"Haft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... than remain to bear the scoffing of the fair smiling woman she so hated. Or, she would have stolen in by night to where Atossa slept, and the wicked-looking Indian knife she wore, would have gone down, swift and sure, to the very haft, into the queen's heart. She would not have borne tamely any slight upon her beauty or her claims. But, as it was, she reigned supreme. The king was just, and showed no difference in the state and attendance ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... spades. All uncovered again for a few instants. The boy propped his wreath against a corner: the brother-in-law his on a lump. The gravediggers put on their caps and carried their earthy spades towards the barrow. Then knocked the blades lightly on the turf: clean. One bent to pluck from the haft a long tuft of grass. One, leaving his mates, walked slowly on with shouldered weapon, its blade blueglancing. Silently at the gravehead another coiled the coffinband. His navelcord. The brother-in-law, turning away, ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... reinforcements from the northern defences was the work of a few minutes. Even the elderly breed cook at the cook-house was claimed, though his only weapons were an ancient patterned revolver and a pick-haft he had snatched up. Fifteen men in all he was able to collect and at the head of them he ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... to the one great predominant purpose of all—a conquering army which was to intimidate the world. The army was the spearpoint of Prussia; the rest was merely the haft. That was what we had to deal with in these old countries. It got on the nerves of Europe. They knew what it all meant. It was an army that in recent times had waged three wars, all of conquest, and the unceasing ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... wel with sauf conscience Excuse me of necgligence Towardes love in alle wise: For thogh I be non of the wise, 920 I am so trewly amerous, That I am evere curious Of hem that conne best enforme To knowe and witen al the forme, What falleth unto loves craft. Bot yit ne fond I noght the haft, Which mihte unto that bladd acorde; For nevere herde I man recorde What thing it is that myhte availe To winne love withoute faile. 930 Yit so fer cowthe I nevere finde Man that be resoun ne be kinde Me cowthe teche such an art, That he ne failede of a part; And as ...
— Confessio Amantis - Tales of the Seven Deadly Sins, 1330-1408 A.D. • John Gower
... down upon it, drew a knife from its sheath in his belt, and counted the prisoners over with the point of the blade. He then drew a few imaginary lines upon the top of the loaf, paused to rub his woolly head with the haft, looking puzzled and as if cutting the loaf into as many pieces as there were prisoners bothered him, and ended by making ...
— Nic Revel - A White Slave's Adventures in Alligator Land • George Manville Fenn
... forth the brand Excalibur, And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon, Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt: For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks, Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long That both his eyes were dazzled as he stood, This way and that dividing the swift mind, In act to throw: but at the last it seem'd Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd ...
— Myths and Legends of All Nations • Various
... against them so soon, they did not advance in order, as King Bucar had commanded. And when the Cid saw this, he ordered his banner to be advanced, and bade his people lay on manfully. The Bishop Don Hieronynio he pricked forward; two Moors he slew with the two first thrusts of the lance; the haft broke, and he laid hand on his sword, God,... how well the Bishop fought! two he slew with the lance and five with the sword; the Moors came round about him and laid on load of blows, but they could not pierce his ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... a sword, rich and fair, and it was drawn out of the sheath half a foot and more; and the sword was of divers fashions, and the pommel was of stone, and there was in him all manner of colours that any man might find, and everych of the colours had divers virtues; and the scales of the haft were of two ribs of divers beasts, the one beast was a serpent which was conversant in Calidone, and is called the Serpent of the fiend; and the bone of him is of such a virtue that there is no hand that handleth him shall never be weary nor hurt. And the other beast is a fish which is ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume II (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... over, the old man gave a knock upon the table with the haft of his knife to bid them prepare for the dance. The moment the signal was given, the women and girls ran all together into a back apartment to tie up their hair, and the young men to the door to wash their faces and change their sabots, and in three minutes every ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... point struck the Neanderthaler at the junction of his neck and shoulder. As it struck, the haft flew from the spear and bounded down the slope. The first point made ...
— B. C. 30,000 • Sterner St. Paul Meek
... the Indian. His dark eyes glowed craftily, while his hand dropped, apparently in careless habit, to the haft ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... great bill) Let me but reach this haft, I shall get hold Of steel enough to fence ...
— The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays • Various
... The violent expansion of Fisette's chest worked palpitating beneath the great arms, and, just ere endurance reached its limit and the trees began to swim before Manson's eyes, his little finger touched the haft of the sheath knife that hung at Fisette's back. The touch ran through Fisette's laboring frame like fire, for he had reached the point where the world seemed dipped in blood. Slowly Manson pushed down his hand, never relaxing his titanic embrace. But ...
— The Rapids • Alan Sullivan
... to get it repaired at once. During the time, therefore, that it was out of use, the woods enjoyed a respite from further damage. At last the man came humbly and begged of the forest to allow him gently to take just one branch wherewith to make him a new haft, and promised that then he would go elsewhere to ply his trade and get his living. That would leave unthreatened many an oak and many a fir that now won universal respect on account of ...
— The Original Fables of La Fontaine - Rendered into English Prose by Fredk. Colin Tilney • Jean de la Fontaine
... Fail'd to transpierce it, and the weapon fell Snapp'd at the neck. Yet, when he struck, the heart 740 Rebounded of Pisander, full of hope. But Menelaus, drawing his bright blade, Sprang on him, while Pisander from behind His buckler drew a brazen battle-axe By its long haft of polish'd olive-wood, 745 And both Chiefs struck together. He the crest That crown'd the shaggy casque of Atreus' son Hew'd from its base, but Menelaus him In his swift onset smote full on the front Above ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... water, and come again and tell me what thou shalt see there." "My lord," said Sir Bedivere, "your command shall be done, and lightly bring you word again." And so Sir Bedivere departed, and by the way he beheld that noble sword, where the pommel and the haft were all of precious stones. And then he said to himself, "If I throw this rich sword into the water, thereof shall never come good, but harm and loss." And then Sir Bedivere hid Excalibur under a tree; and as soon as he might, he came again unto ...
— The Junior Classics, V4 • Willam Patten (Editor)
... jeweled fingers worked convulsively around its haft, like those of one who fain would strike a death blow, yet whose hand was briefly ...
— With Links of Steel • Nicholas Carter
... till there but one remained—calling, calling, but ever soft and far away, and when I would have gone toward this voice—lo! there stood a knife quivering in the ground before me, that grew and grew until its haft touched heaven, yet still the voice called upon ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... instead of a curved, handle, and in usually being sharp on both edges instead of only on one. These are made in various sizes (Fig. 46, a, b), and the blades flat, curved on the flat, or curved at an angle with the edges of the haft. ...
— Diseases of the Horse's Foot • Harry Caulton Reeks
... some private revenge to satisfy after the public welfare had been served. We met one old man in a frenzy, covered with blood from his white beard to his boots, his arms bare to his shoulders, his knife dripping from haft to point." ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr
... a flint to a cutting edge, And shaped it with brutish craft; I broke a shank from the woodland dank, And fitted it, head to haft. Then I hid me close in the reedy tarn, Where the Mammoth came to drink— Through brawn and bone I drave the stone, And slew him upon ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... by flashed the sword whose edge and point No mail could turn, with golden belt, and sheath Of silver, and with haft of ivory: Brightest amid those wondrous arms it shone. Stretched on the earth thereby was that dread spear, Long as the tall-tressed pines of Pelion, Still breathing out the reek of ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... m'bina tree two soldiers, one with the haft of a blood-stained knife between his teeth, had mutilated horribly a living girl. Little Papeete had been decapitated just where his skull lay now; the shrieks and wails of the tortured tore the sky above Berselius; but Adams heard nothing and saw nothing but ...
— The Pools of Silence • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... pit in their swollen bellies. But there were in the old days other deaths, far worse than what one meets under a snake-devil's claws and fangs. And those are the deaths we fear." He was running the smooth haft of his spear back and forth through his fingers as if testing the balance of the weapon because the time was not far away when ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... shield nor helm endured the weight of its dint; no greatness of body or of strength could serve. Thus the victory would have passed to the gods, but that Hother, though his line had already fallen back, darted up, hewed off the club at the haft, and made it useless. And the gods, when they had lost this weapon, fled incontinently. But that antiquity vouches for it, it were quite against common belief to think that men prevailed against gods. ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... Romans. and the labra of the Lydians and Carians; others more nearly resembled the weapons used by our own knights in the middle ages, having a single blade, and a mere ornamental point on the other side of the haft. ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson
... roared Bolle, "and strike home for Foterell, strike home for Harflete! Ah, priest's dog, in the King's name—this!" and the axe sank up to the haft into the breast of the captain who had told Cicely that she would be warm enough that day ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... her bairn, and she came to fetch her out of ill haft and waur guiding. If she wasna sae wise as ither folk, few ither folk had suffered as muckle as she had done; forby that she could fend the waur for hersell within the four wa's of a jail. She could prove by fifty witnesses, and fifty to that, that her daughter had never seen Jock Porteous, ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... memory. Still it was not the intent men or the stately clustering pines that she recalled most clearly; it was the dominant central figure, standing almost statuesque, with head tilted slightly backward, and both hands clenched on the big ax haft. ...
— The Gold Trail • Harold Bindloss
... His deep chest swelled and throbbed; into his face crept the look that had been there on that day when he told Pascherette he loved her—loved her, yet worshiped Dolores as his gods. Letting the ax fall to his elbow by the thong at the haft, he stooped and tenderly picked up the girl, carrying her as a child carries a doll; yet his face was averted from Pascherette's passionate lips that sought to ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... the skin of some wild beast but the cord which tied it was a stout one, and in the belt thus formed was stuck a weapon of such quality as men have rarely carried since. It was a stone ax; an ax heavier than any battle-ax of mediaeval times, its haft a scant three feet in length, inclosing the ax through a split in the tough wood, all being held in place by a taut and hardened mass of knotted sinews. It was a fearful weapon, but one only to be ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... hardened. "While we're putting out information, take note that I'm just as good with actual knives as with figurative ones. If you're still thinking of blistering my fanny, don't try it. You'll find a rawhide haft sticking up out of one of those muscles you're so ...
— The Galaxy Primes • Edward Elmer Smith
... beer barrel, to make up for the drink of which they had deprived themselves. The storm had passed, and the stars were shining brightly. They met nobody on their way until within two or three miles of Gunzenhausen; it was found that the haft of Paolo's axe was deeply stained with blood; and he threw it away on issuing from the wood, as it did not accord well with his present attire, which was rather that of a discharged soldier or a worker in cities than of a countryman. Soon after eight o'clock they approached ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty
... forward with the axe he had snatched from the carpenter's hand, he made one quick cut and drove it into the earth, for the blade to be struck at once by the serpent's head, while the ugly coils were instantaneously knotted round the haft. ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... over me, his spear only cutting the flesh of my shoulder—see! here is its scar; yes, to this day. And my assegai? Ah! it went home; it ran through and through his middle. He rolled over and over on the plain. The dust hid him; only I was now weaponless, for the haft of my spear—it was but a light throwing assegai—broke in two, leaving nothing but a little bit of stick in my hand. And the other one was upon me. Then in the darkness I saw a light. I fell on to my hands and knees and flung myself over sideways. My body ...
— Nada the Lily • H. Rider Haggard
... no need to ask his name, however, for in one hand he carried a weapon such as had seldom seen the light since powder had come to Ireland. It was an ax, some five feet from haft to helve; double-bladed, each blade eight inches long, curved back slightly, and two inches thick by twice as much wide. The edges, which came down sharply from the thickness, were not overkeen, and were not meant to be so. When the thing struck, ...
— Nuala O'Malley • H. Bedford-Jones
... for perhaps two hours. He was resting. To be explicit, he was standing on a fallen tree. Between his feet there was a notch cut half-way through the wood. In this white gash the blade of his axe was driven solidly, and he rested his hands on the rigid haft while he stood drawing gulps of forest-scented air into ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... as though he would have devoured me at that instant time." In the extremity of his terror, he tried to run away from the awful monster; but, as might have been expected under the circumstances, he tumbled to the ground. "I fell down upon my hip, and my knife run into my hip up to the haft. When I came home, my knife was in my sheath. When I drew it out of the sheath, then immediately the sheath fell all to pieces." And further this deponent testifieth, that, after he got up from his fall, his stocking and shoe was full of blood, and that he was forced ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... a message from God unto thee. And he arose out of his seat. And Ehud put forth his left hand, and took the sword from his right thigh, and thrust it into his belly: and the haft also went in after the blade; and the fat closed upon the blade, for he drew not the sword out of his belly; and it came out behind." Then Ehud locked the doors and escaped. "Now when he was gone out, his servants came; and they saw, and, behold, the ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... out into the garden, and to a tangled heap lying in the moonlight, on the edge of the long grass. The slave had fallen on top of his master; one leg lay swathed and twisted; one black hand had but partially relaxed upon the haft of a knife (the knife) that stood up hilt-deep in a blacker heart. And in the hand of Santos was still the revolver (my Deane and Adams) which had sent its last ball through the ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... the sod, then, with the point on the tip of the left forefinger and the haft deftly held between the thumb and finger of his right, shifted it over by his right ear and sent it whirling down, saw it sink two inches in the sand, bolt upright, then queried: "They said their camp was on the Fork ten miles away northward. ...
— To The Front - A Sequel to Cadet Days • Charles King
... at last," said Boots, as he took the axe, pulled it off its haft, and stuffed both head and ...
— East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon • Gudrun Thorne-Thomsen
... rings of that metal on each of his fingers. His head was wrapped round by a silken veil or turban, and his body was cloathed to the knees in a cotton wrapper, wrought with silk and gold. He wore at his side a sword or dagger, with a haft of gold, and a scabbard of carved wood. This country is so rich, that one of the natives offered a crown of massy gold in exchange for six strings of glass beads; but Magellan would not allow such bargains, lest the Spaniards might appear too greedy ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... from God unto thee," and then pulls out his hidden knife with that unsuspected hand of his,—-(the Little Gentleman lifted his clenched left hand with the blood-red jewel on the ring-finger,)—and runs it, blade and haft, into a man's stomach! Don't meddle with these fellows, Sir. They are read mostly by persons whom you would not reach, if you were to write ever so much. Let 'em alone. A man whose opinions are not attacked ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... block of jasper, the ancient stone of sacrifice. Zoraida went by first; Kendric was passing when an impulse prompted him to put out a sudden hand for the keen edged knife of obsidian. He slipped it into his belt and hid the haft with his coat. If it came to an ambush, to an attack in the dark, a revolver bullet might fly wild while the wide sweep of a knife blade would somehow find a sheath in something ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... him, fitted to the grasp, an axe Of iron, ponderous, double-edged, with haft Of olive-wood inserted firm, and wrought With curious art. Then placing in his hand A polished adze, she led herself the way To her isle's utmost verge, where loftiest stood The alder, poplar, and cloud-piercing fir, Though sapless, ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... have looked each other between the eyes, and there they found no fault, They have taken the Oath of the Brother-in-Blood on leavened bread and salt; They have taken the Oath of the Brother-in-Blood on fire and fresh-cut sod, On the hilt and the haft of the Khyber knife, and the Wondrous Names of God. The Colonel's son he rides the mare and Kamal's boy the dun, And two have come back to Fort Bukloh where there went forth but one. And when they ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... by the way he beheld that noble sword, whose pommel and haft were all of precious stones, and then he said to himself, "If I throw this rich sword in the water, thereof shall never come good, but harm ...
— Stories of King Arthur and His Knights - Retold from Malory's "Morte dArthur" • U. Waldo Cutler
... kin go, po bocras kin go, dey cares noddings fur yo when dey wus rich. Now dey air po as Job's turkey, dey wants us Dutchmans an po bocras to dhrive oud our meat an' bread so dey kin demselfs git fat at de public crib. But I tells you dis: Schults will haft nodding to do mit dem. I stays in mine house, mine house is mine castle, and ef dey wants me let dem cum to mine house, by dams I fills dem full uv lead; yo kin put dat in yo pipe and shmoke id." George Howe arose, yawned, then slowly walked to the door, ...
— Hanover; Or The Persecution of the Lowly - A Story of the Wilmington Massacre. • David Bryant Fulton
... doom upon thee!" and with his spear gripped in both hands, he rushed upon Sir Mordred and smote him that the weapon stood out a fathom behind. And Sir Mordred knew that he had his death wound. With all the might that he had, he thrust him up the spear to the haft and, with his sword, struck King Arthur upon the head, that the steel pierced the helmet and bit into the head; then Mordred fell back, stark ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... prophetess. A porridge of goat's beestings was made for her, and for meat there were dressed the hearts of every kind of beast which could be obtained there. She had a brass spoon, and a knife with a handle of walrus tusk, with a double hasp of brass around the haft, and from this the point was broken. And when the tables were removed, Yeoman Thorkel approaches the prophetess Thorbiorg, and asks how she is pleased with the home, and the character of the folk, and how speedily she would be likely to become aware of that ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... metal implement employed at all commonly in the area; it is found in each family. It consists of an iron, steel-bitted blade from an inch to an inch and a half in width and about 6 inches in length. It is attached to the short, wooden handle by a square haft inserted into the handle. Since the haft is square the implement may be instantly converted into either an "ax" with blade parallel to the handle or an "adz" with blade at right angle ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks
... quite oblivious of the fact that he was back once more in the haunt of his enemies, although knowledge that the double-bitted axe he had so unceremoniously borrowed of Colonel Pennington was driven deep into the log beside him, with the haft convenient to his hand, probably had much to do with Bryce's air of detached indifference. He was sitting with his elbows on his knees, his chin in his cupped hands, and a pipe thrust aggressively out ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... and silver tossed aside the shell, rose, and entered the lists. With one hand he seized the gravedigger of the ruff, and hurled him apart from him of the velvet breeches; with the other he presented a dagger with a jeweled haft at the breast of the ruffian with the woman's mantle, while in tones that would have befitted Astrophel plaining of his love to rocks, woods, and streams, he poured forth a flood of wild, singular, and filthy oaths, such as would have disgraced a camp follower. His interference ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... me, prized with me, Till on a sudden Besparked and encircled With Welsh or with Wallsend, Shattering, battering They drew me away. Others in rivalry, Thinking to better The previous performance, Seized me again; Pushed with a leverage Hard on the haft of me, Till with the shocks Sank the red fire, Shivered and sank Subdued into blackness. That is my Toil; I am ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 18, 1892 • Various
... the son of Gwynham—(his domains were swallowed up by the sea, and he himself hardly escaped, and he came to Arthur, and his knife had this peculiarity, that from the time that he came there no haft would ever remain upon it, and owing to this a sickness came over him, and he pined away during the remainder of his life, and of this ...
— Celtic Literature • Matthew Arnold
... his nostrils filled with might: Nostrils quickened eyelids, eyelids hand: Hand for sword at right Groped, the great haft spanned. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... one that is nearer and nigher To the noblest of dames than her lover: With the haft of the helm is he smitten On the hat-block—and fairly amidships! The false heir of Eystein—he falters— He falls in the poop of his galley! Nay! steer not upon me, O Steingerd, Though stoutly ye ...
— The Life and Death of Cormac the Skald • Unknown
... spear, and belonged to him personally. He had brought it all the way from Nubia. It differed from any of the native spears of East Africa both in form and in weight. Its blade was broad and shaped like a leaf; its haft was of wood; and its heel was shod with only the briefest length of iron. Chake kept this spear in a high state of polish, so that its metal shone like silver. He lifted it, poised it, made as though to throw it, to thrust with it. Then with a ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al
... gloat over his victim from his present height was irresistible. He went up another step, and sat down on the very summit of the ladder, his feet resting on one of the lower rounds. The hammer he had been using was lying on his thigh, his hand clutched about its haft. ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown
... fixed stare. Charlie looked at him in surprise for a moment, thinking he was stunned, then he saw that his right arm was twisted under him in the fall, and at once understanding what had happened, turned him half over. He had fallen on the knife, which had penetrated to the haft, killing him instantly. ...
— A Jacobite Exile - Being the Adventures of a Young Englishman in the Service of Charles the Twelfth of Sweden • G. A. Henty
... she takes the heavy shaft From the hunter's cruel hand; With the murderous weapon's haft Furrowing the light-strown sand,— Takes from out her garland's crown, Filled with life, one single grain, Sinks it in the furrow down, And ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... fathers or friends. The second treasure he possesses is Megingjarder (belt of strength); when he girds himself with it his strength is doubled. His third treasure that is of so great value is his iron gloves; these he cannot do without when he lays hold of the hammer's haft. No one is so wise that he can tell all his great works; but I can tell you so many tidings of him that it will grow late before all is told that ...
— The Younger Edda - Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda • Snorre
... between the two; Blunt striving to draw his knife, and Myles, with the energy of despair, holding him tightly by the wrist. It was in vain the elder lad writhed and twisted; he was strong enough to overbear Myles, but still was not able to clutch the haft ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... wanderings about the island had found the skeleton—it was he that had rifled it; he had found the treasure; he had dug it up (it was the haft of his pickaxe that lay broken in the excavation); he had carried it on his back, in many weary journeys, from the foot of a tall pine to a cave he had on the two-pointed hill at the north-east angle of the island, and there it had lain stored in safety since two months ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... here that if a guy wanted a hair cut all he'd haft to do would be to wet his hair, leave his hat off, and break off ...
— Love Letters of a Rookie to Julie • Barney Stone
... to an attire so whimsical and uncommon, however, a pair of small and richly-mounted pistols were at the stranger's girdle; and the haft, of a curiously-carved Asiatic dagger was seen projecting, rather ostentatiously, from between the folds of ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... Baroness was seated in a sea-green dressing-gown ornamented by many pretty devices in lace of priceless fabric, which had taken a coffee tint by reason of its age. A book was lying on her knees, and she was toying with an ivory paper-knife which had its haft in a silver embossed rhinoceros tooth. She nodded Paul to a chair which had evidently been placed ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... with the sword, and on the way he looked at the sword, and saw how noble was the blade and how shining, and how the pommel and haft were full of ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert
... dimensions, we have gradually increased its size, weight and strength and cutting qualities till now we shoot a head whose blade is three inches long, an inch and a quarter wide, a trifle less than a thirty-second thick. It has a haft or tubular shank an inch long. Its weight is half an ounce. The blades are made of spring steel. After annealing the steel we score it diagonally with a hack saw, when it may be broken in triangular pieces in a vise. With a cold chisel, an angular ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... charge thee throw my sword in that water, and come again, and tell me what thou there seest. My lord, said Bedivere, your commandment shall be done, and lightly bring you word again. So Sir Bedivere departed, and by the way he beheld that noble sword, that the pommel and haft were all of precious stones, and then he said to himself, If I throw this rich sword in the water, thereof shall never come good, but harm and loss. And then Sir Bedivere hid Excalibur under a tree. And as soon as he might he came again unto the king, and said he had been at the water, ...
— The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book • Various
... heart. O' course, I didn't have any weapon with me, except as you might call my axe one. I looked around fer it, and saw that it had fallen about three feet farther than I could stretch, and lay half buried in the snow, only the haft stickin' out. ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... twice in one night, it is useless to argue. I gave in at once. "Butter," I said, "placed upon the haft of the javelin, would make it slip, and put him off his shot. He would miss the Secretary and marry the niece." So we put a good deal of butter on Sir Arthur, and for the moment the Secretary is safe. I don't ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... came capering, but there was blood in my eyes and my knee hurt me, so when one of them stuck his spear almost up to the haft in my side, I tossed him. I took him up lightly on my tusks and he lay still at the far end of the ravine where I had dropped him. That stopped the shouting; but it broke out again suddenly, for the ...
— The Trail Book • Mary Austin et al
... minute. It was a strange enough performance. Half-seen hands snapped red fingers in triumph. Ponderously booted feet did a dance of ecstasy in three feet of gluey mud. And meanwhile, Kettle, with a hand on the haft of his knife, edged away from this uncanny demonstration, lest some one should slit his air-tube before he could ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... stood up, grasping his pole, thrust the point lightly into one of the tangled baulks, and pressed with his left hand against the haft. The right hand went up once more, the axe flashed and fell. A thud as the blade came down, ...
— The Song Of The Blood-Red Flower • Johannes Linnankoski
... had fired at the white man and then sprang forward to finish him with his tomahawk. Mrs. Pentry flew to the rescue and just as the savage lifted his arm to brain his foe, she drove her hunting knife to the haft ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... man in the first chariot, with dark and bushy hair; a purple cloak round him, and a golden pin therein; a hooded tunic with gold embroidery on him; and a round shield with an engraved edge of white metal, and a broad spear-head, with rings from point to haft(?), in his hand. A sword as long as the rudder of a boat on ...
— The Cattle-Raid of Cualnge (Tain Bo Cualnge) • Unknown
... with his towel last week sos everything would be neet for inspecshun. Angus got hold of it in the dark next mornin. Gee, youd haft ...
— Dere Mable - Love Letters Of A Rookie • Edward Streeter
... by a great and mighty sound; and I came instant to a possessing of my senses; and I knew that the mighty Voice of the Home-Call did go howling across the Night. And, swift and silent, I slid the cloak from about me, and took the haft of that ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson
... for all. Death shall be mine before dishonour. Rather than assist you in carrying out the least of your evil deeds I will give myself up to justice.' The robber's face grew as dark as a thundercloud, and a devilish light flashed in his eye. For a moment his hand rested upon the haft of his knife; but only for ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... more than thirty, with sandy hair and beard, and a pugnacious jaw, his coarse hickory shirt slashed into ribbons, a bullet wound in the center of his forehead, and one arm broken by a vicious blow. His calloused hands yet gripped the haft of an axe, just as ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... wanderings about the island, had found the skeleton. It was he that had rifled it; he had found the treasure; he had dug it up (it was the haft of his pickax that lay broken in the excavation); he had carried it on his back, in many weary journeys, from the foot of the tall pine to a cave he had on the two-pointed hill at the northeast angle of the island, and there it had lain stored in safety ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... in with the haft of the boat-hook, until he could stretch down and seize upon the collar of the man's coat. As the Irish lad was brawny and nerved just then to mighty deeds, he managed to hoist the fellow into ...
— Motor Boat Boys Down the Coast - or Through Storm and Stress to Florida • Louis Arundel
... both tongue & eares By carriage : thus doth mired Guy complaine, His Waggon on their letters beares Charles Waine, Charles Waine, to which they fay the tayle will reach And at this diftance they both heare, and teach. Now for the peace of God and men, advise (Thou that haft wherewithall to make us wise) Thine owne rich ftudies, and deepe Harriots mine, In which there is no drosse, but all refine, O tell us what to trust to, lest we wax All stiffe and tupid with his paralex ; Say, shall the old Philofophy be true ? Or ...
— Thomas Hariot • Henry Stevens
... bottle glued to his lips, the bottom elevated skyward. Lerumie lifted his right hand in signal to a woman in a canoe alongside. She bent swiftly for something that she tossed to Lerumie. It was a long-handled tomahawk, the head of it an ordinary shingler's hatchet, the haft of it, native-made, a black and polished piece of hard wood, inlaid in rude designs with mother-of-pearl and wrapped with coconut sennit to make a hand grip. The blade of the hatchet had ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... having warned his friends and companions in arms to keep on the alert, prepared for the enterprise, and guided by Aulad, hurried on till he came to the Haft-koh, or Seven Mountains. There he found numerous companies of Demons; and coming to one of the caverns, saw it crowded with the same awful beings. And now consulting with Aulad, he was informed that the most advantageous time for attack would ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... to prevent the PADI being choked by weeds. The women of each room will go over each patch completely at least twice, at an interval of about one month, hoeing down the weeds with a short-handled hoe; the hoe consists of a flat blade projecting at right angles from the iron haft (Fig. 13). The latter is bent downwards at a right angle just above the blade, in a plane perpendicular to that of the blade, and its other end is prolonged by a short wooden handle, into the end of which it is thrust. The woman stoops to the work, hoeing carefully round each PADI plant, ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... necessary to one engaged in his present pursuits. There was, however, a singular and wild display of prodigal and ill judged ornaments, blended with his motley attire. In place of the usual deer-skin belt, he wore around his body a tarnished silken sash of the most gaudy colours; the buck-horn haft of his knife was profusely decorated with plates of silver; the marten's fur of his cap was of a fineness and shadowing that a queen might covet; the buttons of his rude and soiled blanket-coat were of the glittering coinage of Mexico; the stock of his rifle was of beautiful mahogany, ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... hand came in contact with about two feet of the haft standing out of the thatch, and he began tugging at it to draw it forth. "Won't come, won't you? All right, then, go;" and catching hold of the bamboo staff with his left hand, he doubled his fist and turned his right into a mallet, thumping the butt, which readily yielded and went ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... the last of the Folwells made his sortie into the city that sheltered the last Harkness. The Colt was thrust beneath his coat and secured by a narrow leather belt; the hunting-knife hung between his shoulder-blades, with the haft an inch below his coat collar. He knew this much—that Cal Harkness drove an express wagon somewhere in that town, and that he, Sam Folwell, had come to kill him. And as he stepped upon the sidewalk the red came into his eye and the ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... broken sword All the long night through While I keep watch and ward! Then—the red fight through, Bless the wrenched haft for ...
— Collected Poems - Volume Two (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... latter is not known to have been hafted, and its working edges were at the pointed end; whereas in Neolithic times the implement had become an axe in the modern sense, with the pointed end inserted in a haft, and the cutting edge removed to the broader end. There are many other Neolithic types, used with or without a haft, and only a small proportion were ...
— How to Observe in Archaeology • Various
... helmet, and shining spear on the banks of the Boyne, slid into his room, and she placed beside his couch a silver helmet and a silver shield. And she rubbed the helmet, and the shield, and the blue blade and haft of his spear with the juice of the red rowan berries, and she let a drop fall upon his face and hands, and then she slid out ...
— The Golden Spears - And Other Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... vise may be applied to a number of uses, and among others it may be readily converted into a haft or handle for any kind of tailed or shanked tool, such as files, wrenches, olive bits, chisels, or screwdrivers, and may also serve as pincers or nippers. It is of very ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... stocke, in the other cleft, you shall place your other graft, with full as much care, diligence, and euery other obseruation: when both your grafts are thus orderly and arteficially placed, you shall then by setting the haft of your chissell against the stocke, with all lenitie and gentlenesse, draw forth your wedge, in such sort that you doe not displace or alter your grafts, and when your wedge is forth you shall then looke vpon your grafts, and if you perceiue that the stocke doe pinch or ...
— The English Husbandman • Gervase Markham
... thou comest there I charge thee throw my sword in that water and come again and tell me what there thou seest.' 'My lord,' said Bedivere, 'Your commandment shall be done; and lightly bring you word again.' So Sir Bedivere departed, and by the way he beheld that noble sword, that the pommel and the haft was all of precious stones, and then he said to himself, 'If I throw this rich sword in the water, thereof shall never come good, but harm and loss.' And then Sir Bedivere hid Excaliber under a tree. And so, as soon as ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... relenting; her face was whiter than usual and her look was strained. Getting angry, he drove the canoe down the lake with a curling wave at her bow, until the paddle snapped in a savage stroke and he flung the haft away. For a moment, he hoped Sadie would laugh, ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... these, too, had his head bent down in sleep. On a golden throne on the further side of the round table was a king of gigantic stature and august presence. In his hand, held below the hilt, was a mighty sword with scabbard and haft of gold studded with gleaming gems; on his head was a crown set with precious stones which flashed and glinted like so many points of fire. Sleep had set its seal ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... him. He had apparently not yet found his spectacles, but he had in the meanwhile come upon his axe, and now stood very straight, with the long haft reaching to ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... finger in each waistcoat pocket and showed her the butts of two derringers; and at the back of my neck—to her smiling amusement at our heathen fashion—I displayed just the tip of the haft of a short bowie-knife, which went into a leather case under the collar of my coat. And again I drew around the belt which I wore so that she could see the barrel of a good pistol, which had been suspended under cover of the ...
— 54-40 or Fight • Emerson Hough
... chambers. Having secured this haversack in position the diver next dons his body armour, and straps about his waist this belt, with its electric lamp and its dagger. The dagger, as you see, is double- bladed; it has a haft of insulating material, and the blades have connected to them this insulated wire at the point where the blades and the handle unite. You thus have a weapon which, on being plunged into the body of a foe, not only inflicts a severe wound, but also administers an electric ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... He turned his head a trifle in the direction from which the sound had come and then there broke from his lips, a low, weird call. One of the blacks guarding him struck him across the mouth with the haft of his spear; but none there knew the significance of ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... of the shining haft and the dark blue blade and the silver shield," said the Fairy. "They are on the farther bank of the Mystic Lake in the Island of the Western Seas. They are there for the man who is bold enough to seek them. If you are the man who will bring ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... of malice and partial council, examined and interrogate, Depones, That he was a servant to Michael Farquharson in Dubrach, in whose house Serjeant Davies quartered: That he saw the Serjeant have a little pen-knife, upon the end of the haft of which there was a seal for sealing of letters, and he heard the Serjeant say that was the use he made of the said seal: That he saw Serjeant Davies leave his master's house about sun-rising that day upon which he was amissing; that he never saw him since: That about two years ...
— Trial of Duncan Terig, alias Clerk, and Alexander Bane Macdonald • Sir Walter Scott
... to the ground with the packing it had contained, and then with an oath Vasilici drew himself to his full height, one hand upon the haft of his knife in ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... icke oenskvaerd, ehuru densamma vanligen boerjar vid omkring tretton intill femton ars alder; emellertid beror dervid mycket pa flickans kroppsbyggnad. Om hon natt denna alder och aennu icke haft rening, boer modren faesta saerskild uppmaerksamhet dervid; hennes dotter blir antagligen mager och blek, med en egendomlig gulblek hy och hon blir ett saekert och laett offer foer lungsot och nervoes nedslagenhet. ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham
... and telling them that one contained a sword and the other a bullock-goad, asked them to select one and by their choice to determine whether they would be soldiers or husbandmen. From one sheath a haft of gold projected and from the other one of silver. The Agharias pulled out the golden haft and found that they had chosen the goad. The point of the golden and silver handles is obvious, and the story is of some interest for the distant resemblance which it bears ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell
... Near the child's heart lay a knife: Point be up, and haft be down (While she gossips in the town); This, 'mongst other mystic charms, Keeps the sleeping ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... tricks with a knife 6 1/2 inches long, a country lad of Saxony swallowed it, point first. He came under the care of Weserern, physician to the Elector of Brandenburgh, who successfully extracted it, two years and seven months afterward, from the pit of the lad's stomach. The horn haft of the knife was considerably digested. In 1720 Hubner of Rastembourg operated on a woman who had swallowed an open knife. After the incision it was found that the knife had almost pierced the stomach and had excited a slight suppuration. ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... another highly unpopular fatigue. First of all you produce your portable entrenching-tool—it looks like a combination of a modern tack-hammer and a medieval back-scratcher—and fit it to its haft. Then you lie flat upon your face on the wet grass, and having scratched up some small lumps of turf, proceed to build these into a parapet. Into the hole formed by the excavation of the turf you then put your head, and in this ostrich-like posture await further instructions. ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay
... his broidered vest, And there, like slumbering serpent's crest, The jeweled haft of poniard bright Glittered a moment on the sight. "Ha! start ye back! Fool! coward! knave! Think ye my noble father's glaive Would drink the life-blood of a slave? The pearls that on the handle flame Would blush to rubies in their shame; The blade would quiver in thy breast, Ashamed of such ignoble ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... by themselves. The spears and campilans are said to be finely tempered. They themselves adjust the dies for their pataquias. The sheaths, like the hafts of their krises, are of gold richly engraved. The haft of the kris used by Dato Ayuman of Tabiran was of solid gold, and was engraved with sentences from the Koran in Arabic characters. The usual weapons are: campilans, krises (straight and wavy), machetes, bolos, ligdaos, sundanes, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... forge. Throwing off his jerkin, he rolled up his sleeves, and seizing the axe on which he had been engaged when Hilda interrupted him, he wrought so vigorously at the stubborn metal with the great forehammer that in the course of half an hour it was ready to fit on the haft. There was a bundle of hafts in a corner of the workshop. One of these, a tough thick one without knot or flaw, and about five feet long, he fitted to the iron head with great neatness and skill. The polishing of this formidable ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... wound. He silently assisted the Prince in lifting Richard to the cushions of the couch, and the low groan convinced them that he lived: looked anxiously for the wound. The dagger had gone deep between the ribs, and little but the haft could be seen. ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... "Upon this haft stands the assassin's natal autograph, written in the blood of that helpless and unoffending old man who loved you and whom you all loved. There is but one man in the whole earth whose hand can duplicate that crimson sign"—he paused and raised ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... cried he whom they addressed as Allen. 'Jack Cade will be right glad of such a recruit. Blood and carrion! but thou hast the thews of a young ox; and I swear, by the haft of my sword, that it might have gone ill with some of us hadst thou not listened ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... peak behind his head. In his hands he held a goad of polished red-yew, furnished with a crooked hand-grip of gold, and pointed with shining bronze, and where the bronze met the timber there was a circlet of diamond of the diamonds of Banba. He had also a short-handled scourge with a haft of walrus tooth, and the rope, cord, and lash of that scourge were made of delicate and delicately-twisted thread of copper. This equipment was the equipment of a proved charioteer; the apprentices wore only grey capes with white fringes, ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... by the stern shone like a dump of fluid silver. In the hold there were tramplings and rumblings where Disko Troop and Tom Platt moved among the salt-bins. Dan passed Harvey a pitchfork, and led him to the inboard end of the rough table, where Uncle Salters was drumming impatiently with a knife-haft. A tub of salt ...
— "Captains Courageous" • Rudyard Kipling
... bronzed chest showing between the white facings of an open infantry tunic. His nether limbs encased in a pair of dragoon overalls, with vivid green patches on the knees. Was there ever such a picture of savage good nature and childishness as the giant Willem swung the great bamboo haft of his whip above his head, and chided or exhorted his team straining in the drift! "Come up, Buller," to a favourite ass. "Kruger, you scellum," to a refractory lead, while the great thong cracked like a pistol ...
— On the Heels of De Wet • The Intelligence Officer
... the trunk of a tree, in unpleasant proximity to a large fire. Little by little his memory returned, and he remembered clearly everything that had taken place, up to the time when the enclosure had been rushed by the Formosan savages, and he himself had fallen unconscious from the blow of a spear haft across his head. What, he wondered, had become of poor Drake? He had not set eyes on him during the whole of that brief scuffle, and he began to fear the worst ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... in the place of the Lord, And asks for the gifts of the time; Gold, for the haft of a sword To win back Romagna averse, Incense, to sweeten a crime, And myrrh, to embitter ...
— The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... knife lying, which had fallen from some man's belt. A thought of desperate joy came into his mind. He bent himself down with his bound hands, and he contrived to gather up the knife. Then, very swiftly and deftly, he thrust the haft between his knees; then he worked the rope that bound his hands to and fro over the blade; the rope parted, and the blood came back into his numbed fingers with a terrible pain. But David heeded it not, and stooping down, he cut the cord that bound his feet; then he rose softly, and sate down ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... frightened did not seem to enter his calculations. He moved with cat-like stealth to the foot of the tiny staircase, and flattened himself against the wall. Then he stretched his left arm once or twice as if to make sure of it, licked the haft of the ...
— The Lowest Rung - Together with The Hand on the Latch, St. Luke's Summer and The Understudy • Mary Cholmondeley
... to speak again' it," said Dolly, rather startled by Silas's knowledge on this head; "but you see I'm no scholard, and I'm slow at catching the words. My husband says I'm allays like as if I was putting the haft for the handle—that's what he says—for he's very sharp, God help him. But it was awk'ard calling your little sister by such a hard name, when you'd got nothing big to say, ...
— Silas Marner - The Weaver of Raveloe • George Eliot
... the ankle. Then he thrust his knife between the improvised rope and the leg, forming a crude tourniquet. He twisted the knife until tears of pain formed in his eyes. Then he fastened the knife by tucking the haft under the rope. His movements had been very deliberate, but sure, and in a few minutes he hobbled to his pony ...
— The Two-Gun Man • Charles Alden Seltzer
... end to the hilt; the hilt two large live serpents twined together, with eyes like sombre jewels, and sparkling spotted skins, points of fire in their folds, and reflections of the emerald and topaz and ruby stones, studded in the blood-stained haft. Then the seven young men, sons of Aklis, said to Shibli Bagarag, 'Surrender the Lily!' And when he had given into their hands the Lily, they said, 'Grasp the handle ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the bo'sun placed his hand over the poor lad's heart; but there was no movement, though the body was still warm. Immediately upon that, he rose to his feet, a look of vast wrath upon his great face. He plucked his torch from the ground, into which he had plunged the haft, and stared round into the silence of the valley; but there was no living thing in sight, nothing save the giant fungi and the strange shadows cast by our great ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... lasses. When you whistled to let me know it was time, I crept out with a stool I had provided; I put it up against the wall, and mounted upon it; with my six feet, that made nine, and I could lean my elbows on the window-ledge; I took the shutter in one hand, and the haft of my knife in the other, and, whilst I broke two of the panes, I pushed the shutter ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... of the finest Saracen steel work, the haft inlaid with gold. Inside it the knight wished to conceal some jewels of no very great value, in a hollow made for the purpose and opened by twisting a round boss on the hilt. This was often done by travelers, since a man's dagger was his companion day and night, and in case of disaster ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey
... who had removed his armor had not been foolish enough to remove his weapons too; no sane man did that in hostile territory. His hand went to the haft of the ...
— Despoilers of the Golden Empire • Gordon Randall Garrett
... Boulton) is produced by beating together steel and iron wire whilst in a state of half fusion, and eating them with acids, by which the softest part is the most corroded; the edges being of pure steel. Their temper is uncommonly hard. The head or haft is either of ivory, the tooth of the duyong (sea-cow), that of the hippopotamus, the snout of the ikan layer (voilier), of black coral, or of fine-grained wood. This is ornamented with gold or a mixture of that and copper, which they call swasa, highly polished and carved into ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... O. Pettersson, "Climatic Variations in Historic and Prehistoric Times." Svenska Hydrogrifisk—Biologiska Kommissioneur Skrifter, Haft ...
— The Red Man's Continent - A Chronicle of Aboriginal America, Volume 1 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Ellsworth Huntington
... him, and so I would not go to see what he was about. But what I did was this: the arms-room was next door: I lighted a candle, entered it, and swiftly armed myself with a sort of dagger, a kind of boarding-knife, a very murderous little two-edged sword, the blade about seven inches long, and the haft of brass. There were some fifty of these weapons, and I took the first that came to my hand and dropped it into the deep side pocket of my coat and returned to the cook-room. It was not that I was afraid of going unarmed with this man into the hold: there was no ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell
... as keenly as he did, and he would have hated to lose her good opinion. She consulted him in all her little difficulties. If the leg of the kitchen table got wobbly, she knew he would put in new screws for her. When she broke a handle off her rolling pin, he put on another, and he fitted a haft to her favourite butcher-knife after every one else said it must be thrown away. These objects, after they had been mended, acquired a new value in her eyes, and she liked to work with them. When Claude helped her lift or carry anything, ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... less did it break, so light was his tread.) Teithi Hen the son of Gwynhan (his dominions were swallowed by the sea, and he himself barely escaped, and he came to Arthur; and his knife had this peculiarity: from the time he came there no haft would ever remain on it; and owing to this a sickness came on him, and he pined away during the remainder of his life, and of this he died.) Drem the son of Dremidyd (when the gnat arose in the morning with the sun, Drem could see it from Gelli Wis ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... impartially distributed from Cottonwood north, the squares marked J.H. Fyfe lay in a solid block about Cougar Bay,—save for that long tongue of a limit where she had that day noted the new camp. That thrust like the haft of a spear into the heart of ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... pointed with a walrus tooth, is used in the body of a seal, but the iron-pointed one is needed when the animal's head alone is above the water or the ice. Both are cleverly put together with wood, bone, and thongs, so arranged that when necessary head and haft easily ...
— With the Harmony to Labrador - Notes Of A Visit To The Moravian Mission Stations On The North-East - Coast Of Labrador • Benjamin La Trobe
... bear out the physiological conventionalism that gradations of birth, gentle or mean, show themselves primarily in the form of this member. Nothing but a cast of the die of destiny had decided that the girl should handle the tool; and the fingers which clasped the heavy ash haft might have skilfully guided the pencil or swept the string, had they only been set to do it in ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... King's Oak into billets to heat a brown baker's oven; and we will dispark your park, and slay your deer, and eat them ourselves, neither shall you have any portion thereof, whether in neck or haunch. Ye shall not haft a ten-penny knife with the horns thereof, neither shall ye cut a pair of breeches out of the hide, for all ye be cutlers and glovers; and ye shall have no comfort or support neither from the sequestered traitor Henry Lee, who called himself Ranger of Woodstock, nor from any on his behalf; for ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... know it, O King, who have often held it in my hand. The end of the haft is gnawed, for when he was angry the Black One used to bite it. Also a thumb's length from the blade is a black mark made with hot iron. Once the Black One made a bet with one of his captains that at a distance of ten paces he would throw the spear deeper into the body of ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... soon make a good voyageur," Thirlwell remarked. "For one thing, you're determined; I saw you wince once or twice and imagine the paddle-haft hurt." ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... swiftly, and took the spear that she had shot through his buckler, and threw it back again with a great force. He thought, "I will not slay so fair a maiden," and he turned the spear, and hurled it wit the haft loud against her harness. From her mail, also, the sparks flew as on the wind, for Siegmund's child threw mightily; and her strength failed before the blow. King Gunther, I ween, had ...
— The Fall of the Niebelungs • Unknown
... the net, coiling its folds into one hand, taking the good spear in his other. A bush stirred ahead, against the pull of the light breeze. Rynch froze, then the haft of his spear slid into a new hand grip, the coils of his net spun out. A snarl cut over ...
— Star Hunter • Andre Alice Norton
... growing chary of those long blades of steel that hewed through shield and spear-haft as though ...
— Across the Spanish Main - A Tale of the Sea in the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... had given it to Fred Munson when he was left alone with the mustang. So, as he had nothing but his knife, he placed his hand upon the haft, glaring defiantly at his enemies, while he continued walking slowly backward, and gradually edging toward the side of the grove. But Apaches were plenty in that latitude, and the business had scarcely opened ...
— The Cave in the Mountain • Lieut. R. H. Jayne
... as he watched Ennar's hand go to the haft of the ax. Nothing had been said about Ennar's not using his weapons in defense, but Ross discovered that there was some sense of sportmanship in the tribesmen, after all. It was Tulka who pushed to the chief's side and said something which made Foscar roar bull-voiced ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton
... lonely wanderings about the island, had found the skeleton—it was he that had rifled it; he had found the treasure; he had dug it up (it was the haft of his pick-axe that lay broken in the excavation); he had carried it on his back, in many weary journeys, from the foot of the tall pine to a cave he had on the two-pointed hill at the north-east angle of the island, and there it had lain stored in safety since two months before the arrival ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... been filled with high contemplations, went mad like common bravos at the sight of plunder. No man thought of the greater treasure which these gold things warded. We laughed and cried like children, and tore at the plated dead.... I mind how I wrenched off one jewelled face with the haft of my dagger, and a thin trickle of bones fell inside.... And yet, as we ravened and plundered we would fall into fits of shivering, for the thing was not of this world. Often a man would stop and fall to weeping. But the lust of gold consumed ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... up the axe and closely examined this formidable weapon. It was, as I have said, of the nature of a pole-axe. The haft, made out of an enormous rhinoceros horn, was three feet three inches long, about an inch and a quarter thick, and with a knob at the end as large as a Maltese orange, left there to prevent the hand from slipping. This horn haft, though so massive, was as flexible as cane, and practically unbreakable; ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard
... Jade, Weser, and Elbe split up the sands into two main groups. The westernmost of these is symmetrical in outline, an acute-angled triangle, very like a sharp steel-shod pike, if you imagine the peninsula from which it springs to be the wooden haft. The other is a huge congeries of banks, its base resting on the Hanover coast, two of its sides tolerably clean and even, and the third, that facing the north-west, ribboned and lacerated by the fury of the sea, which has eaten out deep cavities and struck hungry tentacles far into the interior. ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... containing bullets and patches, nipple wrench and turn-screw, a bit of dry tow, an oiled rag, and all the indispensables for rifle cleaning; while into it were thrust two knives—one a broad two-edged implement, with a stout buck-horn haft, and a blade of at least twelve inches—the other a much smaller weapon, not being, hilt and all, half the length of the other's blade, but very strong, sharp as a razor, and of surpassing temper. While he was fitting all these in ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... knife from a sheath at his belt. It had a long, bright blade. Joan had seen him use it many a time round the camp-fire. He slipped the blade up his sleeve, retaining the haft of the knife in his hand. He did not speak another word. Nor did he glance at Joan again. She had felt his gaze while she had embraced him, as she raised her lips. That look had been his last. Then he went out. Jim knelt beside the door, peering between ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... the injury of the ancient tree of Judaism will recoil ineffectual, unless her sons and adherents themselves furnish the haft. There is consolation in the thought. Even in sad days it feeds the hope that the time will come, whereof the prophet spoke, when "all thy children shall be disciples of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles
... be the plaything of fate," he exclaimed, after he had tried in vain to recall Atli's directions; "let fate decide, life is but made up of the castings of a die," and with that he threw his dagger into the air, crying, "Point right, haft left!" It landed on its point and sunk almost out of sight in the snow. "Right let it be then," he said, and turned down the ...
— Vandrad the Viking - The Feud and the Spell • J. Storer Clouston
... trembled in his grasp with an almost irresistible impulse. He could hardly restrain himself, as he heard those horrible, incredible words, and saw the loathsome smirk on the speaker's face by which they were accompanied, from leaping then and there at the savage's throat, and plunging his blade to the haft into the vile creature's body. But by a violent effort he mastered his indignation and wrath for the present. Planting himself full in front of Tu-Kila-Kila, and blocking the way to the door of that sacred English girl's hut—oh, how horrible it was to him ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... he muttered. "What is the use of this? Where is he?" And his bloodshot eyes—it was Tuez-les-Moines—questioned the doors, while his hand, trembling and shaking on the haft of his knife, bespoke his eagerness. "Where is he? Where ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... to answer him, a spear haft rang on the great teak double door. There was a pause, and the clang repeated—another pause—a third reverberating, humming metal notice of an interruption, and the doors swung wide. A Hindoo, salaaming low so that the expression ...
— Rung Ho! • Talbot Mundy |
