"Breech" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... takes me away from my Nell. But you must come out with us. There is no such fun as stumping over the moors—the Jew has got all the turn-out for that sort of thing—short frocks and knickerbockers, and a duck of a little breech-loader. She thinks she's a great shot, poor thing, and men are civil and let her imagine that she's knocked over a pheasant or a hare, now and then. As for the partridges, she lets fly, of course, but to say she ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... and Black Eagle offered, through the interpreter, to give him a mustang and a fine wolf-skin. The pony was declined, the skin accepted, a quid pro quo being bestowed on the chief in the shape of one of Mr. Ramsay's breech-loaders, a gift that made the snake eyes glitter. But what earthly return can be made for some friendly offices? Could a thousand guns be considered as an adequate payment for the delirious thrill that Mr. Ramsay ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... one of the so-called "hand cannon," which were often used at this period, both by cavalry and by infantry—portable fire-arms, loaded sometimes at the breech and sometimes by a movable chamber. See illustrations and descriptions of these weapons in Demmin's Arms and Armor (Black's trans.), pp. 59-74, ...
— The Philippine Islands 1493-1898, Vol. 4 of 55 - 1576-1582 • Edited by E. H. Blair and J. A. Robertson
... of Cupid's bow, Once on a time was an a— gut; Now to a nobler office put, By favour or desert preferr'd From giving passage to a t—; But still, though fix'd among the stars, Does sympathize with human a—. Thus, when you feel a hard-bound breech, Conclude love's bow-string at full stretch, Till the kind looseness comes, and then, Conclude the bow relax'd again. And now, the ladies all are bent, To try the great experiment, Ambitious of a regent's heart, Spread all their charms to ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... it, one of the voyageurs threw open the breech of the dead man's gun. It was patent to all that it had been fired once. The empty cartridge ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... rifle, slid a cartridge into the breech, and coaxed the trigger lovingly towards him. Three times he fired, then we went together to look at the target. Not a bullet fired by him had struck it. The instructor glared down the barrel of the gun, made some nasty remarks about deflection, and went back ...
— The Amateur Army • Patrick MacGill
... up, and I reckon we'll find some in a horn flask in the bottom of my cart." His expectations in this particular were realized, and he loaded the rifle with a small blank charge. "Now," he said, shaking the powder into the pan by a succession of smart taps on the breech, "sometimes these old pieces go off and sometimes they don't; it depends on the flint, but you stand back of your Uncle Bob, sonny, and keep yo' fingers out of yo' ears, and ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... confidence to the gun-bearers as the fact of their rifles being good slayers, and they quickly learn to take a pride in their weapons, and to strive in the race to hand the spare rifles. Dust storms, such as I have constantly witnessed in Africa, would be terrible enemies to breech-loaders, as the hard sand, by grating in the joints, would wear away the metal, and destroy ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker
... knocks staying at a big hotel on the sea-shore, where a fellow is obliged to be dressed up all the time," he said when one of his sisters expressed surprise at his choice. "We shall regularly camp out, and father has given me a doubled-barreled breech-loader, to say nothing of his own rod and collection of flies. Jack and I will have the jolliest kind of a time while you're moonin' on the hot sands trying to think it ...
— The Search for the Silver City - A Tale of Adventure in Yucatan • James Otis
... little consequence. Moreover, he was in his shirt sleeves, and without the universal serape, which often serves for both cloak and coat. Otherwise his garb was the ordinary stable wear of a Mexican gentleman's servant; wide velveteen trousers open along the outer seams, and fended with leather at breech and bottoms. "Batos" and a black glaze hat completed his habiliments, with a scarf of China crape, the chammora, around his waist. Scanning the face shadowed by the broad rim of his sombrero, it was seen to be that of Jose, Don Ignacio's groom; while his errand along that road ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid
... obtained no idea of any kind of sorrow other than that coming from the blows of a baton on the rump . . . . On this idea, he thought that the soul of an honest man was no different than a soldier's breech. If Gerron caused trouble to the spirit of a man of honor, he thought that this spirit, like his own, had only a rump, and that any trouble he caused would pass likewise. He deceived himself. The breech of the spirit of an honest man is different ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... how the Nawab had paid Kurreim Khan blood-money, because Shumsh-ud-deen did so hate Fraser Sahib. Whereupon Metcalfe Sahib, a little naked fellow, just the color of an old mahogany table, sent his sepoys and had the Nawab dragged, in all his ragged breech-cloth glory, to the bar of Sahib justice. In about three minutes, the Nawab was condemned to die,—condemned to be hung by an outcast sweeper. But, in consideration of his exalted rank, they consented that he should wear his slippers, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... to consist of fifty soldiers, twenty-five marines, and fifty blue-jackets, who were to embark in the steamer's boats, two of which were provided with small breech-loading pieces running on slides, and under the ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... was mounted upon Brigham, a noted buffalo horse, and he was armed with a breech-loading Springfield rifle, and a weapon which had sent many a red-skin to the ...
— Beadle's Boy's Library of Sport, Story and Adventure, Vol. I, No. 1. - Adventures of Buffalo Bill from Boyhood to Manhood • Prentiss Ingraham
... appeared to him the best piece of political statement he had yet achieved. Very likely it would make Fontenoy more savage still. But Fontenoy's tone and attitude in the House of Commons had been already decisive. The breech between them ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... know myself better, and remember the correction I had already received from him for my insolence; for he might not always be in the humour of sparing a wretch who abused his goodness. To this inuendo I made no reply but by a kick on the breech, which overturned him in an instant. He started up with wonderful agility, and, drawing his sword, attacked me with great fury. Several people interposed, but, when he informed them of its being an affair of honour, they ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... looked at the breech plug before turning on the power," said the German, "but I had no reason to suspect that anything was wrong." He went on to explain that the explosion was something like that which occurs when the breech-block ...
— Lost on the Moon - or In Quest Of The Field of Diamonds • Roy Rockwood
... his sappers at once got to work. The breech-block was unscrewed and taken out, falling a prize to the Light Horse, who vied with each other in carrying it home (it weighs 137lbs.) Then gun-cotton was thrust up the breech into the body of the gun. A vast explosion told the Boers that "Tom" had gone aloft, and his ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... wire-wound guns, whose long chases were prevented from drooping after continuous discharge by an ingenious application of the principle of the cantilever bridge, invented by the creator of the Ithuriel. In the breech-chamber of each of them was a thousand-pound shell, carrying a bursting charge of five hundred pounds of an explosive which was an improvement on blasting gelatine, and the guns were capable of throwing these to ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... be a violent madman; and by such compulsion he took, without any resistance, all that he desired from the houses. I saw this man, who unexpectedly came toward me of his own accord; he was naked, his only covering being a wretched breech-cloth; he wore in his girdle a dagger, and carried in his hands his bow and arrows. I caressed him, and tried to soften him with presents and gentle treatment, and this intercourse we continued for five or six years, with increasing confidence ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XII, 1601-1604 • Edited by Blair and Robertson
... Mildmay. "She is fitted with a torpedo port for'ard, for firing what the professor called 'torpedo-shells'; two 10-inch breech-loading rifled guns, fired through ports in the dining-saloon, and six Maxim guns, fired from the upper deck, to say nothing of small-arms. Such an armament is ample for every occasion which is at all likely to arise; and if ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... the ceremonies in favor of Madam Luna had been ended, they commenced a war-dance around the post, and the spectacle must have been as picturesque as it was animating and wild. The young braves engaged in the dance were naked, excepting a breech-cloth about their loins. They were painted frightfully, their backs being chalked white, with irregular streaks of red, denoting the streaming of blood. Frequently would they cease from dancing, while one of their number ran to the fire, snatching ...
— An account of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha - Red Jacket and his people, 1750-1830 • John Niles Hubbard
... he used all the evil words he had ever heard, and he was Western bred. Then he reacted on himself. "The Fox might come back!" Suddenly he remembered something. He got out a common sulphur match. He wet it on his lips and rubbed it on the muzzle sight: Then on each side of the notch on the breech sight. He lined it for a tree. Yes! surely! What had been a blur of blackness had now ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... the indictment, which was in the usual form. It charged Laura Hawkins, in effect, with the premeditated murder of George Selby, by shooting him with a pistol, with a revolver, shotgun, rifle, repeater, breech-loader, cannon, six-shooter, with a gun, or some other, weapon; with killing him with a slung-shot, a bludgeon, carving knife, bowie knife, pen knife, rolling pin, car, hook, dagger, hair pin, with ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... not hurt, except for a slight twinge in his lame knee. But his gun was a wreck. The stock was shattered close to the breech and a twist of his ...
— The Grizzly King • James Oliver Curwood
... his clothing, until nothing remained but the breech-cloth. Beaulieu took a rope (selected by himself for the purpose) and first tied and knotted one end about the juggler's ankles; his knees were then securely tied together, next the wrists, after which the arms were passed over the knees ...
— The Mide'wiwin or "Grand Medicine Society" of the Ojibwa • Walter James Hoffman
... army. Except that they were booted to the knees, they wore their belts and military trappings over the ordinary dress of citizens. Besides their swords and holster pistols, they carried slung from their saddles the excellent Springfield carbines, loaded at the breech. They inquired the character of our party, and were anxious to know the prospect of killing buffalo, and the chance that their horses would stand the journey to Santa Fe. All this was well enough, but a moment after a worse visitation ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... then our helm was put up to wear round upon the other tack, when the master—who all this time had been anxiously pacing the poop—suddenly ran to the head of the poop-ladder and shouted, "She strikes, sir! she strikes!" and jumping upon the breech of a gun, I saw the tricolour being slowly hauled down from the ensign staff upon which it had been hoisted when her mizenmast fell. The Captain, too, sprang up beside me in time to see the flag go fluttering in over the taffrail as it was ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... the 1st of December a couple of regiments were encamped in the vicinity of Lawrence, behind whose fortifications calmly rested six hundred men, half of them armed with Sharpe's rifles. A howitzer added to their confidence. Finally, the border ruffians, who had heard of the breech-loading rifles and learned of the character of the men behind them, after dallying for several weeks, recrossed the river and permitted the settlers to ratify the new Constitution. In January, 1856, a governor and legislature were chosen, and, in February, the Legislature, meeting at Topeka, ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... As for the rest, they're all children of the coureurs du bois, mingled with God knows how many other bloods. The two turning in by the door are the regulation 'breeds' or Boisbrules. That lad with the worsted breech scarf—notice his eyebrows and the turn of his jaw—shows a Scotchman wept in his mother's smoky tepee. And that handsome looking fellow putting the capote under his head is a French half-breed—you heard him talking; he doesn't like the two Indians turning in next to him. You see, when the ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London
... infested the mountains, and his brother had murdered a friend of Georgi (the van-driver), and was now in gaol at Rhodes for the capital offence. The Turk was very intelligent, and thoroughly conversant with the various methods of breech-loading firearms; he examined several rifles and guns belonging to me, and at once comprehended the mechanism, and explained it to the admiring crowd. When this individual left our camp in the evening, the story that I had heard in outline was ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... making any sort of a fight, the finest ship of the Spanish navy lowered her flag and was headed in for the beach. After she had thus surrendered, and before the Americans could board, she was wrecked by her own crew, who opened sea-valves, smashed out dead lights, threw overboard the breech-blocks of their great guns, and in many other ways worked what destruction they could in the time allotted. As a result of this vandalism, the fine ship rolled over on her side soon after striking, and would have slipped off into deep water had ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... any worse than Duncan's 'silver skin laced with his golden blood,' or so bad as the chamberlains' daggers 'unmannerly breech'd with gore'?[262] If 'to bathe in reeking wounds,' and 'spongy officers,' and even 'alarum'd by his sentinel the wolf, Whose howl's his watch,' and other such phrases in Macbeth, had occurred in the speech of Aeneas, ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... importance; the whistle is used to call attention; the touch is looser in the ranks than formerly; squares to resist cavalry are no longer used; [Footnote: A British officer, who has had good opportunities, says the infantry drill is second to none.] the Berdan breech-loader is the infantry arm; sergeant-majors wear officers' swords, and together with ...
— Afghanistan and the Anglo-Russian Dispute • Theo. F. Rodenbough
... placed one end of the tough ash staff into the muzzle of the gun, then laid hold and lifted it high enough for a block to be placed under it. Then the men depressed the muzzle, the leverage given by the handspike enabling them to raise the breech; and the cask was run over it right up over the trunnions, a little more hoisting and heaving getting the gun right in, when it was easily packed round with doubled-up sails, and wedged tight in ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... to fright, but do the utmost to bestir ourselves; therefore, up at once, and fling a handful of that assafetida upon the fire." Agnolo, at the moment when he moved to do this, let fly such a volley from his breech, that it was far more effectual than the assafetida. [1] The boy, roused by that great stench and noise, lifted his face little, and hearing me laugh, he plucked up courage, and said the devils were taking to flight ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... movement is carried out. Two minutes after the bugle has sounded, some such order as this is given from the officers' bridge. "Enemy off the port bow! make ready with shrapnell shell. Distance three thousand yards. Elevation twenty degrees." The gun loaded, the breech-block closed, every captain of his gun stands to the rear with the lanyard in his hand awaiting the order "Fire!" which when given, the gun is fired, sponged and reloaded. The order might then be given—"Prepare to ram," in which case the sights are made ready for eight hundred yards, and the guns ...
— From Lower Deck to Pulpit • Henry Cowling
... from the ditch to within a few feet of where I was lying. A little beyond the other end of the building stood two cannon pointing towards me with a group of rebels at the breech of each one of them trying to discharge it. They were two of our own guns that had been captured before they had been fired by our gunners and were still loaded with the double charges of canister intended for the rebels. Fortunately the gunners had withdrawn the primers from the ...
— The Battle of Franklin, Tennessee • John K. Shellenberger
... as I think I have mentioned before, a four-pound rifled piece, which was specially made to my order by an eminent firm. It was a most beautiful little weapon, exquisitely finished; was a breech- loader, and threw a solid shot about a mile, and a shell nearly half as far again. It was mounted on a swivel or pivot, which we had the means of firmly fixing to ...
— For Treasure Bound • Harry Collingwood
... brought his hand to one of the Colts at his belt. Most of the half-dozen men squatting on their heels about a fire were three-quarters bare, showing dusty, brown bodies. Two had dirty calico shirts loose above hide breech-clouts. Dark-brown eyes, as unreadable as Johnny Shannon's, surveyed Drew, but none of the Indians moved ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton
... in France in the days preceding the use of modern breech-loading firearms, the gray wolves of Europe were very bold, and a great many ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... Fannin lay against the breech of one of the cannon, blankets having been folded between to make his position easy. His wound was severe and he was suffering greatly, but he uttered no complaint. He had not shown great skill or judgment as a leader, ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the muzzle-loading rifle. Toward the close I had one brigade (Walcutt's) armed with breech-loading "Spencer's;" the cavalry generally had breach-loading carbines, "Spencer's" and "Sharp's," both of ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... I said: "you shall have the book and a breech- loading shot-gun also. As for fishing-tackle, you can get along with a pole cut from the woods until you have earned money enough yourself to ...
— Driven Back to Eden • E. P. Roe
... cried. A red-hot poker glowed above the cannon. Buckshot hailed from a hundred guns, and the poker fell, but soon it came again and this time flat upon the gun. The hand that held it was nervous and fumbling. Suddenly the breech of the gun slipped lower down the upright log. Up went the muzzle, and then came a deafening boom. There was a crash over-head. The cupola of the court-house was shattered, and down came the bell upon the roof, and off it rolled and fell upon the ground ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read
... same time he looks to the priming of his gun, and then fixes his eye on the door as it slowly opens. He drops the breech hastily to the ground as the face of ...
— Shadows of Shasta • Joaquin Miller
... were muzzle-loading. The secondary armament, mounted in tops, cageworks, bulkheads, etc., were breech-loading; but these smaller pieces fell out of favor as time went on owing to reliance on long-range fire and rareness of boarding actions. Down to the middle of the 19th century there was no great improvement in ordnance, save in the way of better powder and boring. Even in Elizabeth's day the ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... first in course, but it has taken the first place in my thoughts. I do assure you that I am not his puff. What I tell you of his reading is literally true; but it is not reading that expresses it, for I could have said as much if he had read nothing but the History of Cinder Breech and that kind of biography. He read with me English History, and stopped for information, and showed an uncommon thirst for it. He asked me as many questions in the History of George 1st concerning the South Sea Scheme, the prosecution of Lord Macclesfield, and the Barrier Treaty, as another ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... 3,000 along the Cheyenne River and northward, and nearly 4,000 on the Standing Rock Agency. It was my fortune to visit a number of villages on the Cheyenne, Morrow, and Grand Rivers and at Standing Rock. The Indians at these places are all wild—that is, still wear blankets, breech-cloths, and leggings, feathers and geegaws, do little toward cultivating the land, and are ignorant heathen. A Sabbath in a village on the Cheyenne showed what wild Indians were. The morning opened with two ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 38, No. 06, June, 1884 • Various
... visiting a 6-inch Howitzer Battery. I noticed specially how keen he was in enquiring about every little detail. Not a single thing seemed to miss his eye, from the close examination of the gun's breech, to inspecting the dug-outs of the men. He then left, and knowing he was going to inspect the Canadians I hurried off in ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... found the Sioux and their allies armed with the best modern breech-loaders, well supplied with ammunition and countless herds of war ponies, and far too numerous and powerful to be handled by the small force at ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... *peal, clap That with the stroke he was well nigh y-blent*; *blinded But he was ready with his iron hot, And Nicholas amid the erse he smote. Off went the skin an handbreadth all about. The hote culter burned so his tout*, *breech That for the smart he weened* he would die; *thought As he were wood*, for woe he gan to cry, *mad "Help! water, water, help for ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... Alexandrian library, a specimen of the original type invented by Memnon the Egyptian, and a manuscript of the first play acted by Thespis. These had not exhausted the stock of the dealer: he possessed the skin of a giraffe killed in the Roman amphitheatre; the head of King Arthur's spear; and the breech of the first cannon fired at the siege of Constantinople. The jury, however, thought that the virtuoso having ordered those curiosities, ought to pay for them, and brought in ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... minutes. During that brief moment the black powder it burned drew upon it the fire of every rifle in the Spanish line. To load his piece, each of our men was forced to crawl to it on his stomach, rise on one elbow in order to shove in the shell and lock the breech, and then, still flat on the ground, wriggle below the crest. In the three minutes three men were wounded and two killed; and the guns were withdrawn. I also withdrew. I withdrew first. Indeed, all that happened after the first three seconds of those three minutes is hearsay, for I was ...
— Notes of a War Correspondent • Richard Harding Davis
... the days of duelling, others the dangers of the road, when highway robbers lurked in every wood, and many a family coach was waylaid and its occupants robbed of their jewels and their purses of gold. To those interested in sporting, and familiar with the breech-loading guns of the present day, much interest attaches to the old powder flasks which were once necessary accompaniments of sportsmen. There are many beautifully engraved, embossed, and decorated flasks in museums, some of the early seventeenth-century specimens being made of boxwood, ...
— Chats on Household Curios • Fred W. Burgess
... considerable land still left to them. We passed several such homesteads lying close together, and as many as four yokes of oxen were ploughing, each attended by a Tarahumare, whose entire clothing consisted of a breech-cloth. The Indians here are very numerous and they are still struggling to resist the encroachments of the whites upon their land, though the ultimate result is ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz
... be past the Tongue of Jagai, right swiftly turn ye then, For the length and the breadth of that grisly plain is sown with Kamal's men. There is rock to the left, and rock to the right, and low lean thorn between, And ye may hear a breech-bolt snick where never a ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... to run home dripping. My friend's gun, moreover, having been surreptitiously borrowed from my cousin's father, was recovered the following day, to our unutterable relief. Out of the balance of the money spent on the boat, we purchased a pin-fire, breech-loading gun, the pride of my life for many days. I was being kept back from school at the time on account of a cold, but I was not surprised to find myself next day sitting in a train, bound for Marlborough, and "referred once more to ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... Allah as they came. But though they were plucky villains they did not repeat that experiment. Either by good luck or good management Stephen knocked over two of them with his double-barrelled rifle, and I also emptied my large-bore breech-loader—the first I ever owned—among them, not without results, while the hunters made ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... was empty, he struck the breech of it with his finger; and then he turned away, not deigning even once to look back again; and Lorna saw his giant figure striding across the meadow-land, as if the Ridds were nobodies, and he the proper owner. Both mother and I were greatly hurt at hearing ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... first instinct was to fling herself into the breech; and, directly her brother emerged from his room, demand for her protegee redress and reinstatement. Her second instinct was—she didn't, in truth, quite know what—for she grew sadly perplexed ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... orders to his mate, and leading Willems on the poop, sat on the breech of one of the brass six-pounders with which his vessel was armed. The boat went off again to bring back the messenger. As soon as it was seen returning dark forms appeared on the brig's spars; then the sails fell in festoons with a swish of their heavy folds, ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... continued. "Took you for old Gilly, you know." He snapped the empty shells from his gun, and blew into the breech, before adding, "Would you mind, then? That is, if you're bound up for Stink-Chau. It's a beastly long tramp, and ...
— Dragon's blood • Henry Milner Rideout
... any other range than point blank! Here is a fort mounting upwards of fifty guns of large calibre, which would have commanded the bay, but the embrasures are so small as barely to admit the muzzle of the gun, the breech of which was imbedded in the earth. These were soon silenced, as may well be supposed, by the attacking squadron taking a position beyond their range, and training their own batteries to bear upon the Chinese ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay
... chest, Raed and I brought up the cannon-rifle. It was about as much as we could get up the stairs with easily. It was, as the reader will probably remember, set in a light framework of wrought-iron, adjusted to a swivel, and arranged with a screw for raising or lowering the breech at will. The bed-pieces of the framework had been pierced for screws. It was, therefore, but a few minutes' work to bore holes in the top of the chest and drive the screws. Meanwhile the captain, who enjoyed the scheme ...
— Left on Labrador - or, The cruise of the Schooner-yacht 'Curlew.' as Recorded by 'Wash.' • Charles Asbury Stephens
... touching speech he ever listened to, the subject being the duties of hospitality. He did not at the time know how nearly the speech concerned him, or that its object was to preserve his life. This, however, soon became manifest when, exception being taken to some breech of etiquette by one of his servants, he was surrounded by a mob of shouting savages, whose evident object was to put an end to him and those with him. For two hours he remained sitting there, expecting ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard
... was undoubtedly the Lord Proprietor's; a breechloader of curiously fine workmanship, bearing the name of a famous St. James' Street maker. Of the hammers, one was down, the other at half-cock; and, pulling open the breech, the Commandant drew forth two cartridges, the one empty, the other unused. He pocketed these and examined the barrels. Clearly, one shot—and one only—had been fired since ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... I could. I wish I could find anything to do," answered Giovanni, laying down the breech-loader and looking out of the window. "The world is turned inside out like a beggar's pocket, and ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... disappearing, superstitions concerning them, usefulness of hatpins or hairpins as pipe-cleaners, usefulness of pins to schoolboys, both when bent for fishing and when filed to an extra point for use on the boy in the seat in front (honouring him in the breech, as Hamlet would have said) and their curious habits of turning up in unexpected places, undoubtedly caught by pins in their long association with the lovelier sex. But of these useful hyphens of raiment we will merely conclude by saying that those interested ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... the breastwork lasted but a few moments; many of the troops encountered hand to hand, and not having the advantage of bayonets on our side, our riflemen used their pieces as war-clubs, breaking many of them off at the breech. The rout commenced at half-past four, and the pursuit by the main army continued ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... couple of training-ships getting ready for a cruise, and it made one proud of his country to see the interest shown by our party in everything on board of them, patiently listening to the explanation of the breech-loading guns, diving down into the between-decks, crowded with the schoolboys, where it is impossible for a man to stand upright and difficult to avoid the stain of paint and tar, or swarming in the cabin, eager to know the mode of the officers' life at sea. So these are the little places where ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... of this gun are given in Fig. 94. The barrel of the gun is made of a piece of brass rod. A hole is drilled through this rod with a small drill and a piece of copper wire is inserted. A square piece of brass for the breech is then drilled out to receive the barrel. One end of the barrel is placed in this hole and held with a drop of solder. A drop of solder should also be used on the copper wire that runs through the barrel. The bearing and shield of the gun are made from ...
— Boys' Book of Model Boats • Raymond Francis Yates
... rain during the night but not enough to wet a sheet of paper. At sunrise temperature 70 degrees, calm. At noon slight breeze southerly; temperature 110 degrees. Found suspended the spring of one of Terry's breech-loading rifles round the neck of a native; he describes the remaining portions of the rifle out to the north-east, which will be nearly in our north course. Highest temperature during the afternoon in the sun 129 ...
— McKinlay's Journal of Exploration in the Interior of Australia • John McKinlay
... from the lef' flank when we opened out. No!' he said, bringing down his hand with a thump on the bedstead, 'a bay'nit ain't no good to a little man—might as well 'ave a bloomin' fishin'-rod! I 'ate a clawin', maulin' mess, but gimme a breech that's wore out a bit, an' hamminition one year in store, to let the powder kiss the bullet, an' put me somewheres where I ain't trod on by 'ulkin swine like you, an' s'elp me Gawd, I could bowl you over five times outer seven at height 'undred. Would ...
— Soldier Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... whistle is heard in the outer darkness, and a dozen forms, lithe and lean, dressed only with the narrow white breech-clout and mocassins, and daubed with white earth until they seem a group of living marbles, come bounding through the entrance, yelping like wolves, and slowly moving round the fire. As they advance, in single file, they throw their bodies into diverse attitudes, some graceful, some ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... its defenders into the air, and forming a huge pit two hundred feet long and sixty feet wide. Lee and Beauregard hurried to the scene, checked the panic that prevailed, brought up troops, and before the great Federal columns approached the breech the Confederates were ready to receive them. The assault was made with little vigor, the approaches to the breech were obstructed by abattis, and instead of rushing forward in a solid mass they occupied the great pit, and contented themselves with ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... long range, in such a manner as to make them appear as natural looking as possible, and then we are ready for business. Now here they come—a flock of seven geese, plump down among the stool, but get up again with equal haste. Two of them are knocked down with the breech-loader, one dead, the other only wounded—a third stopped by the muzzle-loader. Theodoric was dreamily watching his decoys as they danced about, when a bunch of sprig-tail swooped dawn, hovering above the stool. He picked his bird, and dropped two with the first barrel, and another responded to the ...
— Nick Baba's Last Drink and Other Sketches • George P. Goff
... section of a Confederate battery, tumbling over gunner after gunner as they came forward to fire. One of his victims was a general officer, whose horse he killed. At the end of an hour or so, a piece of shell took off the breech of his pet rifle, and he returned disconsolate; but after a few minutes he gathered three rifles that were left by wounded men, and went back again ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... Winchester, and, holding it in front of him, jerked down the lever as he had seen Dorothy do, so as to eject the old and put a fresh cartridge into the breech. But the old cartridge, in springing out, flew up and hit him such a smart rap between the eyes that Leon at once seized his ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie
... water out of the tube, opened the breech-door; and, reaching in with a long, heavy wire, lifted the starting lever and water tripper that gave motion to the torpedo's engine. The exhaust of air into the tube was driven out into the boat by the rapidly ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... temple, [for they always were armed, and kept guard at the festivals, to prevent any innovation which the multitude thus gathered together might make,] one of the soldiers pulled back his garment, and cowering down after an indecent manner, turned his breech to the Jews, and spake such words as you might expect upon such a posture. At this the whole multitude had indignation, and made a clamor to Cumanus, that he would punish the soldier; while the rasher part of the youth, and such as were naturally the most tumultuous, fell to fighting, ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... first minister, after having told his business, with the utmost brevity and in the plainest words, should, at his departure, give the said minister a tweak by the nose, or a kick in the belly, or tread on his corns, or lug him thrice by both ears, or run a pin into his breech; or pinch his arm black and blue, to prevent forgetfulness; and at every levee day, repeat the same operation, till the business ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... of the explosion was very severe. Four of the seven men at the gun had been blown overboard, the breech worker was uninjured, though from the way he swayed about it was evident that he was dazed, and I expected to see him fall over the side at any moment. The remaining two men were as dead ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... real service," said Dunlap, throwing a cartridge into the breech of the Sharp, and ejecting it to show how fast ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... Leslie proceeded direct to the island where, having landed Flora, he proceeded, with some difficulty, to rouse the savages, and supply them with food and drink. They proved to be, as Leslie had said, a pair of fine, well-made men, naked, save for a kind of breech-clout round their loins, of sturdy physique, and apparently but little the worse for their adventure. Nor were they especially unprepossessing in appearance, although there was a certain character of ruthlessness in the expression of their eyes and about their mouths ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... flat in the vicinity of the river, and although much covered with dense bush, it was interspersed with numerous small glades, covered with parched herbage 2 or 3 feet in height. A few Tokrooris accompanied me with spare rifles (all muzzle-loaders, as the breech action had not been introduced in those days), and I was leading the way, occasionally breaking through the intervening bush, with ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... slow-winged birds as they flitted near the ground. My father had at first made him practise for a long time without caps, powder, or shot, merely in quickly bringing the stock close to the shoulder, and getting the eye directly behind the breech. When proficiency in that had become a mechanical habit, the gun was loaded, and then commenced the practice of shooting at moving objects. As the art of bringing the gun properly to the cheek had been so thoroughly mastered ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... meant action of some kind." The ex-rancher was silent for a moment. Then his right fist went into his left palm with a smack. "The only kind o' resolution that'll get anythin' is made o' lead and fits in a rifle breech! And I want to tell you, old man, if there ain't some pretty quick right-about-facin' in certain quarters, I'll be dashed if I ain't for it! An' I won't be standin' alone, ...
— Deep Furrows • Hopkins Moorhouse
... believe those who got away carried some lead with them. Lieutenant Schwatka, who remained with the sleds, said that when the firing began it sounded for a while like a sharp battle, so rapidly and incessantly were the shots delivered. It clearly illustrates the advantage of breech-loaders and magazine guns when game is plentiful and ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... the gun where it is mounted are not sufficient to take up the recoil, hence the braces which protrude against the wooden platforms sunk into the ground. The bridge-like structure on the rear platform of the car is part of the carrier for the shell in loading, and the arched bar over the breech block a part of the newly invented quick ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... gone a step he caught sight of the figure of Soa, outlined in bold relief against the background of the fire and surrounded by many of the freed Settlement men. At the instant when he saw her she was in the act of springing back from the breech of the gun, the lanyard in her hand. Then came the roar of the shot and the ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... apart by the summer's heat, always a-staling. This object swives girls enow, and fancies himself a handsome fellow, and is not condemned to the mill as an ass? Whatso girl would touch thee, we think her capable of licking the breech of a leprous hangman. ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... seaward port-holes blinded, and sweat dripping from our chins. Then we lay on the cabin roof again, in breech-clouts, waiting for a breeze, and showing no light except the red coals of ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... heretofore there was no lawyer nor attorney in owre island, but in Sir George Carey's time [1588] an attorney coming in to settle in the island, was by his command, with a pound of candles hanging att his breech lighted, with bells about his legs, hunted owte of the island; insomuch that owre ancestors lived here so quietly and securely, being neither troubled to London nor Winchester, so they seldom or never ...
— Brannon's Picture of The Isle of Wight • George Brannon
... but just jogged on with our chins cocked up till we were forenent the big drum, where yon old scoundrel Umgazi was standing with his young men looking as black as sin. For a moment their spears were shaking in their hands, and I heard the click of a breech-bolt. If we had winked an eye we would have become pincushions that instant. But some unearthly power upheld us. Even the laddie kept a stiff face, and for me I forgot my breeks in watching the Governor. He looked as solemn as an ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... that the hair along his spine had risen like a brush, and then he heard—growing slowly in Baree's throat—a snarl of ferocious hatred. It was the sort of snarl that had held back the factor from Lac Bain, and Carvel, opening the breech of his gun to see that all was right, chuckled happily. Baree may have heard the chuckle. Perhaps it meant something to him, for he turned his head suddenly and with flattened ears looked ...
— Baree, Son of Kazan • James Oliver Curwood
... forest, humming with insect and bird life, arose a sound that was neither wind nor running water—confused, increasing, nearing! Then a shriek broke within the fort palisades,—"The enemy! the Iroquois!" and the courtyard was in an uproar indescribable. Painted redskins, naked but for the breech clout, were dashing across the cornfields to scale the palisades or force the hastily slammed gates. Father Daniel rushed from church to wigwams rallying the Huron warriors, while the women and children, the aged and the feeble, ran ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... and the Soldiers' Monument, and the Second Presbyterian Church. All the sights there are to see in strange places. And then when the show came back to your own home-town next year, people would wonder whose was that slim and gracile figure in the green silk tights and spangled breech-clout that capered so nimbly on the bounding courser's back, that switched the natty switch and shrilly called out: "Hep! Hep!" They'd screw up their eyes to look hard, and they'd say: "Yes, sir. It is. It's him. It's Willie ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... watching at the cliff's rim. He thought it likely that Tandakora might come, and he had not long to wait. The huge Ojibway came striding through the bushes and into the circle of the firelight, his body bare as usual save for breech cloth, leggins and moccasins, and painted with the hideous devices so dear to the ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... must have had it in his breech-cloth," remarked the corporal seriously, for not a rag besides had he about him. "No, no it couldn't be him, and ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... task of storming such a place. The breech-loading rifles of the Indians thrust through chinks between the rocks were ready to pick off every soldier who showed himself for a moment, while the Indians lay utterly invisible. They were familiar with byways both over and under ground, and could at any time sink ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... principle of the modern revolver was born and partially carried out centuries before the ingenious American, Colonel Colt, perfected a weapon which has since become universal. The same remark will apply to the principle of breech-loading fire-arms, examples of which may here be seen three hundred years old. One very singular cannon was observed, actually made from closely woven rope, so strong and compact as to be capable of bearing a discharge with gunpowder, and which had once seen service ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... respiration, the elevation of the continents, the laws of gravitation, the undulatory theory of light and heat, steam as a motive power in navigation, flying machines, the invention of the camera obscura, magnetic attraction, the use of the stone saw, the system of canalisation, breech loading cannon, the construction of fortifications, the circulation of the blood, the swimming belt, the wheelbarrow, the composition of explosives, the invention of paddle wheels, the smoke stack, the mincing machine! It is, therefore, easy to see why he called "Mechanics the Paradise ...
— Leonardo da Vinci • Maurice W. Brockwell
... write, easy to read, easy to talk about. They please the vanity of mankind. We think as we read, "Thank God, I am not as that man; I did not send green coffee to the Crimea; I did not send patent cartridge to the common guns, and common cartridge to the breech loaders. I make money; that miserable public functionary only wastes money". As for the defence of the department, no one cares for it or reads it. Naturally at first hearing it does not sound true. The Opposition have the unrestricted selection of the point of attack, ...
— The English Constitution • Walter Bagehot
... to doe, that's all, there's half a dozen of my friends i'th' fields sunning against a bank, with half a breech among 'em, I shall be with 'em shortly. The care and continuall vexation of being rich, eat up this rascall. What shall become of my poor familie, they are no sheep, and they must ...
— The Scornful Lady • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... Crown Prince's attack, and by the superiority of the Prussians in generalship, in the discipline of their troops, and in the weapon they carried; for though the Austrians had witnessed in the Danish campaign the effects of the Prussian breech-loading rifle, they had not thought it necessary to adopt a similar arm. Benedek, though no great battle had yet been fought, saw that the campaign was lost, and wrote to the Emperor on the 1st of July recommending him to make peace, for otherwise ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... him with tensely anxious eyes as he broke the breech, looked at the shining circle of cartridges, and ...
— Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • James Oliver Curwood
... also a loose collarless jacket with tight sleeves, whose skirts reach half way down the leg. These garments are fastened in front and are made of medrinaque and colored silks. They wear no shirts or drawers, but bahaques [i.e., breech-clouts] of many wrappings, which cover their privy parts, when they remove their skirts and jackets. The women are good-looking and graceful. They are very neat, and walk slowly. Their hair is black, long, and drawn into a knot on the head. Their robes are wrapped about the waist and ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... pyramid of light rose from the breech of the gun, which sufficed, during the moment it lasted, to discover three boats filled with armed men, advancing immediately opposite, while two others could be seen diverging, apparently one towards the quarter, the other ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... and the instant Felix saw the tell-tale head, he dropped flat to the ground as if he had been shot. The giraffe had not seen him, for the head, having vanished for a moment, reappeared; it was feeding, plucking down small branches of leaves, and Felix, lying on his side, opened the breech of the rifle, drew the empty cartridge case, inserted a cartridge in each barrel, and closed the breech. Now, unknown to Adams, when he had fired the gun the day before, there was a plug of clay in the left-hand ...
— The Pools of Silence • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... before, Major Plympton decided not to execute the prisoners. They were turned over to their own people to be flogged in the presence of the officers. More humiliating than death was their punishment. Their blankets, leggins, and breech-cloths were cut into small pieces, and finally the braves whipped them with long sticks while the women stood ...
— Old Fort Snelling - 1819-1858 • Marcus L. Hansen
... the revolver, throwing open the breech—the cylinder was empty; he had forgotten to load it. "What a fool!" he exclaimed, laughing scornfully, and still laughing he walked to the centre of the room under the chandelier and turned ...
— Vandover and the Brute • Frank Norris
... run thing that ever you saw"—that was the victor's description. It is a singular thing that during those twenty-five years of incessant fighting the material and methods of warfare made so little progress. So far as I know, there was no great change in either between 1789 and 1805. The breech-loader, heavy artillery, the ironclad, all great advances in the art of war, have been invented in time of peace. There are some improvements so obvious, and at the same time so valuable, that it is extraordinary ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... however, and conversation at night was even forbidden. Most of the officers were gone and this threw me pretty much on my own resources. I have forgotten to say that Lemuel Bryant, the man who fell at the breech of my gun, at Little York, and whom I afterwards hauled into the Scourge's boat, got off, very early after our arrival at Halifax. He made two that got quite clear, instead of the one I have already mentioned. Bryant's escape was so clever, as to ...
— Ned Myers • James Fenimore Cooper
... moment the twin reports of Jack's breech-loader again echoed through the house, this time it was answered by a fusilade ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... be cruel, And dare you think of mercy? I'le tell thee fool, Those that surpriz'd thee, were my instruments, I can plot too good Madam, you shall find it: And in the stead of licking of my fingers, Kneeling and whining like a boy new breech'd, To get a toy forsooth, not worth an apple, Thus make my way, and with Authority Command ...
— The Little French Lawyer - A Comedy • Francis Beaumont
... perhaps from the loud Cannons Breech, Which makes no distinction betwixt poor and rich, Instead of his Dog might have taken his ...
— Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry • Edmund Goldsmid
... made that mirth last night? the neighbours say, That Bran the baker did his breech beray: I rather think, though they may speak the worst, 'Twas to his batch, ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... barrel, which is octagon and extremely heavy. Ramrod under barrel. Stock extends only to breech and is inlaid with German silver. Extremely rare. This type was used ...
— A Catalogue of Early Pennsylvania and Other Firearms and Edged Weapons at "Restless Oaks" • Henry W. Shoemaker
... Ireland," shouted Uncle Denny, "when your ancestors were wearing fur breech clouts and using cairns ...
— Still Jim • Honore Willsie Morrow
... many lodges being thirty robes in size. They commenced the work of destruction along the road west as far as Junction Station, 100 miles from here. Their forces in this fight were not less than 2,000, well armed with breech-loading carbines and rifles. A desperate attempt on their part to burn the overland-stage station near this post was made at this time, but was frustrated by the gallantry of Captain N. J. O'Brien, Company F, Seventh Iowa Cavalry. Every ranch and stage-station from ...
— The Battle of Atlanta - and Other Campaigns, Addresses, Etc. • Grenville M. Dodge
... regulars to the right could only remain in support, it fell to the lot of the left wing of this brave brigade to assault in almost impenetrable position an enemy armed with magazine rifles or breech-loaders, and entirely at home. The bugles rang the signal; the officers in silence took their stations, and, stepping into the narrow pathways through the jungle, crouching along the road-ways or crashing through the stiff bamboo, the blue-shirts drove ahead. Two, three ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King
... Ned. See, it works by compressed air," and Tom showed his chum how, when the gun was loaded, the projectile in place, and the breech-block screwed fast, the officer in charge of the firing squad would, on getting the range from the soldier detailed to calculate it, make the necessary adjustments, and pull ...
— Tom Swift and his Giant Cannon - or, The Longest Shots on Record • Victor Appleton
... passed a tea-curing house. This was a long rectangular, one-story building with twenty furnaces arranged, each under an open window, around the sides. In front of each heated furnace with its tray of leaves, a Japanese man, wearing only a breech cloth, and in a state of profuse perspiration, was busy rolling the tea leaves between ...
— Farmers of Forty Centuries - or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea and Japan • F. H. King
... month longer there won't be enough material on land or sea to supply the demand for ready-made garments. As it is, I'm afraid the poor devils will have to go naked themselves until a new crop springs up. I saw one of Pootoo's wives patching his best suit of breech clothes to-day, so he must be hard put for ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... rifle-fire increased in fierceness and came nearer, and seemed to make another instant of inaction a crime. The men were listening with their mouths wide apart, their heads cocked on one side, and their eyes staring. They tightened their cartridge-belts nervously, and opened and shot back the breech-bolts of their rifles. I took out my revolver, and spun the cylinder to reassure myself for the hundredth time that it was ready. But Laguerre stood quite motionless, with his eyes fixed impassively upon his watch as though he were a physician ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... amusing to see them in their full regulation uniform. They had been furnished a regular cavalry uniform and on this parade some of them had their heavy overcoats on, others their large black hats, with all the brass accoutrements attached; some of them were minus pantaloons and only wore a breech-clout. Others wore regulation pantaloons but no shirts, and were bareheaded; others again had the seat of their pantaloons cut out, leaving only leggings; some of them wore brass spurs, though without boots or moccasins; but for all this they seemed to understand ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... odd little difficulties arose too, connected with the use of the guns as a shelter from fire, and very exact rules had to be made to avoid tilting the nose and raising the breech of a gun in order to use it ...
— Little Wars; a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys' games and books • H. G. Wells
... of the direct course. The chief invited us to take part in the sport; which of course we readily consented to do. All arrangements having been made, a part of the band, numbering some fifty or sixty men, armed with bows and arrows, with no other garments than their breech-clouts, set off on horseback in two divisions, followed by a number of men on foot, who concealed themselves as we went along in any holes or behind any hillocks they ...
— Snow Shoes and Canoes - The Early Days of a Fur-Trader in the Hudson Bay Territory • William H. G. Kingston
... as they are also minutely subdivided, the effects of damage by shot and consequent flooding may be localized to a considerable extent. The guns of the ship are to consist of four 20 centimeter Hontorio breech loading guns on Vavasseur carriages, six 12 centimeter guns, eight 6 pounder rapid firing, and eight or ten small guns for boats and mitrailleuse purposes, four of which are in the crow's nests at the top of the two masts of the ship. We may remark ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 623, December 10, 1887 • Various
... of his pocket, and captures his Constantinople to pay for a dinner at the "Freres." What fleets of Russian gunboats have I seen launched to procure a few bottles of champagne! I remember a chasse of Kersch, with the cafe, costing a whole battery of Krupp's breech-loaders!' ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... tide and wind helped, and early one afternoon the big white boat under a ragged sail shouldered its way before the sea breeze into Patusan Reach, manned by fourteen assorted scarecrows glaring hungrily ahead, and fingering the breech-blocks of cheap rifles. Brown calculated upon the terrifying surprise of his appearance. They sailed in with the last of the flood; the Rajah's stockade gave no sign; the first houses on both sides ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... great scene with Peter yesterday. Rex has two guns, you must know—a rifle, and an old fowling-piece—good enough in its way, but awfully old-fashioned (not a breech-loader), and he determined to make old Peter a present of this, for he is a good old fellow, and does not cheat one, and we had resolved to give him something, and we knew this would delight him. I wish you could have seen him. He burst out laughing, ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden
... saddles was an odd-looking object. It resembled a gigantic book, partly open, and set upon the opened edges. It was a pack-saddle, also of Mexican fashion, and in that country called an "alpareja." It had a strong leathern girth, with a breech-strap to keep it from running forward upon the shoulders of the animal that might wear it. At a short distance from the saddles, several blankets—red and green ones—with a bear-skin and a couple of buffalo-robes, were lying upon the grass; and on a branch overhead ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... have a printing-press and a small breech-loading shot-gun that father made for me. I had a cat named Bill, but he is dead. He would jump over my arms, and stand up on his hind-feet and kiss me, and sit ...
— Harper's Young People, October 19, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... rifle, he must bring with him thirty bullets, thirty caps, and half a pound of powder—in addition he must be provisioned for eight days. That there should have been an alternative to the rifle was due to the fact that the law was made at a time when only a few burghers possessed breech-loading rifles—achterlaaiers, ...
— Three Years' War • Christiaan Rudolf de Wet
... not answer. I knew his meaning. When my services were no longer required, he would, with his cowardly instinct, devise a means to kill me. The three soldiers were a fair sample of the poor ignorant Peruvians. They were armed with breech-loading rifles of French pattern, bayonets fixed. After Rodrigo had muttered his threat, he went into the little coach, sitting directly behind me, and could, by his position, observe every move I made. Manuel was standing on the left watching me. Although I had endeavored to ...
— Where Strongest Tide Winds Blew • Robert McReynolds |
