"Bowstring" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... personality), it must yet be admitted that he habitually speaks out of that primitive silence and solitude in which only the heroic soul dwells. Certainly not in contemporary British literature is there another writer whose bowstring has such a twang. ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... constitutional Monarchs of France or England. The proof of this is, that when the people are dissatisfied with their administration, or displeased with the sovereign, they have no difficulty in dispatching him. The twisting of a sash round the neck in Russia, the bowstring in Constantinople or Ispahan, are very effectual monitors—fully as much so as a hostile Parliamentary majority in the house of Commons or Chamber of Deputies. In a word, government in every country being conducted by the few over the many by the hundreds over the hundred thousands, it is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... kissing them wildly, and betraying in her childish grief all the deep, sensitive, despairing sorrow of a woman. The villain before her might have often beaten her, debased her immeasurably, but the mysterious cord that linked their beating hearts was unbroken, though it sang like a bowstring in the gusty horror that swept between, and stretched to attenuation as the elder spirit sank, groaning, into the abyss of its own wickedness. Hot tears gushed from her eyes, her little throat was swollen with the ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... And the fire shall devour them. Their fruit shall Thou destroy from the earth, And their seed from among the children of men. For they intended evil against Thee, They imagined a mischievous device, Which they could not execute. For Thou wilt make them turn their back, Thou wilt make ready Thy bowstring against their faces. Be Thou exalted Jehovah in Thine own strength; We will sing ...
— The Lord of Glory - Meditations on the person, the work and glory of our Lord Jesus Christ • Arno Gaebelein
... they hae ta'en brave Hobbie Noble, Wi's ain bowstring they band him sae; But his gentle heart was ne'er sae sair, As when his ain five ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... beautiful, even under her wet, dark hair. She seemed to be a Caucasian girl—maybe a Georgian. She wore a small gold cross which hung from a gold cord around her neck. There was another, and tighter, cord around her neck, too. I cut the silk bowstring and closed and bound her eyes with my handkerchief before I rowed out a little farther and lowered her into the deep channel which cuts eastward here like the scimitar of that true believer, ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers
... night the buffalo might stray, Or elephant, the stream to drink,—intent my savage game to slay. Then of a water cruse, as slow it filled, the gurgling sound I heard, Nought saw I, but the sullen low of elephant that sound appeared. The swift well-feathered arrow I upon the bowstring fitting straight, Towards the sound the shaft let fly, ah, cruelly deceived by fate! The winged arrow scarce had flown, and scarce had reached its destined aim, 'Ah me, I'm slain,' a feeble moan in trembling human accents came. 'Ah, whence hath come this ...
— National Epics • Kate Milner Rabb
... Pillows of his Divan on the pummel of his saddle to keep his Stomach steady. An end, however, was put to the discomfort he suffered through Corpulence, by the arrival, three weeks after the suppression of the Insurrection, of a Tartar Courier, who brought with him a Bowstring and a Firman from the Grand Seignor. By means of the Bowstring, the Fat Bashaw was then and there strangled,—for they do things in a very off-hand manner in Turkey,—and when the Firman was opened by his Vizier it was found to contain, ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... riding on in the ellipse, and another man fitted an arrow to his bowstring, and as he rode ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... good charade words: Knighthood, penitent, looking-glass, hornpipe, necklace, indolent, lighthouse, Hamlet, pantry, phantom, windfall, sweepstake, sackcloth, antidote, antimony, pearl powder, kingfisher, football, housekeeping, infancy, snowball, definite, bowstring, carpet, Sunday, Shylock, earwig, matrimony, cowhiding, welcome, friendship, horsemanship, ...
— Entertainments for Home, Church and School • Frederica Seeger
... tops of the agitated bushes. Then a large bear, a grizzly, crashed into view, and likewise stopped abruptly, at sight of the humans. He did not like them, and growled querulously. Slowly the boy fitted the arrow to the bow, and slowly he pulled the bowstring taut. But he never removed his eyes ...
— The Scarlet Plague • Jack London
... matter of the kind, the wayward one is "tossed." Tossing is not the sort of pastime any fellow would choose for fun, not if he were the party to be tossed, though it is a beanfeast for the onlookers. They manage it this way. A hide, freshly stripped from a bullock, smoking, bloody, and limber as a bowstring, is requisitioned; the hairy side is turned downwards, two strong men get hold of each corner, cutting holes in the green hide for their hands to have a good grip; they allow the hide to sag until it forms a sort of cradle, into which the ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... conditions," added the confident Giraffe. "And just make up your minds I'm going to do that same stunt yet. Why, half a dozen times already I've been pretty close to getting fire; but something always seemed to happen just at the last minute. Once my bowstring sawed through. Another time the plaguey stick burst. Then Bumpus had to fall all over me just when I felt sure the spark was going to come in the tinder. And the last time, you may remember, when I sang out that ...
— The Boy Scouts in the Maine Woods - The New Test for the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... Rochester, costumed in shawls, with a turban on his head. His dark eyes and swarthy skin and Paynim features suited the costume exactly: he looked the very model of an Eastern emir, an agent or a victim of the bowstring. Presently advanced into view Miss Ingram. She, too, was attired in oriental fashion: a crimson scarf tied sash-like round the waist: an embroidered handkerchief knotted about her temples; her beautifully-moulded arms bare, one of them upraised ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... a figure, painted, clothed, and plumed in scarlet. Everything was scarlet about him, his moccasins, his naked skin, the fantastic cloak and blanket, girdle, knife-hilt, axe shaft, and the rattling quiver on his back—nay, the very arrows in it were set with scarlet feathers, and the looped bowstring was ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... grandsons, nephews of the present Light of the Universe, and children of his sister, the wife of Halil Pasha. Little children die in all ways: these of the much-maligned Mahometan Royal race perished by the bowstring. Sultan Mahmoud (may he rest in glory!) strangled the one; but, having some spark of human feeling, was so moved by the wretchedness and agony of the poor bereaved mother, his daughter, that his Royal heart relented towards her, and he promised that, should she ever have another child, it should ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray
... is 8,765. The Companies vary greatly in numbers: there are 448 Haberdashers, for instance: 380 Fishmongers: and 356 Spectacle Makers: while there are only 16 Fletchers, i.e. makers of arrows. Many of the trades are now extinct, such as the Fletchers above named, the Bowyers, the Girdlers, the Bowstring Makers and ...
— The History of London • Walter Besant
... won't get ahead of me," as he had said at the first; he set his teeth, threw off his hat, and, knitting his brows with a resolute expression, prepared to take steady aim, though his heart beat fast and his thumb trembled as he pressed it on the bowstring. ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... rent in twain his bowstring, and they cut his pond'rous mace, Slew his steeds and chariot-driver, streaked ...
— Maha-bharata - The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse • Anonymous
... in prison, till they grew Of years to fill a bowstring or the throne, One or the other, but which of the two Could yet be known unto the fates alone; Meantime the education they went through Was princely, as the proofs have always shown; So that the heir apparent still was found No less deserving ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... my mother," was the only thing they could get out of her. Her little body was taut as a bowstring, her lips tight. They offered her excuses; the lady mother slept; now she was rising and must be clothed. And then at last they told her, because of the ...
— The Truce of God • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... thread, about an eighth of an inch from the pointed end. When the thread is carried through the cloth, which may be done to the distance of about three-fourths of an inch the thread will be stretched above the curved needle, something like a bowstring, leaving a small open space between the two. A small shuttle, carrying a bobbin, filled with thread, is then made to pass entirely through this open space, between the needle and the thread which it carries; and when the shuttle is returned the thread ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... bowstring. The arrow seemed to sing through the frosty air, and, a second later, the silence was broken by cheer after cheer. The apple lay upon the ground pierced right ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... Rubio, flown with new-born majesty. "Know ye not that this Smyrna is our capital city, and we could confiscate your gold to our royal exchequer? Josiah is King here." And he took his seat upon the throne vacated by Sabbatai. "Get ye gone, or the bastinado and the bowstring ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... my son, that thou pullest not the long bow ere the bowstring be twisted, or ever the arrow be at hand—send not in thy bill ere the ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... well, Till his arrows were all ago', And the fire so fast upon him fell That his bowstring burnt ...
— The Book of Brave Old Ballads • Unknown
... bow," says Ivy. "Loop the bowstring round the hand-piece and you'll get more friction ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... as a bowstring, and the current so strong she pulled upon her anchor. All round the hull, in the blackness, the rippling current bubbled and chattered like a little mountain stream. One cut with my sea-gully and the HISPANIOLA would go ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... if thou losest it, thou shalt be stript of thy Lincoln green, and scourged out of the lists with bowstrings, for a wordy and insolent braggart, and if thou refusest my fair proffer, the Provost of the lists shall cut thy bowstring, break thy bow and arrows, and expel thee from the presence as a ...
— The Speaker, No. 5: Volume II, Issue 1 - December, 1906. • Various
... decisive struggle in the open, but they always seemed to be stealing something which belonged to the men who were engaged in the struggle. And apart from this they were so indifferent in their practice of archery that they drew the bowstring only to the breast[5], so that the missile sent forth was naturally impotent and harmless to those whom it hit[6]. Such, it is evident, was the archery of the past. But the bowmen of the present time go into battle wearing corselets and fitted out ...
— History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8) - The Persian War • Procopius
... man alone A single bowstring uses, and that his own; What matters it to any the worth that's buried? By its own waves the current o'er ...
— Fridthjof's Saga • Esaias Tegner
... that," Carroll smiled. "There were the Sabine women, among other instances. Didn't they cut off their hair to make bowstring for their abductors?" ...
— Vane of the Timberlands • Harold Bindloss
... never-enough-to-be-lamented lock of hair. Other danger awaits him, for "to be strangled was not much better than to be starved; and certainly with half a dozen highly respectable females clinging round his neck, he was not reminded, for the first time in his life, what a domestic bowstring is an affectionate woman." He is next joined by an "influential personage," who informs him that he is in Hubbabub (London)—the largest city, not only that exists, but that ever did exist, and the capital of the Island ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 322, July 12, 1828 • Various
... sorrowing lover mourns His cruel vengeance; and himself he hates, Too credulous listening, and too soon enflam'd: The bird he hates, who first betray'd the deed And caus'd him first to grieve: his bow he hates; His bowstring; arm; and with his arm the dart, Shot vengeful. Fond he clasps her fallen form; And strives by skill, by skill too late apply'd To conquer fate:—his healing arts he tries,— All unavailing. Fruitless he beholds ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid
... my harp that had but one long string, But one low song, but one brief wingy flight, Is voiceless, for my bowstring is cut off. Sever two locks of hair for my sake now, Spoil those bright coils of power, give me your hair, And with my mother twist those locks together Into a bowstring for me. Fierce small head, Thy stinging tresses shall scourge men ...
— The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays • Various
... Roofs. Common Trusses. The Vertical Upright Truss. The Warren Girder. The Bowstring ...
— Carpentry for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... when the head is thrown up. The other fleets and other arrangements threaten the enemy's solar plexus and stomach. Somewhere in relation to the Grand Fleet lies the "blockading" cordon which examines neutral traffic. It could be drawn as tight as a Turkish bowstring, but for reasons which we may arrive at after the war, it does not seem to have been ...
— Sea Warfare • Rudyard Kipling
... exercise as it was performed in the Vieille Garden and told me a new fairy-tale, I verily believe, every afternoon for seven years. Scheherezade could do no more for a Sultan, and to save her own neck from the bowstring! ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... much more readily accept "considerations of state" as a reason for Mr. Motley's removal. Considerations of state have never yet failed the axe or the bowstring when a reason for the use of those convenient implements was wanted, and they are quite equal to every emergency which can arise in a republican autocracy. But for the very reason that a minister ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... fir rounded, and the rest of bone let by a socket into the wood, and having a head of thin iron, or more commonly of slate, secured into a slit by two treenails. Towards the opposite end of the arrow are two feathers, generally of the spotted oval, not very neatly lashed on. The bowstring consists of from twelve to eighteen small lines of three-sinew sinnet, having a loose twist, and with a separate becket of the same size for going over the knobs at the end of ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... said she, on the thousand-and-second night, (I quote the language of the "Isitsoornot" at this point, verbatim) "my dear sister," said she, "now that all this little difficulty about the bowstring has blown over, and that this odious tax is so happily repealed, I feel that I have been guilty of great indiscretion in withholding from you and the king (who I am sorry to say, snores—a thing no gentleman would do) ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... Democrat; the pirates of the Barbary Coast; Democratic gospel pure and undefiled; Janus-faced double; Good Lord, good devil; all things to all men; God-fearing patriots; come what may; all things are fair in love or war; the silken bowstring; the unwary voter; bait to catch gudgeons; to live by or to die by; these obsequious courtiers; Guttenburg; rubber stamp; at all hazards; the most ...
— Public Speaking • Clarence Stratton
... house or taken by his foes; but for her children she would have stayed with him. William continued his wonderful archery, never missing his aim, till all his arrows were spent, and the flames came so close that his bowstring was burnt in two. Great blazing brands came falling upon him from the burning roof, and the floor was hot beneath his feet. "An evil death is this!" thought he. "Better it were that I should take sword and buckler and leap down ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt
... express things rather brutally. I feel this to be the case, for instance, when I say that she had primarily detected such an aid to advancement in the person of Robert Acton, but that she had afterwards remembered that a prudent archer has always a second bowstring. Eugenia was a woman of finely-mingled motive, and her intentions were never sensibly gross. She had a sort of aesthetic ideal for Clifford which seemed to her a disinterested reason for taking him ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... leaf could move on the ground now—not a bush might bend or a bird pass and escape being seen by the four sharp eyes that peered from the brush in the direction indicated by the sound of the breaking stick. Two hearts beat loudly as Fine Bow fitted his arrow to the bowstring. Tense and expectant they waited—yes, it was a deer—a buck, too, and he was coming down the trail, alert and watchful—down the trail that he had often travelled and knew so well. Yes, he had followed his mother along that trail when he was but ...
— Indian Why Stories • Frank Bird Linderman
... Gresham to untie a parcel, and it thereafter serves to spin a fine new top, to help Hal out of a difficulty with his toy, and in the final incident of the story, an archery contest, our provident hero, finding his bowstring "cracked," calmly draws from his pocket the still excellent piece of cord, and affixing it to his bow, wins the match. Hal betrays his great lack of self-control by exclaiming, "The everlasting whipcord, I declare," ...
— Forgotten Books of the American Nursery - A History of the Development of the American Story-Book • Rosalie V. Halsey
... Considerable execution was also done by the Turkish arrows, with which portions of the masts and spars bristled. Several of these missiles came from the bow of the Pacha himself, who was probably the last commander-in-chief who ever drew a bowstring in European battle. But on the whole the fire of the Christians was greatly superior to that of the Turks. Twice the deck of Ali was swept clear of defenders, and twice the Spaniards rushed on board ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... the throat, on the retaliating principle, I soon had some such sensations as one would be apt to feel if his gullet were in a vice. I shall not attempt to describe very minutely the miracle that followed. Hanging ought to be an effectual remedy for many delusions; for, in my case, the bowstring I was under certainly did wonders in a very short time. Gradually the whole scene changed. First came a mist, then a vertigo; and finally, as the captain relaxed his hold, objects appeared in new forms, and instead of being in our lodgings in Bivouac, I found myself in my old apartment ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... bamboo* [The bamboo, of which the quiver is made, is thin and light: it is brought from Assam, and called Tulda, or Dulwa, by the Bengalees.] bow across his back. On his right wrist is a curious wooden guard for the bowstring; and a little pouch, containing aconite poison and a few common implements, is suspended to his girdle. A hat he seldom wears, and when he does, it is often extravagantly broad and flat-brimmed, with a small hemispherical crown. It is made of leaves of Scitamineae, ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... and pain he bored in. He had but one chance—to get this shadow in his gorilla-like arms. He lacked mental flexibility. An idea, getting into his head, stuck; it was not adjustable. Like an arrow sped from the bowstring, it had to fulfill its destiny. It never occurred to him to take to his heels, to get space between himself and this enemy he had so woefully underestimated. Ten feet, and he might have been able to whirl, draw his pistol, and end ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... defeat might amuse with a triumph the vanity of Constantinople; but the more sagacious Michael, despairing of his arms, depended on the effects of a conspiracy; on the secret workings of a rat, who gnawed the bowstring ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... and in less than a century disposed of the throne of its former tyrant. The unseen hand of fate gave to the discharged arrow a higher flight, and quite a different direction from that which it first received from the bowstring. In the womb of happy Brabant that liberty had its birth which, torn from its mother in its earliest infancy, was to gladden the so despised Holland. But the enterprise must not be less thought of because its issue differed from the first design. Man works up, smooths, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... commandant of Wu-ch'ang, he transformed the character of the people by 'proprieties' and music, and was praised by the master. After the death of Confucius, Chi K'ang asked Yen how that event had made no sensation like that which was made by the death of Tsze-ch'an, when the men laid aside their bowstring rings and girdle ornaments, and the women laid aside their pearls and ear-rings, and the voice of weeping was heard in the lanes for three months. Yen replied, 'The influences of Tsze- ch'an and my master might be compared to ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) Unicode Version • James Legge
... longer be trusted. They were open to bribes, intriguing, and a source of danger rather than strength; and finally a reforming Sultan touched a mine of gunpowder which led under their barracks, and they were exterminated, the bowstring and sword finishing the few which ...
— The Great Round World And What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 22, April 8, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... extremities. Many perished raving mad, fancying themselves swimming in boundless seas, yet unable to assuage their thirst. Many of the soldiers lay parched and panting along the battlements, no longer able to draw a bowstring or hurl a stone; while above five thousand Moors, stationed upon a rocky height which overlooked part of the town, kept up a galling fire into it with slings and crossbows, so that the marques ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... thrones, Have awed their servile spirits into fear; Spurned by the foot, they tremble and revere. The day of labor, night's sad, sleepless hour, The inflictive scourge of arbitrary power, The bloody terror of the pointed steel, The murderous stake, the agonizing wheel, And (dreadful choice!) the bowstring or the bowl, Damps their faint vigor and unmans the soul. Disastrous fate! Still tears will fill the eye, Still recollection prompt the mournful sigh, When to the mind recurs thy former fame, And all the horrors ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... into the copses to cut myself a good hazel and make myself a bow, Mr Jack, and get reeds out of the edge of the long lake, to tie nails in the ends and use for arrows. I used to bind the nails in with whitey-brown thread well beeswaxed, and then dress the notch at the other end to keep the bowstring from splitting it up. I've hit rabbits with an arrow before now, though they always run into their holes. You can shoot with a bow and arrow at ...
— Jack at Sea - All Work and no Play made him a Dull Boy • George Manville Fenn
... have no claim whatever against you; neither has this man. I settled all my accounts with him; and I have his receipt in full, signed by him, and witnessed by Captain Sharp and his wife. He is a swindler and a villain; and if I ever catch him in Morocco he shall have the bowstring!" ...
— Across India - Or, Live Boys in the Far East • Oliver Optic
... boys came in sight, but this time there were only two of them, as the youngest had stayed at home. The air was warm and damp, and the snow soft and slushy, and the elder brother's bowstring hung loose, while the bow of the younger caught in a tree and snapped in half. At that moment the dogs began to bark loudly, and the bear rushed out of the thicket and set off in the direction of the mountain. Without thinking that they had nothing to defend themselves with, ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... had occasion to get out the stresses in girders of the bowstring form, the author was not satisfied with the common formulae for the diagonal braces, which, owing to the difficulty of apportioning the stresses amongst five members meeting in one point, were to a large extent based on an assumption as to the course taken by the stresses. As far ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 483, April 4, 1885 • Various
... of the Hittite chariots, which drew aside as if terrified at the glittering figures that dashed upon them so fearlessly. As they swept through, Menna had enough to do to manage his steeds, which were wild with excitement; but Ramses' bow was bent again and again, and at every twang of the bowstring a Hittite champion fell from his chariot. Behind the King came his household troops, and all together they burst through the chariot brigade of the enemy, leaving a long trail marked by dead and wounded men, overturned ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Ancient Egypt • James Baikie
... specially reckoned. Provided there is no waste, it is a coefficient of all the forces, and no one can tell exactly to what extent it may be carried. But what is remarkable is, that just as only a strong arm enables the archer to stretch the bowstring to the utmost extent, so also in War it is only by means of a great directing spirit that we can expect the full power latent in the troops to be developed. For it is one thing if an Army, in consequence of great misfortunes, surrounded with danger, falls all to pieces like a wall that has been ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... of a pair of peculiar goat-skin bellows, provided with wooden nozzles tipped with iron. A catgut bowstring drills for boring holes, and screw-drills for cutting threads, hammers, and an anvil. A rude but ingenious forge is constructed out of a few handfuls of stiff mud, and, building a charcoal fire, they spend the evening in sharpening and tempering ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... horizons fade And thought forgets old gages in the ecstasy of view. The standards go by which the steps were made. On which we trod from former levels to the new. No time for backward glance, no pause for breath, Since impulse like a bowstring loosed us in full flight And in delirium of speed none aim considereth Nor in the blaze of burning codes can think of night. The whirring of sped wheels and horn remind That speed, more speed is best and peace is waste! They rank unfortunate who tag behind And ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy
... than that the gracious sovereign of the Middle Kingdom had confiscated the property of Li's family, that his wife had died of sorrow, in misery, and that his son, Li, having taken the liberty to complain of the glorious emperor's severity, suffered death by the bowstring, as is proper and ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various
... and laid her hand tremulously on his shoulder, and looked down at him with piteous, pleading eyes. No Circassian slave, afraid of bowstring and sack, could have entreated her ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon
... every muscle in Jean's body became as taut as a bowstring. He hunched a little forward, as if about to leap upon the other, and strike him down. And then, all at once, he relaxed. His hands unclenched. And he ...
— God's Country—And the Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... I write; then all desireful turned herself again to that region where the world is most alive.[1] Her silence, and her transmuted countenance imposed silence on my eager mind, which already had new questions in advance. And even as an arrow, that hits the mark before the bowstring is quiet, so we ran into the second realm.[2] Here I saw my lady so joyous as she entered into the light of that heaven, that thereby the planet became more lucent. And if the star war, changed and smiled, what did I become, who even by my nature ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 3, Paradise [Paradiso] • Dante Alighieri
... minutes the birds were fighting within thirty yards of the spot where the Bushman lay. The twang of a bowstring might have been heard by one of the koris, had he been listening. The other could not possibly have heard it; for before the sound could have reached him, a poisoned arrow was sticking through his ears. The barb had passed through, and the shaft remained in his head, ...
— The Bush Boys - History and Adventures of a Cape Farmer and his Family • Captain Mayne Reid
... nothing. Not a blot upon those sordid pages was spared him. It was not possible for an instant to turn away his eyes. His mental clarity was unrelieved by weariness. No shadow dimmed the keen crystal of his brain. He was at tension, like a bowstring that is stretched continually. He realised this, thinking: "Presently I will cut the bow-string, and the bow shall have rest! Even if my once-boasted will-power reasserted itself—even if I rose triumphant for the second ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... called a bowstring a bowstring was out of the question; and Racine, with triumphant art, has managed to introduce the periphrasis in such a way that it exactly expresses the state of mind of the Sultana. She begins ...
— Books and Characters - French and English • Lytton Strachey
... silken thong; Loud twangs the steel, the golden arrow flies, 240 Trails a long line of lustre through the skies; "'Tis done!" he shouts, "the mighty Monarch feels!" And with loud laughter shakes the silver wheels; Bends o'er the car, and whirling, as it moves, His loosen'd bowstring, drives the rising doves. 245 —Pierced on his throne the slarting Thunderer turns, Melts with soft sighs, with kindling rapture burns; Clasps her fair hand, and eyes in fond amaze The bright Intruder with enamour'd gaze. "And leaves my Goddess, like a blooming bride, 250 "The fanes ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... speak two lines with the bowstring round her neck; but the audience cried out ['Murder!'] 'Murder!' and she was obliged to go off ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... whipping him on the opposite of his neck. Presently the plucky savage's arm began to move. Booth watched him intently, and saw that he had fixed an arrow in his bow under the pony's shoulder; just as he was on the point of letting go the bowstring, with the head of the arrow not three feet from Booth's breast as he leaned out of the hole, the latter struck frantically at the weapon, dodged back into the wagon, and up came the Indian. Whenever Booth looked out, down went ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... left fist, palm upward, at arm's length before the body, the right as if grasping the bowstring and drawn back. (Shoshoni and Banak I.) "From their peculiar manner of holding the long bow horizontally in shooting." ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... telescope, set his rifle upright on the moss, and, kneeling, balanced the long spyglass alongside of the blued-steel barrel, resting it on his hand as an archer fits the arrow he is drawing on the bowstring. ...
— Barbarians • Robert W. Chambers
... square-jawed man of thirty-six. His forehead is high and broad and his hair is worn longer than that of other young men—parted on the side and brushed back. He has thin lips and a mouth of unusual width. His mouth-line is as straight as a bowstring, and when he speaks, which is often, or smiles, which is not so frequent, he shows an even line of ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams
... happened in New York. I says to myself: 'Friend Heherezade, you want to get busy and make Bagdad look pretty to the sad sultan of the sour countenance, or it'll be the bowstring for yours.' But I never had any doubt I could ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... pass as "the schadewe that glyt away;" man will fade as a leaf, "so lef on bouh." Where are Paris, and Helen, and Tristan, and Iseult, and Caesar? They have fled out of this world as the shaft from the bowstring: ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... spent the previous night out here in the hills—they awoke to find a fresh trail in the bear-grass within a hundred yards of where they had been sleeping, and in the middle of the track Dick Gird picked up one of the rawhide wristlets which Apaches wore to protect their arms from the bowstring. ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... that evening radiant with a new pride and joy. The storm within me had shifted my whole being from one centre to another. Like the Greek maidens of old, I fain would cut off my long, resplendent tresses to make a bowstring for my hero. Had my outward ornaments been connected with my inner feelings, then my necklet, my armlets, my bracelets, would all have burst their bonds and flung themselves over that assembly like a shower of meteors. Only ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore
... mark. But here the chief, the old White Bear, interposed and said that it was necessary that they should have long claws in order to be able to climb trees. "One of us has already died to furnish the bowstring, and if we now cut off our claws we shall all have to starve together. It is better to trust to the teeth and claws which nature has given us, for it is evident that man's weapons ...
— The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees • James Mooney
... The Khasi bow (ka ryntieh) is of bamboo, and is about 5 feet in height. The longest bow in use is said to be about the height of a man, the average height amongst the Khasis being about about 5 feet 2 inches to 5 feet 4 inches. The bowstring is of split bamboo, the bamboos that are used being u spit, ...
— The Khasis • P. R. T. Gurdon
... "The summer has come to an end And I wake from my dreaming," he mused. "Wake to know That my place is not here—I must go—I must go. Who dares laugh at Love shall hear Love laughing last, As forth from his bowstring barbed arrows are cast. I scoffed at the god with a sneer on my lip, And he forces me now from his chalice to sip A bitter sweet potion. Ah, lightly the part Of a lover I've played many times, but my heart Has been proud in ...
— Three Women • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... hour of the old liberty and power! It would amuse me to see the faces of ENVER and of my wretched brother MOHAMMED as I ordered them to execution—them and their gang of villainous parasites. By the bowstring of my fathers, but that would be a great and worthy killing! Pardon the fond day-dreams of a poor and lonely old man whose only crime has been that he loved his country too well and treated his enemies with a kindness not to be understood by ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 30, 1914 • Various
... and some the rear; Their remedies to reinforce and vary, Came surgeon eke, and eke apothecary; Till the tired Monarch, though of words grown chary, Yet dropt, to recompense their fruitless labor, Some hint about a bowstring or a saber. There lack'd, I promise you, no longer speeches, To rid the palace of ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... out for football, but displayed an aversion for violent physical contention of any sort, especially fighting; which caused him to be branded as a coward. But the time came when, unable longer to endure the insults heaped upon him, the restraint of the young Texan snapped like a bowstring, and the boys of Oakdale found that a sleeping lion had suddenly awakened. Then it came to be known that Grant had inherited a most unfortunate family failing, a terrible temper, which, when uncontrolled, was liable to lead him into ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott
... around the neck and then under his left arm. The ends of the arrows were thus convenient to his right hand, and with one sweeping circular motion he could draw them from the quiver and fit them to the bowstring. ...
— The Hunters of the Hills • Joseph Altsheler
... ascended a very strong rapid, and arrived at a range of three steep cascades, situated in the bend of the river. Here we made a portage of one thousand three hundred yards over a rocky hill, which received the name of the Bowstring Portage, from its shape. We found that the Indians had greatly the advantage of us in this operation; the men carried their small canoes, the women and children the clothes and provisions, and at the end of the portage they ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 1 • John Franklin
... golden-haired youth. Radiant as Apollo, he stood in mighty strength, a flashing shape in the midst of flame. He fitted a glowing arrow to a gleaming bow. The arrow parted with a keen musical twang of the bowstring, and Photogen darting after it, vanished with a shout. Up shot Apollo himself, and from his quiver scattered astonishment and exultation. But the brain of poor Nycteris was pierced through and through. She fell down ...
— Harper's Young People, December 23, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... received the pass-key to Ibrahim Pasha's harem. But the moment it was conveyed to her, she summoned to her presence three black slaves, belonging to the corps of the bostanjis, or gardeners, who also served as executioners, when a person of rank was to be subjected to the process of bowstring, or when any dark deed was to be accomplished in silence and with caution. Terrible appendages to the household of Ottoman sultans were the black slaves belonging to that corps—like snakes, they ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... of ruin and woe! never has any one been so pursued with direful prognostications! never has any one been so beset and impeded by a powerful combination of political and moneyed confederates! never has any one in any country where the administration of justice has risen above the knife or the bowstring, been so lawlessly and shamelessly tried and condemned by rivals and enemies, without hearing, without defence, without the forms of law and justice! History has been ransacked to find examples of tyrants sufficiently ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... paused the beauteous Teacher, and awhile Gazed on her train with sympathetic smile. 'Beware of Love! she cried, ye Nymphs, and hear 'His twanging bowstring with alarmed ear; 'Fly the first whisper of the distant dart, 'Or shield with adamant the fluttering heart; 430 'To secret shades, ye Virgin trains, retire, 'And in your bosoms guard the vestal fire.' —The obedient Beauties hear her ...
— The Temple of Nature; or, the Origin of Society - A Poem, with Philosophical Notes • Erasmus Darwin
... indeed the population is so large they would have very unsettled times of it. At every turning we meet people, or see their villages; all armed with bows and arrows. The bows are unusually long: I measured one made of bamboo, and found that along the bowstring it measured six feet four inches. Many carry large knives of fine iron; and indeed the metal is abundant. Young men and women wear the hair long, a mass of small ringlets comes down and rests on the shoulders, giving them the ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... Hobie Noble, Wi' his ain bowstring they band him sae; And I wat heart was ne'er sae sair, As when his ain five band him ...
— A Collection of Ballads • Andrew Lang
... some one about," he answered. "I heard the twang of a bowstring and the swish of an arrow over my head. Some one aimed—Ah, there ...
— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns
... tongue, the longing tone, Imploringly ask why They can not be as happy now As in the days gone by. And two more hearts, tumultuous With overflowing joy, Are dancing to the music Which that dear, provoking boy Is twanging on his bowstring, As, fluttering his wings, He sends his love-charged arrows While merrily be sings: "Ho! ho! my dainty maiden, It surely can not be You are thinking you are master Of your heart, when it is me." And another gleaming arrow Does the little god's behest, And the dainty little maiden Falls ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... but his fingers could not loose their grip upon the arrow, and the sheep passed by unharmed. Bilh Ahati{COMBINING BREVE}ni scrambled up over the rim of the canon and ran to get ahead of them again, but the bowstring would not leave his fingers as they passed. A third effort, and a fourth, to kill the game brought the same result. Bilh Ahati{COMBINING BREVE}ni cursed himself and the sheep, but ceased suddenly, for whom should he see but four gods, Yebichai, appear before him, who had transformed ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... feverishly restless, watching the movements of the other people. Finally I went up to my room and sat down by the windows, staring out. There came a little tap at the unlocked door and in an instant, like the go of a taut bowstring, I was up ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... stricken whale flew forward; with igniting velocity the line ran through the groove;—ran foul. Ahab stooped to clear it; he did clear it! but the flying turn caught him round the neck, and voicelessly as Turkish mutes bowstring their victim, he was shot out of the boat, ere the crew knew he was gone. Next instant, the heavy eye-splice in the rope's final end flew out of the stark-empty tub, knocked down an oarsmen, and smiting the sea, disappeared in ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... Swift as bowstring speeds a shaft, Through the camp was spread the rumor, And the soldiers, as they quaffed Flemish beer at dinner, laughed At the Emperor's ...
— Required Poems for Reading and Memorizing - Third and Fourth Grades, Prescribed by State Courses of Study • Anonymous
... [4] caused the greatest affliction to Sultan Amurath, forcing him to order the amputation of his head six several times (that is, once in every one of his six parts) during the first act. In reality, the sultan, though otherwise a decent man, was too bloody. What by the bowstring, and what by the cimeter, he had so thinned the population with which he commenced business, that scarcely any of the characters remained alive at the end of act the first. Sultan Amurath found himself ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... with millions of lights, and that all his wondrous thoughts stood embodied hundreds of feet below his tiny swinging plank, shouting together in his honour, when something cracked inside his temples like an overstrained bowstring, the glittering dome broke inward, and he was alone in ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... his cavernous throat. Meanwhile I levelled yet another shaft, Ill pleased to think my first had fled in vain. In the mid-chest I smote him, where the lungs Are seated: still the arrow sank not in, But fell, its errand frustrate, at his feet. Once more was I preparing, sore chagrined, To draw the bowstring, when the ravenous beast Glaring around espied me, lashed his sides With his huge tail, and opened war at once. Swelled his vast neck, his dun locks stood on end With rage: his spine moved sinuous as a bow, Till all his weight hung poised on flank and loin. And e'en as, when a chariot-builder ...
— Theocritus • Theocritus
... sound of a bowstring, and to Brace's horror one of their flying men made a spasmodic jump into the air and came down upon hands and knees, his nearest messmates passing on some twenty yards before they could check their speed; and then, in the midst of the thrill of excitement ...
— Old Gold - The Cruise of the "Jason" Brig • George Manville Fenn
... given no sign of her suffering and her terror, though her eyes were ringed with sleeplessness and her mouth had grown stiff with its effort to command. The tension was torture. Her heart strings were drawn to the snapping point; her mind was a bowstring never relaxed, till every fiber of her ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford
... and low like the cord. Some of us thought they discovered openings through the cord into the pool or lake, that was included between that and the bow; but whether there were or were not such openings is uncertain. We sailed abreast of the low beach or bowstring, within less than a league of the shore, till sun-set, and we then judged ourselves to be about half-way between the two horns. Here we brought-to, and sounded, but found no bottom with one hundred and thirty ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... constructed out of the leather of some ancient breechin. His mouth was open as far as it could; his lips curled up in rage—a sort of terrible grin; his teeth gleaming, ready, from out the darkness, the strap across his mouth tense as a bowstring; his whole frame stiff with indignation and surprise; his roar asking us all round, "Did you ever see the like of this?" He looked a statue of anger and astonishment, ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... folly of neglecting Raften's advice to have a big Dog in camp. He glanced around and would have run, but the tramp was too quick for him and grabbed him by the collar. "Oh, no you don't; hold on, sonny. I'll fix you so you'll do as you're told." He cut the bowstring from its place, and violently throwing Yan down, he tied his feet so that they had about ...
— Two Little Savages • Ernest Thompson Seton
... fiercely that I had not the heart, knowing how slender was her hold on life and how near the brink she stood, to break from her. I constrained myself to stand still, though every muscle grew tense as a drawn bowstring, and I felt the strong rage rising in my throat and choking me as I waited ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... one hand down inside the other, and sat for a moment in silence as tense with stirring possibilities to the others as to himself. The Judge felt moved to a most unusual sensation, as if he were a loosened bowstring beside this twanging, taut intensity. He felt slightly dismayed to have his unspoken principles carried to this nth power. He had given the best of himself, all his thoughts, illusions, hopes, endeavors, ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... out a sort of acquiescence, and then asked me for the loan of a white tie. I should have loved to give him a bowstring instead, with somebody who knew how to operate it. He was a fluff, ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... ramparts, ordered the garrison to allow the towers to advance unmolested by the machines to within bow-shot. Then taking up a long bow, which might have graced the hand of Robin Hood, and choosing two shafts of a yard in length, he drew the bowstring to his ear, and shot his shaft at the tower. The Gothic captain, who was directing its movements from the summit, had trusted too much to the workmanship of his Milan armour. The fabric was not equal to that of Byzantium. The shaft pierced ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... once when on a one-arrow-to-kill buffalo hunt with his brother-in-law. His companion had selected his animal and drew so powerfully on his sinew bowstring that it broke. Roman Nose had killed his own cow and was whipping up close to the other when the misfortune occurred. Both horses were going at full speed and the arrow jerked up in the air. Roman Nose caught it and shot the cow ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... a death shot, they withdraw again to the far ends of the ring. Advancing once more each one throws the drawn bow and arrow upward, then toward the ground, calling heaven and earth to witness his vow to kill the other. Presently one gets a favorable opportunity, his bowstring twangs, and his opponent falls to the ground. The victor utters a cry of triumph, dances up to the body of his fallen foe, and cuts off the head with his bolo. He beckons and cries out to the relatives of the dead man to come and avenge the deed. Nobody appearing, ...
— Negritos of Zambales • William Allan Reed
... should we stop here to die?" They ran on to the camp, but Fox Eye would not run. Hiding behind a rock he prepared to fight, but as he was looking for some enemy to shoot at, holding his arrow on the string, a Snake had crept up on the bank above him; the Piegan heard the twang of the bowstring, and the long, fine arrow passed through his body. His bow and arrow dropped from his hands, and he fell forward, dead. Now, too late, the warriors came rushing out from the Piegan camp to help him, but the Snakes scalped their enemy, scattered ...
— Blackfeet Indian Stories • George Bird Grinnell
... her, standing naked in the lamplight, Beneath the huge tent's cavernous canopy, Against the throng of elephants and camels That champed unwondering in the golden dusk, Moon-white Diana, mettled Artemis— Her body, quick and tense as her own bowstring, Her spirit, an arrow barbed and strung for flight— White snowflakes melting on her night-black hair, And on her glistening breasts and supple thighs: Her red lips parted, her keen eyes alive With fierce, far-ranging hungers of the chase Over the hills of morn—The lantern guttered ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... grip was in position near the forestock. He pulled it back the length of the crossbar and it brought the string with it, stretching it taut. There was a click as the trigger mechanism locked the bowstring in place and at the same time a concealed spring arrangement shoved an arrow ...
— Space Prison • Tom Godwin
... the cavalcade went galloping by! What thousands of bright eyes peered down upon the cavaliers, attracted by the shouting and laughter! Now and then some person would be a little late in attempting to cross before him; then with what grace Demedes would spur after him, his bow and bowstring for whip! And how the spectators shrieked with delight when he overtook the culprit, and wore the flowers out flogging him! And when a balcony was low, and illuminated with a face fairer than common, how the gallant young ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... Winterhie, Oliver the master-gunner, John Brewer, Thomas Hood, and Thomas Drake. And entering on land, they presently met with two or three of the country people. And Robert Winterhie having in his hands a bow and arrows, went about to make a shoot of pleasure, and, in his draught, his bowstring brake; which the rude savages taking as a token of war, began to bend the force of their bows against our company, and drove them to their ...
— Sir Francis Drake's Famous Voyage Round the World • Francis Pretty
... auxiliary cut-throats to murder the reputation of those who offend him. A black-vizarded ruffian (whom we will unmask), who signs the forged name of Trefoil, is at present one of the chief bravoes and bullies in our contemporary's establishment. He is the eunuch who brings the bowstring, and strangles at the order of the Day. We can convict this cowardly slave, and propose to do so. The charge which he has brought against Lord Bangbanagher, because he is a Liberal Irish peer, and against the Board of Poor Law Guardians of the ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the Mohar had bent his bow, and came so near to the king's chariot that he could be heard exclaiming in a hoarse voice, as he let the bowstring snap, "Now I will reckon with you—thief! robber! My bride is your wife, but with this arrow ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... long upon men, Providence, like the sultan to his viziers, sends them the bowstring by a mute, and they ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo
... would come easily Into his hand; but when that he Gat hold of it, full fast it stack, So fuming, down he laid his sack, And with both hands pulled lustily, But as he strained, he cast his eye Back to the dais; there he saw The bowman image 'gin to draw The mighty bowstring to his ear, So, shrieking out aloud for fear, Of that rich stone he loosed his hold And catching up his bag of gold, Gat to his feet: but ere he stood The evil thing of brass and wood Up to his ...
— The Earthly Paradise - A Poem • William Morris
... bowstring speed, a shaft, Through the camp was spread the rumor, And the soldiers, as they quaffed Flemish beer at dinner, laughed At the Emperor's ...
— Voices for the Speechless • Abraham Firth
... savage game to slay, Then of a water cruise, as slow—it filled, the gurgling sound I heard, Nought saw I, but the sullen low—of elephant that sound appeared. The swift well-feathered arrow I—upon the bowstring fitting straight, Toward the sound the shaft let fly—ah, cruelly deceived by fate! The winged arrow scarce had flown—and scarce had reached its destined aim, 'Ah me, I'm slain,' a feeble moan—in trembling human accents came. 'Ah whence hath come this fatal shaft—against a poor recluse ...
— Nala and Damayanti and Other Poems • Henry Hart Milman
... call that pastime, that which we have seen a thousand and one times? By the beard of the Prophet, vizier," he continued in a louder tone, "if I have no sleep to-day, nor appetite to-morrow, there is the bowstring for you, and the stake for ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... cried a voice. By way of answer the bowstring twanged, and an arrow sped home to its feathers through the throat of the speaker, so that he went down, grabbing at it, and spoke no ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard
... meet our contentions Sir Edward cites our own seizures and our own court decisions. It remains to be seen whether out of strands plucked from the mane and tail of the British lion we can fashion a bowstring which will give effective momentum to a counterbolt launched in the general direction of ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... men riding like the wind towards them, they turned their horses to retreat towards the hills, but the white and the black were the swiftest of the tribe's horses, and quickly overtook the two fleeing men. When they came close to the enemy they strung their arrows onto the bowstring and drove them through the two fleeing hunters. As they were falling they tried to shoot, but being greatly exhausted, their bullets whistled harmlessly over the heads of the two friends. They scalped the two enemies and took their guns and ammunition, also secured the two horses ...
— Myths and Legends of the Sioux • Marie L. McLaughlin
... motion. Isabella, too, whose bright eyes had not closed since the first gleam had visited her chamber, was early astir. An ugly dream, it is said, troubled her. Though of ripe years, yet, as we have noticed before, love had not yet aimed his malicious shafts at her bosom, nor even tightened his bowstring as she tripped by, defying his power; so that the dream, which in others would appear but as the overflowing of a youthful and ardent imagination, seemed to her altogether novel and unaccountable, raising up new ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... wishes knew, And he whose lips are ever true Caused the two Gods to meet as foes. Then fierce the rage of battle rose: Bristled in dread each starting hair As Siva strove with Vishnu there. But Vishnu raised his voice amain. And Siva's bowstring twanged in vain; Its master of the Three bright Eyes Stood fixt in fury and surprise. Then all the dwellers in the sky, Minstrel, and saint, and God drew nigh, And prayed them that the strife might cease, And the great rivals met in peace. 'Twas seen how Siva's bow has failed Unnerved, when Vishnu's ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI |
