"Breasting" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... this time once more off Cape Horn. It was my third voyage; I was still a midshipman, and in the second mate's watch. I came on deck at midnight and found the ship hove-to, breasting what in this age of steamboats, and, for the matter of that, perhaps in any other age, might be termed a terrific sea. She was making good weather of it—that is to say, she kept her decks dry, but she was diving and rolling most hideously, with such swift ...
— The Honour of the Flag • W. Clark Russell
... and shot by through spume and rain, every soul in the boat exulted except the woman who lay flat on its keel. The rapids gave a voyager the illusion that they were running uphill to meet him, that they were breasting and opposing him instead of carrying him forward. There was scarcely a breath between riding the edge of the bottomless pit and shooting out on clear water. The rapids were past, and they paddled for the other ...
— The Chase Of Saint-Castin And Other Stories Of The French In The New World • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... be morning." He glanced up at the open sky, for he was breasting the surface of a small lake. "Good!" The pirogue slipped into another bayou at the upper end of the lagoon. The shadows here seemed thicker than ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... all her questions, and had told her over and over again every detail of Mary's flight, and had assured her that the princess was, at that hour, breasting the waves with Brandon, on their high road to paradise, I thought it time to start myself in the same direction and to say a word in my own behalf. So I spoke very freely and told Jane what I felt and ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... could see how she looked when she was riding the waves on the prow of a gallant vessel. That's where she ought to be, I heard a man say. He said Hope squatting on a portico roof may look ridiculous, but Hope breasting the billows is superb." ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... mystery lay behind Manuela's sidelong eyes? What sin or suffering? What knowledge, how gained, justified Esteban's wizened saws? These two were wise before their time; when they ought to have been flirting on the brink of life, here they were, breasting the great flood, familiar with death, ...
— The Spanish Jade • Maurice Hewlett
... far there is no prospect of recognition from the Powers, while order is far from being restored in the provinces. Our fate hangs upon a hair; the slightest negligence may forfeit all. I, who bear this arduous responsibility, feel it my bounden duty to stand at the helm in the hope of successfully breasting ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale
... the ladies' parlour, past the entrance of an extra cabin, and took his stand under the bridge, breasting the steely, salt sea wind. On the deck below, the steerage passengers had settled themselves as far as the bow. Though the Roland was running under full steam, it was not making its maximum speed, prevented by the long, heavy swells that the wind raised and hurled against the bow. Across ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... prediction. Old Mother Nature verified his wisdom by sending a dashing shower, but he cared not at all for a wetting. He knew how to turn his crimson suit into the most perfect of water-proof coats; so he flattened his crest, sleeked his feathers, and breasting the April downpour, kept on calling for rain. He knew he would appear brighter when it was past, and he seemed to know, too, that every day of sunshine and shower would bring nearer his ...
— The Song of the Cardinal • Gene Stratton-Porter
... was blowing dead on for the opening in the reef, and the old whaleman came along breasting the swell with her bluff bows, and entered the lagoon. There was no leadsman in her chains. She just came in as if she knew all the soundings by heart—as probably she did—for these whalemen know every hole and corner ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... Turning about and breasting the waves we faced the oncoming steamer and signaled to her to stop; but hardly had she espied us than she also turned about in the hope to escape. She showed no flag to indicate her nationality, so surely we had sighted an English vessel. Even after we had fired a warning shot, she tried by ...
— The Journal of Submarine Commander von Forstner • Georg-Guenther von Forstner
... drummed dull thunder from the brown earth, and the dust cloud behind drew out and lengthened with the speed of their going. Side by side they swept through the silent land, breasting small rises, swooping down slopes, breathing their horses whenever ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... on mine, but she did not reply, and we hastened on as speedily as the wind and rain would allow. After a short but determined breasting of the storm, during which my breath had nearly failed me, she ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green
... requires a sharp eye to discern a man, but at length they are seen scrambling up the ravines and gullies and breasting the sharp pitches, until at last the first man arrives thoroughly used up and a string of fellows of lesser wind come in, in sections, ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... true. Cain was breasting the water manfully, making for a small cove nearer to where the boat was sunk than the one in which Francisco had landed with Clara and the wounded men, and divided from the other by a ridge of rocks which separated the sandy beach, and extended some way into the ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... Breasting the tape in their readiness for the word, the dry air of North America with its champagne exhilaration was in their lungs whipping their red corpuscles. They had but one thought and that was to "get there." ...
— My Second Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... behold Upon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing; Hear the shrill whistle, which doth order give To sounds confus'd; behold the threaden sails, Borne with the invisible and creeping wind, Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea, Breasting the lofty surge: O, do but think You stand upon the rivage,[3] and behold A city on the inconstant billows dancing; For so appears this fleet majestical, Holding due course to Harfleur. Follow, follow! Grapple your minds to sternage of this navy;[4] And ...
— King Henry the Fifth - Arranged for Representation at the Princess's Theatre • William Shakespeare
... had cut the bank from under a great buttonwood. It hung prone over the water, and one dipping fork seized and held the fainting swimmer. The dog was close, but had entered the current too far down and was breasting it while he bayed in protest to his master's horn. Now, as Euonymus struggled along the tree the brute struck for the bank, and the two gained it together. Euonymus ran, but on a bit of open grass dropped to one knee, at bay. The dog sprang. In the negro fashion the runaway's head ducked ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable
... was at once furled. The jib was kept on, however, to hold us steady. We were now merely breasting the current, and driving on a little with the gusts. Soon it began to rain,—rain and snow together. The dreariness and uncertainty of our situation can hardly be imagined. We did not even know how near we were to the foot of the cliffs, and could merely keep ...
— Left on Labrador - or, The cruise of the Schooner-yacht 'Curlew.' as Recorded by 'Wash.' • Charles Asbury Stephens
... of Koom [D] is one of the pleasantest recollections I retain of the ride between the capital and Ispahan. It was about two o'clock on the afternoon of the 6th of February that, breasting a chain of low sandy hills, the huge golden dome of the Tomb of Fatima became visible. We were then still four miles off; but, even with our jaded steeds, the ride became what it had not yet been—a pleasure. The green sunlit plains of wheat and barley, interspersed ...
— A Ride to India across Persia and Baluchistan • Harry De Windt
... had overtaken Carleton's column. While breasting Nicholson's Nek in the darkness the men were surprised at the sudden clattering by of a Boer picquet. The transport mules, panic-stricken, fled en masse, wrecking the column as they stampeded down the hillside, felling men as they went. It was a gunless, ammunitionless ...
— Sir John French - An Authentic Biography • Cecil Chisholm
... to the case against Mayer, and breasting the hills, the young men talked it over, Crowder leaping to quick conclusions, impulsive, imagination running riot, Mark more judicial, confining himself to what facts they had, warning against hasty judgments. The talk finally ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... be moving along with clock-like regularity, the boat breasting the current and throwing the spray in fine style, when Jud gave ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren
... in the sunshine, before breasting the storm. The pages of blood and mourning will soon be opened—meanwhile ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... victory, but of joyful confidence, and so he who knows himself to have God for his friend and his helper, can go through the world keeping a sunny face, whatever the clouds may be, erect and secure, light of heart and buoyant, holding up his chin above the stormiest waters, and breasting all difficulties and dangers with a confidence far away from presumption, because it is the consequence of the realisation of God's presence. So the goodwill of God is ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... Helen and Lowell had stood, Jim made a detour as he approached the reservation line and avoided the Greek Letter Ranch. He swung into the road well above the ranch, and, breasting the hill where the murder had taken place on the Dollar Sign, he galloped down the slope toward ...
— Mystery Ranch • Arthur Chapman
... sand beyond—far out upon which lay an upturned gabion. Within this locked and stranded box lay two dead bodies. Crabs fought their way eagerly through the cracks of the water-sprung door, and over it, breasting the salt breeze, slowly circled a cormorant—curious and amazed at so strange a ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith
... him voluntarily relinquishing the enjoyments, luxuries, and ease of the opulent refinement in which he was born and bred, and choosing the perils and hardships of the wilderness; as we follow him fording swollen streams, climbing rugged mountains, breasting the forest storms, wading through snowdrifts, sleeping in the open air, living upon the coarse food of hunters and of Indians, we trace with devout admiration the divinely appointed education he was receiving to enable him to meet and endure ...
— Washington's Birthday • Various
... great beeches in Hampstead Lane, breasting the rise to the heath, on their march for that kindly chapel, where, if you dined in the tavern annexed, the incumbent would marry you for nothing, charge but the five shillings, cost price of the Queen's licence, and ...
— The Highwayman • H.C. Bailey
... hard as we stood in for the Old Head of Kinsale pilot boat breasting the foaming surge like a sea gull—"Carrol Cove" in her tiny mainsail—pilot jumped into the main channel a bottle of rum swung by the lead line into the ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... neither on sky nor earth; my heart was with my eyes, and both seemed migrated into Mr. Rochester's frame. I wanted to see the invisible thing on which, as we went along, he appeared to fasten a glance fierce and fell. I wanted to feel the thoughts whose force he seemed breasting and resisting. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... Quickly breasting the wave, Eager the prize to win, First of us all the brave Monongahela went in Under full head of steam— Twice she struck him abeam, Till her stem was a sorry work, (She might have run on a crag!) The Lackawanna hit fair, He flung her aside like cork, And still ...
— Poems of American Patriotism • Brander Matthews (Editor)
... the Lamplighter was not to be cast away by every caprice of the public mind which changed the political aspect of the town council. So Jimmy stayed on through the years and changing administrations—in the sultry heat of the summer nights, or breasting his way through winter's huge snow-drifts, fronting the wind-driven sleet, or dripping through the spring-time rain, his taper hugged tight beneath his thick rubber coat, his matches safe in the depths ...
— The Long Ago • Jacob William Wright
... time to say more; and we thought it very brave of him to say that, for his own house was in the lower village, and there he had a wife and children sick. In half a minute the church was empty, and the street below it full of people, striving and struggling against the blast, and breasting it at an incline like swimmers, but beaten back ever and anon and hurled against one another, with tattered umbrellas, hats gone, and bonnets hanging. And among them, like gulls before the wind, blew dollops of spray ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... founded by the New England Congregationalists, to whom this has ever been a favorite field of activity. But special honor must be paid to the wise and courageous and nobly successful enterprise of large-minded and large-hearted men among the Baptists, who as early as 1764, boldly breasting a current of unworthy prejudice in their own denomination, began the work of Brown University at Providence, which, carried forward by a notable succession of great educators, has been set in the front rank of existing American institutions ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... sun, and a sharp wind from the north, had succeeded to the lowering sky and heavy atmosphere of the morning, and we traveled along with light hearts and brisk steps, breasting the side of a deep ascent, from the summit of which my guide told me, I should behold the sea—the sea, not only the great plain on which I expected to see our armament, but the link which bound me to my country! Suddenly, just as I turned the angle of a cliff, it burst ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... the haunch, and the sturdy beast set off at once up the laborious ascent, with its hoofs sinking in deeply, as instinctively it sloped off to the right instead of breasting the ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... There the light was clearer, and the breeze that runs before the daybreak was dancing through the grass. The Boy turned to the left, following along one of the sheep-trails that crossed the high, sloping pastures. Then he bore to the right, breasting the long ridge, and passed the summit, running lightly to the eastward until he came to a rounded, rocky knoll. There he sat down among the little ...
— The Valley of Vision • Henry Van Dyke
... stood on the deck of a grimy little steamer breasting the outgoing tide that surged through the First Narrows. Wooded banks on either hand spread dusky green in the hot August sun. On their left glinted the roofs and white walls of Hollyburn, dear to ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... plaintiff; but Marstern drew his chair to the opposite side of the hearth and chatted so easily, naturally, and kindly that her trepidation passed utterly. It began to grow late, and a heavier gust than usual shook the house. It appeared to waken him to the dire necessity of breasting the gale, and ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... headed eastward, and rode, Malachi and he, over the soundless turf and through the fog, breasting the ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... medley of sounds blended by distance turned heads towards the east; and presently, breasting the mustard field that lay level and yellow to the hills, came Jose's squad of vaqueros, with Jose himself leading the group at a pace that was recklessly headlong, his crimson sash floating like ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... takes his place in the battle and assails the triumphant Teucrians. The Tyrrhene ranks gather round him, and all at once in unison shower their darts down on the hated foe. As a cliff that juts into the waste of waves, meeting the raging winds and breasting the deep, endures all the threatening force of sky and sea, itself fixed immovable, so he dashes to earth Hebrus son of Dolichaon, and with him Latagus, and Palmus as he fled; catching Latagus full front in the face with a vast fragment of mountain rock, while Palmus he hamstrings, ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... across the ocean was boisterous, and the clumsy caravels had a hard time breasting the waves. The ships were soon separated by alternate storms and fog so that all three did not meet at their appointed rendezvous in the Straits of Belle Isle until the last week in July. Then moving ...
— Crusaders of New France - A Chronicle of the Fleur-de-Lis in the Wilderness - Chronicles of America, Volume 4 • William Bennett Munro
... mysterious that a certain mystery attaches to the people to whom such a thing does happen. Moreover I had never really understood the Fynes; he with his solemnity which extended to the very eating of bread and butter; she with that air of detachment and resolution in breasting the common-place current of their unexciting life, in which the cutting of bread and butter appeared to me, by a long way, the most dangerous episode. Sometimes I amused myself by supposing that to their minds this world of ours ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... hard pressed on several occasions, Mr. Gallacher always fell back on his goal, like the prudent general who covers his retreat, and no man did more heading and breasting in running the ball out that day. He wants the judgment of his companion in the same position, but makes up for it by fearless and unceasing work. He was hard pressed several times by Marshall and Oswald, sen., and had the worst of the tackling, but he generally came up smiling, and renewed ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... not gage his conception of real speed if the gait he struck was not "too fast." They were through New Westminster and rolling across the Fraser bridge before she was well settled in the seat, breasting the road with a lurch and a swing at the curves, a noise under that long hood like giant bees ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... in this for the brave ones. If we could wait long enough we might see the DEARTHS breasting their way ...
— Dear Brutus • J. M. Barrie
... fanning. Play with your fancies; and in them behold Upon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing; Hear the shrill whistle which doth order give To sounds confus'd; behold the threaden sails, Borne with the invisible and creeping wind, Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea, Breasting the lofty surge. O, do but think You stand upon the rivage and behold A city on the inconstant billows dancing; For so appears this fleet majestical, Holding due course to Harfleur. Follow, follow! Grapple your minds to sternage of this navy, And leave your England, as dead midnight still, Guarded ...
— The Life of King Henry V • William Shakespeare [Tudor edition]
... me that there was no reasonable hope, burdened as I now was, of breasting the strong current running toward the mid-river from either bank. I tried it on one side, and I tried it on the other, and gave it up. The one choice left was to let myself drift with her down the stream. Some fifty yards ...
— The Two Destinies • Wilkie Collins
... is at home sick; Stephens is not here; so I am standing very much on my own hand, breasting the conflict alone. So I shall have the consolation of knowing that, if I succeed, the victory will be all my own. The contest will be decided by Monday next, and perhaps sooner.... As soon as it is over I shall leave here and shall be at home at furthest to-day week. If I ...
— Robert Toombs - Statesman, Speaker, Soldier, Sage • Pleasant A. Stovall
... gradient and the rarefied air made it almost impossible to sustain a conversation unless the speakers dawdled. Helen often found herself many yards in advance of the others. She simply could not help breasting the steeper portions of the track. She was drawn forward by an intense eagerness to begin the real business of the day. Bower did not seek to restrain her. He thought her high spirits admirable, and his gaze dwelt appreciatively ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... of a smart-looking schooner, that under a heavy weight of canvas was manfully breasting the breeze, almost conscious, one might fancy, that it was ...
— Woman As She Should Be - or, Agnes Wiltshire • Mary E. Herbert
... watched him breasting the soft heavy blanket that lay on the ground so deep and hemmed them in, turned ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... the river's edge, and began skinning them. He had almost finished when he heard hoarse shouts from up the river. From his position he could see the stream a hundred yards below the ford. Stevens had driven in his horses. He could see them breasting the first sweep of the current, their heads held high, struggling for the opposite shore. He rose, dropped ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... that this was best, and soon, in the fast gathering dusk, the Gem was swung about and was breasting the rather ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Florida - Or, Wintering in the Sunny South • Laura Lee Hope
... route, had forced a way through the reeds and cut across country. So they began to run again harder than before, and kept their lead during the morning. But when afternoon came the Asika gained on them. Now they were breasting a long rise, the river running in the cleft beneath, and Jeekie, who seemed to be absolutely untiring, held Alan by the hand, Fahni following close behind. Two of their men had fallen down and been abandoned, and ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... to most people to contradict him, and the possible truth of the contradiction soon sinks out of sight. So Sir William sat on the brink of the river and watched the others plunging into the waves, diving, rising, breasting the current, and was agreeably supported by the consciousness that if Fate had so ordained it, he himself would have been capable of performing all these feats just as creditably. No need now to stifle a misgiving ...
— The Arbiter - A Novel • Lady F. E. E. Bell
... Breasting the tides where the gulls are flying, Swiftly she's coming in; Shallows and deeps and rocks defying, Bravely she's coming in; Precious the love she will bring to bless me, Snowy the arms she will bring to caress me, In the proud purple of ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... spoken for the next few minutes. Two or three slight swells were crossed without any sign of the enemy; and then, upon breasting a rather higher rise than usual, they saw a mass of moving ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... spot was on another occasion the scene of a superb effort of courageous tenacity. I met a large hare steadily breasting the hill. Turning neither to the right nor left it was soon out of sight over the crest. Five or more minutes later there appeared in view, on the hare's trail, a very tired little fox terrier not much more than half the size of the hare. He also turned aside neither to the right nor the ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... The infantry followed, sturdily breasting the long ascent; a second intrenched position, barring the La Hoya pass, was abandoned on their approach; the strong castle of Perote, with an armament of 60 guns and mortars, opened its gates without firing a shot, and on May 15 the great city of Puebla, surrounded by glens of astonishing fertility, ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... d'hote dinner, Nan kept to her self-imposed task, and was busying herself about the wages of the coastguardsmen, and the probable cost of mackerel, and the chances of Sal's having to face a westerly squall of wind and rain when she was breasting the steep hill rising from Newhaven. Was Sal singing that night before the Old Ship? Or was she in the little cul-de-sac near the Town-hall where the public-house was that the fishermen called in at on their way home? ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... face of a corresponding color. He wore an old white hat, tied under his chin with a handkerchief; his body was short and stout, but his legs of disproportioned and appalling length. I observed him at sunset, breasting the hill with gigantic strides, and standing against the sky on the summit, like a colossal pair of tongs. In a moment after we heard him screaming frantically behind the ridge, and nothing doubting that he was in the clutches of Indians or grizzly bears, some ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... that the more they followed up the victory against one portion of the enemy's line the more did they lay themselves open to being surrounded by the remainder of the enemy. He likened the operation to a man breasting a wave of the sea, who, as rapidly as he clears a way before him, is enveloped by the very water he has displaced. He spoke of the final surrender as inevitable owing to the superiority in numbers of the enemy. ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... voices mingled with the sound of active labour—there too might be seen, in the deep harbour of the narrow channel that separated the town from the island we have just described, some half-dozen gallant vessels bearing the colours of England, breasting with their dark prows the rapid current that strained their creaking cables in every strand, and seemingly impatient of the curb that checked them from gliding impetuously into the broad lake, which some few hundred yards below, appeared to court them ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... friends in Haparanda were right. The Lapp costume is well adapted for cold weather. Nothing is warmer than reindeer skin, and it is convenient either when the wearer is driving in his Lapp sleigh, walking or travelling on skees, or when breasting ...
— The Land of the Long Night • Paul du Chaillu
... the sun came through but in flecks, he judged that it was growing towards noon, and he wotted well that he was growing aweary. For he had been long afoot, and the more part of the time on a rough way, or breasting a slope which was ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris
... of the great herd and, as she watched, more were coming, breasting the waves and breaking from the foam and coming up the beach like vast, ...
— The Beach of Dreams • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... pack-thread, heavy squalls, accompanied with heavy rain all the time beating on us like hail, and bursting over the ship in rapid succession; but the old barquey bravely stood it, bending to the blast when it came, and then buoyantly rising the next moment and breasting it like ...
— Afloat at Last - A Sailor Boy's Log of his Life at Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... the hill, and traversed the road along the margin of the Yaupaae, and were now just entering the lane that runs down to the house. The storm was raging with unabated fury, and the constable, with clenched teeth, and bent head, and half-shut eyes, was breasting the driving flakes, and congratulating himself with the idea that his exposure would soon be over, and he by the side of a warm stove in one of the stores, the hero of the evening, recounting the adventures of the day and comfortably taking his cheerful glass, when suddenly, without having ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... for this ship lest peradventure she miss the island. Full of this dreadful possibility I took to running like any madman, staying for nothing, leaping, scrambling, slipping and stumbling down sheer declivities, breasting precipitous cliffs until I reached and began to descend ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol
... did, having seen nothing of any hounds, but with instinctive knowledge that they were men likely to be right in a hunting-field. "If that ain't Nappie's horse, I'll eat him," said one of the leading men to the other, as all the three were breasting the hill together. Frank only knew that he had been carried over water and timber without a mistake, and felt a glow of gratitude towards Mr. MacFarlane. Up the hill they went, and, not waiting to inquire into the circumstances of a ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... told me that when he first settled in the Valley, a disappointed and angry man, this gulf had much the satisfaction for him that men in great grief or wrath find in breasting a sharp storm. There was something congenial to his ugly unrest in this place, with its violent clamor, its swift dashing of waters, its dismal shadows, and damp chilliness ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... mingled with the hail, Run along upon the ground, And the thunders deeper sound! The loftier Muse, with awful mien, 300 Upon a lonely rock is seen: Full is the eye that speaks the dauntless soul; She seems to hear the gathering tempest roll Beneath her feet; she bids an eagle fly, Breasting the whirlwind, through the dark-red sky; Or, with elated look, lifts high the spear, As sounds of distant battles roll more near. Now deep-hushed in holy trance, She sees the powers of Heaven advance, And wheels, instinct with spirit, bear 310 God's living chariot through the air; Now ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... that no man, who knows me personally or by reputation, will suspect the honesty of my skepticism. If I were politic, and intent only on my own preferment or pecuniary interest, I should swim with the strong tide of public sentiment instead of breasting its powerful influence. The hazard is too great, the labor too burdensome, the remuneration too uncertain, the contest too unequal, to induce a selfish adventurer to assail a combination so formidable. Disinterested opposition and sincere conviction, however, are not conclusive proofs of ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... the express drew the young men to their feet, and the next moment two heavily furred gentlemen had descended to the platform and were breasting the rigor of the night. Frank Rainer introduced them as Mr. Grisben and Mr. Balch, and Faxon, while their luggage was being lifted into the second sleigh, discerned them, by the roving lantern gleam, to be an elderly ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... shore in the face of the wind, meeting, breasting, overcoming it, though with the exertion of determined strength and energy. The gale was rather fierce. It was a sight to see, the rush of that tide of waters, mighty, sweeping, rolling and tumbling in from the great sea, restless, endless. Diana did not stop to ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... is over, Ah me, but its moments were sweet! You are oft', via Folkestone or Dover, To some Continental retreat. On Frenchman and German you'll lavish The smiles that can madden me still; While I, with the gillie McTavish, Am breasting the heather-clad hill. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 8, 1891 • Various
... unerring judgment the better of two possible alternatives, and proceeding with the confidence essential to the unfaltering touch. As Burns beheld the process pass the point of greatest danger and approach conclusion, he felt somewhat as a man may who, unable to help, watches a swimmer breasting tremendous seas, and sees him win past the last smother of breakers and make his way into calmer waters. He was conscious that he himself had been breathing shallowly as he watched, and now drew several ...
— Mrs. Red Pepper • Grace S. Richmond
... receive the returned penitent from the Father's arms into their own, My brother that was dead is alive again, that was lost is found! Never from surf-beaten shore or rocky headland do spectators watch with such anxious interest the life-boat, as, now seen and now lost, now breasting the waves and now hurled back on the foaming crest of a giant billow, she makes for the wreck, as they watch those who, with the Bible in their hearts and hands, go forth to save the lost. And when the poor perishing ...
— The Angels' Song • Thomas Guthrie
... the smoke growing heavier and more pungent as they neared the flames. They could hear the deep toned muttering of the conflagration. And all the way along the road they were breasting a tide of forest dwellers, deer, rabbit, bears, and a host of smaller animals, all scurrying away from the roaring doom ...
— The Boy Scout Fire Fighters • Irving Crump
... laughter fitfully piercing and pealing, Waves, air, midnight, their savagest trinity lashing, Out in the shadows there milk-white combs careering, On beachy slush and sand spirts of snow fierce slanting, Where through the murk the easterly death-wind breasting, Through cutting swirl and spray watchful and firm advancing, (That in the distance! is that a wreck? is the red signal flaring?) Slush and sand of the beach tireless till daylight wending, Steadily, slowly, through hoarse ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... wooden bridge and by Overton steeple—a dim outline on the left—and cantering up Avebury hill eased their horses through Little Kennet. Gathering speed again they swept through Beckhampton village, where the Bath road falls off to the left, and breasting the high downs towards Yatesbury, they ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman
... there's a ridge and a row of charred trees, which stand out gloomily etched against the sky. The sky is grey and damp and sickly; fleecy balls of smoke burst against it—shrapnel. You wonder whether they've caught anybody. Overhead you hear the purr of engines—a flight of aeroplanes breasting the clouds. Behind you observation balloons hang stationary, ...
— The Glory of the Trenches • Coningsby Dawson
... on the morning of March 16, Dr. High telephoned me that Sir Thomas O'Hara was seriously ill, and asked me to come at once. It took but a few minutes to have Jerry at the door, and, breasting a cold, thin rain at a sharp gallop, I was at my friend's door before the clock struck eight. Dr. High met me with a ...
— The Fat of the Land - The Story of an American Farm • John Williams Streeter
... in bosks and overgrown with vine, Upon a headland breasting violet seas, Her castle towers, like a dream divine, With stairs ...
— Poems • Madison Cawein
... aided him with adroit whispers. His brow was unruffled as he bade his carousing chum, the steward, adieu at midnight. The good ship dashed merrily on breasting the ...
— The Midnight Passenger • Richard Henry Savage
... the approaching meeting with their friends after an absence of many weeks. The boats going up the stream were all close to the bank, the crews walking along the causeway and laboring at the towropes, for there was not enough wind to render the sails of any utility in breasting the stream. The craft were of various kinds, some shapeless and rudely fashioned, used in conveying corn from the country higher up down to Thebes, and now returning empty. Others were the fancifully painted boats of the wealthy, with comfortable ...
— The Cat of Bubastes - A Tale of Ancient Egypt • G. A. Henty
... and the bubbles caused by the plunge came the red head, anxious face, and big shoulders of Macklin. He sighted me, and came on, breasting the water with all the vigor of a strong man in good form, and with a new look in his face that meant trouble for me. I looked for the boat; but the fog had thickened again, ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... of the sail is doubt; Faith swells it full to breast the breasting seas. Bold, conscience, fast, and rule the ruling helm; Hell's freezing north no tempest can send out, But it shall toss thee homeward to thy leas; Boisterous wave-crest never shall o'erwhelm Thy sea-float bark as safe as ...
— A Book of Strife in the Form of The Diary of an Old Soul • George MacDonald
... furlongs from the northern side of Epipolae. The fleet then took up its station in the sheltered water behind the peninsula of Thapsus, while the land forces, advancing at a run, crossed the level ground, and then, breasting the ascent, ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell
... ran nimbly behind the thick screen of bushes for about a hundred and fifty yards below the spot where the hippo was unconsciously basking, with his ugly head above the surface. Plunging into the rapid torrent, the veteran hunter was carried some distance down the stream, but breasting the powerful current, he landed upon the rocks on the opposite side, and retiring to some distance from the river, he quickly advanced towards the spot beneath which the hippopotamus was lying. I ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker
... the cross, passed into such a stupor or ecstasy that he had no knowledge of the flight of time. He only knew that, after a certain dreamy interval, the door of his house yielded to a living man, and, nearly naked with breasting the surf and fighting for life, young Abraham staggered into the hut and recognized ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... red glow brightened to orange. Then, breasting at last a long hill, they came to the top, and Beatrice caught her ...
— Her Prairie Knight • B.M. Sinclair, AKA B. M. Bower
... had emerged from darkness into blazing light. He swayed slowly, breasting that deluge of the truth which suddenly ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day
... found himself on the green knoll whence he had first seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed his eyes—it was a bright sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the bushes, and the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure mountain breeze. "Surely," thought Rip, "I have not slept here all night." He recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange man with a keg of liquor—the mountain ravine—the wild ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... night was over and it was broad dawn when the two men got out of the express train at the station nearest to Greifenstein. Without a word they entered the carriage that had been waiting for them, and the sturdy horses plunged into the forest, breasting the ascent as only strong animals can on a cold winter's morning. The early light made the great trees look unspeakably gloomy and mournful. There was not a tinge of colour to relieve the dead black shadows, or the icy grey of the driven snow. The tall firs stood solemn ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford
... the seed," as army men would put it. When this fierce "spraying" was well under way no doubt the order that had been awaited so long and impatiently by the concealed French soldiers was to be given; when they would start toward the bank of the river and strike into the shallow water, breasting their ...
— The Big Five Motorcycle Boys on the Battle Line - Or, With the Allies in France • Ralph Marlow
... Wartrace?" he inquired, when the touring-car was breasting the first of the grades in the gulch-threading climb to ...
— The Honorable Senator Sage-Brush • Francis Lynde
... frost-crystals, so lacking in cohesion that when kicked it flew with the thin hissing of granulated sugar. In three days they had wallowed thirty miles up Minnow Creek and across the series of low divides that separate the several creeks flowing south into Siwash River; and now they were breasting the big divide, past the Bald Buttes, where the way would lead them down Porcupine Creek to the middle reaches of Milk River. Higher up Milk River, it was fairly rumored, were deposits of copper. And this was their goal—a hill ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... heavy sea had just passed, and, before Harry could even say another word, slipping down to the edge of the rock, he glided in, giving himself all the impetus he could with his feet, and almost the next instant was breasting a sea at some distance from the rock. Harry watched him anxiously, not forgetting to pray. Now he seemed almost driven back, and now a foam-crested sea rolling in looked as if it would inevitably overwhelm him. Alas! ...
— Adrift in a Boat • W.H.G. Kingston
... was no waiting on the part of the defenders, who began firing as soon as the advance commenced, with the result that several Indians dropped, to encumber the way and unsettle the serried band of plunging steeds, while the rest, on breasting the rocks, recoiled, and in a state of panic turned, regardless of yells and blows, to gallop back after the fashion of their kind, crowding together till they reached their fellows once again, to stand shivering, snorting, and stamping, but leaving two struggling in the bottom of the gulch in ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... naught but a hunted beast. With elbows pinned to his sides, or with hands extended to ward off the boughs, with bursting lungs and crimson face, he plunged through the tangle, now slipping downwards, now leaping upwards, now all but prostrate, now breasting a mass of thorns. On and on he ran, until he came to the verge of the wood, saw before him an open meadow devoid of shelter or hiding- place, and with a groan of despair cast himself flat. He listened. How ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... the pen of a Napier, or a Bell's Life, I should like to describe this combat properly. It was the last charge of the Guard—(that is, it would have been, only Waterloo had not yet taken place); it was Ney's column breasting the hill of La Haye Sainte, bristling with ten thousand bayonets, and crowned with twenty eagles; it was the shout of the beef-eating British, as, leaping down the hill, they rushed to hug the enemy in the savage arms of battle; in other words, Cuff, coming up full of pluck, but quite ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... the only passenger who had alighted, slipped sixpence into the man's hand, buttoned his coat, and started out to walk in the direction indicated, breasting ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... and take an active interest in shaping the future of their country. There were many failures, but the practical sense of the people surmounted them, and pushed on. All were awake to the value of their heritage, and contributed their share to extend its influence; and so we have gone on breasting manfully political, commercial and other difficulties, but always advancing; and whatever may be said about the growth of other parts of America, figures will show that Canada is to the front. At the Provincial Exhibition in Ottawa, in 1879, the ...
— Life in Canada Fifty Years Ago • Canniff Haight
... stream, twitching her nostrils and wigwagging her big ears to find out what the crackle meant, and hurrying more and more as the sounds grated harshly upon her sensitive nerves. Next moment the river was clear and our canoe was breasting the rippling shallows, while the moose watched us curiously, ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... road dipped into a little valley and rose again, breasting the slope of a wooded hill which thrust itself out from the steeper flank of the mountain-range. Down the hill-side a song floated to meet us—that most noble lyric of ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... like a fish swimming strongly. The Japanese choose the carp because they say it has the power of ascending streams swiftly against the current and of leaping over waterfalls. It is thus supposed to typify a young man breasting the stream of life, and thrusting his ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Japan • John Finnemore
... crime—rescue with violence, and incidental, though not intentional loss of life—we rejoiced that a terrible mistake was, as we thought, averted. But now arose in redoubled fury the savage cry for blood. In vain good men, noble and humane men, in England tried to save the national honour by breasting this horrible outburst of passion. They were overborne. Petitioners for mercy were mobbed and hooted in the streets. We saw all this—we saw all this; and think you it did not sink into our hearts? Fancy if you can our feelings when we heard that yet another ...
— The Wearing of the Green • A.M. Sullivan
... pretty island of Sherkin, which with Tullough to the east, makes the charming little bay of Baltimore completely landlocked. Out in front of all, like a giant sentinel, stands the island of Cape Clear, breasting with its defiant strength that vast ocean whose waves foam around it, lashing its shores, and rushing up its crannied bluffs, still and for ever to be flung back in shattered spray by those bold and rocky headlands. The town of Skibbereen consists chiefly of one long main ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke
... was following to hinder her: but she had caught Molly's bridle and was already astride of her. "Get back!" she call'd softly; and then, "I make a better lad than wench, Jack,"—leap'd the mare through a gap in the wall, and in a moment was breasting the hill and galloping ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch
... Lieutenants Shinnick and Craib, second and third officers respectively. Captain Templeton gave a command. The cable was slipped from the mooring buoy. Ports were darkened and the Plymouth slipped out. A bit inside the protection of the submarine nets, but just outside the channel, she lay to, breasting the flood tide. There she lay for ...
— The Boy Allies with the Victorious Fleets - The Fall of the German Navy • Robert L. Drake
... of the window sapped the color from her cheek, for she saw the stage breasting the hill scarce two hundred yards from the house. She hurried downstairs, pinning her belt as she ran, and flashed into the store, where ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine
... inquiry he was in the water. We called out to him that the current was frightfully strong—we knew a man's life ought not to be perilled; but he just smiled, took up the great pole that lay near, and waded in. I cannot describe the horror of seeing him breasting that stream, expecting, as we did, to see him borne down by it into the wheel. The miller shouted to him that it was madness, but he kept his footing like a rock. He reached the place where the poor dog was, and the fury of the stream was a little ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the further slope of the hill, and were going down, and through the tears of rage and grief that filled my eyes I saw a few horsemen breasting the slope towards us, and one of them was Edric Streone the traitor himself; and when I saw him I felt as a man who lights suddenly on a viper, and I shuddered, for the sight of him was loathsome to me, and Thrand ground ...
— King Olaf's Kinsman - A Story of the Last Saxon Struggle against the Danes in - the Days of Ironside and Cnut • Charles Whistler
... at last after many years, after chastity, friendship, procreation, prudence, and nakedness, After treading ground, and breasting river and lake, After a loosen'd throat, after absorbing eras, temperaments, races, after knowledge, freedom, crimes, After complete faith, after clarifying elevations and removing obstructions, After these and more, it is just possible there comes to a man, a woman, the divine ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs
... while longer, and had looked down to make a sign, "Thou shalt not!" to the ocean. Their escape would trouble me as a prodigiously inexplicable event, did I not know how tough old iron can be—as tough sometimes as the spirit of some men we meet now and then, worn to a shadow and breasting the weight of life. Not the least wonder of these twenty minutes, to my mind, is the behaviour of the two helmsmen. They were amongst the native batch of all sorts brought over from Aden to give evidence at the inquiry. One of them, labouring under intense bashfulness, ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... in him seldom broods over real trouble—not at first, at least. By this test may often be known the real from the fanciful woe. Caius, knew, or his instincts knew, that his only chance of breasting the current was, not to think of its strength, but to keep on swimming. He took his horse's bits and the harness that had been given him for his little sleigh, cleaning and burnishing everything with the utmost care, and at the same time ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... wild-pea vines and columbines, tiny, gnome-faced pansies, violets, and the daintier flowering grasses lined the way with odorous loveliness. Birds called happily from the tree tops. Away up next the clouds an eagle sailed serene, alone, a tiny boat breasting the currents of the ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... the great river near at hand, the swishing of running water against the sturdy bow of the shanty-boat, a hoarse cry from some bird that fluttered along the shore looking for food, possibly a night heron passing over, and once or twice the hoarse whistle of some steamboat breasting the ...
— The House Boat Boys • St. George Rathborne
... lamp-post he glanced at his watch and saw that the time was close on eleven. He took another cross street, and without breasting the throng on the Promenade, made his way to the fashionable club which overlooks that thoroughfare. Here, amid the blaze of crowded baccarat tables, he caught sight of Lord Hubert Dacey, seated with his habitual worn smile behind a rapidly dwindling heap of gold. The heap being ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton |
