island. The wind, which is particularly furious in that part of the lagoon, blew his boat away into the night, and the good brothers at the convent naturally gave up their milkman for lost. The winds and waters drifted him eight ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells

... the shades of Theseus, and Pirithous, and the old heroes; but he had conversed enough with horrors; therefore, covering his face with his hands, that he might see no more spectres, he resumed his seat in his ship, and pushed off. The bark moved of itself without the help of any oar, and soon brought him out of the regions of death into the cheerful quarters of the living, and to the island of Aeaea, whence he ...
— THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES • CHARLES LAMB

... impatient sweep with her paddle. The prow of the canoe dipped and was motionless. Rome had caught the stern, and the girl wheeled in hot anger. Her impulse to strike may have been for the moment and no longer, or she may have read swiftly no unkindness in the mountaineer's steady look; for the uplifted oar was stayed in the air, as though at least she would ...
— A Cumberland Vendetta • John Fox, Jr.

... the quarter-deck awaiting our fate—"come, boys; we three shall stick together. You see it is impossible that the little boat can reach the shore, crowded with men. It will be sure to upset, so I mean rather to trust myself to a large oar. I see through the telescope that the ship will strike at the tail of the reef, where the waves break into the quiet water inside; so, if we manage to cling to the oar till it is driven over the breakers, we may perhaps gain the shore. What say ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne

... who is smitten with love for this devil of a Blanche. And there is this Frenchman, too, with his mysterious influence over you. Yet, you actually ask me such a question! If you do not tell me how things stand, I shall have to put in my oar and do something. Are you ashamed to be frank with me? ...
— The Gambler • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... snorted right out two or three times," said the Clockmaker; "I had to pucker up my mouth like the upper eend of a silk puss, to keep from yawhawin' in her face, to hear the critter let her clapper run that fashion. She is not the first hand that has caught a lobster, by puttin' in her oar afore her turn, I guess. She'll mind her steps next hitch, I reckon." This was our last ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... hold your lives in trust for those who need your succor: A flash of fire by night, a loom of smoke by day, A rag to an oar shall be to you the symbol Of your faith, of your creed, of the law ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy

... and more quickly. The knife is superior to the carnivore's teeth for tearing meat; the hoe better than the mole's paw for digging earth, the trowel than the beaver's tail for beating and spreading mortar. The oar permits us to rival the fish's fin; the sail, the wing of the bird. The distaff and spindle allow our imitating the industry of insect spinners; etc. Man thus reproduces and sums up in his technical contrivances the scattered perfections of the animal world. He even succeeds ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot

... shot out around one of the frequent turns in the river, the gleam of other oars, the high prow of a larger galley, and across the water came the oar-song of a larger company of rowers. Helena started ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks

... training in the world for boy and youth and man. If the boy is very small, equip him with a small, comfortable skiff. He will do the rest. He won't need to be taught. Shortly he will be setting a tiny leg-of-mutton and steering with an oar. Then he will begin to talk keels and centreboards and want to take his blankets out and stop aboard ...
— The Human Drift • Jack London

... And don't you," added Webster, "go shoving your oar in when your social superiors are talking! I've had to speak to you about that before. My remarks were ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... Spirit! being's End and Source! O check thy chariot in its fervid course; Bend from thy throne of darkness and of fire, And with one smile immortalize oar lyre!" ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 110, December, 1866 - A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics • Various

... within him his heart quaked by reason of the strangeness: and he longed to get to land, groaning terribly through the stress of chilling fear. He put out his tail upon the water and worked it like a steering oar, and prayed to heaven that he might get to land. But when the dark waves washed over him he cried aloud and said: 'Not in such wise did the bull bear on his back the beloved load, when he brought Europa across the sea to Crete, as this Frog ...
— Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns, and Homerica • Homer and Hesiod

... creatures they were, that barkt against the moon. I'll give you better counsel as a friend: Cobblers their latchets ought not to transcend; Meddle with common matters, common wrongs; To the House of Commons common things belongs. Leave him the oar that best knows how to row, And state to him that best the state doth know. If I by industry, deep reach, or grace, Am now arriv'd at this or that great place, Must I, to please your inconsiderate rage, Throw down mine honours? Will nought else assuage Your furious wisdoms? ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli

... level ground above the beach the tents and caravans are drawn up in orderly array. Stretching away from the shore is the bay, lying calm and unruffled under the summer sky, except when its glassy surface is rippled by the dip of an oar or churned into froth by the restless pulsations of a passing steamer. Across the bay the hills rise beautiful and purple-blue through the evening glow, throwing out encircling arms around the villages dotted thick and white along their base, as the arms of ...
— Two Little Travellers - A Story for Girls • Frances Browne Arthur

... introduced into the boiler or pot and steam was generated, she was again ready to start on another expedition." The boat was a yawl about eighteen feet in length and six feet beam. She was started at the buoy with a small oar when the propeller was used. The boiler was a ten or twelve gallon iron pot. This boat with a portion of the machinery was abandoned by Fitch, and left to decay on the muddy shore. Shortly after this he died in Kentucky in 1798. Had he lived, or, had the fortune like Fulton, to find such ...
— The Hudson - Three Centuries of History, Romance and Invention • Wallace Bruce

... Under sail and oar, a hundred boats put off from the shore to investigate; when, as they neared the spot, the strange island became dim in outline, less vivid in color, and at last vanished entirely, leaving the wonder-stricken ...
— Irish Wonders • D. R. McAnally, Jr.

... and licentiousness, but great crimes are rare. If you have occasion to hire a boat for a sail in the harbor, be sure to find and employ "Bushy," a tall, intelligent darkey, the best boatman and stroke-oar in Nassau. ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou

... with his head should pay the penalty. This fiat he with heart uplift sent forth, As little knowing what the gods ordained. Obedient to the word, our seamen all Prepared their evening meal, then every man In order to the rowlock lashed his oar. Soon as the light of evening died away And night came on, each man who plied the oar Went to his ship with all the men-at-arms, And the word passed along the lines of war. Then they put forth, each in his place assigned, And through the live-long night the captains kept ...
— Specimens of Greek Tragedy - Aeschylus and Sophocles • Goldwin Smith

... not wave thy staff in air, Or dip thy paddle in the lake, But it carves the bow of beauty there, And the ripples in rhyme the oar forsake." ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... presents of chocolates. But presumably they are not allowed to eat them, so that these can do little to alleviate their sufferings. It is true also that for ever after (if their wives allow it) they can hang an enormous oar on the wall and contemplate it after dinner. But, after all, I can do that too, if I like; for I too ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 17, 1920 • Various

... the shore. The boats were afloat and laden before one knew it. Mr. Marlboro' and Eloise were just one instant too late. Laura Murray shook a triumphant handkerchief at them, and St. George feathered his oar, pausing a moment as if he would return, and then gave a great sweep and his boat ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various

... Race is not a thing to be undertaken lightly. To begin with, it involves great muscular exertion; but this is not unpleasant, and, as I shall presently show, is not dangerous. Further, it ties the aspirant to his oar for at least ten weeks, which is perhaps its greatest disadvantage; and it involves intense application and a pretty good temper under remarks from the "coach" that are sometimes almost more than caustic. But against these drawbacks are to be ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... of the canoes, so filled with men any movement was almost impossible, yet of this I did not complain for my Uncle Chevet was next to me, and Cassion took place at the steering oar in the stern. To be separated from him was all I asked, although the very sound of his harsh voice rasping out orders, as we swung out from the bank rendered me almost frantic. My husband! God! and I was actually married to that despicable creature! I think I hardly realized ...
— Beyond the Frontier • Randall Parrish

... change, Who strayed content along a sunlit beach Gathering shells. He heard a sudden strange Commingled noise: looked up; and gasped for speech. For in the bay, where nothing was before, Moved on the sea, by magic, huge canoes, With bellying cloths on poles, and not one oar, And fluttering ...
— Georgian Poetry 1918-19 • Various

... courage and endurance (for one could see that it was no child's-play, from the pale faces, and panting lips), their strength and activity, so fierce and yet so cultivated, smooth, harmonious, as oar kept time with oar, and every back rose and fell in concert—and felt my soul stirred up to a sort of sweet madness, not merely by the shouts and cheers of the mob around me, but by the loud fierce pulse of the ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al

... firmly, "I want you to keep that boresome old man occupied while I talk with these women. I don't want him putting in his oar." ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland

... them, and, in so doing, to modify seriously the fortunes of many others. Arnold having one day pulled out on the open lake, in his venturesome manner, Pellew gave chase in another boat. The Americans being hard pressed and capture probable, Arnold unbuckled his stock and himself took an oar. So nearly caught was he, that he had to escape into the bushes, leaving behind him stock and buckle; and these, as late as sixty years after, remained in the possession of Pellew's brother. Had he thus been deprived of the opportunity that Saratoga gave him the next ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan

... they will let a human being perish, and so near the shore, when an oar held out would save his life?" was the agonising question at my heart, as I gazed, half-maddened by excitement, on the fearful spectacle. The eyes of a multitude were fixed upon the same object—but not a hand stirred. Every one seemed to expect from ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie

... he pulled the two bow oars of Ellidi; but either oar was thirteen ells long, and two men pulled ...
— The Story Of Frithiof The Bold - 1875 • Anonymous

... who had nearly forgotten his swollen jaw under the excitement of the moment. "I see the oar we tied onto the line that Frank fastened to the cable. It's right ...
— Boy Scouts in Southern Waters • G. Harvey Ralphson

... him Brand, the son of the former president, and about twelve hundred well-mounted men. Crossing the Orange River at Sand Drift, north of Colesberg, upon December 16th, they paused at Kameelfontein to gather up a small post of thirty yeomen and guardsmen under Lieutenant Fletcher, the wellknown oar. Meeting with a stout resistance, and learning that British forces were already converging upon them, they abandoned the attack, and turning away from Colesberg they headed west, cutting the railway line twenty miles to the north of De Aar. On the 22nd they occupied Britstown, which ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle

... Flosi all about his dealings with his host, and Flosi says he will pull an oar with him, so that his marriage bargain might be struck, and buy the ship of him afterwards. The Easterling was glad at that. Flosi offered him land at Borgarhaven, and now the Easterling holds on with his suit to his host when Flosi was by, and Flosi threw in a helping ...
— Njal's Saga • Unknown Icelanders

... so much the greater is the subjection; for the cause being multiplied, so is the effect multiplied. Wherefore it is to be known that there are things which are such pure or simple Arts that Nature is their instrument; even as rowing with an oar, where the Art makes its instrument by impulsion, which is a natural movement; as in the threshing of the corn, where the Art makes its instrument, which is a natural quality. And in this especially a man ought to be subject to the chief and master of the Art. And ...
— The Banquet (Il Convito) • Dante Alighieri

... in sculling, we came within a quoitcast of the unfortunate fisherman. He stayed not to profit by our aid; for when he perceived us near, he uttered a piercing shriek of joy, and bounded toward us through the agitated element the full length of an oar. I saw him for a second on the surface of the water; but the eddying current sucked him down; and all I ever beheld of him again was his hand held above the flood, and clutching in agony at some imaginary aid. I sat gazing in horror on the vacant sea before us: but a breathing ...
— Little Classics, Volume 8 (of 18) - Mystery • Various

... with fruit, fowls, eggs, apes, parrots, shells, and such like wares, with which the owner drives a profitable trade with the ships. He sits on a little bench in the midst of his merchandize with a short, broad oar in either hand; with this he propels his fragile vessel; which is often not more than an inch or two above the water's edge. After we had exchanged our pure Spanish piastres, which is the coin they ...
— Hair Breadth Escapes - Perilous incidents in the lives of sailors and travelers - in Japan, Cuba, East Indies, etc., etc. • T. S. Arthur

... was made out of more heroic stuff. The spirit of adventure had not died within him. His faith is full of the finest romance. "Come," said Jesus and immediately I see Peter drop his oar and begin to climb down out of the boat ...
— Sermons on Biblical Characters • Clovis G. Chappell

... that creek, overspread by the wild shrubs," answered Pausanias; "a few strokes of the oar, and I am where thou seest. And in truth, without thy summons, I should have been on board ere sunset, seeing that on the morrow I have ordered a general review of the vessels of the fleet. Was that to be the ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton

... gracefully-curved papyrus blossoms. Two little platforms surrounded by balustrades on a panelled ground are at the prow and on the poop, like quarter-decks. The pilot stands upon the one, and the steersman before the other, with a large oar in his hand. This oar takes the place of the modern helm. Twelve boatmen in solid silver are rowing under the orders of these two officers; Kames himself being seated in the centre, hatchet and sceptre in hand. Such were some of the objects buried with one single mummy; ...
— Manual Of Egyptian Archaeology And Guide To The Study Of Antiquities In Egypt • Gaston Camille Charles Maspero

... which are even more enchanting than its intense tints. Fishes, apparently of gold and rose-color or of a radiant blue barred and banded with silver, dart, plunge and chase each other after the fragments of biscuit we throw overboard. Films of crystal and ruby oar themselves gently along the upper surface or float like folded sea-flowers on the motionless water. A flock of tiny sea-mews, half the size of the fish, are screaming shrilly and darting down on the shoal; but as for their catching ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various

... two men," says he, "and they rowing round with poteen before the cocks crowed, and the oar of one of them caught the body, and they passing the black ...
— Riders to the Sea • J. M. Synge

... scrambled to their feet and responded. Their cheers rang out. One of them, moved to enthusiasm, seized his oar and beat the water with the flat of the blade. Like a man with a flail he raised the oar high and brought it down with loud smacks on the water, splashing up sparkling drops, rocking the boat in which he stood. He was not a native of Salissa, not a subject of the Queen, but his action expressed ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham

... their graceful wings and uttering at intervals that peculiar wild cry that in solitary haunts sounds so intensely mournful. Errington gazed about him in doubt for some minutes, then suddenly his face brightened. He sat down again in the boat and resumed his oar. ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... and Hector. These are no mere trifles below the dignity of history; they help to explain the extraordinary hold Henry obtained over popular imagination. Suppose there ascended the throne to-day a young prince, the hero of the athletic world, the finest oar, the best bat, the crack marksman of his day, it is easy to imagine the enthusiastic support he would receive from thousands of his people who care much for sport, and nothing at all for politics. Suppose also that that prince ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard

... sail had been hoisted; it filled out slowly and, obeying the long rough oar which Bostock used as a scull, the raft behaved splendidly, leaving the long dark hull of the steamer behind, and steadily nearing the yellow stretch of sand backed by an enormous ...
— King o' the Beach - A Tropic Tale • George Manville Fenn

... dreams, awoke her. A man of very uncouth and rough appearance was standing over them, and two of his companions were looking on, from a long heavy boat which had come close to the bank while they were sleeping. The boat had neither oar nor sail, but was towed by a couple of horses, who, with the rope to which they were harnessed slack and dripping in the water, were resting ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... one of them tipped over an alligator in the water. He was a little fellow, and made off with all his might, to the great amusement of the party. The men had not taken half a dozen strokes more, before another alligator was turned over by an oar. This was a larger one than the other, and his head was lifted entirely out of the water. At the same moment Cornwood, who was standing in the bow of the boat, aimed a revolver ...
— Down South - or, Yacht Adventure in Florida • Oliver Optic



Words linked to "Oar" :   vane, sweep oar, paddle, implement



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