"Bonfire" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... declared limes a contraband article, and solemnly vowed to publicly ferule the first person who was found breaking the law. This much-enduring man had succeeded in banishing gum after a long and stormy war, had made a bonfire of the confiscated novels and newspapers, had suppressed a private post-office, had forbidden distortions of the face, nicknames, and caricatures, and done all that one man could do to keep half ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... street with signals of jollity and triumph. Applauses of the general were every where intermingled with detestation against the parliament The most ridiculous inventions were adopted, in order to express this latter passion. At every bonfire rumps were roasted; and where these could no longer be found, pieces of flesh were cut into that shape; and the funeral of the parliament (the populace exclaimed) was celebrated by these symbols of ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... whose Iliad turns on Helen of Troy; you must condemn Milton's Paradise Lost. Eve and her serpent seem to me a pretty little case of symbolical adultery; you must suppress the Psalms of David, inspired by the highly adulterous love affairs of that Louis XIV. of Judah; you must make a bonfire of Mithridate, le Tartuffe, l'Ecole des Femmes, Phedre, Andromaque, le Mariage de Figaro, Dante's Inferno, Petrarch's Sonnets, all the works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the romances of the Middle Ages, the History of France, and of Rome, etc., etc. Excepting Bossuet's Histoire des ...
— Parisians in the Country - The Illustrious Gaudissart, and The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... now, it takes me back to the time of 1832. I would be eight or ten year old at the time. James Strachan was at the door by five o'clock in the morning in his Sabbath clothes, by arrangement. We was to go up to the hill to see them building the bonfire. Moreover, there was word that Mr. Scrimgour was to be there tossing pennies, just like at a marriage. I was wakened before that by my mother at the pans and bowls. I have always associated elections since that time with jelly-making; for just as my mother would ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... preparations for enforcing the stamp act called forth popular tumults in various places. In Boston the stamp distributor was hanged in effigy; his windows were broken; a house intended for a stamp office was pulled down, and the effigy burnt in a bonfire made of the fragments. The lieutenant-governor, chief justice, and sheriff, attempting to allay the tumult, were pelted. The stamp officer thought himself happy to be hanged merely in effigy, and next day publicly renounced the ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... longer, trifling with the gas, staring and listening. The car was shaking with the throb of the motor, but Casey could feel no forward motion. "Settin' here burnin' gas like a 'lection bonfire—she sure would think I'm drunk if she knowed it," Casey muttered, and straddled over the side of the car to ...
— Casey Ryan • B. M. Bower
... their minds to follow it too. "For the sundown," writes Shakib, "was more appealing to us than the sunrise, ay, more beautiful. The one was so near, the other so far away. Yes, we beheld the Hesperian light that day, and praised Allah. It was the New World's bonfire of hospitality: the sun called to us, and ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... advantage. While the boys—whose forces had been augmented by the addition of Sandy, Smith, Brown and Jones—got down logs and built them into a miniature log cabin, Blue Bonnet made great preparations for the Party. She spread all her Indian blankets at a proper distance from the bonfire-to-be; distributed the buck-board seats judiciously, planning to add the dining-room benches as soon as supper was out of the way; whittled great quantities of long willow wands to a sharp point, maintaining great secrecy as to the use to which the latter were ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... The official order was given, and all of Paine's books that could be found were seized and publicly used for a bonfire by the official hangman. Paine was burned in effigy in many cities, the charge being made that he was one of the men who had brought about the French Revolution. With better truth it could have been stated that he was the man, with the help of George the Third, who had brought about the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... few days earlier Garrick wrote to a friend:—'I did not hear till last night that your friends have generously contributed to your and their own happiness. No one can more rejoice at this circumstance than I do; and as I hope we shall have a bonfire upon the occasion, I beg that you will light it with the inclosed.' The inclosed was a bond for 280. Garrick Corres. ii. 297. Murphy says:—'Dr. Johnson often said that, when he saw a worthy family in distress, ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... I don't know what to advise; and yet we can't let them perish on the floes. We had better get the guns, and build a bonfire on the cape below; perhaps they may see it; but it wasn't for nothing that I saw those men the other night. Poor La Salle laughed at it, but if he ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... often to the highest hill in the center of the island, where he would spend long periods, examining the sea from horizon to horizon with his strong glasses, searching vainly for a sail. He thought once of keeping a mighty bonfire burning every night, but he reconsidered it when he reflected on the character of the ship that it ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... just a little hurt that the police have not prohibited our village bonfire. Why shouldn't Zeppelins come to Little Pilswick? Why should an arrogant metropolis monopolise everything? Still we hid our mortification and the Guy Committee met as usual in the saloon ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, November 4, 1914 • Various
... there for some news of her whereabouts and the roads, changed her mind as she drew near and resolved to pass the house at a gallop. So much for wise resolves. The miserable children who dwelt in the house had been that day making a bonfire for their amusement right on her track. The hot ashes were still there; the pony set his feet in them, reared high, and threw his rider, who had never known the pony do such a thing before and had no reason to expect it of him. ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume I • Susan Warner
... employed, or the same idea differently treated. But Othello had beaten him. "That noble gentleman and that noble lady—h'm—too painful for me." The same night the hoardings were covered with posters, "Burlesque of Othello," and the contrast blazed up in my mind like a bonfire. An unforgettable look it gave me into that kind man's soul. His acquaintance was indeed a liberal and pious education. All the humanities were taught in that bare dining-room beside his gouty footstool. He was a piece of good advice; he was himself the instance that pointed and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... hands and knees to pound the fire, fighting bravely, crying out with pain as he burned himself, and forced to drop stick after stick which caught fire. Soon it grew too hot to remain near, and he stood off and launched fuel at it, which resulted in a fair-sized bonfire; then, in desperation and fear, he hurled the dead pig—the cause of the trouble—at ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... "there is no reason for showing mercy to any of them; they have every one of them done mischief; better fling them out of the window into the court and make a pile of them and set fire to them; or else carry them into the yard, and there a bonfire can be made without the smoke giving any annoyance." The housekeeper said the same, so eager were they both for the slaughter of those innocents, but the curate would not agree to it without first reading at any rate ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... licht a shoo'r could richtly be called rain. The village weans were yearning for the hour to arrive when they might sit on the wet golf-course and have tea; manifestly, therefore, it could not be a bad day for Scotland; but if it should grow worse, what would become of our mammoth subscription bonfire on Pettybaw Law—the bonfire that Brenda Macrae was to light, as ...
— Penelope's Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... went anywhere near the mark. All shrieked over our heads and exploded harmlessly among the forest trees; one, however, dropped near the railway bridge and went off like a Hampstead squib on a wet bonfire night. It shows an utter lack of culture among the Bolshevik officers that they could not appreciate good music after we had taken so much trouble to bring it within their reach. The band finished and the shelling ended. I expect they ...
— With the "Die-Hards" in Siberia • John Ward
... resist the sudden and strong desire which he felt, to be once more among his fellow-men, to hear once more the English speech, and feel once more the grasp of a friendly hand. Hurrying down to the beach, he piled and lighted a large bonfire, to carry a message to his fellow-countrymen, but the ship, instead of sailing shoreward, or of putting off a boat at once, tacked and went farther from the island, taking the fire to be the lights of an enemy's ship at ...
— Famous Islands and Memorable Voyages • Anonymous
... father showed every sign of joy on hearing this news; saying that nothing would exceed his pleasure if all his children died, and that, when the grave should receive the last, he would, as a demonstration of joy, make a bonfire of all that he possessed. And on the present occasion, as a further sign of his hatred, he refused to pay the slightest sum towards the funeral expenses ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... rescued him, and surrender himself. But as soon as it was known that the "patriot" was in prison, the mob showed signs of rescuing him again. Crowds collected around his prison-house, pulled down the outward fence, and made a bonfire with it on the spot. An order was sent to the horse-guards, and a body of soldiers were stationed near the prison, but this only tended to increase the popular excitement. Every day, for nearly a fortnight, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud; so that all the people that was in the camp trembled." Moses had undoubtedly sent some thoroughly trustworthy person, probably Joshua, up the mountain to blow a ram's horn and to light a bonfire, and the effect ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... desolate bit of the Cresswell manor, a tiny cabin, new-boarded and bare, in front of it a blazing bonfire. A white man was tossing into the flames different household articles—a feather bed, a bedstead, two rickety chairs. A young, boyish fellow, golden-faced and curly, stood with clenched fists, while a woman with tear-stained eyes clung to him. The white man raised a cradle to dash ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... never before been kept in the like manner in Chicago. There was a row or two at Grand Crossing between the strikers and the railroad officials, several derailed cars and spiked switches, a row at Blue Island, and a bonfire in the stock yards. People were not travelling on this holiday, and the main streets ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... had they reached the roof than they threw the flaming brands and coal of our bonfire down the chimney, where they broke into fragments and rolled over the floor, setting fire to the scattered ...
— Captured by the Navajos • Charles A. Curtis
... but the turf table was round, and the oatcake divided into bits, one of which was blackened with charcoal. These being drawn from a bonnet, the holder of the black bit was held devoted to Baal, and had to leap three times over the bonfire. ...
— Miscellanea • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... a great glare of light breaks upon the scene from a bonfire of tar-barrels, ignited at the higher end of the cross-road by young SMALLEY; and, to the mingled bewilderment and exasperation of Mr. BUMSTEAD, the radiance reveals, as in noonday, Mr. SCHENCK and his long-lost nephew standing before ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2., No. 32, November 5, 1870 • Various
... the village they are celebrating the National Festival. (The 14th of July, the anniversary of the fall of the Bastille.—Translator's Note.) While the little boys and girls are hopping round a bonfire whose gleams are reflected upon the church-steeple, while the drum is pounded to mark the ascent of each rocket, I am sitting alone in a dark corner, in the comparative coolness that prevails at nine o'clock, harking to the concert of the festival of the fields, ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... come and let us out, you know; at least I take it for granted that they will before the roof comes down. If they don't, we must force the doors ourselves—I've looked at them—and until we do there is no fear of suffocating, for there are no panes to the windows. So, after all, it will only be a bonfire, without danger ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... probable that a week of pure vagabondia cured him of the idea that civilization is a disease, for he came back home, made a bonfire of his attire, and after a vigorous tubbing, was clothed in ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... Neuer at quiet: What are you? but this place is too cold for Hell. Ile Deuill-Porter it no further: I had thought to haue let in some of all Professions, that goe the Primrose way to th' euerlasting Bonfire. ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... country in the name of their monarch. There was firing of guns and shouts of 'Vive le roi!' Then Father Allouez and Saint-Lusson made speeches suitable to the occasion and the audience. At night the blaze of an immense bonfire illuminated with its fitful light the dark trees and foaming rapids. The singing of the Te Deum crowned ...
— The Great Intendant - A Chronicle of Jean Talon in Canada 1665-1672 • Thomas Chapais
... Pliant and apt, they lose no chance to show To what base depths apostasy can go; Outdo the natives in their readiness To roast a negro, or to mob a press; Poise a tarred schoolmate on the lyncher's rail, Or make a bonfire ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... high treason in Richelieu's time,—as when the Huguenots encouraged the invasion of the English on the soil of France. Savonarola was a zealot, and carried the same spirit into politics that he did into religion,—such as when he made a bonfire of what he called vanities. He had an end to carry: he would use any means. There is apt to be a spirit of Jesuitism in all men consumed with zeal, determined on success. To the eye of the Florentine reformer, the ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VI • John Lord
... as hunting in the woods began, the customs regulating it were established. The council teepee no longer existed. A hunting bonfire was kindled every morning at day-break, at which each brave must appear and report. The man who failed to do this before the party set out on the day's hunt was harassed by ridicule. As a rule, the hunters started before sunrise, and the brave who ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... one for robbery. I was beaten and dragged about, while the cry went up, 'Death to the Protestant!' The fire was blazing outside, as they had lots of kerosene, and with all the forms, chairs, texts, clothes and books the street was a veritable bonfire. Everything they could lay hands on was taken. At this moment the cry arose that the soldiers were coming, and a cavalry regiment charged down the street, carrying fear into the hearts of the people. A second charge cleared the street, and several soldiers ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray
... crowd had lit a huge bonfire, and then added to it a second one which, crackling, hissing, and emitting coils of bluish-tinted smoke, had fallen to vying with its fellow in lacing the foam of the rivulet with muslin-like patterns in red. As the mass of dark figures surged between the two flares an hilarious ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... alterings of syllables, as to make it very difficult to preserve a becoming gravity while listening to her. If you laughed, the fun was all over, for Sallie would turn as red as a whole box of wafers; all the dimples in her face would take French leave, and you could almost have declared there was a bonfire lighted up in each of her eyes; but this only lasted a moment, for she was a sweet-tempered, affectionate little creature, and got over being laughed at as quick as possible, which is a great deal quicker than you or ...
— Little Mittens for The Little Darlings - Being the Second Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... and pelted the constables. Encouraged by gentlemen at the windows of neighbouring houses, they tore a large part of the paper from the executioner with shouts of "Wilkes and liberty," carried it in triumph outside Temple Bar, the boundary of the city, and there made a bonfire into which they threw a jack-boot and a petticoat, the popular emblems of Bute and the Princess of Wales. Yet Wilkes was in an unpleasant position. A Scot went to his house intending to murder him; was arrested and found insane. A summons was sent to him to appear at the bar of the house of commons; ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... of art can the spectator be left out of account," he urged. "In a world full of smouldering prejudices a scrap of paper may start the bonfire. English society can afford to laugh where Jewish society must weep. That is why our papers are always so effusively grateful for Christian compliments. You see it is quite true that the author paints not the Jews but bad Jews, but, in the ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... blazing pile. The great sea-lights which ring the Islands now make a brave show; but (say the older inhabitants) it will not compare with the illuminations of bygone summer nights, when as many as forty kilns would be burning together, and island signalling to island with bonfire-lights that flickered across the roadsteads and danced on the wild tide-races. From four to five hours the kilns would be kept burning, and the critical moment came when the mass of kelp began to liquefy, and word was given to ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... eclipses all the others of which he is the hero. This evening the Vidame broke up the heretic church in the Mathurins; nearly all the accursed brood were slain, women as well as men; but there are still enough prisoners to give us a rare bonfire by Saturday. Is it not so, monsieur?" And Le Brusquet ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... made an attack upon the southern gate, while the other commanded by the Admiral advanced upon the northern. Treslong after a short struggle succeeded in forcing his entrance, and arrested, in doing so, the governor of the city, just taking his departure. De la Marck and his men made a bonfire at the northern gate, and then battered down the half-burned portal with the end of an old mast. Thus rudely and rapidly did the Netherland patriots conduct their first successful siege. The two parties, not more perhaps than two hundred and fifty men in all, met before sunset in the centre ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... parade-ground, being strewn and criss-crossed with fallen trees and interset with stumps, some cleanly cut, others with jagged splinters from three to ten feet high. And beyond, with the fierce sunlight quivering above it, rose a mass of prostrate trees piled as if for the base of a tremendous bonfire. Not a Frenchman showed behind it. Was that what they had ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... mobbed until they resigned. In Boston the rioters were especially active. They detested Thomas Hutchinson. He was lieutenant-governor and chief justice and had been active in enforcing the navigation acts. The rioters attacked his house. They broke his furniture, destroyed his clothing, and made a bonfire of his ...
— A Short History of the United States • Edward Channing
... before was repeated, only with greater intensity, and even in the sunlight I could see that the various hues his fiery breathings took on were gorgeous beyond description. A bonfire built of red, pink, green, and yellow lights, backed up by driftwood in a fearful state of combustion, about ...
— Olympian Nights • John Kendrick Bangs
... search was therefore made in a small district, in which no less than thirty were found prepared for the flames, the wheat having been threshed out and the straw re-stacked for the convenience of charging the barony for the bonfire. ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... wind; "but I softly stirred one branch—one which had been placed on the bonfire by the handsomest youth. His piece of wood blazed up, blazed highest. He was chosen the leader of the rustic game, became 'the wild boar,' and had the first choice among the girls for his 'pet lamb.' There were more happiness and merriment amongst ...
— The Sand-Hills of Jutland • Hans Christian Andersen
... that Byron was not a favorite with Hawthorne. In addition to his severe treatment of that poet, in "P's Correspondence," he says in "Earth's Holocaust," where he imagines the works of various authors to be consumed in a bonfire: ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... for, they said there was a flat in Serjeant's Inn just around the corner, which was to be let furnished. I told them I was going in for an exam. and afterwards I was going to take my little papers to a publisher. Miss Flagg lit up like a bonfire at this, and says she, 'I'm a literary agent. Do let me read it; I may be ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... saw them both interred, he cried out that he was well rid of such good-for-nothing children, but that he should be perfectly happy only when the remaining five were buried with the first two, and that when he had got rid of the last he himself would burn down his palace as a bonfire to celebrate the event. ...
— The Cenci - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... occasionally on the ceilings; even this will not be necessary. You may make a holocaust of the contents of any room in the house, and, if the doors, finish, etc., happen to be of iron, as they may be, no one in the house will suspect your bonfire, until the heap of charcoal and ashes is found. Dampness and decay, unsavory odors and impure air, chilly bedrooms and cold floors, will be unknown. The ears in the walls will be stopped, there will be no settlement from shrinking timbers, ...
— Homes And How To Make Them • Eugene Gardner
... of young Audubon that his drawings for many years fell so far short of his ideal, that on each of his birthdays he regularly made a bonfire of all he had produced during the previous year. He cared for nothing else, however, and after his return to America, his home became a museum of birds' eggs and stuffed birds. He took long tramps through the wilderness, with no ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... it!" cried George Wyndham, "Ah, but I'd make a bonfire of my Euclid and Virgil, and all the other worthies, or bury them, as the fellows do yearly at Yale College—I had much rather be fed with some essence ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins
... this man by the shoulder, but at that moment the bullets he had received took effect, and he fell down dead. The whole was the work of a few moments, and must have been his paroxysms of dying rage. In order to take out the charm from him, the Bakatla on the following day made a huge bonfire over the carcass, which was declared to be that of the largest lion they had ever seen. Besides crunching the bone into splinters, he left eleven teeth wounds on the upper part ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... brought them back to the city, and shot them dead in the street. Night now coming on, the apostles of the 'moral unity of France,' many of them by this time being exceedingly drunk, kindled a huge bonfire in front of the Hotel de Ville, flung into it the mutilated corpses of their victims, and towards midnight laying hands upon two priests, MM. Romain and Alexandre, threw them into the flames! Another band during the evening broke into the venerable ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... steaming away on the stove ready for supper. Mrs. Wiggs did not believe in sacrificing the present need to the future comfort. She threw in a liberal portion of pepper, and, seizing the kettle in one hand and the bucket of tallow in the other, staggered back to the bonfire. ...
— Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch • Alice Caldwell Hegan
... in Ephesus were nevertheless successful. He made many converts and exercised an extraordinary influence,—among other things causing magicians voluntarily to burn their own costly books, as Savonarola afterward made a bonfire of vanities at Florence. His sojourn was cut short at length by the riot which was made by the various persons who were directly or indirectly supported by the revenues of the Temple,—a mongrel mob, brought to terms by the tact of the town clerk, who reminded the howling dervishes and angry ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume II • John Lord
... The Terryfication was, at least, an advertisement. To advertise himself, in the modern way, Stevenson was not competent. He never was interviewed as a Celebrity at Home, as far as I am aware. Indeed, he loved not society papers, and lit a bonfire and danced a dance around it in his garden, when some editor of a journal of that sort was committed to prison. His name is not mentioned, but Stevenson and I had against him a grudge of very ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... length, a voice was heard to pronounce the words, "Try it with fire!" The rioters, with an unanimous shout, called for combustibles, and as all their wishes seemed to be instantly supplied, they were soon in possession of two or three empty tar-barrels. A huge red glaring bonfire speedily arose close to the door of the prison, sending up a tall column of smoke and flame against its antique turrets and strongly-grated windows, and illuminating the ferocious and wild gestures of the rioters who surrounded the place, ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... another great victory for the freshmen—and Frank Merriwell, and that night a great bonfire blazed on the campus and the students made merry. They blew horns, sang, cheered and ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish
... Dean Johnson, of New York University's school of commerce, if we all set fire to our Liberty Bonds. We can't go along with the Dean so far, but we have a hundred shares of copper stock that we will contribute to a community bonfire. ...
— The So-called Human Race • Bert Leston Taylor
... already visited them by their bonfire, had received their compliments, watched the sword dance and the dance of the clubs, touched with their lips, or pretended to touch, the stem of a keef, listened to a marriage song warbled by Ali to the accompaniment of a flute and little drums, and applauded ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... exclaimed Mrs. Rushbrooke, "I can hardly see how it will quite change everything for us here in Canada. For instance," she added with a gay laugh, "I do not see that it will change our bonfire tonight. By the way, I see you are not gone, Dr. Brown. You and Jane will surely come over; and, Mr. Murray, you will bring your young people and Mrs. Murray; and, Mr. McPherson, I hope you will be able to come. It is going ...
— The Major • Ralph Connor
... was frightened, no doubt. We don't have fracases at Font Abbey. On this one spot of earth comfort reigns, and balmy peace, and shall reign unruffled while I live. The passions are not admitted here, sir. Gracious Heaven forbid! I'd as soon see a bonfire in the middle of my dining-room as Jealousy ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... have a guy in this town? I had a famous one last year, and such a bonfire as you never saw, for we burnt down a haystack. I should like to have a guy this year; ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... spoken word. And, even were it prayer-time, or at a funeral, Alice must break into wild laughter. "Alice, be sad!"—and, at the instant, down would come her tears, quenching all the mirth of those around her like sudden rain upon a bonfire. "Alice, dance."—and dance she would, not in such court-like measures as she had learned abroad, but some high-paced jig, or hop-skip rigadoon, befitting the brisk lasses at a rustic merry-making. It seemed to be Maule's impulse, not ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... at one dim point, far in among the marshes and the ridges, a light sprang up. "That is an ignis fatuus," was my first thought; and I expected it would soon vanish. It burnt on, however, quite steadily, neither receding nor advancing. "Is it, then, a bonfire just kindled?" I questioned. I watched to see whether it would spread: but no; as it did not diminish, so it did not enlarge. "It may be a candle in a house," I then conjectured; "but if so, I can never reach it. It is much ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... profit they use as capital for the production of more profit, with ever the same waste attached to it; and part as private riches or means for luxurious living, which again is sheer waste—is in fact to be looked on as a kind of bonfire on which rich men burn up the product of the labour they have fleeced from the workers beyond what they themselves can use. So I say that, in spite of our inventions, no worker works under the present system an hour the less on account of those labour-saving ...
— Signs of Change • William Morris
... that he, with his comrades, went to Southern Illinois and Indiana with cavalry and infantry tactics and all the appliances for instructing others in military matters. The conspirators having failed at Chicago during the convention to make their starting point, having failed to make the great bonfire, which was to be the signal for thousands of others not quite so large, to burn up brightly from almost every hill-top in Ohio, Missouri, Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois, it was necessary for their leaders to meet again, ...
— The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details • I. Windslow Ayer
... pranks was the bonfire and the burning of an effigy. Now, so far from being a Ghetto custom, it did not even emanate from Europe, the continent of Ghettos; it belongs to Babylonia and Persia. This is what was done, according to an old Geonic account recovered by ...
— The Book of Delight and Other Papers • Israel Abrahams
... metamorphosis in Virgil of the ships into mermaids is not more absurd than an army of twelve or thirteen thousand of the flower of our troops and nobility performing the office of link-boys, making a bonfire, and running away! The French have said well, "les Anglois viennent nous casser des vitres avec des guin'ees."(900) We have lost six men, they five, and about a hundred vessels, from a fifty-gun ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... the full moon was assisted in her duties by a large bonfire down on our beach. The Adamless Eden, having received its "week-end" male contingent, was stimulated to a corn-roasting. The green ears, stuck on the ends of long sticks, were held by girls and men over the fire till roasted, and then passed on to a row of matrons, ...
— The Making of Mary • Jean Forsyth
... has any one seen a crackle, or a swingling-knife, or a hetchel, or a distaff, and where can one get some tow for strings or for gun-wadding, or some swingling-tow for a bonfire? The quill-wheel, and the spinning-wheel, and the loom are heard no more among us. The last I knew of a certain hetchel, it was nailed up behind the old sheep that did the churning; and when he was disposed to shirk or hang back and stop the machine, it was ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... and the talk became more audible. Captain Tushin, having given orders to his company, sent a soldier to find a dressing station or a doctor for the cadet, and sat down by a bonfire the soldiers had kindled on the road. Rostov, too, dragged himself to the fire. From pain, cold, and damp, a feverish shivering shook his whole body. Drowsiness was irresistibly mastering him, but he kept awake by an excruciating pain in his arm, for which he could find no satisfactory position. ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... Mrs. Kendrick, resuming the use of her shears, "if you'll try to worry along and stand it this time, I'll send out and have a fence built across the big road, and get the niggers to light a bonfire; and we'll stop him the next time he comes along. I'll have to do my duty by my own children, I reckon. But don't be alarmed," she continued, perceiving that Kitty's distress was genuine. "You may have to fly around here and get George ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... I stopped to interview the man in charge. Boards, water-soaked mattresses, rags of blankets and curtains, part of a piano, baby-carriages, and the framework of sewing-machines, piled on top, gave it the appearance of a festive bonfire, and only the familiar odor ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton
... the professor, more gently. "We will give you a chance to defend yourself. It is not customary to inquire into the moral character of specimens, but we do not wish to be unjust. Perhaps you can explain why you made a bonfire the very week after the toads came out of their winter-quarters. Dozens of lives were destroyed before that fire was ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education
... young mistress? That's well. Hist! I say again." The boy entered the room. "I'm in time to save you. In half an hour your house will be broken into, perhaps burned. The boys are clapping their hands now at the thoughts of the bonfire. Father and all the neighbours are getting ready. Hark! hark! No, it is only the wind! The tymbesteres are to give note. When you hear their bells tinkle, the mob will meet. Run for your lives, you and the old man, and don't ever say it was poor Tim who ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... friend Bernard's cracker to the reviewers in No. 12, a perfect fifth of November bit of firework, I can assure you, good people. But it won't go off with me without a brand from the bonfire in return. "Bear ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... stood up in his box waving his drawn sword, which someone, however, ventured to wrest from his grasp. The interior fittings of the theatre were completely destroyed; the furniture and hangings being carried into the street and made a bonfire of, the curtain surmounting the flaming heap like a gigantic flag. A riot at the Lincoln's Inn Fields, in 1721, led to George I.'s order that in future a guard should attend the performances. This ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... and vigor. He had not been long there, however, when, a notice was posted one night on his door, giving him ten days to clear off from this interdicted spot, threatening, in case of non-compliance, to make a bonfire of the house and offices, inmates included. The reply, which Vengeance made to this was fearless and characteristic. He wrote another notice, which he posted on the chapel-door, stating that he would not budge an inch—recommending, at the same time, ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton
... Guicciardini nor Machiavelli, writing years afterwards, when Savonarola had fallen and Florence was again enslaved, could propose anything wiser than his Consiglio Grande. Yet the fierce revivalism advocated by the friar—the bonfire of Lorenzo di Credi's and Fra Bartolommeo's pictures, of MSS, of Boccaccio and classic poets, and of all those fineries which a Venetian Jew is said to have valued in one heap at 22,000 florins—the recitation of such Bacchanalian ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... threw off her masquerading dress, that she had unconsciously worn until now, and dropped it on the floor, where it lay glowing like a smouldering bonfire. She then put on a water-proof riding habit, ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... more. "Attention, Garibaldi wants to speak!" called a workingman that knew him. All looked astonished at the stranger. Many laughed at his agitation. His necktie glowed lurid like a midsummer eve bonfire against the pictures and trophies on ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... dinner from our table: some of the grown-up schoolboys and Polly. We had Mr. and Mrs. Koch, Mr. and Mrs. Owen, Mr. Zehnder, and Mrs. Crookshank at our table. Papa counted that ninety-seven people were fed on the mission premises on Christmas Day. After dinner we had a bonfire in the hollow below our hill, between the house and the church. Quantities of dry bamboo had been collected there, which threw up columns of sparks, and lit up all the under leaves of the trees, making the dark sky ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... ignition, burning; phlogiston; conflagration, holocaust, deflagration; flame, blaze; bonfire, balefire, feu de joie, beacon. Associated Words: pyrology, pyrography, pyromania, pyrophobia, incendiary, incendiarism, arson, lurid, Moloch, fuel, combustible, pyroleter, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... pitch suit and a bonfire, rather than the lustring; and as her clothes are returned, le the lady's be put to her others, to be sent to her when it can be told whither—but not till I give the word neither; for we must get the dear ...
— Clarissa, Volume 6 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... have already begun, for the chimneys roar and a ruddy light gleams through the windows; but "No," say the people above, "those below would take care not to set the house on fire, for they live in it as we do. It is only a straw bonfire and a burning chimney, and a little water will extinguish it; and, besides, these little accidents clear the chimney and burn ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... descended to Eisenach, fraternised with the Landsturm in the market-place, and attended divine service in the parish church without mishap. In the evening they edified the townspeople with gymnastics, which were now the recognised symbol of German vigour, and lighted a great bonfire on the hill opposite the castle. Throughout the official part of the ceremony a reverential spirit prevailed; a few rash words were, however, uttered against promise-breaking kings, and some of the hardier spirits took advantage of ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... city against our kingdom's walls. There should be good fighting, and much spoil. When the soldiers have glutted themselves with wine and women, let the city be set on fire. I shall look every night for a light in the sky, and when it comes I shall know it is my bonfire. Perhaps it will light up my heart for a moment. When that is finished, I shall find you other ...
— King Arthur's Socks and Other Village Plays • Floyd Dell
... There was a bonfire in front of the hotel when the returns began to come in, for Sandy was winning easily, and Sandy certainly showed his gratitude for the way the boys had ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... long in doubt. The first sight that presented itself as they came trooping up the slope in front of the log hut, was an ox roasting whole before a gigantic bonfire. Tables were being extemporised on the broad level plot in front of the gate. Other fires there were, of smaller dimensions, on which sundry steaming pots were placed, and various joints of wild horse, bear, and venison roasted, and sent forth a savoury odour as well as a pleasant ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne
... Hans, as he took a little more breath. "They first counseled me to get a light—then went house and all in a bonfire; next, I must get a journeyman—then went the money; and now they would have me bring more plagues upon me than Moses brought upon Egypt. Nay, nay!" thought Hans; "you'll not catch ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... watches the bonfire. "So that's over. And it's rather a relief to find out that I haven't got to be a lady artist, after all. What is more, I am positive I couldn't write a book. I'm afraid, Torchy, that I am a most every-day ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford
... wearied all my readers. To the execution place was he brought, where first and formost he was stript, then on a sharpe yron stake fastened in the ground, had he his fundament pitcht, which stake ran vp along into his bodie like a spit, vnder his arme-hoales two of like sort, a great bonfire they made round about him, wherewith his flesh rosted not burnd: and euer as with the heate his skinne blistered, the fire was drawne aside, and they basted him with a mixture of Aqua fortis, allam water, and Mercury sublimatum, which ...
— The Vnfortunate Traveller, or The Life Of Jack Wilton - With An Essay On The Life And Writings Of Thomas Nash By Edmund Gosse • Thomas Nash
... growing louder as he came nearer, confirmed his suspicions. The fence at this end was down, and, on entering the field, a gleam of light met his eye on the ground—a cloud of smoke, black figures were flitting round it, pushing brands into red places, and feeding the bonfire. ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... campaigns, have robbed long since of any colour of reality they once possessed. They express no creative purpose now, whatever they did in their inception, they point towards no constructive ideals. Essentially they are things for the museum or the bonfire, whatever momentary expediency may hold back the New Republican from an unqualified advocacy of such a destination. The old party fabrics are no more than dead rotting things, upon which a great tangle of personal jealousies, old grudges, thorny nicknames, prickly memories, family curses, ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells
... on in quad, sir," he said. "The young gentlemen 'as a bonfire on, and they're a larking with the snow. Orful A they're ...
— The Mark Of Cain • Andrew Lang
... become a Christian! The ancestors frizzled in the bonfire, and the descendants singled out and cursed for centuries ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... city. Several persons illuminated their houses in token of their joy. On the following day, when Mr. Aislabie was conveyed to the Tower, the mob assembled on Tower-hill with the intention of hooting and pelting him. Not succeeding in this, they kindled a large bonfire, and danced around it in the exuberance of their delight. Several bonfires were made in other places; London presented the appearance of a holiday, and people congratulated one another as if they had just escaped from some great calamity. The rage upon the acquittal of Mr. Stanhope had ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... prisons, who, with the bayonet's point, carried havoc and ruin into every poor convenience which ingenious wretchedness had been endeavouring to raise around it; and then the triumphant exit with the miserable booty; and, worst of all, the accursed bonfire, on the barrack parade, of the plait contraband, beneath the view of the glaring eyeballs from those lofty roofs, amidst the hurrahs of the troops, frequently drowned in the curses poured down from above like a tempest-shower or in the terrific ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... dangers of pestilence, for you noticed that it was reeking with filth and bad smells, and safely by the falling walls, for the workmen are tearing down everything shaky. Look out, there, or you will get scorched by that huge bonfire. They are burning all over town. Everything that the men can lift is dragged to these fires and burned. This is the plan for clearing the town. You noticed it at the bridge and you notice it here. Men with axes and saws ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... land. By this dignified frock of mine, said Friar John to Panurge, friend, thou hast been afraid during the storm without cause or reason; for thou wert not born to be drowned, but rather to be hanged and exalted in the air, or to be roasted in the midst of a jolly bonfire. My lord, would you have a good cloak for the rain; leave me off your wolf and badger-skin mantle; let Panurge but be flayed, and cover yourself with his hide. But do not come near the fire, nor near your blacksmith's forges, a God's name; for in a moment you will see ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... and perishing chill, we thought as we strolled through the gloomy caverns and crypts underneath the Brooklyn Bridge. Those twisted vistas seen through the archways give an impression of wrecked Louvain. A great bonfire was burning in the middle of the street. Under the Pearl Street elevated the sunlight drifted through the girders in a lively chequer, patterning piles of gray-black snow with a criss-cross of brightness. We had wanted to show our visitor Franklin Square, which he, as a man of letters, ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... from his pulpit, and even to intimate to his Grace that he might no longer receive the Body and Blood of the Lord at the altar of that parish! The parson would scarcely—in these days—have been therefore made bonfire of, and had a pretty martyr's memorial by Mr. Scott's pupils; but he would have lighted a goodly light, nevertheless, in this England of ours, whose pettifogging piety has now neither the courage to deny a duke's grace in its church, nor to declare ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... that British oak with your Gladstonian axe; lop him of his branches; divide him into logs; pile him up into a pyramid; put a match to his base; in short, make a bonfire of him; and what becomes of robust majesty? He is reduced to ashes, you say. Ah, yes, but what proportion of him? Conduct your experiment carefully on a small scale; dry your wood well, and weigh it before burning; weigh your ash afterwards, ...
— Science in Arcady • Grant Allen
... don't know of fire," replied the farmer, coolly, "at leastways, any fire that is worth puttin' out. I have got a bonfire in back here, and it was purty big, and its smoke you may have seen in the village. If you want to stretch your muscle and soak your hose—and that is about all you engine-people do—you may come ...
— The Knights of the White Shield - Up-the-Ladder Club Series, Round One Play • Edward A. Rand
... distinct, yet living side by side; not that the situation is much better anywhere in the Turkish empire. This still survives, though in an advanced state of decay, simply because other States are not prepared to encounter the risks of a disturbance which might end in a general bonfire, extending its ravages to districts very far remote from the scene of ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... the young officers were a positive assurance to all present that their efforts were unnecessary, that what was merely an accidental bonfire had ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... different parts of the country, the besom holds a prominent place. In Bohemia, for instance, the young men collect for some weeks beforehand as many worn-out brooms as they can lay their hands on. These, after dipping in tar, they light—running with them from one bonfire to another—and when burnt out they are placed in the fields as charms against blight.[13] The large ragwort—known in Ireland as the "fairies' horse"—has long been sought for by witches when taking their midnight journeys. Burns, in his ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
... straw; so, one afternoon, when Fritz had so far recovered from his injuries as to be able to crawl out of the hut and sit on a bench outside, which the two had constructed under a rude sort of porch, Eric determined to signalise his brother's convalescence by having a bonfire in honour ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson
... boys to Putnam Hall was the signal for a regular jollification, and my readers can rest assured that all of the cadets made the most of it. Captain Putnam ordered an extra dinner for them, and in the evening a huge bonfire was started on the campus, and, as the boys gathered around Dick, Tom, and Sam they sang "For he's a jolly good fellow!" until they were hoarse. It was a celebration never to be forgotten. "Just the right sort for a home coming," as Sam ...
— The Rover Boys on the Ocean • Arthur M. Winfield |
