"Blade" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the earth continues to support us and the sun still gives us light. Because of our ingratitude, well might the heavens become dark and the earth be perverted—as the Scriptures teach (Ps 106)—and suffer the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, no longer yielding a leaf nor a blade of grass, but completely turned from its course—well might it be so did not God, for the sake of the few godly Christians known and acknowledged of him, forbear ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther
... song And yet ambitious not to sing in vain, I would not trifle merely, though the world Be loudest in their praise who do no more. Yet what can satire, whether grave or gay? It may correct a foible, may chastise The freaks of fashion, regulate the dress, Retrench a sword-blade, or displace a patch; But where are its sublimer trophies found? What vice has it subdued? whose heart reclaimed By rigour, or whom laughed into reform? Alas, Leviathan is not so tamed. Laughed at, he laughs again; and, stricken hard, Turns to the ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... of the celebrated kris, with its flame-shaped wavy blade; the sword, regarded, however, more as an ornament; the parang, which is both knife and weapon; the steel-headed spear, which cost us so many lives in the Perak war; matchlocks, blunderbusses, and lelahs, long heavy brass guns used for the defense of the stockades behind which the ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... This Moidel explained to us as he moved dejectedly forward. "Father, however, told him that our Olm was bad for goats. They not only slip from the rocks, but grow thin and weakly. Just the reverse of the cattle. Onkel Johann—there is no one so deep as he in cattle—says that every blade of grass on our Olm is worth half a pint of milk. And it's not the air, nor the water, nor the winds that make it wholesome, but some law that he cannot understand. Who can? There is Jagdhaus, a wonderfully fertile sennerei an hour beyond Rein. It ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 29. August, 1873. • Various
... had the twenty men passed through the gates than a horn was loudly blown, and instantly each of them drew from beneath his doublet a steel blade, which he fixed upon the end of his staff. At the sound of the horn thirty other men rushed from a neighboring wood, and made for the open gates. In a very few minutes they joined their comrades in the castle, which was quickly ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... said she; "Let one have at one." When he heard this, he sprang to his feet and made for them with his sword and battle gear; and Masurah, the Knight, also sprang up and bore down upon him. Sharrkan met him like a lion and delivered a shoulder cut[FN200] which clove him to the middle, and the blade came out gleaming and glittering from his back and bowels. When the lady beheld that swashingblow, Sharrkan's might was magnified in her sight and she knew that when she overthrew him in the wrestle it was not by her strength but by her beauty and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... feels the hot blood of the nation beat high; With rapture she catches the rallying cry: From mountain and valley and hamlet they come! On every side echoes the roll of the drum. A people as firm, as united, as bold, As ever drew blade for the blessings they hold, Step sternly and solemnly forth in their might, And swear on their altars to die for ...
— Beechenbrook - A Rhyme of the War • Margaret J. Preston
... Highlands, divination by looking into the shoulder-blade of a sheep was used to discover future events or things happening at a distance, a survival from pagan times.[873] The scholiast on Lucan describes the Druidic method of chewing acorns and then prophesying, just as, in Ireland, eating nuts from the sacred ...
— The Religion of the Ancient Celts • J. A. MacCulloch
... always left Mess after that toast, and being rather tired by his march his movements were more abrupt than usual. Kim, with slightly raised head, was still staring at his totem on the table, when the Chaplain stepped on his right shoulder-blade. Kim flinched under the leather, and, rolling sideways, brought down the Chaplain, who, ever a man of action, caught him by the throat and nearly choked the life out of him. Kim then kicked him desperately in the stomach. Mr Bennett gasped and doubled up, ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... hot blood of the Puritan Cavalier was soon at the boiling point. Disdaining to take advantage even of such a foe, he threw aside his gun, and springing upon the gigantic Peksuot, grasped at the knife which was suspended from his neck, the blade of which was double-edged, and ground to a point as sharp as a needle. There was a moment of terrific conflict, and then the stout Indian fell dead upon the ground, with the blood gushing from ...
— King Philip - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... contemporary with the rest of the chasing. He tried to open it, but the dampness had caused it to stick, so that he broke his nails upon the fastening. He took out his knife and attempted to lever its edges apart with the blade. At last, growing impatient, he set it on its hinges upon a rock and commenced to hammer it with a stone. At the third blow the fastening gave, and the sides fell apart. He could see that it contained a miniature, ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... camp, not far from the Hudson, conversing with three soldiers—Van Campen, Perry, and Paul Sanborn, they being the three men who first discovered poor Boyd's body; and then noticed me a-digging in the earth with bleeding fingers and a broken blade. ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... on their way, an I mistake not, to the prison at this moment. I came straight on here after the condemnation, to which I listened with true joy. Ah, citizen Bibot! the blood of these hated aristocrats is good to behold when it drips from the blade of the guillotine. Have a care, citizen Bibot, do not let the ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... white waistcoat. This head had attracted my attention like the stain on the ceiling of which I spoke just now, like the Countess's black tooth, and despite myself I did not take my eyes off the angler as he passed the silver blade of his knife through a slice of that indigestible fruit which I like to see on the plates of others, but can ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... emerald-green empires. Turbulences of colour broke out above the departed sun; giants merged into mountains, and cities became seas, and new processions of other fantastic things sailed by. But the chalk slopes facing south smiled on with the same calm light, as though every blade of grass gathered a ray from the gloaming. All the hills faced the evening with that same quiet glow, which faded softly as the air grew colder; and the ...
— Tales of War • Lord Dunsany
... while Peter Halket took out from his belt a small hunting knife with a rough wooden handle. A small flat stone lay near him, and he passed the blade slowly up and down on it, now and then taking it up, and feeling the edge with his finger. After a while he put it back in his belt, and rose slowly, taking up his small bundle and ...
— Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland • Olive Schreiner
... accordingly, here left their horses under charge of five of their number, and as soon as it was dusk they commenced their stealthy approach to the camp. Sigenok and another young and active Indian undertook to look after me. Not a word was spoken after we set out—not a leaf was moved, scarcely a blade of grass was uselessly pressed down. On they crept slowly, and so gently that I could scarcely hear the footfalls even of my two companions. I imitated their way of walking, and as I had on mocassins I also was able to avoid making the slightest ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston
... other details with you? Surely not. You now possess the key to the riddle; and you know as I do that only a lunatic can behave in this way, stupidly, savagely, mechanically, like a striking clock or the blade of the guillotine...." ...
— The Eight Strokes of the Clock • Maurice Leblanc
... barn and house, and brave The March rain and the winds that rave. ... O, landscape I am one who stands Returned with pale and broken hands Glad for the day that I have known, And finds the deserted doorway strown With shoulder blade and spinal bone. And you who nourished me and bred I find the spirit from you fled. You gave me dreams,'twas at your breast My soul's beginning rose and pressed My steps afar at last and shaped A world elusive, ...
— Toward the Gulf • Edgar Lee Masters
... the estate, for no other purpose in life than that his conspicuously clandestine meetings with the fair Barbara should be misconstrued as an assignation. Ha! out, rapiers! and let us be ready for the moment when Barbara, rushing between the combatants, receives in her own bosom the blade intended for ——, etc. But of course not enough blade to endanger the happy ending. So there you are. A placid, undistinguished tale, that may be commended as nourishment or soporific according to the taste and fancy ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, February 16, 1916 • Various
... veil of snow parted before the wind, as if cleft down the centre by a sword-blade, and Harley and Sylvia beheld a grand and awful sight. Before them were all the peaks and ridges, rising in white cones and pillars against the cloudy sky, and the effect was of distance and sublimity. From the clefts and ravines came a desolate moaning. Harley felt ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... might go on all day describing the curious plants, and trees, and animals, and birds I saw. I must speak of the ginger. The blade is not unlike that of wheat. The roots, which are used, are dug up and scraped free from the outward skin by the negroes. This is the best way of preparing it, and it is then soft and white; but often, from want of hands, ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... the gathering gloom. Fortunately, the road was almost level and free from mud-holes, and Frank Muller rode just ahead to show the way, his strong athletic form standing out clearly against the departing western glow. Silent was the earth, silent as death. No bird or beast, no blade of grass or breath of air stirred upon its surface. The only sign of life was the continual flickering of those awful tongues of light as they licked the lips of the storm. On for mile after mile, on through the desolation! They were ...
— Jess • H. Rider Haggard
... which we travelled rose but slightly. As we continued our course the scenery became more gloomy and barren, and, except on the ground beneath our feet, scarcely a blade of grass or plant of any description was to be seen growing in the clefts of the dark and sombre rocks. The atmosphere, seldom warmed by the rays of the sun, felt chilly in the extreme, and depressed our spirits, and had it not been for the assurance ...
— With Axe and Rifle • W.H.G. Kingston
... and fools in the early days, though we stood aside to let your people run their vulgar course. It was your hired bully—your respected guardian—this dog of an espadachin, who let out a hint of the secret—with a prick of his blade—and a scandal. One of my peon women was a servant at the convent when you were a child, and recognized the woman who put you there and came to see you as a friend. She overheard the Mother Superior say it was ...
— A Ward of the Golden Gate • Bret Harte
... of lost opportunities! How much of the criminal history of the city might I not have learned, if I had paid longer visits to Herr Schreiber, and listened to his account of the notches in the blade, to each of which a ghastly history attached. But the antiquary's bedroom measured fifteen feet by seven, and the window was hermetically sealed; moreover, there was a stove in the room, and—Herr ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... of American scenery, and to the imperfect cultivation, intercepted with woodland, which yet characterizes the even the oldest portions of the United States, might revel for a time amid the sunny meadows. The waving cane fields, the verdant provision grounds, the acres of rich black soil without a blade of grass, and divided into beds two feet square for the cane plants with the precision almost of the cells of a honey comb; and withal he might be charmed with the luxurious mansions—more luxurious than superb—surrounded with the white cedar, the cocoa-nut tree, and the tall, rich mountain ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... and leave the room. One only, the nearest and dearest, is requested to remain and witness the end. Rikiu then removes his tea-gown and carefully folds it upon the mat, thereby disclosing the immaculate white death robe which it had hitherto concealed. Tenderly he gazes on the shining blade of the fatal dagger, and in exquisite verse ...
— The Book of Tea • Kakuzo Okakura
... came home with a stiff leg. The Bristol merchants gave him the freedom of the city in a gold box, and a splendidly-mounted sword with an inscription on the blade, which hangs over the mantel-piece at home. When I first left home, I asked him to give me his old service sword, which used to hang by the other, and he gave it me at once, though I was only a lad of seventeen, ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... orbicular, finely serrate or wavy-edged, with incurved, glandular-tipped teeth, apex rather abruptly acute or short-acuminate; base acute, truncate or slightly heart-shaped, 3-nerved; leafstalk slender, strongly flattened at right angles to the plane of the blade, bending to the slightest breath of air; stipules ...
— Handbook of the Trees of New England • Lorin Low Dame
... out quickly—so quickly that they both flinched away—the long handled knife which, usually, I carried with me for cutting down alders or other growth which sometimes entangled my flies as I fished along the stream. "Listen," said I, "I swear the pirates' oath. On the point of my blade," and I touched it with my right forefinger, "I swear that I pondered on two things ...
— The Lady and the Pirate - Being the Plain Tale of a Diligent Pirate and a Fair Captive • Emerson Hough
... Hubert van Eyck's 'Adoration of the Lamb.' The colouring is almost as bright and jewel-like as that of the fifteenth-century painters, for one of the theories of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was that grass should be painted as green as the single blade—not the colour of the whole field seen immersed in light and atmosphere, which can make green grass seem gray or ...
— The Book of Art for Young People • Agnes Conway
... possible you have never handled a blade?" exclaims the other guy, like he couldn't have heard ...
— Kid Scanlan • H. C. Witwer
... said Tom Marshall—known as "The Oracle"—"I've heerd o' sich cases before: they ain't commin, but—I've heerd o' sich cases before," and he screwed up the left side of his face whilst he reflectively scraped his capacious right ear with the large blade ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... front of him the priests moved suddenly. From Naida burst a shriek. In the radiant glare of the council room flashed the long, thin, cruel blade of a sacrificial knife. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... head of this chapter. The Water of Kane. One finds suggestions and hints of this conception in many passages of Hawaiian song and story, sometimes a phosphorescent flash, answering to the dip of the poet's blade, sometimes crystallized into a set form; but nowhere else than in the following mele have I found this jewel deliberately wrought into shape, faceted, and fixed in a distinct ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... brought from the Tower in separate coaches, there was some dispute in which the axe must go—old Balmerino cried, "Come, come, put it with me." At the bar, he plays with his fingers upon the axe, while he talks to the gentleman-gaoler; and one day somebody coming up to listen, he took up the blade and held it like a fan between their faces. During the trial, a little boy was near him, but not tall enough to see; he made room for the child ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... done it again!" howled the lieutenant, leaping up from his seat. "You numskull! give me that oar." And he tried to wrench the blade from Larry's hand. ...
— The Campaign of the Jungle - or, Under Lawton through Luzon • Edward Stratemeyer
... here's a house Full large to entertain a mouse; But where a rat is dreaded more Than savage Caledonian boar; For, if it's enter'd by a rat, There is no room to bring a cat. A little rivulet seems to steal Down through a thing you call a vale, Like tears adown a wrinkled cheek, Like rain along a blade of leek: And this you call your sweet meander, Which might be suck'd up by a gander, Could he but force his nether bill To scoop the channel of the rill. For sure you'd make a mighty clutter, Were it as big as city gutter. Next come I to your kitchen garden, Where one poor mouse would fare ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... hollow road to the Altenberg, now in the shade, now in the full light, for the moon was shining with astonishing brilliancy. A few clouds floated idly across the zenith, seeming to want to clasp her in their long arms, but she ever eluded their grasp, and her rays, keen as a blade of steel, cut me to the marrow ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian
... One plunge of the blade in the animal's side made it yell like a thing possessed. Then Bob dug his thumbs into the lynx's neck and pressed his fingers into its throat, pulling towards him with all his might, to drag the animal ...
— The Fiery Totem - A Tale of Adventure in the Canadian North-West • Argyll Saxby
... it clear to myself and understand," he thought, looking intently at the untrampled grass before him, and following the movements of a green beetle, advancing along a blade of couch-grass and lifting up in its progress a leaf of goat-weed. "What have I discovered?" he asked himself, bending aside the leaf of goat-weed out of the beetle's way and twisting another blade of grass above for the beetle ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... these circumstances," the bonze ventured to reply, "is enough to make you laugh! They amount to this: there existed in the west, on the bank of the Ling (spiritual) river, by the side of the San Sheng (thrice-born) stone, a blade of the Chiang Chu (purple pearl) grass. At about the same time it was that the block of stone was, consequent upon its rejection by the goddess of works, also left to ramble and wander to its own gratification, ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... was almost entirely confined to seamen of the long voyage. One of its ends was suffered to blow about in the wind, but the other was brought down with care over the chest, where it was confined, by springing the blade of a small knife with an ivory handle, in a manner to confine the silk to the linen: a sort of breast-pin that is even now much used by mariners. If we add, that light, canvas slippers, with foul-anchors worked in worsted upon their insteps, covered his feet, we shall say all ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... during the midst of the confusion. When the surgeon came, he took him aside, and desired he would inform him freely whether the wound were mortal, because in that case, he said, he had some affairs to settle, relating to his family. The blade of the penknife, broken by the violence of the blow against a rib, within a quarter of an inch of the handle, was dropt out (I know not whether from the wound, or his clothes) as the surgeon was going to dress him; he ordered it to be ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift
... are sins of men, who are on the whole making proficiency; which by those that judge rightly, are, after the rule of perfection, discommended, yet the persons commended, upon hope of future fruit, as in the green blade of growing corn. And there are some, resembling offences of foulness or violence, which yet are no sins; because they offend neither Thee, our Lord God, nor human society; when, namely, things fitting for a given period are obtained for the service of life, and we know not whether ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... her other timbers in proportion; and in her caulking was a species of moss peculiar to the country in which she was built. In the cabin and other parts of the vessel were found a human skull; a pair of goat's horns attached to a part of the cranium; a dirk or poniard, about half an inch of the blade of which had wholly resisted corrosion; several glazed and ornamental tiles of a square form; some bricks which had formed the fire hearth; several parts of shoes, or rather sandals, fitting low on the foot, one of ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... had stopped the pony and was watching the inroads of numberless scissor-like mouths on a stub of corn near the roadside. The tassel was gone, the edges of the leaves were eaten away, and lines of hungry insects hung to the centre rib of each blade, gnawing and cutting at every inch ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger
... the Golden Distaff, Goddess of the loud chase, a maiden revered, the slayer of stags, the archer, very sister of Apollo of the golden blade. She through the shadowy hills and the windy headlands rejoicing in the chase draws her golden bow, sending forth shafts of sorrow. Then tremble the crests of the lofty mountains, and terribly the dark woodland rings with din of beasts, and the earth shudders, and the teeming sea. Meanwhile ...
— The Homeric Hymns - A New Prose Translation; and Essays, Literary and Mythological • Andrew Lang
... distance. Up one of the highest I sent Hopkins on, who reported that he could not see the end of it, and that all around looked blank and desolate. It is a singular fact that during the whole day we had not seen a drop of water or a blade of grass. ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... day till the present, disappointment, trial and sorrow have entered largely into the life and experience of women. But of all clouds that have darkened their lives and among all sharp swords that have pierced their hearts, the cloud of the liquor traffic has been the darkest, and its blade the keenest. Myriads of women have looked with anguish on sacrifices offered and loved ones slain, not to save humanity or to draw men nearer to God, but destroyed at the hands of a tyrant as relentless as ...
— Why and how: a hand-book for the use of the W.C.T. unions in Canada • Addie Chisholm
... array. The coat was dove-grey satin; waistcoat of dark red, finely figured, with silver buttons; small clothes of red, white silk stockings, and jewelled shoes with the red heels which are worn at Court. I also bought a new dress sword. It has an openwork silver handle and guard; the blade sheathed in a white scabbard, which is silver-mounted. I wore large frills and a small French hat finely laced with gold; and I bought besides ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... the slopes stood out like lacework, but far down in the valley the light seemed to shimmer like waves on a sea of silver mist. It was all inexpressibly cold, and of a loneliness that was uncanny. Nothing stirred, not a twig, not a blade of grass. It seemed to Dick that if even a leaf fell on the far side of the mountain he could hear it. It was a great, primeval world, voiceless and unpeopled, brooding in a ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... the long, colourless grasses, rippling in faint waves like a still lake that reflects the sunshine and swaying lightly beneath myriads of gauzy-winged bees that flashed with a droning noise from blade to blade, to find rest in the yellow hearts of the damask roses. Across the white vaults and the low-lying marble slabs innumerable shadows chased, and from above the gnarled old locust trees swept a fringe of vivid green, the slender blossoms hanging in tassels from the branches' ends, and ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... would thaw, but then a hard frost would come, glazing everything in an icy coating. This went on until late in April. By that time, almost every farmer in the district had used up his hay; every one of them was at the end of his store, and nowhere was there a blade of grass to feed the live-stock, for the land still lay frozen under its blanket of hard-packed snow and ice. When things had come to this pass, a general district meeting was called to discuss the situation and decide what should be done. Brandur's son-in-law ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... cakes nowadays, like those that Aunt 'Ritta made—glossy brown, all of a size, and porous as a sponge. It was great fun to butter them, and then press them with the flat of a knife-blade, to see spurts and spouts rise from the surface like so ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... the bold Slave rear at last the Sword Of Vengeance? drench'd he deep its thirsty blade In the cold bosom of his tyrant lord? Oh! who shall blame him? thro' the midnight shade Still o'er his tortur'd memory rush'd the thought Of every past delight; his native grove, Friendship's best joys, and Liberty and Love, All lost for ever! then Remembrance ...
— Poems • Robert Southey
... party, I pursued my way, exhilarated by the lively conversation in which I had shared, and the pleasant sympathies exchanged: and perhaps, also, by the ale I had drunk:—fine old ale; yes, English ale, ale brewed in England! And I trod English soil; and breathed English air; and every blade of grass was an Englishman born. Smoky old Liverpool, with all its pitch and tar was now far behind; nothing in sight but open meadows ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... Aegisthus then the sacrificing sword Took from the basket, from the bullock's front To cut the hair, which on the hallow'd fire With his right hand he threw; and, as his slaves The victim held, beneath its shoulder plung'd The blade; then turning to thy brother spoke: "Among her noble arts Thessalia boasts To rein the fiery courser, and with skill The victim's limbs to sever; stranger, take The sharp-edg'd steel and show that fame reports ...
— Story of Orestes - A Condensation of the Trilogy • Richard G. Moulton
... The handle either of a small sword or a huge knife, made of an elk's horn. Around the end where the blade had been inserted was a ferule of silver, which, though black, was not much injured by time. Though the handle showed the hole where the blade had been inserted, yet no iron was found, but an oxyde remained ...
— A Further Contribution to the Study of the Mortuary Customs of the North American Indians • H.C. Yarrow
... Tuscarora expressed a variety of emotions while he thus remained stationary. At first, it was fierce, savage, exulting; then it became gentler, soft, perhaps repentant. He drew his knife from its buckskin sheath, and eyed the blade with a gaze expressive of uneasiness. Perceiving that a clot of blood had collected at the junction with the handle, it was carefully removed by the use of water. His look next passed over his whole person, in order to ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... which Christ promised to his followers was not of this world; the good gift he brought them was not peace, but a sword. It was no sword of territorial conquest, but that flaming blade of conscience and self-conviction which lightened between our first parents and their lost Eden,—that sword of the Spirit that searcheth all things,—which severs one by one the ties of passion, of interest, of self-pride, that bind the soul to earth,—whose ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... The woman Tara had produced from about her person a weapon of some kind. She thought she was unobserved, but from the angle at which I stood, I saw her. A gleaming metal object was in her hand. And then she launched it—a small flat disc of metal, thin, and with its circular edge keen as a knife-blade. ...
— Tarrano the Conqueror • Raymond King Cummings
... pulled the slack of Gerry's shirt toward him and wiped the blade till it was gleaming again. Then he looked toward Walt. ...
— The Best Made Plans • Everett B. Cole
... throbbing he had watched—the heart that had throbbed for him only, the slave, out of all the world of men. He could feel his dagger bite through her white breast as he had felt the soft slice of flesh under his blade before; he could see the blood well up around the knife, slowly at first, with a quick, hot spurt when the steel was withdrawn. So she would remain all his, and none might take her from him. His thoughts maddened him. He groaned aloud and dropped his face in his hands on ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... pieces by Radigund queen of the Amazons (bk. v. 7), yet it reappears whole and sound (canto 12), when it is used with good service against Grantorto (the spirit of rebellion). Spenser says it was called Chrysaor because "the blade was garnished ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... black shape moved fast, and occasionally it gave forth a sinister glitter, as stray moonbeams fell upon blade or bayonet. It seemed to Harry that there was something deadly and inevitable about it, and he began to feel sorry for the Union troops who were besieging the village and who did not know that Stonewall Jackson ...
— The Scouts of Stonewall • Joseph A. Altsheler
... down until everything is in and well mixed. Then you put it down, half a pint at a time, four times a day. It's a sure cure, and inside of a week after taking seventeen quarts and rubbing the empty bottles on your left shoulder blade you'll feel like dancing a jig of ...
— The Rover Boys In The Mountains • Arthur M. Winfield
... not one whit behind in drawing his own blade, and, as steel clashed against steel, ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... to wipe away the contaminating touch of the cloak. His eyes were bothering him of late, and he had not read from his favorite book since he left Panurge hunting for the prophetess. Being now awake and having nothing to do, he took down his master's sword and began polishing the blade. He had scarce begun his labor when the door opened and the vicomte ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... sufficient reason. He was making a journey across country, and with him were a few natives, guides and packmen. Perhaps his head grew hot; anyhow, at some stage he took a penknife from his pocket, and ran the blade under the edge of the wig. The native nearest to him, suspicious of witchcraft, stared at this act, terror written on every feature. With a deft lift of the knife, Turner had the wig clear of his head. The native stayed no longer to consider 'Is this a sorcerer?' He whipped off, to what he considered ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... inside. The most peculiar thing about the ship was the rudder, which was on the starboard or right side, this side being originally called 'steerboard' from this circumstance. The rudder was like a large oar, with long blade and short handle, and was attached, not to the side of the boat, but to the end of a conical piece of wood which projected almost a foot from the side of the vessel, and almost two feet from the stern. This piece of wood was ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... here and there, then a paved footway, then the railings round the close. In full view of the windows of the street rose the sixteenth-century church which plays as best it can the part of Cathedral to Manchester. Round it stretched a black and desolate space paved with tombstones. Not a blade of grass broke the melancholy of those begrimed and time-worn slabs. The rain lay among them in pools, squalid buildings overlooked them, and the church, with its manifest inadequacy to a fine site and a great city, did but little towards overcoming the mean and harsh ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... merely to fill up the gap caused by a deficiency in length of the plank of which it was the continuation. Between the two adjoining ends was a crack of some width, and into that crack did Archibald idly stick his chisel. It seemed to him that the crack widened, so that he was able to press the blade of the chisel down to its thickest part. He now worked it eagerly backward and forward, and, to his delight, the crack rapidly widened still further; in fact, the short board was sliding back underneath the wainscot. ...
— Archibald Malmaison • Julian Hawthorne
... procured sabre, quoit, and mace, Abdul Huq, Wahabi, jerked his dagger from its place, While amid the jungle-grass danced and grinned and jabbered Little Boh Hla-oo and cleared his dah-blade ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... seem capricious or lazy, when really my only difficulty was in selecting a pleasure. The sun had climbed well over the high barriers which lay eastwards, and was shining brightly down through the quivering blue ether overhead; the frost sparkled on every broad flax-blade or slender tussock-spine, as if the silver side of earth were turned outwards that ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... surpassed their expectations. Priests, soldiers and officials came in companies, rank upon rank, of exalted and ornate dignity. Chariots and horses shone with gilding, polished metal and gay housings, while the marching legions clanked with pike and blade and shield. Now that the chief luminaries of the procession had passed, the rich and lofty departed with a great show of indifference to the rest of the parade. But the humbler folk, all unlearned in the art of assumption, ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... long, with slightly arched nape, muscular and clean, showing no dewlap, and carried well up and forward. FORE-QUARTERS—His work underground demands strength and compactness, and, therefore, the chest and shoulder regions should be deep, long, and wide. The shoulder blade should be long, and set on very sloping, the upper arm of equal length with, and at right angles to, the shoulder blade, strong-boned and well-muscled, and lying close to ribs, but moving freely. The lower arm is slightly bent inwards, ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... consisted in making the guide blade straight on the outside (instead of rounding, as then made by all others), from inner point back to bolt or gudgeon, and thick enough at the latter point to let water pass without being obstructed by said bolt ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 795, March 28, 1891 • Various
... take deeper hold of them yet, if His power was to get the deeper hold of them, and, by and by, get hold of the needy crowds. The very setting of the words gives the new meaning to them. John had felt the keen edge of Herod's axe blade, and was now in the upper presence. They were up in the far northern part because of the growing danger threatening Him by ...
— Quiet Talks on Following the Christ • S. D. Gordon
... those of her four husbands, issued from under Fitzford gateway with the shade of Lady Howard inside. A coal-black hound ran in front as far as Okehampton, and on the return journey carried in its mouth a single blade of grass, which it placed on a stone in the old courtyard of Fitzford; and not until all the grass of Okehampton had been thus transported would Lady Howard's penance end! The death-coach glided ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... effort Endicott succeeded in smearing his face with a thin, stringy lather, and gingerly picked up the razor. The Texan looked on in owlish solemnity as the man sat holding the blade helplessly. ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... out to the owner of the coveted top the frightful unsightliness of his treasure, and in other ways seeking to lower the price likely to be demanded as soon as negotiations opened, I at length secured the top in return for six marbles, a redoubtable horse chestnut, and a knife with a broken blade. My subsequent alarm, on missing so costly a possession, can be readily imagined. I could not be expected to endure so serious a deprivation without making a desperate effort to retrieve my fallen fortunes. ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham
... supplication: "Ukko, mightiest of rulers, Loan to me thy sword of battle, Grant to me thy matchless weapon, And against a thousand armies I will war and ever conquer." Ukko, gave the youth his broadsword, Gave his blade of magic powers To the wizard, Kullerwoinen. Thus equipped, the mighty hero Slew the people of Untamo, Burned their villages to ashes; Only left the stones and ovens, And the chimneys of their hamlets. Then ...
— The Kalevala (complete) • John Martin Crawford, trans.
... and Abraham promised so faithfully that he would never deviate from the path of virtue again, now that his evil genius was removed, if they would only let him come back and graduate, that he was given the chance. Nothing new came up about the cutting of the wires except that the end of a knife blade was found on the floor under the place where the hole had been made in the wall. There were no marks of identification on it and nothing was ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at School • Hildegard G. Frey
... sharpe pointed knife in my hand to thrust it to my hart, that mine innocent bloud, doing the funerall honour, may beare witnesse before God of my vndefiled chastity, as being vtterly resolued honourablie to die. And that rather then to lose mine honoure, I may murther my selfe before you wyth this blade and knife in present hand." The king burning with amorous heate, beholding this pitifull spectacle, and consideringe the inuincible constancie and chastitie of the Countesse, vanquished by remorse of conscience, ioyned with like pitie, taking her by the ...
— The Palace of Pleasure, Volume 1 • William Painter
... and they think lots of him here," declared Paul, who was amazed to learn that his chum's parent could have, once upon a time, been reckoned a wild blade. ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... time for a second thought on the seriousness of this event—my first fight in earnest—he was keeping me busy to parry his point and watch his dagger at the same time. I was half-surprised at my own success in turning away his blade, but after I had guarded myself from three or four thrusts, I took to mind that offence is the best defence, and ventured a lunge, which he stopped with his dagger only in the nick of time to save his breast. His look of being almost caught gave me encouragement, ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... the rest?" Thorvald had a thin steel of rage edging his voice. Almost, Shann thought, as if he could turn that blade of rage against one Shann Lantee for being yet alive when more ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... a blade of grass, slipped the end between her lips and chewed it gently, her face puzzled and concerned. She wasn't ordinarily afflicted with nervousness. Fifteen years old, genius level, brown as a berry and not at all bad looking in her sunbriefs, she was the youngest member of one of Orado's most ...
— Novice • James H. Schmitz
... of Flower-Aspect."[271] Celtic romance is full of exquisite touches like that, showing the delicacy of the Celt's feeling in these matters, and how deeply Nature lets him come into her secrets. The quick dropping of blood is called "faster than the fall of the dewdrop from the blade of reed-grass upon the earth, when the dew of June is at the heaviest." And thus is Olwen described: "More yellow was her hair than the flower of the broom, and her skin was whiter than the foam of the wave, and fairer were her hands and her fingers than the blossoms of the wood-anemony amidst ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... and so arranged as to serve as fingers to hold a switch bar (D) between them. This bar is also of copper or brass and is pivoted to the fingers. Near the other end of the base is a similar binding screw (E) and fingers (F) to receive the blade of the switch bar. The bar has a handle (G) of wood. The wires are attached to the respective binding screws ...
— Electricity for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... sword-hilt, Peyton had pulled the weapon a few inches out of the scabbard, and now, though he did not intend to draw while in the house, he unconsciously brought out the full length of what remained of the blade. For the time he had forgotten the sword was broken, and now he was reminded of it ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens
... plain For thee to follow; hold thou to the course Of Concentration Channel, and all things Shall come in answer to thy swerveless wish As comes the needle to the magnet's call, Or sunlight to the prisoned blade of grass That yearns all winter for ...
— Poems of Power • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... wilderness of trees, had not long experience assured me that good game tracks would be found leading to it, and by one of them I reached it. It was in the afternoon, just after one of those tropical sun-showers which decorate every branch and blade with its pendant brilliants, and the little patena was covered with game, either driven to the open space by the drippings from the leaves or tempted by the freshness of the pasture: there were several pairs of elk, the bearded antlered ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent
... of the saw was always in his thoughts; it was as he had said. Last winter, when the roads were hard, he had carted up the big circular blade and the fittings, ordered from Trondhjem through the village store. The parts were lying in one of the sheds now, well smeared with oil to keep off the rust. He had brought up some of the beams too, for the framework; he could begin ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... along Princes Street, the High Street callously exhibits its back garrets. It is true, there is a garden between. And although nothing could be more glaring by way of contrast, sometimes the opposition is more immediate; sometimes the thing lies in a nutshell, and there is not so much as a blade of grass between the rich and poor. To look over the South Bridge and see the Cowgate below full of crying hawkers, is to view one rank of society from another in ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his followers had, therefore, no other weapons than such as could be fashioned out of the tools which they had used in husbandry or mining. Of these rude implements of war the most formidable was made by fastening the blade of a scythe erect on a strong pole. [384] The tithing men of the country round Taunton and Bridgewater received orders to search everywhere for scythes and to bring all that could be found to the camp. ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Where is the glory? Where is the reward, For sacrifice of comfort, quiet, peace? For sacrifice of children, wife, and friends? For sacrifice of firesides—genial homes? What hour, what gift, will ever make amends For broken health, for bruised flesh and bones, For lives cut short by bullet, blade, disease? Where balm to heal the widow's heart, or what Shall soothe a mother's grief for woes like these? Hold, murmurer, hold! Is country naught to thee? Is freedom nothing? Naught an honored name? What though the days be cold, ...
— The Citizen-Soldier - or, Memoirs of a Volunteer • John Beatty
... people, they had forgotten for a moment the stranded boat and its small occupant. As they looked again, they saw she had stuck the oars in the mud, blade down, and was now evidently lashing them to the oar-locks. This done, she stood up and slipped off the blue flannel skirt of her little sailor suit, standing up in her short white petticoat. She hung the skirt by the hem over the oars, and immediately she had a very fair substitute ...
— Cricket at the Seashore • Elizabeth Westyn Timlow
... part, and sank red, though reluctant, beyond the Delectable Mountains. Thou moon, this is Ajalon! Be kindly, for by moonlight one still may labor, and here is labor to be done. Every blade in the Barlow knives is broken. The hole in the stump yields not to slashings, nor to attempts to pry it open. The prey is still unreached. What ...
— The Singing Mouse Stories • Emerson Hough
... already had my jack-knife out—unless I could cut through the scuttle and get at the hasp. The wood was old, frail, and half rotten,—in three minutes I had the point of the blade through. In five, I had cut a hole large enough to admit two fingers. I knew that I was safe from being seen,—anyone on that part of the roof would not be visible from the ground near the house. After cutting for a little while longer I put enough ...
— The Voyage of the Hoppergrass • Edmund Lester Pearson
... many friends of his own age, and lived as most of them did, mixing in all the excitements of city life. He was now rather a wild, reckless young blade, as willing to draw his sword in a street fight as to pay compliments to a pretty maid of honor. One day he got into a fight at a tavern with a noisy braggart. He managed to throw the man into a chair and bind him with a ...
— Historic Boyhoods • Rupert Sargent Holland
... surging noise of the whistles as the falls dropped the boats from the davits; then the men, leaping down into cutters—silently and quick—no sound save the clash of a cutlass or the rattle of an oar-blade as they took their places and shoved off. Again an order ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... fight, louder swelled the din and tumult with the never-ceasing thunder of the guns; and amid it all Don Miguel paced to and fro, impassive as always, the blade of his long rapier gleaming here and there ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... were playing their part well, when an English knight came rushing up, having in his company a hundred men, furnished with various arms. He wielded a northern hatchet, with the blade a full foot long; and was well armed after his manner, being tall, bold, and of noble carriage. In the front of the battle where the Normans thronged most, he came bounding on swifter than the stag, many Normans falling before him and his company. He rushed straight upon ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.
... Canada thistles; that they have to send beyond seas for a spile to stop a leak in an oil cask; that pieces of wood in Nantucket are carried about like bits of the true cross in Rome; that people there plant toadstools before their houses, to get under the shade in summer time; that one blade of grass makes an oasis, three blades in a day's walk a prairie; that they wear quicksand shoes, something like Laplander snowshoes; that they are so shut up, belted about, every way inclosed, surrounded, and made an utter island of by ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... there, too. Late at night, when all honest ducks, excepting somnambulists and such as have vindications on hand, are asleep, Quackalina led the way back to the old nest. But when she got there, although the clear, white moonlight lay upon everything and revealed every blade of grass, not a vestige of nest or straw or ...
— Solomon Crow's Christmas Pockets and Other Tales • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... jeune Lisette! Ah, belle Fifine! Anacreon's lesson all must learn; 'O kairos oxus; Spring is green; But Acer Hyems waits his turn! I hear you whispering from the dust, "Tiens, mon cher, c'est toujours so,— The brightest blade grows dim with rust, The fairest ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... the familiar lines of Pushkin about the golden moon of Spain flashed into my mind. And indeed this was a golden moon. At this moment she radiated rivers of golden light, poured forth liquid gold into the tossing lake at our feet, and sprinkled with golden dust every blade of grass, every pebble, as far as the eye could reach, all round us. Her disk of silvery yellow swiftly glided upward amongst the big stars, on their ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... earliest south winds softly blow Over the brown earth, and the waning snow In the last days of the discrowned March,— Before the silver tassels of the larch, Or any tiniest bud or blade is seen; Or in the woods the faintest kindling green, And all the earth is veiled in azure mist, Waiting the far-off kisses of the sun,— They lift their bright heads shyly one by one. And offer each, in cups of amethyst, Drops of the honey ...
— The Coming of the Princess and Other Poems • Kate Seymour Maclean
... to know about storms that leave the worst Northern trails a summer picnic, and muskegs and tundra that leave you searching for something bigger than miles to measure with, and barren, fly-ridden territory without a leaf or blade of grass and scored every way at once with rifts and water canyons so you can't tell the north from the Desert of Sahara? If you do, read the old report I've been writing. I'll hand you a story that won't shout credit for ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum
... some of the crevices in the stone wall, dwelt many a big, ugly, black spider always on the alert, peeping out of his nook ready to pounce upon any giddy fly or wandering centipede. One of my amusements consisted in tickling the spiders gently, very gently, with a blade of grass or a cherry-stalk in their webs. Mystified, they would rush out, fancying they had to deal with some sort of prey, while I would rapidly draw back my hand in disgust. Well, last year, on that fourteenth of July, ...
— Madame Chrysantheme Complete • Pierre Loti
... the scalpel very freely upon yourself, my boy," said Phillip Stanley, in his friendliest tone. "But let us see if there isn't a different kind of blade that will serve us better. If you were cruelly bound with thongs, and some friend should pass you a keen-edged knife, you would not sit hopelessly looking at your bonds and still continue to bemoan your bondage; you would instantly begin to sever the thongs and so regain ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... great marvel it is, Strange in the mouth that knoweth it not, How the point of the knife and the right hand, The thought of a man, and his blade therewith, Shaped me with skill, that boldly I might So deliver a message to thee In the presence of us two alone, That to other men our talk May not ...
— Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days • Emily Hickey
... credential. And, indeed, it was by means of this jewel that the faultless Sita had been able to support her existence. And the daughter of Janaka further told me as a token from her, that by thee, O tiger among men, a blade of grass (inspired with Mantras and thus converted into a fatal weapon) had once been shot at a crow while ye were on the breast of the mighty hill known by the name of Chitrakuta! And this she said as evidence of my having met her and ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... much as upon my revolver, for, innocent and inoffensive as it looked, it was capable of most deadly execution. I had chosen it in preference to many other more pretentious weapons which had suggested themselves to me. It consisted of a small, flexible steel wire hardly bigger than the blade of a foil, surmounted by a good-sized lead ball, and the whole covered with a closely woven fabric. By grasping the cane by its lower end a tremendously heavy blow could be struck with the ball, and, if an attempt were made to shield the head by throwing up the arm, it was almost certain to fail ...
— The Darrow Enigma • Melvin L. Severy
... downe, Is left (suppos'd of eu'ry one for dead) But afterwards awaking from his swoone, By some that found him, was recouered: So Count Du Marle was likewise ouerthrowne: As he was turning meaning to haue fled, Who fights, the colde blade in his bosome feeles, Who flyes, still heares ...
— The Battaile of Agincourt • Michael Drayton
... a farm-bred grandfather to show them how easy it is to use a sharp shovel or how impossibly hard it can be to drive a dull one into the soil. Similarly, weeding with a sharp hoe is effortless and fast. But most new hoes are sold without even a proper bevel ground into the blade, much less with an edge that has been carefully honed. So after working with dull shovels and hoes, many home food growers mistakenly conclude that cultivation is not possible without using a rotary tiller for both tillage ...
— Organic Gardener's Composting • Steve Solomon
... even of the Mahomedan conquest of India, the Hindu infidels are sent to Jihannam with "the well-watered blade of the Hindi sword"; or the sword is personified as "a Hindu of good family." Coming down to later days, Chardin says of the steel of Persia: "They combine it with Indian steel, which is more tractable ... and is much more esteemed." Dupre, at the beginning of this century, tells us: ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... moves, speedily placing his wary adversary at the saddest disadvantage. But, having attained this height, his power seemed to pass away as from an over-tasked mind. With twice the weight of arm, and as keen a blade, he appeared quite unable to parry a single lunge of Lee's, quite unable to thrust himself. He allowed his corps commanders to be beaten in detail, with no apparent effort to aid them from his abundant resources, the while his opponent was demanding from every man in his command the last ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... have more subjects now than we should want for fifty years. War knocks the whole of their value on the head. We have fifty bodies as good as this, and are simply obliged to bury them. What I mean is, shall we pull the blade out?" ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... not a human being, not a tree, not a blade of grass—the only breaks in the monotonous whiteness are gaping cracks which in places show the layer of moist, ...
— Glimpses of Bengal • Sir Rabindranath Tagore
... if there is any breeze blowing at all, because these insects cling to the salt hay or bog-grass and do not rise above it except in close, muggy weather where no breeze disturbs them. I have slept a few feet over bog meadows without being disturbed by mosquitoes when every blade of grass on the meadows was black with these insects, but there was a breeze blowing which kept the ...
— Shelters, Shacks and Shanties • D.C. Beard
... not have dared use it in her father's hearing. He knew that he was a coward. No man had ever called Y.D. a coward; no man had ever known him for a coward; he had never known himself as such—until to-day. With all his roughness Y.D. had a sense of honor as keen as any razor blade. If he allowed himself wide latitude in some matters it was because he had lived his life in an atmosphere where the wide latitude was the thing. The prairie had been his bed, the sky his roof, himself his own policeman, judge, and executioner since boyhood. When responsibility is so centralized ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... which would have given almost an appearance of summer; but the morning was extremely frosty; the light vapour of the preceding evening had been precipitated by the cold, and covered all the trees and every blade of grass with its fine crystallisations. The rays of a bright morning sun had a dazzling effect among the glittering foliage. A robin, perched upon the top of a mountain-ash that hung its clusters of red berries just before my window, was basking ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... struggle in that way was equalized. He turned in the gripping arms about him and the men were chest to chest. Neither spoke; each fought solely to get the other prostrate, while Nicholas developed a secondary pressure toward the blade buried in the wall. This Woolfolk successfully blocked. In the supreme effort to bring the struggle to a decisive end neither dealt the other minor injuries. There were no blows—nothing but the straining pull of arms, the sudden weight of bodies, the cunning ...
— Wild Oranges • Joseph Hergesheimer |
