"Stab" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... quick stab of the needle, Pete's heavy eyes opened. The little gray-eyed nurse smiled. The interne rubbed Pete's arm and stepped back. Pete's lips moved. The nurse bent her head. ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... Martin placidly; "but that is not so. The master ordered me to remove the Heer Adrian, whereon the Heer Adrian very naturally tried to stab me. But I, having been accustomed to such things in my youth," and he looked deprecatingly towards the Pastor Arentz, "struck the Heer Adrian upon the bone of his elbow, causing the knife to jump from his hand, for had ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... six in number, four of them take their seats some way off and mount guard, while the other two should sit close behind the principal. They must understand that should there be any mistake they must throw the condemned man, and, holding him down, cut off his head with their poniard, or stab him to death. If the second bungles in cutting off the head and the principal attempts to rise, it is the duty of the attendants to kill him. They must help him to take off his upper garments and bare his body. In recent times, ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... over this idle, happy dream, and she opened her eyes with a start, Ugo's face fading away like a flash. The thought had rushed in like a stab from a dagger. Would Philip Quentin be there, and would he care? Would ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... daughter had remarked, seemed wonderfully recovered from the phle-back-omy which had been administered,—"why should you be shocked at stabbing me in the back? Have I not wherewithal in my hand to stab me a thousand times in the heart? Look at these letters, all of which I have read! You had, indeed, reason to leave me in Galway; but I will submit to it no longer. Mr Rainscourt, I ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... under this thrust, but hoped that the Boy did not see it. His stab reminded me that I had found very little time lately to regret Miss Blantock, now Lady Jerveyson; and Molly Winston's words recurred to me: "If I could only prove to you that you aren't and never have been in love with Helen." I had retorted that to accomplish this would be difficult, and she had ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... a stab in the back. It means that those skunks are trying to do by lying what they couldn't do by bribery. It means that while we're thousands of miles away they are trying to gull the public and get other ball players to jump their contracts by a barefaced lie ...
— Baseball Joe Around the World - Pitching on a Grand Tour • Lester Chadwick
... me—or, to be more correct, did not understand it in the least. He used to go about as if he were in a dream. Isn't it extraordinary how one thing leads to another? My feeling was stronger than I had any idea of; because when the Bishop wanted to slight you—and that was like a stab from behind, too!—I absolutely lost my head with Hagbart because of his not having prevented that, instead of going about dreaming. I don't know—but—well, you saw yourself what happened. I blurted out the first thing that came ...
— Three Comedies • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... brave enough to help him restrain the sufferer in his violent moments. They all looked with terror at the door to the estudi, as if behind it were concealed the greatest of dangers. To go shooting through roads and canals was man's work. A stab could be returned; one bullet could answer another; but ah! that frothing mouth which killed with a bite!... that incurable disease which made men writhe in endless agony, like a lizard sliced by ...
— Luna Benamor • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... revenge the wrongs they have suffered. A friendly repast is provided, the military arrive, embrace their ill-fated hosts, and devour what they have provided; which is no sooner done, than they drive all these poor people into the churchyard, and stab them one after another." Report of Faure, Vice-President of a ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... asked aloud, "am I denied the privilege that is extended to the vilest of his species? Will you condemn me unheard? Accuse me in my absence—keep me in ignorance of my charge—and stab me ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... I promise you. Stand back and count off one minute." He leaned close to Harwin as the doctor yielded. "I give you a chance of honorable duel," he said. "You'll take it, or there's no place on earth where my sword is too short to reach you. You've taught me how to stab in the back; I shall not forget it. But I give you your ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, February, 1886. - The Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 2, February, 1886. • Various
... it swept all emotion aside, she could have laughed aloud instead. She was sure of everything, everything now. It thus happened that the last line in its literal sense, in its jubilant sympathy, came to her like a flash of lightning, like the stab of a knife. The ...
— The Bridal March; One Day • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... on the subject rather. I suppose I shall take a stab at it sooner or later. Father says I ought ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... night. I knew she would see that everything was securely fastened before she went away, and so, when I opened one of the windows, I was sure she would come to close it. Crouching down outside I awaited her approach, intending to spring up and stab her while she was pulling the window down. Everything happened as I planned—what ails the Sahib? I did not kill her! No, at the last moment something—never mind what—stayed my arm! The death of an innocent girl did not promise me any lasting satisfaction and I gave up the ...
— The Darrow Enigma • Melvin L. Severy
... flies, we pillory them in history. We have never forgotten the cruelty of Domitian. "At the beginning of his reign," Suetonius tells us "he used to spend hours in seclusion every day, doing nothing but catch flies and stab them with a keenly sharpened stylus. Consequently, when someone once asked whether anyone was in there with Csar, Vibius Crispus made the witty reply: 'Not even a fly.'" And just as most of us are on the side of the fly against Domitian, ...
— The Pleasures of Ignorance • Robert Lynd
... spoke, some recollection seemed to strike Warwick like a sudden stab. The flush died out of his face, the fire from his eyes, and an almost grim composure fell upon him as he said low to himself, with a forward step as if eager to ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... "Why should he stab me?" intoned Peter. "I never saw him before. I am a peaceful citizen. The only interest I have on this ship, Mynheer ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... spirit of free love and peace, Duty's sure recompense through life and death,— These are such harvests as all master-spirits Reap, haply not on earth, but reap no less Because the sheaves are bound by hands not theirs; These are the bloodless daggers wherewithal 170 They stab fallen tyrants, this their high revenge: For their best part of life on earth is when, Long after death, prisoned and pent no more, Their thoughts, their wild dreams even, have become Part of the necessary air men breathe: When, like the moon, herself ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... such tragical miniatures to the world of fashion. There is an unsparing pomp of noble sentiments, but withal most strangely associated with atrocious baseness. Not unfrequently does an injured fair one dispatch a despised lover to stab the faithless one from behind. In almost every piece there is a crafty knave who plays the traitor, for whom, however, there is ready prepared some royal magnanimity, to make all right at the last. The facility with which base treachery is thus taken into favour, as if it were nothing more than an ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... Like a stab came the thought, "Creamed potatoes to please our palates and thousands of babies in Vienna without milk enough to live!" She shook the thought off, saying to herself, "Well, would it make any difference to those Viennese babies if I deprived my ...
— The Brimming Cup • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... from her as he had turned away five years ago, with the same hopeless sense of dishonour and defeat. She called him back, as she had called him back five years ago, and for the same purpose, of delivering a final stab. Only that this time she knew it was a stab; and her own heart felt the ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... might never see Mr. Haward again," answered Audrey. She held her head up, but she felt the stab. It had not occurred to her that hers was the power to vex and ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... her darling sons, Tho' I had one only brother, dear by all The strictest ties of nature, Joined in this cause, and had but ground to fear He meant foul play; may this right hand drop from me, If I'd not hazard all my future peace, And stab him to the heart before you! Who, Who would do less! Would'st ...
— Venice Preserved - A Tragedy in Five Acts • Thomas Otway
... and stab and skin and scrape the people: raise not a finger against it! Thereby will they learn to ...
— Thus Spake Zarathustra - A Book for All and None • Friedrich Nietzsche
... one of the front windows and had awaited a suitable opportunity to stab me. Now, recognizing failure, he leapt out on the near side as I lurched and stumbled from my seat, and ran off like the wind. I never so ...
— The Golden Scorpion • Sax Rohmer
... robbed me of that which is all I care for on earth, what solace can I find in release? Vindication? What is the opinion of the world to me? Oh! how have I ever wronged you, that you persecute me so vindictively, that you stab the only comfort life can ever ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... at home and abroad, I feared lest the people should again repute her a witch, and one day I followed her up the mountain. Well-a-day, she sat on the pile, which still stood there, but with her face turned towards the sea, reciting the versus where Dido mounts the funeral pile in order to stab herself for ...
— The Amber Witch • Wilhelm Meinhold
... Thy grievous pain forgot, Eternal dark thy lot, Groping thy whole life long; After that stab of fire; Enjailed in pitiless ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... image in the mirror, and wondering like a fool if the other man were as good-looking. This would be like a slight crust of contentment,—sad enough at that,—forming for a moment over the black depth of sorrow that was my heart; and next moment the pain would stab through it again, till I could have cried out but for the shame of it; and so the night wore by, and the morning found me still there. I had learned little, save the one thing that was all the world,—that I could ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... deliberately tried the knob and felt the door promptly yield to me; then, with equal deliberation, I dropped my hand into my pocket where my revolver lay. If some one sprang at me and tried to crack my head or stab me,—stabbing was popular hereabouts,—I was in a state of armed preparedness. But when I stepped inside I found an empty room, a bed in which no ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... if cool and collected, generally comes off victorious in the contest. The South Sea Islanders have a thorough knowledge of the habits of this salt-water pirate, and know that by keeping underneath him, they cannot be touched, and they will fearlessly stab the intruder with their knives, and avail themselves of his momentary departure to regain the boat. I have known one instance of a native jumping into the water to distract the attention of a shark that was swimming guard over his friend, and both escaped unhurt; but still, ...
— Australian Search Party • Charles Henry Eden
... for certain general symptoms in this class of injury. Colonel Nicholas Pike, a competent observer, records a case of a man slapping his hand down upon a window sill and feeling a lively stab in the palm. At the same moment a small spider ran across the back of his fingers and was captured. There was a distinct puncture in the hand. Here, then, was a definite case, where the wound and the insect were both in evidence. But examination ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... the siege long enough to win; but he also realised that his followers had little stomach for a long struggle. The rising sun, too, was against every precedent as a time to attack authority. The doctrine of his kind was to stab in the dark, to hit and run—a foundation on which was based ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... general terms hypothetical cases of tyranny, and inquiring whether in such cases resistance would be lawful. The answers which he obtained increased his distress. He at length told his accomplices that he could go no further with them. If they thought him capable of betraying them, they might stab him; and he should hardly blame them; for, by drawing back after going so far, he had given them a kind of right over his life. They had, however, he assured them, nothing to fear from him: he would keep their ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... and the little watch below, too, got uneasy and sleepless; for one of these swords, they knew well, would reach through and through our little boat, from keel to deck. Large ships have occasionally been sent into port leaky from the stab of a sword, but what I most dreaded was the possibility of one of us being ourselves ...
— Voyage of the Liberdade • Captain Joshua Slocum
... your call— With musket, pike, or knife; He wields the deadliest blade of all Who lightest holds his life. The arm that drives its unbought blows With all a patriot's scorn, Might brain a tyrant with a rose, Or stab him with a thorn. ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... father?' she said. It were a mean, mean trick to play. It were a stab in the dark, father, and it took my breath away for a time, and I were mad with ye. Yes, Father—I was 'most quite mad in earnest; and ef I had met you last night, maybe I'd ha' done you an injury. I can't ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade
... herself the happiness of repeating all the current gossip, not sparing her two friends a single stab. Natalie and Madame Evangelista looked at each other and laughed, but they fully understood the meaning of the tale and the motives of their friend. The Spanish lady took her revenge very much as Celimene took ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... officers to arrest Falstaff: On the mention of his name, one of them immediately observes, "that it may chance to cost some of them their lives, for that he will stab."—"Alas a day," says the hostess, "take heed of him, he cares not what mischief he doth; if his weapon be out, he will foin like any devil; He will spare neither man, woman, or child." Accordingly, we ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith
... attention on the wrong man was, of course, rather favourable to the designs of Kateegoose, so that, when the party passed the summer-house, he was enabled to spring upon his enemy, unobserved for the first moment, with knife upraised. But the stab from which the Sioux chief could not have escaped was rendered harmless by the prompt action of Okematan, who threw up his left arm, turned the blow aside, and received a slight ...
— The Buffalo Runners - A Tale of the Red River Plains • R.M. Ballantyne
... and a kindly uncle has failed to secure the needed relief. In a fit of passion growing out of despair, the hero kills the villainous creditor, and decides to poison his (the hero's) wife and children, and then stab himself. In his dying moments he learns that the uncle has substituted a harmless cordial for the poison and that a long-lost brother has died leaving him a fortune. This bare outline gives no indication of Hill's careful theological rationalization of character ...
— The Gamester (1753) • Edward Moore
... AEson to youth, which she performs; then, going to the court of Pelias, she avenges the injuries which he had done to the family of Jason, by making him the victim of the credulity of his own daughters, who, in compliance with her pretended regard for them, stab him to death. Medea, having executed her design, makes her escape ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso
... not confined to the armies that fought and captured one another, but extended to women and children, who were often seized, carried away from their homes into the country of the enemy, and made slaves. It is bad and senseless enough for men to stand up and stab one another as they used to in old times, or shoot one another as they do now; but to carry a mother away from her children, or take a little girl away from her home and playmates and make a slave of her, is something worse. But it was often done in those ancient days, as you will learn when ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... her eyes to bright sunshine. For a minute she couldn't think where she was. Then the strangeness came back with a stab, not so poignant as on the night before but none the ...
— The Camerons of Highboro • Beth B. Gilchrist
... fact about these recent biological experiments of Dr. Carrel, of the Rockefeller Institute: they seem to prove that the life of a man is not merely the sum of the life of the myriad cells of his body. Stab the man to death, and the cells of his body still live and will continue to live if grafted upon another live man. Probably every part of the body would continue to live and grow indefinitely, in the proper medium. That the cell life should continue after the soul ...
— The Breath of Life • John Burroughs
... which, figuratively, was constantly held over her. She was scarcely forty-two years old, and already had the stammerings of terror, and vague, pitiful looks of an old woman in her dotage. Her son continued to stab her with his piercing glances, hoping that she would run away when her courage was exhausted. The unfortunate woman suffered terribly from shame, restrained desire and enforced cowardice, receiving the blows dealt her with passive resignation, ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... quarrels, as sickening as they are human, which can take place only between two people who love each other; who love each other so well that each knows with cruel certainty the surest way to wound the other; and who stab, and tear, and claw at these vulnerable spots in exact proportion to ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... pose but serves to ward off Pangs that had of yore prevailed; E'en the stab of being scored off Owns the ...
— Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses • John Kendall (AKA Dum-Dum)
... bear no more. Every one of these words was a fresh stab to her remorseful heart—every tone showed to her the depth of love that lay in that father's heart, and revealed to her the suffering that she must have caused. It was too much; and with a deep groan she sank away from his ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... they finally layed it to me, as they always do, 'cause Pa called me very early this morning, and when I came down stairs he came out in the hall and his face was redder'n a beet, and he tried to stab me with his big toe-nail, and if it hadn't been for these pieces of brick he would have hurt my feelings. I see they had my chum's sister's clothes all pinned up in a newspaper, and I s'pose when I go back ...
— Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa - 1883 • George W. Peck
... hanging as far out of the window as safety would allow. A long black braid of hair swung with the motion of the coach; the child held her hat in one hand and with the other made ineffectual attempts to stab the driver ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... so you see how I am proven mean. Give me your hand and laugh to me; laugh with your heart and eyes and lips. I am jealous of your pain. I am a woman. I would have it all, gather it all into my bosom, and cherish each sharp stab like a flower my lover gives to me. I am glad of them. They are flowers that will not wither. Add a kiss, sweetheart, the sharpest stab, and so the chief flower, the very rose of flowers. There, that is well," and she rose from her knees and ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... donn'd misen up i' mi Sundy clooas an went for a walk throo th' market, an when aw coom to th' butter-cross aw saw a chap 'at had a cock an two hens in a basket for sale, an he offered 'em to me for ten shillin'. 'Ten fiddlesticks!' aw sed, 'awl gie thee five,' an he put on a luk as if awd stab'd him to th' heart, an begun tellin' me hah mich they'd cost him, an 'at he'd nivver ha tried to sell 'em but he wor behund wi his rent, an wor foorced to pairt wi 'em to keep th' bums aght, an he assured me they wor layin' ivvery day. But th' fact wor, aw didn't ...
— Yorksher Puddin' - A Collection of the Most Popular Dialect Stories from the - Pen of John Hartley • John Hartley
... taken the plunge and said her say, but the last words are spoken with sinking inflection, followed instantly by a sinking heart. He makes no answer whatever. She dares not look up into his face to see the effect of her stab. He stands there silent only an instant; then raises his cap, turns, and ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... went quickly to her heart, as though to still a sudden stab of pain, and for the moment her face whitened ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... and unsavoury. His grandfather, he said, lived to 117, and was as vigorous as a young man, in consequence of sucking the blood of a viper warm every morning; but they had been forced to kill him, he being attacked with a violent fit of the colic, and desiring them to stab him, which, in obedience to another "custom of the country," they had done. Splendide mendax! was certainly, in his younger days, this much venerated friend of our great moralist. I should, however, feel inclined ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 183, April 30, 1853 • Various
... rapid calculation. "Sixty-four!" he cried out, gleefully. "We are closer. Now let's take a stab at ninety-three." And he began to figure, but ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... our imaginary court would pay little attention to mere professions of a desire for peace. A nation, like an individual, can covertly stab the peace of another while saying, "Art thou in health, my brother?" and even the peace of civilization can be betrayed by a Judas kiss. Professions of peace belong to the cant of diplomacy and have always characterized ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... the sea and swam for their lives. The small boats were twenty yards out. Scarcely was Phillips in the nearest, when a wounded sailor, swimming for refuge, fainted and sank to the bottom. Though half stunned from a stone blow on his head and bleeding from a stab in the back, Phillips leaped to the rescue, dived to bottom, caught the exhausted sailor by the hair of the head and so snatched him into the boat. The dead and the arms of the fugitives had been deserted in the wild scramble ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... expect it, too—though the Alberta isn't much better. You get coasting on either of 'em, and half-way down, bang! the front wheel collapses, hind wheel flies up and hits you in the neck, handle-bar turns just in time to stab you in the chest; and there you are, miles from home, a physical, moral, bicycle wreck. But the Arena wheel is different. In fact, I may say that the only safe wheel is the Arena. That's the one I ride. However, at fifty ...
— The Bicyclers and Three Other Farces • John Kendrick Bangs
... enough and ladylike enough to be an American," thought Frances approvingly and with a sudden stab of homesickness. ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... introduced into all their political measures corruption, cruelty, and avarice. And indeed the story is well known, and celebrated in many literary compositions, that a certain Decimus Virginius was obliged, on account of the libidinous violence of one of these decemvirs, to stab his virgin daughter in the midst of the forum. Then, when he in his desperation had fled to the Roman army which was encamped on Mount Algidum, the soldiers abandoned the war in which they were engaged, ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... for every moment of happiness. You revenged yourself on me for the humiliation of being the slave of your passion for me. I was never sure of you for a moment. I trembled whenever a letter came from you, lest it should contain some stab for me. I dreaded your visits almost as much as I longed for them. I was your plaything, not your companion. (She rises, exclaiming) Oh, there was such suffering in my happiness that I hardly knew joy from pain. (She sinks ...
— The Philanderer • George Bernard Shaw
... said, "that attempting to stab a British naval officer is very bad business. But here comes something that will teach you more," and he pointed to Frank, who reappeared at that moment followed by two sailors bearing heavy chains. "These irons," Jack continued, "will ...
— The Boy Allies with the Victorious Fleets - The Fall of the German Navy • Robert L. Drake
... though not a poet, was a great writer on poetry and our early English songs and ballads, complained bitterly of the ignorant reviewers, and described himself as brought to an end in ill- health and low spirits—certain to be insulted by a base and prostitute gang of lurking assassins who stab in the dark, and whose poisoned daggers he had already experienced. Ritson himself was a fairly venomous critic, and the "Ritsonian" style has become proverbial. Nowadays authors do not usually die of criticism, not even susceptible ...
— Books Fatal to Their Authors • P. H. Ditchfield
... right had produced a hymn-book from his pocket and opened it and found his place with the same air of smug efficiency. Robert had no book. He longed for one. He knew that the clergyman was watching him again. His companion nudged him, and by a stab of a stumpy, inky forefinger indicated the verse which he himself was singing in an aggressive treble. But Robert only stared helplessly. At another time he might have recognized "God—love—dove—" and other words of one syllable, ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... once uttered a syllable of unkindness to Harry Esmond; and her cruel words smote the poor boy, so that he stood for some moments bewildered with grief and rage at the injustice of such a stab from such a hand. He turned quite white from red, which he ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... brushed it away, and it came back wet and blurring. She averted her face, ashamed of the tears Stewart might see. She was sorry for him. He was going away, and this time, judging from the nature of his farewell to his horse, it was to be forever. Like a stab from a cold blade a pain shot through Madeline's heart. The wonder of it, the incomprehensibility of it, the utter newness and strangeness of this sharp pain that now left behind a dull pang, made her forget Stewart, her surroundings, everything except to search ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... joy to thee! What if thou heard'st him now? What if his spirit 80 Re-enter'd its cold corse, and came upon thee, With many a stab from many a murderer's poniard? What if, his steadfast eye still beaming pity And brother's love, he turn'd his head aside, Lest he should look at thee, and with one look 85 Hurl thee beyond all power ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... misinterpretation more evident than in the meanings given to the glorious phrase, "the Will of God." I do not exaggerate when I say that in most Caucasian minds the Will of God is a bitter, ruthless force, to which we can only drug ourselves into submission. It is always ready to thwart us, to stab us in the back, or to strike us where our affections are tenderest. We hold our blessings only on the tenure of its caprice. Our pleasures are but the stolen moments we can snatch from ...
— The Conquest of Fear • Basil King
... castles and monasteries, and lastly, they had tried to cloak their dreadful sins with excuses from the Gospel. He therefore urged the government to put down the insurrection. "Have no pity on the poor folk; stab, ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... paper of this series. Another was set on foot by his eldest sister, Lucilla; nor did her close relationship protect her from capital punishment. In that instance, the immediate agent of her purposes, Quintianus, a young man, of signal resolution and daring, who had attempted to stab the emperor at the entrance of the amphitheatre, though baffled in his purpose, uttered a word which rang continually in the ears of Commodus, and poisoned his peace of mind for ever. His vengeance, perhaps, ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... Spaniard to bring me across in a small sailboat, and the tide carried us down too far, so I told him to land and I'd walk back to town, rather than tack back. And these men met me, and tried to rob me! This man," he accused excitedly, pointing a rageful finger at Swift, "was going to stab me in the throat when he saw I resisted. I was fighting the three, and they were getting the best of me. I never owned a gun, and I just had my fists. The two others had grabbed me, and this man Swift pulled a knife. ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... and he—now think of it—he a free, strong man, she a chained and helpless girl—he drew his dagger and flung himself at her to stab her. But Warwick seized him and held him back. Warwick was wise. Take her life in that way? Send her to Heaven stainless and undisgraced? It would make her the idol of France, and the whole nation would rise and march to victory and ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc Volume 2 • Mark Twain
... his adventures. Federigo's story seemed to be reflected from her face as from a living mirror. At one point her face became pale with passion; her black eyes flashed, and she made a sudden movement with her clenched hand in the air, as if she were giving some one a stab with a dagger. She threw her head back then with a triumphant, scornful laugh that showed her dazzling white teeth; and Salve inferred that her brother must have killed some person or other in Monte Video, probably in self-preservation, ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... past, whirled, and closed in with the fury of a wildcat. Lennon's parry of the knife stab was sheer luck, but not the blow that he drove to the solar plexus. Superb as was the physical condition of the young Apache, that solid jolt sent him reeling back, ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet
... and tearless; and he knew Mavis lay sleepless and racked with fear in her little room. By this time they all must have heard, and he wondered what John Burnham was thinking, and Gray, and then with a stab at his heart he thought of Marjorie. He wondered if she had got his good-by note—the taking back of his promise to her. Well, it was all over now. The lights fell behind him, the moon rose, and under ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... peasants, merchants, and shopkeepers to KNOW HOW TO MAKE A BARGAIN,—that is, to deceive one's man. This is so universally accepted, that the cheated party takes no offence. It is known with what reluctance our government resolved upon the abolition of lotteries. It felt that it was dealing a stab thereby at property. The pickpocket, the blackleg, and the charlatan make especial use of their dexterity of hand, their subtlety of mind, the magic power of their eloquence, and their great fertility of invention. Sometimes they offer bait ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... has happened to me, is happening to me? Coulter felt the chill of the evening wind stab deep into his bones. Then he looked down at his vanished embonpoint and patted with his gloves the flat hardness that had replaced it. It was all right with him as long as he didn't wake up too soon—before ...
— A World Apart • Samuel Kimball Merwin
... yet again the great soul of the hero!" put in Basset with grim irony. "If he lie abed i' th' day for a wound to his wrist, what shall he do for a stab to his feelings? You shall drive him to drown him in salt water; and that were cruelty unheard-of, for it should make his eyes smart. I tell thee what, Jack Enville—there is one ass aboard the fleet, and his name is neither Arthur Tremayne ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt
... serjeant great uneasiness, and, after having kept him long awake, tormented him in his sleep with a most horrid dream, in which he imagined that he saw the colonel standing by the bedside of Amelia, with a naked sword in his hand, and threatening to stab her instantly unless she complied with his desires. Upon this the serjeant started up in his bed, and, catching his wife by the throat, cried out, "D—n you, put up your sword this instant, and leave the room, or by Heaven I'll drive mine ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... treachery and crimes of man, his perfidious friendship, his dissembled spite, his infernal thirst for vengeance! ha, and if all this indeed be so— why not this instant seize a blessing within my grasp? why not at once defeat the malice of my jailors? it shall be so, and thus— (going to stab himself, ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol. I. No. 3. March 1810 • Various
... porthole, and, now and then, the swish of waters as they swept past the schooner. He wondered what Tayoga was doing and what would Willet think when he came back to Albany and found him gone. It gave him a stab of agony. His pride was hurt, too, that he had been trapped so thoroughly. Then his resolution returned to his aid. Making a supreme effort of his will, he dismissed the thought, concentrating his mind on hope. Would Tayoga's Manitou help him? Would Tododaho ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... recompense. They cared for their cause as well as for the English Queen, and they had their reward. If they saved her they saved their own country. She too did not lie on a bed of roses. To prevent open war she was exposing her own life to the assassin. At any moment a pistol-shot or a stab with a dagger might add Elizabeth to the list of victims. She knew it, yet she went on upon her own policy, and faced in her person her own share of the risk. One thing only she did. If she would not defend her ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude
... soldiers told off to escort the king through the city. The procession was marching on quite smoothly, when a man, armed with a dagger, rushed out of an alley straight towards the king. Nur Mahomed, who was the nearest of the guards, threw himself in the way, and received the stab that had been apparently intended for the king. Luckily the blow was a hurried one, and the dagger glanced on his breastbone, so that, although he received a severe wound, his youth and strength quickly got the better of it. The king was, of course, obliged ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... that necessity, the spur to industry in new and rising nations, (that spur which taxes and rent continue to excite, for the good of mankind, for a certain period,) begins to crush what it had raised, and to stab where it formerly stimulated. Then it is that the money-lenders, who, at first, sent off their capital, having ceased to be engaged in trade, withdraw, by degrees, and rather content themselves with a diminished income in another country, than struggle with the ...
— An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations. • William Playfair
... Colonies. By all means have Colonies. They could rely on him for moral support. But when it came to legging it out to West Australia to act as a sort of valet to Uncle Frederick's beastly sheep—no. Not for James. For him the literary life. Yes, that was James's dream—to have a stab at the literary life. At Oxford he had contributed to the Isis, and since coming down had been endeavouring to do the same to the papers of the Metropolis. He had had no success so far. But some inward voice seemed to ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... we are concerned, it seems to me the Northern Nut Growers' Association made a pretty good stab at surveying the materials available. In other words, I think an additional nut contest is not going to turn up the perfect nut. That is, we have one contest after another, and the ones that win the first prizes as the best nuts we can find are not markedly ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 41st Annual Meeting • Various
... dwell upon. It was wiser not to). Some pains are dull and steady. One can endure them and smile. Others recur at intervals, occasioned by some unimportant detail like a man on the street selling roasted chestnuts, which reminds one of saffron woods in late October. Such pain is like the stab of ...
— The Fifth Wheel - A Novel • Olive Higgins Prouty
... say that Plan B was the best choice," he said at last. It was a wild stab at nothing, he realized, and yet he could do no better. Had he made ...
— But, I Don't Think • Gordon Randall Garrett
... between them. But of the first pair one was five or six paces in front of the other. This man shouted out loud and charged me, shield and spear up. Now I had no shield—nothing but the assegai; but I was crafty and he was overbold. On he came. I stood waiting for him till he drew back the spear to stab me. Then suddenly I dropped to my knees and thrust upward with all my strength, beneath the rim of his shield, and he also thrust, but over me, his spear only cutting the flesh of my shoulder—see! here is its scar; yes, to this day. And my assegai? Ah! it went home; it ran ...
— Nada the Lily • H. Rider Haggard
... from her to quell a new fight at the other end of the room. Another woman was there, coarse, dirty, beastly. She drew a knife and demanded her share of the night's robberies. She was trying to break from the men who held her to stab Jim. They were all fighting and smashing ...
— The Foolish Virgin • Thomas Dixon
... and Matt Quintal chancing, curiously enough, to be near Sally and Bessy, overheard the whisper, and for the first time each received a painful stab ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... so keenly at "Mr. N. Smith" that it seemed to Annesley he must feel the stab of eyes, sharp as pin-pricks, in his back. He had the self-control, however, not to look round, not even to change expression. No man in the restaurant appeared more calmly ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... Simplicissimus, or would have pickt out as he is Hirudo Sanguifuga, so honest a meaning? Trust me I cannot but marvell at the disposition of these men, who are so malicious as they will not spare to stab others, though it be through their owne bodies, and wrong other men with their owne double harme. Such mens wordes a wise man compares to boltes shot right-up against heaven, that come not neare heaven, but downe againe upon ...
— Shakespeare's Lost Years in London, 1586-1592 • Arthur Acheson
... "Other murderers stab but at our existence, a frail and perishing trifle at the best. But here is an assassin who aims at our very essence,—who not only forbids us to be any longer, but to have been at all. Let our ancestors look ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... though his later antagonist, set forth Anabaptist views with greater moderation; and in course of time the sect became more or less tinged with Calvinistic theology.] He furiously begged the princes to put down the insurrection. "Whoever can, should smite, strangle, or stab, ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... cry to stab the heart. He dropped the brush and looked up at her. She was pale, and her eyes were very big. "Well, what is the matter ...
— The Trimming of Goosie • James Hopper
... with agony, while the determined fellow kept whetting his knife. At last she made a sudden spring and endeavoured to seize his arm; but, missing her aim, he immediately struck her with his fist and began to stab her. ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... glances sweet, Hers was a bosom of impetuous heat; A heart too wildly in its joys elate, Formed but to madly love—or madly hate; A spirit of strong throbs, and steadfast will; To doat, detest, to die for, or to kill; Which, like the Arab chief, would fiercely dare To stab the heart she might no longer share; And yet so tender, if he loved again, Would die to save his ...
— The Culprit Fay - and Other Poems • Joseph Rodman Drake
... will stab the serpent to the heart, who so disgraced me and my family honour. I will murder her there in the coach ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V1 • William Mienhold
... ditch two hundred yards long at the rate of ten yards per day, and was still at work without pause or intermission, had begun to cut it just twenty days previous. A reverend anti-geologist takes up Sir Charles;[44] and, after denouncing the calculation as "a stab at the Christian religion," seeing it involves the assertion that the "Falls were actually at Queenston four thousand years before the creation of the world according to Moses," he brings certain facts, adduced both by other writers and Sir Charles himself, to bear ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... not dead! I can feel his heart beat. The stab was too low to reach his heart. Quick, we must do something to stop this flow of blood, or he soon will be dead," and Thure tore open the bosom of the rough flannel shirt, exposing the red mouth of a knife wound from which ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil
... me before you go. (Bares her breast.) Stab me with your knife— right here! I won't scream. (Shuts her eyes.) I shall think I am nursing my child, and the little ...
— Modern Icelandic Plays - Eyvind of the Hills; The Hraun Farm • Jhann Sigurjnsson
... and touched a spring. The dagger split suddenly into three blades, as when one separates the forefinger and the ring-finger from the middle one. The outside blades were sharp on their outer edge. The stab was to be made with the dagger shut, then the spring touched and the ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... blaze quickly sprang up and leapt among the sticks, and then she flew to prepare the bed. If she might only get it ready before they came! The thought of that helpless head lying against Father Orin's shoulder was like a stab at her heart. ...
— Round Anvil Rock - A Romance • Nancy Huston Banks
... anticipated no trouble in paddling alongside while it was swimming, and putting the knife into its throat. When the buck discovered the pursuer it redoubled its efforts to reach the shore, but Paul was faster and was soon close on the antlered beauty. As he raised the knife to stab, the deer also raised and struck viciously with its front feet, and Paul barely dodged the blow which would have cut through the rubber suit like a keen edged knife. Again and again did he try to get an opening ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... unable to gain any satisfaction from the friar, he sought the secretary of the Inquisition in his bureau at a monastery of the Dominicans. The secretary rubbed his hands at the sight of the speechful face. "Aha! What new foxes hast thou scented?" The greeting stung like a stab. ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... since he must know that to lay open his vanity in public is no less absurd than to lay open his bosom to an enemy whose drawn sword is pointed against it; for every man hath a dagger in his hand ready to stab the vanity of ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding
... Stroeve's pictures, all in splendid frames. Stroeve had always been very proud of his taste. He had never lost his appreciation for the romantic atmosphere of a studio, and though now the sight of it was like a stab in his heart, without thinking what he was at, he changed slightly the position of a Louis XV. table which was one of his treasures. Suddenly he caught sight of a canvas with its face to the wall. It was a much larger one than he himself was in ...
— The Moon and Sixpence • W. Somerset Maugham
... was under contract, of course—strictly a pot-boiler, I'm afraid. Thought it was pretty good at the time, but this one—ah!" He fondled the smooth sheets of paper. "In this one I could say something. Always before it was hit and run, make a stab at it, then rush on to stab at something else. Not this one." He patted the manuscript happily. "With this one there ...
— Martyr • Alan Edward Nourse
... himself the censures of the church by attempting it. The monk John, who had been legate of the eastern patriarchs in the seventh council, being present, spoke also very resolutely to the emperor on the subject, so that the pretors and patricians threatened to stab him on the spot: and the emperor, boiling with rage, drove them both from his presence. As soon as they were gone, he turned the empress Mary out of his palace, and obliged her to put on a religious veil. Tarasius persisting in ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... time when Thomas Jefferson was beginning to reconsider his ideals, with a leaning toward brass-bound palaces on wheels and dictatorial authority over uniformed lackeys and other of his fellow creatures, that fate dealt the Major its final stab and prepared to pour wine and oil into the wound—though of the balm-pouring, none could guess at the moment of wounding. It was not in Caspar Dabney to be patient under a blow, and for a time his ragings threatened to shake even Mammy Juliet's loyalty—than ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... arrived. The murderers embraced Giuliano and discovered that this timid youth had left his secret coat of mail at home. But a difficulty, which ought to have been foreseen, arose. Monteseoco, cut-throat as he was, refused to stab Lorenzo before the high altar: at the last moment some sense of the religio loci dashed his courage. Two priests were then discovered who had no such silly scruples. In the words of an old chronicle, 'Another man was found, who, being a priest, was more accustomed to the place and therefore ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... danger threatens her young. Anne had a slight cough, a pain at her side, a difficulty of breathing. Miss W—- considered it as little more than a common cold; but Charlotte felt every indication of incipient consumption as a stab at her heart, remembering Maria and Elizabeth, whose places once knew them, and should know them ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell
... it, I will 'noint my naked throat, Which when you stab, look on your weapon's point, And you shall see't rebated [219] ...
— Tamburlaine the Great, Part II. • Christopher Marlowe
... service men and women, then bear in mind that the names of all "agents" are secure from public knowledge, even of a military court, that they can stab in the dark and never be held accountable by their victims, and that appropriations are made in bulk for this service without an accounting, and you will then understand the full strength and appreciate the unique infamy of the French ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... quarter yards of length into the smallest possible compass, and shrieks until the domestic police come to the rescue, and apprehend the sharp little villains. Do not laugh at this. Years ago he lost his choicest friend by the stab of just such a little dastard ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various
... the front, all the characters following)—Now, while all thoughts are deadened in my heated brain, but those of fury and revenge—thus treason falls, and the vile traitress dies. [Seizing Agnes, and going to stab her ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... Disbrowe, major, I am persuaded," returned Parravicin. "He is too much a man of honour to stab a ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... crinoline or a cheap muslin. Cut a strip of such goods on a true bias, three-eighths of an inch wide. Remove the selvage and stretch the strip. Bind the edge wire with it, holding it very tight. Sew close to wire using a stab stitch. ...
— Make Your Own Hats • Gene Allen Martin
... they prick on, ceaselessly, For that stab in Love's fierce fashion Which, unfired by lover's passion, ...
— Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with - Miscellaneous Pieces • Thomas Hardy
... re-established them in power. At this very time too, they are permitting their chief magistrate to send over not only soldiers of our common blood, but Scotch and foreign mercenaries to invade and destroy us. These facts have given the last stab to agonizing affection, and manly spirit bids us to renounce for ever these unfeeling brethren. We must endeavour to forget our former love for them, and hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends. We might have been a free and a great people together; but a communication ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... to collect his kit, while I started in again on "Types of Ethical Theory" and took a stab at a chapter headed ...
— A Wodehouse Miscellany - Articles & Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... which reply he meant to insinuate that the few drops of white blood in the veins of the cheeky one might yet come through an experience to which a pure Indian would scorn to submit. "But," continued the chief, after a pause to let the stab take full effect, "but Softswan is well known. She is strong as the mountain sheep and fleet as the mustang. She will not hamper Big Tim. Enough! We will let them go, and take possession of ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... part was, that just as I said it, the girl did snatch out the knife and stab the ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... skill of a juggler tossing balls at Bartholomew Fair. Suffice it to say that she is as complaisant as ever, and treats the favourites, be they who they will, with a condescending and smiling geniality that enables her to give many an unexpected stab—the dagger hid in flowers. 'Tis thus, in my opinion, every sensible woman in the like case should carry herself. 'Tis not tears and agonies that move that sex, but good humour and composure, and thus ...
— The Ladies - A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty • E. Barrington
... a sudden accession of sharp stabbing pain. It seemed to tick through her body as might a clock, and each stab came as with the sway of the pendulum, and with a regularity that was exquisite torture. The stabs of pain came quicker, the pendulum was working faster. Faster and faster it swung, and so the torture was ever increasing. Now the pain was in ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... long silence. Brother William's gray head sagged on his shoulder, and the hymn-book slipped from his gnarled old hands. The knitting sisters began, one after another, to stab their needles into their balls of gray yarn and roll their ...
— The Way to Peace • Margaret Deland
... when thou hast, as I Commanded thee, done blabbing, Although to give the lye Deserves no less than stabbing, Yet stab at thee who will, No stab ...
— Book of Old Ballads • Selected by Beverly Nichols
... fair-spoken words, false in their thought; then do they at length shrewdly betray: in profession they have the perfume of honey, smooth gossip so sweet; and in their souls purpose, with devilish craft, a stab in the dark. ...
— Anglo-Saxon Literature • John Earle
... the ropes swinging from his shoulder-bar, lifts them from the ground, and with a brisk walk conveys them on board the chop-boat, where they are carefully stowed away. As they are carried out of the hong, a fellow stands ready, and, as if about to stab the packages, thrusts at each one two sharp sticks with red ends, leaving them jammed between the ratan and the tea-box. One of these sticks is taken out when the chest leaves the chop-boat, and the other when it reaches the deck of the vessel; and as soon as one hundred chests ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... talk. They sat unmoving, without stir of hand or head, quiescent. Then Lee all at once experienced a feeling of profound compassion for Ruth as he regarded her, a poignant stab in his breast like pain. Sitting there without movement, with her hands idle upon her lap, with her face a little lifted and her eyes wistfully bent on the great wall opposite, she seemed so young and small to be dwelling at such a place, so helpless, so ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... the wind was so high that all the windows and doors in the old house shook and rattled. In fact, it was just such weather as he loved. His plan of action was this. He was to make his way quietly to Washington Otis's room, gibber at him from the foot of the bed, and stab himself three times in the throat to the sound of slow music. He bore Washington a special grudge, being quite aware that it was he who was in the habit of removing the famous Canterville blood- stain, by means of Pinkerton's Paragon Detergent. Having reduced the ...
— Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories • Oscar Wilde |
