"Semicircle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... closing days of July, 1915, is an unbroken narrative of forward movements of German armies on all parts of the great semicircle. The movement now, however, was slow. The Russians were fighting desperately, and the Germans had to win their way inch by inch. By the 21st the Russians were withdrawing in Courland to the east of the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... danger attacked them. The fiery old burgomaster flung himself on his mule, and, spurring him to a gallop, he headed not his own men only, but the fugitives. His object was to cut them off. The old man came galloping in a semicircle, and got on the edge of the wood, right in front of Gerard; the others might escape ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... made up the Tenth Infantry and the Zirk cavalrymen tried briefly to fight as individuals, shrieking "Znidd suddabit!" until the Kragans were upon them, stabbing and shooting. They drove the rioters from the steps or killed them there, they wiped out those who had gotten into the semicircle of the storm-porch. The inside doors, von Schlichten saw, were open, but beyond them were Terrans and a dozen or so Kragans. Hideyoshi O'Leary and Barney Mordkovitz seemed to ...
— Uller Uprising • Henry Beam Piper, John D. Clark and John F. Carr
... you," Maggie cried. "I am sending you down a farewell present." She whispered to Prince Shan, who handed her something from his pocket, smiled, and gave an order. The great ship passed in a semicircle and hovered almost exactly above their heads. A little shower of small scraps of paper came floating down. Nigel picked one up, examined it, and understood. He ...
— The Great Prince Shan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the bow, where he paused, one foot lifted to the gunwale just above the emblem of the painted star. Immediately a dead silence fell. Groups shifted, drew apart, and together again, like the slow agglomeration of sawdust on the surface of water, until at last they formed in a semicircle of staring, whose centre was the bow of the canoe and the stranger from Kettle Portage. The men scowled, the women regarded him ...
— Conjuror's House - A Romance of the Free Forest • Stewart Edward White
... the figure at the side, the eye will instantly prefer the semicircle to the straight line; the trefoil (composed of three semicircles) to the triangle; and the cinqfoil to the pentagon. The mathematician may perhaps feel an opposite preference; but he must be conscious that he does so under the influence of feelings quite ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... this evening sat a goodly semicircle of men,—commercial travellers. Some of them were quite dry and comfortable, and wore an air of superior fortune over others whose shoes and lower garments sent out more or less steam and odor toward the open fireplace. Several were smoking. One who neither smoked nor ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... Marigny's eye. He was minded to laugh outright, but forebore. Then he sprang into his seat, and the car curled in quick semicircle and climbed the hill to the left, while the Frenchman, surprised by this rapid movement, signaled frantically to Mrs. Devar, nodding farewell, that they had ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... be numbered consecutively, stand in a circle or semicircle. One player stands in the center of the circle or in front of the semicircle, with his index finger on the top of a cane, wand, or closed umbrella, which stands perpendicularly to the floor. Suddenly he lifts his finger from the cane, at the same time calling the number assigned ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft
... him, calm, serious, and serene, as if her soul were soaring high above all human passions. Far from diminishing her exquisite beauty, the terrible events of the last months had only surrounded her, as it were, with a divine halo. She had fallen off a little, however. And the dark semicircle under her eyes, and the disorder of her hair, betrayed the fatigue and the anxiety of the long nights which she had spent ...
— Within an Inch of His Life • Emile Gaboriau
... transformed into the Apollo saloon—she saw that whilst the company, rank behind rank, in close semicircles, had crowded round the performers to hear a favourite singer, Miss Broadhurst and Lord Colambre were standing in the outer semicircle, talking to one another earnestly. Now would Petito have given up her reversionary chance of the three nearly new gowns she expected from Lady Clonbrony, in case she stayed; or, in case she went, the reversionary chance of any dress of Lady Dashfort's, except her scarlet velvet, merely to hear ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. 6 • Maria Edgeworth
... soon had to trust entirely to chance. Chance, we are sorry to say, did not befriend him; for, after wandering over the wide-extending downs, he came upon the little hamlet of Tinkler Hatch, and was informed that he had been riding in a semicircle. ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... They formed a semicircle about him—a wall of red bodies, whose pointed heads were craned forward, while an excited chatter in their broken, whistling speech filled the room with shrill clamor. Then one of them pointed above ...
— Two Thousand Miles Below • Charles Willard Diffin
... and townsfolk, with their pikes and muskets, waiting for the battle to begin. Right in the pirates' front was a troop of horsemen armed with lances, swords, and pistols, drawn up in very good order, and ready to advance. The pirates on their coming from the wood formed into a semicircle or half-moon shape, the bow outwards, the horns curving to prevent the cavalry from taking them in flank. They had drums and colours in their ranks. The drums beat out a bravery, the colours were displayed. The men halted for a moment to get their breath and to reprime their guns. Then they ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... a gray wolf going north this evening. His direction is propitious," remarked Anookasan, as he led the others down the slope and into the heavy timber. The river just here made a sharp turn, forming a densely wooded semicircle, in the ...
— Old Indian Days • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... his class outside the building. His children sit round him in a semicircle. He is sitting on an upturned box with his back against the lateral logs of the building. There is a pleasant shade here, also the pungent odor from the bright green bluff which faces him. The Indian ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... of their footsteps warned the soldiers in the church below of their coming, and these formed in a semicircle round the door to receive the expected onslaught. When they saw that the Royalists were unarmed they lowered their weapons, and an officer said: "Take these men out into the street, and shoot them there, according to ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty
... approached by an avenue of cypresses sixty feet in height, and between these trees, on either side of the way, are colossal horses rampant, beneath whose extended forelegs the carriage of the invader passes. I opened a large door in one wing of the house, and found myself in a miniature theater, with its semicircle of boxes decorated in ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock
... the El Dorado was twenty-seven hundred miles off the coast of Chile, having run a swelling semicircle to get the benefit of the southeast trades, and being far south of Antofagasta. That was the way of the wind, which forced a ship from Oregon to Chile to swing far out from the coast, and make a deep southward dip before catching the south-west ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... is a weird-looking and uncanny monster, but he knows one line of strategy that is startling in its logic. Often when a bull moose is fleeing from a long stern chase,—always through wooded country,—he will turn aside, swing a wide semicircle backward, and then lie down for a rest close up to leeward of his trail. There he lies motionless and waits for man-made noises, or man scent; and when he senses either sign of his pursuer, he silently moves away in a ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... dye each successive scene in the hue of blood. First of all, he was in a great cathedral, sombre and vast, and by the dim light of the candles he saw that some solemn ceremony was going forward. Priests, mitred and robed, sat in a semicircle in front of the altar; on the altar-steps were three figures; behind the altar a space of gloom, from whence issued the soft, clear singing of the choristers. Then, suddenly, into that clear sweet singing broke a loud blare of trumpets; a man bounded on to the altar-steps; there ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... spruce woods, level as a floor, we came out on the rounded shoulder of a mountain to find ourselves nearly nine thousand feet above the sea. Below us was a deep canon to the middle of the earth. And spread in a semicircle about the curve of our mountain a most magnificent panoramic view. First there were the plains, represented by a brown haze of heat; then, very remote, the foot-hills, the brush-hills, the pine mountains, the upper timber, the tremendous granite peaks, and ...
— The Mountains • Stewart Edward White
... stood up a small tree, and beyond this the line across the mountain-top was taken up by a company ("E.") of the Royal Irish Fusiliers, which, in its turn, linked on to the defenders ("A.," "B.," "F." companies Royal Irish Fusiliers) of the eastern crest. The formation thus took the shape of a semicircle, behind a diameter, composed of one company Gloucester and one Royal Irish Fusiliers, facing the rise to the northward. Some 700 yards back from these the arc followed the contour of the mountain in rear. ...
— History of the War in South Africa 1899-1902 v. 1 (of 4) - Compiled by Direction of His Majesty's Government • Frederick Maurice
... of 1942, studies were made on wilted and stunted cabbage plants growing in a semicircle on one side of a field adjacent to a walnut tree (Fig. 1). The field was located near Hall, New York, in a region known to be infested with cabbage yellows. From a distance, the affected plants appeared to have yellows, but upon close study, it ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Thirty-Fourth Annual Report 1943 • Various
... with a swift threatening gesture, and he started back. This and Cavor's sudden shout and leap clearly astonished all the Selenites. They receded hastily, facing us. For one of those moments that seem to last for ever, we stood in angry protest, with a scattered semicircle of these ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... his whole court assembled to see my balloon. Tippoo was seated in a splendid pavilion, and his principal courtiers stood in a semicircle on each side of him: the youth, whom I formerly observed, was again on his right hand, and his eyes were immovably fixed upon my balloon, which had been previously filled and fastened down by cords. I had the curiosity to ask who this youth was: I was informed he was ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... noncommittally. He peered out the window at the vast, indigo horizons of the desert, curving off to northward into a semicircle of burnished blue. Here, there, the etherial wonder of a mirage painted the sandy sea. Vast distances opened on all sides; the sparkling air, brilliant with what seemed a kind of suspended jewel-dust, made every object visible ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... pile of rocks on the crest of the mountain, which fell away abruptly to the westward. At our feet lay the Tyri Fjord, with its deeply indented shores and its irregular, scattered islands, shining blue and bright in the morning sun, while away beyond it stretched a great semicircle of rolling hills covered with green farms, dotted with red farm-houses, and here and there a white church glimmering like a spangle on the breast of the landscape. Behind this soft, warm, beautiful region, rose dark, ...
— Northern Travel - Summer and Winter Pictures of Sweden, Denmark and Lapland • Bayard Taylor
... planter with the design of reposing himself. Observing the distress of the family, and being informed of the circumstances, he requested that the shoes and stockings last worn by the child should be brought to him. He then ordered his dog to smell them; and taking the house for a centre, described a semicircle of a quarter of a mile, urging the dog to find out the scent. They had not gone far before the sagacious animal began to bark. The track was followed up by the dog with still louder barking, till at last, darting off at full ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... Square had stopped as their drivers sighted what was rising there, and by now the bordering streets were tangled with traffic. A distant crowd of milling people heightened the turmoil. The northern edge was deserted, but in a large semicircle was spread a fear-struck, panicky mob. A single policeman, his face white and his eyes wide, tried to straighten out the tangle of vehicles, but it was infinitely beyond him and he sent in a riot call; ...
— A Scientist Rises • Desmond Winter Hall
... a doctor skilled in medicine, and endowed with the power of ubiquity. A tree with human legs, a herbalist or professor of botany. Night is represented by a finely crossed or barred sun, or a circle with human legs. Rain is figured by a dot or semicircle filled with water and placed on the head. The heaven with three disks of the sun is understood to mean three days' journey, and a landing after a voyage is represented by a tortoise. Short sentences, too, can be pictured in this manner. ...
— Chips From A German Workshop - Volume I - Essays on the Science of Religion • Friedrich Max Mueller
... main terrace, soon after dawn. In the centre ZEUS sits alone, throned and silent. One by one the Gods come out of the house, and arrange themselves in a semicircle, to the left and right, each as he passes making obeisance to ZEUS. It is a perfectly still morning, and a dense white mist hangs over the woods, completely hiding the sea and the farther shore. ...
— Hypolympia - Or, The Gods in the Island, an Ironic Fantasy • Edmund Gosse
... warning, or the faintest preparation for what was coming, I found myself looking into the interior of a large room. Some twenty boys and girls, thirteen to fourteen years of age, occupied a double row of chairs arranged in the form of a semicircle about a desk at which a young man was seated with his back to us. The rows of students were facing us, apparently not twenty feet away. The rustling of their garments and every change of expression in their mobile faces were as distinct to my eyes and ears as if we ...
— Equality • Edward Bellamy
... Beauvais hoped for that promotion). They were assembled there in all the solemnity of their priestly and professional robes, the reporters ready with their pens, the range of dark figures forming a semicircle round the presiding Bishop, when the officer of the court led in the prisoner, clothed in her worn and war-stained tunic, like a boy, with her hair cut close as for the helmet, and her slim figure, no doubt more ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... the midst of a semicircle of mountains of whitish rock, the steep and naked sides of which scarce afford "a footing for the goat." Stretching into the Mediterranean they inclose a commodious harbor, in front of which are two or three rocky islands anchored in a sea of more vivid blue than any water I had ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant
... caused by the collapse of the cliff. It had smashed right across the gorge, banking the up-stream water back in a pool which overflowed in a rapid. The slip had happened long ago. It was grassed over, but the face of the cliffs that stood about the semicircle was still almost fresh-looking and white as on the day when the rock must have broken and slid down. Starkly exposed and black under the foot of these cliffs were the mouths of several caves. And as they stood there, looking at the space, and ...
— Tales of Space and Time • Herbert George Wells
... left to right, and in instant response his clustered bunch of warriors spread out in regulated intervals, assuming positions not unlike the sticks of a fan such as the Creoles use, until they formed a complete semicircle, their flanks close in against the cliff, and their centre well back upon the bank of the stream. It was a pretty movement, executed with the precision of long discipline, and De Noyan brought his hand down ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... Indians sat in a semicircle, with the sole intent, you might think, of staring all night at the strangers. Yet they had brought in Arctic hares and grouse, and even a haunch of venison. But they laid these things on the floor beside them, and sat ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... presented with two ugly images wrapped with red cloth, and a sort of hymn was sung. Then they were marched to the scaffolding, where was a table on which lay fruits and vegetables surmounted by a very much decomposed pig, and in a semicircle round one end of this table were twelve images. Placing Cook near the scaffolding, Koah, as King and others call Touahah, took up the pig and holding it towards him made a long speech. Then, dropping the offensive porker, he made signs that the two ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson
... another gun. He was the mainstay of our gunnery since Captain Rhodes's misfortune'—a misfortune due to the same cause. But, in spite of all such drawbacks on the British side, Louisbourg got much the worst of it. The French had to fire from the centre outwards, at a semicircle of batteries that fired back convergingly at them. Besides, it was almost as hard to hit the thin, irregular line of British batteries as it was to miss the deep, wide target of overcrowded Louisbourg. The walls were continually being smashed from without ...
— The Great Fortress - A Chronicle of Louisbourg 1720-1760 • William Wood
... more attentive to scenery than most boys of his age, Colin fairly cried aloud with admiration as the steamer rounded the point and turned into Avalon Bay. Almost a perfect semicircle, the beach of glistening white sand enclosed a basin of turquoise sea in which were reflected the dark, rich tones of the cliffs, all glowing like an opal beneath the sun, while above rose the hills covered with the wild lilac and greasewood of California. ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... a thunderbolt, Colonel Washington and his troopers, flying their famous crimson flag, sweep down in a semicircle round the hill, and charge the enemy's ...
— Hero Stories from American History - For Elementary Schools • Albert F. Blaisdell
... tells us in her memoirs, 'although perfectly straight and well made, I was enclosed in stiff stays, with a steel busk in front; while above my frock, bands drew my shoulders back till the shoulder-blades met. Then a steel rod with a semicircle, which went under my chin, was clasped to the steel busk in my stays. In this constrained state I and most of the younger girls had to prepare our lessons'; and in the life of Miss Edgeworth we read that, being sent to a certain fashionable ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... went on into the library and found that the boys had arranged the chairs in a semicircle around the fire and were already opening the ...
— Billie Bradley on Lighthouse Island - The Mystery of the Wreck • Janet D. Wheeler
... suddenly into an atmosphere of merriment within a few yards of the men posted at the periscopes along the sandbagged parapet. The electric lights were burning, and a blue haze of tobacco smoke obscured the air from a semicircle of listeners, sitting on packing-cases and forms round the piano on the platform, and the chorus of "Gilbert the Filbert," sung with a will, greeted them as they ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... the breeding of cattle. Soft with fodder grass, and covered with a few groups of trees, with slopes intersected by rustling brooks, it rose up out of the sea, and was encompassed by a steep wall of rock in the form of a semicircle; and here cattle would find grass, water, shade, and the protection of an enclosing rampart. While travelling along the coast, we had remarked a succession of similar localities, which however, from lack of enterprise and from the dread of pirates, were not utilized. ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.
... of a semicircular form on one side, and square on the other. The space contained within the semicircle was allotted to the spectators, and had seats placed one above another to the top of the building. The square part in the front of it was appropriated to the actors; and in the interval, between both, was ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... a loose semicircle, for there were two points which he must reach on the ride, the town of Alder, where lived the seventh man who must die for Grey Molly, and the Cumberland ranch, last of all, where he would take Joan. Very early after his start he ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand
... of a semicircular perimeter of 30 cm. radius. E is an eye-rest fixed at the centre of the semicircle; CD is a square hole which is closed by the screen S fitted into the front pair of the grooves GG. In the center of S and on a level with the eye E is a hole A, 2 cm. in diameter, which contains a 'jewel' ...
— Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1 • Various
... houses, each considerably larger than the one of Suba, rose pompously in a wide cleared space beside the stream. Before them, ranged in a semicircle, stood hundreds of Mayorunas—men, women, children—all silently watching the canoes of the newcomers. In the center of the arc, like the hub of a human half wheel, a small knot of men waited in aloof dignity, four of them adorned with the ornate feather dresses of subchiefs, backed by a dozen ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... a place where they made shingles last summer, and there was a shed against the rocks, if we could only find it." Finally they doubled an abrupt angle in the nearly smooth wall, which bent suddenly back from the stream, for many feet, making a semicircle of a little space, and in the back of which Bart discovered the anxiously looked-for shed;—a mere rude cover, on posts driven into ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... Snap, "the wind is blowing from the west. So we had better make a semicircle and come up on the other side of the game. If we don't, the wind will carry our scent to them and they'll ...
— Four Boy Hunters • Captain Ralph Bonehill
... few here, and a few there, hidden away in every bend of the rocks where a little ground could be levelled, so that the tides in stormy weather break with threat and fury on the very doorstones of the lowest cottages. Yet as the lofty semicircle of hills bend inward, the sea follows; and there is a fair harbour, where the fishing boats ride together while their sails dry in the afternoon sun. Then the hamlet is very still; for the men are sleeping off the weariness of their night work, while the children play quietly among the ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... already dispersed. Singers and stage manager had hastily scattered in every direction to give vent, each in his own fashion, to the misery of the situation. None but the workmen, lamp-cleaners, and a few of the chorus gathered in a semicircle around Spontini, in order to have a look at that remarkable man, as he held forth with wonderful effect on the requirements of true theatrical art. Turning towards the dismal scene, I gently and respectfully pointed out to Spontini the uselessness of his declamation, and promised that everything ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... basin, his eyes focused on his throat, and his hand came down and around, carrying the razor blade through a lethal semicircle. ...
— Dead Ringer • Lester del Rey
... shut out the fearful blaze. Armitage, standing upright now and rubbing open his eyes, saw that the time had come to turn, and quickly. The D'Estang was approaching the battleship, pointing toward her port bow. The idea of the manoeuvre was to turn in a semicircle, passing the Arizona at a distance of about two hundred yards. He shouted ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... in the inclosure of the North Theatre, a smaller building than that which stands beside the South Gate, but large enough to hold an audience of two or three thousand. The semicircle of seats is still unbroken; the arrangements of the stage, the stairways, the entries of the building ...
— Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land - Impressions of Travel in Body and Spirit • Henry Van Dyke
... into what further was intended to be done. We suffered much from the heat of the weather and want of fresh air; for the town of Port Louis is wholly exposed to the rays of the sun, whilst the mountains which form a semicircle round it to the east and south, not only prevent the trade wind from reaching it, but reflect the heat in such a manner, that from November to April it is almost insupportable. During this season, the inhabitants whose affairs do not oblige them to remain, fly to the higher ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... days of the Bourbon Restoration it has been the practice in the French Chambers for the more conservative members to seat themselves on the President's right, and for the Radical ones to place themselves on his left. The central seats of the semicircle in which the members' seats are arranged in tiers are usually occupied by men of moderate views. Generally speaking, such terms as Right Centre and Left Centre are applied to groups of Moderates inclining in the first place to Conservatism ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... their respective partisans, in a sort of semicircle, of which the champion was in the centre,—all eagerly intent on watching the movements of the two men, one of whom—perhaps both—was about to be hurried ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... Shackwell started suddenly to his feet. A sound of carriage-wheels had disturbed the quiet street. They paused and then rolled up the semicircle to the door ...
— The Hermit and the Wild Woman and Other Stories • Edith Wharton
... cloister, and, separating into two rows as she appeared, sang the Veni Creator, while the bell of the monastery sounded its loudest peal. Then they led her in triumph to their church, sang Te Deum, and, while the honored guest knelt before the altar, all the sisterhood knelt around her in a semicircle. Their hearts beat high within them. That day they were to know who of their number were chosen for the new convent of Quebec, of which Madame de la Peltrie was to be the foundress; and when their devotions were over, they flung themselves at her feet, each begging with tears ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... and opened his eyes, for the moment not knowing where he was nor how he had come to be there. He saw strange torture instruments and tall monstrosities with pumpkin-shaped heads surrounding him closely in a semicircle, and staring at him out of ...
— The Red Hell of Jupiter • Paul Ernst
... ship seems to be going full speed for the shore of an entirely enclosed sea, and here, saving for the tell-tale railway, there seems no way out of the abyss without scaling the perpendicular walls. The rocks are at their finest at Killingnoble Scar, where they take the form of a semicircle on the west side of the railway. The scar was for a very long period famous for the breed of hawks, which were specially watched by the Goathland men for the use of James I., and the hawks were not displaced from their eyrie even by the incursion of the railway into the ...
— Yorkshire—Coast & Moorland Scenes • Gordon Home
... these conditions were fulfilled; and Villars had used these two precious days in throwing up a series of immensely strong works. The heights he occupied formed a concave semicircle, enfilading on all sides the little plain of Malplaquet, and this semicircle now bristled with redoubts, palisades, abattis, and stockades; while the two trouees, or openings, by which it was presumed that ...
— The Cornet of Horse - A Tale of Marlborough's Wars • G. A. Henty
... longer without form and void, but was detaching itself into huge fragments, which let in the sun and were gradually sucked up by him. Rapidly everything became transformed, and lo! as if by enchantment, the whole sky resumed once more its deepest blue, the perfect semicircle of the horizon sharply revealed itself, and vessels five miles off were visible to their spars. Michael reached the end of his journey and waited, looking out from one of the upper stories. He saw nothing of the splendour of the scene before him. He ...
— Miriam's Schooling and Other Papers - Gideon; Samuel; Saul; Miriam's Schooling; and Michael Trevanion • Mark Rutherford
... which had been begun and completed between sundown and sundown, groaned day and night with the perpetual stream of life all setting southward. In three days there were ten miles of intrenchments lining the hills, making a semicircle from the river above the city to the banks of the river below; and these were thickly manned from end to end, and made terrible to the astonished enemy by black and frowning cannon. General Heath, with his twenty thousand Rebel veterans, flushed with their ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... a strange and impressive scene. They stood on the top of a lofty range of hill, and, underneath them lay a vast semicircle, miles in extent, of gleaming white sand, that had in bygone ages been washed in by the Atlantic. Into this vast plain of silver whiteness the sea, entering by a somewhat narrow portal, stretched in long arms of a pale ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... scarce could spy the Christ for Saints, Beheld before a golden altar lie The longest lance his eyes had ever seen, Point-painted red; and seizing thereupon Pushed through an open casement down, leaned on it, Leapt in a semicircle, and lit on earth; Then hand at ear, and harkening from what side The blindfold rummage buried in the walls Might echo, ran the counter path, and found His charger, mounted on him and away. An arrow whizzed ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson
... at last burned down to their sockets and softly Betty blew out the last flickering flames. With a nod of understanding Mollie turned down the lighted lamp and after a fashion of many years the three girls drew three little old fashioned rockers in a semicircle up before the ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hill • Margaret Vandercook
... garrisons flung down their arms. Some forts were surrendered by treachery, and some by despair. In a few days the whole open country north of the Coleroon had submitted. The English inhabitants of Madras could already see by night, from the top of Mount St. Thomas, the eastern sky reddened by a vast semicircle of blazing villages. The white villas, to which our countrymen retire after the daily labours of government and of trade, when the cool evening breeze springs up from the bay, were now left without inhabitants; for bands of the fierce horsemen ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the high road, and soon come upon the first signs of this Danish festival. An open gravelled space of some extent stretches out before an imposing mansion of modern appearance; a plantation of trees on each side shapes the space into a rude semicircle. This mansion is the manor house, and in front, in the midst of a confused crowd, some dozen young men in gay sylvan costumes are standing in a circle, armed with flails, and vigorously threshing the ground. Jolly, ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... poena claudo." Of course, he can not walk much; but, placed in a ride, or at the corner of a cover, he rolls over the hares and pulls down the pheasants unerringly as ever; when you come up, you will find him surrounded by a semicircle of slain, and not a ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... police, a settler, and the missionary, in all twelve or fourteen persons, set off towards Coffin's Bay, following as they supposed upon the track of the murders. Upon reaching the coast some natives were seen fishing in the water, and the party was at once spread out in a kind of semicircle, among the scrub, to close upon and capture them; the officer, missionary, and guide, being stationed near the centre. As the party advanced nearer, the guide saw that he was mistaken in the group before him, and that they were not the guilty ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... miles above Chattanooga, thus forming on the south and south-east a perfect wall of natural defenses, upon which, for two months, lay the besieging forces of the Confederate army. To complete the semicircle of walls around Chattanooga on the south side of the river, Lookout mountain stands in its huge dimensions, a key ...
— History of the Eighty-sixth Regiment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry, during its term of service • John R. Kinnear
... a semicircle, in order that they might see one another; and two notaries stood before them, the one on the right and the other on the left, to record the pros and cons in the various processes. Rabbi Yehudah says there were three such notaries, ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... You have probably not visited this place, general, or you, colonel. It is a fort, and outside is a pen, or stockade as it is called, covering two or three acres. Inside are cabins for the prisoners, in the shape of a semicircle, and grounds to walk in, except in the space marked off by the 'dead line.' If any prisoner crosses that he is shot by the sentries, whose beat is on a platform running round upon the top of ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... raod the view off was superb. Nothing bordered one side of the way and the mountain bordered the other. Far below lay the sea, stretching away into blue infinity, a vast semicircle of ultramarine domed by a hemisphere of azure; and it was noticeable how much vaster the sea looked than the sky. We were so high above it that the heavings of its longer swells were leveled to imperceptibility, while the waves only graved the motionless surface. ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... to the medicine lodge. All the wood of the sweat house was placed in a tree, excepting four small pieces, which were deposited, together with the pine boughs from the interior of the sweat house, in a semicircle formed by the rocks from the sweat house at the base of a pinon tree. A line of meal 2 inches in length running east and west was sprinkled on the apex of the semicircle, and upon this line the black tube was laid. A bit of meal was ...
— Eighth Annual Report • Various
... and FREDERIC go to mouth of cave and converse. EDITH beckons her sisters, who form a semicircle ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... gown stopped all at once. The nun was standing in front of a green curtain. She lifted it. This was what we saw. The semicircle of a wide apse. Behind, rows upon rows of round arches. Below the arches, in the choir stalls, a long half-circle of stately figures. The figures were draped from head to foot. When they bent their heads not an inch of flesh was visible, except a few hands here ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... Park—or, if it were to be a late affair, before—we would have family prayers, in which the servants joined. This was in deference to English custom; not that we were irreligious, but we had not before been accustomed to express our religious feelings in just that manner. All being grouped in a semicircle, my father would open the Bible and read a chapter; then he would take a prayer-book containing thirty or forty well-considered addresses to the Almighty, and everybody would kneel down and cover their eyes with their hands. The "Amen" ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne
... most of them young, uprose and with a great clanking and jangling of spurs and spur-chains strode over to him. They grouped before him in a semicircle, trying bashfully to wedge their shoulders, one behind another's, their faces a-grin and apologetic, and at the same time expressing a casual and unconscious democraticness. In truth, to them Hardman Pool was more than mere chief. He was elder brother, or ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... a deal box, with a soap advertisement on it, made a very fair intrenching tool, and soon formidable snow-works could be seen rising rapidly on the slopes of the clothes' drying ground, making a semicircle about that corner which contained the big iron swing, erect on its two tall posts. Hugh John and Maid Margaret, the attacking party, were still invisible, probably concocting a plan. But Sweetheart and Sir Toady, laughing and jesting as at some supreme stratagem, ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... the shady side yards stood Kent, turning the crank of a hand-organ! He was facing the highway where the other two boys were, but not a trace of recognition was in his face. Ranged in a semicircle before him was a line of little children shuffling their toes ...
— Three Young Knights • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... were placed on watch at the mouth of the cove, where mines similar to the first had been sunk in the ice in a semicircle some little distance outside that before exploded. This precaution had been taken on the day succeeding the great repulse of the enemy, although the scouts felt assured that the attempt would not be repeated. ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... could be no possible mistake—was seated in the very centre of the great square upon some sort of throne, the precise shape and material of which I could not make out, for it was entirely hidden by an immense and magnificent kaross of lions' skins; and formed up in a semicircle behind and around him were about a hundred warriors, the arms and accoutrements of whom were of so elaborate and splendid a character that I at once judged them—rightly, as it ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... boy was holding his ground so calmly, their revolvers began to bark spitefully, flicking up a semicircle of dust about the pony's feet, causing the little animal to prance and rear into ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Texas - Or, The Veiled Riddle of the Plains • Frank Gee Patchin
... action which ensued is as difficult to describe as it must have been to direct. The Boer front covered some seven or eight miles, with kopjes, like chains of fortresses, between. They formed a huge semicircle of which our advance was the chord, and they were able from this position to pour in a converging artillery fire which grew steadily hotter as the day advanced. In the early part of the day our forty-two guns, working furiously, though with a want of ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the upper-right of the view, is encamped the mass of the Austrian army, amid half-finished entrenchments. Advanced posts of the same are seen south-east of the city, not far from the advanced corps of the French Grand-Army under SOULT, MARMONT, LANNES, NEY, and DUPONT, which occupy in a semicircle the whole breadth of the flat landscape in front, and extend across the river to higher ground on the ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... slim, high desk, like a music-stand, with a cover of red velvet, and near it was a light ornamental chair, on which he was sure Verena would not seat herself, though he could fancy her leaning at moments on the back. Behind this was a kind of semicircle of a dozen arm-chairs, which had evidently been arranged for the friends of the speaker, her sponsors and patrons. The hall was more and more full of premonitory sounds; people making a noise as they unfolded, on hinges, their seats, and itinerant boys, ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. II (of II) • Henry James
... came to know his stage well—the purple semicircle of hills, the slim trees leaning over houses, the yellow sands, the streaming green of ravines. All that had the crude and blended colouring, the appropriateness almost excessive, the suspicious immobility of a painted scene; and it enclosed so perfectly the accomplished ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... be well, Major, if we could do nothing better," said Waldron. "But I do not feel obliged to attack the front seriously at all. The rebels have been thoughtless enough to leave that long semicircle of wooded knolls unoccupied, even by scouts. It stretches from the front of their centre clear around their right flank. I shall use it as a veil to cover us while we get into position. I shall throw out a regiment, a battery, and five companies of cavalry, to make a feint against ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... the bowl of blood into the temple. He went through the feast hall in front to a little room at the back. Here stood wooden statues of the gods in a semicircle. Before them was a stone altar. Ingolf took a little brush of twigs that lay on it and dipped it into the ...
— Viking Tales • Jennie Hall
... At five A.M. the bugle sounded for rising, two hours being allowed for prayers and breakfast. At night each man had to retire to his wagon for prayer at eight-thirty, and to rest at nine. If they camped by a river they drew the wagons into a semicircle with the river at its base. Other times the wagons made a circle, a fore-wheel of one touching a rear wheel of the next, thus providing a corral for the stock. In such manner was the wisdom of the Lord concerning this hegira supplemented in detail by the worldly ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... over. It had passed without a hitch, and the gentlemen were now enjoying their claret and conversation in a comfortable semicircle in front of ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... past had opened a Monte bank with the dollars we had given him, and was sitting on the ground solemnly dealing cards one by one from the bottom of a dirty pack, a crowd of gamblers standing or sitting in a semicircle before him, silently watching the cards and keeping a vigilant eye upon their stakes which lay on the ground before the banker. Other parties were busy at the same game in other parts of the open space before the shop, which served as the ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... and the men were set around in a semicircle with me and Somerfield at the end. Then a red-eyed old hag tottered out and began cursing Somerfield. She spat in his face and called him all outrageous names that came to her vindictive tongue. Luckily it was that he had been put next, and so, forewarned, was able to grin and bear it. But ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... other boat to lie-to at a little distance off. They received me with great courtesy and politeness; and would retire back from the boat on my making the least motion with my hand. A man, whom I took to be a chief, seeing this, made them form a semicircle round the boat's bow, and beat such as attempted to break through this order. This man I loaded with presents, giving likewise to others, and asked by signs for fresh water, in hopes of seeing where they ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... contained not less than 640 apartments, with room enough for a population of 3,000; within a third of a mile from this huge structure stood Pueblo Chettro Kettle, with 506 apartments. The most common variation from the rectangular shape was that in which a terraced semicircle was substituted for the three terraced sides, as in Pueblo Bonito, or the whole rectangular design was converted into an ellipse, as in Pueblo Penasca Blanca. There are indications that these fortresses were not in all cases built at one time, but that, at least in some cases, ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... surpassed in size, although not in artistic beauty; they were certainly more than 200 feet in circumference, and eighty feet in height. Excessively narrow entrances, with simple doors, conduct into the interior. On the outside, two small flights of steps, forming a semicircle, lead up to the top. The doors were not opened for us, and we were obliged to content ourselves with the assurance that, with the exception of a small, plain sarcophagus ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... coffeepot, hot-water pitcher, milk and cream pitchers, spoon tray, and cups and saucers may be placed so as to form a semicircle about the hostess's place. The coffeepot should be placed at the right, and the cups and saucers at the left. If tiles or stands for the coffeepot and hot-water pitcher are used, they should also be a part of the table service. A large tray may ...
— School and Home Cooking • Carlotta C. Greer
... was standing with his back to the piano; the gaping guests formed a semicircle in front of him. Marcia, sitting on a couch, motionless, with cheeks of deadly whiteness, uttered no sound, and her eyes looked like patches of darkness in her icy face. Lucy, standing at the piano, never took her eyes from ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... had been re-enforced to 27,000. Three divisions, under Smith, Wallace, and McClernand, stretched in a semicircle about Donelson from north to south. On the night of the 14th the Confederate generals held a consultation, and decided to try cutting their way out. Most of the troops were withdrawn from the rifle-pits ...
— History of the United States, Volume 4 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... round anxiously. "Agatha, what must—what can I do? No," he muttered to himself, "I can do nothing." He walked to the window, and stood looking out mutely on the little garden—tiny, but so pretty, with its green verandah, its semicircle of arbutus trees serving as a frame to the hilly landscape beyond, its one wavy acacia, woodbine-clasped, at the foot of which a robin-redbreast was hopping and singing over the few ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... of a great automobile advancing toward them down the west drive of the park—its wheels slipping in a crazy manner, that made the coachman of Mrs. Star's sleigh give it a wide berth. Just as it got abreast of them, it became perfectly unmanageable—slewed to the left, made a semicircle which turned it round, and, catching the back of the sleigh on its low front, turned the light vehicle over as easily as if it ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... curve very purely outlined with light; over it luminous trams, like shuttles of fire, are thrown across and across, continually weaving the stuff of human existence. From further off all these lights dwindle to a radiant semicircle that gazes out over the expanse with a quiet, mysterious expectancy. Far away seaward you may see the low golden ...
— Letters from America • Rupert Brooke
... first impression of the Cirque or oule more impressive, a small projecting wall of rock marks the entry to the gigantic amphitheatre. This passed, the end of the world seems gained: a vast semicircle of rocks rises precipitously to the height of between 1000 and 2000 feet. These gigantic walls are divided into three or four steps or ledges, on each of which rests a glacier, from which stream cascades. That to the left is 1266 feet high, and ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 456 - Volume 18, New Series, September 25, 1852 • Various
... much as I do, Barry," put in Gordon, "but it might help if I mentioned that news came down from Van last night that his men had got the opium chaps in a semicircle and were driving them ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle |
