"Portcullis" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... such a place would be to capture. On two sides the rock fell away almost sheer from the castle walls, whilst on the other two a deep moat had been dug, which was fed by small mountain rivulets that never ran dry; and the entrance was commanded by a drawbridge, whose frowning portcullis was kept by a grim warder looking fully equal to the office allotted ...
— The Lord of Dynevor • Evelyn Everett-Green
... of the parade ground which was formerly the Constable's Garden. Here Sir Walter Raleigh was allowed to walk during his long imprisonment, and could sometimes converse over the wall with the passers-by. Observe the grooves for working the massive portcullis, which was raised by chains and a windlass. These still exist on the upper floor. Immediately adjoining the gateway on ...
— Authorised Guide to the Tower of London • W. J. Loftie
... evidently built with a view to defence from within. If you take a country walk anywhere in Normandy you find that the gardens of the country houses have massive gates and high walls, the front door is like a portcullis, and the window shutters are barricades. The smallest cottages have great doors and window shutters, and if there is a garden, it is two to one that the wall is a real wall. And not only in the country ...
— Personality in Literature • Rolfe Arnold Scott-James
... was low when they came before the walls of Canalise, and passing beneath grim portcullis and through frowning gateway, with ring and tramp, crossed the wide market square a-throng with jostling townsfolk, who laughed and pointed, cheered and hooted, staring amain at Jocelyn in his threadbare motley; but Yolande, fronting all eyes with proud head aloft, drew ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... churches they studied fortresses—those of Domfront and Falaise. They admired under the gate the grooves of the portcullis, and, having reached the top, they first saw all the country around them, then the roofs of the houses in the town, the streets intersecting one another, the carts on the square, the women at the washhouse. The wall descended perpendicularly ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... the mighty rock, which sparkled all over with crystals, he found a narrow bridge, defended by gates and portcullis and towers with loopholes. But the gates stood wide open, and were dropping from their great hinges; the portcullis was eaten away with rust, and clung to the grooves evidently immovable; while the loopholed towers had ...
— The Princess and the Curdie • George MacDonald
... could perceive, now, that the drawbridge was up, the portcullis down, and all the bars and shutters of the castle in place. Moreover, in the outer darkness in which he moved, he imagined there roamed lions and wolves and ravening beasts—and he with no guide but Judge Blodgett, who stands there in the ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... bid my heralds ready be, And every minstrel sound his glee, And all our trumpets blow; And, from the platform, spare ye not To fire a noble salvo-shot: Lord Marmion waits below!" Then to the castle's lower ward Sped forty yeomen tall, The iron-studded gates unbarred, Raised the portcullis' ponderous guard, The lofty palisade unsparred, And ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott
... as it came in, without refreshing or doing him any good! How it could have happened was quite a mystery to me, till I returned with him to the town gate. There I saw that when I rushed in pell-mell with the flying enemy, they had dropped the portcullis (a heavy falling door, with sharp spikes at the bottom, let down suddenly to prevent the entrance of an enemy into a fortified town) unperceived by me, which had totally cut off his hind part, that still lay quivering on ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... houses also served as castles and stations for garrisons. Take, for instance, Ewenny; it is much more like a castle than a religious house, with its great embattled walls and towers, and magnificent gate-house furnished with a triple portcullis and "shoots," or holes in the roof above for pouring molten lead on the assailants' heads. The De Londres family were businesslike as well as pious; Ewenny's prime object was to help them to gain heaven, it also helped them to gain the earth. The close and constant connection which these ...
— Mediaeval Wales - Chiefly in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries: Six Popular Lectures • A. G. Little
... — Grimeston in front closely guarded by the Spanish captain — it was seen by the assailants that Redhead had kept his word: the drawbridge across the moat was down and the portcullis was up. Within the fort Lord Willoughby, Vere, and two thousand men were waiting for them. When about fifty had crossed the drawbridge the portcullis was suddenly let fall and the drawbridge hauled up. As the portcullis ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... perspiration trickle out through the clapboards on the outside. On the closing afternoon, during the matinee performance, the building was struck by lightning and a hole knocked out of the Corinthian duplex that surmounts the oblique portcullis on the off side. The reader will see at once the ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... creaked, the bridge sank into its appointed place, and at the same moment the portcullis was heard to wind up with a grating sound. The little troop entered the courtyard through ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... the thing dying a natural death." Said Philippa:—"I don't believe you want it to"—a construction denounced, we believe, by sensitive grammarians. The Earl let it pass, replying:—"I do not wish it to die a violent death." Her ladyship dropped the portcullis of her mind against a crowd of useless reflections. One was, whether her own relation with this young man's father had died a violent death; and, if so, was she any the worse? The rest were a motley crowd, with "might have been!" tattooed upon their brows and woven ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... close upon him, although he was not near enough to strike him with his sword. Thereupon Owain descried a vast and resplendent Castle. And they came to the Castle gate. And the black Knight was allowed to enter, and the portcullis was let fall upon Owain; and it struck his horse behind the saddle, and cut him in two, and carried away the rowels of the spurs that were upon Owain's heels. And the portcullis descended to the floor. ...
— The Mabinogion Vol. 1 (of 3) • Owen M. Edwards
... WALTER RALEIGH (the tobacconist, not the professor) and brought up to date by OLIVER CROMWELL. It has dungeons (for keeping the butter cool), loop-holes (through which to pour hot porridge on invaders), an oubliette (for bores) and a portcullis. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 10, 1917 • Various
... hundred iron-clad horses carried their mailed riders beneath the portcullis of the grim pile, and Norman the Devil, riding at their head, spurred rapidly in the direction of the castle of Peter ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... me welcome? If so, they are a long time about it,—for I have knocked once, twice, three times, and there is no admittance. It is a severe process, too; for, though the original gate, which may have been an iron portcullis for aught I know, has given place to rough boards, the latter are not particularly tender of my knuckles, and, though romance is romance, pain is a fact. So I fold my airy wings for the present, and look about me for a big stone to pound with. It is of no use. The old castle is deaf ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... appearance of the building very closely, for, observing his hesitation, the two guards prodded him vindictively with the points of their knives, and pushed him before them through the massive stone gateway, which was protected by a strong portcullis at either end, as well as an iron double door between, strong enough to turn rifle bullets. Frobisher now realised that even if he had succeeded in sinking all the junks and reaching the gate of the fort his difficulties would only have begun, and that his plan ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... Hill. We will climb those steps, only of course the stones were newer and cleaner then, and less worn by generations of climbing feet. Up them we mount till we reach the gateway with its threatening portcullis, where the soldiers of King Charles the Second, in their jackboots, are walking up and down on guard, determined to keep out all intruders. Intruders we certainly are, seeing that we belong to another generation and another century. There is no entrance at that gateway for us. ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... wings, Had been less heartfelt by him than the clang Of clattering hoofs; into the court he sprang, Just as two noble steeds, and palfreys twain, Were slanting out their necks with loosened rein; While from beneath the threat'ning portcullis They brought their happy burthens. What a kiss, What gentle squeeze he gave each lady's hand! How tremblingly their delicate ancles spann'd! Into how sweet a trance his soul was gone, While whisperings of affection Made him delay to let their tender feet Come to the earth; ...
— Poems 1817 • John Keats
... over the draw-bridge through a gateway covered with ivy, and still guarded as of old, by an ancient portcullis. In the hall of the castle, pannelled with richly carved oak, are religiously guarded the helmet of Cromwell, the armor of the Black Prince, and many historic relics and art treasures. The drawing-room is finished in cedar. In former days guests were summoned to the great banqueting hall ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... There was neither portcullis, nor moat, nor drawbridge to her feudal stronghold at Corellia, but there was big, white Argo. Argo alone would pin any one ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... gate, the outermost of all, and turning aside from the steps leading up to the white stone gate and main entrance beyond, with its drawbridge and double portcullis, Richard, by his companion's directions, led his mare to the left, and, rounding the moat of the citadel, sought the western gate of the castle, which seemed to shelter itself under the great bulk of the Yellow Tower, ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... towers of Cairncarque. There was a castle indeed!—something to call a castle!—with its huge square tower at every corner, and its still huger two towers in the middle of its front, its moat, and the causeway where once had been its drawbridge!—Yes! there were the spikes of the portcullis, sticking down from the top of the gateway, like the long upper teeth of a giant or ogre! That was a real castle—such as he had read of in books, such as ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... into a roar at this significant remark, and, again abashed, dropped portcullis on its laughter, cutting off the flanks and tail of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... cathedral, and is of itself a monument of the first rank, being so designated by the Commission des Monumentes Historiques. A feudal defence, square, broad-based, turreted, flanked with circular watch-towers, and still further strengthened by a barbican which once held a portcullis, this wonderfully effective barrier more than suggests the mediaeval stronghold. Two other towers of the ancient enceinte still remain, the Tour Gougin, and the Tour ...
— The Cathedrals of Northern France • Francis Miltoun
... roof-tree was laid in the land which its owner had helped to build up to a great nation. On a hill-side its appearance would have been grand. As it was, it was impressive, and particularly as first seen from the road. The portcullis was gone, but the arched gateway still remained, flanked by towers that looked sombre and stern, even amidst the deep green of the ivy which covered the left tower almost to the battlements. I was afterwards told that the ivy itself ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 50, December, 1861 • Various
... open now, and under the arched gateway, with the portcullis over her head, fitly framing her, stood the tall, gaunt figure of the lady, grayer, thinner, more haggard than when Grisell had last seen her, and beside her, leaning on a crutch, a white-faced boy, small and stunted ...
— Grisly Grisell • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a position, but also a mother whose children were threatened. When they had finished their explanation, the crowd looking on, no doubt impatient of the pause and of the voices that could not reach their ears, Margaret stepped back and bade her attendants quickly to let down the portcullis. They must have been stationed ready with the intention, and no doubt the lords had no attendants with them who could have hindered any such step or forced an entrance. While the people looked on wondering, the iron bars came crashing down, and in a moment the Queen and her child were safe ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... it. Behind the wall were tall slate roofs mossed with silver, a chapel belfry, the top of a keep. A moat filled with wild shrubs and brambles surrounded the place; the drawbridge had been replaced by a stone arch, and the portcullis by an iron gate. I stood for a long time on the hither side of the moat, gazing about me, and letting the influence of the place sink in. I said to myself: "If I wait long enough, the guardian will turn up and show me the tombs—" and I rather hoped he ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 1 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... hats as if they never, in the nature of things, could hope to see them again, and the very contact of their persons with the benches evoked an uncontrollable wail, which seemed to say: "It is all up with us now! Let the portcullis fall!" ...
— The Girl and the Kingdom - Learning to Teach • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... yards. Methought it scarce worth the trouble to mount the mule for to 'light off him again so soon: howbeit, I did as I was bid. Madam Isabel suffered her lord to lift her upon the other; and away hied we for the Castle, our cavaliers a-walking behind. When we 'light, and the portcullis was drawn up, Master Jeronymo prayeth the porter to send word unto the ineffable Lord Comptroller that the English damsel sent hither by the most noble Lady, Dona Catalina (so they call my Lady of Suffolk's Grace) doth entreat for leave to kiss the dust under his ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... over every step which we took worthy of a diplomatist, we finally stood upon the drawbridge of the castle. Here the savage customs of the rude days in which it was built immediately impress the beholder. Traces remain of the ponderous iron portcullis, heavy wooden bars, arrow-holes, and slits in the masonry for the pouring of boiling water or oil upon adverse knight or lordly freebooter. A steep path leads through two great entrance-gates into the large inner court, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 29. August, 1873. • Various
... with a double architrave, in the frieze of which he placed all the arms of the Commune. And what is more, he made the whole staircase of hard-stone up to the floor where the Signori lived, fortifying it at the top and half-way up with a portcullis at each point, in case of tumults; and at the head of the staircase he made a door which was called the "catena,"[23] beside which there was ever standing an usher, who opened or closed it according as he was commanded by those in authority. He strengthened ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol 2, Berna to Michelozzo Michelozzi • Giorgio Vasari
... interposition; obtrusion; discouragement, discountenance. impediment, let, obstacle, obstruction, knot, knag[obs3]; check, hitch, contretemps, screw loose, grit in the oil. bar, stile, barrier; [barrier to vehicles] turnstile, turnpike; gate, portcullis. beaver dam; trocha[obs3]; barricade &c. (defense) 717; wall, dead wall, sea wall, levee breakwater, groyne[obs3]; bulkhead, block, buffer; stopper &c. 263; boom, dam, weir, burrock[obs3]. drawback, objection; stumbling-block, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... through Kenilworth Castle with Shakespeare, Walter Scott, Mary Ann Evans and a youth I used to know in boyhood by the name of Bill Hursey. We chased each other across the drawbridge, through the portcullis, down the slippery stones into the donjon-keep, around the moat, and up the stone steps to the topmost turret of the towers. Finally Shakespeare was "it," but he got mad and refused to play. Walter Scott said it was "no fair," and Bill Hursey thrust out the knuckle ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard
... great castle, resplendent with new stone, shone before them. The wounded knight thundered across the drawbridge, with Owen close behind him; but when the blue knight gained the street beyond, the portcullis was let fall with a rush. Sir Owen fell from his horse, and looking round he found that the horse had been cut in twain ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert
... island we pass under two ancient towers, and into 'the court of the Lion;' then to a third gate, with its towers and battlements, and frowning portcullis; and we see, as we pass, the lion (the insignia of the knights of Mont St. Michael) carved in stone, and set into the wall. We are received in the ancient guard-room by a 'young brother,' who has (shall it be repeated?) 'turned the guard-room ...
— Normandy Picturesque • Henry Blackburn
... their outer walls. I observed with much interest that the provision for closing the entrances from the street was not swinging doors of wood, but either metal bars, such as we had seen in Tizoc's house, or else a metal grating, that was arranged like a portcullis to slide up and down in a groove; and I attributed the absence of wooden doors less to a desire for stronger barriers than to the comparative recentness of the acquisition of the knowledge of wood-working ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier
... saw all, but lost not a moment. He had not made this haste for his life only: before he had risen to his knees or set foot in the gate, he had formed his plan. "The Portcullis!" he cried. "The Portcullis! Where are the chains? On this side?" Less than a week before he had stood and watched the guard as they released it and ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... however; and after the usual sputter of gutturals which precedes any arrangement in this country, we were mounted in a high, awkward carriage, and rode to the town. Two ancient round tower and a wall first met my eye; then a drawbridge, arched passage, and portcullis. Under this passage we passed, and at our right hand was the church, where once was laid the worn form that had stood so many whirlwinds—where, in short, Luther was buried. But this we did not then know; so ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... principle, still more adverse to the living economy of the age. They were formed, Sir, on the principle of purveyance and receipt in kind. In former days, when the household was vast, and the supply scanty and precarious, the royal purveyors, sallying forth from under the Gothic portcullis to purchase provision with power and prerogative instead of money, brought home the plunder of an hundred markets, and all that could be seized from a flying and hiding country, and deposited their spoil in an hundred caverns, with each its keeper. There, every commodity, received in its ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... fortifications are elevated 300 feet from the level of the ocean. The upper is separated from the lower town by a stone wall, which has the form of a horn-work. Through this wall is a gate, [115] which has a guard; the guard-room is opposite the gate, and by means of a portcullis defends the entrance. For the convenience of foot-passengers there is a door [116] near the gate, with wooden stairs, by ascending which you reach the upper town. On the right of the gate is a building which resembles a chapel, [117] and serves for the House of ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... to Charlotte, and found, to my surprise, that she had had the same joys and encountered the same disappointments in this delectable country. She, too, had walked up that road and flattened her nose against that portcullis; and she pointed out something that I had overlooked—to wit, that if you rowed off in a boat to the curly ship, and got hold of a rope, and clambered aboard of her, and swarmed up the mast, and got into the crow's-nest, ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... porch it was, flanked by two comical little turrets, with loopholes, from which a thread-paper or Tom Thumb might have defended it. Otherwise it resembled a church porch, except for the formidable points of a sham portcullis; but there was no denying that it greatly increased the comfort of the house, with its two sets of heavy doors, and the seats on either side. The great hall door had been closed up, plastered over within, and rendered inoffensive. Towards the west there ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... hospital. I believe it had been a home for destitute children. There were sentries at the gate and massive concentric circles of barbed wire through which we passed under an arch that was let down like a portcullis at nightfall. The lieutenant showed his permit, and we ran the car into a brick-paved yard and marched through a lot more sentries to the office of ...
— Greenmantle • John Buchan
... went in a chariot, splendid in his fine robes of fur, with a gold chain about his neck. And the guards hurried to let down the portcullis for him, and with low bows bade him enter. But when Saint Berach came he wore only his gray monk's robe, all torn and tattered. He was shivering with cold, and weak from having walked so far. So they thought him a mere ...
— The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts • Abbie Farwell Brown
... it. But it was in the civil war that it showed itself in its full force. The weakness of the Crown and the strife of political factions for supremacy left the nobles masters of the field; and the white rose of the House of York, the red rose of the House of Lancaster, the portcullis of the Beauforts, the pied bull of the Nevilles, the bear and ragged staff which Warwick borrowed from the Beauchamps, were seen on hundreds of breasts in ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green
... in three divisions and seated on the ground. On seeing their enemies advance they rose up and fell into their ranks. That of the Prince was the first to do so, whose archers were formed in the manner of a portcullis, or harrow, and the men-at-arms in the rear. The earls of Northampton and Arundel, who commanded the second division, had posted themselves in good order on his wing, to assist and succor the Prince if necessary. You must know that these kings, earls, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... officer appointed to render the proper salutes, acted as chief mourner, surrounded by weeping mourners, who made the ruins of Janina echo with their lamentations. The guns were fired at long intervals. The portcullis was raised to admit the procession, and the whole garrison, drawn up to receive it, rendered a military salute. The body, covered with matting, was laid in a grave beside that of Amina. When the grave had been filled in, a priest approached to listen to the supposed ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... of Milianah, the chief of the Arab bureau, who was walking with his lady in the cool of the morning, hearing these unusual noises and seeing between the branches the flash of sunlight on the weapons, feared a surprise attack; whereupon he lowered the portcullis, beat the alarm and put the town ...
— Tartarin de Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet
... and wildest part of the country, may be found, crouching within a ravine, a little ruined chateau. The dilapidated turrets would not catch your eye until you were about a hundred yards from the principal portcullis. The venerable trees around and the scattered rocks above, bury it in everlasting obscurity; and you would experience the greatest difficulty, even in broad daylight, in crossing the deserted path leading to ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... commands a panoramic view of the country for thirty miles round. It has all the characteristics of a town of the feudal times, with high embattled and loopholed walls, numerous towers, and deep and strong gateways, under which are still to be seen the grooves of the portcullis, the warder's guard-room, and the hooks that supported the ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... make himself heard? He knew that her family and her immediate friends—Mr. Langhope, the Gaineses, Mrs. Ansell and Mr. Tredegar—far from being means of communication, were so many sentinels ready to raise the drawbridge and drop the portcullis at his approach. They were all in league to stifle the incipient feelings he had roused in Bessy, to push her back into the deadening routine of her former life, and the only voice that might conceivably speak for him was ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... some are regular; as, trellis, trellises: so, annolis, butteris, caddis, dervis, iris, marquis, metropolis, portcullis, proboscis. Some seem to have no need of the plural; as, ambergris, aqua-fortis, arthritis, brewis, crasis, elephantiasis, genesis, orris, siriasis, tennis. But most nouns of this ending follow the Greek or Latin form, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... knight from his keep on the forest-bound gazed: The drawbridge was down, the portcullis was raised: And true to his hope came the palfrey amain, With his only loved lady, who ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... chivalry, when every mountain that bathes its shadow in the Rhine had its castle; not inhabited as now by a few rats and owls, nor covered with moss and wallflowers and funguses and creeping ivy. No, no; where the ivy now clusters there grew strong portcullis and bars of steel; where the wallflowers now quiver in the ramparts there were silken banners embroidered with wonderful heraldry; men-at-arms marched where now you shall only see a bank of moss or a hideous black champignon; ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope
... seal, called the sigillum ad causas, used for minor public documents or for private papers authenticated by public authority. This paper bears a seal having the legend "Sigillum ad causas oppidi Rotterodami", encircling an impression of a castle with portcullis, standing on a shore, with a swan swimming in front of ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various
... although gaining on him inch by inch. By the time the castle moat was reached, Sir Ivaine was only five feet behind. The horses thundered one after the other over the bridge. The Black Knight rode under the portcullis, or sharp iron gate, which was raised. The instant he was inside, the portcullis fell, in order to shut out ...
— King Arthur and His Knights • Maude L. Radford
... garth was neither knight nor squire nor sergeant; no spear-head glittered from the wall, no gleam of helm showed from the war-swales; no porter was at the gate; the drawbridge over the deep ghyll was down, the portcullis was up, and the great door cast ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... gate by which Mrs Wilson had dismissed me. A flight of rude steps cut in the rock led to the portcullis, which still hung, now fixed in its place in front of the gate; for though the Hall had no external defences, it had been well fitted for the half-sieges of troublous times. A modern mansion stands, ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... of last week the portcullis, which hail been placed in the northern gate, and was composed of solid rice paper, with cross-bars of chop-sticks, was much damaged. It is now under repair, and will be coated entirely with tea-chest lead, to render it perfectly impregnable. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... some ten months ago, when her father came back into his own, and leading his daughter by the hand, had taken her on a tour of inspection to show her the magnificence of her ancestral home. She had loved at once the fine old chateau with its lichen-covered walls, its fine portcullis and crenelated towers, she had wept over the torn tapestries, the broken furniture, the family portraits which a rough and impious rabble had wilfully damaged, she had loved the wide sweep of the terrace walls, the views over the Isere and across the mountain range to the peaks ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... less fortunate, there being no way of entering the building, save by walking in through the gate, or climbing the walls with the help of a scaling ladder. The place is much more formidable looking than the battery, being in appearance a strong castle, with dry ditch, drawbridge, and portcullis to the main and, so far as I could see, the only entrance. In plan it is shaped like the letter L, with the angle turned harbour-ward; and it must mount about thirty pieces of ordnance, for I managed to count that number ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... alone, monseigneur," said the Chancellor Olivier, the Cardinal de Tournon, and Birago, who were stationed outside of the portcullis. ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac
... top of the cavern, curled there or passed out into the glen through the briers that dropped like a portcullis. The fagots crackled in the flame, the light danced, the warmth was pleasant. So was the sense of adventure and of solitude a deux. They stretched themselves beside the flame. Alexander produced from his pouch four small red-cheeked apples. They ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston
... name thrilled him. He thought he remembered the latter in Froissart: it conjured up "baronial halls" and "donjon keeps," rang resonantly in his mind like "Let the portcullis fall!" At home he had been wont to speak of the "oldest families in Cranston," complaining of the invasions of "new people" into the social territory of the McCords and Mellins and Kramers—a pleasant conception which the presence of a De Vaurigard revealed to him as a petty and ...
— His Own People • Booth Tarkington
... suggested that if we went faster we should get by sooner. It seemed to me that it was an ill-judged time to be taking a walk. Just as we were drifting in that suffocating stillness past a great cannon that stood just within a raised portcullis, with nothing between me and it but the moat, a most uncommon jackass in there split the world with his bray, and I fell out of the saddle. Sir Bertrand grabbed me as I went, which was well, for if I had gone to the ground in my armor I could not have gotten up again by myself. The English warders ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... Durward saw none along the spacious front, except where, in the centre of the first and outward boundary, arose two strong towers, the usual defences of a gateway; and he could observe their ordinary accompaniments, portcullis and drawbridge—of which the first was lowered, and the last raised. Similar entrance towers were visible on the second and third bounding wall, but not in the same line with those on the outward circuit; because the passage did not cut right through the whole three ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... the surprisal of the Tower, the killing his Grace the Lord General, Sir John Robinson, Lieutenant of the Tower, and Sir Richard Brown; and then to have declared for an equal division of lands, &c. The better to effect this hellish design, the City was to have been fired, and the portcullis let down to keep out all assistance; and the Horse Guards to have been surprised in the inns where they were quartered, several ostlers having been gained for that purpose. The Tower was accordingly viewed, and its surprise ordered by boats over the moat, and ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... there was disappointment, here that flaming discovery, there this sudden terror—nothing had changed for him, the Moor, St. Arthe Church, St. Dreot Woods, the high white gates and mysterious hidden park of Portcullis House—all were as though it had been yesterday that he had last seen them. Polchester had dwindled before his giant growth. Here the moor, the woods, the roads had grown, and it was he ...
— The Golden Scarecrow • Hugh Walpole
... guards, and ordered the gate to be opened, for the consul had arrived. The guards, as if awakened at their call, began to be in a hurry and bustle, and exert themselves in opening the gate, which was closed by letting down the portcullis; some raised this with levers, others drew it up with ropes to such a height that the men could come in without stooping. The opening was scarcely wide enough, when the deserters eagerly rushed through the gate, and after ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... when, all of a sudden, the horse stopped at the door of a great house; and, but that he knew the place was ten miles off, my father would have thought he was at Redgauntlet Castle. They rode into the outer courtyard, through the muckle faulding yetts, and aneath the auld portcullis; and the whole front of the house was lighted, and there were pipes and fiddles, and as much dancing and deray within as used to be in Sir Robert's house at Pace and Yule, and such high seasons. They lap off, and my gudesire, ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various
... semi-barbaric pomp, Albert made arrangements to leave his castle to engage in the perilous holy war against the Saracens, from which few ever returned. A few years were employed in the necessary preparations. At the sound of the bugle the portcullis was raised, the drawbridge spanned the moat, and Albert, at the head of thirty steel-clad warriors, with nodding plumes, and banners unfurled, emerged from the castle, and proceeded to the neighboring convent of Mari. His wife, Hedwige, and their three sons, Rhodolph, ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... seashore; a pretty little harbour surrounded with quaint-looking houses; two or three white villas in fertile gardens, on a raised road; and, dominating all the scene, a fine old feudal castle, with keep, battlements, drawbridge, portcullis, and all that becomes ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon
... unseen flowers. They loved to hear and to tell of the grand and beautiful things at that fairy palace, the Castle,—a noble old edifice, with massive towers, a moat, a lofty gateway, and an ancient drawbridge and portcullis, which stood high in ...
— Stories of Many Lands • Grace Greenwood
... the roof may be seen the three lions of England, a cross between four martlets, three crowns each pierced by an arrow, and another design. The smaller designs include four-leaved flowers, Tudor roses, fleurs-de-lys, the portcullis, some undescribable creatures, crossed keys, crossed swords, crossed crosiers, crosses, crowns, crowns pierced with arrows, crowned female heads, an eagle, the head of the Baptist in a charger, an angel, mitres, three feathers rising from a crown, S. Andrew's cross, and perhaps others. There ...
— The Cathedral Church of Peterborough - A Description Of Its Fabric And A Brief History Of The Episcopal See • W.D. Sweeting
... crossed the drawbridge, which always gives me a sensation of old feudal times and recalls the days of my childhood when I used to sit under the sickle-pear tree at "Cherry Lawn" reading Scott's "Marmion"—"Up drawbridge, grooms—what, Warder, ho! Let the portcullis fall!" wondering what a "portcullis" was, and if I should ever see ...
— Chateau and Country Life in France • Mary King Waddington
... lovers were delighted to transfer their trysting place to those romantic quarters—a castle tower in the heart of New York, surrounded by a harbor moat, and an elevator which served well the purpose of a bridge leading to the portcullis of the upper floors. Mr. and Mrs. Gibson, and their daughter, the winsome Nellie, were delighted to have them as visitors, and entered into their defense against the cruel father and his co-conspirators, the faithless chum and the unfeeling world in general, with hearty warmth, cheering Gabrielle ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... to the Castle of Adventure. One does not have to scale its beetling parapets or assault its scarps and frowning bastions; neither is one obliged to force with clamor and blaring trumpets and glittering gorgets the drawbridge and portcullis. Rather the pathway lies through one of those many little doors, obscure, yet easily accessible, latchless and boltless, to which the average person gives no particular attention, and yet which invariably lead to the very heart of this Castle Delectable. The whimsical chatelaine of this ...
— Hearts and Masks • Harold MacGrath
... I speak of castles, not of rooks. I do not know whence came this custom of calling the most romantic piece on the board by the name of a very ordinary bird, but I, at least, will not be a party to it. I refuse to surrender the portcullis and the moat, the bastion and the well-manned towers, which were the features of every castle with which hitherto I have played, in order to take the field with allies so unromantic as a brace of rooks. You may tell ...
— If I May • A. A. Milne
... castle,—not simply a country mansion so called, but a stone edifice with battlements and a round tower at one corner, and a gate which looked as if it might have had a portcullis, and narrow windows in a portion of it, and a cannon mounted upon a low roof, and an excavation called the moat,—but which was now a fantastic and somewhat picturesque garden,—running round two ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... notice and obstruction. As they rode among the hills with their long train, soldiers, ecclesiastics, women, and children, they saw a galloping band of Arabs in pursuit. The archbishop bade them turn instantly into a deserted castle they were just passing, to drop the portcullis and man the walls. That they might look as numerous as possible, he bade all the women dress themselves like men and tie their long hair beneath their chins to resemble beards. He then put helmets ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... the archway was suspended a portcullis of wrought-iron bars. This was the real barrier, for, even if the attacking party succeeded in battering down the outer gate, they would find themselves cooped up in the passageway and exposed ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... time than the former one. The arcade has fallen in, and it requires some attention to reinstate it. This gate formed three entrances. The two side ways were probably intended for pedestrians; the one in the middle was closed by means of a portcullis sliding in a groove, still visible, but covered with stucco. As the portcullis, in descending, would have, thrown down this coating, we must infer that at the time of the eruption it had not been in use for a long while, Pompeii having ceased ...
— The Wonders of Pompeii • Marc Monnier
... cried, "is the king's own favourite, and if any harm come to a lock of her hair, I tell you that there is not a living soul within this portcullis who will not die a death of torture. Fools, will you gasp out your lives upon the rack, or writhe in boiling oil, at ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... reached the great gate, part of the foemen had already entered Rome, and we had them in our rear. The castellan had ordered the portcullis to be lowered, in order to do which they cleared a little space, and this enabled us four to get inside. On the instant that I entered, the captain Palone de' Medici claimed me as being of the papal household and forced me to abandon Alessandro, which I had to do much against my will. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... the west side, leading to a dungeon, and forth on to the mere, now filled up with mire and weeds. But the largest passage and most used was, and is, that towards the south and town; there being formerly a portcullis over that gate, which was made in one of the strongest towers, and a drawbridge without, defended by an half-moon of stone, about a man's height, standing in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19. No. 575 - 10 Nov 1832 • Various
... sallying forth, and looking from his castle wall, he perceived a large party of armed men on the other side of the moat, who were calling on the warder in the king's name to lower the drawbridge and raise the portcullis, which had both been secured by Matilda's order. The baron walked along the battlement till he came opposite to these unexpected visitors, who, as soon as they saw him, called out, "Lower the ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock
... and Poictiers, and must therefore have seen the primitive forerunner of the modern field-gun in use. The walls of the castle now enclose a grassy quadrangle, to which access is gained through a fine gateway, which still retains its outer iron portcullis. The three others, through which an attacking force was obliged to penetrate, have all disappeared. Although it has been stated that the parliamentary forces under Waller captured Bodiam Castle during the Civil War, it seems to be unlikely that such an attack was ...
— What to See in England • Gordon Home
... and the huge moat which surrounds it. Great linden, oak and beech trees shadow the walk, and in secluded nooks little mountain-streams spring from the side of the wall into stone basins. There is a tower over the moat on the south side, next the mountain, where the portcullis still hangs with its sharp teeth as it was last drawn up; on each side stand two grim knights guarding the entrance. In one of the wooded walks is an old tree brought from America in the year 1618. It is of the kind called "arbor ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume V (of X) • Various
... barbican the party was halted by the guard. An officer with a lantern stepped out upon the lowered portcullis. The lieutenant who had captured them rode forward ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... The exterior walls had in no way suffered, and the shell of the central building had so far resisted the fire, that it was not necessary to rebuild it. The roof and floors had been replaced, and the defences considerably strengthened. A portcullis had been placed above the door; so that, in case of the outer wall being carried, or the gate forced, it could at once be lowered. A projecting battlement had been thrown out over this, with openings below, through which boiling lead and pitch could be poured on ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty
... Regensburg, and perhaps, above all, Nuernberg, represented the high-water mark of mediaeval civilization as regards town life. On entering the burg, should it have happened to be in time of peace and in daylight, the stranger would clear the drawbridge and the portcullis without much challenge; passing along streets lined with the houses and shops of the burghers, in whose open frontages the master and his apprentices and gesellen plied their trades, discussing eagerly over their work the politics of the town, and at this period probably the theological ...
— German Culture Past and Present • Ernest Belfort Bax
... doorway is left for the jaguar to enter. Above this is suspended a large plank of wood communicating with one on the ground, over which the jaguar on entering must tread, and it is so contrived that as he does so the portcullis falls and shuts him in. A live pig is fastened by a rope in the centre of the enclosure as a bait. An Indian is always on the watch at night in a tree near the spot, and the moment the jaguar is caught he gives the alarm, and his companions assemble and ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston
... were generally kept strongly guarded. Facing the east, and commanding a view of the river and adjacent country, stood the barbacan gate and drawbridge, which latter was further defended by strong oaken doors and an iron portcullis, forming the great gate of the castle wall, and the principal entrance into the fortress. Two towers of immense strength, united by a narrow, dimly-lighted passage, guarded this gate, and on these depended the grate or portcullis, ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... fowls, three-quarters of a yard of bread, and a bottle of porter, for Mr. Jorrocks on the journey, and ere another sun went down, the sandy suburbs of Calais saw them toiling towards her ramparts, and rumbling over the drawbridges and under the portcullis, that guard the entrance to her gloomy town. Calais! cold, cheerless, lifeless Calais! Whose soul has ever warmed as it approached thy town? but how many hearts have turned with sickening sorrow from the ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... death, King Lot, on the King Pellinore. Anon after this Balin and the damosel rode till they came to a castle, and there Balin alighted, and he and the damosel went to go into the castle, and anon as Balin came within the castle's gate the portcullis fell down at his back, and there fell many men about the damosel, and would have slain her. When Balin saw that, he was sore aggrieved, for he might not help the damosel. Then he went up into the tower, and leapt over walls into the ditch, and hurt ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... by the entrance of the new prisoner, the clashing of arms, the grating of the heavy portcullis, as it groaned and strained in its ascent, the dull fall of the drawbridge, the voices of men, and the rattling of wheels, awakened the Prince; who, with the natural weariness of a captive, had already retired to rest. ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... Sir Garlon's life, whenever next he might encounter and behold him in his bodily shape. Anon, he and the hermit buried the good knight Sir Perin, and rode on with the damsel till they came to a great castle, whereinto they were about to enter. But when Sir Balin had passed through the gateway, the portcullis fell behind him suddenly, leaving the damsel on the outer side, with men around her, drawing their swords as ...
— The Legends Of King Arthur And His Knights • James Knowles
... the time-scarred walls. The wagon stopped at the great gate. A horn sounded from within, the gate swung open, a drawbridge fell with a hideous creaking of machinery, and we passed in, twenty or thirty feet above the snow-drifted moat. Beyond the portcullis a dim door swung open. Some sort of seneschal met us with a light and led us below the twilight arches, where beyond, I could catch glimpses of the baileys and courts and the donjon tower against the ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... Howled back my curse; but 'midst the tread, The thunder of my courser's speed, Perchance they did not hear nor heed: 390 It vexes me—for I would fain Have paid their insult back again. I paid it well in after days: There is not of that castle gate, Its drawbridge and portcullis' weight, Stone—bar—moat—bridge—or barrier left; Nor of its fields a blade of grass, Save what grows on a ridge of wall, Where stood the hearth-stone of the hall; And many a time ye there might pass, 400 Nor dream that e'er the fortress was. I saw its turrets in a blaze, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... flush of rage O'ercame the ashen hue of age: Fierce he broke forth; "And dar'st thou then To beard the lion in his den, The Douglas in his hall? And hopest thou hence unscathed to go? No, by Saint Bride of Bothwell, no! Up draw-bridge, grooms,—what, warder, ho! Let the portcullis fall." Lord Marmion turned,—well was his need, And dashed the rowels in his steed, Like arrow through the archway sprung; The ponderous grate behind him rung: To pass there was such scanty room, The bars, descending, ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... the foot of the western tower, he reined in his horse. He did not alight, but, approaching so near the wall that he could rest his foot upon an abutment, he stood up, and raised the blind of a window on the ground-floor, made in the form of a portcullis, such as is still seen on some ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... night; that refectory, upon which the architect had bestowed the air, the beauty, and the rose window of a cathedral; that elegant chapel of the Virgin; that monumental dormitory; those vast gardens; that portcullis; that drawbridge; that envelope of battlements which notched to the eye the verdure of the surrounding meadows; those courtyards, where gleamed men at arms, intermingled with golden copes;—the whole grouped ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo |
