"Single combat" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... who threatens to pull their quarry away from them; he will be coughed down or interrupted by insulting noises, and he may esteem himself highly fortunate if he is not asked to step outside and engage in single combat. Everything that mean malignity can do to balk him will be done, and, unless he is a very strong man physically and morally, the opposition will tire him out. There is usually one dominant family in such towns—for the possibility of making a heavy fortune ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... trial by battle was one in which the accused challenged his accuser to single combat, and staked tbe question of his guilt or innocence on the result of the duel. This trial was introduced into England by the Normans, within one hundred and fifty years before Magna Carta. It was not ...
— An Essay on the Trial By Jury • Lysander Spooner
... of the seven chiefs against Thebes came on, led by Polynices. Eteocles sallied out to meet them, and there was a terrible battle, ending in all the seven chiefs being slain, and the two brothers, Eteocles and Polynices, were killed by one another in single combat. Creon, the uncle, who thus became king, had always been on the side of Eteocles, and therefore commanded that whilst this younger brother was entombed with all due solemnities, the body of the elder should be left upon the battlefield to be torn by dogs and vultures, ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... on whom this indignity is cast, by a law among the tribes, may take away the life of the offender if he can; but it is customary, and thought more honourable, to settle the difficulty by single combat, in which the parties may use the kind of weapons on which they mutually agree. Public sentiment will admit of no compromise. If no resistance is offered to the insult, the person insulted is thenceforth ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... remains for us, then, to decide whether we shall carry on the war in our national capacity—one united people against a common enemy—or whether some champion, famous in former fights, shall be selected to defy the slayer of our brother Antaeus to single combat. In the latter case, though not unconscious that there may be taller men among you, I hereby offer myself for that enviable duty. And believe me, dear countrymen, whether I live or die, the honor of this great country, ...
— Tanglewood Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... I fear—the man whose face I plastered with mud? I carry a sword at my side, and he could not fight me in a single combat." ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... gaine so goodly meed: But Blandamour thereat full greatly grudged, And litle prays'd his labours evill speed, That for to winne the saddle lost the steed. Ne lesse thereat did Paridell complaine, And thought t'appeale from that which was decreed To single combat with Sir Satyrane: Thereto him Ate stird, ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church
... judgment of Heaven overtook the bad earl of Gloucester, whose treasons were discovered, and himself slain in single combat with his brother, the lawful earl; and how Gonerill's husband, the duke of Albany, who was innocent of the death of Cordelia, and had never encouraged his lady in her wicked proceedings against her father, ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... read from it, or rather from Poinsinet's own figure, his exact signalement, laid his hand on his shoulder, and arrested him in the name of the King, and of the provost-marshal of Paris. "I arrest you, sir," said he, gravely, "with regret; you have slain, with seventeen wounds, in single combat, Colonel Count de Cartentierce, one of his Majesty's household; and, as his murderer, you fall under the immediate authority of the provost-marshal, and die without trial ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... found on the next day by the roadside. Now Yussuf, the Governor, was himself a soldier of some repute, and when he heard of the failure of his messenger he boastfully expressed a desire to meet the celebrated Marko in single combat. On this challenge being reported to him Marko rode off on a half-tamed steed at midday into the heart of Podgorica, and reined up before the Pasha's house. In fear and trembling the Turks hastily closed their bazaars and houses as that fearful horseman galloped ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... did, my dear; but had he not occupied his attention I should have been a dead man. The thrust was aimed at me as I fell, and would have pierced me had he not sprung forward and turned it aside, and then engaged in single combat with Mocenigo, who, with all his faults, was brave and a skillful swordsman; and yet, as the governor himself said, probably Francisco would have slain him, even had not the combat ended as ...
— The Lion of Saint Mark - A Story of Venice in the Fourteenth Century • G. A. Henty
... hair, which had the same chestnut shine as Griff's— enough to make us correct possible vanity by terming it red, though we were ready to fight any one else who presumed to do so. Indeed Griff had defended its hue in single combat, and his eye was treated for it with beefsteak by Peter in the pantry. We were immensely, though silently, proud of her in her white embroidered cambric frock, red sash and shoes, and coral necklace, almost an heirloom, for it had been brought from Sicily in Nelson's days by my ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... nominated Jack Hayes, the celebrated Texan ranger. Hayes had been in the Mexican war. It was told of him that when the American and Mexican armies were encamped opposite each other, that a Mexican officer, splendidly equipped, came forward on horseback, and challenged any American to meet him in single combat between the two forces. Jack Hayes volunteered to go, and he killed him. He took his horse, gold watch and personal effects. He afterward learned who he was, and that he left a widow. He sent all his personal effects to her as a present. Of course, we were interested ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower
... of Dundubhi, a giant, suspended by Bali, who, deeming this an insult, presently appears. After a prolix interchange of civility and defiance, Rama and Bali resolve to determine their respective supremacy by single combat. Bali is slain. His brother Sugriva is inaugurated as king and determines to assist Rama to recover Sita. A bridge is built over the sea. Rama's army advance to Lanka. Kumbhakarna, a brother of Ravana, and Meghanada, a son of Ravana, go forth to battle. Malyavan wishes them prosperity ...
— Tales from the Hindu Dramatists • R. N. Dutta
... still his courage. He went to battle to conquer or die, and the first thing he did was to kill the English general's son in single combat. Macbeth then felt that no man could fight him and live, and when Macduff came to him blazing for revenge, Macbeth said to him, "Go back; I have spilt too much ...
— Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare • E. Nesbit
... found that Jonathan and his son—another powerful six-footer—had gone that morning to search for eggs, which they felt sure must have been laid somewhere about the enclosed field. To keep the male bird in play while the search was being made, the father took his forked stick, met the cock in single combat, clapped the fork on his neck, and let him kick away. All might have gone well, for the father, besides being strong, was accustomed to such work; but the bird, instead of keeping up a straightforward assault, as it ought ...
— Six Months at the Cape • R.M. Ballantyne
... month at school, that he is sure to have a fight, and with almost equal certainty that he will have but one. Tom Brown was one of these; and as it is our well-weighed intention to give a full, true, and correct account of Tom's only single combat with a school-fellow, let those young persons whose stomachs are not strong, or who think a good set-to with the weapons which God has given to us all, an uncivilized, unchristian, or ungentlemanly, affair, just skip this chapter ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... beyond frequent short ejaculations. The men in the passage called to him for further news, but he did not heed them. To my ears the fighting continued as general as before, with the shouts of many throats and the clash of many weapons, so that I could not at all distinguish the single combat between my father and the red Captain from the rest of ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... the Campus Martius and by letting water into it introduced ships. In all the contests the captives and those condemned to death took part. Some even of the knights, and,—not to mention others,—a son of a man who had been praetor fought in single combat. Indeed, a senator named Fulvius Sepinus[92] desired to contend in full armor, but was prevented; for Caesar had expressed a fervent wish that that should never take place, though he did permit the knights to contend. The patrician children went through the so-called Troy equestrian exercise ...
— Dio's Rome • Cassius Dio
... and whose only redeeming light in a long history was that splendid and brave Catherine Sforza, married to one of their name, who held the fortress of Forli so bravely against Caesar Borgia, who challenged him to single combat, which he refused out of shame, who was overcome by him at last, and brought captive to the Vatican in chains of gold, as Aurelian brought Zenobia. In the days of her power she had lived in the great palace for ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... is built, the army passes over it, the Saxons are discomfited in a great battle, and Guiteclin is killed in single combat by Charlemagne himself. ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... occupation. He was said to be the finest sword in the British Army—Abercromby's Black Cock, they called him. He'd a standing challenge out against any man of ours who'd take it up. Killed seven of our fellows in seven days, a man a morning, in single combat, between the outpost lines—all fair and square and according to Cocker, and the staffs of both Armies looking on. Sounds like a legend, don't it?—The eighth day I appeared to do battle with him. I was twenty-one at the time, and looked seventeen. It was to have been the great ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... could scarcely now lift the weapon over his head. He tried his armor. It was too tight for him. And the old soldier burst into tears, when he found he could not buckle it. Such a man was not fit to encounter the terrible Rowski in single combat. ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Canute thereupon fell to, and fought five battles—O unhappy England, what a fighting-ground it was!—and then Ironside, who was a big man, proposed to Canute, who was a little man, that they two should fight it out in single combat. If Canute had been the big man, he would probably have said yes, but, being the little man, he decidedly said no. However, he declared that he was willing to divide the kingdom—to take all that lay north of Watling Street, as the old Roman ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... Charles VIII, pressing him to hurry on his march with the artillery and rearguard. The confederates had given an evasive answer, for they were pondering whether they ought to jeopardise the whole Italian force in a single combat, and, putting all to the hazard, attempt to annihilate the King of France and his army together, so overwhelming the conqueror in the ruins of his ambition. The messenger found Charles busy superintending the passage of the last of his cannon over the mountain of Pontremoli. This was ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... portentous pause, a silence so big with incalculable dangers that the members with one accord checked the words on their lips, like soldiers dropping their arms to watch a single combat between their leaders. Then Mrs. Dane gave expression to their inmost dread by saying sharply: "Ah—you say THE ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... burgess. He received us hospitably. In the hall of his house was a Uhlan's lance with drooping pennon which excited our curiosity. How had it come here? He was only too pleased to explain. He had taken it from a marauding Uhlan with whom he had engaged in single combat, strangling him with ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... and of a despicable appearance; of no character either as to his family, or in other respects: his flame was Jonathan. He went out at the high priest John's monument, and uttered many other insolent things to the Romans, a challenged the best of them all to a single combat. But many of those that stood there in the army huffed him, and many of them [as they might well be] were afraid of him. Some of them also reasoned thus, and that justly enough: that it was not fit to fight with a man that desired to die, because those that utterly despaired ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... land, he would make him sensible of his just displeasure." So Harold advanced his forces into Sussex, within seven miles of his enemy. The Norman Duke, to save the effusion of blood, sent these offers to Harold; either wholly to resign the kingdom to him, or to try the quarrel with him in single combat. To ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift
... citizen, was unfortunately killed. What rendered his fate the more melancholy, was, that the act was done by the mistake of his own countrymen. It was at this time also, that Gen. Count Pulaski, a Polander, began to distinguish himself as a partisan. His address in single combat, was greatly celebrated. Col. Kowatch, under his command, was killed before the lines, and shamefully mutilated by the British. Of the campaign of 1779, it was not the intention of the author to give a minute detail; but only to sketch out those feelings, ...
— A Sketch of the Life of Brig. Gen. Francis Marion • William Dobein James
... advantageously, let us consider, that we may not seem to have only that end in view but some other also, if we might praise ourselves to excite in our hearers emulation and ambition. For Nestor, by reciting his battles and acts of prowess, stirred up Patroclus and nine others to single combat with Hector. For the exhortation that adds deed to word and example and proper emulation is animating and moving and stimulating, and with its impulse and resolution inspires hope that the things we aim at are attainable ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... to revenge it. On the following day, therefore, Tarfe, one of the stoutest of the infidel warriors, paraded in front of the Christian army, dragging the sacred inscription of Ave Maria at his horse's tail. The cause of the Virgin was eagerly vindicated by Garcilaso de la Vega, who slew the Moor in single combat, and elevated the inscription of Ave Maria, in devotion and triumph, at the end of ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving
... Soarez came to anchor about a league from the city of Jiddah, yet so excellent were some of the cannon of the place, that three or four pieces were able to carry that prodigious distance. Soliman sent a message to the Christian fleet offering a single combat man to man, which Gaspar de Silva and Antonio de Menezes both offered to accept, but Soarez would not allow the combat. Soarez now caused the channel leading up to Jiddah to be sounded, and at this time the inhabitants were much alarmed by the fire of one of the Portuguese vessels; but ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr
... ornaments of the French horses were covered with blood, and their movements were encumbered by their weight. The sword of Wedderburn had already smitten three of the Chevalier's followers to the ground, and the two chiefs now contended in single combat. D'Arcy fought with the fury of despair, but Home continued to bear upon him as a tiger that has been robbed of its cubs. Every moment the force of the Chevalier was thinned, and every instant the number of his enemies increased, as the neighbouring peasantry rallied round the standard of ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various
... court of her brother, he finally sees her at a feast. They love each other at their first meeting. In Isenstein, far over the sea, lives Brunhild, the Amazon-queen, who is pledged to wed only him who can conquer her in single combat. Gunther, the brother of Kriemhild, desires her for his wife. Siegfried promises to win her for him on condition that Gunther grant him Kriemhild's hand in return. They proceed to Brunhild's land, where Siegfried, by ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock
... "Education" narrates how a fairy knight, while conducting his young son to the house of Paidia, encounters the giant Custom and worsts him in single combat. There is some humor in the description of the stream of science into which the crowd of infant learners are unwillingly plunged, and upon whose ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... assurance to avow dislike; the theater has its partisans who understand the force of combinations trained up to vociferation, clapping of hands and clattering of sticks; and though a man might have strength sufficient to overcome a lion in single combat, he may run the risk of being devoured by an ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... peril and temptation. To seek such a pair his 'tricksy spirit,' Puck, has ranged in vain through the world. Puck, however, hears the sentence passed on Sir Huon of Bordeaux, a young knight, who, having been insulted by the son of Charlemagne, kills him in single combat, and is for this condemned by the monarch to travel to Bagdad to slay him who sits on the Caliph's left hand, and to claim his daughter as his bride. Oberon instantly resolves to make this pair the instruments of his reunion with his queen, ...
— The Standard Operas (12th edition) • George P. Upton
... this mean!" inquired Morton of Arthur, "it looks as though they were about to engage in single combat." ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer
... terribly cut up by their cavalry, a large body of our horse came suddenly up, and a melee ensued of great fierceness. Three of the enemy, one after another, did my captain slay with his own hand; and then came a single combat the like of which few have seen. Some of us left off fighting to witness it. The English commander, seeing half his men cut to pieces, rode furiously upon my captain, and tried to cut him down. It was a beautiful sight. Each was a master of fence, and ...
— The French Prisoners of Norman Cross - A Tale • Arthur Brown
... Theodosius, we are told, gave an independent command to the patrician Procopius, and sent him at the head of a body of troops to oppose Varahran. The armies met, and were on the point of engaging when the Persian monarch made a proposition to decide the war, not by a general battle, but by a single combat. Procopius assented; and a warrior was selected on either side, the Persians choosing for their champion a certain Ardazanes, and the Romans "Areobindus the Goth," count of the "Foederati." In the conflict which followed the Persian charged his adversary with his spear, but the nimble ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... statue, and forgot to do him obeisance. Was this indeed Arjuna, the one great idol of my dreams! Yes, I had long ago heard how he had vowed a twelve-years' celibacy. Many a day my young ambition had spurred me on to break my lance with him, to challenge him in disguise to single combat, and prove my skill in arms against him. Ah, foolish heart, whither fled thy presumption? Could I but exchange my youth with all its aspirations for the clod of earth under his feet, I should deem it a most precious grace. I know not in what whirlpool of thought I was lost, when suddenly I saw ...
— Chitra - A Play in One Act • Rabindranath Tagore
... with thy high terms; Only this proof I 'll of thy valour make, In single combat thou shalt buckle with me, And if thou vanquishest, thy words are true; Otherwise ...
— King Henry VI, First Part • William Shakespeare [Aldus edition]
... left her, she confirmed the promise of the crier, and agreed to take him for her husband. The report was soon spread abroad, and coming to the young lord's ears, he demanded that the farmer should resign his claim to the lady, or else meet him in single combat. ...
— Harper's Young People, November 4, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... little girl who swung her fists in single combat and uppercut her brother and me whenever her sense of fairness was outraged? The time has come when you, who were so fair to others, are going to be fair ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers
... of Burgundy, recognizing the young hero, went out to meet him and politely inquired the cause of his visit. Imagine his dismay when Siegfried proposed a single combat, in which the victor might claim the land and allegiance of the vanquished. Neither Gunther nor any of his knights would accept the challenge; but Gunther and his brother hastened forward ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... what he likes," said May plaintively. If otherwise engaged it would be in chasing cats, running down fowls, barking at message boys—to whom he had the greatest antipathy—or, most serious foible of all, threatening to engage in single combat with dogs twice his size and three times ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... century, had often been made, not only by the narrow passage between Iceland and Greenland, but, also, by the open sea; for the Basques [Headnote 1] went to Newfoundland. The smallest danger was the mere voyage; for these men, who went to the very end of the then known world, to challenge the whale to single combat, to steer right away into the Northern sea, to attack the mighty monster, amid darkness and storms, with the dense fog all around, and the foaming waves below,—those who could do this, were not the men to shrink from the ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... signal to begin, both chiding the length of that dreadful suspense, when an unexpected proposal from the Alban general put a stop to the onset. 3. Stepping in between both armies, he offered the Romans to decide the dispute by single combat; adding, that the side whose champion was overcome, should submit to the conqueror. A proposal like this, suited the impetuous temper of the Roman king, and was embraced with joy by his subjects, each of whom hoped that he himself ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... would seize upon them, and, although carried into the air, would not loosen his grip, but cling to them, obstruct their flight, and perhaps bring them to earth in the heart of the jungle, where, cut off from their kind, the single combat would be waged to the death. From where I watched, I saw massacres innumerable; terrible battles in which some creature—a giant beside an ant—fought for his life, crushing to death scores of the ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... it is said, had dispatched an embassy to King Richard, with the present of a colt recommended as a gallant war-horse, challenging Coeur de Lion to meet him in single combat between the armies, for the purpose of deciding at once their pretensions to the land of Palestine, and the theological question whether the God of the Christians, or Jupiter, the deity of the Saracens, should be the future object of ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... indignantly, "how he brings the treacherous murderer of William Longsword into the presence of a free-born Norman, unless he would see him slain where he stands. Were it not for the boy, I would challenge the traitor this instant to single combat." ...
— The Little Duke - Richard the Fearless • Charlotte M. Yonge
... by this time became so earnest that seven Senators were constrained to wait upon him, but it produced no sedative effect.) Mr. CHANDLER kept on in this manner until he had challenged the population of the planet to single combat, and then subsided, and ordered five hundred copies of the morrow's Globe to send ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 7, May 14, 1870 • Various
... characters are thinking, sometimes it describes or interprets the meaning of their movements. Plot: the ghost of Kumasaka makes reparation for his brigandage by protecting the country. He comes back to praise the bravery of the young man who killed him in single combat. ...
— Certain Noble Plays of Japan • Ezra Pound
... the plains of Vouille, near Poictiers. Soon after the commencement of the battle, the monarchs of either nation perceiving each other, rushed forward at the same instant, and engaged in single combat, when the superior skill and strength of Clovis decided the victory in his favor; he dismounted his adversary, and slew him on the spot. Nothing now remained to impede the progress of the conqueror, who extended his empire from the banks of the Loire to the Pyrenean mountains. ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various
... a trophy of my valor? Then when he comes into her presence, throwing himself at her feet, he may thus make his humble submission: "Lady, I am the giant Caraculiambro, lord of the island of Malindrania, vanquished in single combat by that never-deservedly-enough-extolled knight-errant Don Quixote de la Mancha, who has commanded me to cast myself most humbly at your feet, that it may please your honor to dispose of me according to your ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan
... was declar'd; And, summon'd there, the second prize he shard. A coat of mail, brave Demoleus bore, More brave Aeneas from his shoulders tore, In single combat on the Trojan shore: This was ordain'd for Mnestheus to possess; In war for his defense, for ornament in peace. Rich was the gift, and glorious to behold, But yet so pond'rous with its plates of gold, That scarce two servants could the weight sustain; Yet, loaded thus, Demoleus ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil
... whom a knife and fork shall always be laid at my table, has just informed me that Clement's Bibliotheque Curieuse, and Panzer's Typographical Annals, are knocked down to me, after Mustapha had picked me out for single combat, and battered my breast-plate with a thousand ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... a supernatural being. No man, the soldiers said, could have fought as he fought or, at the end of a day of such toil and bloodshed, could have slain Twala, who, in addition to being the king, was supposed to be the strongest warrior in the country, in single combat, shearing through his bull-neck at a stroke. Indeed, that stroke became proverbial in Kukuanaland, and any extraordinary blow or feat of strength was ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... action, engagement, joust, tournament; tilt, tilting [medieval times]; tournay[obs3], list; pitched battle. death struggle, struggle for life or death, life or death struggle, Armageddon[obs3]. hard knocks, sharp contest, tug of war. naval engagement, naumachia[obs3], sea fight. duel, duello[It]; single combat, monomachy[obs3], satisfaction, passage d'armes[Fr], passage of arms, affair of honor; triangular duel; hostile meeting, digladiation[obs3]; deeds of arms, feats of arms; appeal to arms &c. (warfare) 722. pugnacity; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... body, headed by the three commanders and attended by the whole junior school, visited the Pennies' school first, whose gates were promptly closed, and having challenged the Pennies with opprobrious words to come out and fight like men—Redhead being offered the chance of single combat with Dunc or Speug or Jock Howieson—the Seminaries then made their way to McIntyre's Academy. As this unfortunate place of learning had no gate, Speug led the Seminaries into the centre of their courtyard, McIntyre's boys having no spirit left in them and being now hidden ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... Boccaccio, according to whom the husband Giovanni Malatesta was a cripple, and killed the lovers in flagrante delicto. Hunt makes him a personable man, though of proud and gloomy temper. He slays his brother Paolo in chivalrous fashion and in single combat, and Francesca dies of a broken heart. The descriptive portions of the "Story of Rimini" are charming: the feudal procession with trumpeters, heralds, squires, and knights, sent to escort home the bride, the pine forest outside Ravenna, and the garden at Rimini ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... River and mountain have their traditions of spectres and transformations; giant "cauldrons" resound in the mountains, and monumental stones are erected over warriors, who "buckled on their belts," and fell in single combat. From Hallingdal went forth the national Polska (the Halling), and only the Hardanger-fela (the Hallingdal fiddle) can rightly give its wild, extraordinary melody. Most beautiful are the flowers of remembrance which the Christian antiquity exhibits, and the eternal snow upon the crowns ...
— Strife and Peace • Fredrika Bremer
... temples, and the mighty Gilgamesh lived in his palace. Ea-bani, deserted by his bestial companions, felt lonely and desired human friendship. So he consented to accompany his bride. Having heard of Gilgamesh from the hunter, he proposed to test his strength in single combat, but Shamash, god of the sun, warned Ea-bani that he was the protector of Gilgamesh, who had been endowed with great knowledge by Bel and Anu and Ea. Gilgamesh was also counselled in a vision of night to receive Ea-bani as ...
— Myths of Babylonia and Assyria • Donald A. Mackenzie
... neighbour of the English," and accordingly he sallied out one morning and burnt the castle to the ground. Chandos complained to the Black Prince, who sent a letter of remonstrance to Clisson, but it was only replied by a challenge to the Prince to meet him in single combat. Clisson caused his own ship to be built at Treguier, and had constructed a tower or framework of large timber, to be put together on his landing in England, for the lords to retreat to as a place of safety, and to be lodged therein securely in ...
— Brittany & Its Byways • Fanny Bury Palliser
... a son by Aife, and instructed her to call him Conla, to give him his father's ring, to send him to seek Cuchulainn, and to forbid him to reveal his name. In the sequel, Cuchulainn, unaware that Conla was his son, slew him in single combat, too late discovering his identity from the ring which he wore. This is the well-known saga formula of Sohrab and Rustum, of Theseus and Hippolytus. On his return from Scathach's isle Cuchulainn destroyed ...
— The Religion of the Ancient Celts • J. A. MacCulloch
... his young manhood he crossed the Channel, voyaged in the Mediterranean, fought the Turks, killing three of them in single combat, was taken prisoner and enslaved by the Tartars, killed his inhuman master, escaped into Russia, went thence through Europe to Africa, was in desperate naval battles, returned to England, sailing thence for Virginia, which he reached at the age ...
— History of American Literature • Reuben Post Halleck
... The Philistines Made Another Expedition Against The Hebrews Under The Reign Of Saul; And How They Were Overcome By David's Slaying Goliath In Single Combat. ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... connected with a battle on the plain of Rigo, which Hunyadi lost:—"The next day, which was Friday, as the two armies were drawn up in battle array, a Magyar hero riding forth, galloped up and down, challenging the Turks to single combat. Then came out to meet him the son of a renowned bashaw of Asia; rushing upon each other, both broke their lances, but the Magyar hero and his horse rolled over upon the ground, for the Turks had always the best horses." O young man ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... slaughter house, while all around me my comrades were slain like sheep or pigs for the wedding breakfast, or picnic, or gorgeous banquet of some great nobleman. You must have seen numbers of men killed either in a general engagement, or in single combat, but you never saw anything so truly pitiable as the way in which we fell in that cloister, with the mixing bowl and the loaded tables lying all about, and the ground reeking with our blood. I heard Priam's daughter Cassandra scream as Clytemnestra killed her close beside ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... noteworthy scene, describes the appearance of each hostile chief. The seventh and last is Polynices. Eteocles, although conscious of his father's curse, nevertheless declares with gloomy resoluteness that he will meet his brother in single combat, and, resisting the entreaties of the Chorus, goes forth to his doom. The attack on the town is repelled, but the brothers fall, each by the other's hand. Thus is the curse fulfilled. Presently their bodies are wheeled in. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... code in the Middle Ages the challenge and the single combat were recognized institutions; and they say that knights-errant used to go riding through the country seeking worthy opponents. And according to the cow-boy code in southeastern Arizona during the early ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... The great advantage of such a system of avoiding war is admitted by all intelligent people. We notice here a singular inconsistency in the principles upon which this strife is carried on, viz.: If it be a single combat, either a friendly contest or a deadly one, the parties are expected to contest on equal terms as nearly as may be arranged; but if large numbers are engaged, or in other words, when the contest becomes war, the rule is reversed ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various
... with the peaceful reconciliation and commingling of their forces. On the contrary, it was as if a general engagement had been abandoned and both the opposing companies had resolved themselves into the happy audience of a single combat. It was altogether a friendly and chivalrous contest, you understand,—nothing bitter or malicious about it,—but none the less it was a duel a l'outrance, a struggle for the mastery between two men whom nature had made rivals, and for ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... warlike feeling is given in the war-dance which is executed by one or two warriors only. The youth, in full panoply of war, and brandishing a PARANG and shield, goes through the movements of a single combat with some fanciful exaggeration (Pl. 171). He crouches beneath his shield, and springs violently hither and thither, emitting piercing yells of defiance and rage, cutting and striking at his imaginary foe or his partner in the dance. But it is characteristic of the Kayans that neither ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... summons to some ineffable death in the woods of Colonus. The expulsion of Polynices, the younger son, from Thebes; his return with a confederate band of princes for the recovery of his rights; the death of the two brothers in single combat; the public prohibition of funeral rights to Polynices, as one who had levied war against his native land; and the final reappearance of Antigone, who defies the law, and secures a grave to her brother at the certain price of a grave to herself— ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... their long lances, will single out and challenge each other; they run a tilt, and as each has warded off the blow, and passed unhurt, they will courteously turn back and salute each other, as an acknowledgment of their enemy's bravery and skill. When these challenges take place, or indeed in any single combat without challenge, none of these Indians will take advantage of possessing a superior weapon. If one has a rifle and knows that his opponent has not, he will throw his rifle down, and only use the ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat
... to the unfortunate Oedipus, having been supplanted by his younger brother Eteocles, brought an army of Argives against his native city, Thebes. The army was defeated, and the two brothers slew each other in single combat. On this Creon, the brother- in-law of Oedipus, succeeding to the chief power, forbade the burial of Polynices. But Antigone, sister of the dead, placing the dues of affection and piety before ...
— The Seven Plays in English Verse • Sophocles
... He challenges Harold to single combat, as the Gauls did their adversaries, according to Diodorus Siculus; and as Francis I. will do later when at feud with Charles V. He was to die in an expedition undertaken out of revenge for an epigram of the king of France, and ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... of the helpers of AEneas, who is presently warned by the nymphs in what peril Ascanius stands: comes in sight of the camp and with difficulty lands his men (208-369). A hard-fought battle by the river follows, of which Pallas and Lausus are the heroes (370-531). Pallas is killed by Turnus in single combat (532-603). AEneas in revenge gives no quarter, but slays and slays, until Juno, warned by Jupiter that if she would save Turnus even for a time she must act at once, goes down into the battle and fashions in the form of AEneas a phantom, which flees before Turnus ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... progress in driving back the Georgia regiment, when the Captain encountered the Major of the Georgians. Whether something in the eye of each defied the other, will perhaps never be known; but certain it is that Captain S—— sprung for a single combat with the Major, and that the Major, quite as willing, sprung forward with a corresponding intention. A few passes were made with the sword by each, and then both seemed to forget the use of the weapon. In half a minute swords ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... the Annals of Tiglath-pileser I. the king counts the number of his victims: 4 urus, 10 male elephants, 120 lions slain in single combat on foot, 800 lions killed by arrows let fly from his chariot. In the Annals of Assurnazirpal, the king boasts of having slain 30 elephants, 250 urus, ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... to get by until that single combat should be ended; but as Wetherby paused the big German made a circling swipe with his rifle, and his bayonet tore a great gash in the Reedshire's gas helmet. The little man in jumping back lost his balance, and rolled head over heels into one of the craters, ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... made the brilliant discovery that every scorpion hates all other scorpions with a deep and abiding hatred. This provided us with a new game. Instead of killing them out of hand we caught the biggest scorpions, made a ring in the sand about a couple of feet in diameter, and matched them in single combat. ...
— With Our Army in Palestine • Antony Bluett
... Now we exhort you with patience and constancy to submit yourselves to his authority. Do not excite that wrath before which our enemies tremble. Acquiesce in the rule of justice in which the whole world rejoices. Why should you, who have now an upright Judge[292], settle your grievances by single combat? What has man got a tongue for, if the armed hand is to settle all differences? or where can peace be looked for, if there is fighting in a civilised State like ours[293]? Imitate then our Goths, who ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... battle that ensued, Mahfuz, the Goliath of the Unbelievers, was slain in single combat by Gabriel Andreas, a soldier of tried valour, who had assumed the monastic life in consequence of having lost the tip of his tongue for treasonable freedom of speech: the green standard was captured, and 12,000 Moslems fell. David ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... spot the company surveyed the whole plain, and saw at the foot of the Acropolis the Trojan and the Achaean armies face to face, about to settle their agreement to let the war be decided by a single combat ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... brave soldier and had served with distinction as an officer in the French service; he was one of the excellent swordsmen of Europe; had fought several duels in France, where it is no child's play to fight a duel; but had never unsheathed his sword for single combat, but in defence of the feeble and insulted—he was kind and open-hearted but of too great simplicity; he had once ten thousand pounds left him, all of which he lent to a friend, who disappeared and never returned him a penny. ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow
... yet the seas were the same in which both the heroes wandered; and Dido cannot be denied to be the poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter books of Virgil's poem are the four and twenty Iliads contracted; a quarrel occasioned by a lady, a single combat, battles fought, and a town besieged. I say not this in derogation to Virgil, neither do I contradict anything which I have formerly said in his just praise: for his Episodes are almost wholly of his own invention; and the form which he has given to the telling, makes the tale his ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... that well enough,' thou must say, 'Thou challengedst him to single combat; but he was old, and so his friends advised him not to fight with thee, and then they let the suit fall ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... exception of a hunting-knife, his enemy was altogether unarmed; for he knew that in the event of missing his mark the young man's speed of foot would enable him to outstrip him, while his strength of frame would quickly terminate a single combat. ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... and abolished them again; such were the races of mules, either rode or in a chariot as likewise the crown appointed for boys that were victor's in the five contests. And, in short, a thousand things in those games are mere novelties. At Pisa they had a single combat, where he that yielded or was overcome was killed upon the place. But pray for the future require no author for my story, lest I may appear ridiculous if amidst my cups I ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... to the lake, and when the sheep arrived at the lake, they immediately spread round it, and the prince placed the falcon on a stump, and the hounds and bagpipes under the stump, then tucked up his hose and sleeves, waded into the lake, and began to shout: "Dragon, dragon! come out to single combat with me to-day that we may measure ourselves together, unless you're a woman."[6] The dragon called out in reply, "I will do so now, prince—now!" Erelong behold the dragon! it is large, it is terrible, it is disgusting! When the dragon came out, it seized him by the waist, and they ...
— Folk Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... questions about God are not so ingenuous as that of the infant St. Thomas. The armour of their faith will not be so easily pierced by chance shots as if they were without preparation, and at the same time they will know enough of the greatness of the subject not to challenge "any unbeliever" to single combat, and undertake to prove against all opponents the existence and perfections ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart
... middle of the shed under which we slept. The question of arms was more obscure. We had a good many tools, indeed, which we employed in the manufacture of our toys; but they were none of them suited for a single combat between civilised men, and, being nondescript, it was found extremely hard to equalise the chances of the combatants. At length a pair of scissors was unscrewed; and a couple of tough wands being found in a corner of the courtyard, one blade of the scissors ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Amuba, and you have certainly hit upon the weak point in the use of such a weapon; but for single combat, or the fighting of broken ranks, they would be grand. When we get back to Thebes if I can find any peasant who can instruct me in the use of these neboots I ...
— The Cat of Bubastes - A Tale of Ancient Egypt • G. A. Henty
... of Roncesvalles Roland and Olivier had met in single combat on a quiet island in the Rhone. Toward even a fleecy cloud hovered over them, and from its midst an angel "wrapped in rosy light" separated the combatants, bidding them be friends, and telling them to turn their swords against ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... Napoleon would have been heartily glad to cry for quarter ere the lapse of five minutes, and even the Blacksmith Tartar would, perhaps, have shrunk from the opponent with whom, after having had a dispute with him, my father engaged in single combat for one hour, at the end of which time the champions shook hands and retired, each having experienced quite enough of the other's prowess. The name of my ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... they miss even their immediate end; the objects of their praise are more inclined (and quite right too) to dislike and discard them for toadies—if they are men of spirit, at any rate. Aristobulus inserted in his history an account of a single combat between Alexander and Porus, and selected this passage to read aloud to the former; he reckoned that his best chance of pleasing was to invent heroic deeds for the king, and heighten his achievements. Well, they were on board ship in the Hydaspes; Alexander took hold of the book, ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata
... father as master. There were no class-privileges: the fact that the Tities took precedence of the Ramnes, and both ranked before the Luceres, did not affect their equality in all legal rights. The burgess cavalry, which at this period was used for single combat in front of the line on horseback or even on foot, and was rather a select or reserve corps than a special arm of the service, and which accordingly contained by far the wealthiest, best-armed, and best-trained men, was naturally held in higher estimation than ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... place all around in single combat, and charges and counter charges made by little parties who were separated from the main body crowded together in the central portions of the battlefield; and snatching at the opportunity, Serge, spear in hand, leaned over to Marcus and, pointing forward ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn
... all, did our young Cossacks, disgusted with pillage, greed, and a feeble foe, and burning with the desire to distinguish themselves in presence of their chiefs, seek to measure themselves in single combat with the warlike and boastful Lyakhs, prancing on their spirited horses, with the sleeves of their jackets thrown back and streaming in the wind. This game was inspiriting; they won at it many costly sets of horse-trappings and valuable weapons. In a month the scarcely ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... Goliath, mocked the host of Israel, and challenged any of their stern warriors to single combat, what human being could have imagined that the gigantic heathen would be successfully met in the mortal struggle by a youth 'ruddy and of a fair countenance?' who unarmed, except with a sling and a stone, gave the carcases of the hosts ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... army, either because they judged the occasion unfavourable or because, after so many defeats, they feared a pitched battle, did not come down from their hill. The two heralds sent by two English knights to offer single combat received the answer: "For to-day you may go to bed, because it grows late. But to-morrow, if it be God's will, we will come ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... fulfilling those high functions. He was anxious thoroughly to discharge the duties of a dictatorship without grasping any more of its power than was indispensable to his purpose. But he was alone on that little isthmus, in single combat with the great Spanish monarchy. It was to him that all eyes turned, during the infinite horrors of the Harlem sieges and in the more prosperous leaguer of Alkmaar. What he could do he did. He devised ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... that an ye have no taste for fray nor avail for fight and ye have no training save for bibbing of wine and ease at home, I have sworn and swear by Him who lighted the lucident fires of the Sun and the Moon, none shall sally forth to do single combat with this youth save I myself." But when so saying he knew not that was hidden from him in the World of Secrets. Presently he rushed into the field of fight with reins floating upon his courser's neck and he renowned it, showing ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... combat of the previous day had decided, young James Douglas of Avondale was to lead one party, being the successful tilter of the day of single combat, while the Earl himself was to ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett |
