"Straits" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... brain, but is of sweet woman and have a special power which the Count give her, and which he may not take away altogether, though he think not so. Hush! Let me speak, and you shall learn. Oh, John, my friend, we are in awful straits. I fear, as I never feared before. We can only trust the good God. Silence! ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... brother Thomas had been taking counsel together about the matter. Mr. Wyley was for turning the boy off at once, and reducing him to the utmost straits of poverty; but his more prudent brother was opposed ...
— Fern's Hollow • Hesba Stretton
... south-east. We were actually thirty miles to the east of the position we had occupied when we left the floe on the 9th. It has been noted by sealers operating in this area that there are often heavy sets to the east in the Belgica Straits, and no doubt it was one of these sets that we had experienced. The originating cause would be a north-westerly gale off Cape Horn, producing the swell that had already caused us so much trouble. After a whispered consultation with Worsley ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... September they passed the Tropic of Capricorn, and by the middle of October they were almost opposite the Straits of Magellan. On this voyage they had kept most of the time far away from the coast, and had landed only when necessary to re-stock their ship ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... TAMAR, accompanied by two transports, sailed through Torres Straits and anchored in Port Essington, in 1824. The port was, however, at that time condemned as a site for a settlement, the supply of fresh water did not come up to expectations, and the dry months ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... six leagues distant. This cape, which forms the southern extremity of the American continent, has always been an object of terror to the navigators who have to pass from one sea to the other; several of whom to avoid doubling it, have exposed themselves to the long and dangerous passage of the straits of Magellan, especially when about entering the Pacific ocean. When we saw ourselves under the stupendous rocks of the cape, we felt no other desire but to get away from them as soon as possible, so little agreeable were those rocks to the view, even ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... Toro, says Zurita, on the 13th June, and went by the river to the city of Porto, in order to await the armada of the king of France, the captain of which was Colon, (Colombo,) who was to navigate by the straits of Gibraltar to pass ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... school, and their first resource; they even began to visit the banks of Cape Breton, the isle of Sable, and all the other fishing places, with which this coast of America abounds. By degrees they went a-whaling to Newfoundland, to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, to the Straits of Belleisle, the coast of Labrador, Davis's Straits, even to Cape Desolation, in 70 degrees of latitude; where the Danes carry on some fisheries in spite of the perpetual severities of the inhospitable climate. In process of ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... that had befallen me from first to last, whereat he marvelled and said to me, "By Allah, O my son, thou hast indeed been miraculously preserved! Were not the term of thy life a long one, thou hadst not escaped from these straits; but praised by Allah for safety!" Then he spoke cheerily to me and entreated me with kindness and consideration: moreover, he made me his agent for the port and registrar of all ships that entered the harbour. I attended him regularly, to receive his commandments, and he favoured me and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... traffic with Spain, for which purpose, in 1563, there set out from Portsmouth a ship called the 'Three Half Moons,' with thirty-eight men on board, and well armed, the better to encounter any foes they might meet. Now, drawing near the Straits, they found themselves beset by eight Turkish galleys, so that it was impossible for them to fly, but they must either yield or be sunk. This the owner perceiving, manfully encouraged his company, telling them ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... times a conquering army did not resettle or colonize the territories it had subdued, but was contented with overrunning the country and exacting tribute from the people. Such was the nature of the Babylonian and Persian conquests. After overrunning Ethiopia and some other countries near the Straits of Babelmandeb, the conqueror proceeded to India, which he overran beyond the Ganges, and ascended the high table-land of Central Asia; then proceeding westward, he entered Europe, nor halted in his devastating career until he reached Thrace. From thence he marched ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume III • John Lord
... monastic habitation is situated, the road sharply turns round an elbow of the mountain, and the Eleusinian plain opens immediately in front. It is, however, for a plain, but of small dimensions. On the left is the Island of Salamis, and the straits where the battle was fought; but neither of it nor of the mysteries for which the Temple of Ceres was for so many ages celebrated, has the poet given us description or suggestion; and yet few topics among all his wild and wonderful subjects were so likely to have furnished such "ample ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt
... second place, the ebb was now making—a strong, rippling current running westward through the basin, and then south'ard and seaward down the straits by which we had entered in the morning. Even the ripples were a danger to our overloaded craft, but the worst of it was that we were swept out of our true course, and away from our proper landing-place behind the point. ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... reason to believe that arrangements will soon be made at St. Petersburg, through private companies and government subsidies, for completing the line of telegraph from Novgorod to the mouth of the Amoor, and thence across the straits to Russian America. In the mean time, a company has already been formed and incorporated in Canada, under the name of the Transmundane Telegraphic Company, which will afford important aid in continuing the proposed line through British America. The plan is, to carry ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... their emperor, Montezuma, and for a time seemed to be full master of the land. We might go on to tell how at length the Mexicans rose in fury, attacked the Spaniards with the courage of desperation, mortally wounded their own emperor, and at length brought the invaders into such terrible straits that they were forced to fight their way out of the city as their last hope ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... the compass through the difficult straits of a London life for some time," replied Bob, "and I begin to think that, with all its ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... to throw back in his face that inheritance so coldly offered. At the same time I had to consider that he was an old man, and, after all, my relation; and that I was a poor one, in considerable straits, with a hope at heart which that inheritance might yet enable me to realise. Nor could I forget that, however icy his manners, he had behaved to me from the first with the extreme of liberality and—I was about to write, ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the Hellespont. In that direction no real obstacles were to be anticipated; for Philip of Macedonia might be entirely depended on, Prusias king of Bithynia was in alliance with the Romans, and the Roman fleet could easily establish itself in the straits. The long and weary march along the coast of Macedonia and Thrace was accomplished without material loss; Philip made provision on the one hand for supplying their wants, on the other for their friendly reception ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... way. And if you will so far honour me as to drink a bowl of punch to lighten our wits, we may find some solution of our friends' difficulties. First let me call for lights, and let me shut out this dreary evening. Courage, my friends! I warrant we shall smile some day at our present desperate straits, and meanwhile "to wait" is the ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... language in distant countries, you may be sure that the inhabitants of each have been the same people; that is to say, if you find the languages a good deal the same; for a word here and there being the same, will not do. Thus Butler, in his Hudibras, remembering that Penguin, in the Straits of Magellan, signifies a bird with a white head, and that the same word has, in Wales, the signification of a white-headed wench (PEN head, and GUIN white), by way of ridicule, concludes that the people of those ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... necessity that Australia should command both the northern and the southern shores of Torres Straits might still have been secured without the sacrifice of any important initiative in matters of government ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86
... of France also had been fighting to protect their retreat southward in these August days of 1914. After the passages of the Sambre were forced, during the great Mons-Charleroi battle, the Fifth French Army was placed in very perilous straits by the failure of the Fourth Army, under General Langle, to hold the Belgian river town of Givet. Hard pressed in the rear by General von Buelow's army, and on their right by General von Hausen commanding the Saxon Army and the Prussian Guard, the Fifth ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of 12) - The War Begins, Invasion of Belgium, Battle of the Marne • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... the result, the experience, has corrected the contradictory theory of the eye, you begin to suspect, without any aid from science, that there were two currents, one of which comes round in a curve and effects the exit for the other which the window had driven in; just as in the Straits of Gibraltar there is manifestly an upper current setting one way, which you therefore conjecture to argue a lower current setting the other, and thus redressing the equilibrium. Here the smoke corresponds to bits of chip or any loose suspended body in the Gibraltar current. What answers ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... sometimes outraged, by this prejudice against color, I am indebted to it for many passages of quiet amusement. A half-cured subject of it is sometimes driven into awkward straits, especially if he happens to get a genuine specimen of the race ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... dawning day we could make out dimly, ahead of us, only bleak bare hills. As the Moltke steamed through the straits we saw a lighthouse and a few buildings on the shore and over the low hill on our right the tops of masts; but when the vessel had entered through a narrow passage between the moles extending from either side, and ...
— A Trip to the Orient - The Story of a Mediterranean Cruise • Robert Urie Jacob
... Asia. To connect Africa with Europe could only have been an idea of those who divided the earth into an eastern and a western half, and did not know the vast extent of Africa to the south. [122] Fretum, &c.; that is, the Fretum Herculeum, or the Straits of Gibraltar. It is clear that Sallust wants to state only the northern frontier of Africa on the Mediterranean, and the frontiers in the east and west. The extent of Africa southward was too little ...
— De Bello Catilinario et Jugurthino • Caius Sallustii Crispi (Sallustius)
... example in history of the contagious quality of ideas than the sudden spread of revolutionary excitement through Europe in 1848. In the course of a few weeks the established order seemed everywhere to be crumbling to pieces. The Revolution began in Palermo, crossed the Straits of Messina, and passed in successive waves of convulsion through Central Italy to Paris, Vienna, Milan, and Berlin. It has often been remarked that the Latin races are of all the peoples of Europe most prone to revolution; but this proposition did not hold good in 1848. The Czechs ...
— The War and Democracy • R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern,
... in the following words: "One might judge, if the territory four leagues in extent lying between Panama and this river were cut through, he could pass from the south sea to that on the other side, and thus shorten the route by more than fifteen hundred leagues. From Panama to the Straits of Magellan would constitute an island, and from Panama to New Foundland another, so that the whole of America would be in two islands."—Vide Brief Discours des Choses Plus Remarquables, par Sammuel Champlain de Brovage, 1599, ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Vol. 1 • Samuel de Champlain
... dragon-ship or war-vessel for her adventurous son, and with the lad, as helmsman and guardian, was sent old Rane, whom men called "the far-travelled," because he had sailed westward as far as England and southward to Nrvasund (by which name men then knew the Straits of Gibraltar). Boys toughened quickly in those stirring days, and this lad, who, because he was commander of a dragon-ship, was called Olaf the King—though he had no land to rule—was of viking blood, and ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... years ago this very year. Meanwhile they had extended their empire into Syria, Egypt, and along the coast of Africa. And thus at length they more than half encompassed the Mediterranean, from the straits of Gibraltar to the Gulf of Venice, and reigned in three quarters ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... the Straits of Gibraltar: very healthy. Also, a Malay term of rank, and four of whom form the council of the sultan of ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... says that the bones of the leg measured 3 feet 4 inches, and the skull was 3 feet and 1 inch, just about the size of the skull of Borghini, who, however, was only of ordinary height. In his account of a voyage to the Straits of Magellan, Jacob Lemaire says that on December 17, 1615, he found at Port Desire several graves covered with stones, and beneath the stones were skeletons of men which measured between 10 and 11 feet. The ancient idea ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... last generation. There were tropical settlements like British Honduras, British Guiana, Sierra Leone, and Cape Coast Castle; there were many West Indian Islands, and scattered possessions like Mauritius and Hong-Kong and Singapore and the Straits Settlements; there were garrison towns or coaling-stations like Gibraltar, Malta, Aden, St. Helena. To none of these were the institutions of full responsible self-government granted. Some of them possessed representative institutions without responsible ...
— The Expansion of Europe - The Culmination of Modern History • Ramsay Muir
... first day of December, a long range of blue hills rose on the far horizon as if springing from the sea; we soon found it to be the coast of Sumatra. Contrary winds kept us beating about and prevented our entering the straits of Sunda, but we found ourselves surrounded by a number of ships from all nations sharing a like fate, and waiting with the same impatience for a favoring wind to blow them into Sunda Roads or to their different destinations. At last the wished for breeze sprung up, the sails swelled, and ...
— Hair Breadth Escapes - Perilous incidents in the lives of sailors and travelers - in Japan, Cuba, East Indies, etc., etc. • T. S. Arthur
... nothing else to do but to make the effort to get back to their home as soon as possible. This, they now find, is no easy matter. A strange barricade of stakes is in the way, and there is only one opening, and even that is a very narrow one. But they are now in such sad straits for fresh air that they must try that one place and get to their ...
— Winter Adventures of Three Boys • Egerton R. Young
... Ludovicoburgum Fundatum et Munitum, M.DCC.XX ('Louisbourg Founded and Fortified, 1720'). Its obverse bore the profile of the young Louis XV, whose statesmen hoped they had now established a French Gibraltar in America, where French fleets and forts would command the straits leading into the St Lawrence and threaten the coast of New England, in much the same way as British fleets and forts commanded the entrance to the Mediterranean and threatened the coasts of France and Spain. This hope seemed flattering enough in time of peace; ...
— The Great Fortress - A Chronicle of Louisbourg 1720-1760 • William Wood
... of people to take such a thing shabbily," said Westover. "They didn't happen to mention it, but Mrs. Vostrand must have got used to seeing young fellows in straits of all kinds during her life abroad. I know that I sometimes made the cup of tea and biscuit she used to give me in Florence do duty for a dinner, and I ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... important thing the Turk has done for Germany has been the closing of the Black Sea. The sowing of a few mines in the Straits promptly put an end to Russian trade from the Black Sea and dealt southern Russia a great blow commercially. Germany thus struck at England, because a large part of the English food supply has normally come from the ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... whom to contrast himself favourably. If he would risk his fortune on the spinning of a coin, being aware of the prevalence of his good-luck, archaeology will tell him that the best luck will change; or if, when in sore straits, he asks whether ever a man was so unlucky, archaeology will answer him that many millions of men have been more unfavoured than he. Archaeology provides a precedent for almost every event or occurrence where modern ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall
... these two men of means, who exercised a veritable secret power, and through her piety, which put her on good terms with the clergy, she succeeded in raising her husband up to the highest official positions—profiting also by the financial straits of Clement Chardin des Lupeaulx, Secretary General ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... therefore, where the state of nature is to be found? we may answer, it is here; and it matters not whether we are understood to speak in the island of Great Britain, at the Cape of Good Hope, or the Straits of Magellan. While this active being is in the train of employing his talents, and of operating on the subjects around him, all situations are equally natural. If we are told, that vice, at least, is contrary to nature; we may answer, it is worse; ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.
... confine your exertions, in that way, to your own more lofty mind. Again I refuse to have my mind, or whatever it is that does duty for it, habituated to anything. A gracious Providence knows that I should die outright, after all my blameless life, if reduced to those horrible straits you always picture. And I have too much faith in a gracious Providence to conceive for one moment that it would treat me so. I decline the subject. Why should we make such troubles? There is clear soup for dinner, and some ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... the bay and the Sacramento to New Helvetia An appeal to the alcalde Kanackas Straits of San Pueblo and Pedro Straits of Carquinez Town of Francisca Feather-beds furnished by nature Mouth of the Sacramento Islands Delaware Tom A man who has forgotten his mother tongue Salmon of the Sacramento Indian ...
— What I Saw in California • Edwin Bryant
... To what straits must the advocates of suffrage for women be driven when they needs must seek to show that the ballot is not degrading. What becomes of all our fine talk of the ballot as an educator if they who seek to secure it ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... agriculture after twenty years of high prices and protection.[558] One may naturally ask, if much money had been made by farmers during these years, where had it all gone to that they were reduced at the first breath of adversity to such straits? Some allowance must be made for the fact that these accounts come from those interested in the land, who were always ready to make the most of misfortune with a view to further protection, and the farmer is a notorious grumbler. It ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler
... breathless interest. Yonder, between two lines of shrubs, were moving bodies—men, footsore and weary, crawling along with slow, painful movements; one at least of them was a European, and even at that distance Trent could tell that they were in grievous straits. He felt for his revolver, and, finding that it was in his belt, descended the hill ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... distinguished naval officer, who flourished in the reign of Elizabeth. He made his name immortal by a voyage into the South Seas, through the Straits of Magellan; which, at that time, no Englishman had ever attempted. He died on board his own ship in ...
— A Catechism of Familiar Things; Their History, and the Events Which Led to Their Discovery • Benziger Brothers
... yet to use her personal liberty rightly, nor did she at all appreciate or desire that other and better freedom. Therefore the Lord disappointed her at this time, and turned the course of her life, as it were, upside down, that by painful experiences and narrow straits she might learn what an all-sufficient Friend he could be to her; that she might learn too the sinfulness of her own heart, and his free grace and mercy ...
— Step by Step - or, Tidy's Way to Freedom • The American Tract Society
... the valley for another rock like that. It is the only one; and the Arabs laughed because they knew it. We must content ourselves with this little hill where a few hawthorn bushes offer us tiny islets of shade, beset with thorns, and separated by straits of intolerable glare. Here we eat a little, but without comfort; and sleep a little, but without refreshment; and talk a little, but restlessly. As soon as we dare, we get into the saddle again and toil up through the valley, ...
— Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land - Impressions of Travel in Body and Spirit • Henry Van Dyke
... were off the coast of Sardinia, steaming rapidly along for the Straits of Bonifacio. The night had been tranquil, and the morning was more tranquil still; but no one who knew the capricious Mediterranean felt confident of continued fair weather. However, at sea the mind takes little thought for the morrow, or even for the afternoon; ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 445 - Volume 18, New Series, July 10, 1852 • Various
... thought that this was the safest and best course that he could take. He did not dare to go through France for fear of Philip. To go all the way by sea, which would require him to sail out through the Straits of Gibraltar into the Atlantic, would require altogether too long and dangerous a voyage for so late a season of the year. The only alternative left was to attempt to pass through Germany; and, as the German powers were hostile to him, ...
— Richard I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... are never very fussy, when it's something to eat; and Polly will like the fun." And as she opened the box and took out a fresh plateful of their dainty crackers, Katharine invited up her guests who came willingly enough, never dreaming of the straits to which their friends' hospitality had ...
— Half a Dozen Girls • Anna Chapin Ray
... Juan de Solis, the navigator, to determine whether Castila del Oro were an island, and to send to Cuba a chart of the coast, if any strait were possible. For this, De Solis visited Nicaragua and Honduras; and later, led far to the south, perished in the La Plata. For this, Magellan entered the straits, which, strangely enough, he affirmed before setting out, that he "would enter," since he "had seen them marked out on the geographer Martin Behaim's globe." For this, Cortez sent out his expeditions on both coasts, exposing his own life and treasure, and sending home to the emperor, in his second ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... must be protected. It is not a Samnite or Tuscan foe we are engaged with, so that the empire taken from us might still continue in Italy. A Carthaginian enemy draws after him from the remotest regions of the world, from the straits of the ocean and the pillars of Hercules, a body of soldiers who are not even natives of Africa, destitute of all laws, and of the condition and almost of the language of men. Savage and ferocious from nature and habit, ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... the sun, the moon, birds flying in the air, &c., could be put in afterward by an artist of higher grade. And, by the way, now I think of it, I may as well open with a sunrise off Cape Guardafui, and a distant view of the Straits of Babel Mandel, give a passing glance at the sources of the Nile, which lie in that undiscovered region, a brief glimpse at the Mountains of the Moon, and wind up with a splendid sunset in the Bight ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... they anchored in the mountain-girt harbor of Acapulco. The discoveries of the celebrated navigator, Magellan, fixed the commercial character and importance of this sea-port. He had sailed through the straits that bear his name, and coasted northwardly as far as the trades. From this port he bore away to the Spice Islands, discovering on the voyage the Philippine Islands, where the city of Manilla was founded. By this voyage he demonstrated that the advantages of a route across the Pacific ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... bones of the deer and the urus; that the Australian heaps up the shells of devoured shellfish in mounds which represent the "refuse-heaps" or "Kjokkenmodding," of Denmark; and, finally, that, on the other side of Torres Straits, a race akin to the Australians are among the few people who now build their houses on pile-works, like those of ...
— The Antiquity of Man • Charles Lyell
... believe that Wade and Read and Kit and Wash were not live boys, sailing up Hudson Straits, and reigning temporarily over an Esquimaux tribe."—The Independent, ...
— Frank Among The Rancheros • Harry Castlemon
... Yes, my dear; for after we have divided the whole globe into land and water, we again subdivide the land into Continents, Islands, Peninsulas, Isthmusses, and Promontories,—the water into Oceans, Seas, Straits, Gulfs, ...
— A Week of Instruction and Amusement, • Mrs. Harley
... During the reign of Honorius mixed hordes of Vandals, Suabians, and Alans poured through Gaul across the Pyrenees, and divided Spain into barbarian monarchies. A few years later the Vandals, called across the Straits of Gibraltar by the treachery of Count Boniface, overran the province of Africa, and established a powerful kingdom, whose fleets, issuing from the port of Carthage, swept the Mediterranean and sacked Rome itself. Rome had, by the famous edict of Antoninus Caracalla, given the world ...
— Latin Literature • J. W. Mackail
... last words and your last gifts—and a letter—for Peter, and send me in your stead to-night. I will deliver them faithfully. I will tell him—for he should be told—of the sore straits in which you find yourself. Set him this noble example of duty, and believe me, it will touch his heart more nearly than even that sacred parting which ...
— Peter's Mother • Mrs. Henry De La Pasture
... of the last storm, which frost had preserved in every shadowy spot, lay all about them. The sky was clear, and full of stars, for the wind that blew cold from the northwest had dispelled the snowy clouds. The waves rushed into countless gulfs and crannies and straits on the ruggedest of shores, and the sounds of waves and wind kept calling like voices from the unseen. By a path, seemingly fitter for goats than men, they descended halfway to the beach, and under ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... broken at any point, the fate of the campaign was sealed. Feeling this truth, of which his military sagacity left him in no doubt, he had to bear the further weight of that general confidence which he did not share. He did not complain, however, or in any manner indicate the desperate straits to which he had come. He called for fresh troops to supply his losses; when they did not arrive he continued to oppose his powerful adversary with the remnant still at his command. These were now more like old comrades than mere private soldiers ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... lighthouses nearest to the Eddystone would be very different; and supposing that the boy sent aloft to watch for the light were to report 253 instead of 243, without waiting to correct his view, the captain, by turning to his book, would perhaps find that No. 253 was in the Straits of Sunda, or some equally remote situation, and would easily recognise the error. When we take into account the number of vessels lost by mistaking one lighthouse for another, the value of this proposal becomes apparent. Mr Babbage ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 430 - Volume 17, New Series, March 27, 1852 • Various
... from the siege wherewith they were closely pressing it, a battle was won in the open field, and the rebellion though not yet finally crushed was sufficiently weakened for Belisarius to return to Sicily in the late spring of 536. He crossed the Straits of Messina, landed in Italy, was received by the provincials of Bruttii and Lucania with open arms, and met with no check to his progress till, probably in the early days of June, he stood with his army under the walls ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin
... these four pursuers was Billy Wantage, who had come to know of the curious action of the Seigneur of Chaudiere from an intimate friend, a clerk in the bank. Billy's fortunes were now in a bad way, and, in desperate straits for money, he had planned this bold attempt at the highwayman's art with two gamblers, to whom he owed money, and a certain notorious horse-trader of whom he had made a companion of late. Having escaped punishment for a crime once before, through Charley's supposed death, the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... currents, then, are a most important element in determining the climate of a country. If we would take the case of our hypothetical polar continent again, and, instead of presenting a continuous coast line, imagine it penetrated by long straits and fiords, possessing numerous bays, large inland seas, and in general allowing a free communication with the ocean, we are very sure the effect would ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen
... interested in the early French history of the State, to which he had been drawn by his study of the titles to landed property in Detroit and its neighborhood, and some of his discoveries were curious. One of these had reference to an island in the straits near Detroit known as "Skillagalee,'' which had puzzled him a long time. The name seemed to be Irish, and the question was how an Irish name could have been thus applied. Finally he found on an old map an earlier name. It was le ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... night he had been restless. He was in a panic that the Peruccas are seeking him. He is no longer responsible, mon ami; his mind is gone. From his muttered talk of the last few days, they conclude that he is making his way south to Bonifacio, in order to cross the straits from there to Sardinia. He is on foot, alone, and ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... ruin us: be artful and cunning, or Mr. White may be hanged and all our houses burnt over our heads.' We both secretly returned, she to the room where the young ladies were, and I to the piazza I had just left."*1* This little narrative will give some idea of the straits to which the good whig matrons of Carolina were sometimes reduced in those days. But no time was allowed Horry to extort the provisions as suggested. He had scarcely got to the piazza when his videttes gave the alarm. Two shots ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... mines, and, since he sees the importance which lies in this, let him do all in his power to find persons in every way satisfactory to go there. Let him inform us every year of what he may be doing; for he knows in what great straits the royal estate is, and how much is being spent in those regions, without there being any results from it, while so much profit lies in those mines, as we have been informed, and as has been written to him. And let him again ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XX, 1621-1624 • Various
... a blind, mechanical way, his brain receptive to nothing else, Jimmie Dale walked on along the street. To kill a man! Death he had faced himself a hundred times, witnessed it a hundred times in its most violent forms, had seen murder done before his eyes, had been in straits where, to save his own life, it had seemed the one last desperate chance—and yet his hands were still clean! To kill a man in fair fight, in struggle, when the blood was hot, was terrible enough, a possibility that was always before him, the one thing from which he shrank, the one thing that, as ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... Captain Gillespie to the pilot, while he cocked his eye up aloft as if he seriously thought of setting the royals. "I said I'd get out of the Straits before the afternoon; and, you know, when I say a thing I ...
— Afloat at Last - A Sailor Boy's Log of his Life at Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... erected eight alms-houses for as many poor families, besides a donation of L12 per annum to the curate. This worthy benefactor was born here, and from a state of indigence succeeded in amassing considerable wealth by mercantile pursuits. He is stated to have been poisoned, in the straits of Gibraltar, on his voyage from Leghorn, with a valuable cargo, by the ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... had been accustomed to use could not be raised on the plantation, and the conditions brought about by the war frequently made it impossible to secure these things. The whites were often in great straits. Parched corn was used for coffee, and a kind of black molasses was used instead of sugar. Many times nothing was used to sweeten ...
— Up From Slavery: An Autobiography • Booker T. Washington
... came to regard as their legitimate prey. These "corsarios Luteranos," as the Spaniards sometimes called them, scouring the coast of the Main from Venezuela to Cartagena, hovering about the broad channel between Cuba and Yucatan, or prowling in the Florida Straits, became the nightmare of Spanish seamen. Like a pack of terriers they hung upon the skirts of the great unwieldy fleets, ready to snap up any unfortunate vessel which a tempest or other accident had separated from its fellows. When Thomas Gage was sailing ...
— The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century • Clarence Henry Haring
... faithful Mohammedan, who drinks neither wine nor spirits, makes up for his abstinence by free indulgence in coffee. In the islands of the Indian Ocean the natives stimulate themselves by chewing the betel nut; and in the Malacca Straits Settlements, Penang, Singapore, and other islands, the people obtain their spirit from the fermented sap of the toddy-palm. In Japan the natives get mildly stimulated by immoderate drinking of tea many times each day; and all of the civilized and barbaric world is addicted, ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... resistance, the plains of Macedonia and Thessaly. The troops which had been posted to defend the Straits of Thermopylae, retired, as they were directed, without attempting to disturb the secure and rapid passage of Alaric; and the fertile fields of Phocis and Boeotia were instantly covered with a deluge of barbarians, who massacred the ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... of Conde, which occurred in the spring of 1588, by depriving me of my only patron, reduced me to such straits that the winter of that year, which saw the King of Navarre come to spend his Christmas at St. Jean d'Angely, saw also the nadir of my fortunes. I did not know at this time—I may confess it to-day without shame—wither to turn for a gold crown or ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... creeping slowly out towards the unknown West, as if in anticipation of Columbus, throwing its outposts farther and farther into the ocean, as its pioneers grew more and more sure of their ground outside the Straits of Gibraltar. Some seamen of Prince Henry's, returning from "Guinea" to Spain, some adventurer trying to "win fame for himself with the Lord Infant," some merchants sent out to try their luck on the western side as ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... misrepresentation. In fact, however, he seems to have been both an accurate and truthful observer, and a discoverer of the very first order. Starting from his native city Massilia (Marseilles), he passed through the Straits of Gibraltar and traced the coast-line of Europe to Denmark (visiting Britain on his way), and perhaps even on into the Baltic.[16] The shore of Norway (which he called, as the natives still call it, ...
— Early Britain—Roman Britain • Edward Conybeare
... were generally defeated in the election; new leaders, like Clay, Calhoun, and Crawford, made the dominant party a war party, and forced the President into their policy; and the war of 1812 was begun. Its early defeats on land, its startling successes at sea, its financial straits, the desperation of the contest after the fall of Napoleon, and the brilliant victory which crowned its close, all combined to raise the national feeling to the highest pitch; and the federalists, whose stock object of denunciation was "Mr. Madison's war," though Mr. Madison ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... mighty rock whence the monster Scylla swooped down upon unfortunate mariners; but here the goddess Hera came to their assistance, and sent to them the sea-nymph Thetis, who guided them safely through these dangerous straits. ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens
... and you shall have no cause to fear, for I will be ever near you. I will tarry here but one day; and ere you reach Paris, I will be there, be certain. Within ten days, I doubt not I can convert my acres into gold, and ship that gold across the narrow straits; and that done, the speed of horses, and a swift sailing ship will soon have us safe in England; and if that land be not so fair, or so dear as our own France, at least there are no tyrants there, like this Louis; and there ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... William Shakespeare was thus employed in London in building up name and fortune for himself, his father was in financial straits. As early as January, 1586, John Shakespeare had no property on which a creditor could place a lien. In September of the same year, he was deprived of his alderman's gown for lack of attention to town ...
— An Introduction to Shakespeare • H. N. MacCracken
... Nor I, nor any other Argive, saw Thee toiling in that fray, when Trojans strove Fiercely to hale away Achilles slain. My might it was that with the spear unstrung The knees of some in fight, and others thrilled With panic as they pressed on ceaselessly. Then fled they in dire straits, as geese or cranes Flee from an eagle swooping as they feed Along a grassy meadow; so, in dread The Trojans shrinking backward from my spear And lightening sword, fled into Ilium To 'scape destruction. If thy might came there Ever at all, not anywhere nigh me With foes thou ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... renewed life. Some of the smaller islands are merely sunken volcanoes, such as Gebeh, for instance, and the Banda Islands, where the 'Goonong Api' (Fire-Mountain) is a living proof. The best known of all these volcanoes is the terrible Cracatao, one of the three which may be seen in the Straits of Sunda. Readers may remember the great eruption of 1886, when half the island of Cracatao and part of the mountain, which was split clean in two, were swallowed up in the sea, and parts of the coasts ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough
... other nations; and this partly out of regard to the dignity of the British flag, and partly because any exclusive right accorded to Russia would be resisted by the States bordering on the Black Sea and by those interested in the trade and navigation of the Danube. But the opening of the Straits was one thing, the possession of Constantinople by Russia was another, and in his opinion would cause a European convulsion; for he saw in Constantinople what has since been termed 'the great strategic centre of the world': [Footnote: The expression was used by Mr. Winston Churchill in a speech ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... and other tools; for the Maid, as I deem, intended no more than to take and hold Margny, that so she might cut the Burgundians in twain, and sunder from them the English at Venette. Now as the night was not far off, then at nightfall would the English be in sore straits, as not knowing the country and the country roads, and not having the power to join them of Burgundy at Clairoix. This, one told me afterwards, was the device of ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang
... a larger population, if more broken up, notwithstanding the advantage resulting from the comparatively low mountains along the coasts, and the useful winds. A greater subdivision of land and water, more great islands connected by isthmuses, and more mediterraneans joined by straits, would be a further advantage to commerce; but with the sources of power at hand, the resistless winds and water-power, much increased in effectiveness by their weight, the great tides when several moons are on the same side, or opposite ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... Nominated Councils. The 'Civil Service,' 'Residents.' Law, custom, equity and common sense. Slavery abolished. Sources of revenue—'Opium Farm' monopoly, poll tax, customs, excise, fines and fees. Revenue and expenditure. Early financial straits. Sarawak offered to England, France and Holland. The Borneo Company (Ltd.). Public debt. Advantages of Chinese immigration 'Without the Chinese we can do nothing.' Java an exception. Chinese are good traders, agriculturists, miners, artizans, &c.: ...
— British Borneo - Sketches of Brunai, Sarawak, Labuan, and North Borneo • W. H. Treacher
... took her hands from the wall, and turned to go on up the hill to the point which commanded the open sea and the beginning of the Straits of Messina, she was terrified. Suspicion was hardening into certainty. Something dreadful must ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens
... fault of the sufferers that they fall into these straits. Struggling artists must necessarily change from place to place, and thus it frequently happens that they become, as it were, strangers in every place, and very slight circumstances—a passing illness, the sickness of the ...
— Speeches: Literary and Social • Charles Dickens
... inuaded.] the Britains as kept out, prepared to assaile the Ile of Anglesey, a countrie full of inhabitants, and a place of refuge for all outlawes and rebels. He builded certeine brigantins with flat keeles to serue for the ebbes and shallow shelues here and there, lieng vncerteinlie in the straits which he had to passe. The footmen ferried ouer in those vessels, the horssemen following by the foords, and swimming when they came into the deepe, got likewise to the shore, where stood in order of battell and huge number of armed ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (4 of 8) - The Fovrth Booke Of The Historie Of England • Raphael Holinshed
... seventeen last stages, even on our way hither, we could extract nothing from the country; or, if there was now and again anything, we passed over and utterly consumed it. At this time our project is to take another and a longer journey certainly, but we shall not be in straits for provisions. The earliest stages must be very long, as long as we can make them; the object is to put as large a space as possible between us and the royal army; once we are two or three days' journey off, the danger is over. The king ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon
... known in those days as Giovanni Pavesi, and he wasn't in such dire financial straits, either. It was his money that backed the enterprise, and it was common property, undenied by him or anyone else, that the chief object in the speculation was the love of the prima donna, Carmenita Malban. And, Bob, she was the most beautiful ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... in a city of the moderate size of that in which these two men practised there should arise situations which sometimes brought about a clash between them. The patient of one, having arrived at serious straits, often called for a consultation with the other. The very professional bearing and methods of the two were so different, strive though they might to adapt themselves to each other at least in the presence of the patient, that trouble ...
— Red Pepper's Patients - With an Account of Anne Linton's Case in Particular • Grace S. Richmond
... foreign possessions, the Philippines have cost Spain the least blood and labour. The honour of their discovery belongs to Magalhaens, whose name is associated with the straits at the southern extremity of the American continent, but which has no memorial in these islands. Now that the glory which he gained by being the first to penetrate from the Atlantic to the Pacific has been in some measure obliterated by the disuse of ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: Explorers • Various
... pinases, the one called the Serpent, and the other the Mary Sparke of Plimouth, both of them belonging to Sir Walter Raleigh, written by John Euesham Gentleman, wherein were taken the gouernour, of the Isle of Sainct Michael, and Pedro Sarmiento gouernour of the Straits of ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, v. 7 - England's Naval Exploits Against Spain • Richard Hakluyt
... Griffin. Voyage through the Lakes and Straits. The Storm. Superstition of the Voyagers. Arrival at Mackinac. Scenery there. Friendship of the Indians. Sail on Lakes Huron and Michigan. Arrival at Green Bay. The well-freighted ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... in that household. Old gowns were worn and mended till they could be worn and mended no longer. The girls were of an age to go abroad to school, but they must be contented with such education as they could pick up at home, so long as one poor creature suffered straits through their father's fault. The only indulgence allowed was almsgiving. Mopsie might divide her dinner with a hungry child, or Jane bestow her new petticoat on an aged woman; but they must, in consequence, deny ...
— The Late Miss Hollingford • Rosa Mulholland
... Arizona and New Mexico we were frequently reduced to serious straits to find decent drinking-water. On many occasions I have drunk, and drunk with relief and satisfaction, such filthy, slimy, greenish-looking stuff as would disgust a frog and give the Lancet a fit, though that discriminating journal would probably call it soup. Sometimes even water, and I ...
— Ranching, Sport and Travel • Thomas Carson
... very sorry for you. But I see one path which you have not yet tried, which can lead you out of these sore straits. You have tried living for yourself a good many years, and the result is great weariness and heaviness of soul. Try now to live for others. Take a class in the Sunday-school. Go with me to visit my poor people. You will be astonished to ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss |
