"Skirmish" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... books of the Association; for the body held its meetings without exercising its undoubted prerogative of "blotting out" the scene of outrage "from the map of Ireland." On the second occasion, the wreckers of Conciliation Hall were met as they deserved, and after a short skirmish ...
— The Felon's Track • Michael Doheny
... the Discovery of several Islands, and an Interview and Skirmish with the Inhabitants upon one of them. The Arrival of the Ship at Tanna, and the ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... should be ultimately destroyed by the enemy it mattered little, for by capturing the non-combatants the Queres still remained masters of the situation. Tyope was explaining all this to the Hishtanyi Chayan; and the two, in consequence of their conversation, had remained behind the foremost skirmish-line. The shaman was listening, and from time to time grunting assent ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier
... skirmish the idolaters triumphed over the royal army sent against them, and full of confidence they resolved to march upon Kailua. The King sent an envoy to try and conciliate them, and came very near being an envoy short by the operation; the savages not only refused to listen to him, but wanted to kill ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the south was shot in the course of a skirmish, and the revolution was now finally crushed. The numbers who paid the fullest penalty for their active discontent were very great, and the final embers of the insurrection were extinguished to the tune ...
— South America • W. H. Koebel
... unserviceable by the wet. The first engagement of importance was that of the 21st of August between Wallmoden and Davoust at Vellahn. A few days afterward, Theodore Korner, the youthful poet and hero, fell in a skirmish between the French and Wallmoden's outpost at Gadebusch.—Oudinot advanced close upon Berlin, which was protected by the crown prince of Sweden. A murderous conflict took place, on the 23d of August, at ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks
... the English, Iberville, Sainte-Helene, and Perrot issued forth with three hundred sharpshooters and a band of Huron Indians. In the skirmish that followed, Iberville and Perrot pressed with a handful of men forward very close to the ranks of the English. In the charge which the New Englander ordered, Iberville and Perrot saw Gering, and they tried hard to reach him. But the movement ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... With his usual hauteur he prepared to teach the ex-Marquis his place from the outset. He placed for him a stiff small chair; but the envoy quickly repelled the slight and vindicated the honour of the Republic by occupying the largest arm-chair available. After this preliminary skirmish things went more smoothly; but only the briefest summary of their conversation can be given here. Chauvelin assured Grenville of the desire of France to respect the neutrality of the Dutch, though they had fired on two French vessels entering the Scheldt. The opening of that ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... well, when he made this allusion to mischief formerly done to the crew of the Foam, that he touched a rankling sore in the breast of Scraggs, who in a skirmish with the natives some time before had lost an eye; and the idea of revenging himself on the defenseless women and children of his enemies was so congenial to the mind of the second mate, that his objections to act willingly under Manton's orders ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... presence in broken culverts and other damage to the railway. After falling back for the night to Witteputs, the patrol marched north-eastward on the morning of the 10th, and encountered several hundred Boers, with field guns, a few miles to the east of Belmont. A skirmish ensued in which Lt.-Col. C. E. Keith-Falconer was killed, Lt. C. C. Wood mortally wounded, and Lts. F. Bevan and H. C. Hall and four men wounded. To the westward of the railway line a detachment of thirty of Rimington's Guides successfully reconnoitred as far as Prieska. Though ...
— History of the War in South Africa 1899-1902 v. 1 (of 4) - Compiled by Direction of His Majesty's Government • Frederick Maurice
... Spaniards being killed and several wounded, we succeeded in taking their commander." In his report he complimented this Spanish officer, Don Miguel Tyrason, upon his gallantry. Near a hundred Spaniards were made prisoners in this sharp skirmish. ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... day with Mrs. McKinstry, or it is doubtful whether she would have allowed even this close to the skirmish, for she had a taste for such encounters. Blair however heard the dripping and swashing of water in the rear of the house as he went up the narrow stairway. The wide cap-border of Mrs. McKinstry was fanning backwards and forwards, as she bent with a regular motion over ...
— The Boy Patriot • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... the month our cavalry relieved the infantry on the line of the Rapidan, and on the nineteenth, in a sharp skirmish between Stuart's and Bayard's forces, Captain Charles Walters, of the Harris Light Cavalry, was killed. This officer was very popular in the regiment, and his death cast a gloom over all. Wrapped in a soldier's blanket his body was consigned to a soldier's ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... revolutions and usurpations, faction began to prevail among the nobility, which invited Ceodwalla, King of Wessex, with his brother, Mollo, to attack the kingdom. These invaders committed great devastations in Kent; but the death of Mollo, who was slain in a skirmish [h], gave a short breathing-time to that kingdom. Widred restored the affairs of Kent, and, after a reign of thirty-two years [i], left the crown to his posterity. Eadbert, Ethelbert, and Alric, his descendants, successively mounted the throne. After the ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... is a beautiful lakelet, about five miles south of Loch Katrine. On its eastern side is the scene of Helen Macgregor's skirmish with the King's troops in Rob Roy; and near its head, on the northern side, is a waterfall, which is the original of Flora MacIvor's favorite retreat in Waverley. Aberfoyle is a village about a mile and a half to the ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... side street, soon after such a skirmish had swept it from end to end, a dark figure glided from door to door. He had not fought; he seemed unwilling to do so, for at the sound of approaching conflict he was in readiness to retreat and hide himself. More than one wounded man in the roadway pleaded for help, ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... guard had arrived, and before Sigel could form had passed around to his front, at the same time enveloping his flanks. By the skilful disposition of his detachment, and the admirable conduct of the men, Sigel was able to resume and continue his march, an unbroken skirmish, rising at times into engagement, from half-past ten o'clock till half-past three, when he was joined by reinforcements which General Curtis had hurried back to him. The line was formed, facing to the south, on the crest of the bluffs overlooking the Valley of Sugar Creek, Sigel being on ...
— From Fort Henry to Corinth • Manning Ferguson Force
... visited all the principal battlefields. In England the impression was that the bloodiest battle was fought at Gravelotte. The error was due, I believe, to our having no war correspondent on the spot. Compared with that on the plains between St. Marie and St. Privat, Gravelotte was but a cavalry skirmish. We were fortunate enough to meet a German artillery officer at St. Marie who had been in the action, and who kindly explained the distribution of the forces. Large square mounds were scattered ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... not the man, who led that forlorn hope, and I did think I should have a rosette at least, when others got stars and bars for far less dangerous deeds. Never mind, my master knew the truth, and thanked me for my help by keeping me always with him till the sad day when he was shot in a skirmish, and lay for hours with none to watch and mourn over him but ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... to Senlis urging Charles to come up with the main army. He went on September 1—the king promised to start next day. D'Alencon returned to the Maid, the king still loitered. At last d'Alencon brought him to St. Denis on September 7, and there was a skirmish that day. ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... gave me a thought. The blow was a final one. My last hopes were shattered with a crash, just as a block of ice, thawed by the sunshine of spring, suddenly falls into tiny morsels. I was utterly defeated at the first skirmish, and, like the Prussians at Jena, lost everything at once in one day. No, she was not angry ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... They dwelt in mud huts thatched with straw. They had no currency and no ventilation,—no drafts, in other words. Their boats were made of wicker-work plastered with clay. Their swords were made of tin alloyed with copper, and after a brief skirmish, the entire army had to fall back ...
— Comic History of England • Bill Nye
... to be merely those of private ambition. There it had been one scene of wasting sickness. A few deeds of arms had been done to refresh the spirits of the French, such as the taking of the fort of Carthage, and now and then a skirmish of some foraging party; but in general the Moors launched their spears and fled without staying for combat. Many who had hid themselves in the vaults and cellars of Carthage had been dragged out and put ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... screen that do everything but talk. Thrilling display of the heroism of American Soldiers during the Spanish-American War! See the landing of the Regulars under fire! See men fall in actual battle before your very eyes! Watch the charge up San Juan Hill—the thrilling infantry skirmish! ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... was cross with everybody for what was nobody's fault, revenged himself all dinner-time by never speaking a word to his next neighbour, Miss Newbroom, who was longing with all her heart to talk sentiment to him about the Exhibition; and when Argemone, in the midst of a brilliant word- skirmish with Lord Vieuxbois, stole a glance at him, he chose to fancy that they were both talking of him, and looked ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... man was a creature so vile and degraded, no man with the commonest pretension to honesty would dream of employing him. The history of his father could be adduced, and any private little anecdotes of his mother would find a favourable opportunity for mention. Though a mere skirmish, if judiciously managed, this will occupy a week or two, and at the same time serve to indicate that you mean to show fight; for by this time the 'Legale's' blood will be up, and he is certain to make reprisals on your man, so that for a month or so you and the other principal ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... a narrow valley between the Camel's Back and Thunder Cloud Mountain. A mile or so from the entrance to the glen the road, always bad and now almost washed away by the recent heavy rains, became impassable. The party abandoned the machines and in skirmish ...
— More Tish • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... this letter was written, the young man was sent for. He and his company had captured a number of men in a skirmish. ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... this doubtful situation, which lasted about a quarter of an hour, the ship, from which a much greater number of natives were seen than could be discovered on shore, brought her broad side to bear, and entirely dispersed them, by firing a few shot over their heads. In this skirmish, only two of them were hurt with the small shot, and not a single life was lost; a case which would not have happened if Lieutenant Cook had not restrained his men, who either from fear or the love of mischief, shewed ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... milkmaid), drank himself daily drunk with brimming healths to the king, council, and bishops; held orgies with the Laird of Lagg, Theophilus Oglethorpe, and Sir James Turner; and lastly, took his gray gelding, and joined Clavers at Killiecrankie. At the skirmish of Dunkeld, 1689, he was shot dead by a Cameronian with a silver button (being supposed to have proof from the Evil One against lead and steel), and his grave is still called, the Wicked ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... in 'The State Trials,' was that the attack was dangerous; that the plan was to cut down and resuscitate Wilson; that Porteous did not order, but tried to prevent, the firing; and that neither at first nor in a later skirmish at the West Bow did he fire himself. There was much "cross swearing" at the trial of Porteous (July 20); the jury found him guilty, and he was sentenced to be hanged on September 8. A petition from him to Queen Caroline (George ...
— A Short History of Scotland • Andrew Lang
... of General McDowell's army had a skirmish with General Longstreet's brigade at Blackburn's Ford, which the Rebels call the battle of Bull Run, while that which was fought on the 21st they call the battle of Manassas. General Beauregard expected that ...
— My Days and Nights on the Battle-Field • Charles Carleton Coffin
... under that name—a slender, brown-eyed girl, as blithesome as a bird. No, I had not forgotten; only the magic of three years has made of you a woman. Again and again have I questioned in Montreal and Quebec, but no one seemed to know. At the convent they said your father fell in Indian skirmish." ...
— Beyond the Frontier • Randall Parrish
... Indians were routed and pursued by Captain Freeman's company, and a squad of the Third Regiment men, with a howitzer. Their camp was captured, which contained quite an amount of plunder. A light skirmish took place on the 29th of September, in which the enemy was routed, and this affair ended the siege ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau
... the inside of the inclosure, with the beat close to the fence, for the purpose of keeping the men in camp. No enlisted man could go out except on a pass signed by his captain, and approved by the colonel. The drilling of the men was conducted principally inside the grounds, but on skirmish drill we went outside, in order to have room enough. The quarters or barracks of the men were, for each company, a rather long, low structure, crudely built of native lumber and covered with clapboards and a top dressing of straw, containing two rows of bunks, one above and one below. These shacks ...
— The Story of a Common Soldier of Army Life in the Civil War, 1861-1865 • Leander Stillwell
... the cornet, whose young blood was boiling for a skirmish; "you will at least drive them to the shore, where I can ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... force consisted of one company of cavalry and four companies of infantry, of Major Nethercote's North Carolina battalion. After a brief skirmish we dispersed the rebels, killing two, wounded and missing amounting to fifty. Our loss was two wounded and four missing. The advance then moved on, after crossing a bridge, partly destroyed, over a creek, and being delayed an hour in fixing ...
— Kinston, Whitehall and Goldsboro (North Carolina) expedition, December, 1862 • W. W. Howe
... to me the gates of war. The occasion was this, he had resented, with a shower of stones, an affront offered to us by an individual boy, belonging to a cotton-factory; for more than two years afterward, this became the teterrima causa of a skirmish, or a battle, as often as we passed the factory; and, unfortunately, that was twice a day on every day except Sunday. Our situation in respect to the enemy was as follows: Greenhay, a country-house ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... hand, Parker smiled and bowed his thanks, and the two parted with feelings of perfect kindness, notwithstanding the little skirmish with ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... debt,—not the maiming of strong men and their violent removal from the future labors of peace, nor the emotional suffering of thousands of families whose hearts are in the field with their dear ones, tossed to and fro in every skirmish, where the balls slay more than the bodies which are pierced: not these evils alone,—nor the feverish excitement of eighteen millions of people, whose gifts and intelligence are all distraught, and at the mercy of every bulletin,—nor yet the possible violations of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various
... since he had become aware of her flight, George was thankful that the girl had disappeared. He perceived that he had too quickly eliminated Percy from the list of the Things That Matter. Engrossed with his own affairs, and having regarded their late skirmish as a decisive battle from which there would be no rallying, he had overlooked the possibility of this annoying and unnecessary person following them in another cab—a task which, in the congested, slow-moving traffic, must have been a perfectly simple one. Well, here ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... quarrels which gave rise to numbers of old tales and songs. However, the Protector invaded Scotland; and ARRAN, the Scottish Regent, with an army twice as large as his, advanced to meet him. They encountered on the banks of the river Esk, within a few miles of Edinburgh; and there, after a little skirmish, the Protector made such moderate proposals, in offering to retire if the Scotch would only engage not to marry their princess to any foreign prince, that the Regent thought the English were afraid. But in this he made a horrible mistake; ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... but a skirmish. The date of the beginning of the real contest was Sept. 12, 1786, when, it was voted "to build a new meeting-house in the centre of the town, or in the nearest convenient place to the centre." It was thus agreed that a new house was to be built, but where to build ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, February, 1886. - The Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 2, February, 1886. • Various
... intolerance of shortcomings. If Marston cared to bother about breaking such a humble citizen, malice had a handy weapon. But most of all was Mayo concerned with the view Alma Marston would take of the situation. She would either believe that he had fallen overboard in the skirmish with the attacking Polly or had deserted without warning—and in the case of a lover both suppositions were agonizing. His distress was so apparent that the girl, from her seat on the opposite transom, extended sympathy in the glances she dared to ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... anthropological ways of treating the Daphne myth. The question of our allies then coming up, I stated my reasons for regarding Prof. Tiele 'rather as an ally than an adversary,' the reason being his own statement. Presently, I replied to Prof. Tiele's criticism of my treatment of the myth of Cronos. After a skirmish on Italian fields, I gave my reasons for disagreeing with Mr. Max Muller's view of Mannhardt's position. His theory of Demeter Erinnys was contrasted with that of Mr. Max Muller. Totemism occupied us next, and the views of Mr. Max Muller and ...
— Modern Mythology • Andrew Lang
... on Saturdays, my father allers throws a skirmish line of niggers across the road, with orders to capture my grandfather as he comes romancin' along. An' them faithful servitors never fails. They swarms down on my grandfather, searches him out of the saddle an' packs him exultin'ly ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... the twentieth of July the Army of the North was encamped about seven miles from Beaureguard's lines at Bull Run. The volunteers were singing, shouting, girding their loins for the fray. They had heard the firing on the first skirmish line. Fifteen or twenty men had ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon
... did not remain there. He sprang to his feet, and renewed the attack. But he had lost his confidence. He was bewildered, and, to confess the truth, panic-stricken, and the second skirmish was ...
— Hector's Inheritance - or The Boys of Smith Institute • Horatio Alger
... big battle in which the Cresville chums had taken part. They had been out on skirmish work and on night patrol, and they had come in conflict with parties of Germans, but no large bodies. They had even each been wounded slightly, but never before, in all their lives, had they had a part in such ...
— Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line - The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam • Clarence Young
... opportunity for seeing the final conflict preceding the surrender. Presently up out of the little valley where Floing is located came the Germans, deploying just on the rim of the plateau a very heavy skirmish-line, supported by a line of battle at close distance. When these skirmishers appeared, the French infantry had withdrawn within its intrenched lines, but a strong body of their cavalry, already formed in ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. II., Part 6 • P. H. Sheridan
... Victoria to Charing Cross is a journey that occupies no considerable time, and Babington found himself at his destination with five minutes to wait. At twenty past his cousin arrived, and they made their way to the theatre. A brief skirmish with a liveried menial in the lobby, and they were ...
— Tales of St. Austin's • P. G. Wodehouse
... go take a coronet of our horse, As many lancers, and light armed knights As may suffice for such an enterprise, And place them in the grove of Caledon. With these, when as the skirmish doth increase, Retire thou from the shelters of the wood, And set upon the weakened Troyans' backs, For policy joined with chivalry Can never be put ...
— 2. Mucedorus • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... possibly avoid it, for there is none other that I like so much, and none else so much deserves it; for we were the light regiment of the Light Division, and fired the first and last shot in almost every battle, siege, and skirmish, in which the army was engaged ...
— Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, in the Peninsula, France, and the Netherlands - from 1809 to 1815 • Captain J. Kincaid
... armed with bows and arrows, from which they screened themselves in their ship with a fence of planks; and they defended themselves with so much spirit that their enemies were forced to retire, after giving them battle for an hour. Thorwald received a severe wound from an arrow in this skirmish, of which he died; and over his grave, on a cape or promontory, two crosses were erected at his request; from which the cape was called Krossa-ness, or ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... a man too much accustomed to the ancient state of manners in the Highlands, to look upon the issue of such a skirmish as anything worthy of wonder ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... worshipful burgher! and let our skirmish end in something that may be useful to both. Thou hast that which would be acceptable to me, and I have that which no owner of cheeses would refuse, did he know the means by which it might be come ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... wide pink baldness running so far back from his prominent temples and forehead that when he tipped his face toward the blue joists overhead, enjoying the fatigue of a well-filled day, his polished skull sent back the firelight brilliantly. There was a light skirmish of conversation going on, in which he took no part. No one seemed really acquainted with another. Presently a man sitting next on the left of him put away a quill toothpick in his watch-pocket, looked up into the face of the standing man, and ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... stood temptingly within my reach, if he did not get out incontinently—to jump up and array myself with all due speed; for, when I had collected my bewildered thoughts, I well remembered that we had settled on a fox-hunt before breakfast, as a preliminary to a fresh skirmish ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... stream proved no better than that they had left, and the only signs of inhabitants they met were savage and hostile tribes of Indians, with whom they kept up a steady skirmish. Some of the more friendly told them that the fruitful land they sought was but a few days' journey down the river, and they went wearily on, day by day, as the promised land still fled before their feet. Doubtless they were led by their ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... seemed to me that I must be elbowed into my skirmish by the most unexpected of chances, but Nais was firmly minded that there should be no fight, if courage on her part could turn it. "Come out with me," she whispered, "and keep distant from the light of ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... ascertained that more than half of this number were among those who rode express to the "settlements" to carry the news of their gallant attack upon General Black Hawk and his British band. Such was the panic among the troops engaged in this skirmish, that they reported the Indian force at 1500 and even 2000 men! Black Hawk's statement has already been given, in which he places his number at forty; and one of the volunteers whose horse was lame, and who hid himself, and watched the Indians as they passed him in the pursuit and on ...
— Great Indian Chief of the West - Or, Life and Adventures of Black Hawk • Benjamin Drake
... the three bands were in motion, the main bodies marching north, south, and east, while strong parties were sent out from each to skirmish in all directions. ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... quote Miss Anthony's own words, "As usual when she had fired her gun she went home and left me to finish the battle." In this case it lasted several days, but Mrs. Stanton knew she could count upon her friend to defend her to the last ditch. Miss Anthony was always on the skirmish line. She would interview the married women who could not leave home and children, get their approval of her plans and then go to the front. Once or twice a year she would gather her hosts for a big battle, but the rest of the time she did picket duty, acted as scout and penetrated alone the ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... half a mile, following along the track by which you came! If you had been awake—and cooking—or singing—or making any sort of noise they must have heard you! Instead, they turned down toward the plain a little short distance too soon—and my men met them—and there was a skirmish—and I rallied my other men, and attacked them suddenly. We accounted for two of the tin-plate men, and so many of the thing they call a regiment that the others took to flight. Jannam! (My soul!) But you are paragons ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... mutineers did not, however, offer themselves to be browned like a pack of helpless sheep for long. They were Africans who had been born in an atmosphere of scuffle and skirmish, and death had no especial terrors for them. Moreover, they had learnt certain elements of the modern art of war from white officers; and now, in the moment of trial, their dull brains worked, and the crafty knowledge came back to them. They were a thousand ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... continued. About half-past five p.m., 300 or 400 persons, chiefly boys, came along the Strand, shouting, "No Peel!" "Down with the raw lobsters!" (the new police); "This way, my lads; we'll give it them!" At the back of the menageries at Charing Cross the police rushed upon them, and after a skirmish put them to flight. At seven o'clock the vast crowd by Temple Bar compelled every coachman and passenger in a coach, as a passport, to pull off his hat and shout "Huzza!" Stones were thrown, and attempts were made to close the gates of the Bar. The City marshals, however, compelled ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... said it! This sure is a hell of a war. Tough on a guy's feet. Yeah, that's right. Holland Tunnel skirmish. Where the Ruskies used that new gun. Uhuh. God! It was awful. Guys popping off all around a guy and him not knowing why. No sense to it. No noise. No ...
— Belly Laugh • Gordon Randall Garrett
... after his skirmish with Orleans and Dunois, one of his comrades had, at Lord Crawford's command, replaced the morion, cloven by the sword of the latter, with one of the steel lined bonnets which formed a part of the proper and well known equipment of the Scottish Guards. That an individual ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... an insignificant skirmish when Washington attacked Jumonville near Pittsburgh, and it is now remembered by only a line or two in our histories and the little cairn of stones "far up among the mountain fogs near the headwaters of the Youghiogheny River," which ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley
... to succour the Danes, king Edmund is forced to get him out of the field, the Englishmen put to their hard shifts and slaine by heapes; what noble personages were killed in this battell, of two dead bodies latelie found in the place where this hot and heauie skirmish ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (7 of 8) - The Seventh Boke of the Historie of England • Raphael Holinshed
... There was a skirmish of small talk, during which Mr. Clamp was placid and self-conscious, while his vis-a-vis, though smiling and apparently at ease, was yet alert and excited,—darting furtive glances, that would have startled him like flashes of sunlight reflected from ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... have had the sanction of a decree." The bulk of the Parliament was provoked at the President's unguarded expression, baited him very fiercely, and then I made some pretence to go out, leaving Quatresous, a young man of the warmest temper, in the House to skirmish with him in my stead, as having experienced more than once that the only way to get anything of moment passed in Parliamentary or other assemblies is to exasperate the young men against the ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... were estimated, I should say that was about the most effective piece of generalship on record. If the gentleman who conducted that neat little skirmish were living to-day there would not be a question as to his eligibility for a third term, unit rule or no unit rule. If we could provide our generals with a bone like that, we might reduce the standing army sufficiently to reassure the ...
— Men, Women, and Gods - And Other Lectures • Helen H. Gardener
... something mysterious about his early years, and something baleful about his silent warfare with Napoleon. As a very young soldier he had been an Austrian officer in 1793. His command served in Belgium; and there, in a skirmish, he was overpowered by the French in superior numbers, but resisted desperately. In the melee a saber slashed him across the right side of his face, and he was made prisoner. The wound deprived him of his right eye, so that for ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... the country may be poor, but in America such never suffer for food. If hunger threatens, the children can skirmish among the neighbors. The village of Danvers was separated by only a mile or so of swale and swamp from Salem, a place that once rivaled Boston commercially, and in matters of black cats, and elderly women who aviated on broomsticks ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 11 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Businessmen • Elbert Hubbard
... still firmly believed that Prussia would accomplish her great purpose, and defeat Napoleon. The disastrous skirmish of Saalfeld, and the death of Prince Louis Ferdinand, had made a bad impression, but not shaken the ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... began in the usual fashion an hour later, and throughout all that long, dismal morning it was a continual skirmish. The savages pressed closer than ever, and all the vigilance and accuracy of the riflemen were needed to drive them off. One man was killed and several were wounded, but the borderers merely shut their teeth down the ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... mounted and armed, and attended by about a dozen officers and servants. He told Sir Moses he came to offer him his services and to do him honour, and that in this Holy Land he respected persons of all religions. He directed his soldiers to skirmish up and down the sides of the mountain, charging and retreating for our amusement. The Cadi (Judge) and his son also joined our party, paying Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore
... I would correspond with her, but communication was cut off, and I could not send or receive a letter from Belogorsk. My only pastime consisted in military sorties. Thanks to Pougatcheff I had an excellent horse, and I shared my meager pittance with it. I went out every day beyond the ramparts to skirmish with Pougatcheff's advance guards. The rebels had the best of it; they had plenty of food and were well mounted. Our poor cavalry were in no condition to oppose them. Sometimes our half-starved infantry went into the field; ...
— Marie • Alexander Pushkin
... he had prepared for his own instruction. He was obliged to begin with the officers, that they might be qualified to assist him in instructing the men under their command. He was then able to institute regimental, squad, skirmish, and bayonet drill, and kept his men at these exercises from six to eight hours daily till the Forty-second won the reputation of being the best drilled regiment to be ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... more than in a thousand other places of Greek and Latin, old and modern writings, but the sweet fruits of amorous dalliance, which Venus liketh best when reaped in secret, and culled by fervent lovers filchingly. Why so, I prithee tell? Because, when the feat of the loose-coat skirmish happeneth to be done underhand and privily, between two well-disposed, athwart the steps of a pair of stairs lurkingly, and in covert behind a suit of hangings, or close hid and trussed upon an unbound faggot, it is more pleasing to the Cyprian goddess, ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... his return to the house at noon, had given, in answer to Rutherford's eager inquiries, an account of the "skirmish" as he called it. Rutherford was so proud of his friend, and of the victory he had won, that at the first opportunity, he told the story to Miss Gladden, before Houston had even returned to the office. Miss Gladden was enthusiastic ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... Spaniards. The natives, confident of their strength, refused to listen, and began to discharge their culverins and a few arrows. The captain, seeing that they would not listen to reason, ordered them to be fired upon. The skirmish lasted in one place or the other about three hours, since the Spaniards could not assault or enter the fort because of the moat of water surrounding it. But, as fortune would have it, the natives had left on the other side, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 - Volume III, 1569-1576 • E.H. Blair
... sympathy fail. And as Edwin would be exasperated because Maggie's attitude towards argument was that of a woman, so would Maggie resent a certain mulishness in him characteristic of the unfathomable stupid sex. Once a week, for example, when his room was 'done out,' there was invariably a skirmish between them, because Edwin really did hate anybody to 'meddle among his things.' The derangement of even a brush on the dressing-table would rankle in his mind. Also he was very 'crotchety about his meals,' and on the subject of fresh air. Unless he was sitting in a perceptible draught, he ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... with the road from Grand Gulf to Raymond and Jackson was reached, Logan with his division was turned to the left towards Grand Gulf. I went with him a short distance from this junction. McPherson had encountered the largest force yet met since the battle of Port Gibson and had a skirmish nearly approaching a battle; but the road Logan had taken enabled him to come up on the enemy's right flank, and they soon gave way. McPherson was ordered to hold Hankinson's ferry and the road back to Willow Springs with one division; McClernand, who was now in the rear, ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant
... remember, after repelling the French attack, and standing in square against two heavy charges of cuirassiers, the first thing I saw where the French battery had stood, was Phil Beamish and about a handful of brave fellows, all that remained from the skirmish. He captured two of the enemy's field-pieces, and was 'Captain Beamish' ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... The king's troops, with a shout, pushed on to Concord. Most of the military stores, however, which they had come to destroy had been removed. A British detachment advanced to Concord Bridge, and in the skirmish here the Americans returned ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... thing to do," declared Bud. "Some of us have got to go down there and stop 'em from crossing. This is the first skirmish of ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker
... I replied. But it seemed as if they never would, for what promised to be an attack along our whole line dwindled down to a mere exchange of shots. Hour after hour went by, and yet they never advanced beyond a certain point except when a company or so would dash forward and a sharp skirmish would break forth for a moment or two, and then die away again. But far over to our left the sound of the battle came rolling nearer and nearer, telling the tale of Sullivan's men ...
— The Tory Maid • Herbert Baird Stimpson
... Fall of Londonderry expected Succours arrive from England Treachery of Lundy; the Inhabitants of Londonderry resolve to defend themselves Their Character Londonderry besieged The Siege turned into a Blockade Naval Skirmish in Bantry Bay A Parliament summoned by James sits at Dublin A Toleration Act passed; Acts passed for the Confiscation of the Property of Protestants Issue of base Money The great Act of Attainder James prorogues ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... send him word and he will have them sent back, or others as good in their places. Oh, you do not know how dreadful to be at feud with a man like Fergus Mac-Ivor. I was only a girl of ten when my father and his servants had a skirmish with a party of them, near our home-farm—so near, indeed, that some of the windows of the house were broken by the bullets, and three of the Highland raiders were killed. I remember seeing them brought in and laid on the floor in the hall, each wrapped in his plaid. And next ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... their first course should hold, To skirmish with them, vpon euery stay, But fight by no meanes with them, though they would, Except they finde them forraging for pray, So still you haue them shut vp in a Fould, And still to Callis keepe them in their way; So Fabius wearied Hanibal, so we May English Henry, ...
— The Battaile of Agincourt • Michael Drayton
... the argument: promote your deserving men, but do not be afraid to hire a keen outsider; he helps everybody, even the kickers, for if you disintegrate and go down in defeat, the kickers will have to skirmish around for new jobs ...
— Love, Life & Work • Elbert Hubbard
... many wonderful deeds, and if any devised a sport, warriors, joyous in strife, welcomed it straightway. So were the knights proven before the guests, and they of Gunther's land won glory. The wounded also came forth to take part with their comrades, to skirmish with the buckler, and to shoot the shaft, and waxed strong thereby, and ...
— The Fall of the Niebelungs • Unknown
... procured; the prisoners were passed below and secured; and we then had time to turn our attention to the other craft. Where was she? During the skirmish I had caught a momentary glimpse of her at about a cable's length on our port beam through the glancing of the pistol-flashes on her spars and rigging, but now she was nowhere ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... the woman who labored with us. Paul, divining that she meant the kitchen, fled down-stairs. I stole a look at Emma Hulett's face as she bent over the sister she had not seen in thirty years, and I knew that Mrs. Purdon's battle was won. It even seemed that she had won another skirmish in her never-ending war with death, for a little warmth began to come back ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... too late to call back the cavalry. Peter's eyes followed Boylan's sweeping arm. The horsemen were in skirmish on the slope, just breaking out into charge. The town above and the emplacements adjoining which had kept their secret so well, were now in a blur of sulphur and action directed upon the cavalry charge. The whole line went down in the deluge—suddenly vanished under ...
— Red Fleece • Will Levington Comfort
... The race instinct is in the North, but is not cultivated as much as it is in the South. Send your men to the North who are most adroit in their appeals to prejudice and you will find a force there to join you. Then remember you Southerners sprang to arms so gallantly in that skirmish with Spain that you made a fine impression. It was discovered that you had been brave enough not to allow defeat to rankle in your hearts, a really good quality. A more opportune time for you Southern people to take a stand would be hard to ...
— The Hindered Hand - or, The Reign of the Repressionist • Sutton E. Griggs
... distant than this indefinite expression, or the measure of their own eager gaze, had led the Swedes to calculate. Moreover, a small river, the Rippart, that lay between the King and Luetzen, whose narrow bridge could be only passed by one or two at a time, impeded the advance full two hours—a skirmish with Isolani's cavalry, who were quartered at a village near the bridge, may also have occasioned some little loss of time—so that when the Swedish army had reached the fatal field it was nightfall, and too late ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... Liege, but indeed it was questionable whether any would be of use to him. He was not taller indeed than he was two years before, but he was broader, by some inches, than before. From the quartermaster he obtained a pair of jack boots which had belonged to a trooper who had been killed in a skirmish two days before, and from the armourer he got a sword, cuirass, and pistols. As to riding breeches there was no trouble, for several of the officers had garments which would fit him, but for a regimental coat he ...
— The Cornet of Horse - A Tale of Marlborough's Wars • G. A. Henty
... a light skirmish to gain the fort; at last hee entered; many slayne, some prisoners, and some escaping. Now by the command of that battery, the retreate being assured, Capt Foxe seconds him w^th much bravery, beateing upon their trenches from the easterne to the south-west point, till hee came to the work ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... there long when, finding that the rulers of Venice were enlisting soldiers, he entered their service; and before he had had much experience of that calling he was made Captain of two hundred men. The army of the Venetians had advanced by that time to Zara in Sclavonia; and one day, when a brisk skirmish took place, Morto, desiring to win a greater name in that profession than he had gained in the art of painting, went bravely forward, and, after fighting in the melee, was left dead on the field, even as he had always been in name,[13] ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 05 ( of 10) Andrea da Fiesole to Lorenzo Lotto • Giorgio Vasari
... cove; and at last were obliged to bivouac not far from a party of natives. They were very inoffensive as long as they were few in numbers, but in the morning (21st) being joined by others they showed symptoms of hostility, and we thought that we should have come to a skirmish. An European labours under great disadvantages when treating with savages like these who have not the least idea of the power of firearms. In the very act of levelling his musket he appears to the savage far inferior to a man armed with a bow ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin
... strongest, gave to these untried troops a savage hint of the hardships of campaigning, into which they had been plunged without any gradual steps of breaking in, and much more terrible experiences were close at hand. Of these there came a slight foretaste in a skirmish with the enemy on the 24th near Jericho Ford on the North Anna River, resulting in the death of one man and the wounding of three others, the first of what was soon to be ...
— The County Regiment • Dudley Landon Vaill
... armed in steel or iron strong, But each a glaive had pendant by his side, Their bows and quivers at their shoulders hung, Their horses well inured to chase and ride, In diet spare, untired with labor long; Ready to charge, and to retire at will, Though broken, scattered, fled, they skirmish still; ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... where his sister Margaret had become wife of King Malcolm. It was probably some assurance of Malcolm's aid which roused the Mercian Earls, Eadwine and Morkere, to a fresh rising in 1071. But the revolt was at once foiled by the vigilance of the Conqueror. Eadwine fell in an obscure skirmish, while Morkere found shelter for a while in the fen country where a desperate band of patriots gathered round an outlawed leader, Hereward. Nowhere had William found so stubborn a resistance: but a causeway two miles long was at last driven across the marshes, and the last hopes of ...
— History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 • John Richard Green
... gate, and ran up between the dusty lines of dwarf box, eager to tell her what he had done. He thumped on the cracked, unpainted door, and impatiently waited the skirmish of observation along the edge of the window-blinds. This was unduly drawn out. Presently he heard women's voices whispering to each other inside. They seemed urgent, almost angry voices. Now and then he caught ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... Sevastopol Roads, and many weeks elapsed before a particle of cargo was taken out and landed for the benefit of the much neglected soldiers—such was the disorganized condition of the service. Macvie and his crew saw many a skirmish and several pitched battles during their five months' stay in the vicinity of wild wreck and ruin. In April, 1855, the cargo had been all landed and instructions were given to sail at once for Constantinople. In due course they arrived there, and received orders to go on to Smyrna, ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... cockiness begotten of big lumps of armed friends approaching from the rear, determined to go on occupying. This, in a spirit of great courage, with slowly increasing forces, against rapidly increasing forces, they did, until the brisk and pliant skirmish which opened the business of the day had grown so in weight and ferocity that it was evident to the least astute that the decisive battle of the New World ...
— Aladdin O'Brien • Gouverneur Morris
... Limerick, the bare idea of giving up possession of the fair Ennis to their rival the Midland was gall and wormwood; and so they opposed the project with might and main, and they were assisted in their opposition by certain public bodies, some thought as much for the excitement of a skirmish in the Committee Rooms as anything else. The working agreement between the Waterford and Limerick and the Ennis Companies, which had lasted for ten years or so, was expiring; the Ennis Company had grown tired of the union; ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow
... one hundred and fifty followed them, bursting from their tepees like an explosion, and rushing along quickly in skirmish-line. Two Whistles rode beside his speeding prophet, and saw the red sword waving near his face, and the sun in the great still sky, and the swimming, fleeting earth. His superstition and the fierce ride put him in a ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... have arrived for us, and will be presented at New Year's,—one from friends in New York, and the other from a lady in Connecticut. I see that "Frank Leslie's Illustrated Weekly" of December 20th has a highly imaginative picture of the muster-in of our first company, and also of a skirmish on ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... too easily detect, they abound no less in repetitions than in arguments dropped and left at loose ends—the whole bewraying a man called unexpectedly to a post where in the act of adapting himself, of learning that he might teach, he had often to adjourn his main purpose and skirmish with difficulties—they will be the truer to life; and so may experimentally enforce their preaching, that the Art of Writing is a ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... you would get rid of that infernal horse of yours," began the Colonel by way of a preliminary to the skirmish, while his nephew seated himself unconcernedly in a chair opposite him, tilting it backwards and leisurely crossing his legs. "He positively threatened to devour me bodily as I ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown |
