"Defenceless" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to see the land. Scarcely any Cape in the world is sighted by so many vessels and touched at by so few as Acheen Head. Lord Reay warned us most strongly against approaching it too closely in our comparatively defenceless condition, on account of the piratical ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey
... raise protecting walls for thee, Thou young, defenceless land of liberty? Or who could build a fortress strong enough, Or stretch a mighty bulwark long enough To hold thy far-extended coast Against the overweening host That took the open path across the sea, And like ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke
... leader, was slain by a stone thrown by one of the monks from the walls; this tended to kindle the fury of the besiegers, and so exasperated Hulda that it is said he killed with his own hand the whole of the poor defenceless monks, including their venerable abbot. The sacred edifice, completely in their hands, was soon laid waste; they broke down the altars, destroyed the monuments, and—much will the bibliophile deplore it—set fire to their immense library "ingens bibliotheca," ...
— Bibliomania in the Middle Ages • Frederick Somner Merryweather
... a bacchanalian, character; and seen more than one association easily formed and yet more easily dispersed. With a Cistercian rule, perhaps they might have lasted longer. In the neighbourhood of women it is but a touch-and-go association that can be formed among defenceless men; the stronger electricity is sure to triumph; the dreams of boyhood, the schemes of youth, are abandoned after an interview of ten minutes, and the arts and sciences, and professional male jollity, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Princess de Lamballe. A ferocious mob soon assembled at the door of the hotel, broke in by force, and after deliberately shooting him, dragged the body to the adjoining bridge, and with every mark of contumely threw it into the Rhone. Such is the brief outline of the murder of a defenceless man, on a charge which, whether true or not, should have rested between God and his conscience. Jouey may indeed be pardoned for commenting and enlarging on this story, though the simple facts address themselves more strongly to ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes
... innocent, Roderigo, I am innocent! Oh, how couldst thou be so deceived? He quitted the cottage, discomfited and enraged; again he sought me, and again and again; and when the door was closed upon him, he waylaid my steps. Lone and defenceless as we were, thy wife and child, with but one attendant I feared him not; but I trembled at thy return, for I knew that thou went a Spaniard, a Castilian, and that beneath thy calm and gentle seeming lurked pride, and jealousy, and revenge. Thy letter came, the only letter since thy ...
— Calderon The Courtier - A Tale • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... certainly one of the darkest that have ever vexed the minds of men. It contains a material truth before which we remain defenceless; and, if we accept it as it stands, we can discover no remedy for the evil that threatens us. But material and tangible truths are never anything but a more or less salient angle of greater and deeper-lying truths. And, on the other hand, mankind appears to be such a necessary and ...
— The Wrack of the Storm • Maurice Maeterlinck
... my girl being trapped by such a villain as I firmly believed the man whom we knew as Sir Gilbert Carstairs to be was enough to shake every nerve in my body; but to think that she had been in his power for twenty-four hours, alone, defenceless, brought on me a faintness that was almost beyond sustaining. I felt physically and mentally ill—weak. And yet, God knows! there never was so much as a thought of defeat in me. What I felt was that I must get there, and make some effort that would bring the suspense to an end for both of us. I ...
— Dead Men's Money • J. S. Fletcher
... unseen and unheard, crept near, and piercing him with their arrows he fell dead. They took his scalp, threw the body into a ditch, covering it with a few leaves, and fled. When they arrived at their village they very boastfully exhibited the scalp of the defenceless missionary, as that of an Iroquois warrior. To obtain this renown was the only object of the cowardly assassins ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... on the ice, and advanced alone and unarmed towards the canal, or chasm, which separated the parties. He carried a small white flag and a bag containing presents. Innocent-looking and defenceless though he was, however, the Eskimos approached him with hesitating and slow steps, regarding every motion of the interpreter with suspicion, and frequently stooping to thrust their hands into their boots, in which they all ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne
... always ignored him. Did it not rather mean, then, that Jewdwine would not trust her there; that, knowing her nature and how defenceless it lay before the impulses of its own kindness, he feared for her any personal communication with his friend? It did not occur to Rickman that what Jewdwine dreaded more than anything for Lucia was the influence of a unique and irresistible personal charm. As far as he could ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... highly dangerous to wooden ships maintaining a close blockade at some Southern port. While there was much newspaper comment in England that the vessels were "new Alabamas," and in America that they were "floating fortresses," suitable for attack upon defenceless Northern cities, their primary purpose was to break up ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams
... profoundly religious nature, must often have been severely tried by these throngs, but not even delicate health prevented her from exercising a large and beautiful hospitality to these spiritually lame, halt, and heart-sick who came to receive a healing touch. Though never ruffled, Emerson was not defenceless before boorish intruders. On one occasion a boisterous declaimer against "the conventionalities," who kept on his hat in the drawing-room after invitation to lay it aside, was told, "We will continue the conversation ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... true, had come out to meet them, but all in the garb of peace; dressed in white, and crowned with flowers, as if for a festival. Hostility died away in the bosoms of the warriors, as they gazed on these defenceless men,—few are so brutal as to attack the unresisting and the friendly. But what was the astonishment of the whole army, when they beheld the fiery Alexander himself go forward towards the Jewish high priest, who headed the brilliant procession, ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins
... with them to the place from whence the noise came. He found a poor wretch, who had been crossing from a neighbouring village, in the possession of a party of kidnappers, who were tying his hands. Mr. Falconbridge, however, dared not rescue him, lest, in the defenceless state of his own town, retaliation might ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... sous. Since Salvat's arrest, the woman and the child had been forsaken and suspected by one and all. Driven forth from their wretched lodging, they were without food and wandered hither and thither dependent on chance alms. Never had greater want and misery fallen on defenceless creatures. ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... of Great-Britain wages no War with the Industrious Peasant, the sacred Orders of Religion, or the defenceless Women and Children: To these in their distressful Circumstances His Royal Clemency offers Protection. The People may remain unmolested on their Lands, inhabit their Houses, and enjoy their Religion in Security. For these inestimable ...
— The Olden Time Series: Vol. 2: The Days of the Spinning-Wheel in New England • Various
... returned Jeremias. "I have inquired particularly. The bird in the wood is not more defenceless than that child. Poverty there will be in the house; and what little there is, that monster of a ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... with the energy of despair, seized the barrel of his weapon in both hands; but Gabriel was coming forward with his axe, a terrible foe, and his first stroke carried away the butt of the rifle. He was still hesitating, however, to kill a defenceless man, when two armed servants appeared at the end of the pathway. Gabriel did not see them coming; but at the moment when they would have seized him by the shoulders, Solomon uttered a cry and ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... doctrines shall be spread over the earth by fire and sword. They are only too ready to obey this order. Already steeped in blood from the combat outside the walls, they continue to gather in the harvest with dripping scimitars. The defenceless are fastened together with chains and driven out ...
— From Pole to Pole - A Book for Young People • Sven Anders Hedin
... the question. "I never did trust that nurse," said I. "But to steal the treasured capital of a defenceless infant!" ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 15, 1914 • Various
... the side, where the heads of those in the boat had been cut off. Sometimes the pirates would wait until they knew the men of a village were away at their paddy farms, then they would fall suddenly upon the defenceless old men, women, and children, kill some, make slaves of the young ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... innocent, and it is as much my duty to free him as it was to condemn him." Villefort thus forestalled any danger of an inquiry, which, however improbable it might be, if it did take place would leave him defenceless. ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... National was of the same order. It began, inevitably, with ice-water. Ice-water is the thing that waiters fill up intervals with. Instead of pausing between courses for the usual waiter's meditation, they make instinctively for the silver ice-water jug, and fill every defenceless glass. Ice-water is universal. It is taken before, during and after every meal, and there are ice-water tanks (and paper cups) on every railway carriage and every hotel. At first one loathes it, and it seems to create an unnatural thirst, but the habit ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... thinks I, with my rings and London clothes, in the presence of the Honorable, with whom I had dealt in pride and anger! 'Twas a pretty figure I had cut, all my life—the whelp of a ruined, prostituted skipper: the issue of a murderous barratry! What protection had the defenceless child that had been I against these machinations? What protest the boy, growing in guarded ignorance? What appeal the man in love, confronted by his origin and shameful fostering? Enraged by this, what I thought ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan
... the adherents of the Salonica Government to take advantage of the withdrawal of the Greek troops into the Peloponnesus in order to invade by land or by sea any part whatever of Greek territory thus left defenceless, or to permit the installation of Venizelist authorities in any territories actually in the possession of the Royal Government which they might see fit to occupy hereafter for military reasons. Lastly, they signified their readiness to raise the blockade as soon ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott
... it not be better that we should all be together, even if we are obliged to conceal ourselves in consequence of not being prepared? Suppose the savages were to overrun the island, and find my mother, my little brother, and sister, defenceless, at the time we were obliged to retreat from our house; how dreadful that ...
— Masterman Ready • Captain Marryat
... by what were called "free quarters"—in other words, the billeting of soldiers indiscriminately among the houses of the peasantry, thereby leaving the wives and daughters of Irish Catholics at the mercy of a hostile soldiery—by the burning of houses, the shooting down of almost defenceless crowds, and the flogging and hanging of men and women. Certain it is that many of the British officers high in command protested loudly against such a policy, and that some of them positively refused ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... With a terrible ironic calm she sorted them from his pockets, and spread them out on the table like a pack of cards. He dared not look at her. He was afraid to see what she was seeing. She had torn open the door of his secret chamber, and there in that blasting light was his treasure, naked, defenceless. He could have cried out in his dread, "Only ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... elephants, with guns, and hundreds of brown men with gongs and rockets and torches. Then everybody in the jungle suffers. The reason the beasts give among themselves is that Man is the weakest and most defenceless of all living things, and it is unsportsmanlike to touch him. They say too—and it is true—that man-eaters become mangy, and ...
— The Kipling Reader - Selections from the Books of Rudyard Kipling • Rudyard Kipling
... stain with which thou hast this day sullied the fair escutcheon of chivalry, in riding down a helpless Christian knight, and ravishing a defenceless maiden from the hands that alone have a right to protect her! I will give thee thy life on one condition, craven! Surrender up to me the maiden, and thou art free to depart! But enter not a foot again into the Christian camp. An army ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... put a good man at the mercy of a bad, while telling him not to defend himself or his fellows; in no way can the success of evil be made surer and quicker; but the wrong was peculiarly great when at such a time and in such a place the defenceless Indians were thrust between the anvil of their savage red brethren and the hammer of the lawless and brutal white borderers. The awful harvest which the poor converts reaped had in reality been sown for them by their own friends and ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... Muspratt called promptly to his bugler. The first yell had told him what was happening; that the men of the Forty-sixth, sent round for the feint attack, had found the rear wall defenceless and were escalading, in ignorance of the parley at ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... errand thinking that the villa was defenceless. See your mistake! Each one of these behind me has more arrows in store than all your number, and never shot bolt from bow without piercing the mark. Off! Away with your foul odours and your yelping throats! And if, when you have turned tail, ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing
... possibility of being claimed as slaves. Mr. Fitzgerald may not mean that I shall ever come to harm; but he may die without providing against it, as poor papa did. I don't know what forms are necessary for my safety. I don't understand how it is that there is no law to protect a defenceless woman, who has done no wrong. I will wait here a little longer to recruit my strength and have this matter settled. I wish it were possible for you, my dear, good mother, to come to me for two or three weeks in June; then perhaps you could ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... everywhere. They flew about his head like a firework, making him see sparks in a most startling way till Vane put all his remaining strength into a tremendous blow which took effect upon a horizontal bough; the stick snapped in two close to his hand, and he stood defenceless once more, but the victor after all, for the second boy was running blindly in and out among the trees, and the first was quite ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... famous collier, "River Clyde," We sat as men who wait the summons dread. Brave soldiers fell, defenceless, at our side, We, too, might soon be ...
— The Incomparable 29th and the "River Clyde" • George Davidson
... it does not exist. I have had to ask myself what would happen to your country in the case of a European war, where your fleet was distributed to guard your vast possessions in every quarter of the world, and the answer to that is that you are, to all practical purposes, defenceless. In almost any combination which could arrange itself, your country is at ...
— The Illustrious Prince • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... for fuel, for tools, for repairs, the uncertain distribution of the available water, all these troubles are discussed in villages and in local Conferences. The Arms Act oppresses them, by leaving them defenceless against wild beasts and wild men. The union of Judicial and Executive functions makes justice often inaccessible, and always costly both in money and in time. The village officials naturally care more to please ...
— The Case For India • Annie Besant
... getting out of life the full of its juice. Was he not smiting hip and thigh? He longed, I am sure, to be in the thick of the actual fighting, but age debarred him, and he was not of that more sensitive type which shrinks from smiting the defenceless if it cannot smite anything stronger. I remember ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... above the clouds, they went, and down again, towards the defenceless Earth, that could not flee from the chariot of the Sun. Great rivers hid themselves in the ground, and mountains were consumed. Harvests perished like a moth that is singed in ...
— Old Greek Folk Stories Told Anew • Josephine Preston Peabody
... and slowly turned his eyes toward the river. Once more Pootoo's gigantic weapon saved his defenceless head from the blow of an eager antagonist, but the white man knew naught of his escape. His dazed eyes saw only the band of warriors flying over the plain toward the field of battle. Far in their rear came a ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... cruel pranks he played on the poor, the helpless, and defenceless, until at last people became afraid to go outside their houses, and were afraid to stay in them, for every day brought some new wickedness done by him, and every fresh one was worse ...
— Cornwall's Wonderland • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... that 'the public weal requires that one should commit treachery, use falsehoods, and perform massacres.' [17] Personally, he shrinks from such a mission. His softer heart is not strong enough for these deeds. He relates [18] that he 'never could see without displeasure an innocent and defenceless beast pursued and killed, from which we have received no offence at all.' He is moved by the aspect of 'the hart when it is embossed and out of breath, and, finding its strength gone, has no other resource left but to yield itself up to us who pursue it, asking for ...
— Shakspere And Montaigne • Jacob Feis
... wonderful how power has vanished, in a sense wonderful how it has increased. I sit here, an unarmed discredited man, at a small writing-table in a little defenceless dwelling among the vines, and no human being can stop my pen except by the deliberate self-immolation of murdering me, nor destroy its fruits except by theft and crime. No King, no council, can seize and torture me; no Church, no nation silence me. Such powers ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... under the idea that it will give them courage, and a spirit of hatred and revenge against their enemies. What can calm these ferocious feelings, and curb this savage fury of the passions in the torturous destruction of defenceless women and sucking infants? what, but the introduction and influence of Christianity, the best civilizer of the wandering natives of these dreary wilds, and the most probable means of fixing them in the pursuit of agriculture, and of those social advantages and privileges ...
— The Substance of a Journal During a Residence at the Red River Colony, British North America • John West
... so startled Malcolm that for a moment he forgot his watch, and when he looked again the men had vanished. Not having any clue to their intent, and knowing only that on such a night the house was nearly defenceless, he turned at once and made for it. As he approached the front, coming over the bridge, he fancied he saw a figure disappear through the entrance, and quickened his pace. Just as he reached it, he heard a door bang, and supposing ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... across the American, and the cat was still safely in the bag; but how much longer it could be kept there, the saints alone knew. He was feeling—very properly—guilty in regard to this latest escapade; but what can a defenceless waiter do in the hands of an impetuous young American whose pockets are stuffed with silver lire and ...
— Jerry Junior • Jean Webster
... crawls about the bottom of the water or up the stems of plants, with its thickly-chitinized head and legs protruding from the larger orifice, while it maintains a secure hold of the silk lining of the tube by means of a pair of strong hooks at the posterior end of its soft defenceless abdomen. Their food appears for the most part to be of a vegetable nature. Some species, however, are alleged to be carnivorous, and a North American form of the genus Hydropsyche is said to spin around the mouth of its burrow a silken net for the capture ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... can I retain my Anger? Oh, look but ever thus—in spite of Injuries— I shall become as tame and peaceable, As are your charming Eyes, when dress'd in Love, Which melting down my Rage, leave me defenceless. —Ah, Madam, have a generous care of me, For I have now ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... God. They were politely invited to sit down: but they replied by noisy interruption and threats. "Mort-Dieu, they must all be killed!" was their exclamation as they returned to report to Guise what they had seen. The defenceless Huguenots were thrown into confusion by these significant menaces, and hastened to secure the entrance. It was too late. The duke himself was approaching, and a volley from the arquebuses of his troop speedily scattered the unarmed worshippers. It is unnecessary ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... dread this event, and who would not prefer almost any neighbours to the French: and it seems perfect infatuation in the Administration of this country that they chuse the present moment for leaving that frontier almost defenceless by the ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... unprecise that, once let loose, we cannot know what lives of harmlessness, of innocence, of virtue, they are going to destroy. You find your range, you fix your elevation, you touch a button: you hear your gun go off. And over there, among the unarmed—the weak, the defenceless, the infirm—it has done—what? Singled out for destruction what life or lives; ten, twenty, a hundred?—you do not know. So with nations, when once they have gone to war; their imprecision becomes—horrible; though the cause of your ...
— Angels & Ministers • Laurence Housman
... had had trouble with the Bedloes and perhaps others in the town, and that they warped the truth in the telling. For was any more faith to be put in the word of the Smiths than in that of Buck Thornton himself? And did she not know him for what he was, a man who was not above assaulting a defenceless girl, not ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory
... intriguing and troublesome rascal; a person who had, from the commencement, been trying to supplant and ruin him. He it was that gave the Sakarran pirates permission to ascend the river for the purpose of attacking the comparatively defenceless mountain Dyaks; and he it was that persecuted the unfortunate young Illanun chief, Si Tundo, even to his assassination. He was at last got rid of from Sarawak, but only to join and plan mischief with that noted piratical chief, Seriff Sahib; ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... the harbour; and after a due proportion of guns, some shotted and some not, the whole convoy were under weigh, and hove-to round their protectors. The first step taken by the latter was to disembarrass their proteges of one-third of their crews, leaving them as defenceless as possible, that they might not confide in their own strength, but put their whole trust in the men-of-war, and keep as close to them as possible. Having taken out every unprotected man, they distributed convoy signals in lieu, and half a dozen more guns announced ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... rolled over—shot through the heart. Really, for a moment I had a mad apprehension that in some occult way, some freak of hypnotic suggestion, I had actually wrought the child harm. I stood there breathlessly triumphant and wondering whether it was now my business to rush in and scalp the defenceless prisoners. I became aware of a head and a stick above ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... learnt a few hours later that they were part of loads which were disposed of on the outskirts of the town the day before. The circumstances connected with some of these kidnapping excursions are appalling, and the barbarities practised by cruel masters upon some of these defenceless creatures during the course of their servitude are scarcely less horrible than those reported from Turkey. It is no disgrace in this country for an official to ride a fine horse which was got for two Kafir children, ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard
... Natures softened with something mild and tractable, and by that means are qualified for a Domestick Life. In this Case the Passions generally correspond with the Make of the Body. We do not find the Fury of a Lion in so weak and defenceless an Animal as a Lamb, nor the Meekness of a Lamb in a Creature so armed for Battel and Assault as the Lion. In the same manner, we find that particular Animals have a more or less exquisite Sharpness and Sagacity in those ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... at the mouth of the valley whence we came, half looking to see it blocked by men, but it was not. There was nothing to stay us three armed men in this place, with but three against us, and they well-nigh defenceless. Morfed ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... military training together." Carson touched lightly on fears that had been expressed lest political advantage should be taken by the Government or by the Nationalists of the conversion of the U.V.F. into a Division of the British Army, which would leave Ulster defenceless. "We are quite strong enough," he said, "to take care of ourselves, and so I say to men, so far as they have confidence and trust in me, that I advise them to go and do their duty to the country, and we will take care of politics hereafter." He concluded by ...
— Ulster's Stand For Union • Ronald McNeill
... unfathomable abyss to this delightful world, and established that reign here which now totters to its base? How, therefore, dares yon treacherous fiend to cast a stain on Satan's bravery? he who preys only on the defenceless—who sucks the blood of infants, and delights only in acts of ignoble cruelty and unequal contention. Away with the boaster who never joins in action, but, like a cormorant, hovers over the field, to feed upon the wounded, and overwhelm ...
— The Poetical Works of Henry Kirke White - With a Memoir by Sir Harris Nicolas • Henry Kirke White
... in his despatch urged the Madrid Government to grant certain reforms, in any case, which could not fail to affect the hitherto independent position of the friars in governmental affairs. He also drew the attention of the Government to the defenceless condition of the capital in the event of a foreign attack (vide Senate speeches reported in the Diario de las Sesiones, Madrid, 1899 and 1900). The friars were exceedingly wroth, and combined to defeat the General's ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... borders; neither shall any man desire thy land when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God thrice in the year." Now, would obedience to this precept be tempting God? Doubtless not. Yet surely there is a much greater natural difficulty in the way of protecting the defenceless wives and families of a whole people during the absence of all the males at Jerusalem, than there is in providing subsistence sufficient for those who daily labour; for by this means the great mass of mankind are, and ever ...
— Christian Devotedness • Anthony Norris Groves
... party or the other, for those very principles. He who proceeds without principle, as chance, timidity, or self-preservation directs, will not perhaps fare better; but he will be less blamed. What are we in the great scale of events, we poor defenceless frontier inhabitants? What is it to the gazing world, whether we breathe or whether we die? Whatever virtue, whatever merit and disinterestedness we may exhibit in our secluded retreats, ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... Oh, often, often as I think That thou no longer livest, and that I Shall never see thee on the earth again, Incredible it seems! Alas, alas! What is this thing, that they call death? Oh, would That I, this day, the mystery could solve, And my defenceless head withdraw from Fate's Relentless hate! I still am young, and still Feel all the blight and misery of age, Which I so dread; and distant far it seems; But, ah, how little different from age, The flower ...
— The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi • Giacomo Leopardi
... derogatory to the profession of the law, or to the distinguished members of that illustrious order. Well am I aware that we have in this ancient city innumerable worthy gentlemen, the knights-errant of modern days, who go about redressing wrongs and defending the defenceless, not for the love of filthy lucre, nor the selfish cravings of renown, but merely for the pleasure of doing good. Sooner would I throw this trusty pen into the flames, and cork up my ink-bottle for ever, ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... proudly. She wished to annihilate this newly-created countess with her withering contempt. But the king, who perceived the signs of a coming storm upon his mother's brow, determined to prevent this outbreak. It wounded his noble and generous soul to see a poor, defenceless woman tormented in this manner. He was too noble-minded to take offence at the quiet and composed bearing of the countess, which had excited his mother's anger. In her display of spirit and intelligence, he forgot her lowly birth, and laying his hand ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... class of birds there are a number of cases that make some approach to mimicry, such as the resemblance of the cuckoos, a weak and defenceless group of birds, to hawks and Gallinaceae. There is, however, one example which goes much further than this, and seems to be of exactly the same nature as the many cases of insect mimicry which have been already given. In Australia and the Moluccas there is ...
— Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection - A Series of Essays • Alfred Russel Wallace
... defeat into a victory, and save yourself from being mauled and possibly killed in a fight which was none of your own making. Added to all this, science gives a consciousness of power and ability to assist the weak and defenceless, which ought to be most welcome to the mind of any man. Though always anxious to avoid anything like "a row," there are times when it may be necessary to interfere for the sake of humanity, and how much more easy is it to make that interference dignified and effective ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn
... arms Marc Dupre loosed Maren, the trembling lessening as the danger passed. That sight of the defenceless girl among the Indians had shaken him like a leaf in the wind, had nerved his arms with iron, had worked in him both with ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... political wisdom. The King of Prussia, faithful to the ruling principle of his life, wished simply to aggrandise his dominions at a much smaller cost and at much less risk than he could have done in any other direction; for at that time Poland was perfectly defenceless from a material point of view, and more than ever, perhaps, inclined to put its faith in humanitarian illusions. Morally, the Republic was in a state of ferment and consequent weakness, which so often accompanies the period of social reform. The strength arrayed against her was just then ...
— Notes on Life and Letters • Joseph Conrad
... General Lee and General Jackson were sitting by the side of the plank road, on some empty cracker boxes, discussing the situation, when Stuart came up and reported the result of his reconnoissance. He said the right flank of Howard's corps was defenceless and easily assailable. Jackson at once asked permission to take his own corps—about 26,000 muskets—make a detour through the woods to conceal his march from observation, and fall unexpectedly upon the weak point referred to by Stuart. It was a startling proposition ...
— Chancellorsville and Gettysburg - Campaigns of the Civil War - VI • Abner Doubleday
... Of what grief have I not tasted? And why? Simply because I have ever kept the truth in view, because ever I have preserved inviolate an unsullied conscience, because ever I have stretched out a helping hand to the defenceless widow and the hapless orphan!" After which outpouring Chichikov pulled out his handkerchief, and wiped away ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... had never seen Chicago. Now that he saw it, he hardly believed it. His first glimpse of it left him cowering, terrified. The noise, the rush, the glitter, the grimness, the vastness, were like blows upon his defenceless head. They beat the braggadocio and the self-confidence temporarily out of him. ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... attack and murder of the Menomonies at Prairie du Chien. This murder was committed by a part of Black Hawk's band, who had been driven from their villages on the Mississippi below the rapids. They ascended the river to Dubuque—from thence the party set out, and fell on the unsuspicious and defenceless Menomonies. ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... Hall—"A fig for your pistol! I care not a curse for it."—"Ay, lad," said the deep voice of Fighting Charlie, "but the tow's out now". He had no occasion to utter another word; the rogues, surprised at finding a man of redoubted courage well armed, instead of being defenceless, took to the moss in every direction, and he passed on his ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... forgot yourself a fortnight ago as to hint at your outrageous ideas regarding me, I forced myself to remember that you were not an Englishman, that perhaps in your country there may be a social code which permits a man to dishonour his home and to annoy a defenceless woman. I cannot forgive you a second time. Let me pass! Let me pass, I tell you, or I ...
— The Stowmarket Mystery - Or, A Legacy of Hate • Louis Tracy
... judged to be her unspeakable indiscretion, the thought rushed in on her straight from him, the naked, terrible thought, that there should be anything they had to hide, they had to be alone for. She saw at the same time how defenceless he was before it; he couldn't keep it back; he couldn't put it away from him. It was always with him, a danger watching ...
— The Flaw in the Crystal • May Sinclair
... does not please the most intelligent persons at home. Obstinate officials set at defiance the liberal initiations of the government. In conflicts with simple citizens guilty officials are like men armed cap-a-pie fighting with the defenceless. The bureaucrat inevitably cares more for routine than for results. The machinery is regarded as an achieved result instead of as a working instrument. It tends to be the most unimproving and shallow of governments in quality, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee
... bright. "You a noble, and you dare not? You a noble, and you cannot govern yourself? Consider, M. le Vicomte! A few days may see me traverse the road so many traverse every day; the road of the guillotine. Then my daughter will be alone, defenceless, unprotected. I ask you—for I have no one else to whom I can turn—to be her brother and ...
— In Kings' Byways • Stanley J. Weyman
... of 1812 furnished another startling proof of the isolated and defenceless position of the provinces. The relations between Upper Canada and Lower Canada, never cordial, {7} became worse. In 1814, at the close of the war, Chief Justice Sewell of Quebec, in a correspondence with the Duke of Kent (Queen Victoria's father), disclosed a ...
— The Fathers of Confederation - A Chronicle of the Birth of the Dominion • A. H. U. Colquhoun
... And they were near another of the sites consecrated by his history, the place where, just before the change of his name, the angels of God met him and 'he called the name of the place Mahanaim.' That means 'the two camps,' the one, Jacob's defenceless company of women and children, the other, their ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... new champion aimed a fierce blow at Sigmund, which the old hero parried with his sword. The shock shattered the matchless blade, and although the strange assailant vanished as he had come, Sigmund was left defenceless and was soon wounded unto death ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... and victorious in Germany without a power to oppose them, should they venture to attack the Protestant states and to annul the religious treaty. Had Ferdinand been in reality far from disposed to abuse his conquests, still the defenceless position of the Protestants was most likely to suggest the temptation. Obsolete conventions could not bind a prince who thought that he owed all to religion, and believed that a religious creed would sanctify any deed, however violent. Upper Germany ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... unfavourable notions of British heretics, and urged them on to the destruction of the colony. Good policy required that the governor should keep a watchful eye on the motions of such neighbours, and guard his weak and defenceless colony against the pernicious designs of their Spanish rivals. Some men he discovered who were attempting to entice servants to revolt; these were ordered to receive so many stripes. Others, in defiance of the feeble power of the magistrate, took to such courses as were subversive of public ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 1 • Alexander Hewatt
... trust on Thee is stayed, All my help from Thee I bring, Cover my defenceless head With the ...
— Addresses • Henry Drummond
... expression of the officer's face that he had won the day: "Come now, Count von Hemelstein, let's be friends. I would not have liked you had you not resented my remarks, and I was a cad to take advantage of your absolutely defenceless position." ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... abasement of his fortune; his endurance of injury to a certain point, when patience suddenly forsook him, and his, to us, irresistibly comic rage and exasperation! What would that generous seaman Pipes have thought a defenceless Frenchman fit for, but as the object of spirited and well-conducted pranks? Nothing cruel or revengeful, but only to show our own superior wit and address in concerted ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 274, Saturday, September 22, 1827 • Various
... refuge have I none, Hangs my helpless soul on Thee; Leave, oh, leave me not alone, Still support and comfort me: All my trust on Thee is stayed, All my help from Thee I bring; Cover my defenceless head With ...
— The Three Comrades • Kristina Roy
... shown in his letters, was greatly impressed by the magnitude of the prize and by the defenceless condition of his capture. He alleged these as the motives for staying in person at St. Eustatius, to settle the complicated tangle of neutral and belligerent rights in the property involved, and to provide against the enemy's again ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... loose in the beautiful old villages of France along a front of five hundred miles. The facts are monotonous in the repetition of their horror, and one's imagination is not helped but stupefied by long records of outrages upon defenceless women, with indiscriminate shooting down village streets, with unarmed peasants killed as they trudged across their fields or burned in their own homesteads, with false accusations against innocent villagers, so that hostages were collected and shot in groups as a punishment for alleged ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... appalled. The sudden, paralysing conviction flashed upon her that the palace had been deserted by its guards and was in the hands of murderers. She seemed to hear them swarming everywhere, unopposed, yet lusting for blood, while she, a defenceless woman, stood cowering against ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... back to his aunt snivelling, defenceless but happy. He had never had a friend except Gustus, and now he had given Gustus the greatest treasure that ...
— The Magic World • Edith Nesbit
... You, the bad servant of a bad man's wicked son," exclaimed the angered tutor; "it's you who dare to set upon defenceless age and innocence, with its new cork legs on? Very good. Then take that, and I hope you ...
— Jack Harkaway's Boy Tinker Among The Turks - Book Number Fifteen in the Jack Harkaway Series • Bracebridge Hemyng
... and had therefore had fuller experience than other men in the army, of the satrap's real character. On a sudden he now turns round, and on the faith of a few verbal declarations, puts all the military chiefs into the most defenceless posture and the most obvious peril, such as hardly the strongest grounds for confidence could have justified. Though the remark of Machiavel is justified by large experience—that from the short-sightedness of ...
— The Two Great Retreats of History • George Grote
... would judge the matter fairly. Herdonius, if nothing else, by avowing himself an enemy, in a manner gave you notice to take up arms: this man, by denying the existence of war, took arms out of your hands, and exposed you defenceless to your slaves and exiles. And did you, (without any offence to Caius Claudius and to Publius Valerius, now no more let me say it,) did you advance against the Capitoline hill before you expelled those enemies from the forum. It is shameful before gods and men. When the enemy were ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... Knight in Arms, Whose chance on these defenceless dores may sease, If ever deed of honour did thee please, Guard them, and him within protect from harms, He can requite thee, for he knows the charms That call Fame on such gentle acts as these, And he can spred ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... her they hardly seemed to exist, or were perceived, as it were, dimly, and their contact scarce felt. I suppose it is true in all warfares, that a well-armed and alert soldier is let alone by the foes that would have swallowed him up if he had been defenceless or not giving heed. And if you could have seen Esther's face during that hour, you would understand that all possible enemies were, at least for the time, as hushed as the lions in Daniel's den; so glad, so grave, so pure and steadfast, so enjoying, was the expression ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... importance of which had wholly escaped him, Paul's only auxiliary was the old notary, Mathias. Both were about to be confronted, unaware and defenceless, by a most unexpected circumstance; to be pressed by an enemy whose strategy was planned, and driven to decide on a course without having time to reflect upon it. Where is the man who would not have succumbed, even though assisted by Cujas and Barthole? How should he look for deceit and treachery ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... suddenly made by the whole force of the mountaineers. Climbing along the mountain-sides above the defile, they hurled down stones on the entangled foe, and loosened and rolled great rocks down upon their defenceless heads. ...
— Historic Tales, Volume 11 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... strikes, like the fatal flash, fraught with destruction? When there is but a single moment longer in which rescue is still possible, ought assistance to be delayed? Open me the door; you need have nothing to fear from a poor defenceless wretch, who is deserted of all the world, pursued and distressed by an awful fate, when he comes to beseech Mademoiselle to save him from threatening danger?" La Martiniere heard the man below moaning and sobbing with anguish as he said these words, ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... not stripped him of the armour of Achilles, which, in Homer, he is wearing. Achilles then meets Hector, but far from rushing to avenge on him Patroclus, he retires like a coward, musters his men, and makes them surround and slay the defenceless Hector. ...
— Shakespeare, Bacon and the Great Unknown • Andrew Lang
... sadly contemplated her face as its pale responsiveness modulated through a crowd of expressions that showed only too clearly to what a pitch she was strung. If ever Winterborne's heart fretted his bosom it was at this sight of a perfectly defenceless creature conditioned by such circumstances. He forgot his own agony in the satisfaction of having at least found her a shelter. He took his plate and cup from her hands, saying, "Now I'll push the shutter to, and you will find an iron pin on the ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... was a downright contemptible trick to play on the defenceless engineer. Had I been able to render him any assistance, I should have ...
— Mr. Hawkins' Humorous Adventures • Edgar Franklin
... solitary wife, remained to share his fate or halve the bitterness of his fall. Poor savage! he was learning the lesson which Fate teaches to most of us who live long enough, that the eyes of mankind are blind to the discredited, and that he who is defenceless and fallen finds few friends and little mercy. Nor, indeed, in this case did he ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... one. Now when the whole doctrine of our Saviour inculcates nothing more frequently than meekness, patience, and a contempt of this world, is it not plain what the meaning of the place is? Namely, that he might now dismiss his ambassadors in a more naked, defenceless condition, he does not only advise them to take no thought for shoes or scrip, but even commands them to part with the very clothes from their back, that so they might have the less incumbrance and entanglement in the going through their office and function. He cautions them, it is true, to. be furnished ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus
... "'Ah, alas! poor defenceless women learn, too late, how constantly associated is the retiring modesty which decries, with the ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... can that strong, intrepid mind Attack a weak, defenceless kind? Those jaws should prey on nobler food, And drink the boar's and lion's blood; Great souls with generous pity melt, Which coward tyrants never felt. How harmless is our fleecy care! Be brave, and let thy ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... the anti-foreign feeling in China culminated in the massacre of defenceless men and women, the three missionaries whose names head this chapter were working in the city of Ta-ning. The inhabitants of this little city among the hills had always treated the missionaries with ...
— Noble Deeds of the World's Heroines • Henry Charles Moore
... furnishes it with a keel of lead, in order to render it sufficiently steady. The old articulata abound in marks of ingenious mechanical contrivance. The trilobites were covered over back and head with the most exquisitely constructed plate armor: but as their abdomens seem to have been soft and defenceless, they had the ability of coiling themselves round on the approach of danger, plate moving on plate with the nicest adjustment, till the rim of the armed tail rested on that of the armed head, and the creature presented the appearance of a ball ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... attacking one defenceless temperance man, displayed the same spirit of cowardice as their northern brethren show when they hire a stranger to do the work for them. They had greater success attending their efforts, but probably there was no more ...
— The Story of a Dark Plot - or Tyranny on the Frontier • A.L.O. C. and W.W. Smith
... spent, unarmed, and defenceless, he scarce knew what to do; whether to fly, or to turn round and die as a refuge from the greater evil of endeavouring to prolong a struggle which seemed hopeless. Instinct, however, urged him on, at all risks, and though he could not go very far, or ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... Overseer, who had the first Lot, with seventeen more of all Sorts and Sizes, but not one of Quality with him. When he saw this, he found what they meant; for, as I said, he understood English pretty well; and being wholly unarm'd and defenceless, so as it was in vain to make any Resistance, he only beheld the Captain with a Look all fierce and disdainful, upbraiding him with Eyes that forc'd Blushes on his guilty Cheeks, he only cry'd in passing over the Side of the Ship; Farewel, Sir, ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... days since in Iowa, where the fiend now lies buried. Any man who is so dead to shame, and so callous of soul generally, as to force his unwelcome endearments upon a poor, defenceless old lady, while her beautiful young daughter stands weeping by, equally defenceless, deserves pretty much all the evil that can be done to him. Splitting him like a fish is so disgracefully inadequate a punishment, that the man who should administer it might justly ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile
... offend a courtly ear by the recital of those disgusting scenes. Besides this, it might give pain to that humanity which hath, as you observe, prompted your overtures, to dwell upon the splendid victories obtained by a licentious soldiery over unarmed men in defenceless villages, their wanton devastations, their deliberate murders, or to inspect those scenes of carnage painted by the wild excesses of savage rage. These amiable traits of national conduct cannot but revive ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... the same thing. The only difference lies in the fact that thousands of defenceless women and little children are calling. Would you have the nation stand with its hands in ...
— The Tin Soldier • Temple Bailey
... magnanimity displayed in her latter years, do not redound more highly to her praise than all that preceded. Elizabeth wished for some plausible pretext to take away the life of the unhappy Mary, whom, though so defenceless, she regarded as a dangerous rival. The Duke of Norfolk made offers of marriage to Mary, to which she consented, in case she should be liberated. His scheme also was to favor the Catholic cause, and on its being ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... luck would have it, this chanced to be the little Helen, altogether defenceless and unarmed. Murtagh, still shouting, rushed to the rescue; while Henry, with his musket raised to his shoulder, endeavoured to get between the ape and its intended victim, so that he could fire right into the face of the assailant, without endangering the ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... bliss, strove to take the full consciousness of it into a being which seemed too narrow to contain it. His first impulse was to rush forward, clasp her passionately in his arms, and hold her in the embrace which encircled, for him, the boundless promise of life; but she stood there, defenceless, save in her holy truth and trust, and his heart bowed down and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... of a summer storm; like a prodigious gleaming army they swarm and bend forward, eager, undeviating, one-purposed. It's quite impossible to describe it—this great silver horde. They are entirely defenceless, of course, and almost every living thing preys upon them. The birds congregate in millions, the four-footed beasts come down from the hills, the Apaches of the sea harry them in dense droves, and even man appears from distant coasts to take his toll; but still they press bravely ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... defenceless on the score of reason, she shifted her ground and appealed to his delicacy. On this he appealed to her love, and then calm reason was jostled off the field, and passion and sentiment battled ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade
... soft place on the floor. We spoke to the nearest picket. He told us that it would be madness to try to cross one part of the ground unless we had revolvers, because a gang of Huns were in hiding ready to knock down passengers and hold up any one who seemed defenceless. However, after a little cogitating, he said that he would escort us to General Hastings' headquarters, and we started, picking our way over the remains of streets and passing over great obstructions that had been left by the torrent. Ruin and wreck ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... Lightfoot rang'd the forest round, By chance his foe's retreat he found. "Let us a while the war suspend, And reason as from friend to friend." "A truce?" replies the Wolf. "'Tis done." The Dog the parley thus begun. "How can that strong intrepid mind Attack a weak defenceless kind? Those jaws should prey on nobler food, And drink the boar's and lion's blood, Great souls with generous pity melt, Which coward tyrants never felt. How harmless is our fleecy care! Be brave, and let thy mercy spare." "Friend," says the Wolf, "the matter weigh; Nature designed ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... as a tavern-threshold to every blockhead in the parish,—or that any Pharisee who kept carefully to windward of his virtues, out of the way of infection, has thereby earned the right to mismoralize his failings after he is dumbly defenceless. The moral compasses that are too short for the aberration may be, must be, unequal to the orbit. We would not deny that Burns was a chamberer and a drunkard because he was a great poet; but we would not admit that whiskey and wenches made him any the less the most richly endowed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... two days of that eventful year which will long be remembered in San Francisco,—two days when a mob of her citizens set upon and killed unarmed, defenceless foreigners because they were foreigners, and of another race, religion, and color, and worked for what wages they could get. There were some public men so timid, that, seeing this, they thought that the end of the world had come. There were some eminent statesmen, whose names I am ashamed to write ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... checkmating the curse of fate and avoiding the threatened suicide. He who loses his life in the defence of persecuted and defenceless travellers dies as a man of honor. Let us ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... plundered by that sordid and licentious class of infringers known in the parlance of the world, with no exaggeration of phrase, as 'pirates,' The spoliations of their incessant guerilla warfare upon his defenceless rights have unquestionably amounted to millions. In the very front rank of this predatory band stands one who sustains in this case the double and most convenient character of contestant and witness; and it is but a subdued expression ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... philistinism, hounded on by dreadful protectors of dreadful "young persons," invades the very citadel of civilisation itself, and pours its terrible "pure" scum and its popular sentimental mud over the altars of the defenceless immortals. No one asks that these tyrannical young people and their anxious guardians should read the classics or should read the works of such far-descended inheritors of the classical tradition who, like Remy de Gourmont, seek to keep the sacred fire alight. Let them hold their hands off! ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... scarce wished for, never baulked the amorous conceited old, nor the ill-favoured young, yet when he had extended in his arms the young, the charming fair and longing Sylvia, the untouched, unspotted, and till then, unwishing lovely maid, yielded, defenceless, and unguarded all, he wanted power to seize the trembling prey: defend me, heaven, from madness. Oh Sylvia, I have reflected on all the little circumstances that might occasion this disaster, and damn me to this degree of coldness, but I can fix on none: I had, it is ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... and bodyguards: each of those preliminary victories had to be won. Once more I pause, and consider my situation. I have got the better of the guards; I am master of the garrison; I present you the tyrant stripped, unarmed, defenceless. May I claim some credit for this, or do you still require his blood? Well, if blood you must have, that too is not wanting; my hands are not unstained; the glorious deed is accomplished; the youthful tyrant, the terror of all men, his father's sole security and protection, the equivalent of many ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata
... House of Austria? What prevented this house, particularly in its German branch, from yielding to the pressing demands of so many of its subjects, and, after the example of other princes, enriching itself at the expense of a defenceless clergy? It is difficult to credit that a belief in the infallibility of the Romish Church had any greater influence on the pious adherence of this house, than the opposite conviction had on the revolt of the Protestant ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... catched full with a fair round swing. Whereas had these blows followed one another on a yielding head, the injury it inflicted as a battering-ram might have outweighed the damage it received in inflicting it. As it was, Peter—so Uncle Moses called the Sweep—was for one moment defenceless, being preoccupied in seizing his opponent by the ankles; and although his cranium had no sinuses, and was so thick it could crush a quart-pot like an opera-hat, it did not court a fourth double concussion, and this time he was ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... all the threatening gestures we could think of, actually lay hold of the helpless infant, destroy, and devour it;—to see her widely open her destructive jaws, and the poor lamb beat down with greedy haste; to look on the defenceless posture of tender limbs first trampled upon, then torn asunder; to see the filthy snout digging in the yet living entrails, suck up the smoking blood, and now and then to hear the crackling of the bones, ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... deadly fight between these two young fellows. Sam's sword had gone from his hand in the fall, and he was defenceless, save by such splendid physical powers as he had by nature. But his adversary, though perhaps a little lighter, was a terrible enemy, and fought with the strength and litheness of a leopard. He had his hand at Sam's throat, and was trying to choke him. Sam saw that one great effort ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... defenceless under a cynical sky, which was unthreatening but mocking. Dotting a stretch of country thirty miles on either side of the railway, and extending as far to the east and west along its line, there were scattered ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough
... seating himself in an attitude of luxurious ease, approaching almost to indolent recklessness. "We are the most chivalrous people in the world. There is no people, I think, on the face of the globe, among whom the innocent and defenceless are so ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... He foresaw this, and he was lost in admiration at the native police idea. The stroke of genius that collected all the Felixes of the Congo basin into an army of darkness, and collected all the weak and defenceless into a herd of slaves, was a ...
— The Pools of Silence • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... be made upon the place, the houses surrounded and strict search made. One hour the streets would be deserted, the next every corner bristled with rude soldiery, flinging insults and imprecations on the feeble old men and defenceless women, who, panic-stricken, stood about vainly endeavoring to seem at their ease and keep up a show ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... these masses of film and fluid, floating at the mercy of wind and wave, possess powers which we should hardly associate with so simple a structure, and can accomplish works of which we should little suspect them. Delicate and defenceless as they appear, they can capture fishes of large size, and digest them with ease and rapidity. Some of them are in truth formidable monsters. Professor E. Forbes gives the following humorous description ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal - Volume XVII., No 423, New Series. February 7th, 1852 • Various
... they only waited, they would have seen all the soldier garrison march away, leaving the women and children and a few grandfathers—and the fort would have been seized without trouble except to the defenceless families. ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... him a torrent of abuse. "You! Who are you, that you dare to speak to me like that? His little finger is worth your whole body. He is a man, a brave man, not a coward, like you. A coward! Yes, a coward! a coward! A coward! You are very brave with defenceless men and weak women. You have beaten me until I was bruised black, you cur; but who ever saw you attack a man unless he was chained or bound? Do not I know you? I have seen you taunt a man at the triangles, until I wished the screaming wretch could get loose, ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke |
