"Explode" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the end of the day; but the literary husband is ever in possession. His work must not be disturbed even when he is merely thinking. The study is consequently a kind of domestic cordite factory, and you are never certain when it may explode. The concussion of a dust-pan and brush may set it going, the sweeping of a carpet in the room upstairs. Then behold a haggard, brain-weary man, fierce and dishevelled, and full of shattered masterpiece—expostulating. Other houses have their day of cleaning out this room, and their ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... package which was placed in his room," he went on, "must have been a little infernal machine of glass, constructed so as to explode the moment the wrapper was broken. The flying pieces of glass injected the poison as by a myriad of hypodermic needles— the highly poisonous toxin of abrin, product of the jequirity, which is ordinarily destroyed in the stomach but acts powerfully if injected into the blood. ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve
... He heard the pistol explode and his face felt scorched, but he struck savagely, and something rattled upon the floor. The pistol had dropped and he was somewhat surprised to feel himself unhurt as he grappled with Daly. They ...
— Carmen's Messenger • Harold Bindloss
... to this new menace swept toward the bombers in three parallel lines, above, to right and left of them. Allan's plane leaping to position at the very end of one long line. The three leaders reached the first rocket-ship, and their green beams shot out. In that instant the enemy craft seemed to explode in intense blue light. Then the awful dazzle was gone. The rocket ship was there, just as before, but the American helio-planes were gone, were wiped out as though they had never been. The next trio, and the next, rushed ...
— When the Sleepers Woke • Arthur Leo Zagat
... never saw so naturally pastoral a man. He carried good-temper about with him, and yet he could rebuke with a sharpness which surprised me, if there was need. He was curiously tolerant, I used to think, of sensual sins, but in the presence of cruelty or meanness or deliberate deceit he used to explode into the most violent language. I remember a scene which it is almost a terror to me now to recollect, when I was walking with him, and we met a tipsy farmer of a neighbouring village flogging his horse along a lane. He ran up beside the cart, he stopped ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... banderillas are planted in this way, rendering the bull mad with rage and pain. Should the animal prove of a cowardly nature and refuse to attack repeatedly, banderillas de fuego (fire) are used. These are furnished with fulminating crackers, which explode with terrific noise as the bull careers about the ring. During this division numerous manoeuvres are sometimes indulged in for the purpose of tiring the bull out, such as leaping between his horns, vaulting over ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... them. And here, in this desecrated resting-place of the village dead, where the shattered gravestones were mingled with barbed wire, death-dealing fragments of iron, and rusting stick-bombs that had failed to explode, was a wooden cross, on which was rudely written the name of Hans Siebert. Mouldering at the foot of the cross was a grey woollen German tunic from which ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... You take it between your thumb and second finger, thus, and poise it by placing the tip of the first finger behind it, thus; but you must throw hard, and wait until the upper part of the door is smashed, and you can fling it clear, or three ounces of dynamite will explode in front of your nose, with disastrous effect. I will have a second bomb ready if the first one ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... Major, comin' to a sittin' position. 'Hoor-rash-o!' says he again, and then he went off like a pack of firecrackers. A sneeze wouldn't more'n get fairly started before another'd explode in the middle of it. And the Major was as powerful a sneezer as he was talker. Gee! them bass sneezes of his sounded like a freight-engine exhaust. Mind you, he didn't open his eyes; just sat there, covered with carmine and soothin' syrup, ...
— Mr. Scraggs • Henry Wallace Phillips
... off, as if trying to avoid a volleying gust, and another wave crested itself ahead of the blunt bows and then seemed to explode, dropping tons of water on deck. Laths, lumber, and bunches of shingles were ripped loose and went into the sea. The Polly appeared to be showing sagacity of her own in that crisis; she was jettisoning cargo for ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... began to blur within, I would lay aside my book and muse over wild rumors of secrets borne by this messenger between the generations. Journals and letters, it was said, were there concealed, which should change the current gossip of history, and explode many bubble-reputations that had glittered on the world. There were hints of deadly sins, committed by men high in Church and State, which their perpetrators lacked the courage to confess before their fellows, but which, in the bitterness of remorse, they ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... them, as to Mr. Moody, the worst of sins; and they consider the only proper thing to do with it, is to follow the advice of the Bishop of London, some years ago, and fling doubt away as you would a loaded shell. They apparently look upon Christianity as a huge powder magazine, which is likely to explode if a spark of candid inquiry comes ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various
... partially disclosed many strange secrets, and since then he had been even more enlightened. It was but too evident to him that his protector was engaged in some dark and insidious plot, and Paul felt that he was standing over a mine which might explode at any moment. He now began to fancy that there was some mysterious link between the woman Schimmel, who was so carefully watched, and the Marquis de Croisenois, so haughty, and yet on such intimate ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... Justice ever minding his father of his bloody death and sufferings, to the effect that he take vengeance for it even on thess that crucifies him afresh. The mother he brought on the stage as the embleme of mercy, crying imperiously, jure matris, I inhibite your justice, I explode your rigor, I discharge your severity. Let mercy alone triumph. Surely if this be not blasphemy I know not whats blasphemie. To make Christ only Justice fights diamettrally[129] wt the Aposle John, ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... on the shoulder as it were of the cigar, was a small hatch or opening, just large enough to allow a man to pop through it: from her bows projected a long iron outrigger, at the end of which there was fixed a torpedo that would explode on coming into contact ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha
... cast upon him (not only by malignant prelates, but even by the high fliers, or more corrupted part of the presbyterian persuasion) namely, on account of his firing at bishop Sharp; which, they think, is enough to explode, affront or bespatter all the faithful contendings of the true reformed and covenanted church of Scotland. But in this Mr. Mitchel stands in need of little or no vindication; for by this time the reader may perceive, that he looked upon ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... Protestants saw with consternation the Spaniards establishing themselves upon the Lower Rhine; with still greater anxiety did the Roman Catholics see the Hollanders bursting through the frontiers of the empire. It was in the west that the mine was expected to explode which had long been dug under the whole of Germany. To the west, apprehension and anxiety turned; but the spark which kindled the flame came ...
— The History of the Thirty Years' War • Friedrich Schiller, Translated by Rev. A. J. W. Morrison, M.A.
... of such a thing as that?" exclaimed the latter, nearly ready to explode with laughter, yet feeling a bit angry at the same time. "What under the sun d'ye suppose he's doing such a ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... it known, are mechanical fish of machined steel, self-propelling and self-steering, actuated by a small air engine, and carrying in their "war heads" a charge of over two hundred pounds of guncotton, and in their blunt noses a detonating cap to explode it ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... proves that even with incandescent lights special precautions must be taken to avoid any risk of fire. A lamp having been enveloped with paper and lighted by a current, the heat generated was sufficient to set fire to the paper, which burnt out and caused the lamp to explode. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884 • Various
... her chair exhausted by her excitement. Alf reached round for the chair he had left, and brought it to the table. He sat down, his elbows on the table and his hands clasped; and he looked directly at Jenny as though he were determined to explode this false bubble of misunderstanding which she was sedulously creating. As he looked at her, with his face made keen by the strength of his resolve, Jenny felt her heart turn to water. She was physically afraid of him, not because he ...
— Nocturne • Frank Swinnerton
... there waiting for them and looked at Many Eyes critically, but they forebore to laugh at her. Sahwah felt as though she would explode if they made fun of her. But they made no disparaging remarks, although they both felt dubious about the flying qualities of a kite in the shape of a Primitive Woman. However, they were game and promised to shout for her with all ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... grenades. Pte. J. Melrose and Corporal A.R. Kelly were amongst the first to attempt this and their example was quickly followed by others. It was a deadly dangerous game, for it was impossible to tell how long any fuse had still to burn and the grenade might explode at any moment, but though several men were killed and wounded in this way, the survivors persisted bravely and the Turkish advance was effectually checked. Their bombing slackened off gradually and it became ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... man, for instance Captain Stubbard, little accidents will happen, like the fall of a shell upon the beach this afternoon. Some people were close to it, according to the rumour; but luckily it did not explode." ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... be mourning over the fate of whoever takes your place," the engineer murmured, with a sarcasm entirely lost on his listener. "Hell, Dale," he now let his feeling explode. "I've seen lots of fellows from the mountains, but any one of 'em would lose a hand before letting another man take his medicine! You've got to let me do it, you understand!—but I do reserve this opportunity ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... before the other Leaguesman could fire. But Dugald was not aiming for The Barbarian. First he had to eliminate Geoffrey from the scene entirely. When he fired, at almost point-blank range, the world seemed to explode in ...
— The Barbarians • John Sentry
... on oxygen. While this element does not burn, a certain amount of it must be present to support combustion. Thus, the most inflammable gas or liquid will not burn or explode unless oxygenized. Explosives are made by using a sufficient amount, in a concentrated form, which is added to the fuel, so that when it is ignited there is a sufficient amount of oxygen present to support combustion, hence the rapid ...
— Practical Mechanics for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... to say that the drive was conducted under shell-fire, but no one must suppose that shells were exploding at everybody's feet. All the same, only a little time before a shell did drop the other side of the shooting party, and a very little time afterwards we saw one explode to the right, about two hundred yards from where we were. In fact, the general position was not unlike that described by Mr. Jorrocks: the shooters were having all the pleasures and excitements of war with only one per cent. of ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... goats there'd be no music, my dear; music depends upon goats," said her father rather sharply, and Mr. Pepper went on to describe the white, hairless, blind monsters lying curled on the ridges of sand at the bottom of the sea, which would explode if you brought them to the surface, their sides bursting asunder and scattering entrails to the winds when released from pressure, with considerable detail and with such show of knowledge, that Ridley was disgusted, and begged him ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... heap of gunpowder inside a flame so that the outer envelope of burning gas does not ignite it (Fig. 37). There you see a heap of gunpowder in the centre of our large flame. The flame is so completely hollow that even it cannot explode ...
— The Story of a Tinder-box • Charles Meymott Tidy
... to conquer her, and yet produce the same effect. It is indifferent to a Chinese where he makes his garden, whether on a spot favoured, or abandoned, by the rural deities. If the latter, he invites them, or compels them to return. His point is to change every thing from what he found it, to explode the old fashion of the creation, and introduce novelty in every corner. If there be a waste, he adorns it with trees; if a dry desert, he waters it with a river, or floats it with a lake. If there be a smooth flat, he varies it ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... needed the time to let things happen the way Willy's influence makes them happen. I don't think Goil was totally convinced. But he must have been partly, at least, for with all the system's experts arguing about just exactly what made the ship explode, and with no two experts agreeing on an explanation, he might have given some benefit of the doubt to Willy. Anyway, he was so relieved that his interests in Mars were saved that he smiled for the next three days, dismissed me as an incurable visionary or some other sort of ...
— Jack of No Trades • Charles Cottrell
... firing. The Mauser bullets drove in sheets through the trees and the tall jungle grass, making a peculiar whirring or rustling sound; some of the bullets seemed to pop in the air, so that we thought they were explosive; and, indeed, many of those which were coated with brass did explode, in the sense that the brass coat was ripped off, making a thin plate of hard metal with a jagged edge, which inflicted a ghastly wound. These bullets were shot from a .45-calibre rifle carrying smokeless powder, which was much used ...
— Rough Riders • Theodore Roosevelt
... volley. As I was reloading with feverish haste, I saw an Indian rush at Colonel Washington with raised tomahawk. Washington raised his pistol, coolly took aim, and pulled the trigger, but the powder flashed and did not explode. With the sweat starting from my forehead, I dashed some powder into the pan of my pistol, jerked it up, and fired. Ah, Captain Paul, how I blessed your lessons in that moment! for the ball went true, and the Indian rolled in the mud almost at Washington's feet. They had had ...
— A Soldier of Virginia • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... He saw plainly that the unseen marauder had been aboard when he had thrown the box over, and thus had not seen it explode in midair: did not know whether it had been tossed out or merely rendered harmless by being tampered with. If only the latter, it could be quickly repaired and set again. That must be ...
— Raiders Invisible • Desmond Winter Hall
... horseback; that the Indians gave way; but that five or six Frenchmen who were in the town held the English in check till the fugitives rallied; that Washington and his men then took to flight, and would have been pursued but for the loss of some barrels of gunpowder which chanced to explode during the action. Dumas adds that several large parties are now on the track of the enemy, and he hopes will cut them to pieces. He then asks for a supply of provisions and merchandise to replace those which ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... from under the car and got on his feet. He thrust his grimy hands deep into his pockets, stood for a moment contemplative and belligerent, as if undecided whether to explode or not, and then ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... death to the rhymes," said Adrian. "I saw her this morning. The boy hasn't bad taste. As you say, she is too good for a farmer. Such a spark would explode any System. She slightly affected mine. The Huron is ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... instead of being lowered. These abuses are possible to a greater or less extent in all combinations, large or small, but this fact is no more of an argument against combinations than the fact that steam may explode is an argument against steam. Steam is necessary and can be made comparatively safe. Combination is necessary and its abuses can be minimized; otherwise our legislators must acknowledge their incapacity to deal with the most important instrument ...
— Random Reminiscences of Men and Events • John D. Rockefeller
... fully ripe, by removing the seeds. It is of a horn-color, about three and a half inches wide and two high, and looks like a little striped melon. The ripe fruit, on taking out one of the twelve woody cells which compose it, will explode with a noise like a pistol, each cell giving a double report. This sometimes takes place while the fruit is hanging on the tree, and sometimes when it stands upon the table filled with sand. To prevent this, it is prettily hooped ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various
... suffer through a damaging foreign exchange crisis—stemming from years of loose fiscal policies that have exacerbated inflation and allowed public debt to explode. After accruing more than $1.5 billion in debt arrears in the first six months of FY98/99, Pakistani officials approached multilateral creditors requesting balance-of-payments relief and structural support. In January 1999, Islamabad received more than $1 billion ...
— The 1999 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... said before, this habit of digression will be the death of me. Like a rocket, I start off splendidly, but explode and fall to pieces in every direction before I get half way on my journey. If the scintillations are varied and gayly colored, to be sure, the powder is not utterly lost; but the trouble of it is, if one keeps going off like rockets all the time, he will never get any where, and in the end ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... a pang of vexation run through him. He was ready to explode, but succeeded in showing a good exterior and said jokingly: "Suppose she came accompanied ...
— The Silver Lining - A Guernsey Story • John Roussel
... careful of them as if they were my real brothers. And there I was trying to be, only she didn't understand. Then, another day, not long before, I coaxed some big boys who have a naphtha-launch to give the 'Balls a sail on it down the bay. The thing happened to explode, and, though nobody was hurt, she went on just terrible because I'd taken the children without asking her. How could I ask her when she was off shopping, or somewhere, just at the very moment the idea popped into my head? And nothing befell the little fellows ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... rather, some disparity of temper, taste, character, may almost be postulated of a completely happy alliance; as in chemistry you bring together an acid and an alkali, and, always provided they don't explode—" ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... "Don't explode, Simmy," she cried. "I wasn't intimating a thing. I was positively asserting it. But go on, please. You interest me. Don't try to look injured, Simmy. You can't manage ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... justices for diabolical compacts. Nor had he concluded his advice in a narrower circle, as I have heard, than the denial of any such operations, but out of reason of state, and to gratify the church, which hath in no age thought fit to explode out of the common people's minds an apprehension of witchcraft." The author adds, that he "must confess James to have been the promptest man living in his dexterity to discover an imposture," and subjoins a remarkable story in confirmation of ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin
... demand for realization of it, and then finding what you coveted in the palm of your hand, as it were, you would know what is in my heart, and why expression of some kind is necessary to me just now, and why I'll explode if it is denied. It will lower the tension, if you will accept this as a matter of fact; as if you rather expected and ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... thing, whether we are there to experience it or not, and would remain there though there were not left a man on the face of the earth. Precisely in the same way gunpowder has a power of exploding. It will not explode if you put no match to it. But it has always the power of so exploding, and is therefore called an explosive compound, which it very positively and assuredly is, whatever philosophy may say ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... a complete imbroglio, worthy of a romance, seems ever threatening to appear upon my monotonous horizon; a regular intrigue seems ever ready to explode in the midst of this little world of mousmes and grasshoppers: Chrysantheme in love with Yves; Yves with Chrysantheme; Oyouki with me; I with no one. We might even find here, ready to hand, the elements of a ...
— Madame Chrysantheme Complete • Pierre Loti
... as he leaned against the rail for support, "wouldn't there be evolution of heat from the action of the acids on the lime—enough to explode the nitro-glycerine just formed?" ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... heavy face, with no clearly cut outline in it, was not the typical face for passion; but she was capable of passion to an extraordinary degree, and what is more remarkable, it was not explosive passion, or rather it was not passion which she suffered to explode. I remember once when she was a little mite she was asked out somewhere to tea. She was dressed and ready, but it began to rain fast, and she was told she could not go. She besought, but it was in vain. We could not afford ...
— Mark Rutherford's Deliverance • Mark Rutherford
... difficulty at all. Let us explain this,—a man says he knows that fire explodes gunpowder; but he does not know how or by what means it does this. Suppose, then, he finds out the means, he is still just where he was; he must again ask how or by what means these discovered means explode the gunpowder; and so on ad infinitum. Now the mind may quibble with itself for ever, and make what difficulties it pleases in this way; but there is no real difficulty in the case. In considering any sequence, we always know the how or the means as soon as we know the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... water wheel Whistler had seen at the foot of the dam had probably furnished power for some machine that had been fixed on the face of the dam with a charge of dynamite. This invention had been rigged to explode the dynamite after a certain length of time—time enough, without doubt, to enable the inventor to get well away from the vicinity ...
— Navy Boys Behind the Big Guns - Sinking the German U-Boats • Halsey Davidson
... from him I learned of remarkable escapes that he had had from death during the four days of the drive. On one occasion a Hun shell, sufficient in size to have blown him to atoms, lodged in his truck among supplies and failed to explode. I saw the shell myself, also saw the hole in the top of the truck through which it passed and can vouch for the truthfulness of the story. On another occasion a shrapnel shell exploded on the road just to the right of his truck. When it burst, it sent small pieces of metal flying in all ...
— In the Flash Ranging Service - Observations of an American Soldier During His Service - With the A.E.F. in France • Edward Alva Trueblood
... necessary to attack France in the full enthusiasm of her Revolution. The generals, and even the Marechal de Lascy himself, hesitated before frontiers reputed to be impregnable, whilst the emperor was apprehensive for the Low Countries and Italy. The French maxims had passed the Rhine, and might explode in the German states at the moment when the princes and people were called upon to take arms against France, and the diet of the people might prove more powerful than the diet of the kings. Dilatory measures would have the same intimidating effect on the revolutionary genius, without ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... an immense variety in the brilliancy of the shooting stars, from the weak telescopic sparks that vanish like a flash of lightning, to the incandescent bolides or fire-balls that explode in the atmosphere. ...
— Astronomy for Amateurs • Camille Flammarion
... time, nothing happened. Then the viewplate was filled with a deadly blue-white glare. Unlike an ordinary atomic bomb, the flare bomb would not explode violently; it simply burned, sending out a brilliant flare of deadly radiation that would crisp all life dozens ...
— The Judas Valley • Gerald Vance
... benefit of sufferers from a fire—somewhere or other. In our day multitudes of people fall victims to all kinds of dreadful disasters, explosions of boilers, explosions of fire-damp, of everything that can explode, for the agents of destruction seem to be in a state of unnatural excitement as well as human beings. Never before, perhaps, have inanimate things seemed so much in accordance with the spirit of the times. Fred found a superb placard, the work of Cheret, ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon
... very far from being the famous moonlighter his fancy had conjured up, and it is barely possible that he was disappointed at not having seen some more savage looking party, for he had speculated considerably about these people who explode nitro-glycerine in an ...
— Ralph Gurney's Oil Speculation • James Otis
... explode, you see, nor did it have wings," laughed Wynifred. "So it took no aerial voyage—we may be sure of that. I'd give anything to find ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... have actually to hit the U-boat; to explode one anywhere near is enough. When our fellows let go one of them, the ship has to be going 25 knots to be safe. One of our destroyers was making 11 knots one night—the best she could do under the weather conditions—and an ash-can was washed ...
— The U-boat hunters • James B. Connolly
... speculate about the intimate structure of the radio-active atoms, and the mode in which they broke up with the liberation of some of their store of internal energy. How could we imagine an atomic structure which would persist unchanged for long periods of time, and yet eventually spontaneously explode, as here an atom and there an atom reached a condition ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others
... that I couldn't bear to touch it again, and so I concluded I'd go on board and signal. So I came up alongside, and got on board. Solomon was down below; so I just stepped forward, and put my head over the hatchway, and spoke to him. I declare I thought he'd explode. He didn't think I was a ghost at all. It wasn't fear, you know—it was nothing but delight, and all that sort of thing, you know. Well, you know, then we went to work signaling to you, and he took the fog horn, and I went to the flag, and so ...
— Lost in the Fog • James De Mille
... for countermeasures to protect our troops in Iraq against improvised explosive devices, but the administration has not put forward a request to invest comparable resources in trying to understand the people who fabricate, plant, and explode those devices. ...
— The Iraq Study Group Report • United States Institute for Peace
... lead from afar. When low bullets drilled the canvas, the chief suggested to Augustus that Ute Jack had climbed up; and when the bullets flew high, then Ute Jack was doubtless in a hole. Nor did Augustus contrive to drop a shell from the howitzer upon Ute Jack and explode him—a shrewd and deadly conception; the shells went beyond, except one, that ripped through the canvas, somewhat near the ground; and Augustus, dripping, turned at length, and saying, "It won't go down," stood vacantly wiping his white face. Then the two ...
— The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories • Owen Wister
... 233, 234.] A locomotive engine was sent to McCoy on Sunday (16th), and with it he went on to Durham, taking his telegrapher along. Some torpedoes had been found on the road below, and McCoy diminished the risk from any others, by putting some empty cars ahead of the locomotive to explode them if there should be any. He got through safely, however, found Kilpatrick at Durham, opened telegraphic communication with headquarters at Raleigh, was authorized to read and transmit by the wire Johnston's reply, and so was able before night to give his impatiently waiting chief the Confederate ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... speaking. His voice was so low-pitched that Robert could not hear what he said. It was like the murderous, meaningless growling of a mad dog; every now and then it seemed to break free—to explode into a shattering roar—and then with a frightful effort to be dragged back, held down, in order that it might leap out again with a redoubled violence. It was punctuated by the sharp, spiteful smack of a fist brought down into the ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... and Pierre, with twenty of the boys, into the worst part of the town. Each shall carry a ball of yarn dipped in turpentine, mixed with sulphur and other inflammable things. They shall also carry another ball, having but a thin coating of the yarn, and powder inside so as to explode. When the clock strikes two, we will say, each of them will smash the window of some store, light both balls, and put them in. I want the explosion of one ball to scare anyone who may be sleeping there half out of their senses, and make them rush out ...
— No Surrender! - A Tale of the Rising in La Vendee • G. A. Henty
... a good deal of a fellow already, but at the sight of her welcoming smile his self-esteem almost caused him to explode. What magic there is in a girl's smile! It is the raisin which, dropped in the yeast of male complacency, ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... no oxides, and no acids except HF. HF, HCl, HBr, HI, are striking illustrations of acids with no O. HClO4 is a very strong oxidizing agent. A drop of it will set paper on fire, or with powdered charcoal explode violently. This is owing to the ease with which it gives up 0. Notice why its molecule is broken up more readily than HC103. The higher the molecular tower, or the more atoms it contains, the greater its liability to fall. ...
— An Introduction to Chemical Science • R.P. Williams
... of the neighbouring mountains were heard the stirring sounds of the bagpipes and drums, and at short intervals a halfpenny rocket would explode in mid-air, streaking the blue sky ...
— Tales from the Lands of Nuts and Grapes - Spanish and Portuguese Folklore • Charles Sellers and Others
... his satisfaction on these grounds was added besides a peculiar pleasure in the discovery of him which he could ask no one to share—that it was to him as a lump of dynamite under his wife's lounge, of which no one knew but himself, and which he could at any instant explode. It was sweet to know what he could do! to be aware, and alone aware, of the fool's paradise in which my lady and her brood lived! And already, through his own precipitation, his ...
— There & Back • George MacDonald
... exciting moments he fully comprehended the affair. He knew, as in a case he had once seen on shipboard, that this was spirit of extraordinary strength, and that the vapour would explode wherever it gathered, even while the surface of the ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn
... fire before. The sound of a bursting shell was not a new one. But there had always before been a strong element of chance in my favour. When the Germans were shelling a town, who was I that a shell should pick me out to fall on or to explode near? But this was different. They were firing at a battery, and I was beside that battery. It was all very well for the officer in charge to have said they had never located his battery. I did not believe him. I still doubt him. For another ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... he was trying an experiment. Anthony is great on experiments, and always has been. But this was a bomb. I thought he wanted to see if I could catch it on the fly, and drop it into water before it had time to explode. ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... finally adopted by the board. It was that a certain kind of powder, known as 'B' powder, degenerates under heat, and becomes, in time, extremely combustible, so that it will sometimes explode apparently ...
— The Destroyer - A Tale of International Intrigue • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... is taken from a journal, dated December 22, 1895: "Providence (Rhode Island).—A recent prophecy that a boiler would explode between December 16 and 24 in a store has seriously affected the Christmas trade. Shoppers are incredibly nervous. One store advertises, 'No boilers are being used; lifts running electrically.' All stores have had ...
— How it Works • Archibald Williams
... battens. So for a little space let the unholy creature lie there writhing. Let it understand what it is to have a back broken by the weight of an impossible burden. Let it try vainly to drag its limbs from beneath an immovable load. Observe it, let it suffer. Very soon we will finish with it, and explode the iniquitous system it represents. See, in the name of humanity, of labour, of the unknown and unnumbered millions of the martyred poor, I set a match to this good little fuse, and, with the rapidity of thought, blow blasphemous tyrant Capital into a thousand fragments ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... that dreadful tragedy will remember that the explosion was precipitated by the fall of the box containing dynamite from a cart, or wheelbarrow, conveying it to the steamer. The hammer was set, by clockwork apparatus, to explode the dynamite after the departure of the steamer from England and when near mid-ocean, and Keith, confiding in the efficacy of the arrangement, was actually about to take passage in the steamer from Bremerhaven as far as England. ...
— The Narrative of a Blockade-Runner • John Wilkinson
... his shoulders impatiently. Seeing that he was getting angry and was like to explode, Esperance cried out, "Wait, godfather, you must let me try to convince my parents. Suppose, father, that I had chosen the same career as Maurice. What different armour should ...
— The Idol of Paris • Sarah Bernhardt
... started instantly the boy above you finished, the next boy began, and took your place. I can still see and hear the unfortunate J. getting up steam for his line four or five boys ahead of time, so that he might explode at the right moment, which desirable end, however, he but very rarely accomplished, and never catching up, he used, like the man in the parable, always to "begin with shame to take the lowest place." Sometimes the master in ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... the girl. "I am sure that he is quite dead, and it wouldn't be safe for you down there now. The gasoline tank may explode any minute." ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... tactics and concentrated their fire upon individual batteries, but it was evident that they found difficulty in getting the range. Many of the shells fell short, casting up pillars of water, or went over the forts to explode in ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... of royalty and realm serves not to keep warm toes extended beyond short blankets at Christmas-tide. It is not strange that late in December, 1776, all Jersey was mined with discontent, and needed but the spark of Continental success to explode. ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... filled with powder, which could be set off by percussion. It was the plan to drop these down from the airship, into the midst of the savages. When the bomb struck the ground, or even on the bodies of the red dwarfs, it would explode. It was hoped that these would so dismay the little men that they would desert the village, and leave the way clear for a search to be made for ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton
... of the hall, the petard was heard to explode, and he saw that it had succeeded; for the soldiers rushed, brandishing their swords and pistols, in at the postern of the turret, whose gate had been successfully forced. A thrill of exultation, but not unmingled with horror ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... rid a gentleman annually of his duns, with the smallest possible quantity of corporeal inconvenience. When luxuries become necessaries, insolvency is the best safety-valve to discharge the surplus dishonesty of the people, which, if pent up, would explode in dangerous overt acts of crime and violence; and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 381 Saturday, July 18, 1829 • Various
... theories are not very clear. He thinks, like some other people, that Locke's chapter on 'Substance' is 'unsatisfactory'; and agrees with some 'strictures' on the early chapters of Mill's 'Political Economy.' He writes an essay to explode the poor old social contract. He holds that the study of metaphysics is desirable, but adds the note, 'not including ontological inquiries under the head of metaphysics.' He denies, however, the proposition that 'all general truths are founded on experience.' ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... those who can get the green hard ones eat them raw. The potted pomegranates are now in bloom and also in fruit in the pots. The color is a wonderful scarlet. The lotus ponds are in bloom—wonderful color in a deep rose. When the buds are nearly ready to open they look as if they were about to explode and fill the air with their intense color. The huge leaves are brilliant and lovely—light green and delicately veined. But the lotus was never made for art, and only religion could have made it acceptable to art. The sacred ponds are well kept and are in ...
— Letters from China and Japan • John Dewey
... said, with no trace of a smile, "we don't allow little girls to bring bombs in here.... If you see anything around that you think needs an infernal machine set off under it, why, you come and tell me. See?... Tell me before you explode anything—not after. You anarchists are apt to get ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... head little with the particular accident which woke up the sleeping disease. The disease was there, and if one thing had not awakened it some other would. And so, if the population of a great city have got into a socially diseased state, it matters little what shock may have caused it to explode. Politics may in one case, fanaticism in another, national hatred in a third, hunger in a fourth—perhaps even, as in Byzantium of old, no more important matter than the jealousy between the blue and the green charioteers in the theatre, may inflame a ...
— Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... inspector's office and smoke was a sensational breach of the usual code. But as he had distinctly heard the invitation to sit, and to smoke, Philip proceeded to do both, and waited in silence for the next mine to explode under his feet. And there was a certain ease in his manner of doing these things which would have assured most men that he was not unaccustomed to sitting ...
— Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • James Oliver Curwood
... prices, that should continue too. And that ought to make the Congress and the president feel better. Our goal is health insurance everybody can depend on—comprehensive benefits that cover preventive care and prescription drugs, health premiums that don't just explode when you get sick or you get older, the power—no matter how small your business is —to choose dependable insurance at the same competitive rates that governments and big business get today, one simple form for people who are sick, and most of all, the ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... money-order business. As it is, the government coins money and transfers money, but will not take it on storage, which is absurd, and forces the people to deposit with loan and discount concerns, liable to explode at any ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 22, September, 1891 • Various
... civilization. The romance of achievement under difficulties, of obscure beginnings and triumphant ends; the story of how great men started, their struggles, their long waitings, amid want and woe, the obstacles overcome, the final triumphs; examples, which explode excuses, of men who have seized common situations and made them great, of those of average capacity who have succeeded by the use of ordinary means, by dint of indomitable will and inflexible purpose: ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... in this performance made it actually painful since the feeling could not be expressed—since we knew that our father knew that we were only too liable to explode in the presence of an honoured guest, and nothing vexed him more. While in the room we dared not change glances or even smile; but after seeing and hearing the wonderful laugh a few times we would steal off and going to some quiet spot sit in a circle and start imitating ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... What does part of a last act or the “star song” matter in comparison with five minutes of valuable time to the good? Like the river captains, we propose to run under full head of steam and get there, or b—- explode! ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... of October formal possession was taken of Cabul, the troops occupying the Bala Hissar. Delay had taken place in this operation, as it was feared that the Afghans might explode large quantities of ammunition known to be stored there. A durbar was held after we had entered the Bala Hissar. The whole of the sirdars and principal men of Cabul and its neighbourhood attended. Of these the leaders, who had been more than suspected of heading the plot against us, were ...
— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... favourable, it only needs a spark to explode a powder magazine; and there are moments when a word can turn an outwardly calm and patient man into a raging maniac. This introduction of Mrs. Porter's name into the discussion at this particular point broke down the last remnants ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... in a single plea for the poor, little Lucy, dancing so gayly over the mine just ready to explode. She was purely selfish still, with all her qualms of conscience, and thought only of Anna, whom she would make happy at another's sacrifice. So she never hinted that it was possible for Arthur to keep his word pledged to Lucy ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes
... German militarism which the Sergeant was reproducing to the full, a sample of the preciseness of the Teuton. Keeping this elderly guard at attention till the poor fellow looked as though he would explode, he groped in the pocket in the tail of his tunic, and, producing a notebook, proceeded to extricate from it a sheet of paper on which were some typewritten lines; and then in a ponderous and somewhat menacing voice he read the orders—orders which set forth exactly and minutely when a guard ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... about three seconds later a bomb fell in front of the hotel. It was a "dud," and did not explode, but it made a hole in the pavement and sent a jet of splintered stone ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... himself. He is preparing a bombshell of sorts. It will explode here. Goodness only knows who will be ...
— The Stowmarket Mystery - Or, A Legacy of Hate • Louis Tracy |
