"Onset" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... an assault from they knew not how many savages, aided by British leaders, for the band from old Chilicothe, was to be joined by warriors from several other tribes. In ten days, Boonesborough was ready for the onset. These arduous labors being completed, Boone heroically resolved to strike consternation into the Indians, by showing them that he was prepared for aggressive as well as defensive warfare, and that they must leave behind them warriors for the ...
— Daniel Boone - The Pioneer of Kentucky • John S. C. Abbott
... signal for their onset. Nash pinioned his arms behind while Boland seized a long cabbage stump which was lying in the gutter. Struggling and kicking under the cuts of the cane and the blows of the knotty stump Stephen was borne back against a ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce
... the Irish, for four hours, received and repulsed the various charges of the Puritan horse. Then as the sun began to descend, pouring its rays upon the enemy, O'Neill led his whole force—five thousand men against eight—to the attack. One terrible onset swept away every trace of resistance. There were counted on the field 3,243 of the Covenanters, and of the Catholics but 70 killed and 100 wounded. Lord Ardes, and 21 Scottish officers, 32 standards, 1,500 draught horses, and all the guns and ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... associates. The shadow of coming events began to fall upon him, and his daughter gradually divined his lack of hopefulness. The days were already sad and full of anxiety, for her husband was absent. He had scouted the idea of the Yankees standing up before the impetuous onset of the Southern soldiers, and his words had apparently proved true, yet even those Northern cowards had killed one closely allied to her before they fled. Remembering, therefore, her husband's headlong courage, what assurance ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... ledges of the rocks, which were levelled to form its foundation. The courses of the masonry were irregular, laid without cement or mortar of any kind. This bold piece of engineering served the double purpose of sea-wall and rampart, and was thus fitted to withstand alike the onset of hostile fleets and the surges of ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... sentences are charged with a heroic energy, and, when he is telling a great tale, their rise and fall are like the flashing and falling of the bright sword of some great champion in battle, or the onset and withdrawal of Atlantic surges. He can at need be beautifully tender and quiet. Who that has read his tale of the young Finn and the Seven Ancients will forget the weeping of Finn over the kindness of the ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... pigeon postal communication was exceedingly interesting. Mr. Arthur Hirst, who at the onset of the war had started a loft of the best Yorkshire racing pigeons at Durban, settled himself at the Intelligence Department Headquarters, Ladysmith, and from thence sent out his intelligent birds. Of these he had some 200, all of which were trained by himself and his assistants. His early experiments ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... fifth, five hundred feet. The finish at the top shows as a heavy crumbling wall, probably one hundred feet or more high. How the mass seems to be resisting the siege of time, throwing out its salients here and there, and meeting the onset of the foes like a ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs
... all revolted from the General. The King now daring not to trust the Revolted, to make tryal of their Truth and Fidelity, put them in the forefront of his Battel, and commanded them to give the first Onset. The King at that time might have Twenty or Thirty thousand Men in the Field. Who taking their opportunity, set upon the Portugueze Army, and gave them such a total overthrow, that as they report in that ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... proceeding in two districts of New York city. By Monday night the buildings and the blocks in which the provost marshals had their respective offices had been burned to the ground by a furious rabble, whose onset the police had in vain attempted to stay, and the great metropolis of North America was at the mercy of a raging mob, which roamed through the streets, robbing, beating, burning, murdering ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... fast they come; See how they gather! Wide waves the eagle plume, Blended with heather. Cast your plaids, draw your blades, Forward each man set; Pibroch of Donuil Dhu, Knell for the onset! ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... monster, Of the "Louisville and Nashville," Sounded loud the shrill steam-whistle Of the railroad "On to Richmond." And the Old Church walls so sacred, Fell beneath the stormy cargo, Our Republican ancestress Bent her hoary head in shrinking; All the rank and mouldy ruins Fell before the thund'ring onset. Never more the timeworn benches Shall reecho words of wisdom; Never more the brick and plaster Shall have grace from text and precept, Ne'er alas! her slumb'ring children Give her earthly praise and homage. Gone forever, church and pastor, Gone, all gone, her saints' ...
— The Song of Lancaster, Kentucky - to the statesmen, soldiers, and citizens of Garrard County. • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... darkness upon the sea, kindling upon it a livid clearness of foam, and the first gust of the squall boarded the brig in a stinging flick of rain and spray. As if overwhelmed by the suddenness of the fierce onset, the vessel remained for a second upright where she floated, shaking with tremendous jerks from trucks to keel; while high up in the night the invisible canvas was heard rattling and beating ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... two feet in diameter and slippery with snow and ice. A stout block-house filled with sharpshooters guarded this rude bridge, which was raised some five feet from the ground. Within the palisaded fortress perhaps not less than 2000 warriors, with many women and children, awaited the onset of the white men, for here had Canonchet gathered together nearly the whole of his available force. This was a military mistake. It was cooping up his men for slaughter. They would have been much ...
— The Beginnings of New England - Or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty • John Fiske
... felt best on horseback, and would accept a score of ill chances and fight in the saddle, rather than a dozen advantages and go afoot. I think they were not displeased at their discovery by the sentinel, which gave them an excuse for a harebrained onset ahorse, in place of the tedious manoeuvre afoot that had been planned. As for Tom and me, we were at the age when a man ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... men around him, hurling them against the firm front of Charles' veterans. It was the crucial moment; the turning point in a struggle that could not be prolonged, but would be rather sharp, short and decisive. If his men failed at the onset, all was lost; if they gained but a little ascendancy now, their mastery of the field became fairly assured. Great would be the reward for success; the fruits of victory—the emperor himself. And savagely the ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham
... sea rang terribly around, and the earth crashed loudly: wide Heaven was shaken and groaned, and high Olympus reeled from its foundation under the charge of the undying gods, and a heavy quaking reached dim Tartarus and the deep sound of their feet in the fearful onset and of their hard missiles. So, then, they launched their grievous shafts upon one another, and the cry of both armies as they shouted reached to starry heaven; and they met together ...
— Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns, and Homerica • Homer and Hesiod
... onset was not so violent, but they hastened to gather together a few blankets, and the boys filled their pockets, with a delightful sense of unusualness and peril, almost equal to a shipwreck or an attack by Indians. Dorothy took her unlucky chickens under her cloak and they made a rush, all together, ...
— Stories by American Authors (Volume 4) • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... productive of a satisfactory result. Should any one therefore regard it as a subject for controversy, we would only reply that, if different, or to them better, methods be adopted by other painters, no less certain is it that there are numbers who at the onset of their career have not the least knowledge of any one of these methods; and that it is chiefly for such that these notes have been penned. In short, that to all about to paint their first picture we ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various
... the Tinjar people turned as one man and tore furiously down the hill to seize their weapons, while the Baram men ran to their huts and in a few seconds were prancing madly to and fro on the crest of the hill, thirsting for the onset of the bloody battle that now seemed a matter of a few seconds only. At the same time the Dayaks were swarming out of the bazaar seeking something to kill, like the typical Englishman, though not knowing ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... meantime I will do my best to amuse them until you come, but make all haste." This he did, and the Good Knight, lance in rest, galloped across the bridge to the other end, where the Spaniards were on the point of passing. But, like a lion in his rage, Bayard rushed at them with so furious an onset that two or three of the foremost men were driven back and hurled into the water, from whence they rose no more, for the river was wide and deep. For a moment they were driven back, but seeing there was only ...
— Bayard: The Good Knight Without Fear And Without Reproach • Christopher Hare
... seemed to Mr. Brumley to offer a certain resistance of spirit to the effusion of Lady Beach-Mandarin, rather as two small anchored vessels might resist the onset of a great and foaming tide, but after a time it was clear they admired her greatly. His attention was, however, a little distracted from them by the fact that he was the sole representative of the more serviceable sex among five women and so in duty bound to stand by Lady Harman and ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... is as noticeable on the side of the enemy as on our own. The phenomenal losses suffered by the Germans' new formations have been remarked, and they were in part due to their lack of training. Moreover, though at the first onset these formations advanced to the attack as gravely as their active corps, they have not by any means, shown the same recuperative powers. The Twenty-seventh Corps, for instance, which is a new formation composed principally of men with from only seven to twelve weeks' training, has not ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various
... current nearly all the ancient mariners of the State were set; not to allow the brave ship to drift there, though some little boats might try it. For the present there seemed to be a pause, with no open onset, but people on the shore expecting, each according to his wishes, and the feel of his own finger, whence the rush of wind should come which might direct ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... him know that it was a promise of victory from the gods, and that he should soon be master of Tyre; the word satyros divided in two being sa Tyros, and signifying Tyre is thine; and in truth, at the next onset, he took the town by storm, and by a complete victory reduced that ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... consecutive or deep-laid policy, as foolish republicans must be; and next, he knew that he had the most powerful army in the world, which, if put to the test, would crush the undisciplined American militia at the first onset. He adopted, therefore, a double policy: he pretended openly to be most friendly to the Americans; he flattered all of them whom he could reach in Berlin, and he directed an effusive propaganda in the United States. In secret, ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... draw the combat away from her, I went on to meet him with my club; and before his first onset was done, his sword flew over his head in two pieces. It was an old trick, and cost nothing to a 'prentice outside Temple Bar. And while he looked round, bewildered, after his weapon, I took him by the nape of his neck and the cloth of his breeches, and walked with ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... flashed the steel like lightning; on went the troop like the clash of a thousand waves when the sun is upon them; and before the breath of the riders was thrice drawn, came the crash—the shock—the slaughter of battle. The Spaniards made but a faint resistance to the impetuosity of the onset: they broke on every side beneath the force of the charge, like the weak barriers of a rapid and swollen stream; and the French troops, after a brief but bloody victory (joined by a second squadron from the ...
— Falkland, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... bark had assembled on the quarterdeck, stout English tars every man of them, armed with pikes and belaying-pins; and at a word from the mate they rushed in a body over the plank. Some were thrust off into the water, but so fierce was their onset that others gained the wharf, laying sharply about them in all directions, but getting full as many knocks as they gave. For a space there was a very bedlam of cries and broken heads, those behind in the mob surging forward to reach the scrimmage, forcing ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... last bank, after taking breath and measuring with their eye the space yet to be traversed before crossing swords with the enemy, rushed on like lions, confident of victory and trusting in their sacred cause. The Bourbon force could not resist the terrible onset of men fighting for freedom; they fled, and never stopped till they reached the town of Calatafimi, several miles from the battlefield. We ceased our pursuit a short distance from the entrance to the town, which is very strongly situated. If one gives ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne
... accumulation of artillery were 26 batteries of 12-inch guns and several of the German giants, the famous 42-centimetre pieces, which brought down the pride of Antwerp and Namur. By the middle of May everything was ready for the onset to begin, and this avalanche of soldiery came rolling down the Asiago plateau, between the Adige and the Brenta. Below them, basking in the sunshine, stretched the alluring plains of Venetia, with their wealth, their women, and ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... that had dared to resist the onset of the brute, to fight against it, to wound it, was feeling the full fury of the monster's rage. The gleaming lights of the doomed ship were waving lines that swept to and fro in the grip of those monstrous arms. The boat beneath Thorpe's feet was tossing in the waves that told of the titanic struggle. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... realized their advantage in this respect. It encouraged them to rush into close quarters, where the rapid discharge of their pistols soon told upon the enemy, no matter how bravely they had withstood the onset. I have seen the victory decided alone by the superiority of the pistol over the saber, where the opposing columns had crossed each other in the charge and, wheeling, ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various
... if he had found her at once, he would never have desired her so fiercely. Now, for the first time in his life impassioned, he felt something mysterious and unwelcome to him begin to mingle with his desire. Above all, life without her meant dullness, lack of vitality, the swift onset of middle-age. He saw this with shrinking. He walked wearily, looking older than he was in ...
— Gone to Earth • Mary Webb
... unless the flaming onset of Mohammedanism be an exception, have dawned imperceptibly upon the world. A little while ago and the thing was not; and then suddenly it has been found in existence, and already in a state of diffusion. People have begun to hear of ...
— God The Invisible King • Herbert George Wells
... coarsely upon the roundness of women's bodies. The windows of these rooms were obscured with draperies, their floors a carpet patchwork; the china ornaments on their mantels were of a class apart. After the first onset several of the women who had apartments to let said she would not do for them, and in effect dismissed her. This also struck her ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... that at such a time the slaughter would be terrible; but, after the first onset, when men went down headlong, the number of killed and wounded were few. For there were no withering volleys of musketry, no field-pieces playing upon the disorganised cavalry from a distance; it was a sheer combat of mounted men armed with the sword, ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn
... of hill and valley, with no more order or care than if they had been chasing rabbits. Black Hawk, who had been at supper when the running fight began, hastily gathered a handful of warriors and attacked the scattered whites. The onset of the savages acted like an icy bath on the red-hot valor of the volunteers; they turned and ran for their lives, stampeding the camp as they fled. There was very little resistance—so little that Black Hawk, fearing a ruse, tried to recall ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... The onset was terrible. Richard inspirited his whole troop by his reckless and headlong bravery, and by the terrible energy with which he gave himself to the work of slaughtering all who came in his way. The darts and javelins that were shot by the enemy glanced off from him without inflicting ...
— Richard I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... contemplation and silence. It was an hour to caress in years to come, none the less that it was accepted as the mere routine of daily life in the short term of its existence. It was an hour that came to an end when the party arrived at the hedge of the unripe sloes that had checked the onset of Albion Villas towards the new town, and passed through the turnstile Fenwick and Vereker had passed through in the morning. Then speech came back, and each did what all folk invariably do after a ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... of the chase arises not so much from the onset of the wounded animal as from the nature of the ground which the hunter must ride over. The prairie does not always present a smooth, level, and uniform surface; very often it is broken with hills and hollows, intersected by ravines, and in the ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... moment, when a second onset must have brought them into collision with those who stood on the defensive within, in which case great loss of life and bloodshed would inevitably have ensued,—the hindmost portion of the crowd gave way, and the rumour spread from mouth to mouth that a messenger had ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... the slant of a roof, the horses keeping out of the way of the wagon; up the other side with the reeking animals straining every fiber; over bridges that bent fearfully beneath the shock of their onset; swaying around curves with the wheels sluing and sparks flying, and over the level as though the ...
— The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch • Henry Wallace Phillips
... by a sensation of pleasure, specifically known as voluptuous pleasure, the voluptuous sensation, or simply voluptuousness (in Latin, libido sexualis). Several stages of the voluptuous sensation must be distinguished: its onset; the equable voluptuous sensation; the voluptuous acme, coincident with the rhythmical contraction of the perineal muscles and the ejaculation of the semen; and, finally, the quite sudden diminution and cessation of the voluptuous sensation. Associated with the last stage we usually ...
— The Sexual Life of the Child • Albert Moll
... had dispatch'd him; yet once more They swear fidelity to thee, and wait The shout for onset, all ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... The Reformed Librarie-Keeper is part of his reform program preparatory to the onset of the millennium is apparent both from its setting and its content. It was published in 1650 along with two other tracts (not reprinted here)[7] and Dury's supplement to his Reformed School, which itself had appeared a few months earlier. The Reformed School was a basic presentation ...
— The Reformed Librarie-Keeper (1650) • John Dury
... him to prick its bearer in the neck, but only with the point of his sword. The thrust delivered, he leapt back, and not too soon, for forgetting his caution in his fury, the savage charged straight at him with a roar like that of a lion. So swift and terrible was his onset that Aziel, having no time to spring aside, did the only thing possible. Gripping the ground with his feet, he bent his body forward, and with outstretched arm and sword, braced up his muscles to receive the charge. Another instant, and the leopard skin cloak fluttered before him. With ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... such emergency as the setting up of a newspaper so declaredly adverse to every species of vested trust and power; for it was easy to forsee that those immediately on the scene would be the first opposed to the onset and brunt of the battle. Never can any public man have a more delicate task imposed upon him, than to steer clear of offence in such a predicament. After a full consideration of the business, Mr Scudmyloof declared that he would retire from the field, ...
— The Provost • John Galt
... contracted, if there is pain, and its seat is in the head. This is frequently the very first outward sign of any thing being wrong, and will occur at the very onset of disease; if therefore remarked at an early period, and proper remedies used, its notice may prevent one of the most fearful of infantile ...
— The Maternal Management of Children, in Health and Disease. • Thomas Bull, M.D.
... breakfast having been got out of the cuddy in the meanwhile, and arranged for our onset by Drake, we seized cups, knives and forks, and were soon ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... experience that this extreme toleration, when it comes to dissolve, produces the most severe revenge; for taking fire on a sudden, anger and fury being combined in one, discharge their utmost force at the first onset, ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... formidable to her neighbors, she has the effect of a seventy-four-gun ship in time of peace; for, while you assure yourself that there is no real danger, you can not help thinking how tremendous would be her onset, if pugnaciously inclined, and how futile the effort to inflict any counter-injury. She certainly looks tenfold—nay, a hundredfold—better able to take care of herself than our slender-framed and haggard womankind; but I have not found reason to suppose that the English dowager ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... every movement. For this service they had no equals. In the woods they could steal upon an enemy unawares, or lie in wait for his approach. In the field they were of little use. Much of the terror they inspired came from the suddenness of their onset, their hideous looks and unearthly war-cries, and their cruel practice of ...
— Burgoyne's Invasion of 1777 - With an outline sketch of the American Invasion of Canada, 1775-76. • Samuel Adams Drake
... the face of it, this latter scheme had the appearance of suicide, but, in fact, it was not so desperate as it seemed. The Abati being such cowards it was quite probable that they would run in their thousands before the onset of a few hundred determined men, and that, if once victory declared itself for the Child of Kings, the bulk of her subjects would return to their allegiance. So we settled on it in preference to surrender, which we knew meant death to ourselves, ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard
... all the energies of the human race seemed to be expended in destruction; and in almost every scene of smouldering cities, of ravaged valleys, of battle-fields rendered hideous with the shouts of onset and shrieks of despair, we see the apparition of the stalwart frame of Guise, scarred, and war-worn, and blackened with the smoke and dust of the fray, riding upon his proud charger, wherever peril was most imminent, as if his ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... Instances of loyalty to the flag, and valor in its defence; Bravery on the Battle-Field and Quarter-Deck; Examples of Youthful Courage in the storm of Combat; Infantry, Artillery and Cavalry in line of action—the tramp and onset; extraordinary fortitude under suffering; undaunted heroism in death; the roll of fame and story. Reminiscences of victory and disaster of Camp Picket, Spy, Scout, Bivouac and Siege, with feats of Daring, Bold and Brilliant Marches, Remarkable Cases ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... Stratford were called out to prove the strength of their heads; and in the number of the champions was Shakespeare, who, in spite of the proverb that "they who drink beer will think beer," was as true to his ale as Falstaff to his sack. The chivalry of Stratford was staggered at the first onset, and sounded a retreat while they had yet the legs to carry them off the field. They had scarcely marched a mile when, their legs failing them, they were forced to lie down under a crab tree, where they passed the night. It was still standing, and ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... whole tendency of language in the modern world is towards disappearance of local dialects, and their absorption into a uniform literary language. The dialects of England are almost dead before the onset of universal education, and the great work of Dr. Wright was only just in time to rescue them from oblivion. Even one generation hence it will be impossible to collect much of the local speech recorded ...
— International Language - Past, Present and Future: With Specimens of Esperanto and Grammar • Walter J. Clark
... irony, which otherwise, probably, would have been its general acceptation. But, Sir, if it be imagined that by this mutual quotation and commendation; if it be supposed that, by casting the characters of the drama assigning to each his part, to one the attack, to another the cry of onset; or if it be thought that, by a loud and empty vaunt of anticipated victory, any laurels are to be won here; if it be imagined, especially, that any or all these things will shake any purpose of mine,—I can tell the honorable member, once for all, that he is greatly mistaken, and that he ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... winter slowly vanished and spring advanced, and still Mrs. Jarvis did not come. Vigilance at The Dale was never relaxed through the delay, however. Everything was kept in a state of preparation, and Miss Gordon ordered her household as soldiers awaiting an onset of the enemy. Sarah Emily had a clean apron every morning, and the house was kept in speckless order from the stone step of the front porch to the rain-barrel by the back door of the woodshed. Even the barnyard was swept every morning before the younger Gordons left for school, ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... two armies stood face to face, waiting for the signal of onset, Henry rode along the front of his squadron, ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 6 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. French. • Charles Morris
... many victorious recollections, confident in the talents of their accomplished leader, and undismayed even by the desperation of their circumstances, charged the mass of the Welshmen with their usual determined valour. It was a gallant sight to see this little body of cavalry advance to the onset, their plumes floating above their helmets, their lances in rest, and projecting six feet in length before the breasts of their coursers; their shields hanging from their necks, that their left ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... the Rebel States as if they were at once in and out of the Union. Among the most striking figures in the House were Butler and Cox, whose contests were greatly relished. They were well matched, and alternately carried off the prize of victory. Butler, in the first onset, achieved a decided triumph in his reply to a very personal assault by Cox. "As to the vituperation of the member from New York," said he, "he will hear my answer to him by every boy that whistles it on the street, and every hand-organ, 'Shoo, fly, don't bodder me'!" Cox, for the ...
— Political Recollections - 1840 to 1872 • George W. Julian
... likewise well contented with her victory, though it had cost her a black eye, which Partridge had given her at the first onset. Between these two, therefore, a league was struck, and those hands which had been the instruments of war became now the ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... he made some of the men go out with him, and upon the open plain they met with North Wind, who at once challenged the champion to do battle. The two rushed upon one another with great fury, and in the first onset Star Boy broke the bow of North Wind; but in the second, Star Boy was overthrown ...
— Wigwam Evenings - Sioux Folk Tales Retold • Charles Alexander Eastman and Elaine Goodale Eastman
... will crown with success so just a cause. The enemy will endeavor to intimidate by show and appearance; but remember they have been repulsed on various occasions by a few brave Americans. Their cause is bad,—their men are conscious of it; and, if opposed with firmness and coolness on their first onset, with our advantage of works, and knowledge of the ground, the victory is most assuredly ours. Every good soldier will be silent and attentive, wait for orders, and reserve his fire until he is sure of ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... copied, ne variatur, the partition of Poland. When the record of modern treasons was examined, that was the first thing which made its appearance. The congress of Vienna consulted that crime before consummating its own. 1772 sounded the onset; 1815 was the death of the game. Such was Feuilly's habitual text. This poor workingman had constituted himself the tutor of Justice, and she recompensed him by rendering him great. The fact is, that there is eternity in right. ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... had not given ground. He was sitting behind a rocky outcrop and at the suggestion of Willet was giving orders to his men. Oppressed at first by the ambush and weight of responsibility he was exulting now in their ability to check the savage onset. Robert was quite willing to play a little to his pride and he said in the ...
— The Shadow of the North - A Story of Old New York and a Lost Campaign • Joseph A. Altsheler
... I have the honour to assure you, sir,' said Aramis, 'that I killed one of the guards with his own sword, for mine was broken at the first onset.' ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... ranks, to make their evolutions, or to obey their commanders; but in tolerating hardships, in dexterity of forming ambuscades, (the art military of savages,) they are said to have excelled. A natural ferocity and an impetuous onset stood them in the place ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... India seas, and proclaims his judgments in such melancholy dispensations. The wind increased, the roaring of the ocean deepened upon the ear, and all hands in every craft upon the gulf were engaged in reefing their sails, and making every thing snug for the onset. ...
— Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman • William L. Stone
... of grace and adornment. So she had yielded to the needs of her heart, and only this morning was gladdened by the charm of some new clothing which became her well, and which Waymark would see in a day or two. It lay there before her now that she returned home, and, in the first onset of trouble, she sat down and cried ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... and killed the defenders by scores. Time after time along those parts of the front selected for assault were parapets destroyed, and time after time did the thinning band of survivors build them up again and await the next onset ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... few minutes the signal to charge was given, and Reno retreated pell mell before the onset of ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... the Apennines. Their generals could display the tactical skill on which they prided themselves, and their splendid cavalry had some chance of emulating the former exploits of the Hungarian and Croatian horse. They therefore awaited the onset of the French, little dismayed by recent disasters, and animated by the belief that their antagonist, unversed in regular warfare, would at once lose in the plains the bubble reputation gained in ravines. But the country in the second part of this campaign ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... already telling in outline, ahead of the list, thrilling things about the Orleans Guards, the whirlwind onset of whose maiden bayonets had captured double its share of the first camp taken from the amazed, unbreakfasted enemy, and who again and again, hour by hour, by the half-mile and mile, had splendidly helped to drive him—while he hammered back with ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable
... Hasn't the vagabone drawn a pint of blood from my nose already?—look at that!" he exclaimed, throwing away a handful of the warm gore "hell seize her! look at that—Ho be the—" He made another onset at the yet unconscious girl as he spoke, and would have still inflicted further punishment upon her, were it ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... Stewart had at the first onset sprung like a lion upon the Master of Albany, and without drawing his sword had grappled with him. 'In the name of St. Andrew and the King, yield thy prey, thou dastard,' were his words as he threw ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... of quarry; that our host Smit with sick presage of some wrathful God Quailed, but the foe as from one iron throat With one great sheer sole thousand-throated cry Shook earth, heart-staggered from their shout, and clove The eyeless hollow of heaven; and breached therewith As with an onset of strength-shattering sound The rent vault of the roaring noon of night From her throned seat of usurpation rang 1510 Reverberate answer; such response there pealed As though the tide's charge of a storming sea Had burst the sky's wall, and made broad a breach In the ambient ...
— Erechtheus - A Tragedy (New Edition) • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... Fancher's militia came up, sober farmers of the village that lay below us buried in smoke; and our dragoons listened to the tales of these men, some of whom had been in the village when the onset came, and had remained there, skulking about to pick off the enemy until ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... stand amazed and tremble, While the hoarse thunder, like a bloody trumpet, Roars a loud onset to the gaping waters, Quick ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... communicated this design to his army; slightly mentioned the guilt and rashness of the Caesar; and ventured to assure them, that if the mutineers of Gaul presumed to meet them in the field, they would be unable to sustain the fire of their eyes, and the irresistible weight of their shout of onset. The speech of the emperor was received with military applause, and Theodotus, the president of the council of Hierapolis, requested, with tears of adulation, that his city might be adorned with the head of the vanquished rebel. [40] A chosen detachment ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... this ominous impression, I now turned aside into the woods, resolving to spy out the posture of the Community as craftily as the wild Indian before he makes his onset. I would go wandering about the outskirts of the farm, and, perhaps, catching sight of a solitary acquaintance, would approach him amid the brown shadows of the trees (a kind of medium fit for spirits departed and revisitant, like myself), and entreat him to ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... your eyelids? Once, like you, I too was young; From the first is life a struggle, and fresh youth its Berserk-gang. Hardly pressed and tried it must be, that its onset triumph not; I have proved you and forgiven. ...
— Fridthjof's Saga • Esaias Tegner
... usually light- footed and skipped about his adversary in a taunting, teasing way. Again and again he cast his net intentionally too short, merely to show how easily he could recover it and escape his opponent's onset. He danced, capered, pretended to be lame and that he could not avoid being overtaken, led his pursuer on, out-manoeuvred him, derided him; twice he lunged through the flapping straps of his kilt and grazed his thigh. The secutor was barely scratched, but his blood trickled ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White
... advanced to repel them. The opposing forces met in the forest on the south-western shore, not far from Crown point, on the morning of the 30th of July. The Iroquois, two hundred in number, advanced to the onset. "Among them," says Mr. Parkman, "could be seen several chiefs, conspicuous by their tall plumes. Some bore shields of wood and hide, and some were covered with a kind of armour made of tough twigs, interlaced with a vegetable ...
— Canadian Notabilities, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... this, it became more and more manifest, was absolutely impossible. As well might the council have proposed a revival of slavery. The capitalist system had already been smashed beyond repair by the onset of limitless gold and energy; it fell to pieces at the first endeavour to stand it up again. Already before the war half of the industrial class had been out of work, the attempt to put them back into wages employment on the old lines was futile from the outset—the absolute shattering ...
— The World Set Free • Herbert George Wells
... Luckily, the bull's onset was directed at the umbrella. There was a thundering of hoofs, a dull roar, and the poor man, as he gained the summit and cast a frantic look behind, saw a vision of jagged silk and flying ribs. With ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... kingdom, poor as it was, supplied him with the steadiest and the most daring soldiers that Europe had seen since the fall of the Roman Empire. The renown of the Spanish infantry had been growing from the day when it flung off the onset of the French chivalry on the field of Ravenna; and the Spanish generals stood without rivals in their military skill, as they stood without ...
— History of the English People - Volume 4 (of 8) • John Richard Green
... the administration of opening medicine during the first ten days, and a peculiar disease of the kidneys ending in anasarca (dropsy), on which account, the medical man ought, when practicable, to be sent for at the onset, that no time may be lost in applying ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse
... grows more hard and harder yet, Franks and pagans, with marvellous onset, Each other strike and each himself defends. So many shafts bloodstained and shattered, So many flags and ensigns tattered; So many Franks lose their young lustihead, Who'll see no more their mothers nor their friends, Nor hosts of France, that in ...
— The Song of Roland • Anonymous
... a fat Yankee (very like my Paris friend) mounted, being like myself hopeless of any other means of escape, I seized upon a bridle in hopes that I should then be left in peace. But this was the signal for a more furious onset, for, seeing that I would at length ride, each one was determined that he alone should profit by the transaction, and a dozen animals were forced suddenly upon me and a dozen hands tried to lift me upon their respective beasts. But now my patience was exhausted, so, keeping firm hold of the bridle ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Marchant
... sprang to the onslaught. Leaping into his chariot he led the Trojans on. Nine captains of the Greeks he slew in the first onset. Now their ranks would have been broken, and the Greeks would have fled back to their ships if Odysseus had not been on that wing of the battle with Diomedes, the great horseman. Odysseus cried out, "Come hither, Diomedes, or verily Hector will sweep ...
— The Adventures of Odysseus and The Tales of Troy • Padriac Colum
... to prevent my boldness; and oh, Octavio, though I have been bred in all the saucy daring of a forward lover, yet now I wanted a convenient impudence; awed with a haughty sweetness in her look, like a Fauxbrave after a vigorous onset, finding the danger fly so thick around him, sheers off, and dares not face the pressing foe, struck with too fierce a lightning from her eyes, whence the gods sent a thousand winged darts, I veiled my own, and durst not play with fire: while thus she hotly did pursue ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... have something to do with the disease. McCollum and his workers were confirmed in their views by the excellent results that followed the use of a mineral oil as a laxative. Another piece of evidence they gave for their views was that when animals were fed on oats and milk the onset of the scurvy could be delayed by merely adding the cathartic, phenolphthalein, to the mixture. They met the argument of the curative power of orange juice by preparing an artificial juice of citric acid, inorganic salts and cane sugar and showing that this synthetic ...
— The Vitamine Manual • Walter H. Eddy
... harsher features, and a mien more grave; But ne'er in battlefield throbbed heart so brave As that which beats beneath the Scottish plaid; And when the pibroch bids the battle rave, And level for the charge your arms are laid, Where lives the desperate foe that for such onset stayed! ...
— Some Poems by Sir Walter Scott • Sir Walter Scott
... you, and I shall remain till the weather is moderate, that we may go, as we have agreed, to see Poulaho, at Tongataboo." Macca-ackavow then got up and said, "You will not sleep on shore, then, Mattie?" (which directly signifies, we will kill you); and he left me. The onset was now preparing: every one, as I have described before, kept knocking stones together; and Eefow quitted me. All but two or three things were in the boat, when we walked down the beach, every one in a silent kind of horror. We all got into the boat, except ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... commencement, opening, outset, incipience, inception, inchoation[obs3]; introduction &c. (precursor) 64; alpha, initial; inauguration, debut, le premier pas, embarcation[Fr], rising of the curtain; maiden speech; outbreak, onset, brunt; initiative, move, first move; narrow end of the wedge, thin end of the wedge; fresh start, new departure. origin &c. (cause) 153; source, rise; bud, germ &c. 153; egg, rudiment; genesis, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... as she had opened her eyes, Alec and Curly hurried off to get out their boat. They met the miller in an awful rage; for the sudden onset of twice the quantity of water on his overshot wheel, had set his machinery off as if it had been bewitched, and one old stone, which had lost its iron girdle, had flown in pieces, to the frightful danger of the miller ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... hear me enter, so I had the advantage at the onset of taking him by surprise. He was standing in the centre of the hearthrug, with his arms folded and his eyes cast down upon the ground. His eyebrows almost met in a black frown, and a curious grey pallor had spread ...
— A Monk of Cruta • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... being chemically treated, and duly manipulated by machinery, will be re-issued to the world in the shape of paper. The Salvation Army consumes no less than thirty tons of paper every week. Here, therefore, would be one customer for as much paper as the new mill would be able to turn out at the onset; paper on which we could print the glad tidings of great joy, and tell the poor of all nations the news of salvation for earth and Heaven, full, present, and free to all the ...
— "In Darkest England and The Way Out" • General William Booth
... the room, and were advancing. They were broad-shouldered men, of a determined bearing, with sinister faces, and both wore swords and kept their slouch hats on their heads. Stradella was unarmed, and could only stand before Ortensia, awaiting their onset, for he had not a doubt but that they were Bravi sent by Pignaver to murder him. To his surprise they stopped before him, ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... fight or to venture at the risk of bodily harm. Like Theodore Roosevelt, the truly courageous individual engages his adversary without stopping to consider the possible consequences to himself. The timid man shrinks from the onset while he takes counsel of his fears, and reflects that "It may injure me in my business," or that "It may hurt my standing;" and in the end he becomes ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... aught He did with me! Fight ye in the way of God; whoso of ye is killed, Paradise shall be his abode, and whoso kills, his endeavour shall be for his glory." When they heard her words, their concern and anxiety ceased from them and they stood firm, awaiting the onset of the infidels, who fell on them from all sides, whilst the swords played upon their necks and the cup of death went round ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous
... you, and I shall remain till the weather is moderate that we may go, as we have agreed, to see Poulaho at Tongataboo." Maccaackavow then got up and said: "You will not sleep on shore? then Mattie" (which directly signifies we will kill you) and he left me. The onset was now preparing; everyone as I have described before kept knocking stones together, and Eefow quitted me. All but two or three things were in the boat, when I took Nageete by the hand, and we walked down the beach, everyone in a silent ...
— A Voyage to the South Sea • William Bligh
... than one who has rescu'd him from Slavery. Mr. SPECTATOR, I am but a young Fellow, and if Mr. Freeman submits, I shall be looked upon as an Incendiary, and never get a Wife as long as I breathe. He has indeed sent Word home he shall lie at Hampstead to-night; but I believe Fear of the first Onset after this Rupture has too great a Place in this Resolution. Mrs. Freeman has a very pretty Sister; suppose I delivered him up, and articled with the Mother for her for bringing him home. If he has not Courage to stand it, (you are a great Casuist) is it such ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... the story every summer as long as they could remember. Mrs. Beecher alone still maintained an attitude of admiration for her husband's antiquarian knowledge, the more creditable because she must have been familiar with the onset of the MacWilliam Burkes before even Marion was old enough to listen. To Hyacinth the story was both new and interesting. It stirred him to think of the Lynotts fighting hopelessly, or begging mercy in the darkness and the cold ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... morning of September 14, 1356, the battle began. The English were few in number, but they were determined to contest every inch of the ground and not surrender while a hundred of them remained to fight. For hours they withstood the onset of the French. At last a body of English horsemen charged furiously on one part of the French line, while the Black ...
— Famous Men of the Middle Ages • John H. Haaren
... Mansourah was under the command of Changarnier; it was reduced to three hundred men; he halted this little troop and said, "Come, my men, look these fellows in the face; they are six thousand, you are three hundred; surely the match is even." This speech was sufficient. The Frenchmen awaited the onset till the enemy was within pistol-shot; then, after a murderous volley, they charged on the Arabs, who broke and fled in dismay. During the remainder of the day they would not approach this band nearer than long rifle range. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... and drew it partly out of its scabbard, as if he meant to attack him, his eyes flashing fire and every feature working in its frenzy—the baron meanwhile standing perfectly motionless, quietly awaiting the onset. ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... had the news reached these unfortunate besieged people than a sortie was determined upon, and such is the effect of good fortune that it infuses new spirit, and generally insures further success. In the onset the Americans gained some advantages. During a thick mist and heavy rain, they succeeded in turning the right of the British picquets, and made themselves masters of the batteries, doing great damage to the British works. But no sooner was the alarm given than re-inforcements were obtained, ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... defendants to one assailant, every assailant being to fight by turnes eight several times fighting, two every time with push and pike of sword, twelve strokes at a time; after which, the barre for separation was to be let downe until a fresh onset." The summons ran in ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... no order maintained after the first onset. Every man seemed to fight for his own hand. Crossing and re-crossing and firing recklessly in all directions, it seemed a very miracle that no fatal accidents occurred. Minor ones there were. Archie and his nautical comrade witnessed a few ...
— The Buffalo Runners - A Tale of the Red River Plains • R.M. Ballantyne
... Metropole, a certain constraint had crept into their intercourse. Wyndham was not easily deceived, and he rightly interpreted her abrupt dismissal of him as a final effort to assert herself before the onset of the inevitable. Even if he at times suspected her of playing a part, she had chosen the right part to play, and he respected her for it. He himself was leading a curious double life. He was working hard at ...
— Audrey Craven • May Sinclair
... she should be thus early taken away. She had left home and friends to labor for God in a heathen land; and why at the very onset he should call her to the grave, she could not understand. The great desire of her heart was to be the humble instrument in the conversion of sinners. She wished to win souls to Christ—to turn the attention of ...
— Daughters of the Cross: or Woman's Mission • Daniel C. Eddy
... to have no other set, unless he would strike a blow for them. And so, while his gossips doffed their hats, and shook with what was left of them, he set his staff above his head, and rode at the Doone robber. With a trick of his horse, the wild man escaped the sudden onset, although it must have amazed him sadly that any durst resist him. Then when Smiler was carried away with the dash and the weight of my father (not being brought up to battle, nor used to turn, save in plough harness), the outlaw whistled ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... except the Lacedaemonians, and they arrived a day too late for the battle; but the rest were panic-stricken and kept quiet, too happy in having escaped for a time. He who has present to his mind that conflict will know what manner of men they were who received the onset of the barbarians at Marathon, and chastened the pride of the whole of Asia, and by the victory which they gained over the barbarians first taught other men that the power of the Persians was not invincible, but that hosts of men and the multitude of ...
— Menexenus • Plato
... encamped all but in the city is certain, and may be sufficiently confirmed by the names that the places thereabout yet retain, and the graves and monuments of those that fell in the battle. Both armies being in sight, there was a long pause and doubt on each side which should give the first onset; at last Theseus, having sacrificed to Fear, in obedience to the command of an oracle he had received, gave them battle; and this happened in the month of Boedromion, in which to this very day the Athenians celebrate the Feast Boedromia. Clidemus, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... Napoleon and Ney's corps at Bautzen. The second, under Prince Eugene, which consisted chiefly of cavalry, was much weaker in point of numerical amount, and was intended for a subordinate attack, to distract the enemy's attention from the principal onset in front under Marlborough.[10] With ordinary officers, or even eminent generals of a second order, a dangerous rivalry for the supreme command would unquestionably have arisen, and added to the many seeds ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... the willows with a broken elbow from one of their bullets. There was no time, nor were there means, for dressing the wound. He gritted his teeth, dug the elbow into the soft sand to stanch the flow of blood, and waited for the next onset. ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... had wound himself up to an even tenor of stately declamation, from which no exigence of dialogue or person could make him swerve for an instant. To dream of his rising with the scene (the common trick of tragedians) was preposterous; for from the onset he had planted himself, as upon a terrace, on an eminence vastly above the audience, and he kept that sublime level to the end. He looked from his throne of elevated sentiment upon the under-world of spectators with a most sovran and becoming ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... equal to the occasion. He had endured Sue's absence as long as he could, then had resolved on a long day's siege, with a grand storming-onset late in ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... you may imagine, fixed and conservative. It is a mental mold petrified with age; the minds participating must conform to it, solidify, and grow harder in the matrix it provides than granite or adamant. We have seen how in recent times the Confucian literati resisted the onset of westernism. All these steam-engines and telegraphs seemed to them fearfully crude and vulgar in comparison with the niceties of literary style, the finesses of time-taking ceremonious courtesies, that had been ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... time, and To mildness farewell! Its bristles are low'ring With darkness; o'erpowering Are its waters, aye showering With onset so fell; Seem the kid and the yearling As rung ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... gave the order to face round, and form into a solid body to receive their onset. As they approached there was a tall young man in a high turban that blazed with diamonds, mounted on a noble white horse, who spurred swiftly in front, and rode straight for where our commander was ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... greater degree than are those of the sire's, especially that feature of paramount importance, a beautiful disposition, hence I speak of the maternal side of the house first. There are two inexorable laws that confront the breeder at the onset, more rigid than were those of the Medes and Persians, the non-observance of which will inevitably lead to shipwreck. Better by far turn one's energies in attempting to square the circle, or produce a strain of frogs covered with feathers, than attempt to raise Boston terriers ...
— The Boston Terrier and All About It - A Practical, Scientific, and Up to Date Guide to the Breeding of the American Dog • Edward Axtell
... the countrie, gaue battell at a place called Wigmere or Rigmere, vnto Vikill or Wilfeketell leader of the English host in those parties, on the fift of Maie. The men of Northfolke and Suffolke fled at the first onset giuen: but the Cambridgeshire men sticked to it valiantlie, winning thereby perpetuall fame and commendation. There was no mindfulnesse amongest them of running awaie, so that a great number of the nobilitie and other were beaten ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (7 of 8) - The Seventh Boke of the Historie of England • Raphael Holinshed
... mustered his forces The war of wars to wage, And with storm and thunder of onset Did the foe of foes engage, And the Lord of Death, the undying, Was beset and harried sore, In his immemorial fastness At night's aboriginal core. And during years a thousand Man leaguered his enemy's hold, While nature was ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson
... Raphael, and Diego Perez, being prime sailers, closed up first with the enemy, and immediately attacked two of the largest ships of the Moors. Sodre fought with one of these alone, and Raphael and Perez assailed the other. Almost on the first onset, great numbers of the enemies were so dismayed that they leapt into the sea to escape by swimming. On the coming up of De Gama with the rest of the fleet, all the enemies ships made off as fast as they could towards the shore, except those two which were ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... and came slowly into it: with her first gleam the noises increased to a deafening uproar, and I began to see dim shapes about me. As she ascended and grew brighter, the noises became yet louder, and the shapes clearer. A furious battle was raging around me. Wild cries and roars of rage, shock of onset, struggle prolonged, all mingled with words articulate, surged in my ears. Curses and credos, snarls and sneers, laughter and mockery, sacred names and howls of hate, came huddling in chaotic interpenetration. Skeletons and phantoms ...
— Lilith • George MacDonald
... has the martial horizon grown dun, Not yet has the terrible conflict begun: But the tumult of legions,—the rush and the roar, Break over our borders, like waves on the shore. Along the Potomac, the confident foe Stands marshalled for onset,—prepared, at a blow, To vanquish the daring rebellion, and fling Utter ruin at ...
— Beechenbrook - A Rhyme of the War • Margaret J. Preston
... quickly as on land, at once charged the invaders in front, and sent round a detachment to take them in the rear. The assault was accordingly soon changed into a disgraceful flight, in which those who had been the loudest in urging to this rash onset set the example. Barca Gana, who had boasted himself invulnerable, was deeply wounded through his coat of mail and four cotton tobes, and with difficulty rescued by his chiefs from five La Sala horsemen, who had ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... of infantry who had started with good prospects in the Civil War, had early been given command of a brigade of volunteers and within the month had had his raw concourse of undrilled, undisciplined levies swept from under him in the first fierce onset at Shiloh. What else could have been expected of men to whom arms had been issued but ten days before, and who had not yet learned which end to bite from the cartridge? Hurled from his terrified horse, the general had been picked up senseless, to see no more of fighting until ...
— Tonio, Son of the Sierras - A Story of the Apache War • Charles King
... appearance with his army. The Numidians were assembled and drawn up by Jugurtha, as well as time permitted; and a battle was at once commenced. Where the king commanded in person, the struggle was maintained for some time; but the rest of his force was routed and put to flight at the first onset. The Romans took a considerable number of standards and arms, but not many prisoners; for, in almost every battle, their feet afforded more security to the Numidians ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust
... and would have folded her in his arms, but she evaded his onset and said with her dramatic intonation, "The knights of old won their lady-loves by brilliant deeds. If you are elected a member of Congress, you may come ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... earnest, and the weather to portend a gale. Then, the Atlantic seemed determined to prove that report had not exaggerated the hardships of a winter passage. It blew harder and harder all Friday, and after a brief lull on Saturday—as though gathering breath for the final onset—the storm fairly reached its height, and then slowly abated, leaving us substantial tokens of its visit in the shape of shattered boats, and the ruin of all our port bulwarks forward of the deck-house. I fancy there was nothing extraordinary in the ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... character. Hence the strict seclusion of girls almost universally practised among uncivilised peoples. The precautions taken indicate, as Hartland points out, that they are at this period not merely charged with a malign influence, but are peculiarly susceptible to the onset of powers other than human. And with a modification of language the same idea has persisted down to our time, even amongst those who would reject with indignation the statement that savage ideas concerning the nature of puberty form the real basis of their ...
— Religion & Sex - Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development • Chapman Cohen |
