"Devastation" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... on the world. They are in themselves generally useless, like footprints; and yet almost any sign of man's passage might, under certain conditions, interest a man. A footprint could fill Robinson Crusoe with emotion, the devastation wrought by an army's march might prove many things to a historian, and even the disorder in which a room is casually left may express very vividly ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... Joe had thrown some light sticks on the embers, the fire revealed a much disordered camp. The Indians had rushed over it as a squad of football players might tear through a rival eleven, leaving devastation in their wake. The only consolation was that Hank had managed to prevent the animals from stampeding, and the possession of their ponies, in a country where foot travel is almost out of the question, ...
— The Moving Picture Boys on the Coast • Victor Appleton
... our madcap huntress; and without other note of preparation sounded than their own thunder, her iron-grey's hoofs were in the thick of the sage assembly, causing an indecorous trepidation, combined with devastation ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... are back from their marvellous task. The game of War is done, the games of Peace are again being played. Tennis suffered the world over from war's blight, but everywhere the game sprang up in renewed life at the close of hostilities. The season of 1919 was one of reconstruction after the devastation. New figures were standing in prominence where old stars were accustomed to be seen. The question on the lips of all the tennis players was whether the stars of pre-War days would return ...
— The Art of Lawn Tennis • William T. Tilden, 2D
... district in a southerly direction for about 100 m. till it debouches into the Bay of Bengal. During the latter part of its course this noble river expands into a large estuary containing many islands, the principal of which is that of Dakshin Shahbazpur. The islands on the sea-front are exposed to devastation by cyclonic storm-waves. The Arial Khan, a branch of the Ganges, enters the district from the north, and flows generally in a south-easterly direction till it falls into the estuary of the Meghna. The main channel of the ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... here seen that the only thing mentioned as breaking out more suddenly and being more dreadful in its devastation than an earthquake is the "plague": "quo IMPROVISIOR GRAVIORque PESTIS fuit." Bracciolini spoke from personal observation. When he was here in England in 1422, he would not venture abroad nor leave London, ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross
... true invasion, this taking possession of the virgin sod, but as I considered, there was a haunting sadness in it, for these shining pine pennons represented the inexorable plow. They prophesied the death of all wild creatures and assured the devastation of the beautiful, the destruction of all the signs and seasons of ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... assisting at a great development whose evidences to-day on every hand attest its magnitude. We have felt the fierce play of volcanic effort, lifting new continents of opportunity from the infertile sea, without any devastation of pre-existing fields of human toil and harvest. But it still remains to elucidate the actual thing done; to reduce it to concrete data, and in reducing, to unfold its ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... Baroda were one of the chief branches of the Mahratta confederacy, which in the 18th century spread devastation and terror over India. About 1721 one Pilaji gaekwar carved a fertile slice of territory out of Gujarat, and afterwards received the title of "Leader of the Royal Troops" from the peshwa. During the last thirty-two years of the century the house ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... fluid this trade spirit, yet the country is deluged with it, and it leaves behind it disaster and demoralisation and ruined homes. Mary feels bitter against the civilised countries that seek profit from the moral devastation of humanity. ...
— Mary Slessor of Calabar: Pioneer Missionary • W. P. Livingstone
... the crops of the white men. Famines came at frequent intervals to weaken the colonists and add to their misfortunes. But by far the most terrible scourge was the "sicknesse" that swept over Virginia year after year, leaving in its wake horrible suffering and devastation. ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... element: The Columns gave way: The Roofs came tumbling down upon the Rioters, and crushed many of them beneath their weight. Nothing was to be heard but shrieks and groans; The Convent was wrapped in flames, and the whole presented a scene of devastation and horror. ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... around the little rock pinnacle and stood looking somberly down at the devastation that was being wrought, with no greater beginning, probably, than a dropped match or cigarette stub. He was thinking hazily that so his old life had been swept away in the devastating effect of a passing whim, a foolish bit of play. The girl irritated him with her ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... they meant to take prisoners. These unwelcome Firengis were also to be known by certain strange inventions on three legs, into which they would gaze by the hour. Were they warriors, threatening devastation? Or were they magicians, spying into the future and laying a spell upon the people of Luristan? Their account of themselves the Father of Swords found far from satisfactory, claiming as they did that they proposed to build a road of iron, whereby it would be possible ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... . . . Precisely. They can do an infinite deal of mischief sometimes in quite unexpected ways. For who could have imagined that a young girl, daughter of a ruined Royalist whose life was held only by the contempt of his enemies, would have had the power to bring death and devastation upon two flourishing provinces and cause serious anxiety to the leaders of the revolution in the very hour of its success!" He paused to let the wonder ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... destiny to smoke in ruins, so surely must the high-souled Anna fall—'Ill starred wench!'—I, Fairfax, like other conquerors, cannot shut pity from my bosom. While I cry havoc I could almost weep; could look reluctant down on devastation which myself had made, and heave a sigh, and curse my proper prowess!—In love and war alike, such, Fairfax, is towering ambition. It must have victims: its reckless altars ask a full and large ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... forestry service, in speaking of the great devastation caused by forest fires, make the startling assertion that a new navy of first-class battle-ships could be built for the sum lost during a few weeks in the fires that raged from the pines of Maine to the redwoods ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee
... are still greater than in the intellectual field. Certainly it is not enough to have the villain punished in the last few pictures of the reel. If scenes of vice or crime are shown with all their lure and glamour the moral devastation of such a suggestive show is not undone by the appended social reaction. The misguided boys or girls feel sure that they would be successful enough not to be trapped. The mind through a mechanism which has been ...
— The Photoplay - A Psychological Study • Hugo Muensterberg
... as a secondary restraining force there is the reasonable fear of devastation. The "good German" vindictiveness might make one ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... exculpate him from all blame as to the mode of punishing the Indians. "Of the expedition," Washington says, in writing to him, "the immediate objects are the total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible." Washington knew that this kind of warfare was the only possible means of putting an end to Indian wars. Any other mode of proceeding, he was fully aware, was ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... proceeded to the isle of Fyen, went on land, plundered, and made great devastation. So says Arnor, ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... scarcely conceive the magnificence of this residence, or the tremendous devastation the French have committed. The throne-room was lined with ebony, carved in a marvellous way. There were huge mirrors of all shapes and kinds, clocks, watches, musical boxes with puppets on them, magnificent china of every description, heaps and ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... attempt is made to rescue Black Harry, it will be very unfortunate for Harry, as I shall immediately shoot him. I do not propose to let him escape, to continue his career of crime and devastation." ...
— Frank Merriwell's Bravery • Burt L. Standish
... villages in Meath. Neither of those rulers—those chief protectors of the people—seems to have been conscious that he was doing anything wrong in destroying the homes and the food of the wretched inhabitants, whom they alternately scourged. On the contrary, the extent of devastation which they were able to effect was supposed to put them in a better position for meeting together, and treating as honourable and gallant representatives of ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... lying in the heart of the country of the Camisards; four of the five legions camped all round it and almost within view—Salomon and Joani to the north, Castanet and Roland to the south; and when Julien had finished his famous work, the devastation of the High Cevennes, which lasted all through October and November, 1703, and during which four hundred and sixty villages and hamlets were, with fire and pickaxe, utterly subverted, a man standing on this eminence would have looked forth upon a silent, smokeless, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Greek observe, in common with many of his countrymen—for, lost as they are, they yet feel on this occasion—thus may Lord Elgin boast of having ruined Athens. An Italian painter of the first eminence, named Lusieri[205], is the agent of devastation; and like the Greek finder[206] of Verres in Sicily, who followed the same profession, he has proved the able instrument of plunder. Between this artist and the French Consul Fauvel[207], who wishes to rescue the remains for his own government, there is now a ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... of prodigy. There was vague sensation. In one of his novels I found an introduction by Lord Roberts warning Englishmen to prepare for the German invasion planned by Mr. Le Queux for 1910! History has not yet revealed the horror and devastation of that war; but this horror and devastation lent to Mr. Le Queux's book ...
— Personality in Literature • Rolfe Arnold Scott-James
... and Campo Santo. These gave him great assistance and much light, advantages which could not be enjoyed by Giotto, because the ancient paintings which have been preserved are not so numerous as the sculptures. And although statues have frequently been destroyed by fire, devastation, and the fury of war, or buried or transported to various places, yet it is easy for a connoisseur to recognise the productions of all the different countries by their various styles. For example, the Egyptian is slender, with long figures; the Greek is artificial, ...
— The Lives of the Painters, Sculptors & Architects, Volume 1 (of 8) • Giorgio Vasari
... escaped with their clothing, and let the soldiers loose on it. They destroyed everything they could lay their hands on, if it could not be carried off; broke open armoirs, trunks, sacked the house, and left it one scene of devastation and ruin. They even stole Miss Jones's braid! She got here with nothing but the ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... Testament contains the first revelations of God; the New Testament, the last revelations. Our Christian Brother "forgets" to remind the visitor that the difference of opinion regarding these two Testaments of God has caused more sorrow, bloodshed, harm, devilment, misery, and devastation than any other single item in the life and history ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... so dishonorable. Why should you bury me alive? Is it because one friend still comes with no scheme for the devastation ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... made me careless of all consequences relative to myself. I rushed to the bed and throwing myself on my father, awakened him by loud cries. The family were speedily roused, and were compelled to remain impotent spectators of the devastation. Fortunately the wind blew in a contrary direction, so that our habitation was ...
— Memoirs of Carwin the Biloquist - (A Fragment) • Charles Brockden Brown
... conscious that a fortnight ago he had been in Bun Hill with no idea of travel in his mind, and that now he was between the Falls of Niagara amidst the devastation and ruins of the greatest air fight in the world, and that in the interval he had been across France, Belgium, Germany, England, Ireland, and a number of other countries. It was an interesting thought and suitable for conversation, but of no great practical utility. "Wonder 'ow I can get ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... political unity. Despite the ardent longings of many Italian patriots [Footnote: Of such patriots was Machiavelli (see below, p. 194). Machiavelli wrote in The Prince: "Our country, left almost without life, still waits to know who it is that is to heal her bruises, to put an end to the devastation and plunder of Lombardy and to the exactions and imposts of Naples and Tuscany, and to stanch those wounds of hers which long neglect has changed into running sores. We see how she prays God to send some one to rescue her from these barbarous cruelties and oppressions. We see too how ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... out of the village. All this passed with such rapidity as scarcely to leave the impression of reality upon the mind. As soon as the sun rose in the morning, Victoire looked out for the turrets of the Chateau de Fleury, and she saw that they were safe—safe in the midst of the surrounding devastation. Nothing remained of the superb palace of Chantilly but the white arches of ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. 6 • Maria Edgeworth
... into the county of Derby, in order to ravage with fire and sword the lands of the earl of that name, and take revenge on, him for his disloyalty. Like maxims of war prevailed with both parties throughout England; and the kingdom was thus exposed in a moment to greater devastation, from the animosities of the rival barons, than it would have suffered from many years of foreign or even domestic hostilities, conducted by more humane and more ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... aviators have followed the knightly code of old which respects a good opponent and honors him. Captain Boelcke's death, after his meteoric career, was mourned alike by friend and foe. Great as is the damage done by this war, horrible as is its devastation, it has acted as a tonic on aviation. Before the war, of course, there had been some achievements of note. Since the day when the Wright brothers announced their conquest of the air, man did not rest till the problem was completely solved. And this war, which continually has spurred man to ...
— An Aviator's Field Book - Being the field reports of Oswald Boelcke, from August 1, - 1914 to October 28, 1916 • Oswald Boelcke
... country, filling the atmosphere with driving clouds of suffocating fume, and leaving a broad and blackened trail of spectral trunks shorn of limbs and foliage, smoking and burning, to mark the immense sweep of its devastation. ...
— Thirty-Seven Days of Peril - from Scribner's Monthly Vol III Nov. 1871 • Truman Everts
... crossed at sunset and the fringe of war's devastation penetrated. Little interest or casual comment was aroused, although a reputable thirsty one remarked that he thought Jerry might have ...
— Norman Ten Hundred - A Record of the 1st (Service) Bn. Royal Guernsey Light Infantry • A. Stanley Blicq
... chiefly composed of one or two irregular streets running along the bottom of a narrow valley. Hitherto, in passing up the lower part of the vale, we had looked in vain for any traces of the inundation; but now we suddenly found ourselves in the midst of ruin and devastation. Holmfirth is only two miles and a half from the reservoir, and being at a contracted part of the valley, the water came upon it in great depth and with great force. We found a bridge deprived of its parapets, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 440 - Volume 17, New Series, June 5, 1852 • Various
... was established within the Holy Roman Empire in 1719; it became a sovereign state in 1806. Until the end of World War I, it was closely tied to Austria, but the economic devastation caused by that conflict forced Liechtenstein to conclude a customs and monetary union with Switzerland. Since World War II (in which Liechtenstein remained neutral) the country's low taxes have spurred outstanding ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... what I go to find out." Then I told him all I had gathered about the unknown force in the hills, and the apparent strategy of a campaign which was beyond an Indian's wits. "There is a white man at the back of it," I said, "a white man who talks in Bible words and is mad for devastation." ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan
... indignation at finding my palings broken down, and some sugar-cane, that I had been most carefully rearing, rooted up and destroyed, while the author of the mischief, a huge sow, innocent of the restraining ring (I would have hung the ring of the 'Devastation's' best bower-anchor to her snout, had I been allowed to follow out my wishes), stood gloating over the havoc she had caused. Then, in my wrath, I had hastily loaded a carbine with a handful of salt, and prematurely converted a portion of my enemy's ...
— Australian Search Party • Charles Henry Eden
... necessary for carrying out his schemes by a fellow-countryman and friend, who had returned to his fatherland with a fortune acquired beyond the Atlantic. Our talented author has certainly not lost sight of the fact that Germany, as a whole, has as little recovered from the devastation of the Thirty Years' War as the eastern districts of Prussia have recovered from the effects of the war with France in the present century. Let the faults and failings of our national German character be ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... was the debris of a pile of plates and scattered fragments of cups and saucers which had been suddenly dropped by the steward in his fright and were smashed to atoms; while, in the centre of the scene of devastation, was the dungeon-like cavity of the after-hatchway, the cover of which had been shifted from its coamings by the man, in order for him to get up some of the cabin provisions from the hold, whose gloomy depths ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... when any of us get into difficulties. I was encouraged in my new undertaking, and my heart began to beat high with the hope of being able one day to visit the pomp of the Southern and Western people in my vengeance; and of seeing their cities and towns one common scene of devastation, smoked ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... thief in the night, as she goes about her devastation of human rights with the tread of a thief and with the cunning of a bold deceiver, which she is, and this country must station trustworthy men upon the ramparts of this government to watch her progress and batter down her foundation of superstition and ignorance, or ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... day: but he, good, easy man, unsuspicious as Fielding's parson Adams, is wholly engrossed in the contemplation of a superscription to a letter, addressed to the bishop of the diocese. So important an object prevents his attending to his daughter, or regarding the devastation occasioned by his gaunt and hungry Rozinante having snatched at the straw that packs up some earthenware, ...
— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler
... business fascinates me like a tune or a passion; yet all the while I thrill with a strong distaste. The horror of the thing, objective and subjective, is always present to my mind; the horror of creeping things, a superstitious horror of the void and the powers about me, the horror of my own devastation and continual murders. The life of the plants comes through my finger- tips, their struggles go to my heart like supplications. I feel myself blood-boltered; then I look back on my cleared grass, and count myself an ally in a fair quarrel, and ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... outward devastation—the red eyes of parents and servants who had not slept all night, and looked at her as their obdurate hostage, and the prying constables lodged upon the premises to see that nothing was smuggled out, the ring of the auctioneer's bell, and the fingering of boors and old gossips ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... desire to get upon its own soil the awful devastation it had bestowed upon Belgium and France, through President Wilson, of the United States of America, asked the Allies for the terms ...
— The Sequel - What the Great War will mean to Australia • George A. Taylor
... disaster, but nothing interferes with the movements of the squadron as a whole. It is the homogeneity of the attacking fleet which tells, and which undermines the moral of the enemy, even if it does not wreak decisive material devastation. The work accomplished to the best of their ability, the airmen speed back to their lines ...
— Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War • Frederick A. Talbot
... road, I should have said, the trail was one of devastation. In the midst of the dry veldt one sometimes came upon a farmhouse with its grove of trees, and spring, and pleasant fields; but always the farm was derelict, windows broken, rooms gutted, stock destroyed, with often some poor abandoned ...
— The Relief of Mafeking • Filson Young
... acted as dutiful, Faithful and Loyal Subjects to their most Gracious Sovereign the said Queen of Hungary even during the many Revolutions that have happened in Prague within these few Years and notwithstanding the great Devastation and Excesses which Naturally occur'd therefrom they have continued and still do continue firm and unshaken in their Principles of Affection & Fidelity to her said Majesty and her most ...
— Notes on the Diplomatic History of the Jewish Question • Lucien Wolf
... and dismay filled the city, at the sight of the devastation that was being wrought; and there were very many among the multitude who would gladly have avoided further evils, by submitting to the Romans. But such an idea did not enter the heads of the military leaders, and Simon determined ...
— For the Temple - A Tale of the Fall of Jerusalem • G. A. Henty
... of devastation could not have been completed many minutes before their arrival, the elephant appeared to have gone away from the ground. At east, it was not to be seen anywhere near the spot; and it is needless ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... great and beneficent operations of Nature are produced by slow and often imperceptible degrees. The work of destruction and devastation only is violent and rapid. The Volcano and the Earthquake, the Tornado and the Avalanche, leap suddenly into full life and fearful energy, and smite with an unexpected blow. Vesuvius buried Pompeii and ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... summits graceful undulations of snow. The house and lantern erected by James Ross were still in a tolerable state of preservation; but the provisions seemed to have been ransacked by foxes and bears, the recent traces of which were easily distinguished. Men, too, had had something to do with the devastation, for a few remains of Esquimaux huts remained upon the shores of the Bay. The six graves inclosing the remains of the six sailors of the Enterprise and the Investigator were recognisable by a slight swelling of the ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... would 'sell' better. To relieve his impatience, therefore, I wrote a more or less 'sensational' novel dealing with the absinthe drinkers of Paris, entitled "Wormwood," which did a certain amount of good in its way, by helping to call public attention to the devastation wrought by the use of the pernicious drug among the French and other Continental peoples—and after this, receiving a strong and almost imperative impetus towards that particular goal whither my ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli
... recognition of the gross imperfections and marked inadequacy of our banking and currency system even in our most quiet financial periods is of long standing; and later there has matured a recognition of the fact that our system is responsible for the extraordinary devastation, waste, and business paralysis of our recurring periods of panic. Though the members of the Monetary Commission have for a considerable time been working in the open, and while large numbers of the people have been openly working with them, and while the press has largely ...
— State of the Union Addresses of William H. Taft • William H. Taft
... us," said Groot Willem, as he rode by the side of Hendrik, "those elephants would destroy that field of maize. The owners of the field could not prevent them, if they were to try. They cannot even frighten them away from their work of devastation." ...
— The Giraffe Hunters • Mayne Reid
... vagueness of human thought. The fear grows shadowy; and Imagination, the enemy of men, the father of all terrors, unstimulated, sinks to rest in the dullness of exhausted emotion. Jim saw nothing but the disorder of his tossed cabin. He lay there battened down in the midst of a small devastation, and felt secretly glad he had not to go on deck. But now and again an uncontrollable rush of anguish would grip him bodily, make him gasp and writhe under the blankets, and then the unintelligent brutality of ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... the dead were abandoned to the wild beasts of the desert. The resistance of Edessa, and the deficiency of spoil, inclined the mind of Cabades to peace: he sold his conquests for an exorbitant price; and the same line, though marked with slaughter and devastation, still separated the two empires. To avert the repetition of the same evils, Anastasius resolved to found a new colony, so strong, that it should defy the power of the Persian, so far advanced towards Assyria, that its stationary troops might defend the ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... the wise are full of care; the good-for-nothing seek for nothing, they feed on vegetables, and roam where they list; they wander purposeless like a boat not made fast!' 'The mountain trees,' the text goes on to say, 'lead to their own devastation; the spring (conduces) to its own plunder; and so on." And the more he therefore indulged in reflection, the more depressed he felt. "Now there are only these few girls," he proceeded to ponder minutely, "and yet, I'm unable to ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... angry; and in his anger he overreached himself. The chair slid back. He tried to balance himself and, in the mad effort to maintain a perpendicular position, made a frantic clutch at the pipe. Ruin and devastation! Down came the pipe, and with it a peck of ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... result of this religious strife was to check the progress of the higher civilization of the people for nearly three centuries, and to delay greatly the coming of the great blessing of freedom in matters of religious belief, while the poverty and misery resulting from the devastation of these religious wars left neither the energy for nor the interest in educational or ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY
... not leave any dead at Elizabeth City. This appears to have been due in part to the good work of Captain Newce who took defensive measures and made plans to alleviate the suffering resulting from the Indian devastation. The massacre stimulated the growth of population in Elizabeth City which still, however, was not immune from Indian attack as witnessed by the four who were killed ...
— The First Seventeen Years: Virginia 1607-1624 • Charles E. Hatch
... treason and disarming the Union, and most adroitly were its plans in this respect carried into effect. It had gained over to its side most of the Southern material in the little army and navy of the country, and prepared it for perfidy, in committing devastation or theft on the public property. Thus allied and thus equipped, in the confidence of its pernicious strength, it commenced its warfare ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... and Surrounding Country. Destroying Earthquake Comes Without Warning, in the Early Hours of the Morning; Immense Structures Topple and Crumble; Great Leland Stanford University Succumbs; Water Mains Demolished and Fire Completes Devastation; Fighting ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum
... only until he saw that his work of devastation was well under way, then he led his followers back toward the hills. At sunset he reined in upon the crest of a ridge and looked behind him into the valley. The whole sky was black with smoke, as if a city ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... were burning too, and the streets in the neighborhood were piled up with furniture and goods which the wretched inmates of the dwellings had vainly endeavored to save. These inmates themselves were standing around, distracted with grief and terror, and gazing hopelessly upon the scene of devastation before them. ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... the loud thud of feet just behind, turned with desperate eyes, dodged, tripped, shrieked and was caught and ripped. Another and another. In the dancing, flickering half-light of the flames of fire and torches, a hellish scene of devastation ...
— Hawk Carse • Anthony Gilmore
... penalty by a compact with the States for the gradual emancipation of the slaves remaining at the time of the negotiation. The sudden and utter overthrow of the existing organization of labor and capital in those States, coming in addition to the awful devastation which the war has produced, will deal a disastrous blow, not alone to those unfortunate States, but to the commerce and industry of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... the two peaks of Bou-Kournein, had all vanished from the view. Cape Bon, too, the most northern promontory of Africa and the point of the continent nearest to the island of Sicily, had been included in the general devastation. ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... of the fire cooled the temper of the raiders, for half the men were idle hangers-on, rather than absolute strikers. One frantic woman flew to the scene of devastation: her boy, four years old, was missing. They tried to comfort her with the thought that some neighbor had kindly taken him in, but she kept wildly imploring ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... know as how the day is settled,' answered Jim, even now scarcely conscious of the devastation he was causing in one fair breast. 'But from the rate the courting is scudding along at, I should say it won't be ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... proportion are said to be massed in Georgia, a State that has hitherto suffered little from the war, but which now seems about to become the scene of vast and important operations, which cannot be carried on without causing sweeping devastation. The public journals state that there are two million slaves in Georgia, most of whom have been taken or sent thither by their owners, inhabitants of other States. This must tend greatly to increase the difficulties of the enemy, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... expensive means of fighting them; but after all the strain had to come somewhere, and the long struggle of Ladysmith may have meant a more certain and complete collapse in the future. At least, by the plan actually adopted we saved Natal from total devastation, and that must count against ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... now to watch a slow, implacable, methodical devastation of their country, tract by tract. Day by day they fight, and one by one they fall. Comrades and friends drop at each other's sides; sons drop by fathers, and brothers by brothers. The smoke rises in the valley, and the home is blotted ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... he said, "I had to leave the mail at Niuafou, in the Tongan Islands. It is a tiny isle, three miles long by as wide, an old crater in which is a lagoon, hot springs, and every sign of the devastation of many eruptions. The mail for Niuafou was often only a single letter and a few newspapers. We sealed them in a tin can, and when we met the postmaster at sea, we threw it over. He would be three miles out, swimming, with a small ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... prized by the natives, constant visits are made to New Guinea and the easternmost islands, where they are procured, and afterward sold at high prices among any Malay community. The great nests of piracy are Magindano, Sooloo, and the northern part of Borneo; and the devastation and misery they inflict on the rest of the Archipelago are well known; yet are no measures adopted for their suppression, as every European community, be it English, Dutch, or Spanish, seems quite satisfied to clear the vicinity of its own ports, and never ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... In this march of devastation and destruction the prince overran all the southern part of France. One of his attendants in this campaign, a knight who served in the prince's household, in a letter which he wrote back to England ...
— Richard II - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... does not portray an actual scene from Autumn (LANE), but is rather to be taken as symbolic of the atmosphere of Miss MURIEL HINE'S latest book. The faun, I imagine, stands for Rollo, the middle-aged lover of the country, into whose happy life other, more human, loves break with such devastation. What the rabbits mean is a more difficult problem. I jest; but as a matter of fact I should be the first to admit that Miss HINE has written a story that, despite a certain crudity of colouring, is both unconventional and alive. The attitude of the characters towards their parents, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 20, 1917 • Various
... deserved his pitiable end. His discovery was a blunder, and he became the despoiler of the new world he had unwittingly found. A rabid seeker of gold and a vice-royalty, he left to the new continent a legacy of devastation and crime. Finding America, he thought he had discovered the Indies, and maintained that belief until his death. Claiming to desire the conversion of the Indians to Christianity, he did what he ...
— The Writer, Volume VI, April 1892. - A Monthly Magazine to Interest and Help All Literary Workers • Various
... cherished at the outset of the expedition vanished long before our arrival in Cairo. Egypt was no longer the empire of the Ptolemies, covered with populous and wealthy cities; it now presented one unvaried scene of devastation and misery. Instead of being aided by the inhabitants, whom we had ruined, for the sake of delivering them from the yoke of the beys, we found all against us: Mamelukes, Arabs, and fellahs. No Frenchman was secure of his life who happened ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... Joe the doughnuts, Ed the jelly, and Frank suggested "spoons all round" for the Italian cream. A few trifles in the way of custard, fruit, and wafer biscuits were not worth mentioning; but every dish was soon emptied, and Jack said, as he surveyed the scene of devastation ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... with little temples, and idol altars, with many fountains, wells, and summer-houses of carved stone curiously arched, so that I must confess a poor banished Englishman might have been content to dwell here. But this observation may serve universally for the whole of this country, that ruin and devastation operates every where; for, since the property of all has become vested in the king, no person takes care of any thing, so that in every place the spoil and devastations of war appear, and no ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr
... a sight was now presented to the view of the travellers; what a scene of devastation was that which lay outspread around them! The long grass was pressed so flat to the ground that it would scarcely have afforded cover to the smallest animal; stately trees were lying prostrate, either uprooted altogether, or ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... canvases in which the artist had depicted horrifying biblical scenes: massacres, devastation, revolting plagues; but all this in such a manner, that, despite the painter's lavish distribution of blood, wounds and severed heads, these canvases instead of horrifying, produced an impression of merriment. One of them represented the daughter ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... storm was clearly defined. Its limits were as distinctly marked by its Creator as if it had been a living intelligence sent forth to put a belt of desolation round the world; and, although the edge of devastation was not five hundred yards from the rock behind which the hunters were stationed, only a few drops of ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... afternoon was devoted to a discussion led by Dr. Rosalie Slaughter Morton (N. Y.), delegated representative of Prince Morrow and the American Society for Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis. In an eloquent address she described the terrible devastation, especially among women and children, from diseases which until lately had been concealed and never mentioned. She attributed these conditions partly to the fact that boys and girls were left in ignorance and this was often because the mothers were ignorant. The chief cause of ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... claims few, if any, would dispute the title of France to be the protecting Power in the case of Syria. Here there will not be, as was the case with the Armenians, any work of repatriation to be done. Such devastation and depopulation as has been wrought by Jemal the Great, with hunger and disease to help him, was wrought on the spot, and, though it will take many years to heal the wounds inflicted by that barbaric plagiarist of Potsdam, it is ...
— Crescent and Iron Cross • E. F. Benson
... visitation in Frankfurt. To appreciate this fact at its true significance we must remember that Germany suffered from direct invasion by Russia immediately on the outbreak of the war, and that all the stories of atrocities and devastation that we heard of Belgium were also ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... first Lord, "I shall give your invention my best attention; but I must tell you that there are many others in this country, as well as yourself, who are exerting their minds to discover the most effectual method of spreading wholesale devastation ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... been blown up with water. We were stunned and confused by the shock, and so drenched and blinded with spray, that we knew not for a few moments whither to flee for shelter. At length we all three gained an eminence beyond the reach of the water; but what a scene of devastation met our gaze as we looked along the shore! This enormous wave not only burst over the reef, but continued its way across the lagoon, and fell on the sandy beach of the island with such force that passed completely over it and dashed into the woods, levelling the ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... proper food and water being unprocurable. Then the Battalion was relieved and taken into support, where three or four days were spent, and on the 10th two companies moved to the Maltz Horn position. The next night the two remaining companies moved up. The devastation in the neighbourhood of Cockrane Alley was worse than at Guillemont. Here the men witnessed the full terrors of the stricken field. Living men dwelt among the unburied dead. Booted feet of killed soldiers protruded from the side of the trench. ...
— The Story of the "9th King's" in France • Enos Herbert Glynne Roberts
... nations. Such a cure was required for such a distemper. The fire of London, it has been observed was a blessing. It burned down the city; but it burned out the plague. The same may be said of the tremendous devastation of the Roman dominions. It annihilated the noisome recesses in which lurked the seeds of great moral maladies; it cleared an atmosphere fatal to the health and vigour of the human mind. It cost Europe a thousand years of barbarism to ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... cannonade along the whole front of that position ensued; the tirailleurs of either army posted themselves along the margins of the ravine, and fired incessantly at each other, their pieces almost touching. Cannon and musketry spread devastation everywhere—for the armies were but a few toises apart. For more than two hours Victor withstood singly the vigorous assaults of a far superior force; Marengo had been taken and retaken several times, ere Lannes received orders to reinforce him. The second line at length ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... Although this devastation caused me much vexation, I could not help laughing at their antics, and at the humble and submissive manner in which I had advanced to pay homage to them. I called my sons, who laughed heartily, and rallied "the prince of the monkeys" without mercy, ...
— The Swiss Family Robinson; or Adventures in a Desert Island • Johann David Wyss
... gifts of Providence are distributed with partiality, as nothing could be more unfounded. Independent of the destruction of the plantations which tropical hurricanes so often occasion, an insect of the locust kind, more particularly in the East Indies, produces such fearful devastation as to realize the scene described by the prophet Joel—"A fire devoureth before them, and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them[T]." From such visitations, ...
— The Church of England Magazine - Volume 10, No. 263, January 9, 1841 • Various
... going by, and he turned round and said: "And her name was Maud!" It was in the height of Opper's popularity, his "comic supplements" the chief dependence of the road-houses for wall-paper. The reference was so apposite that we burst into laughter, but there was nothing funny about the devastation that had been wrought. That good trail was all gone—the bottom pounded out of it—and nothing was left but a ploughed lane punched full of sink-holes. We had no trouble following the trail on the river after this encounter, but it had ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... three belligerents. The endurance that they displayed, the hardships that they had to bear, the losses that they suffered—both victor and conquered—have given us a clearer idea what war means to the men that actually wage it. Occasionally we have had glimpses of the devastation that it brings to the country over the hills and valleys and over the plains and forests of which it rages. Again and again we have been told of the horrible suffering and utter ruin which was the share of the civic population, rich and poor, young and old, man, woman, or child. But these ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... prodigy to see how calmly Mr Cayenne acted on that occasion; for, being at other times as crabbed as a wud terrier, folk were afraid to tell him, till he came out himself in the morning and saw the devastation; at the sight of which he gave only a shrill whistle, and began to laugh at the idea of the men fearing to take him the news, as if he had not fortune and philosophy enough, as he called it, to withstand ...
— The Annals of the Parish • John Galt
... daylight, while gladly hailed by the occupants of the wrecked raft, also disclosed the extent of the devastation caused by the flood. As they had surmised, the Venture was stranded at the foot of the huge stone bagasse-burner. The mill near by was partly demolished. The great house, standing amid its clumps of shrubbery and stately trees, ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe
... itself into destruction. We see that men's political dealings with one another are based on wholly wrong ideals, and can only be saved by quite different ideals from continuing to be a source of suffering, devastation, and sin. ...
— Political Ideals • Bertrand Russell
... ears, was more than enough to scare away a fit of apoplexy. We went out hastily and separated the gallant animals. Afterward I told the lady where she would find my wife—just round the corner, under the trees. She nodded and went off with her dog, leaving me appalled before the death and devastation she had lightly made—and with the awfully instructive sound of the word ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... therefore, that we have not witnessed within the last three thousand years the devastation by deluge of a large continent, yet, as we may predict the future occurrence of such catastrophes, we are authorized to regard them as part of the present order of nature, and they may be introduced into geological speculations respecting the ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley
... successfully resisted only by large armies, and sometimes the armies were not large enough to cope with them. Again and again during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries Tartar hordes swept over the country—burning the villages and towns, and spreading devastation wherever they appeared—and during more than two centuries Russia had to pay a heavy tribute to ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... breakfast, the minister, Dr. Somerville, called upon us with Mr. Scott, and we went to the manse, a very pretty house, with pretty gardens, and in a beautiful situation, though close to the town. Dr. Somerville and his family complained bitterly of the devastation that had been made among the woods within view from their windows, which looked up the Jed. He conducted us to the church, which under his directions has been lately repaired, and is a very neat place within. Dr. Somerville spoke of the dirt and other ...
— Recollections of a Tour Made in Scotland A.D. 1803 • Dorothy Wordsworth
... it is said, on his wife's persuasion. He was made one of Charles's chaplains, and vainly tried to secure the legal ratification of Charles's declaration of the 25th of October 1660. He was ejected for Nonconformity in 1662, and was so affected by the sight of the devastation caused by the great fire of London that he died shortly afterwards, on the 29th of October 1666. He was buried in the ruins of his church, near the place where the pulpit had stood. His publications are almost entirely sermons. His eldest son (Edmund), known as "the younger," was educated at Cambridge, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... reasoned, if this fair prospect, after so many ages of tumultuous history and the shock of calamitous events, after battle, famine, terror of earthquake and fire, devastation by foul disease, could still recover and present such an effect of triumphant youthfulness, such, at once august and mirthful, charm, might not her beloved one, lying here broken in health and in spirit, likewise ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... question. In the meantime people poured in from all quarters to oppose the insurgents, who obtained no increase of numbers, but, on the contrary, were deserted by many of their body in consequence of the acts of devastation and plunder into which ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 3: Martin Van Buren • James D. Richardson
... total paralysis of all natural activities. It was like a deadly pall. This was no new terror; it was old devastation—bred ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... light smoke was seen stealing from the cottage chimney up the mountain side. Within, the fire was yet smouldering on the hearth, and the chairs in a circle round it, as if the inhabitants had but gone forth to view the devastation of the Slide, and would shortly return, to thank Heaven for their miraculous escape. All had left separate tokens, by which those who had known the family were made to shed a tear for each. Who has not heard their name? (The story has been told far and wide, and Will forever be a legend of these ...
— The Great Stone Face - And Other Tales Of The White Mountains • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... fled for refuge to the towns till these in fear of famine shut their gates against them. Then in their despair they threw themselves into the woods and became brigands in their turn. So terrible was the devastation that two hostile bodies of troops failed at one time even to find one another in the desolate Beauce. Misery and disease killed a hundred thousand people in Paris alone. At last the cessation of the war in Holland and the temporary lull of strife in England enabled the Regent to take ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green
... by way of the Oswego River, Oneida Lake, and across country to the Susquehanna Valley. He ravaged the Schoharie Valley, laid siege to Middle Fort unsuccessfully, then, turning north, raided all the country from Fort Hunter. He let loose his forces for the general purpose of devastation. He again did his work thoroughly,—brutally, as was customary in Indian warfare at that time. Major Jelles Fonda, one of the victims of this ruthless destruction, who had been a confidential officer under Sir William Johnson, was absent, ...
— Colonel John Brown, of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, the Brave Accuser of Benedict Arnold • Archibald Murray Howe
... none; that it was a most extraordinary war, in which the Carlists had the superiority in the field, but possessed no fortified and even no open town; and that, notwithstanding all the plunder and devastation incidental to such a state of things, all the farmers in the disturbed ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... other little charming attentions which were intended to strike at long range the gentlemen who formed the escort, the townspeople, the officers of the different cities she passed through, pages, populace, and servants; it was wholesale slaughter, a general devastation. By the time Madame arrived at Paris, she had reduced to slavery about a hundred thousand lovers: and brought in her train to Paris half a dozen men who were almost mad about her, and two who were, indeed, ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... earlier epochs, would have seemed an absurdity—the epidemic of over-production. Society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of momentary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence; industry and commerce seem to be destroyed; and why? Because there is too much civilisation, too much means of subsistence, too much industry, too much commerce. ...
— The Communist Manifesto • Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
... power, they were yet rude, rough, unpolished. They were warriors. They fought on horseback, covered with defensive armor. They were greedy and quarrelsome, and hence were engaged in perpetual strife,—in the assault on castles and devastation of lands. These castles were generally gloomy, heavy, and uncomfortable, yet were very numerous in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. They were occupied by the feudal family, perhaps the chaplain, strangers of rank, bards, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume V • John Lord
... midst of such trying scenes and devastation on the part of the French and savages, that superstition and fanaticism broke loose in Salem and produced a reign of terror far greater than that caused by the savages on the frontier. It was from such scenes to such scenes that Charles ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick
... indignation occasioned in Protestant countries by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, resulted in an alliance against the French king headed by William of Orange. Louis speedily justified the suspicions of Europe by a frightful devastation of the Palatinate, burning whole towns and destroying many castles, including the exceptionally beautiful one of the elector at Heidelberg. Ten years later, however, Louis agreed to a peace which put things back as they were before ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... that he held back; yet if he had not done it, it would soon have become a torrent, and before morning the sea would have swept over the land, submerging fields, homes, and cities. Between the sea and all this devastation there was but a boy's hand. Had the child failed, the floods would have rolled in with their remorseless ruin. We understand how important it was that that boy should be faithful to his duty, since he was the only one God had that night to ...
— Making the Most of Life • J. R. Miller
... courage: yet who can regret that their cause was lost? ... Viewed from another standpoint than that of religious bias, and simply judged by its results, the Jesuit effort to Christianize Japan must be regarded as a crime against humanity, a labour of devastation, a calamity comparable only,—by reason of the misery and destruction which it wrought,—to an earthquake, a tidal-wave, a ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn
... on the face of the globe, we refuse entirely to displace those medieval notions according to which personal honor found its best protection in the dueling pistol, and national honor its only vindication in slaughter and devastation. To unlimited arbitration we ...
— Prize Orations of the Intercollegiate Peace Association • Intercollegiate Peace Association
... lightning, or rain. To them "fair is foul, and foul is fair," as they "hover through the fog and filthy air." The whole of the earlier part of the third scene of the first act is one blast of tempest with its attendant devastation. They can loose and bind the winds,[1] cause vessels to be tempest-tossed at sea, and mutilate wrecked bodies.[2] They describe themselves as "posters of the sea and land;"[3] the heath they meet upon is blasted;[4] ...
— Elizabethan Demonology • Thomas Alfred Spalding
... the war—the devastation of lands, the burning of houses—had reduced the fortunes of many of the Athenian nobles. With their property diminished their influence. Poverty, and discontent, and jealousy of new families rising into repute [101], induced these men of fallen fortunes to conspire ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... ft.); Principe (3000 ft.); San Thome (6,913 ft.); and Anno Bom (1,350 ft.). San Thome and Principe are Portuguese possessions, Fernando Po and Anno Bom Spanish, and they are all exceedingly unhealthy. San Thome is still called "The Dutchman's Church-yard," on account of the devastation its climate wrought among the Hollanders when they once occupied it; as they seem, at one time or another, to have occupied all Portuguese possessions out here, during the long war these two powers waged with each other for supremacy in the Bights, a supremacy that neither of them attained to. Principe ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... the enemy. They executed their orders with so much boldness and celerity, that they had almost surprised the Barbarian chiefs, who returned in the fearless confidence of intoxication from one of their nocturnal festivals. Without repeating the uniform and disgusting tale of slaughter and devastation, it is sufficient to observe, that Julian dictated his own conditions of peace to six of the haughtiest kings of the Alemanni, three of whom were permitted to view the severe discipline and martial pomp of a Roman camp. Followed by twenty thousand captives, whom he had ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... devastation was now spread through all the townships. Fire, sword, and the other different instruments of destruction, alternately triumphed. The settlements of the tories alone generally escaped, and appeared as islands in the midst of the surrounding ruin. The merciless ravagers, ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... tempered when this is the case. I come in full dress. And do the honour to the Duke's motto. I saw my little man off on Monday, after expedition over Bank and Tower. Thence to Pym's, Poultry: oysters consumed by dozings. Thence to Purcell's: great devastation of pastry. Thence to Shoreditch, where Sons calmly said: "Never mind, Papa; it is no use minding it. I shall soon be back to you," and so administered comfort to his forlorn Dad.—My salute to the Conquered One, and I am your loving, ...
— How to Write Letters (Formerly The Book of Letters) - A Complete Guide to Correct Business and Personal Correspondence • Mary Owens Crowther
... along the way in the most fertile places and gathering force by multiplication until the thirteenth century. Then like a mighty flood they poured into eastern Europe, carrying everywhere in their pathway subjugation, devastation, and slaughter. During the early part of these migrations, the great Roman Empire trembled as she beheld the irresistible moving hosts, and her downfall was hastened by the ponderous blows dealt her ...
— Wealth of the World's Waste Places and Oceania • Jewett Castello Gilson
... efforts; it was within his own dominion, to check the violence of the strong against the weak, to put a stop to the quarrels of the strong amongst themselves, to make an end, in France at least, of unrighteousness and devastation, and to establish there some sort of order and some sort of justice, that he displayed his energy and his perseverance. "He was animated," says Suger, "by a strong sense of equity; to air his courage was his delight; he scorned inaction; he opened his eyes to see the ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... driven to despair, or to a resignation which, arising from fanaticism, assumed the same dark hue. America had also received the taint; and, were it yellow fever or plague, the epidemic was gifted with a virulence before unfelt. The devastation was not confined to the towns, but spread throughout the country; the hunter died in the woods, the peasant in the corn-fields, and the ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... seigneur of Mount Murray, one of the two seigniories into which Malbaie was divided, was sent out on these ravaging expeditions. Years after, some of Fraser's neighbours of French origin rallied him on his capacity for devastation as shown at this time. See Fraser's Journal, Appendix A, p. 253, and the Memoires of Philippe Aubert de Gaspe, 1866, ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... behind the Bzura, and his left stretching out towards Lodz. The Germans attacked all along the line on 18 November, but Ruszky's left seemed to afford the easiest prey; it had no natural line of defence, and Hindenburg's devastation during his retreat in October made the arrival of reinforcements from Ivanov farther south unlikely. Nevertheless Mackensen's most impetuous drive was against Ruszky's centre across the causeway at Piontek; it promised a dramatic ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... for. So I hurried on with my work. I found three dark slides—the parts that carried the plates in the back of the camera, you know—one of them fixed in the camera itself. These I opened, and exposed the plates to ruination as before. I suppose nobody ever did so much devastation in a photographic studio in ten ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison
... Some of the Indians were killed and their crops destroyed. This roused their revengeful passions to the utmost. The Raritan savages visited the colony of De Vries, on Staten Island, with death and devastation. Reward was offered for the head of anyone of the murderers. An Indian never forgot an injury. The nephew of one of the natives who twenty years before had been wantonly killed went to sell furs at Fort Amsterdam, and while ...
— History of the United States, Vol. I (of VI) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... Gharati a-Zay ma huna Rajil;" "Ya Gharati" will recur presently, p. 195, along with "ya Musibati" Oh my calamity! I take it therefore to be an exclamation of distress from "Gharat" invasion, with its incidents of devastation, rapine and ruin. It would be the natural outcry of the women left helpless in an unprotected camp when invaded by a hostile tribe. In "a-Zay ma" the latter particle is not the negative, but the pronoun, giving to "a-Zay" "in what manner," "how ?" the more emphatical sense of "how ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... contain a piteous picture of this business, the hereditary feuds of centuries bursting out on the first symptoms of ill-will between the two governments, with fire and devastation.—State Papers, vol. iv. ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... fortress of the greatest importance. In pursuance of the design of the Florentines and the king, the duke of Calabria, by the assistance of the Colonna family (the Orsini had joined the pope), plundered the country about Rome and committed great devastation; while the Florentines, with Niccolo Vitelli, besieged and took Citta di Castello, expelling Lorenzo Vitelli, who held it for the pope, and placing Niccolo in it ...
— History Of Florence And Of The Affairs Of Italy - From The Earliest Times To The Death Of Lorenzo The Magnificent • Niccolo Machiavelli
... It was a dreadful thing for us to sit supinely and watch her death agony. It was our duty, even more from the standpoint of National honor than from the standpoint of National interest, to stop the devastation and destruction. Because of these considerations I favored war; and to-day, when in retrospect it is easier to see things clearly, there are few humane and honorable men who do not believe that the war was ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... scene with massy clouds, the flames of burning fragments became more visible, and the fiery course of the red bullets was perceptible as they crossed each other in their path, while their effects in fire and devastation were fearful to behold. It was evident that the Mussulmans had been attempting a sally, for a sharp fire of musketry burst forth suddenly amid the roaring of the cannon. The fight was approaching the trenches of the Christians, and on board the vessels none were agreed whether the besiegers ...
— The Two Captains • Friedrich de La Motte-Fouque
... neatly at the end of some adventure or emotional crisis, feeling that the story was going on splendidly and that his power to write was full and strong, and then, having written the number of the next chapter, he would reach forward to write the first word ... and suddenly there was devastation in his mind, and "My God! I don't know what to make them ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... have questioned, when lingering near The home of the dead, of the friends who were dear, If the brightest enchantments of earth could repair The sad devastation that time has made there; If the joys of the world had a balm to impart, That would act as a charm to the woes of the heart. Yes, there is such a balm, but it comes from above, It is wafted to earth on the pinions of love; 'Tis the spirit of piety, spotless and pure, That teaches ...
— Heart Utterances at Various Periods of a Chequered Life. • Eliza Paul Kirkbride Gurney
... through which the Gila winds its way westward to the Colorado. In times of continued drought the bed of the Gila is dry, but the region is subject to great and violent storms, and floods roll down from the heights with marvelous precipitation, carrying devastation on their way. Where the Colorado River forms the boundary between California and Arizona it cuts through a number of volcanic rocks by black, yawning canyons. Between these canyons the river has a low but ...
— Canyons of the Colorado • J. W. Powell
... to plunder for the very means of life. Goaded by hunger and distress of every kind, those formidable and ferocious "wood kernes" only paid the country back, by inflicting on it that plunder and devastation which they had received at its hands. Neither is it surprising that they should make no distinction in their depredations, because they experienced, to their cost, that no "hosting," on either or any side, ever made a distinction ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... her into deeper misery and profounder degradation. With truth we here may apply the strong censure of a Chinese Emperor, "That the march of Christians is whitened with human bones." Wherever we have touched her western shores there our footsteps have been marked with blood and devastation. We have fostered and encouraged within the heart of Africa the most odious and unnatural passions. We have stimulated the prince to sell his subjects, the father to sell his child, the brother to sell the sister, the husband the wife, into thrice-accursed and again accursed ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... which guilt conceals itself from the perpetrator's conscience, and oftenest, perhaps, by the splendor of its garments. Statesmen, rulers, generals, and all men who act over an extensive sphere, are most liable to be deluded in this way; they commit wrong, devastation, and murder, on so grand a scale, that it impresses them as speculative rather than actual; but in our procession we find them linked in detestable conjunction with the meanest criminals whose deeds have the vulgarity of petty details. Here the effect of circumstance ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... with the arrival of Bugeaud, the war in Africa was changed; hitherto it had been a mere war of occupation,—a holding of the ground already French against the attacking Arabs; now it was to be a duel, a war of devastation; thus only could France hope to tame the indefatigable Abd-el-Kader, and permanently hold her own. The trouble was not so much to fight him as to get near enough to fight him; for he pursued a truly Fabian policy, and being lighter armed, was ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... Pitt, Fox, and a crowd of their followers, in the senate of England, and the almost fiendish vividness of the republican oratory, have remained without equals, and almost without imitators—the brilliancy of French soldiership, in a war which swept Europe with the swiftness and the devastation of a flight of locusts—the British campaigns of the Peninsula, those most consummate displays of fortitude and decision, of the science which baffles an enemy, and of the bravery which crushes him—will be lessons to the soldier in every period ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... execution a plan intended to bring about the fulfilment of his desires. He came to terms with the same Armatolians whom he had formerly treated so harshly, and let them loose, provided with arms and ammunition, on the country which he wished to obtain. Soon the whole region echoed with stories of devastation and pillage. The pacha, unable to repel the incursions of these mountaineers, employed the few troops he had in oppressing the inhabitants of the plains, who, groaning under both extortion and rapine, vainly ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... that, screened by the bushes and trees which fringed the bank of the river, they saw but little of the ruin and devastation left in the wake of the German hosts. There were farmers who had tried to defend their families and homes from the invaders. Burning houses and barns marked the places where they had lived and died. But the children, thinking ...
— The Belgian Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... immense explosion took place, which shook everything around.[76] The village cattle, loosened from their confinements, ran about in wild confusion, and mixed themselves with the horrors of the night: in short, my words fall short of any description that could be made of this awful scene of devastation; and I must bless the mercy of that Almighty hand which hath spared me in the ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... brakes, and brambles, and, in truth, More ragged than need was! O'er pathless rocks, Through beds of matted fern and tangled thickets, 15 Forcing my way, I came to one dear nook Unvisited, where not a broken bough Drooped with its withered leaves, ungracious sign Of devastation; but the hazels rose Tall and erect, with tempting clusters hung, 20 A virgin scene! A little while I stood, Breathing with such suppression of the heart As joy delights in; and with wise restraint Voluptuous, fearless of a rival, eyed The banquet; or beneath the trees I ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson
... layman ask such Romanists, and let them give answer, why they despoil and mock all of God's commandments, and rant so violently about this power, whereas they cannot show at all why it is necessary, or what it is good for. For ever since it has arisen, it has accomplished nothing but the devastation of Christendom, and no one is able to show anything good or useful that has resulted from it. Of this I will speak more fully if this Romanist comes again, and then, please God, I will throw light upon the Holy Chair at Rome and expose it as it ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther
... storm broke, his instant determination and rapidity of movements, his ever-ready munitions for battle and siege, made his later campaigns always successful. He felt that he was carrying on war in his own country; so his wars were not wars of devastation, but the crushing of armies ...
— A Short History of Wales • Owen M. Edwards
... within other sep'rate is it fram'd. To God, his neighbour, and himself, by man Force may be offer'd; to himself I say And his possessions, as thou soon shalt hear At full. Death, violent death, and painful wounds Upon his neighbour he inflicts; and wastes By devastation, pillage, and the flames, His substance. Slayers, and each one that smites In malice, plund'rers, and all robbers, hence The torment undergo of the first round In different herds. Man can do violence To himself ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... place his charge in safety, to permit of a halt for refreshment and rest on the way. The Greek's uneasiness on Zarah's account was increased as, towards dawn, they met parties of peasants fleeing, as they said, from the Syrians, who, like a vast cloud of locusts, were carrying devastation through the land. Lycidas felt that danger was on all sides; he knew not whether to advance or to retreat; responsibility weighed heavily upon him, and he almost envied the stolid composure with which the hardy Joab trudged on his weary way. The Athenian would ...
— Hebrew Heroes - A Tale Founded on Jewish History • AKA A.L.O.E. A.L.O.E., Charlotte Maria Tucker
... divided equally between the Venetians and the remaining leaders. For the second time Constantinople was carried by storm; a fire destroyed a large part of the city; and the Crusaders completed the devastation by three days of indiscriminate plunder and massacre. Neither the treasures of the churches nor the priceless monuments and statues of the public places were spared. The sum-total of the booty was thought to be equal to all the wealth of Western Europe; but when it came ...
— Medieval Europe • H. W. C. Davis
... entirely subdued by the valour and fortune of Charles XII. and having received a king of his nomination, submitted cheerfully, glad to see an end of devastation, as they then flattered themselves; but the troubles of that unfortunate kingdom were yet to endure much longer.—Augustus, impatient of recovering what he had lost, and the czar of Muscovy jealous and envious of the king of Sweden's glory, came ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... houses and seeing the processions. This prevented any lives being lost, as every one ran out of doors at the first shock, which was not very severe. The second, a few minutes afterwards, threw down a great many houses, and others, which continued all night and part of the next day, completed the devastation. The line of disturbance was very narrow, so that the native town a mile to the east scarcely suffered at all. The wave passed from north to south, through the islands of Tidore and Makian, and terminated in Batchian, where it was not felt till four the ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... Franks, and given Attila so terrible a defeat at Chlons that the Huns were fairly driven out of Gaul. And here it must be mentioned that when in the next year, 452, Attila with his murderous host, came down into Italy, and after horrible devastation of all the northern provinces, came to the gates of Rome, no one dared to meet him but one venerable bishop, Leo, the Pope, who, when his flock were in transports of despair, went forth only accompanied by one magistrate to meet the invader, and endeavored ...
— The Junior Classics • Various |
