Definition of "wharf-boat" [wharf-boat]

• In the United States, a boat supporting a platform sometimes used as a wharf in rivers or in other situations where actual wharves do not exist, or where they are impracticable from the great variation in the height of the water. (noun)
• A boat employed about a wharf or wharves. (noun)

The Century Dictionary (Public Domain)

• "Sometimes you come to a real village, and there you generally find an old steamer doing duty for wharf-boat and hotel, in case of passengers landing at unseasonable hours of the night."
• "The plank was laid from the wharf-boat, and, without daring to hesitate, I walked over it."
• "One night we were on a boat that was putting off freight at the wharf-boat that lay at the mouth of Red River."