"Thunderbolt" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fragments the stone upon which he fell without his infant body being injured in the least. And he fell from his mother's lap because Kunti, frightened by a tiger, had risen up suddenly, unconscious of the child that lay asleep on her lap. And as she had risen, the infant, of body hard as the thunderbolt, falling down upon the mountain breast, broke into a hundred fragments the rocky mass upon which he fell. And beholding this, Pandu wondered much. And it so happened that that very day on which Vrikodara was born, was also, O best of Bharatas, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... country, and the household daps becomes the more elaborate epulum Iovis, in which the whole community, as it were, entertained him at a banquet. As a sky-deity, too, he is particularly concerned with the thunderbolt and the lightning-flash (Iuppiter Fulmen, Fulgur), and to him are sacred the always ominous spots which had been struck by lightning (bidentalia): with the more alarming occurrence of lightning by night he has a special connection under the cult-title Iuppiter Summanus. ...
— The Religion of Ancient Rome • Cyril Bailey
... which we entered as an opportunity offered—being finished we return to our chief topic, i.e. the enquiry into the purport of the Vedanta-texts.—We read (Ka. Up. II, 6, 2), 'Whatever there is, the whole world when gone forth trembles in the pra/n/a. It (the pra/n/a) is a great terror, a raised thunderbolt. Those who know it become immortal[226].'—This passage declares that this whole world trembles, abiding in pra/n/a, and that there is raised something very terrible, called a thunderbolt, and that through its knowledge immortality is obtained. But as it is not immediately ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut
... us with any trace of that famous Tribune, from which the Roman people were governed by eloquence. Three pillars remain of a temple, raised by Augustus in honour of Jupiter Tonans, when the thunderbolt fell at his feet without striking him, and an arch which the senate raised to Septimus Severus in reward of his exploits. The names of his two sons, Caracalla and Geta, were inscribed on the fronton of ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... Is this the idea of a God infinite in power, as in wisdom and goodness? Are we to think that the Almighty has just for once set a universe in motion, and forever withdrawn Himself from all meddling with its affairs? He permits us to control the electric power: but is never permitted to direct a thunderbolt upon the guilty, or to turn one aside from any path it might incline ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No. 6, December 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... a human expression of terror, the Landgrave fell, as if shot by a thunderbolt, stretched at his full length upon the ground, lifeless apparently, and bereft of consciousness or sensation. A sympathetic cry of horror arose from the spectators. All rushed towards The Masque. The young cavaliers, ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... being a mighty physician, raised men from the dead. But Zeus was wroth that a man should have such power, and so make of no effect the ordinance of the Gods. Wherefore he smote Asclepius with a thunderbolt and slew him. And when Apollo knew this, he slew the Cyclopes that had made the thunderbolts for his father Zeus, for men say that they make them on their forges that are in the mountain of Etna. But Zeus suffered not this deed to go unpunished, but passed this sentence on his son Apollo, that ...
— Stories from the Greek Tragedians • Alfred Church
... profound sorrow. Just at that moment I saw a man hurrying up the path which led into the village from the valley below. Almost breathless with exertion, he uttered a few words to the first he met. His communication flew like lightning among the crowd. They scattered in every direction, as if a thunderbolt had fallen among them. Masks were torn off and hastily concealed, dresses were changed, and the block and axe, and all the things connected with the representation, were carried away, while the people ran along the streets, and shut themselves up in their houses ...
— Manco, the Peruvian Chief - An Englishman's Adventures in the Country of the Incas • W.H.G. Kingston
... arrived news, which fell upon him with the force of a thunderbolt, that the revolt had extended to the Spanish provinces, and was headed by Galba. He fainted upon hearing this; and falling to the ground, lay for a long time lifeless, as it seemed, and speechless. Upon coming to himself again, he tore his robe, struck his forehead, ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... compound of several characters. He has Turpin's ubiquity, Claude Duval's sang-froid, the personal attractiveness of Gardiner (leader of a gang which made a business of robbing gold-escorts in New South Wales about forty years ago), and the humorous daredevilry of the 'Captain Thunderbolt' who obtained notoriety in the same colony ...
— Australian Writers • Desmond Byrne
... matter-of-course preparation, suddenly, like a thunderbolt from a clear sky, came orders to leave. The whole garrison, officers and men, ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... The doctors told me, later, I had fallen into what they were pleased to call "a Second State." I was examined and reported upon as a Psychological Curiosity. But at the time, I knew nothing of all this. A thunderbolt, as it were, destroyed at one blow every relic, every trace of my previous existence; and I began life all over again, with that terrible scene of blood as my first birthday ...
— Recalled to Life • Grant Allen
... a thunderbolt. They were all silent. Surely He could see that they had followed Him, and knew why. Could He not see into their thoughts? Had He suddenly begun to doubt their faith in Him? Or had He lost faith in Himself? It is all so mysterious and terrifying. As they were silent ...
— I.N.R.I. - A prisoner's Story of the Cross • Peter Rosegger
... {119} Like a thunderbolt, Colonel Washington and his troopers, flying their famous crimson flag, sweep down in a semicircle round the hill, and charge the ...
— Hero Stories from American History - For Elementary Schools • Albert F. Blaisdell
... heard of her much sooner, and no thunderbolt that ever rent the heavens could have startled him more than the ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... weakness; but the more facility I have as King to gratify myself, the more I ought to be on my guard against sin and scandal. I pardon you this time, but never address to me a similar discourse again if you wish that I should continue to love you." This was a thunderbolt for my father; the scales fell from his eyes; the idea of the King's timidity in love disappeared before the display of a virtue ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... for him. And truly Selim was not much his debtor; for, at the first flash and glimpse of a red coat, he would paw and champ his iron bit with rage; and the moment he heard the word "go", off he was among them like a thunderbolt. ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... thunderbolt—and beyond it the beckoning. "You and I will," she said calmly. And then, as if to forestall the possible refusal: "It is merely to sit in the next room and to go in and give him his medicine at half-hour intervals. ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... of the Prince. It was delicious, on account of his profound astonishment, and that remnant of grand airs which the pose of his head and arms still betrayed. The Prince had remained as if struck by a thunderbolt; from time to time, he exclaimed, in his high-pitched voice, shrill and perturbed, as though articulating with difficulty: "How is this? how is this?" After concluding her compliment, the Duchess, as though from respect, afforded him ample time ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... Madame des Ursins, who up to this time had been on such good terms with the King and Madame de Maintenon, did not appear to me to be favourable. I was confirmed in this view by what had just happened with regard to her sovereignty; but I was a thousand leagues from the thunderbolt which this lightning announced, and which only declared itself to ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... fell, Is this of melancholy, brat of hell. There born in hellish darkness doth it dwell, The Furies brought it up, Megara's teat, Alecto gave it bitter milk to eat. And all conspir'd a bane to mortal men, To bring this devil out of that black den. Jupiter's thunderbolt, not storm at sea, Nor whirlwind doth our hearts so much dismay. What? am I bit by that fierce Cerberus? Or stung by [2751]serpent so pestiferous? Or put on shirt that's dipt in Nessus' blood? My pain's past cure; ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... news fell like a thunderbolt, and Mark felt a curious chilling sensation come over him, as he tried to keep it from his mother and Mrs O'Halloran. But the latter was quick at seeing there was something wrong, and she stopped and asked what it was, and wrung it unwillingly from ...
— Mother Carey's Chicken - Her Voyage to the Unknown Isle • George Manville Fenn
... images, then woe betide him if a sudden noise strikes sharply on his senses and calls his errant soul back to its prison-house of flesh and bones. The shock of the reunion of these two powers, body and mind,—one of which partakes of the unseen qualities of a thunderbolt, while the other shares with sentient nature that soft resistant force which deifies destruction,—this shock, this struggle, or, rather let us say, this painful meeting and co-mingling, gives rise to frightful sufferings. ...
— Seraphita • Honore de Balzac
... him. Emancipation must be given sooner or later, or all goes down in a hideous ruin; and no experience can calculate nicely when the last moment of safety is reached. It may come, and the crashing thunderbolt tell that ...
— The Future of the Colored Race in America • William Aikman
... storm as fierce as ever I did see," remarked Chissel. "Why, there was a thunderbolt as big as six of my fists put together, fell right through the decks, and out through the ship's bottom; and if I hadn't been there to plug the hole, we should all have gone to Davy Jones' locker, as sure as fate. You was there, Trundle, and you know, ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... mother-in-law those little things which most wives would have been delighted to do for their husbands' comfort. Ethelyn was very unhappy, very angry, and very bitterly disappointed. The fact that she was not going to Washington had fallen upon her like a thunderbolt, paralyzing her, as it were, so that after the first great shock was over she seemed like some benumbed creature bereft of care, or feeling, ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... If a thunderbolt had fallen in the room it could not have had a more startling effect than this outburst of Honor's. The nurse recoiled in horror thinking she was in the presence of a free-thinker who is first cousin to an atheist, and Mrs. ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... felt the presence of the slaves behind him, and shrank back numbed and appalled. A mist came before his eyes; the voice he heard summoning him to stand up seemed to come from infinite distances. The hand of doom had fallen like a thunderbolt. The leathern thong in the hands of the slave was the token of instant death. There was no chance of escape. The Nubians had him at their mercy. As his brain struggled to regain its understanding, he saw, as in a dream, David enter the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... thunderbolt cleave the impious tongue which utters the criminal proposal! Thou hast murdered my beloved Charles; and shall Amelia, his betrothed, call ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... a meteor, and I shall leave it like a thunderbolt." These words of Maupassant to Jose Maria de Heredia on the occasion of a memorable meeting are, in spite of their morbid solemnity, not an inexact summing up of the brief career during which, for ten years, the writer, by turns undaunted ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... or it might, for example, wear a crested lark upon its helmet and be called the Legion of the "Lark." The commander of the whole legion is a man of senatorial rank; its standard is a silver eagle on the top of a staff, commonly holding a thunderbolt in its claw. To each legion there are ten regiments, called "cohorts," averaging six hundred men, and every such regiment has its colonel, or, as the translation of the Bible calls Claudius Lysias, "its chief captain." The regiment in its turn consists of six companies ...
— Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul • T. G. Tucker
... four o'clock in the morning of the Fourth of July when the thunderbolt struck Fort Ryan. It was not very loud; it damaged no building; but it struck the very souls of men. A thousand thunder claps, a year's tornadoes in an hour, could not have been more staggering; and yet ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton
... been more than two minutes afterwards until we suddenly felt the waves subside, and were enveloped in foam. The boat made a sharp half turn to larboard, and then shot off in its new direction like a thunderbolt. At the same moment the roaring noise of the water was completely drowned in a kind of shrill shriek—such a sound as you might imagine given out by the waterpipes of many thousand steam vessels, letting off their steam all together. We were now in the ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... beamed upon her in that more horrible Gomorrah. The marble trembled under her feet—a sulphurous stench shot through its crevices—the virgin shrieked and fell forwards, scorched and blackened to a cinder. She was blasted, as if by a thunderbolt.[11] Cagliostro looked with horror upon the ashes of the Bacchante. He had seen youth stricken down by age; he had seen virtue annihilated, so to speak, at the mandate of vice; he had seen—and even his callous heart exulted at the thought—he had seen innocence ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... western nations in the kingdom of Jerusalem, established by the first crusaders in 1099, had greatly diminished, still the news of the loss of the Holy City—which was taken by Saladin, Sultan of Egypt and Syria, in 1187—fell like a thunderbolt on men's minds. Once more the flame which had kindled the mystic war of God blazed high. "What a disgrace, what an affliction," cried Pope Urban III, "that the jewel which the second Urban won for ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... was his address, Mr. Coleridge, Nether-Stowey, Somersetshire; and that he should be glad to see me there in a few weeks' time, and, if I chose, would come half-way to meet me. I was not less surprised than the shepherd-boy (this simile is to be found in Cassandra) when he sees a thunderbolt fall close at his feet. I stammered out my acknowledgments and acceptance of this offer (I thought Mr. Wedgwood's annuity a trifle to it) as well as I could; and this mighty business being settled, the poet-preacher took leave, and I accompanied him six miles on the road. It was a fine ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... shoulders of the one nearest, and crushed him to the ground with his weight. His clenched fist caught the lieutenant between the eyes and stretched him on his back—the third man wisely drew aside to let this human thunderbolt pass by! ...
— The Lighthouse • Robert Ballantyne
... lion the courser was seized with terror, and his strength instantly failed him. He fell, and died as if he had been struck with a thunderbolt. The valiant knight soon got upon his feet, and, invoking the name of the great Prophet, he plunged his spear into the enormous jaws which were opened to devour him. This exploit of courage and intrepidity gained him, together with the applauses of his ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... to eager crowds as they passed through hamlet, village, and town—swept like a thrill of electric fire throughout the land. News was news in those days! You didn't get it at all till you got it altogether, and then you got it like a thunderbolt. There was no dribbling of advance telegrams; no daily papers to spread the news (or lies), and contradict 'em next day, in the same columns with commentaries or prophetic remarks on what might or should have been, but wasn't, until news got muddled up into a hopeless entanglement, so ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... small brass cups, containing minute offerings of rice and other things, changed daily. There were prayer-wheels, cymbals, horns and drums, and a prayer-cylinder six feet high, which it took the strength of two men to turn. On a shelf immediately below the idols were the brazen sceptre, bell, and thunderbolt, a brass lotus blossom, and the spouted brass flagon decorated with peacocks' feathers, which is used at baptisms, and for pouring holy water upon the hands at festivals. In houses in which there is not a roof temple the best room is set apart for religious use ...
— Among the Tibetans • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs Bishop)
... encounter of the two young princes with their father. Some brilliant thoughts occur, the justice and beauty of which are not surpassed in any literature. The comparison of Chandraketu to a lion's cub turning to brave the thunderbolt is one of these; and another is the illustration of the effects of education upon minds possessed or destitute ...
— Tales from the Hindu Dramatists • R. N. Dutta
... him]. In the midst of connubial and communal peace the thunderbolt has fallen on the King.[MENELAUS tugs at ANALYTIKOS' robe.] Broken in spirit as he is, he is already pawing the ground like a battle steed. Never will we lay down our arms! We and Jupiter! [Cheers.] Never until the Queen is restored to Menelaus. ...
— Washington Square Plays - Volume XX, The Drama League Series of Plays • Various
... the Cyclops seated at their imperishable work, forging a thunderbolt for King Zeus; by now it was almost finished in its brightness and still it wanted but one ray, which they were beating out with their iron hammers as it spurted forth a breath of ...
— The Argonautica • Apollonius Rhodius
... Up he went like a streak of lightning, Lit on the moon like a thunderbolt. Nought could he find but a man with a lantern, Riding about on a pea-green colt. Oh! Heigh-ho! . . . Why did I come here? oh! . . . A fling and a swing and a flap of my wing, And back to the earth ...
— The Nursery, April 1878, Vol. XXIII. No. 4 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... beings, while snakes' heads, growing out of the human bodies, rendered the aspect of the group still more portentous. The center of the pediment was probably occupied by a figure of Zeus, hurling his thunderbolt at this strange enemy. We have therefore here a scene from one of the favorite subjects of Greek art at all periods—the gigantomachy, or battle of gods and giants. Fig. 81 gives a better idea of the nearest of the three heads. [Footnote: It is ...
— A History Of Greek Art • F. B. Tarbell
... seen the unknown knight employing the same dreadful weapon! Hitherto he had been on his defence; now he began the attack; and the gleaming axe whirred in his hand like a reed, but descended like a thunderbolt! "Yield! yield! Sir Rowski," shouted he, ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the prayer of Malachy that roused the elements, the tempest fell upon those who sought his life,[418] the dark whirlwind[419] enveloped only those who had made ready the works of darkness.[420] Finally, he who was the leader of so great wickedness was struck by a thunderbolt and perished with three others, companions in death as they had been partners in crime; and the next day their bodies were found half-burnt and putrid, clinging to the branches of trees, each where the wind[421] had lifted him up and cast ...
— St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of Armagh • H. J. Lawlor
... the wisest of us start, and back, and think it incumbent on our pride in love affairs, to resist the slightest interference, or the best advice, from the best friends. What! love upon compulsion! No—Jupiter is not more tenacious of his thunderbolt than Cupid is of his arrows. Blind as he is, none may presume to direct the hand of that ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... empowered at last to resume their sitting, it was only a six months' term: that is, the Parliament henceforth found itself divided into two fragments, perfect strangers one to the other, which were to sit alternately for six months. "A veritable thunderbolt for that sovereign court, for by the six months' term," says M. Floquet, "there was no longer any Parliament, properly speaking, but two phantoms of Parliament, making war on each other, whilst the government had the field open to ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... waiting. Took the air for a look about. Manitou left me a mile up. Evidently likes the Alps. Soared over Mount Terrible whither I dared not venture—yet! Saw no Huns. Back by sundown. Manitou dropped in to dinner—like a thunderbolt from the zenith. Astonishment of Blue Devils on guard. Much curiosity. Manitou a hero. All see in him an omen of American victory. ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... contingency. Why had she not thought of it before? Why had he never thought of it? If it should come to pass! The prospect did not appal her; it did not overwhelm her with confusion or oppress her with shame; it did not threaten to fall like a thunderbolt; the thought of it came down like ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... The sight of you two gave me such a shock, it threw me into such a transport of rage that, unable to break my irons, I rose upon my feet, and, with my hands still pinioned behind me, my legs still loaded with heavy chains, I bounded out of my stall with two leaps, and fell like a thunderbolt upon the old patrician. The shock caused the old man to roll under me. In default of the liberty of my hands to strangle him, I bit him in the face, near the neck. The "horse-dealers" and their keepers threw themselves upon me; but bearing with all my weight ...
— The Brass Bell - or, The Chariot of Death • Eugene Sue
... a reanimation of external Venice. But there was a thunderbolt in it; for about an hour before sunset, when the ladies were superintending and trying not to criticize the ingenious efforts to produce a make-believe of comfort on board for them, word was brought down to the boat by ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Had a thunderbolt burst on board, or had the vessel struck on a rock in the middle of the ocean, the alarm that was instantly spread on board could not have been greater; and where all had been listless inactivity but a moment before, was now all life, ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... better, then," Tom admitted. "For the moment it came over me, like a thunderbolt, that Dalton might nip all our work in the bud by sending a cablegram. Still, couldn't he send it ...
— The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless - The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise • H. Irving Hancock
... people, and produced on my mind a feeling of fear and awe. But how different it is now. If a minister was to preach now about all wicked people going to hell, it would produce no more effect on their minds than water on a duck's back, for the word hell is now a spent thunderbolt, used uselessly by the mouths of so many. It may be well for theologians to know (if any of them believe in hell as preached) whether or not they have got through discussing hell; their views have no weight whatever on the minds of the masses, ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge
... Senate in Cicero's time was convened according to expedience, or perhaps as to the dignity of the occasion, in various temples. Of these none had a higher reputation than that of the special Jupiter who is held to have befriended Romulus in his fight with the Sabines. Here was launched that thunderbolt of eloquence which all English school-boys have known for its "Quousque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra." Whether it be from the awe which has come down to me from my earliest years, mixed perhaps with something of dread for the great pedagogue who first made the words to sound grandly ...
— Life of Cicero - Volume One • Anthony Trollope
... put constraint on her. And 'twas only when I led her to this terrace, after the thunderbolt, and pointed out the scattered soldiery, that she came to herself, that at length she perceived that your God was the most powerful. "What," she cried, "'tis he, he, my Satni, who shakes the heavens and the earth for me! For me!" she murmured, "for me!" She would have ...
— Woman on Her Own, False Gods & The Red Robe - Three Plays By Brieux • Eugene Brieux
... quickly and tried you too high all at once. I ought to have known. Oh, my poor dear boy, you must have had a dreadful time. Why didn't you tell me? The news in the 'Gazette' came upon me like a thunderbolt. I didn't know what to think. I'm afraid I thought the worst, the very horrid worst—that you had got tired of it and resigned of your own accord. How was one to know? Your letter was ...
— The Rough Road • William John Locke
... these men, and they sent down fire from heaven upon the pyramid, which caused its building to be discontinued. It is stated that at the time of the Spanish Conquest, the inhabitants of Cholula preserved with great veneration a large aerolite, which they said was the thunderbolt that fell upon the top of the pyramid ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... the enslaver or the enslaved." The solemn conclusion of the illustrious signers of this mighty protest was that: "That society is, in our estimation, not deserving of the countenance of the British public." This powerful instrument fell, as Garrison wrote at the time, "like a thunderbolt upon the society." The damage inflicted upon it was immense, irreparable. The name of Thomas Clarkson was conspicuous by its absence from the protest. He could not be induced to take positive ground against the society. Garrison had visited him for this purpose. But the venerable ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... at him. There was no malice in the thunderbolt that he unleashed then. He simply told what he ...
— The Passing of Ku Sui • Anthony Gilmore
... calamity, and the Rocky Morning News and other Colorado journals shed copious tears over the sad lot of the abandoned pilgrims. Even the American newspapers, which so often foresee events that never happen, had not been able to foresee this thunderbolt that had descended in the ...
— Modern Saints and Seers • Jean Finot
... thunderbolt falling in the midst of them, and the poor woman perceived this instinctively. Her son's impatience had been the spark which set the smouldering fire in her alight, but even he was astounded by the quick and sudden blaze which lit up the ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... room while she was gone, full of sadness. He had been very fond of the Squire, and that awfully sudden death, an apopleptic seizure, instantaneous as a thunderbolt, had impressed him very painfully. It was his first experience of the kind, and it was infinitely terrible to him. It seemed to him a long time before Vixen appeared, and then the door opened, and a slim black figure came in, a white fixed face ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... imprisonment. In point of fact, in most of such cases the criminals have either fled, or have been instantly apprehended. Indeed, as we have seen the police, which is but an instrument, and the officers of justice had descended on Esther's house with the swiftness of a thunderbolt. Even if there had not been the reasons for revenge suggested to the superior police by Corentin, there was a robbery to be investigated of seven hundred and fifty thousand francs ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... arms around the waist of the tower. Throughout the tumult, flocks of sea-birds, driven from the surface, and bewildered in the dense darkness of the storm, would fly for the light and smite the lantern; and then they would fall backward into the surf, as if struck with a thunderbolt. Other creatures flew with more care; and Nancy shuddered as she saw the gleaming eyes of huge fish hawks outside, and beheld their dusky wings waving ...
— Annette, The Metis Spy • Joseph Edmund Collins
... great elephant, Airavata, of huge body and with two pair of white tusks. And him took Indra the wielder of the thunderbolt. But with the churning still going on, the poison Kalakuta appeared at last. Engulfing the Earth it suddenly blazed up like a fire attended with fumes. And by the scent of the fearful Kalakuta, the three worlds were stupefied. And then Siva, being solicited by Brahman, swallowed ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... had struck like a thunderbolt on the baronet; but it was a thunderbolt whose falling he had anticipated with shuddering horror during every day and every hour since his arrival ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... the teleview. Through clutching beds of seaweed the enemy submarine was ploughing. Her great, smooth bow lay straight ahead, metal hawser arm spanning the thirty feet between them. In another second, Keith thought grimly, two dynamite packed tubes of sudden death would thunderbolt into that hull, and— ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... fell like a thunderbolt on the assembled group. Even Frida was shocked. Your most open-minded woman begins to draw a line when you touch her class prejudices in the matter of marriage, especially with reference to her own relations. "Why, really, Mr. Ingledew," she ...
— The British Barbarians • Grant Allen
... poetry almost as much as they admired it. They could not believe that either vision at the one end or violence at the other could ever be practical. They were deaf to that great warning of Hugo: "You say the poet is in the clouds; but so is the thunderbolt." Ideals exhausted themselves in the void; Victorian England, very unwisely, would have no more to do with idealists in politics. And this, chiefly, because there had been about these great poets a young and splendid sterility; since the pantheist Shelley was in fact washed under by the wave ...
— The Victorian Age in Literature • G. K. Chesterton
... to him as though his heart was beating as noisily as a clock-pendulum, and that every one would turn to inquire whence came the noise. But every one was occupied; no one turned round; no one suspected that there was a man present on whom a thunderbolt had ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... shot and killed men himself. I'm afraid he's been rather wicked, you know. He's lived alone in the woods like a hermit without seeing a soul, and then, again, he's been a chief among the Indians, with Heaven knows how many Indian wives! They called him 'The Pale-faced Thunderbolt,' my dear, and 'The Young Man who Swallows the Lightning,' or something ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... brilliancy seemed to fall like a meteor a few yards in front of our eyes. At first we were sure the house had been struck, so that the first impulse was to rush out of doors; but the succeeding report being much less severe, confidence was restored. The general conclusion was that a thunderbolt had fallen, and, missing the house by a few yards, had disappeared in the earth. A search next morning on the lawn did not throw any light on the matter. Probably, if there was a thunderbolt, it fell into the river; for it is well known that water is a great conductor of ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... Rich Mountain came. It fell like a thunderbolt from the summer sky, that the people deluded themselves was to sail over them with never a cloud! The flood-tide of success, upon which they had been floating so gaily, was suddenly dammed and flowed back upon them in ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... conscience at ease in the absolution which he had wrung from Mother Church after his own fashion, he was entirely absorbed in preparations for a campaign against the Moors which was to widen his dominions. Therefore when at length the thunderbolt descended, it fell—so far as he was ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... a thunderbolt fall on the tower della Credenza on its Northern side, and it descended with a slow motion down that side, and then at once parted from that tower and carried with it and tore away from that wall a space of 3 braccia wide and two deep; and this wall was 4 braccia thick and ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci
... each? Therefore he was a councillor before the usual age, And a popular leader and an acute judge, And upon enemies he breathed a strategic flame (such as military rules required), And was an irresistible thunderbolt upon their serried ranks. He presided over the army like a father, Guarding the commonweal lest any advantage to it should be stolen. Contracting a highly-born and seemly marriage connection, And securing thus again royal ...
— Byzantine Churches in Constantinople - Their History and Architecture • Alexander Van Millingen
... over-high for nerve an' is a long way from bein' clean strain game; but he figgers, so I allers reckons, that the Colonel ain't no thunderbolt of war himse'f, so when he reads as to him an' Peets an' them treemors an' the whiskey checks, he starts in to drink an' discuss about his honor, an' gives it ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... publishing day is Thursday. The Encore is the Times of the music-hall world. It casts its curses here, bestows its benedictions (sparely) there. The Encore criticising the latest action of the Variety Artists' Federation is the nearest modern approach to Jove hurling the thunderbolt. Its motto is, "Cry havoc, and let loose the ...
— The Swoop! or How Clarence Saved England - A Tale of the Great Invasion • P. G. Wodehouse
... West Indiaman, the night had set in and a stiff breeze had arisen, so that the long and laborious search that was made for the body of poor Mrs. Ellice proved utterly fruitless. Captain Ellice, whose wound was very severe, was struck down as if by a thunderbolt, and for a long time his life was despaired of. During his illness Fred nursed him with the utmost tenderness, and in seeking to comfort his father, found some relief to ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... this sentence on me was like that of a thunderbolt; I returned home like a man in a dream. I immediately sat down and wrote to Manucci, asking him why I had been subjected to such an insult; but Philippe, my man, brought me ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... the Ohio, through all the gigantic valley of a river so great that it seems a fable, south to New Orleans, and westward to the undiscovered lies the country that is to be! And Napoleon, in order that he may brandish over England one thunderbolt the more, sells it for a song!—and we buy it for a song—and not one man in fifty guesses that we have bought the song of the future! The man who bought it knows its value—but Mr. Jefferson cares only for Done lays. He'll not have the Phrygian. He dreams of cotton and olives, of flocks and herds, ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... sure. At a loud peal overhead the boy I was playing with deliberately stuck up his scornful lips at the clouds and in other ways expressed his defiance. I fairly cringed in my tracks; I expected to see my companion smitten with a thunderbolt at my side. That I recall the incident so vividly shows what a deep impression it made upon me. But I have long ceased to think that the Ruler of the storms sees or cares whether we make faces at the clouds or not—do ...
— My Boyhood • John Burroughs
... people, like mice, compared with old Aladdin. They only wanted a tower that would reach heaven— a mere trifle. He wanted a tower that would pass heaven and rise above it, and go on rising for ever and ever. And Allah cast him down to earth with a thunderbolt, which sank into the earth, boring a hole deeper and deeper, till it made a well that was without a bottom as the tower was to have been without a top. And down that inverted tower of darkness the soul of the proud Sultan is falling forever ...
— The Man Who Knew Too Much • G.K. Chesterton
... nimble, fleeting. raro, -a strange, unusual. rasgar tear, rend. raudal m. torrent, stream. raudo, -a rapid, swift, precipitate.. raya f. stripe, streak. rayar border upon. rayo m. ray, thunderbolt, beam, light. razn f. reason, reasoning. realidad f. reality. realizar realize, make real, bring about. rebelde adj. rebellious. rebramar bellow. recatado, -a cautious, careful, prudent. recato m. modesty, prudence, coyness. recelo m. misgiving, apprehension, fear. ...
— El Estudiante de Salamanca and Other Selections • George Tyler Northup
... forest trees waved their heads on high, And shrunk from the storm's fierce stroke; The lightning flash'd as from GOD'S own eye, The thunderbolt crash'd through the startled sky, As it ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various
... temper had reached its breaking point. It snapped. In a twinkling, things were happening. Using quick, almost superhuman strength, he picked up the half-breed by the neck and one leg and hurled him, like a thunderbolt, into the ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens
... Galilean?" Like a thunderbolt the question struck Peter. He stiffened with terror and cursed himself for having dared to come near the fire. "Of course not!" he answered gruffly, and backed away. The man who had seen him strike Malchus with his sword had not heard the question. Peter sighed. His luck ...
— Men Called Him Master • Elwyn Allen Smith
... let for years, and there was quite a pleasant little place in town, 3 Southwick Crescent—yes, she would probably prefer to go, even had he not meant to marry Mary. The announcement of that little affair would be something in the nature of a thunderbolt. ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... two other things happened. Grim Morgan hit the guard like a crashing thunderbolt and Hilary's gun barked once. The monster tottered under the impact. A puzzled expression flitted over his pinkish eyes, a filmy sheath spread over them like a veil, and he fell heavily, a neat bullet hole square between ...
— Slaves of Mercury • Nat Schachner
... What a thunderbolt! All at once Bernhard's flushed countenance became livid, his eyes glared savagely, and there suddenly spread a choking, suffocating expression on his large handsome face. The noise and clamour of hoarse angry voices became almost stupefying, but in the end the Teutons ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker
... sooner given the signal than the champions vanished from their posts with the speed of lightning and closed in the center of the lists with the shock of a thunderbolt. The lances burst into shivers up to the very grasp and it seemed at the moment that both knights had fallen, for the shock had made each horse recoil 5 backwards upon its haunches. The address of the riders ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... the Prophet Ilya that the power once attributed to Perun is now ascribed. The pagan wielder of the thunderbolt is represented in modern traditions by more than one Christian saint. Sometimes, as St. George, he transfixes monsters with his lance; sometimes, as St. Andrew, he smites with his mace a spot given over to witchcraft. There was a village (says one of the legends of the Chernigof Government) in ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... cured. When you command the skies clear, the wind suddenly blows or likewise abates; the falling thunderbolt at your command moves back to the clouds. Oh, I implore you, who in the air can keep up the beneficent dew or let it pour its welcome freshness on the withering plant, impart fresh vigor to my old limbs. See me; I am dying; revive my drooping energy; ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... the army, and of its treasures, its provisions, a crowd of enormous waggons, loaded with the Emperor's equipage, a large quantity of artillery, and a great number of wounded men. Our retreat had come upon them like an unexpected storm, almost like a thunderbolt. Some were terrified and thrown into confusion, while consternation kept others motionless. Orders, men, horses, and carriages, were running about in all directions, crossing and ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... were removing from the bit table, I poppit out, in the first and foremost instance, to take a vizzy of the depredation the flames had made in our neighbourhood. Losh keep us all, what a spectacle of wreck and ruination! The roof was clean off and away, as if a thunderbolt from heaven had knocked it down through the two floors, carrying every thing before it like a perfect whirlwind. Nought were standing but black, bare walls, a perfect picture of desolation; some with the bit pictures on nails still hanging up where the rooms were like; and others ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... of the cathedral rose high above the framework of broken arches and single pillars, like a white rock which had been split from end to end by a thunderbolt. A recent shell had torn out a slice so that the top of the tower was supported only upon broken buttresses, and the great pile was hollowed out like a decayed tooth. The Cloth Hall was but a skeleton in stone, with immense gaunt ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... strong and compact Body of Figures. The Genius of Heroic Poetry appeared with a Sword in her Hand, and a Lawrel on her Head. Tragedy was crowned with Cypress, and covered with Robes dipped in Blood. Satyr had Smiles in her Look, and a Dagger under her Garment. Rhetorick was known by her Thunderbolt; and Comedy by her Mask. After several other Figures, Epigram marched up in the Rear, who had been posted there at the Beginning of the Expedition, that he might not revolt to the Enemy, whom he was suspected to favour in his Heart. I was very much awed and delighted with the ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... is fierce, irascible, haughty; and what slighted lover is not revengeful? For my sake, Cleonice, for your poor father's sake, show no scorn, no repugnance; be gentle, play with him, draw not down the thunderbolt, even if you turn ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton
... not killed by a thunderbolt," Matvey went on, crossing himself before the ikon and moving his lips. "My dead mother must have been praying for me in the other world. When everyone in the town looked upon me as a saint, and even the ladies and gentlemen of good family used to come to me in secret for consolation, ...
— The Bishop and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... superinduced upon solid excellence. This peculiarity is especially noticeable in narratives where the element of horror is central, as in 'The Avenger.' The gentle whisper rises, gradually and by insensible degrees, to the awful voice of the thunderbolt. The prelude is calm enough, sweet enough, but soon the music ascends to a fiercer key; the plot darkens; the crisis gathers; louder and more tumultuous waxes the fiendish tumult, until all lesser passions ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... turning in his onward course—the momentary pause to fix more accurately the position of his prey—the arrow-like descent— the plunge—the white spray dancing upward, and then the hiatus occasioned by the total disappearance of the winged thunderbolt, until the white object starts forth again above the blue surface—all these points are incomparable to behold. No ingenuity of man, aided by all the elements of air, water, or fire, can produce an exhibition with ...
— The Boy Tar • Mayne Reid
... compared to the hurtling arrow or the whizzing lance. Especially did this apply to the phenomenon of the lightning. The belief that a stone is shot from the sky with each thunderclap is shown in our word "thunderbolt," and even yet the vulgar in many countries point out certain forms of stones as derived from this source. As the refreshing rain which accompanies the thunder gust instills new life into vegetation, and covers the ground ...
— American Hero-Myths - A Study in the Native Religions of the Western Continent • Daniel G. Brinton
... glistening thread about their shriveled stems, seemed for a short space to lift Philip Steele from out of the world he was in, to another in which his mind was only vaguely conscious, stunned by this letter that had come with the unexpectedness of a thunderbolt to change, in a single instant, every current of life in his body. For a few moments he made no effort to grasp the individual significance of the letter, the flowers, the golden hair. One thought filled his brain—one great, overpowering truth, which excluded everything else—and this was the ...
— Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • James Oliver Curwood
... depends on preconceived ideas of conversions. I have heard of sudden and violent crises of the soul, of a thunderbolt, or even of faith exploding at last in ground slowly and cleverly mined. It is quite evident that conversions may happen in one or other of these two ways, for God acts as may seem good to Him, but there must be also a third means, and this no doubt the most usual, ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... expectation, grinds up obstacles, crushes men like flies. All the terror of the situation is in the fluctuations of the flooring. How fight an inclined plane subject to caprices? The ship has, so to speak, in its belly, an imprisoned thunderstorm, striving to escape; something like a thunderbolt rumbling above ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... the thunderbolt will fall? when the tempest is about to burst? where the prairie-fire will break ...
— Dick Onslow - Among the Redskins • W.H.G. Kingston
... had known of the disappearance of the will, except the lawyer and the secretary, it came as a thunderbolt. ...
— The Gold Bag • Carolyn Wells
... fleet, and followed the same route. All who were sincere hoped to arrive the same day at the coast of the Desert, and that every one would get on shore; but MM. Schmaltz and Lachaumareys gave orders to take the route for Senegal. This sudden change in the resolutions of the chiefs was like a thunderbolt to the officers commanding the boats. Having nothing on board but what was barely necessary to enable us to allay the cravings of hunger for one day, we were all sensibly affected. The other boats, which, like ourselves, ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard
... eastward and was dispersed. Black though had been its shadow, it endured but for a moment; the echo of its fury passed away, and its deadly thunderbolt left behind a purer atmosphere. So sweeps and rages over men's heads the storm of calamity; and so dissolves, though ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... Borizow we halted at the sound of loud shouts, thinking ourselves cut off by the Russian army. I saw the Emperor grow pale; it was like a thunderbolt. A few lancers were hastily dispatched, and we saw them soon returning waving their banners in the air. His Majesty understood the signal, and even before the cuirassiers had reassured us, so clearly did he keep in mind even the possible position of each corps of his army, he exclaimed, "I bet it ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... relation to any persons better disposed to use all possible means to comfort you." "Madam," replied Abou Ayoub's disconsolate widow, "a favourite of the commander of the true believers, a lady whose name is Fetnah, is the occasion of all our misfortunes." These words were like a thunderbolt to the favourite; but suppressing her agitation and concern, she suffered Ganem's mother to proceed in the following manner: "I am the widow of Abou Ayoub, a merchant of Damascus; I had a son called Ganem, who, coming to trade at Bagdad, has been accused of carrying ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... flames. For this policy he was suspected by both sides. At one time he was accused before an English court of being in league with the Americans. At another time he was accused by the Americans of being in league with the English. At length the thunderbolt fell. As the Christian Indians of Gnadenhtten were engaged one day in tilling the soil, the American troops of Colonel Williamson appeared upon the scene, asked for quarters, were comfortably, lodged, and then, disarming ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... cool. This morning a little cold and raw. Now's the time for catching coughs and cold;—people are coughing already. Just before day-break, a thunderbolt was said to be discharged over the city, accompanied with a long, low growling muttering sound, which reverberated from the Saharan hills. The circumstance remarkable, in the falling of this dread bolt of heaven's artillery, at the time the sky was perfectly ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... his listener sufficiently excited, Tom launched his thunderbolt in one brief sentence, and fell back to watch ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... me take a little nourishment, and noticing that with my strength my melancholy and anxiety were returning, Marcasse announced, with a simple, genuine delight, that Edmee was not dead, and that they did not despair of saving her. These words fell upon me like a thunderbolt; for I was still under the impression that this frightful adventure was a delusion of my delirium. I began to shout and to brandish my arms in a terrible manner. Marcasse fell on his knees by my bed and implored ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... [Greek: hek kakistou korakost kakiston hoon]. This I am astonished at, if the report is true: that there are among the Parisian divines those who pride themselves on having at length secured a man who by the thunderbolt of his eloquence is to break asunder the whole party of Luther and restore the church to its pristine tranquility. For he wrote also against Luther as I hear. And then the divines complain that they are slandered by me, who aid their studies in so many night-watches; while they themselves ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus
... thunderbolt upon the assembly. The prisoner's face grew pale; he grasped the railing in front of him and gazed wistfully at the jurors who stood ...
— Bucholz and the Detectives • Allan Pinkerton
... from the time I received the first message until we pulled out and started on our wild ride of rescue. Forty miles in forty minutes, with one slow down was our time. The old derrick and wreck outfit swayed to and fro like reeds in the wind, as we went down the track like a thunderbolt, but fortunately we held to the rails. There was scarcely a word spoken in the caboose, every one being intent upon holding on and thinking of the horrible scene we were soon to view. When we reached Truxton we found the track walker there, and after ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... forgotten that in his entire emotional life Strindberg was an artist and as such a man of impulse, with the spontaneity and naivity and intensity of a child. For him love had nothing to do with respectability and worldly calculations; he liked to think of it as a thunderbolt striking mortals with a destructive force like the lightning hurled by the almighty Zeus. It is easy to understand that a man of such temperament would not be particularly suited for married life, where self-sacrifice and strong-minded patience may ...
— The Road to Damascus - A Trilogy • August Strindberg
... cannot tell; but take this quantity as certain, and consider that this represents merely the results of the labor of the constant summer streams, utterly irrespective of all sudden falls of stones and of masses of mountain (a single thunderbolt will sometimes leave a scar on the flank of a soft rock, looking like a trench for a railroad); and we shall then begin to apprehend something of the operation of the great laws of change, which are the conditions of all material existence, however apparently enduring. The ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... to Proserpine the possession of Adonis, caused the women of Thrace to become enamoured of her son, and to tear him in pieces while disputing the possession of him. An ancient author, quoted by Hyginus, says that Orpheus was killed by the stroke of a thunderbolt, while he was accompanying the Argonauts; and Apollodorus says the same. Diodorus Siculus calls him one of the kings of Thrace; while other writers, among whom are Cicero and Aristotle, assert that there never ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... before, I can scarcely complain, when I remember my own action. But you will never know how bitterly I have repented of my folly. When that terrible charge was made against me last Monday—it came, when I was so happy and hopeful, like a sudden thunderbolt—I thought I should lose my reason. I felt that you had gone away believing I was utterly false and had been insincere in everything from first to last. I was like one who had fallen from a great height, and I scarcely spoke or moved for two days. I was not like ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... meat. When she seems to lose ground with him by her slander against the Round Table which he loved, she recovers it by making him believe that she saw all other men, "the knights, the Court, the King, dark in his light": and when in answer to her imprecation on herself a fearful thunderbolt descends and storm rages, then, nestling in his bosom, part in fear but more in craft, she overcomes the last remnant of his resolution, wins the secret she has so indefatigably wooed, and that instant uses it to close ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... extinguished in them; nothing was—heard but the rolling of the thunder and the dash of the water against the rocks, for the men in the half-ruined cabin, grouped round a corpse and a villain, were silent, tongue-tied with horror, and fearing lest God himself should send a thunderbolt upon them. ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... following the death of her mother, a thunderbolt fell at Constance's feet, which eventually ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... Klictsò they went to a place called Tse'binà yol (Wind Circles Around a Rock). When they drew near the place they heard loud peals of thunder and the lightning struck close to them in four different places. They were now approaching the home of the lightning gods; this is why destruction by the thunderbolt seemed to threaten them. Then the Navajo spoke to the lightning, as he had formerly spoken to the whirlwind, saying, "'Tis I, Reared Within the Mountains. Who art thou?" whereat the thunder and the lightning ceased, and ...
— The Mountain Chant, A Navajo Ceremony • Washington Matthews
... thunderbolt has fallen with a vengeance now. On Friday night after leaving you, in the course of conversation, my father put me one or two questions as to beliefs, which I candidly answered. I really hate all lying so much now—a new found honesty that has somehow come ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... air, and heavy cannonading, and occasionally an explosion, like the blowing up of a powder-wagon. Mingled with this was the sound of thunder-bells from a village not far off. They were all ringing dolefully to ward off the thunderbolt. At the entrance of the village stood a large wooden crucifix; around which was a crowd of priests and peasants, kneeling in the wet grass, by the roadside, with their hands and eyes lifted toheaven, and praying for rain. Their prayer ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... contains some objects deserving of attention. There are two altars with wheels carved on them, both small, the largest only two feet three inches high, and that has on it not the wheel only, but the thunderbolt. These are altars to the Gaulish god of the sun. The second bears an inscription "et terrae matri." It was dedicated doubtless to the "sun and to the earth mother," but the first portion of the legend is lost. ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... Shakespeare readings, my dearest. Can I forget anything that recalls you to me, half of my heart? If there had been time, indeed, I might have written to my uncle; I might even have come to you; but the hour descended like a thunderbolt; I fled, Manuela with me. The manner of my flight? you will ask. Marguerite, it was managed—I do not boast, I am the soul of humility, you know it!—the manner of it was perfect. Listen, and you shall hear all. You remember that in my last letter—written, alas! ...
— Rita • Laura E. Richards
... albatross moving athwart the sky, no longer slow sailing as before, but with the swift-cutting flight of a falcon pouncing down upon its prey. It seemed descending not in a straight line, but in an acute parabolic curve, like a thunderbolt or some aerolite projected toward the surface of the sea. But the bird, with a whirr like the sound of running spindles, was going in a definite direction, the point evidently aimed at being the ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... It was only at intervals they spoke, for there was no call to do so, and it was not wise to allow any cause to interfere with their watchfulness for the peril which was liable to come with the suddenness of the thunderbolt. ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis
... a sort of family resemblance to the freaks of lightning or the thunderbolt. Indeed, so striking is the similarity, that people have been prone to think, that, previously to an explosion, the steam in the boiler must have become in some inexplicable way charged with electricity like a thunder-cloud, and that ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... exertions greater than my strength could bear; or that the policy which I initiated was not honourable, and worthy of Athens, and indeed necessary: and then denounce me, but not before. {194} But if the thunderbolt [or the storm] which fell has proved too mighty, not only for us, but for all the other Hellenes, what are we to do? It is as though a ship-owner, who had done all that he could to ensure safety, and had equipped the ship with all ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 2 • Demosthenes
... through the city like a thunderbolt, that the renowned financial operator and millionnaire, Aloysius Darvid, had, during the night, in his study, taken his own life with a revolver. The first and universal thought was of bankruptcy. But no. Soon it became clear and most certain ...
— The Argonauts • Eliza Orzeszko (AKA Orzeszkowa)
... a thunderbolt broke over the Brandenburger Thor, and rolled like the breaking of a wave to the other end of the street. The king had left the Potsdam railway station a quarter of an hour ago, and the crowd greeted him with a tremendous shout as his carriage appeared. The people wished by this ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... a miserable thing for a question of truth {319} to be confined to mere presumption and counter-presumption, with no decisive thunderbolt of fact to clear the baffling darkness. And, sooth to say, in talking so much of the merely presumption-weakening value of our records, I have myself been wilfully taking the point of view of the so-called 'rigorously ...
— The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James
... could not do, and giving way utterly, she shrieked and rushed from the room. She rushed upstairs. She stood in the middle of the floor listening to the silence, her thoughts falling about her like shaken leaves. It was as if a thunderbolt had destroyed the world, and left her alone in a desert. The furniture of the room, the bed, the chairs, the books she loved, seemed to have become as grains of sand, and she forgot all connection between them and herself. She ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... medicable by any antidote. Once administered, there was no more hope for its victim than for the souls of the damned who have received the final judgment. One drop of that bright water upon the tongue of a Titan would blast him like Jove's thunderbolt, would shrivel him up ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... shame Of Greece in peace, her thunderbolt in war— Demetrius the Macedonian, and Taker ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... the verge of the ditch for an instant, and then sprang in and crouched trembling at the feet of their master. The next instant the dark, thundering mass passed over head, being nothing less than an immense herd of buffalo driven forwards by the flames! The horses bowed their heads as if a thunderbolt was passing. The fire and the heavens were hid from view, and the roar above resembled the rush of mighty waters. When the last animal had sprung over the chasm, Glenn thanked the propitious accident that thus providentially prevented him ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... stairs, with the door double-locked, lay a hope of safety in the present, and of ultimate deliverance; there she had a respite from terror, as long as she kept the world outside. To her, therefore, the notion of sending for Tavannes, or communicating with him, came as a thunderbolt. Was her mistress mad? Did she wish to court her fate? To reach Tavannes they must apply to his riders, for Carlat and the men-servants were confined above. Those riders were grim, brutal men, who might resort ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... the sum-total of four thousand and eighteen francs eighty-five centimes, the amount of the three bills and expenses already incurred. On the morning of the very day when Doublon served the writ upon Eve, requiring her to pay a sum so enormous in her eyes, there came a letter like a thunderbolt from Metivier:— ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac
... could not destroy the ship merely by staring at her! Somewhere, somewhere, concealed but not far distant, that accomplice must have awaited the first beam of the rising sun as the signal to hurl his thunderbolt, to loose his ...
— The Destroyer - A Tale of International Intrigue • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... received the honors due to Zeus and his fiat had ruined the happiness of a contented home as completely as the thunderbolt wielded by the Father of ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... those—be they men or women—who yesterday drove you away, shall to-morrow tremble before you—to-morrow, do I say? nay, this very day I have already shown my displeasure—have already threatened. It is in my power, even now, to hurl the thunderbolt I have hitherto withheld. Louise, Louise, you shall be bitterly revenged; tears of blood shall repay you for the tears you have shed. Give me only ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... was like a thunderbolt to Mrs. Grizzle, who began to perceive that she had not succeeded quite so well as she imagined, in selecting for her brother a gentle and obedient yoke-fellow, who would always treat her with that profound respect which ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... that I am to blame, but I could not help glancing at the letter, picking it out of the senseless hand of Monsieur Otto. My God! the thunderbolt that it was! I did not faint, but I sat down beside my chief and I burst into tears. It was but a few words, but they told us that Egypt had been evacuated by our troops a month before. All our treaty was undone then, and the one consideration which had induced our enemies ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a thunderbolt to the Council, when those who were friendly to Garnett were pondering how they should act in view of Denis Quirk's charges; and those who stood opposed to Garnett were rejoicing in his discomfort. To the former his counter ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... Suddenly, like a thunderbolt, seventy-five pieces of artillery belched forth their sheets of flame and howling shells; and in an instant, our whole division was thrown into the most perfect confusion by the deadly missiles which flew among us in every direction. Such cannonading ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... Heep.) The clouds have gathered, the storm has broken, and the thunderbolt has fallen on the devoted head of Wilkins Micawber! Emma, my dear, the die is cast. All is over. Leave me ...
— Practice Book • Leland Powers
... saved her from shame! Yes, and I knew, too, that some day I must find her. I have carried the terror of that in my heart all these years. Yet I dared to take your love, and dared to fly from my sin; and then there comes this thunderbolt—oh, merciful heaven, it is too much to bear, too much to bear!" He sank down again; poor Helen could find no word of comfort, no utterance of her own bursting heart except the same frantic clasp ...
— King Midas • Upton Sinclair
... too long forgotten that the earth was given to him for usufruct alone, not for consumption, still less for profligate waste. Nature has provided against the absolute destruction of any of her elementary matter, the raw material of her works; the thunderbolt and the tornado, the most convulsive throes of even the volcano and the earthquake, being only phenomena of decomposition and recomposition. But she has left it within the power of man irreparably to derange the combinations of ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... driver follow the Cumberland sleigh post-haste. I was determined to see Carmel and have Carmel see me. Whatever cold judgment might say against the meeting, I could not live in my present anxiety. If the thunderbolt which had struck her had spared her life and reason she must know from my own lips that I was not only a free man, but as innocent of the awful charge conveyed in Sweetwater's action as was the brother, who had just been acquitted of it by ...
— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green
... the animal right upon the breast; and what with the force by which it had been launched from Pouchskin's powerful arm, and the impetus it had gained in its descent, it acted on Bruin like a thunderbolt—not only knocking him over on his back, but carrying his body along with it full ten paces down ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid
... thunderbolt out of a clear sky, and Bessie gave a little gasp of surprise: "So soon! Oh, Charlie, take me with you!" Realizing in the next instant the purport of the suggestion, she flung away from my hands and rushed into the parlor, where a dim, soft ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 29. August, 1873. • Various
... remained innocent. For, in short, can a heart be truly enamoured which does not dread as well as hope? And could you believe I loved you if this ominous letter had not alarmed me; if I had not trembled at the thunderbolt which I imagined had destroyed all my happiness? I leave it to yourself to judge if such an accident would not have caused any other lover to commit the same error; if I could disbelieve, alas, a proof which seemed ...
— Don Garcia of Navarre • Moliere
... clear notes fell like a thunderbolt upon the men. With a start they brought themselves up, and stared—only to see a little white-robed figure, with its astonished eyes uplifted with childlike, earnest gaze, as ...
— Five Little Peppers And How They Grew • Margaret Sidney
... thunderbolt falling upon his head out of serenest sky, the sad. Sir. Thomas remained, for a time, in a state of political annihilation. 'Sweet Robin' meanwhile, though stunned, was unscathed—thanks to the convenient conductor at his side. For, in Elizabeth's court, mediocrity was not always golden, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... to Phillis and talking himself, he had time to compass the situation that this thunderbolt created for him. Evidently, the first thing to do was to prevent a suspicion from arising in Phillis's mind, and it was to this that he applied himself on explaining the different kinds of paralysis. ...
— Conscience, Complete • Hector Malot
... fetishes whence he was evolved, the Indra of Vedic India is shepherd of the herd of heavenly kine. Vritra, a three-headed monster in the form of a serpent, steals away the herd and hides it in his cave. Indra pursues the robber, enters the cave with fury, overwhelms the monster with his thunderbolt, and leads back the kine to heaven, their milk sprinkling the earth. This myth gradually assumed in the Vedic hymns more splendid and artistic forms, and more amazing personifications. The original motive of the myth, as it has been interpreted even by Indian commentators, was the ...
— Myth and Science - An Essay • Tito Vignoli |
