"Grappling" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mild and peaceable Man in his Profession. If the former was too furious, this was too sheepish, for his Part; insomuch that after a short modest Walk upon the Stage, he would fall at the first Touch of 'Hydaspes', without grappling with him, and giving him an Opportunity of showing his Variety of 'Italian' Tripps: It is said, indeed, that he once gave him a Ripp in his flesh-colour Doublet, but this was only to make work for himself, in his private Character of a Taylor. I must not omit that ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... brought down eight of them with your rifle, before they charged. Even while I was fighting I always heard your voice, like a trumpet; and after the sergeant had fallen you seemed to take command, as if it was your right. You saved my life when you bayoneted two of the three who were grappling with me, and you ...
— Through Three Campaigns - A Story of Chitral, Tirah and Ashanti • G. A. Henty
... across one. It was more than likely that her crew had been a regular set of half-buccaneers, willing to trade if there was trade, and fight if there was any fighting on hand. Anyway, the two vessels had had a tough time of it, and each of them had met her match. I could see the grappling-irons which had fastened them together. They had blown so many holes in each other's sides that they had gone to the bottom as peaceably as a pair of twins holding each other ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... was breaking; it was light in the streets, but all seemed quiet without. The doors reeled and shook beneath the pressure of the pursuers. Gawtrey flung the rope across the street to the opposite parapet; after two or three efforts, the grappling-hook caught firm hold—the ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 3 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... gave some orders to the quartermaster, and rang three bells to back her. The Bronx came alongside of the Scotian as handsomely as though she had been a river steamer making one of her usual landings. The hands who had been stationed for the purpose immediately used their grappling irons, and the two vessels ...
— On The Blockade - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray Afloat • Oliver Optic
... his dock-yards, where the two large pahies or canoes were building, each of which was an hundred and eight feet long. They were almost ready to launch, and were intended to make one joint double pahie or canoe. The king begged of me a grappling and rope, to which I added an English jack and pendant (with the use of which he was well acquainted), and desired the pahie might be called Britannia. This he very readily agreed to; and she was named accordingly. After this he gave me a hog, and a turtle of about sixty pounds weight, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... shouted, in a rapture. "In every way—and always—as long as you live? Do you mean it?" He had caught her hand to his breast and was grappling it tight there and drawing her ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... the Movement himself, consuming all his strength in the process. At intervals he was forced to take rest cures. On a number of occasions it was thought that he had reached the end of his strength. When he was grappling with the Uganda project, York-Steiner, an intimate friend, wrote of his appearance: "The imposing figure is now stooped, the face sallow, the eyes—the mirrors of a fine soul—were darkened, the mouth was drawn in pain ...
— The Jewish State • Theodor Herzl
... strolled along the sand, stopping now and then to pick up a pretty shell or pebble. Out in the bay was the fleet of clamming boats, little schooners from which the grappling rakes were thrown overboard, and allowed to drag along the bottom with the motion of the craft, to be hauled up now and then, and emptied of their ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Ocean View - Or, The Box That Was Found in the Sand • Laura Lee Hope
... lecturing Englishman—the people has been fairly sated; but because Americans are no longer eager to lionise any English author or artist with some measure of a London reputation, it does not by any means imply that they are not still seeking for, and grappling, the best in art and letters wherever they can find it. They only doubt whether the Englishman who comes to lecture is, after ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... to kill him. I shot them both with a right and left, for fortunately my rifle was just reloaded. He rose once more and killed a third man. Stephen came to his support and grappling with an Arab, dashed his head against the gate-post so that he fell. Old Bausi, panting like a grampus, plunged in with his remaining Mazitu and the combatants became so confused in the dark gloom of the overhanging smoke that I could scarcely tell one from the other. ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... bound, the craft that bore them was close in under the frowning protective wall which engirdled it, and a few minutes later the boat ranged up alongside one of the two flights of landing steps, the paddles were laid in, and the crew, springing to their feet, checked the vessel's way by grappling a number of large bronze mooring rings the shanks of which were deeply sunk into the face of the massive masonry. Then the officer who had arrested the prisoners, and still had them in charge, gave the word to land, and the young ...
— The Adventures of Dick Maitland - A Tale of Unknown Africa • Harry Collingwood
... after the Law-mania of 1719; and it is hardly possible to overstate the value of their services at a time when the kingdom was governed by an idle and dissolute regent, and when there was not a nobleman about the court capable of grappling with the situation. The regent died of his debaucheries in the midst of their work. The Duke of Bourbon succeeded him; he was governed by Madame de Prie; and between them they concocted a nice scheme for getting the young king married, who ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... the chase alone. Carson could not endure the thought of failure. His pride of character led him ever to resolve to accomplish whatever he should undertake. He seems not at all to have thought of the peril he would encounter in grappling with the savage alone. The Indian was of herculean size and strength, and of wonderful agility. He was well armed, and thoroughly understood the use of his rifle. His bravery had already given him renown, and it was certain that under ...
— Christopher Carson • John S. C. Abbott
... said, "the meat of action, the meat of words." There is no time in vaudeville climaxes for one word that does not point out, or clinch home the action. Here action speaks louder than words. Furthermore, in the speed of bodily movement there is actually no time for words. If two men are grappling in a life and death struggle they can't ...
— Writing for Vaudeville • Brett Page
... would question the right of a man to strike a dagger to the heart of the assassin whose grasp was on his throat, because there is a law against the private use of deadly weapons? The clutch of a parricidal rebellion is grappling at the national existence, and what shall we think of those men who would stay the arm of Government from stabbing at its vitals by interposing constitutional scruples? Even if the Constitution did stand in the way, who but a fool or a traitor would hesitate to go around it or over it ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... on the journey to New York. He had had one of those sudden flashes of illumination vouchsafed to all men who are dominated by a strong and beloved woman, which show them a world of harder men, more fiercely trained and grappling with the abstractions of thought and war. In that world the arms of Gloria would exist only as the hot embrace of a chance mistress, coolly ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... himself to being a publicist and sociologist, had charge of bread for the poor during the great bread riots in Amsterdam and is now engaged in grappling nationally and internationally with industrial and civil war as the cause of all failures of men and nations to express and fulfill their real selves ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... of asylums is the necessity now for making appropriate provision for idiots and imbeciles, and their education so far as practicable, grappling at the same time with the problem how best to provide for the mass of incurable pauper patients in the provinces, and the extension of middle-class asylums, and of cottages in connection ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... rain all day long. Hebrew class—Psalms. New beauty in the original every time I read. Dr. Welsh—lecture on Pliny's letter about the Christians of Bithynia. Professor Jameson on quartz. Dr. Chalmers grappling with Hume's arguments. Evening—Notes, and little else. Mind and body dull." This is a specimen of ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar
... promise of God—which in David's case may be the specific promise conveyed by his designation to the throne—but the God who promises, the inmost nature of that confidence as being a living union with God, the power of it as grappling with his dread, and enabling him now to say, ...
— The Life of David - As Reflected in His Psalms • Alexander Maclaren
... the height of the window above the little roadway. To reach it he uses a water-trough, whose iron rings are bent, and also the marks of a grappling-iron that he carries with him and uses to hoist himself to the window are distinctly visible on the ironwork of the little balcony outside. The marks are quite ...
— The Secret of the Night • Gaston Leroux
... don't know as how he'd like it. He's been that upset these last few days. I——" He hesitated. Visibly an idea had visited him with which he was grappling. "You're not from Miss Austen, ...
— The Paliser case • Edgar Saltus
... boat, after having first passed through the body of one of her crew. Barney had no rockets; and, as the combat at long range was telling upon his men, he at once dashed forward into the midst of the enemy. Soon the barges were engaged in desperate hand-to-hand conflicts. The sailors, grappling with their adversary's craft, fought with pistol and cutlass across the gunwales. Barney, in a small barge with twenty men, dashed about, now striking a blow in aid of some overmatched American boat, then ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... promise of effecting the dominant task, the crushing of the Boer army, though it aimed at grappling in detail with several of the subordinate tasks; but its execution proved as indecisive as its conception. In Natal the main force under Sir Redvers Buller himself completely failed in the attack on the ...
— Lessons of the War • Spenser Wilkinson
... fully directed by him, I set out, determined on robbery, equipped with a dark dress, a short sword, a spade, a crowbar, a pair of pincers, a wooden man's head,[4] a magic candle, a rope and grappling-iron, a box with a bee in it,[5] ...
— Hindoo Tales - Or, The Adventures of Ten Princes • Translated by P. W. Jacob
... make that knowledge his own? But when he attempts himself to master a subject of importance, when he would rise into the higher region of mathematics, philosophy, history, poetry, religion, art; or even when he would prepare himself for grappling with the great questions of life, what long processes of thought! what patient gathering together of materials! what judgment, memory, comparison, and protracted meditation are essential to complete success? The man who would triumph over obstacles and ascend the heights of ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... a sudden cry, which rose in the next instant to a shrill scream. Two men were struggling in the doorway, grappling each other savagely for one dreadful minute of confusion and agony. Then one fell heavily, his head crashing against the angle of the doorway, and lay at full length, with his white face looking ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... big business and to the damage done by the combination of politics with big business. In this matter I was not behind the rest of my friends; indeed, I was ahead of them, for no serious leader in political life then appreciated the prime need of grappling with these questions. One partial reason—not an excuse or a justification, but a partial reason—for my slowness in grasping the importance of action in these matters was the corrupt and unattractive nature of so many of the men ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... The footsteps gained upon him. He felt himself grasped by his cloak, when suddenly his pursuer was attacked in turn: a fierce fight and struggle ensued—a pistol was discharged that lit up rock and bush for a period, and showed two figures grappling together—all was then darker than ever. The contest continued—the combatants clenched each other, and panted and groaned, and rolled among the rocks. There was snarling and growling as of a cur, mingled with curses in ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... seven Hudson's Bay ships worming their way laboriously through the ice floes of the straits. Small sails only {154} were used. With grappling hooks thrown out on the ice pans and crews toiling to their armpits in ice slush, the boats pulled themselves forward, resting on the lee side of some ice floe during ebb tide, all hands out to fight the roaring ice pans when the tide began to come in. At length on the night of July 27, ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... the war pass into Attica, nor be dashed from your seat through looking back to the simplicity of those old hostilities with Sparta. You must guard against him, at the greatest possible distance, both by political measures and by preparations; you must prevent his stirring from home, instead of grappling with him at close quarters in a struggle to the death. {52} For, men of Athens, we have many natural advantages for a war,[n] if we are willing to do our duty. There is the character of his country, much of which we can harry and damage, and a thousand ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 2 • Demosthenes
... risen to a pitch which left no doubt of their hostile intentions. The anchor was got up, when some of the blacks seized the painter, and others in trying to capsize the boat brought the gunwale down to the water's edge, at the same time grappling with the men to pull them out, and dragging the galley inshore towards the shoal water. The bowman, with the anchor in his hand, was struck on the head with a stone-headed axe, the blow was repeated, but fortunately ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... and straining body, he urged Caesar to a last supreme effort, and the great black creature responded gallantly. With head low to the ground, his muscles standing out like ropes upon his shoulders, his forelegs bent like grappling-hooks, his quarters tucked beneath him, he put his giant heart into the work. Step by step, inch by inch he gained, yawing and sliding, stumbling and floundering, making way where all way seemed impossible. Slowly they crept up, slowly, ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... world, least likely to make him support slavery or apologize for it. The man who did most to work into his mind ideas of moral and political science was Dr. William Small, a liberal Scotchman; the man who did most to direct his studies in law, and his grappling with social problems, was George Wythe. To both of these Jefferson confessed the deepest debt for their efforts to strengthen his mind and make his footing firm. Now, of all men in this country at that time, these two were least likely to support pro-slavery theories or tolerate pro-slavery ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... engaged to take him immediately to Ferriby. He then called up the police in Hull, and had a long talk with the superintendent. Finally it was arranged that a sergeant and twelve men were to meet him on the shore at the back of the signal cabin near the Ferriby depot, with a boat and a grappling ladder for getting aboard the Girondin. This done, Willis hurried back to the platform, reaching it just as the 7.56 came in. He watched Archer get on board, and then ...
— The Pit Prop Syndicate • Freeman Wills Crofts
... way, the sailor passed a stout new rope from a belaying-pin through this hole, and then he betrayed his watch on deck by hauling the end up with a clew, and gently returning it to the deep with a long grappling-iron made fast to it. This had not fluke enough to lay fast hold and bring the vessel up; for in that case it would have been immediately discovered; but it dragged along the bottom like a trawl, and by its weight, and a hitch every now and then in some hole, it hampered ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... Something in her figure affected him as it had that night when she stood in the doorway—some heroic endurance, some fighting courage that held it erect, and yet it was touched by a yearning as restless and unsatisfied as the desert wind. Bob knew her father was incapable of grappling alone with the problems of life. This project had all been hers; it was her will, her brain, her courage that had wrought the change on the face of this spot of desert. Yet how softly girlish as she sat there ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby
... "Grappling with the affairs of state affords unique opportunities for growth, while the honor of having served the state operates as a magnifying glass enlarging the inspirational force of individuals so honored. ...
— The Hindered Hand - or, The Reign of the Repressionist • Sutton E. Griggs
... simple philosophy a tree is a vegetable, a child is an animal, a building is a mineral and this classification needs no further scrutiny or analysis. But there is one thing in Washington Square that embodies an intellectual problem, a grappling of the soul, a matter for continual ...
— Mince Pie • Christopher Darlington Morley
... instant flight in his mind, but remained standing inert, half paralysed by sheer panic, while several men surrounded Tom, and dragged him forcibly up from the ground where he lay, still grasping his murdered man. As they wrenched the gypsy's grappling arms away, Wrotham fell back on the floor, stone dead. Life had been thrust out of him with the first blow dealt him by Tom's claspknife, which had been aimed at his throat as a butcher aims at the throat of a swine. His bleeding ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... was now at an end. My uncle had been all the morning making purchases of a part of the tools and apparatus required for this desperate undertaking. The passage was encumbered with rope ladders, knotted cords, torches, flasks, grappling irons, alpenstocks, pickaxes, iron shod sticks, enough to load ...
— A Journey to the Interior of the Earth • Jules Verne
... accomplished as follows:—After forming a pair of large wings, each of them forty yards long, and fourteen wide, and annexing them to myself, I mounted at break of day, when every creature, even the watch upon deck, was fast asleep. As I hovered over the ship I fastened three grappling irons to the tops of the three masts with my sling, and fairly lifted her several yards out of the water, and then proceeded across to Dover, where I arrived in half an hour! Having no further occasion for these wings, I made them a ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... nightly encounter diminished on each occasion, and the curiosity which stimulated me to the study of the phenomenon rapidly gave way to the sentiment akin to terror when I proved myself incapable of grappling with ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... them. Ho, ho! bend to your oars, my hearties! grappling-chains ready there! ho! on ...
— The Merryweathers • Laura E. Richards
... lasted for some minutes, till both of Pizarro's pages were stretched by his side, when Rada, impatient of the delay, called out, "Why are we so long about it? Down with the tyrant!" and taking one of his companions, Narvaez, in his arms, he thrust him against the marquess. Pizarro, instantly grappling with his opponent, ran him through with his sword. But at that moment he received a wound in the throat, and reeling, he sank on the floor, while the swords of Rada and several of the conspirators were plunged into his body. "Jesu!" exclaimed the dying man, and, ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... ports. Brest was blockaded. A squadron of Mediterranean galleys coming to its relief anchored in the shallow water off Conquet. Howard determined to cut them out; he grappled and boarded their admiral's galley. The grappling was cut away, his boat swept out in the tide, and Howard, left unsupported, was thrust overboard by the Frenchmen's pikes.[129] His death was regarded as a national disaster, but he had retrieved England's reputation ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard
... Corunna for repairs, caused Elizabeth, with her usual parsimony, to order four great vessels to be dismantled; Howard retained them instead, at his own charges. On July 19, 1588, the Armada was sighted off the Lizard, and for eighteen days the naval heroes were grappling with that "invincible" fleet. Elizabeth herself visited the camp at Tilbury, rode through the lines, wearing a corselet and a farthingale of amazing dimensions, while a page bore her helmet, and addressed ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... mizen-mast over her side. The escape of the Frenchmen was now hopeless—they must either conquer or be captured. They made a bold attempt to win, by immediately running aboard the brig, before the lugger had lost her way, and securing her with grappling-irons. ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... Miss Lamont. It was fly-fishing under extreme difficulties. The artist, who kept his flies a good deal of the time out of the boat, frankly confessed that he would prefer an honest worm and hook, or a net, or even a grappling-iron. Miss Lamont, with a great deal of energy, kept her line whirling about, and at length, on a successful cast, landed the artist's hat among the water-lilies. There was nothing discouraging in this, and they both resumed operations with cheerfulness ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... down stream were thus effectually disposed of; but the two coming up were now close at hand, and before another gun could be brought to bear their bows struck the sides of the steamer, grappling-irons were thrown over the bulwarks and into the chains, and yelling savagely their crews of fierce fighting men came ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... boy." She gave him a little cake to accelerate his departure and to turn his mind from further argument, and after he was gone she swung the discussion to Buddy and his growing tendency toward grappling with problems beyond his seven years. Also, she pointed out the necessity for choosing one's ...
— The Uphill Climb • B. M. Bower
... hesitate, and I thought that he was about to rush out upon the platform and seize Ala in order to rescue her from some danger that he foresaw; when, all at once, the multitude rose to its feet, staggering, and began to rush to and fro, colliding with one another, falling, rising again, grappling, struggling, uttering terrible cries—and then I saw the flash ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... over the illustrations of the 'Painter's Camp' with George Leslie. He has promised to do twenty etchings of figure-subjects to illustrate it, and I shall do twenty landscapes. I have learned a great deal from Haden here, and I feel sure now of grappling successfully with the difficulties which plagued me before. Besides, I am anxious to have a book with etchings in it out in time to appear with the work on Etching. I am sure this new edition of the 'Painter's Camp' will be something jolly. It's ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... government bethought them of appealing to the only man in the empire who was capable of grappling with the difficulty. Omer Pacha was taken once more into favour, and was despatched to the scene of discord. A Slave by birth, but tied to the interests of his imperial master by the devotion of a lifetime, no more fitting choice could have been ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot
... says the thing can not be done. Is that so? After death seizes upon that soul, is there no resurrection? If a man topples off the edge of life, is there nothing to break his fall? If an impenitent man goes overboard, are there no grappling-hooks to hoist him into safety? The text says distinctly: "Then a great ransom ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... him that on the strand Had Mother Becker waited long! And well for him her grasping hand And grappling arm were strong! ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... and most assiduous in practising, the warlike exercises of archery, and hurling the javelin. 6. When it suited his age, he grew extremely fond of the chase, and of braving dangers in encounters with wild beasts. On one occasion, he did not shrink from a she-bear that attacked him, but, in grappling with her, was dragged from off his horse, and received some wounds, the scars of which were visible on his body, but at last killed her. The person who first came to his assistance, he made a happy man in ...
— The First Four Books of Xenophon's Anabasis • Xenophon
... the solution of his problem by betaking himself to the house-tops. Through the aid of a rope, furnished with cross-pieces inserted in the strands at regular intervals and a grappling-hook at the free end, he could pass easily from roof to roof of contiguous buildings, and so gain points of observation that otherwise he would ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... the other side of the corpse, covering it from attack, while his two assistants who were left proceeded quickly to lay hold of it. They had raised it, laid it on the bier, and were setting off by an unusual track across the waste, while Agellius, Aspar, and the third were grappling with some ruffians who had rushed upon them. Few, however, were there as yet to take part against them, but their cries of alarm were bringing others up, and the Christians were in growing danger of being worsted and carried off, when suddenly the soldiers interfered. Under pretence of ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... distance defending himself with difficulty against a savage, who attacked him eagerly with one of those long spears, towards which he entertained such an aversion. Browne was nowhere to be seen. Morton and his strong antagonist were still grappling on the ground, but the latter had gained the advantage, and was now endeavouring, while he held Morton under him, to reach a club lying near, with which to put an end to the struggle. Another of the enemy was sitting a few ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer
... rages the lurid conflagration of Anger; feel how thy own so quiet Soul is straightway involuntarily kindled with the like, and ye blaze and reverberate on each other, till it is all one limitless confluent flame (of embracing Love, or of deadly-grappling Hate); and then say what miraculous virtue goes out of man into man. But if so, through all the thick-plied hulls of our Earthly Life; how much more when it is of the Divine Life we speak, and inmost ME is, as it were, brought into ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... Political opposition there was none; but the Council had to be governed under the glare of inevitable publicity, with a free press in Europe, and hostile views prevalent in Catholic theology. The causes which made religious science utterly powerless in the strife, and kept it from grappling with the forces arrayed against it, are of deeper import than the issue ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... sailed straight amid the anchored treasure-ships. Barely had the Golden Hind taken a position in the midst of the enemy's fleet, when, selecting one of the staunchest {6} vessels of the enemy, Drake had grappling-irons thrown out, clamping his ship to her victim. In a trice the English sailors were on the Spanish deck with swords out and the rallying-cry of 'God and St George! Down with Spanish dogs!' Dumbfounded and unarmed, down the hatches, over the bulwarks into ...
— Pioneers of the Pacific Coast - A Chronicle of Sea Rovers and Fur Hunters • Agnes C. Laut
... self-fertilising hermaphrodite, so that each hair-breadth variation is not lost by intercrossing. Your manner of putting the case would be even more striking than it is if the mind could grapple with such numbers—it is grappling with eternity—think of each of a thousand seeds bringing forth its plant, and then each a thousand. A globe stretching to the furthest fixed star would very soon be covered. I cannot even grapple ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... back to our ship, all but Thord and half a dozen warriors, whom he kept as guard for me, I suppose; and the grappling lines were cast off. Then we made sail again, and headed to rejoin the rest of the Saxon vessels. Odda's crippled ship had repaired her damage at this time, and went with us. But first it was plain that she thought ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... murdered poor Peter, in a treacherous, and even bungling and disgusting, and altogether hideous manner. "A glass of burgundy [poisoned burgundy], your Highness?" said they, at dinner with his poor Highness. On the back of which, the burgundy having failed and been found out, came grappling and hauling, trampling, shrieking, and at last strangulation. Surely the Devil will reward such a Five of his Elect?—But we detain Herr Busching: it is still only Friday morning, 9th of the month; and the Czarina's Hackney Coach, in the ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... the natives to retire to some distance: They immediately complied, and I then landed with the Captain of the Swallow, and several of the officers: The marines were drawn up, and the boats were brought to a grappling near the shore. I then made signs to the natives to come near, and directed them to sit down in a semicircle, which they did with great order and cheerfulness. When this was done, I distributed among them several knives, scissars, buttons, beads, combs, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... you might conceive the helpless horror grappling with me there behind that fastened door; but this, indeed, you may not, having felt it not. For one dazed moment I was sick as death with fear and frenzy and I know not what besides, and all the blackness of the night swam sudden red before my eyes. ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... heard a shrill and sudden cry, And, looking up, I saw the antic Puck Grappling with Time, who clutch'd him like a fly, Victim of his own sport,—the jester's luck! He, whilst his fellows grieved, poor wight, had stuck His freakish gauds upon the Ancient's brow, And now his ear, and now his beard, would pluck; Whereas the angry churl had ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... poems relinquished by the critics as hopelessly, if not intentionally, obscure. Ulalume, for example, held by some to be a mere experiment on the jingling capacity of words and the taste of readers for grappling with insoluble puzzles, is pronounced by one familiar with his most intimate feelings at the time of its composition a sublimated but distinct reflex of them and of the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various
... shovels and battle-gear, Men jostle and climb to meet the bristling fire. Lines of grey, muttering faces, masked with fear, They leave their trenches, going over the top, While time ticks blank and busy on their wrists, And hope, with furtive eyes and grappling fists, Flounders in mud. O ...
— The War Poems of Siegfried Sassoon • Siegfried Sassoon
... he missed the vessel of the Turkish flotilla towards which he had struck out, but fortunately succeeded in grappling the chain cable of that which lay next to it, and the crew of which, as the reader will recollect, I had roused ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... had a worried, puzzled expression, and his voice bespoke puzzled wrath. It was evident his slow moving peasant's mind was grappling with the bloody fact of a hell-ship. It was something new in his experience. He was trying to fathom it. Why were he and his mates thumped, when they willingly did their work? What for? "Nils iss goot ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... some sort," she admitted. "I cannot describe it. I only know it is there. He seems much more thoughtful and less hard. The change would be an improvement," she went on, "except that somehow or other it makes me feel uneasy. It is as though he were grappling with some crisis." ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... treasonable oaths, which was a practice in the society of United Irishmen, was a capital offence; and that in case a witness was murdered, which frequently happened, before a trial, his written testimony should be considered sufficient evidence. While government was thus grappling with the disaffection which prevailed, a body of men united under the name of Orangemen, for the purposes of security. This was natural; but, unfortunately, it only increased the religious animosities which already ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... the background of your mind all the time you are writing. It will be always intruding and pushing in its face, and you will be able to give only half your mind to your subject. But frankly and naturally use the I, and the remembrance of yourself vanishes. You are grappling with the subject; you are thinking of it, and of nothing else. You use the readiest and most unaffected mode of speech to set out your thoughts of it. You have written I a dozen times, but you have not thought of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... place could have caught fire or smoked at all. And each was silent—myself from sheer incapacity and befuddlement, the Colonel from the quiet pluck that faces all things yet speaks little, and John Silence from the intense mental grappling with this latest manifestation of a profound problem that called for concentration of thought rather ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... Hal, grappling with two of the enemy, was giving a good account of himself; but Chester, weak from the loss of blood, was unable to hold his own. A blow from the butt of one of the Austrian's revolvers and he went to ...
— The Boy Allies with the Cossacks - Or, A Wild Dash over the Carpathians • Clair W. Hayes
... to the mountain, and in plain view of the house. On the second day, this dusky monarch was seen flying about above them. Presently he began to hover over them, after the manner of a hawk watching for mice. He then with extended legs let himself slowly down upon them, actually grappling the backs of the young cattle, and frightening the creatures so that they rushed about the field in great consternation; and finally, as he grew bolder and more frequent in his descents, the whole herd broke over the fence, and came tearing down to the house "like mad." It did not seem to ...
— A Book of Natural History - Young Folks' Library Volume XIV. • Various
... journalist was in some ways in his favor; in other ways, to the detriment of his work. It meant an early start on a career of over thirty years. It meant writing under pressure with the spontaneity and reality which usually result. It also meant the bold grappling with the technique of a great art, learning to make novels by making them. Again, one truly inspired to fiction is lucky to have a novitiate in youth. ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton
... have beguil'd me with a counterfeit Resembling majesty; which, being touch'd and tried, Proves valueless; you are forsworn, forsworn: You came in arms to spill mine enemies' blood, But now in arms you strengthen it with yours: The grappling vigour and rough frown of war Is cold in amity and painted peace, And our oppression hath made up this league.— Arm, arm, you heavens, against these perjur'd kings! A widow cries: be husband to me, heavens! Let not the hours of this ungodly day Wear out the day in peace; ...
— King John • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... him on his daily journey, in relays of eight every hour, two to the left of him, and two to the right, two before Him, and two behind. Strong as he is, he could complete his course from south to north in a single instant, but three hundred and sixty-five angels restrain him by means of as many grappling-irons. Every day one looses his hold, and the sun must thus spend three hundred and sixty-five days on his course. The progress of the sun in his circuit is an uninterrupted song of praise to God. And this song alone makes his motion possible. ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... be some Whose writhed features, fixed in all their strength Of grappling agony, do stare at you, With their dead eyes half opened. And there be some struck through with bristling darts Whose clenched hands have torn the pebbles up; Whose gnashing teeth have ground ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... muttering, slipping, grappling, the two figures waltzed grotesquely about in the falling snow. Then the mayor's feet slid from under him on the treacherous white carpet, and the two went down together. As Mr. Magee swooped down upon them he saw the hand of the stranger find the mayor's pocket, ...
— Seven Keys to Baldpate • Earl Derr Biggers
... back soon with a rope it would be easy enough; and possibly they might be able to rig up a grappling-iron or "creeper," as the fishermen called it, for the line that was lost; but a little consideration told him that in all probability the line had sunk before now and was right at the ...
— Menhardoc • George Manville Fenn
... opium under certain arrears of weakness, I had occasion to notice a disreputable attorney in London, who showed me some attentions, partly on my own account as a boy of some expectations, but much more with the purpose of fastening his professional grappling-hooks upon the young Earl of A——t, my former companion, and my present correspondent. This man's house was slightly described, and, with more minuteness, I had exposed some interesting traits in his household economy. A question, therefore, naturally arose in several people's curiosity—Where ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... Lord Palmerston made a mistake in not grappling with it from the first, and using all the power the Crown had entrusted to him, even ostentatiously, for the purpose. Now it might be most difficult—but it ought not to pass without a solemn protest ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... I sent two boats, one from each ship, to search more accurately for a landing-place; and, at the same time, two others to fish at a grappling near the shore. These last returned about eight o'clock, with upward of two hundred weight of fish. Encouraged by this success, they were dispatched again after breakfast; and I then went in another boat, to take a view of the coast and attempt landing, but this I found to be wholly impracticable. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... fork of the "Y" the first breach was made, and down the sheer sides of the ravine the British troops dropped with bayonet in hand. Then followed a stubborn struggle, for the Germans filled both sides of the chasm. Bombing, bayoneting, and grappling hand to hand continued for some time, the Germans despite their bravery being slowly forced back. At this stage of the fighting the British delivered a new frontal attack against the narrow bit of the front ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... soon as he was within earshot, "the pirates are bested, and we can make a safe escape if you will give an order to set loose the grappling irons and lines and bid our men raise sail!" He looked eagerly at Captain Blizzard. "The pirates look pretty tired now, but the Vulture might pursue us if I didn't know ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... without any explosive smack. These omissions oppressed and depressed her considerably; still, on the whole, we got on very well. Accustomed to instruct foreign girls, who hardly ever will think and study for themselves— who have no idea of grappling with a difficulty, and overcoming it by dint of reflection or application—our progress, which in truth was very leisurely, seemed to astound her. In her eyes, we were a pair of glacial prodigies, cold, ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... bull-ring, and particularly this exciting and dangerous game of bull-grappling, or [Greek: taurokathapsia], was an established and habitual form of Minoan sport is proved by the multitude of representations of it which have survived. The charging bull of Tiryns, the first to be discovered, was a mystery so long as it stood alone; but it is only one of a succession of such ...
— The Sea-Kings of Crete • James Baikie
... Incapable of grappling with contemporary life, of rendering the most simple aspects of things and persons visible and palpable, unqualified to explain the complicated wiles of intellects indifferent to the benefits of salvation, this language was nevertheless excellent when it treated of abstract subjects. It proved ...
— Against The Grain • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... a few days later, while he was grappling at the treasury with a file of papers on the mysteries of superannuation, Mr. Gladstone was again summoned by the prime minister, and again (Jan. 26) he writes ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... horsemen the pioneers of this strange army passed. At one that rolled along the ground, breaking shapelessly and trailing out reluctantly into long grappling ribbons and bands, all three horses began to shy and dance. The master was seized with a sudden, unreasonable impatience. He cursed the drifting globes roundly. "Get on!" he cried; "get on! What do these things matter? How can they matter? Back to the trail!" He fell swearing at ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... would have you set your heart at rest; for Mr. Williams will do very well again. He is not half so bad as he fancied. O these scholars, said she, they have not the hearts of mice! He has only a few scratches on his face; which, said she, I suppose he got by grappling among the gravel at the bottom of the dam, to try to find a hole in the ground, to hide himself from the robbers. His shin and his knee are hardly to be seen to ail any thing. He says in his letter, he was a frightful spectacle: He might be so, indeed, when he first came in a doors; but he looks ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... combine in agricultural production and distribution, but are also making a promising beginning in grappling with the problem of agricultural finance. It is in the last portion of the Irish programme that by far the most interesting study of the co-operative system can be made, on account of its success in the poorest parts ...
— The Evolution of the Country Community - A Study in Religious Sociology • Warren H. Wilson
... grappling with the idea. The two turned their horses homeward, casting an occasional glance to the southward, but were unrewarded by the sight of a dust cloud, the signal of an approaching herd. The trail foreman was satisfied ...
— Wells Brothers • Andy Adams
... We were in no trim for receiving broadsides, or grappling with sea-dogs, however merry the ports might be for a man in my plight. Our business was to bring the Misericorde safe into Leith Roads, and to that ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed |
