"Detonation" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to take the glass which was all but slipping from his hand when Lakalatcha flamed with redoubled fury. It was as if the mountain had suddenly bared its fiery heart to the heavens, and a muffled detonation ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... down to the ledge; and from this point they and Oldham slung themselves down to the bed of the stream, by the same means. A few sappers had followed, when a box of dynamite exploded with a violent detonation, and the rest of the ...
— Through Three Campaigns - A Story of Chitral, Tirah and Ashanti • G. A. Henty
... was poured upon the burning sulphur and nitrate of soda with greater rapidity than before, by slightly elevating the spout, the effect was to blow up the pot on the top into the air to a height of upwards of seventy feet, accompanied by a loud detonation. With this the coroner and jury became convinced that whether or not the premises in Hillgate contained gunpowder, they contained elements as certainly explosive, and perhaps ...
— Fires and Firemen • Anon.
... consideration and will see to it that the powder chamber in which the explosion takes place as well as the breech lock on which the shock is exerted is of steel so wrought and tempered as to withstand the terrific strain. At the moment of detonation the shock will be about equal to that of a heavy engine and a train of Pullman coaches running at seventy miles an hour, smashing into a stone wall. On leaving the muzzle of the gun the shell will have an energy equivalent to that of a train of cars weighing 580 tons and running at ...
— Marvels of Modern Science • Paul Severing
... switch and closed it. As he did so the cabin rocked on its foundations and both Carnes and Walter were thrown to the ground. The thud of a detonation deep in the earth came ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various
... they looked, the strange craft quivered, tottered, and fell over on its side, and the next instant was enveloped in a blinding sheet of flame that brought with it a dull detonation and a ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... Tartars of the North, were ignorant of the use of gunpowder, and toward the end of the sixteenth century they still used the arms employed in the time of Genghis. Each one of Iermak's warriors faced a crowd of the enemy. If his bullet only killed one of them, the frightful detonation of his gun put to flight twenty or thirty. In the first combat, held on the bank of the Tobol, at a place called Babassan, Iermak, under shelter of intrenchments, checked by some discharges of musketry the impetuosity of ten thousand men of Mahmetkul's cavalry, who rushed forward ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... flash split up the sky as a stone splits a window pane. Pulsating streaks of fire, red, green, and blue, radiated in all directions, half-blinding them with the brazen glare. And before it faded, a crackling detonation seemed to rip the very ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... ye have th' belly-ache!" cried this tall man, and, without more warning, there was a tremendous flash and detonation, a mighty flying of the clear waters just under the bows of the foremost canoes ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... patch, he added the last trace of pressure. He saw a train of sparks leap from the jerking muzzle, and felt the butt jar upon his shoulder. Still, as is almost invariably the case with a man whose whole force of will is concentrated on holding the little sight on a living mark, he heard no detonation. He recognized, however, the unmistakable thud of the bullet smashing through soft flesh, and that was what he ...
— The Gold Trail • Harold Bindloss
... himself as to the choice of his victim; and the soldier, who was bold enough to undertake this double murder, has not force nor courage to consummate it. He flies, carrying in his hand a useless whip, with a heavy mantle on his shoulders, in spite of the detonation of two pistols at his ears, and the rapid steps of an angry master in pursuit, which ought to have set him upon some better means of escape. And we find this man, full of youth and vigor, lying with his face to the ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... adheres but very slightly, and the smallest additional force is capable of setting it free; and, when such force is applied, it often recovers the state of gas instantaneously. This rapid passage from the solid to the aeriform state is called detonation, or fulmination, because it is usually accompanied with noise and explosion. Deflagrations are commonly produced by means of combinations of charcoal either with nitre or oxygenated muriat of potash; sometimes, to assist the inflammation, sulphur is added; and, upon the just proportion ...
— Elements of Chemistry, - In a New Systematic Order, Containing all the Modern Discoveries • Antoine Lavoisier
... outrage; coup de main; strain, shock, shog^; spasm, convulsion, throe; hysterics, passion &c (state of excitability) 825. outbreak, outburst; debacle; burst, bounce, dissilience^, discharge, volley, explosion, blow up, blast, detonation, rush, eruption, displosion^, torrent. turmoil &c (disorder) 59; ferment &c (agitation) 315; storm, tempest, rough weather; squall &c (wind) 349; earthquake, volcano, thunderstorm. berserk, berserker; fury, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... upon the ice. The two men were almost lifted from their feet. Not far away they heard the tumultuous crash of the rising waves. As they were lashing the blubber to Ootah's sledge, a resounding detonation vibrated through the ice under him—the field on which they stood slowly ...
— The Eternal Maiden • T. Everett Harre
... any other time during the war. The howitzer battery was placed directly in front of the position, and poured forth a terrible fire over the whole face of the hill. Lyddite shells sped snorting into the trenches, and, with a terrific detonation, shot up the earth in clouds. One destroyed a laager on the kopje, others did fearful execution, striking the hard rocks and boulders, and spreading devastation far and wide. But still the enemy failed to budge from their strong entrenchments. The 62nd and 18th Field Batteries, under ...
— 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
... Detachment (milit.) tacxmento. Detail detalo. Details (minutes) detaleto. Detain malhelpi, deteni. Detect eltrovi. Deter malhelpi. Deteriorate difekti. Determine decidi. Determination decideco. Determined decida. Detest malami. Dethrone detroni. Detonation eksplodbruo. Detract kalumnii. Detriment malprofito, perdo. Detrimental malhelpa. Devastate dezertigi, ruinigi. Develope vastigi. Development vastigo. Deviate malrektigxi. Deviation malrektigxo. Device devizo. Devil diablo. Devine diveni. Devious malrekta. Devise (invent) ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... were still unharmed. But it was going hard with them. In fact, a fierce blow on his blade from a bludgeon shivered the weapon of the Frenchman. A sword was aimed at his heart. There was a blinding flash, a detonation, and the man who held it staggered back. The Countess, the last pistol almost touching the man's body, had pulled the trigger. Marteau seized the sword of the man who had menaced him. The next instant the chateau was shaken by a terrific roar. The Russians outside having constructed ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... This was the detonation which had so startled Jerry and Bob, and now, with others, they looked over the top of the trench at the ruins of the truck. It was blown apart, and the wooden body and wheels were scattered about while the engine was a mere mass of twisted and ...
— Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line - The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam • Clarence Young
... flash and detonation frightened them; whether Perdosa, still clinging to his rock, managed to turn their attention by his flanking efforts, or whether, quite simply, the wall of dead finally turned them back, I do not know, but with one accord ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... is that of having toys—such as imitation musical instruments, crackers which make an unpleasant detonation, imitations of negro minstrels, balloons, flags, and pasteboard lobsters, toads, and insects—presented to each lady. These articles are neither tasteful nor amusing, and have "no excuse for being" except that they afford an opportunity ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... any serious damage. As a mere pyrotechnic spectacle it was certainly a grand sight to watch the graceful curves of the live shells through the air—a parabola of vivid brightness against the black sky, as the burning fuse, fanned by its rapid motion, glowed like a shooting- star. The loud detonation, and explosion of fiery fragments that followed, however, was rather discomposing to the nerves, and unfavourable for restful slumber ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow
... by the side of the hearth where a few pieces of green wood smoked without burning, they started at each of the distant reports of the cannon. At each detonation that shook the window-panes, Mme. Favoral thought that it was, perhaps, the one that had ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... down the rope. The explosion had certainly done enough damage, and if the ice "cradle" beneath the vessel's keel had not been so thick she must have been sunk with the shock of the detonation. The ice "blanket" that covered her though had been shattered like a pane of glass—and, with picks thrown down onto the decks from above the boys soon cleared a path to the door of a ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... with the bayonet. As they saw the Pontificals swerve back they uttered cries of joy. It was two o'clock. The enemy's fire slackened; something was going on which the volunteers could not make out. All at once there was a sharp unfamiliar detonation, resembling the whirring sound of a machine. The French had ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... struck by the difference among them in regard to energy of explosion, and discovered that if a portion of free carbon, sufficient to combine with the oxygen disengaged from the nitro-glycerine, was present at the moment of detonation, the effect was greater than where, as in the case of gunpowder, the solid portion alone furnished oxygen enough to burn all the free carbon, without calling upon the nitro-glycerine for any. In fact, it appeared from experiment that ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 483, April 4, 1885 • Various
... thunder was uninterrupted. Now and then a vivid zig-zag flash gored the intense darkness with its baleful blue death-light, followed by a crash, appalling as if the battlements of heaven had been shattered. Once the whole air seemed ablaze, and the simultaneous shock of the detonation was so violent, that Beryl involuntarily sank on her knees, and hid her eyes on a chair. The rain fell in torrents, that added a solemn sullen swell to the diapason of the thunder fugue, and by degrees a delicious coolness crept into ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... mile with a beam whose cross section is not more than twenty or twenty-five feet in diameter. Our gunners, completely concealed beneath the foliage of the forest, with weapons which did not reveal their position, as did the flashes and detonation of the Twentieth Century artillery, hit their repeller rays ...
— The Airlords of Han • Philip Francis Nowlan
... Absolutely impossible, I tell you! What you are inventing now is impossible!... You forget that a shot from a gun, a shot from so powerful a weapon, makes a noise. Why, deuce take it, the detonation must be heard!" ...
— A Nest of Spies • Pierre Souvestre
... about what the new comers were was solved before we reached the river, for we could hear the rapid detonation of the stock-whips loud above the lowing of the cattle; so we sat and watched them debouche from the forest into the broad river meadows in the gathering gloom: saw the scene so venerable and ancient, so seldom seen in the Old World—the patriarchs moving into the desert ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... bare feet pattering on the parquet of the hall that restored his senses and as the door of the room flew open he stamped on the still burning electric bulb lying at his feet. The detonation as it flew into fragments came simultaneously with the sharp, stinging report of a small calibre pistol. The room was plunged into utter darkness in which could be heard the sound of two men breathing and the zinging of the mantelpiece brasses from ...
— Men of Affairs • Roland Pertwee
... as the bullets hissed over his head. The battle had begun! Another hour and the Mormon kingdom would be at the mercy of the avenging host from the mainland—and Marion would be his own for ever! He heard again the deep rumble of a heavy gun and from its sullen detonation he knew that it was fired from a ship at sea. A nearer crash of returning fire turned him into a deserted street down which he ran wildly, on past the last houses of the town, until he came to the foot of a hill up which he climbed more ...
— The Courage of Captain Plum • James Oliver Curwood
... that a loud explosion took place when the meteorite fell at Ensisheim. In this we have a characteristic feature of the phenomenon. Nearly all the descents of meteorites that have been observed seem to have been ushered in by a detonation. We do not, however, assert that this is quite an invariable feature; and it is also the case that meteors often detonate without throwing down any solid fragments that have been collected. The violence associated with the phenomenon is forcibly ...
— The Story of the Heavens • Robert Stawell Ball
... word seemed to have the explosive force of nitroglycerine. Its detonation rang through the room and left them all silent, as though their ears were stunned and their tongues paralyzed. Alec was the first to see that some event far out of the common had reduced his cousin, Count Julius Marulitch, almost ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... and walls with cement on metal lath, and otherwise protecting the openings. In it are installed apparatus for determining calorific value of explosives, pressure produced on ignition, susceptibility to ignition when dropped, rate of detonation, length and duration of flame, and kindred factors. Elsewhere on the grounds is a gallery of boiler-steel plate, 100 ft. long and more than 6 ft. in diameter, solidly attached to a mass of concrete at one end, in which is embedded a cannon from which to discharge the explosive ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXX, Dec. 1910 • Herbert M. Wilson
... the morning, in the midst of this hilarious scramble to be off to the floe, there was a flash and spit of fire, and the clap of an explosion, and the clatter of a sealing-gun on the bare floor; and in the breathless, dead little interval between the appalling detonation and a man's groan of dismay followed by a woman's choke and scream of terror, Dolly West, Bad-Weather Tom's small maid, stood swaying, wreathed in gray smoke, her little hands ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan
... a periscope depth, and I surveyed her from a position off her stern. She was sinking fast, but I felt so furious at being nearly trapped that I could not resist giving her a torpedo; detonation was complete, and a mass of wreckage shot into the air as the hull of the ship disappeared. As to the two boats, I left them to make the best course to land that ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... of fire. The fatal touch is given. The detonation of the blast goes shrieking up to heaven. The mansions of bonanza kings are tottering to their doom; That swirling tide of fiery fate halts at the gaping tomb. Beyond the cataclysm's brink, the multitude, too dazed to think, ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... as it was, had escaped detonation in the blast. He had only to stagger across the twenty yards separating him from it, then release the stud that would send ...
— Astounding Stories, May, 1931 • Various
... the emerging men; he hurled another. A leap of blue flame, which flared high and blinding, followed its detonation. He hurled at the other causeway, first halting by a bomb the out rush of men; and thus he marked the mouth of this second causeway the next instant by a sheet ...
— The Boy Allies with Haig in Flanders • Clair W. Hayes
... 22, 1831, a violent detonation was suddenly heard in the coal mine of Bois-Monzil, belonging to M. Robinot. The waters from the old works rushed impetuously along the new galleries. "The waters, the waters!" such was the cry that resounded from the affrighted workmen throughout the mine. Only ten miners out of twenty-six were ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... in the comparative calm under the tree, drifting closer to him, started to obey. But it suddenly approached his face, and seized with a reckless terror, he snatched off his hat and batted at it as one would at a pestilent bee. Instantly there was a blinding glare, a stunning detonation, and a violent air-wave which threw me clear off my feet and to the ground. I sat up blindly with my vision full of opalescent lights and my ears ringing, unable ...
— Disowned • Victor Endersby
... this time the cannon were thundering—so close that it seemed each hilltop would bring them into view, and as the detonation puffed across the landscape, one even fancied one could feel the concussion in one's ear. Up from a field ahead of us an aeroplane rose and, in a wide spiral, went climbing up the sky, now almost cleared, ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... the Nordenfeldt shields with the bullets pattering against the steel and stinging the air overhead? He or his ghost, barefoot in the sand that sopped the blood of fallen comrades, the ship shaking with the detonation of her guns, the hoarse cheering of her crew re-echoing in his half- deafened ears? A dream, yes; tragic and wonderful in the retrospect, filled with wild, ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne
... float for hours—in the open sea—and be picked up not much the worse for it. I might have lasted it out better than many others. There's nothing the matter with my heart." He withdrew his right fist from his pocket, and the blow he struck on his chest resounded like a muffled detonation in ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... downward plunging he had reached the river bank. The tranquil silver surface quivered and glittered before him. He saw what he knew he would see, the black target of a man's head above it, making for the Bar. He took deliberate aim and fired. There was no echo to that sharp detonation; a distant dog barked, there was a slight whisper in the trees beside him, that was all! But the head of the man was no longer visible, and the liquid silver filmed over again, without a ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... way. This is the bombardier-beetle, common in certain other countries, but also found in England, which if chased will discharge from its stern a puff of bluish-white smoke, accompanied by a slight detonation. It can fire many shots from its stern chasers. It is said that a highly volatile liquid is secreted by glands, which when it meets the air passes into vapour so suddenly as to produce ...
— Ranching, Sport and Travel • Thomas Carson
... was racing back again, running as madly as if a troop of demons was after him. A flash cleft the darkness; a deep detonation thundered and echoed against the hills; the building against which Hetty leaned shook as if an earthquake had seized it, and Thursday Smith was thrown flat on his face and rolled almost to the terrified girl's feet, where he lay motionless. Only ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces on Vacation • Edith Van Dyne
... melts. Therefore, when this same wind a-fire Hath split black cloud, it scatters the fire-seeds, Which, so to say, have been pressed out by force Of sudden from the cloud;—and these do make The pulsing flashes of flame; thence followeth The detonation which attacks our ears More tardily than aught which comes along Unto the sight of eyeballs. This takes place— As know thou mayst—at times when clouds are dense And one upon the other piled aloft With wonderful upheavings—nor be thou Deceived because we see how broad ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... knowledge of explosives, and I know of nothing that would produce such results as we have here. Perhaps Professor Carl Seigfried could give you some information on that point. The science of detonation has been his life study, and he stands head and shoulders above his ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... descending perpendicularly, with a steady force; and the thunder rolled far off, as if coming from under the sea. Sometimes the muffled rumbling stopped, and let us hear plainly the gentle hiss and the patter of the drops falling upon a vast expanse. Suddenly, mingled with a loud detonation right over our heads, a burst of light outlined under the bellying strip of our sail the pointed crown of Castro's hat, reposing on a heap of black clothing huddled in the bows. The darkness swallowed it all. I swung Seraphina in front of ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... fright the savages from their propriety. Beaujeu and a dozen more fell dead upon the spot, and the Indians already began to fly, their courage being unable to endure the unwonted tumult of such a portentous detonation. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... hands in the pockets of his sheepskin coat and his shoulders hunched up to his ears under the falling snow. On being overtaken this peasant suddenly faced about and swung his arm. In an instant there was a terrible shock, a detonation muffled in the multitude of snowflakes; both horses lay dead and mangled on the ground and the coachman, with a shrill cry, had fallen off the box mortally wounded. The footman (who survived) had no ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... our eyes at the willows. After an interval a long stab of light pierced the dusk and the round detonation of old-fashioned black powder shook the silence. There came to us the babbling of voices released. At the same instant the newly risen moon plastered us against that whitewashed wall like insects pinned in a ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... The detonation was answered by a cry, a scream of pain, from the lighted cage. It paused on the instant, like a bird stricken a-wing, some four floors below, but at ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... Dick, Dave and Tom, their ears rang with the noise until they felt as though surely their ear-drums had been ruptured by the force of that awesome detonation. ...
— The Grammar School Boys in Summer Athletics • H. Irving Hancock |
