"Musket" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... death of Colonel Phelypeaux, who died of fever brought on by want of rest and exposure to the sun. On the same day another, and almost as serious a loss, was sustained, for Captain Wilmot was killed by a musket shot while in the act of mounting a gun in ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... was the first gendarme still there, but the young man now perceived a second yellow, blue, and white uniform at the foot of the staircase, the only one by which he could descend, while a third, on horseback, holding a musket in his fist, was posted as a sentinel at the great street door which alone afforded the means ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... is what I cut out of it,'—and he handed the Governor a little round stone, as big and almost as regular as a musket-ball. ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... million. Adapted to the weakness of human nature, which receives with rivirince ideas however childish, that come draped in long-tailed and exotic words, that aasimine polysyllable has riconciled the modern mind to the chimeras of th' ancients, and outbutchered the guillotine, the musket, and the sword: ay, and but ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... some disused fencing. The stockade had loopholes in it, and above the top she could see a fluttering flag and the point of a tent. Jack was perched up on a kind of look-out, and Guy was pacing solemnly before the covered entrance with a musket of very mild ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... his good nature has laid under obligations to him, is one LeFevre, a lieutenant in Angus's; but he knows me not,' said he a second time, musing. 'Possibly, he may my story,' added he; 'pray tell the captain I was the ensign at Breda whose wife was most unfortunately killed with a musket-shot, as she lay in my arms in my tent.' 'I remember the story, an't please your honor,' said I, very well.' 'Do you so?' said he, wiping his eyes with his handkerchief; 'then well may I.' In saying this, he drew a little ring out of his bosom, which seemed tied with a ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... smoke; the roar of cannonry deafens us. Dazed, we crouch behind an earthwork while the enemy creeps through the smoke. Suddenly they charge. We fire, but they surge on through the smoke. They mount the earthwork. We leap together! Men scream hoarsely! Musket butts crash! Daggers plunge into quivering flesh! ...
— Prize Orations of the Intercollegiate Peace Association • Intercollegiate Peace Association
... himself the glory of a crow when the bullet came into his neighborhood. He replied to every volley with an elevated comb, and a flapping of his wings, and a clarion peal, which rang along the foreshore ere the musket roar died out. But before the girl had time to ponder what it was, or wherefore, round the corner came somebody, running ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... vigour of its life, it is flying down a steep gradient at the rate of 50 miles an hour, backed up by, say, 30 passenger carriages, each weighing on an average 5.5 tons? If ordinary houses could suddenly be placed in its path, it would, passengers and all, run through them as a musket-ball goes through a keg of butter; but what would be the result if, at this full speed, the engine by any accident were to be diverted against a mass of solid rock, such as sometimes is to be seen at the entrance of a tunnel, it is impossible to calculate or even to conjecture. It is stated ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... within easy shot now, and I stopped to make sure of my rickety old weapon. A dragoon's musket would not have needed such constant care. "Life turns on trifles," said ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... as it's much to tell," said that gentleman, somewhat crestfallen. "This here old musket of mine is the hardest shooting gun in our country. I've kilt me a goose with it many a time, at a hundred yards. She's a Harper's Ferry musket that done good service in the Civil War. She's been hanging in my room, loaded, for three or four ...
— Maw's Vacation - The Story of a Human Being in the Yellowstone • Emerson Hough
... us," cried the latter, "we are discovered," In the movement of speech he was turning to Archdale, preparatory to dropping measuring eyes upon the musket, ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 6 • Various
... could not be called the same Temple with that of the Captivity, except under an abuse of ideas as to matter and form, of which all nations have furnished illustrations, from the ship Argo to that of old Drake, from Sir John Cutler's stockings to the Highlander's (or Irishman's) musket. ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... us go with them to see the hunt. Only Mr. Wopsle cared to go, and then Joe said he would take me. To this Mrs. Joe merely remarked: "If you bring the boy back, with his head blown to bits with a musket, don't look to me to put it ...
— Ten Boys from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... ventured out of the shelter of the ravelin to ascertain the cause; he, safe and untouched during that long afternoon of carnage, fell now, under a stray musket-shot, and lay helpless and exposed upon the ground undiscerned by his men, who were recalled to help in the hot reception which had been planned for the French; who, descending the city walls into the Pacha's garden, ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. III • Elizabeth Gaskell
... courser bold, My bantling in my rear, And in my hand my musket hold - O how they quake ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... early in the nineteenth century, and even to this hour, that cry of "Haro! Haro! a l'aide mon prince, on me fait tort!" preserves the custom of Normandy, and of Rollo the Dane, in Jersey, so that the sound of it "makes the workman drop his tools, the woman her knitting, the militiaman his musket, the fisherman his net, the schoolmaster his birch, and the ecrivain his babble, to await the judgment of ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... thought, an ideal, which has led to an entirely new line of action. It will not be easy to maintain. Some never moved from their old positions, some are constantly slipping back to the old ways of thought and the old action of seizing a musket and relying on force. America has taken the lead in this new direction, and that lead America must continue to hold. If we expect others to rely on our fairness and justice we must show that we rely on their ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various
... history or fiction. As for his being merely of tin, I entirely forget it, except when I realize against what odds he fights, or when I stop to admire the wonderful way Andersen carries out his simile of the old tin spoon—the stiffness of the musket, ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... our Guard this day, let every man Beare a charg'd Pistoll hid; and at a watch-word Given by a Musket, when our selfe sees Time, Rush in; and if Medina's Faction wrastle Against your forces, kill; but ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... man—a villainous-looking rascal, with shaven head and scalping lock—favoured us with a graphic mimicry of a fight, showing the methods in his day. He took the handjar between his teeth and a musket in his hands, yelling and scowling fearfully; then, the last cartridge fired or the moment for hand-to-hand combat arrived, the rifle was thrown away, and brandishing the handjar in the air, he darted towards us. It was a most realistic performance, and made us feel thankful ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... native sword only, but the soldier, in addition to his sword, was on one occasion, as we have seen, armed with the relics of a revolver that would not revolve. On May 10th, for the first time, the soldier detailed to accompany me was provided with a rusty old musket with a very long barrel. I examined this weapon with much curiosity. China is our neighbour in Eastern Asia, and is, it is often stated, an ideal power to be intrusted with the government of the buffer state called for ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... pardon me, sir, I don't think it was. The Indians have to fight in their own way, and the Kentucky riflemen are the best in the world. Why, sir, the things they can do with their rifles are amazing. A musket is like an old-fashioned arquebus compared with their long-barreled weapons. I know one of them—and I must say it, though I hate him—who could kill running deer at two hundred yards, as fast as you could hand him the rifles, never ...
— The Keepers of the Trail - A Story of the Great Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... Notwithstanding the reports of deserters and others, he showed much anxiety to determine the exact strength of the Irish. After examining the position for some time from a height, he rode down towards the river, accompanied by several of his officers. When within musket shot of the bank, near the ford and village of Old Bridge, he perceived that a small island in the Boyne was occupied by a party of the Irish horse. Near the ford some field works had been thrown up. It was at this point that the king determined to cross the river, and he spent some time ...
— Orange and Green - A Tale of the Boyne and Limerick • G. A. Henty
... Canada passed an Act appointing commissioners to inquire into the amount of damage done to the property of loyal citizens; and in the following year it voted a sum of L4000 to make good the losses. Men were paid for a cow driven off, or for an old musket commandeered. The Special Council of Lower Canada made similar provision, as was only natural and right; but its task was much harder than that of the Assembly's. Clearly, the property of loyalists destroyed or injured during the civil ...
— The Winning of Popular Government - A Chronicle of the Union of 1841 • Archibald Macmechan
... came a mighty splather amid the weed, and they seemed unable to gather in any of the slack, and then, after a certain pause, I saw the man in the look-out point something, and immediately afterwards there belched out in front of him a little puff of smoke, and, presently, I caught the report of a musket, so that I knew that he was firing at something in the weed. He fired again, and yet once more, and after that they were able to haul in upon the line, and so I perceived that his fire had proved effectual; yet we had no knowledge ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... FEJEVARY has a lean, distinguished face, his dark eyes are penetrating and rather wistful. The left sleeve of his old uniform is empty. SILAS MORTON is a strong man who has borne the burden of the land, and not for himself alone—the pioneer. Seeing the stranger, he sets his musket against the wall and holds out his hand to him, as MR FEJEVARY goes up ...
— Plays • Susan Glaspell
... the bleating of the flock, And the twitter of birds among the trees, And felt the breath of the morning-breeze Blowing over the meadows brown. And one was safe and asleep in his bed Who at the bridge would be first to fall, Who that day would be lying dead, Pierced by a British musket-ball. ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... maintenance of his old station off Brest, and says, "For God's sake, if you should be so lucky as to get sight of the enemy, get as close to them as possible. Do not let them shuffle with you by engaging at a distance, but get within musket shot if you can. This will be the means to make the action decisive." In these words we find an unbroken chain of tradition between Hawke and Nelson. One of Hawke's pupils was William Locker; and Locker in turn, just before Hawke's death, had Nelson for a lieutenant. To him Nelson in after ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... sir," the boy said in some confusion. "I was only saying what our soldiers think, and it is natural that I, being only a boy, should make him my hero, for he went to the wars when he was a year younger than I am, and at fourteen carried a musket as a volunteer under Maurice of Nassau, and for five years he was in all the battles in Holland, and raised the first battery that opened ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty
... power of imagination and a knowledge of language hardly to be expected in a boy of Frank's age. On the top of the case, at either end, stand the busts of Clay and Webster, and between them are two relics of Revolutionary times, a sword and musket crossed, with the words "Bunker Hill" printed on a slip of paper fastened to them. On the opposite side of the room stands a bureau, the drawers of which are filled with clothing, and on the top are placed two beautiful specimens ...
— Frank, the Young Naturalist • Harry Castlemon
... to the word; he heard speeches, and undoubtedly in all sincerity read his own thoughts into them. He thought the millennium was at hand. When the fighting began he joined the revolutionists; though I can nowhere find proof that he shouldered a musket. Had he done so it is extremely probable he would have shot the man behind him. It is hard to get at the truth about these days of May. Perhaps he did help to escort supplies; but with his excitable brain we must remember that what he thought he saw and what he actually did see may be two ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... was with Dean Harry Kellar when the latter made his famous trip around the world in 1877. Look combined fire-eating and sword-swallowing in a rather startling manner. His best effect was the swallowing of a red-hot sword.[1] Another thriller consisted in fastening a long sword to the stock of a musket; when he had swallowed about half the length of the blade, he discharged the gun and the recoil drove the sword suddenly down his throat to the very hilt. Although Look always appeared in a Chinese make-up, Dean Kellar told me ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini
... on equal terms, the weapons of all being the bow and arrow, the tomahawk, the knife, and the war-club. But now the Iroquois had firearms, procured from the Dutch of the Hudson, and were skilled in the use of the musket, which gave them a great advantage over their Huron ...
— The Jesuit Missions: - A Chronicle of the Cross in the Wilderness • Thomas Guthrie Marquis
... at Ilha Grande, our destination, on the 7th day of January, 1887, and came to anchor in nine fathoms of water, at about noon, within musket-range of the guard-ship, and within speaking distance of several vessels riding quarantine, with more or less communication going on among them all, through flags. Several ships, chafing under the restraint of quarantine, were "firing signals" at the guard-ship. One Scandinavian, I remember, ...
— Voyage of the Liberdade • Captain Joshua Slocum
... life-guards too, had it not been for some regiments upon the right, who marched up boldly to their relief, and received the enemy's fire in their faces, before any one of their own platoons discharged a musket,—they'll go to heaven for it,—added Trim.—Trim is right, said my uncle Toby, nodding to Yorick,—he's perfectly right. What signified his marching the horse, continued the corporal, where the ground was so strait, that the French had such a nation of ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... there's pirates about, they might do a'most as they likes wi' us, for I don't think there are three cutlasses aboard, and ne'er a musket as I can see, and only powder enough to fire off that little popgun there ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson
... new invaders with the shovel and musket, he perceives at a few paces' distance Marimonda, sorrowful and drooping, perched on the strong branch of a sapota-tree. By her piteous and chilly appearance, her tangled and wet hair, he doubts not but she has passed the whole night exposed ...
— The Solitary of Juan Fernandez, or The Real Robinson Crusoe • Joseph Xavier Saintine
... Buckingham's great Masque, by a false step, he strained a vein in the inside of his leg, which ever after occasioned him to halt. He afterwards taught dancing to the sisters of Sir Ralph Hopton, at Wytham in Somersetshire, where, at leisure, he learned to handle the pike and musket. When Thomas earl of Strafford became Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, he was retained in his family to teach the art of dancing, and being an excellent penman, he was frequently employed by the earl to transcribe ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber
... country by wagon, where trains were forbidden to stop, and another mile or so over the trestles of St. Mary's on a dirt car with the workmen, brought us into camp as the evening fires were lighted and the bugle sounded supper. The genial surgeon in charge, Dr. Hutton, who carried a knapsack and musket in an Illinois regiment in '62, met us cordially and extended every possible hospitality. Soon there filed past us to supper the tall doctor and his little flock; some light and fair-skinned, with the easy step ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton
... shot! The outpost stood a hundred yards to the left of him reloading. A black head started up behind a curve of rising ground, a bullet whizzed by, and the man with the musket fell in ...
— The Tysons - (Mr. and Mrs. Nevill Tyson) • May Sinclair
... of flanking, or preventing a flank fire from the enemy in the event of his appearing on the opposite side of the river. The enemy in the meantime advanced with steadiness in open column of sections to within musket shot, when Lieutenant-Colonel De Salaberry discharged his rifle as signal to commence firing, at which a mounted officer was seen to fall. The bugles sounded, and a quick fire was immediately opened upon the enemy who wheeled up ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... in the street had been occasioned by the frantic behavior of a man with a musket. He had fired it among a crowd of women and children. It proved, however, to have been without ball, and the fellow was suffered to go his way as a lunatic or a drunkard. When he had gone, D—— came from the window, whither I had followed him immediately ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... them all; a brave little soul and honest; they respected her as if she were one of their own children, or one of their own sisters, and Nernia coming through the starlight, with an old musket slung at her back, which Adone had taught her to use, and her small, bronzed feet leaping over the ground like a young goat's, was a figure which soon became familiar and welcome to the people. She seemed to them like a harbinger of ...
— The Waters of Edera • Louise de la Rame, a.k.a. Ouida
... musket. We made the turn as the bear was bounding away from the well-licked pitcher ...
— Some Three Hundred Years Ago • Edith Gilman Brewster
... name I listed under was that of James Moriarty. One name is as good as another when you are going to the wars; and no name is, perchance, the best of any. As James Moriarty, after perfecting myself in musket-drill, and the pike-exercise, in our winter quarters at Dunkirk, I was entered in the Gardes Francais, a portion of the renowned Maison du Roy, or Household Troops, and as such went through the second Rhenish campaign, taking my share, and a liberal one too, in killing my fellow-Christians, burning ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... stand for some time casting lamb's-eyes at the object of his affections—to the amorous audacity of the full-grown sheep he never soared—then suddenly, without the slightest provocation, he would discharge at her a compliment, elaborate, long-winded, Grandisonian, as a raw recruit fires his musket, shutting his eyes, and incontinently take to flight, without waiting to see the effect of his shot. If he had spent half the time and pains on his sermons that he did on his small-talk (I believe he used to write out three or four foul copies of each sentence previously at home), what a boon it ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... wife away, telling her that he would take care of the house. The firing was near by, over Seminary Ridge. Soon a wounded soldier came into the town and stopped at an old house on the opposite corner. Burns saw the poor fellow lay down his musket, and the inspiration to go into the battle seems then first to have seized him. He went ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... town. It had already a local history when, a hundred years ago, the larger current of human affairs flowed for a moment around it. Concord has the honour of being the first spot in which blood was shed in the war of the Revolution; here occurred the first exchange of musket-shots between the King's troops and the American insurgents. Here, as Emerson says in the little hymn which he contributed in 1836 to the dedication of a ...
— Hawthorne - (English Men of Letters Series) • Henry James, Junr.
... "manes of July!" (the phrase is pretty and grammatical) why did you with sharp bullets break those Louvre windows? Why did you bayonet red-coated Swiss behind that fair white facade, and, braving cannon, musket, sabre, perspective guillotine, burst yonder bronze gates, rush through that peaceful picture-gallery, and hurl royalty, loyalty, and a thousand years of Kings, head-over-heels out ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... organized bands of mercenaries, would suffer from these novel means of destruction, which did their work at a distance; and there were Condottieri who opposed to the utmost the introduction at least of the musket, which had lately been invented in Germany. We read that Paolo Vitelli, while recognizing and himself adopting the cannon, put out the eyes and cut off the hands of the captured 'schioppettieri' (arquebusiers) because he held it unworthy that a gallant, and it might ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... out. For an instant there was perfect silence; then, as the flame caught and flared, there rose from the men around him a low, involuntary "A—h," such as one may sometimes hear at Lord's when a dangerous wicket goes down. Then in the distance two musket shots rang out, and after them a few more; but along the cantonment wall all was silent; men stood with beating hearts awaiting the onslaught. For some minutes the suspense lasted, and then suddenly burst from the darkness a wild storm of ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... the musket, he is about to execute summary justice, as emperors are in the habit of doing, when something in the face of the weary sentinel appears to touch him. And well it might, for a most engaging little warrior was Jack as he lay with his shako ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... at Stillman's Defeat, but I was about as near it as Cass to Hull's surrender; and like him I saw the place very soon afterward. It is quite certain I did not break my sword, for I had none to break, but I bent my musket pretty badly on one occasion. * * * If General Cass went in advance of me in picking whortleberries, I guess I surpassed him in charges upon the wild onion. If he saw any live, fighting Indians, it is more than I did, but I had a good many bloody ...
— A Cousin's Conspiracy - A Boy's Struggle for an Inheritance • Horatio Alger
... to the knee, confined round the waist by belts profusely decorated with strips of leopard skin and tiny brass bells which tinkled musically as they moved. In their belts they carried several knives, while the musket and the little round cap of pangolin ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... little memoir, still unpublished, about his Highland wanderings. In this he says that he was 'led off the field by those about him,' when the clans broke at Culloden. 'The Prince then changed his horse, his own having been wounded by a musket-ball in the shoulder.' {20a} ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... I fell, wounded, I couldna say where at the time. When I came to myself and, finding that all was quiet, sat up and felt myself over, I found that it was a musket bullet that had ploughed along the top of my head, and would ha' killed me had it not been that my skull was, as my father had often said when I was a boy, thicker than ordinary. There were dead men lying all about me; but it was a dark night, and as there was no time to be lost if ...
— With Frederick the Great - A Story of the Seven Years' War • G. A. Henty
... sit in that other room until the office is closed for to-day, and then you will be led over to the Navy-yard and put into a uniform, and from that time on for three years you will have a number, the same number as the one on your musket. You and the musket will both belong to the government. You will clean and load the musket, and fight with it if God ever gives us the chance; and the government will feed you and keep you clean, and fight with you ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis
... through his mind, and then he saw the bright blade swiftly descending. It was met, however, by the coxswain, who seeing the danger of his officer, interposed his own sword, and turned the rebel's weapon aside. Frank was on his feet again in an instant, and seeing a musket, with a bayonet attached, standing in the corner, he seized it with a shout of joy. If there was any thing he thoroughly understood, it was the bayonet-exercise. He remembered that the knowledge of it had once saved his life, ...
— Frank on the Lower Mississippi • Harry Castlemon
... believed myself a match for him even at that work I would not descend so far below the dignity of a gentleman as to fight like a porter; but if he had anything to say to me, I was his man at blunderbuss, musket, pistol, sword, hatchet, spit, cleaver, fork, or needle; nay, I swore, that should he give his tongue any more saucy liberties at my expense, I would crop his ears without any ceremony. This rhodomontade, delivered with a stern countenance and resolute tone, had the desired effect upon my ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... resolved to prove my honesty; faith, and I'm resolved to prove his patience: Oh, I shall abuse him intolerably. This small piece of service will bring him clean out of love with the soldier for ever. He will never come within the sign of it, the sight of a cassock, or a musket-rest again. He will hate the musters at Mile-end for it, to his dying day. It's no matter, let the world think me a bad counterfeit, if I cannot give him the slip at an instant: why, this is better than to have staid his ...
— Every Man In His Humor - (The Anglicized Edition) • Ben Jonson
... don't you go and forget the old maxim that "one drop of honey catches more flies than a half-gallon of gall." Load your musket with this maxim, and ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... we were completely enclosed, a musket-ball was fired over the largest prahu. The men in the prahus gave their accustomed yell, and the whole force advanced ...
— Borneo and the Indian Archipelago - with drawings of costume and scenery • Frank S. Marryat
... expresses all the nuances of the military psychology: the exhilaration of the long unisonal stride, the grip on the musket, the pride in the regimentals and the regiment,—esprit de corps. He expresses the inevitable foppery of the severest soldier, the tease and the taunt of the evolutions, the fierce wish that all this ploying and deploying were in the face of an actual enemy, ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes
... Drummond dashed up and drew rein. There was not a minute to lose. The leading Americans were coming on in excellent order, only a musket-shot away; Pearson's thousand were just in the act of giving up the key to the whole position; and Drummond's eight hundred were plodding along a mile or so in rear. But within that fleeting minute Drummond made the plan that brought on the most desperately contested battle of the ...
— The War With the United States - A Chronicle of 1812 - Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • William Wood
... enough. When I can get a day to myself, I don't think it's any great hardship to carry father's heavy fowling-piece from sunrise to sunset; and I guess I can stand it to carry a musket as long as ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic
... fear of that man hung like a black shadow over all Europe, and that there was a time when the glint of a fire at night upon the coast would set every woman upon her knees and every man gripping for his musket. He had always won: that was the terror of it. The Fates seemed to be behind him. And now we knew that he lay upon the northern coast with a hundred and fifty thousand veterans, and the boats for their ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... another human being together, in some spot secure from the intrusion of spectators. A musket is conveniently at hand. It is already loaded. I say to my companion, "I will place myself before you; I will stand motionless: take up that musket, and shoot me through the heart." I want to know what passes in the mind of the man to ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... was soon aware that war was likely to break out at any time, and he took an active part in preparing for it. He helped to organize a company of soldiers who should be ready to fight for the American cause, and made the trip from Rhode Island to Boston to get a musket for himself. In Boston he watched with much interest the British regulars taking their drill, and brought back with him not only a musket, hidden under some straw in his wagon, but also a runaway British soldier, who was to drill ...
— Stories of Later American History • Wilbur F. Gordy
... Portuguese nobleman, who had been wrecked on the shoal off the entrance of the harbour[5], and who had seen half his companions drowned, and half eaten by the Indians, had contrived to conciliate the natives. He had saved a musket and some powder from the wreck, and having taken an opportunity of shooting a bird in the presence of the inhabitants, they called him Caramuru, or the man of fire; and, as he accompanied them on an expedition against their enemies the Tapuyas, he became a favourite, ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham
... the rooms against them, rising to the ceiling from a base like the segment of a pyramid, extending to the opposite side of the chamber; and every preparation was made for effectually barricading the door before night. Ladders were then fixed to ascend to the veranda, which was rendered musket-proof nearly as high as its railings, to protect the men. The Donna Isidora, and the women of the establishment, were in the afternoon despatched to Don Teodoro's; and, at the request of Francisco, joined to the ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... the day they could be found along the river bank. Many of them were ten to twelve years old, and were as useless on the range as drones in autumn to a colony of honey-bees. Las Palomas boasted quite an arsenal of firearms, of every make and pattern, from a musket to a repeater. The outfit was divided into two squads, one going down nearly to Shepherd's, and the other beginning operations considerably above the Ganso. June Deweese took the down-river end, while Uncle Lance took ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... we were able to charge and discharge, the space of fiue houres, being neuer a cables length distant either of vs from other. In which time we receiued diuers shot both in the hull of our ship, masts, and sailes, to the number of 32 great, besides 500 musket shot and harquebuzes a crocke at the least, which we tolde after the fight. And because we perceiued them to be stout, we thought good to boord the Biscaine, which was on head the other: where lying aboord about an houre, and plying our ordinance and small ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt
... the Morleys at Boulogne. These kind Americans were going to England, and they took her with them. But I quit Paris! No: I am old; I am growing obese. I have always been short-sighted. I can neither wield a sword nor handle a musket. But Paris needs defenders; and every moment I was away from her I sighed to myself, 'il faut etre la!' I returned before the Vandals had possessed themselves of our railways, the convoi overcrowded with men like myself, who had removed wives and families; and when we ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... to the place of execution, and on coming near to the scaffold, he made a sudden halt, and momentarily shrunk at the sight; because he had, to the last, entertained hopes that his life would have been taken by the musket, and not by the halter. This apparent want of resolution quickly passed away, and the disappointment he felt told more against the uncompromising spirit of the times than against himself. Rejecting assistance, he approached and ascended the platform with a steady pace and lofty demeanour, and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, No. - 480, Saturday, March 12, 1831 • Various
... a night's patrol with his seven policemen, Michele went down the road, musket in hand, to meet the Assistant Collector, who had ridden in to quell Tibasu. But, in the presence of this young Englishman, Michele felt himself slipping back more and more into the native, and the tale of the ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... upper edge of his cloth and a girdle of string cut his clumsy abdomen into folds. His forehead was low, his nose very flat and his lower lip swollen and purplish-red. His hair was short and fuzzy, and about his neck was a string and a little purse of skin. He carried a musket, and a powder-flask was stuck in his girdle. It was a curious confrontation. There opposed to him stood I, a little soiled, perhaps, but still a rather elaborately civilised human being, born, bred and trained ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... saw a Dutchman break his pate once For calling him pot-gun; he made his head Have a bore in 't like a musket. ...
— The Duchess of Malfi • John Webster
... Lowlander—mark you, a Lowlander—to drive. He was in the stable one afternoon—the old stable, we have pulled it down—when suddenly the horses began to kick and rear. He looked round to the open door, and there stood a huge Highlander in our tartans, with musket, pistols, claymore, dirk, skian, and all, and soft brogues of untanned leather on his feet. The coachman, in a panic, made a blind rush at the figure, but behold, there was nobody, and a boy outside had seen no man. The horses ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... coolness in danger, and courage in action. At last, on the 24th of September, 1586, in a gallant attack on a greatly superior force of the enemy, near Zutphen, a town he was besieging, after having had one horse shot from under him, he was severely wounded by a musket-ball in the left leg. ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood
... ship, the Trinidad, and supposed it to be Spanish, but when they perceived that it was a ship of pirates, they tried to obtain the weather-gauge, but the pirates obtained it, and then they began to fire musket-shots, and with the first three shots they killed the captain of the Rosario, who was called Juan Lopez, and fired other shots, and captured the ship, and took out with the hooks [?] all that they deemed necessary of the wine and brandy, and all the silver and other things that ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various
... your wife acts with regard to marriage as young fashionables do with regard to their country. If they are drawn for the army, they buy a man to carry the musket, to die in their place and to spare them the hardships ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... tongue of flame would lick up into the night towards that russet patch of sky, betraying the cause of it and proclaiming that incendiaries were at work. Above the ominous din that told of the business afoot there came now and again the crack of a musket, and dominating all other sounds was the sullen roar of the revolted peasants, the risen serfs, the rebellious vassals of the ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini
... ponies. He drove past all the streets. "Stoi! (Stop!)" cried Rouletabille. A gate, a soldier, musket at shoulder, bayonet in play; another gate, another soldier, another bayonet; a park with walls around it, and around the walls ...
— The Secret of the Night • Gaston Leroux
... contained his Sunday clothes, on his back, and with his musket and his game-bag over his shoulder, Rudy started to take the shortest way across the mountain. Still it was a great distance. The shooting matches were to commence on that day, and to continue for a whole ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... by Germans; and Germany equally hates the institutions of this country, because she sees the blood and the bone of intelligent Germany coming to the United States and becoming capable citizens, instead of carrying the needle-musket at home. She is hated by France, because France has got a Republic which she calls democratic and social, but which is still a tyranny—and the worst of all tyrannies, because the tyrant is a mob. I do not disguise the fact that we are ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various
... was Golah's son, a youth about eighteen years of age. He was armed with a long Moorish musket, a heavy Spanish sword, and the dirk that ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid
... the other sketches. One was a musket, with a wide butt and a band-fastened stock; the lock-mechanism, vaguely flintlock, had been dotted in tentatively. The other was a long pistol, similarly definite in outline and vague in mechanical detail; it was merely a ...
— Time Crime • H. Beam Piper
... him, he told them faintly that he was not much hurt, only a little stunned. That he was seated by the fount, with his horses grazing, when the band of armed men rode up, and one of them struck him over the head with the barrel of his musket, and when he recovered somewhat he found himself a prisoner, with his legs tied as he was found, and the horses led and driven down a narrow defile, out of which they had made their way into a forest of shady trees. Later on they ...
— Yussuf the Guide - The Mountain Bandits; Strange Adventure in Asia Minor • George Manville Fenn
... here lived the makers of crossbows (Arab. Bunduk now meaning a fire piece, musket, etc.). It is the modern district about the ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... remedy here is a Stone bow, a Piece, especially if you haue a Musket or Spar-hawke in Winter to make the Black bird stoope into ...
— A New Orchard And Garden • William Lawson
... with the lantern opened the carriage-door, and said two or three words to the one who acted as driver, who immediately got down from his seat, took up a short musket which he kept under his feet, and placed its muzzle ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... dog is covered with dust, But sturdy and stanch he stands; And the little toy soldier is red with rust, And his musket moulds in his hands. Time was when the little toy dog was new, And the soldier was passing fair; And that was the time when our Little Boy Blue Kissed ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... be destroying unnecessarily the lives of the unfortunate beings on board. Still he could not tell what trick they might be intending. The guns were again loaded and run out. We had now got within musket range. We could, however, only see a couple of men at the helm, and another walking the deck, yet there was no sign that the pirate ever thought of ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... a carpet-knight and have not idled in ladies' bowers. I have worked hard and dreamed of you. I am willing to do all that a man can to win you. Cowardice has not kept me from the war, but you. If it would please you I would put on the blue and shoulder a musket to-morrow. If you will permit more discretion and time, I can soon obtain a commission as an officer. But before I fight other battles, I wish to win the supreme victory of my life. Whatever orders I may take ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... press in on the strangers. For a moment affairs looked threatening. Cartier's boat was surrounded by seven canoes filled with painted, gibbering savages. But the French had a formidable defence. A volley of musket shots fired by the sailors over the heads of the Indians dispersed the canoes in rapid flight. Finding, however, that no harm was done by the strange thunder of the weapons, the canoes came flocking back again, their occupants making ...
— The Mariner of St. Malo: A Chronicle of the Voyages of Jacques Cartier • Stephen Leacock
... this weapon which thou art about to receive in defence of thy country and thy honour?" On the youth's reply, "I have no other resolve," arms were presented, drums rolled, and the senior officer girded the new soldier with his sword, and placed his musket in his hand to the accompaniment of moral formulas. The young man then made a solemn promise not to disgrace his comrades by any crime or want of application to his duties. Led to his place in the ranks, he presented arms, each brigade marched away, led by its brigadier, ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner
... rival's troops to recruit his own ranks? Like every genuine institution of the Italian Renaissance, warfare was thus a work of fine art, a masterpiece of intellectual subtlety; and like the Renaissance itself, this peculiar form of warfare was essentially transitional. The cannon and the musket were already in use; and it only required one blast of gunpowder to turn the sham-fight of courtly, traitorous, finessing captains of adventure into something terribly more real. To men like the Marquis of Mantua ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... two outposts also on the Arkansas River. If all these forts were properly garrisoned, they would take every disposable musket in the regular army of the United States; whilst at present they have, in consequence of the protracted Florida war, scarcely sufficient men to do ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... Paraguay, great havoc is committed among the herds of horses by the jaguars, whose strength is quite sufficient to enable them to drag off one of these animals. Azara caused the body of a horse, which had been recently killed by a jaguar, to be drawn within musket-shot of a tree, in which he intended to pass the night, anticipating that the jaguar would return in the course of it, to its victim; but while he was gone to prepare for his adventure, behold the animal swam across a large and deep river, ...
— Forest & Frontiers • G. A. Henty
... while an old man belonging to Col. Lloyd was engaged in catching a few of the many millions of oysters that lined the bottom of that creek, to satisfy his hunger, the villainous Mr. Bondley, lying in ambush, without the slightest ceremony, discharged the contents of his musket into the back and shoulders of the poor old man. As good fortune would have it, the shot did not prove mortal, and Mr. Bondley came over, the next day, to see Col. Lloyd—whether to pay him for his property, or to justify himself for what he had done, ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... Ireland:— "It was day-light at the time, but not broad day-light; I had fired my musket but not used my bayonet. I ran because there were three against me. I was one of the first men in the stockade. There was no other soldier or policeman near me when the prisoner and the ...
— The Eureka Stockade • Carboni Raffaello
... Not hunt the bear with musket, carbine, or wheel-lock? What then—did King Charles reckon to have a wrestling bout or a turn at "single-stick" with the Jarl Bruin? So wondered Arvid Horn, but he said nothing, waiting the king's own pleasure, as became ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... Kisco gave just time enough for the photographs, and most of the day was devoted to them. Sam was taken in twenty poses—in the act of leading his troops in a breach, giving the order to fire, charging bayonets himself with a musket supposed to have been taken from a dead foe, standing with his arms folded and his cap pulled over his eyes in the trenches, and waving his cap on a bastion in the moment of triumph. Cleary lay down so that his friend might be pictured with his ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... make every effort toward his exemption. When all efforts proved unavailing, the general took him into his own regiment, and "the Union sympathizer never wore a Confederate uniform, and only once shouldered a Confederate musket, when on a great panic day he stood, a figurehead guard at the door of a government department. At last, in 1864, when even General Winder could not longer protect him from active service at the front, Van Lew deserted again, and served with the Federal Army ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... steps, threw himself on to the great carved balustrade, and, rapidly gliding down upon his chest, literally shot off before he reached the upright scroll at the bottom, and faced the men. His loud questioning voice brought out a sergeant, musket in hand, and sword and bayonet in his diagonal belt behind, closely followed by a big, fat, puffy, unwholesome-looking man with sallow face ...
— The New Forest Spy • George Manville Fenn
... Jennings, who commanded the mob at the [Hawn's Mill] massacre, was assaulted in Chillicothe, Missouri, on the evening of January 20, 1862, by an unknown person, who shot him on the street with a revolver or musket, as the Colonel was going home after dark." * They are silent as ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... promoting the militia interests of the populous county of Chester. When the war-fever swept down his beautiful valley, and the drum called the young men from villages and farms, this ancient yeoman and miller—for he was both—took a musket at the sprightly age of sixty-five, and joined a Volunteer company. Neither ridicule nor entreaty could bend his purpose; but the Secretary of War, hearing of the case, conferred a brigade quartermastership upon him. He threw off the infirmities of age, stepped as proudly as any youngster, ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... Casus we gained that all the folk ran cursing away from the cart, and followed us at the distance of a good musket-shot, thinking that my child was calling on Satan to help her. Only one lad, of about five-and-twenty, whom, however, I did not know, tarried a few paces behind the cart, until his father came, and seeing he would not go away willingly, pushed him into the ditch, ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... twin stunted bullocks, patient noses to the ground, tails a-switch. Beside his cattle the driver plodded, goad in hand, a naked sword upon his hip. Within his reach, between the rude bales of the loaded cart, the butt of a brass-bound musket protruded significantly.... All men went armed in that wild land: to do as much is one of the boons attendant upon citizenship in ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance
... they were plagued with flies, and those in such multitudes that they were scarce able to defend themselves. They saw at a distance eight savages, with each a staff in his hand, who advanced towards them within musket-shot; but as soon as they perceived the Dutch sailors moving towards them, they fled as fast as they were able. It was by this time about noon, and, perceiving no appearance either of getting water, or entering into any correspondence with the natives, they resolved to go on board and ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton
... toward the maternal nest. The temptation on Markham's part to capture this sprig of porkdom was too mighty to be overcome by any lingering fear of Alexandria's dungeon, so instantly clapping his musket to his shoulder he blazed away, with the result of piggy's dropping in his tracks, without so much as an audible grunt. He sprang out, and had barely secured his prey, when a mounted officer with a squad of ...
— History of Company F, 1st Regiment, R.I. Volunteers, during the Spring and Summer of 1861 • Charles H. Clarke
... slept with the utmost precautions, as if he feared an attack upon his life. His sword and dagger lay ready by his bedside, and he kept a loaded musket within reach. He had also a bolt constructed in such a manner that, by aid of pulleys, he could fasten or unfasten the door of his chamber while in bed. All this was known to Philip, and he ordered the mechanic who had made it to derange ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... themselves, and darkness for the camp, and he sang his war song, shouting and rattling the deer hoofs. Also the Indians rattled deer hoofs, and it was like a giant breathing his last, being shot with many musket flashes. ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... the store of arms, in a small cave next to the powder store, and musket powder and bullets were also there. As he loaded the weapons, she passed them out in armfuls, then gave Stumpy a flask of powder for priming, and told him to hold out until Milo could bring up other ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... fondness went round them, caressing them with her paws. Finding at last that they were cold and lifeless, she raised her head toward the ship, and growled a curse upon their murderers, which they returned with a volley of musket balls. She fell between her cubs, and ...
— Anecdotes of Animals • Unknown
... he told his pupil that one day he would be a great philologist. Of course, young Borrow was by no means the sort of lad to spend all his time on books. He loved to sally forth with an old condemned musket, and did such execution that he seldom returned (sad to say!) without a string of bullfinches, blackbirds, and linnets hanging round his neck. Yet, as Mr. Jenkins says, Borrow's "love of animals was almost feminine." With less zest he went fishing—too ...
— Souvenir of the George Borrow Celebration - Norwich, July 5th, 1913 • James Hooper
... firearm, weapon, rifle, shotgun, blunderbuss, musket, flobert, pistol, revolver, derringer, cannon, swivel gun, matchlock, breech-loader, stanchion gun, arquebus, Krupp gun, Winchester, howitzer, gatling gun, flintlock. Associated Words: bayonet, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... friend and correspondent; and Herbert Lunsford leads the infantry, "the inhuman cannibal foot," as the Puritan journals call them. There are five hundred of these, in lightest marching order, and carrying either pike or arquebuse,—this last being a matchlock musket with an iron rest to support it, and a lance combined, to resist cavalry,—the whole being called "Swine (Swedish) feathers,"—a weapon so clumsy, that the Cavaliers say a Puritan needs two years' practice to discharge one without winking. And over all these float flags of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various
... scarcely checked by severe corporeal punishment. Some of the men attempted thefts at the risk of their lives; and, in one instance, a cask of bottled beer having been landed too late to be got into store, was placed, by a serjeant's tent, in care of a sentry, whose musket was known to be loaded with ball. During the night two fellows attempted to get at it, and being discovered were fired at, which so alarmed them, that one of them, in his hurry to escape, fell into a mangrove swamp, which caused him so much pain that ...
— The Wreck on the Andamans • Joseph Darvall
... to have a muster every year. On that occasion every white man shouldered his musket. The citizens and the so-called country gentlemen wore military uniforms. The poor whites took their places in the ranks in every-day dress, some without shoes, some without hats. This grand occasion had already passed; ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)
... have to be put forth before the blessings of freedom and knowledge can be fairly enjoyed by this people; and until colored men manage by dint of hard acquisition to enter the ranks of skilled industry, very little substantial respect will be shown them, even with the ballot-box and musket in their hands. ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... armies the heavy cavalry was the principal arm. The musket was an unwieldy matchlock fired from a rest, and without a bayonet, so that in the infantry regiments it was necessary to combine pikemen with the musketeers. Cannon there were of all calibres and with a whole vocabulary of fantastic names, but none capable ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... 1812, only one hundred. Yakutat gave two thousand in 1794, only three hundred, six years later. Fifteen thousand were gathered at Sitka in 1804, only one hundred and fifty thirty years later. Of course the Russians obtained such results only by a system of musket, bludgeon, and outrage, that are repellent to the modern mind. Women were seized as hostages for a big hunt. Women were even murdered as a punishment for small returns. Men were sacrificed like dogs by the "promyshleniki"—riffraff blackguard Russian hunters from the Siberian ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... of the seventeenth century a great change had taken place in the arms of the infantry. The pike had been gradually giving place to the musket; and, at the close of the reign of Charles the Second, most of his foot were musketeers. Still, however, there was a large intermixture of pikemen. Each class of troops was occasionally instructed in the use ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... and halted straight, Set his back against the gate, Caught his musket to his chin, While the hive of hell within Sent abroad a seething hum As of towns whose king is come Leading conquest home from far And the captives of his war, And the car of triumph waits, And they open wide the gates. But across the ...
— Last Poems • A. E. Housman
... the butt of his musket heavily against the earth, utter an exclamation and then run toward them. His shout had also been heard at the tavern, and the guests, bareheaded, began to pour out, and look about confusedly to see whence the ...
— The Shadow of the North - A Story of Old New York and a Lost Campaign • Joseph A. Altsheler
... attained the years of manhood—lay, with his head upon his arm, in the embrace of an unquiet sleep, which a thrill of pain from his wounds seemed each moment on the point of breaking. His right hand grasped a musket; and, to judge from the violent action of his features, his slumbers were bringing back a vision of the conflict of which he was one of the few survivors. A shout deep and loud in his dreaming fancy—found its way in an imperfect murmur ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... had served there. Under his able guidance, the British stormed the batteries and spiked the guns, under a flank fire from other guns which they also spiked, while the enemy, without giving way, poured upon them musket balls thick as hail. Detachments of musketeers took them on each flank, and some getting to their rear among the jungle, fired upon them with deadly aim. The British were thus compelled to cut their way back ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... agitated by military writers in more recent times, Puysegur advocating the musket, and Folard and Lloyd contending in favor of restoring the pike. Even in our own service, so late as the war of 1812, a distinguished general of the army strongly urged the use of the pike, and the fifteenth (and perhaps another ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... directed the Themistocles and Aris to anchor off a battery at the point, and cannonade it whilst I entered the harbour with boats and schooners. At 4.30 P.M. they anchored with much gallantry, and soon silenced the musket-shot from the battery. At the same moment I entered the harbour with the boats and schooners, and we shortly took possession of seven brigs: they were all on shore, and most without sails bent. However, by 9 P.M. we succeeded in getting out five prizes, three loaded with provisions ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, Vol. II • Thomas Lord Cochrane |
