"Hilt" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... nothing, but there was something in my face which told him that I knew all, and warned him of his doom. He looked past me, but the narrow road was blocked with men. I drew near, but he did not wait for me. Once he put his hand on the hilt of the sword, then suddenly he wheeled his horse round and fled ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... 'Twas on the heath, As he did gripe and hold it from his breast, He cut my blade with fifty pallid fingers, On his knees, crying out He had at home an old and doating father; And yet I slew him! There was a ribbon round his neck That caught in the hilt of my sword. A stripling, and so long a dying? ...
— Cromwell • Alfred B. Richards
... these culinary preparations the buccaneer had not appeared to perceive the chevalier, who, with foot advanced, nose in the air, and hand on the hilt of his sword, was prepared to answer proudly any interrogatories which might be made, and even to question in return Master Rend-your-Soul. The latter, having cut off the head and feet of the pigeon which he was plucking, ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... around. I had just found the second package I needed and was about to lay my hand on the third when a long and painful sigh, uttered just at my shoulder, made me bound like a madman from my seat and land several feet off. As I jumped I had turned round my hand on the hilt of my sword, and, truly, if I had not felt it at my side I should have taken to my heels like ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... knife. He leaned over upon it backward and managed to get the hilt between the partly-cramped fingers of one hand. With a clumsy, sawing movement, he scraped the blade over the rope that held his arms together. He was far from certain of success, but he stuck to the task with grim ...
— The Camp in the Snow - Besiedged by Danger • William Murray Graydon
... Don Quixote uttered in a threatening manner, his hand on the hilt of his sword. Whether because of his threats or because the grave had been dug and Crysostom's remains were about to be lowered into it, they all stayed until the burial was over. The grave was closed with a large stone, and then the shepherds strewed flowers, ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... it was found that a ball had struck him forward of the flank just back of the saddle, and had gone entirely through. In a few minutes the poor beast dropped dead; he had given no sign of injury until we came to a stop. A ball had struck the metal scabbard of my sword, just below the hilt, and broken it nearly off; before the battle was over it had broken off entirely. There were three of us: one had lost a horse, killed; one a hat and one a sword-scabbard. All were thankful that ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant
... origin of heraldry itself, perhaps nothing connected with it has given rise to so much controversy as the origin of this celebrated charge." It has been at various times asserted to be an Iris, a Lily, a sword-hilt, a spearhead, and a toad, or to be simply the Fleur de St. Louis. Adhuc sub judice lis est—and it is never likely to be satisfactorily settled. I need not therefore dwell on it, especially as my present business is to settle not what the Fleur-de-luce meant in the arms of ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... times, Imp, when knights rode out to battle, it was customary for them when they made a solemn promise to kiss the cross-hilt of their swords, just to show they meant to keep it. So now I ask you to go back to your Auntie Lisbeth, to take care of her, to shield and guard her from all things evil, and never to forget that you are her loyal and true knight; ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... of unusual magnificence. The table service was entirely of gold—the celebrated set of the house of Savoy—and behind the chair of each guest stood a servant in powdered wig and gorgeous livery of red plush. I sat at the right of the King, who—his hands resting on his sword, the hilt of which glittered with jewels—sat through the hour and a half at table without once tasting food or drink, for it was his rule to eat but two meals in twenty-four hours—breakfast at noon, and dinner at midnight. The King remained silent most of the time, ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... faintly, for the recollection of one which I had seen only a few days prior to the tragic occurrence—the one with the arms of the Medici carved upon its hilt, ...
— The Sign of Silence • William Le Queux
... heard of last night? When did you arrive? Are you teachers of religion? Are you married? Why do you dress so?' These and other similar questions we answered; when he appeared to be pleased with us, and sat down on an elevated seat—his hand resting on the hilt of his sword, and his eyes intently ...
— Lives of the Three Mrs. Judsons • Arabella W. Stuart
... that the Count was annoyed. He was standing in the middle of the salon, fingering his sword-hilt in a manner which expressed the most absurd irritation. So I said immediately that I was awfully sorry, but it seemed so difficult to get anything to eat in Rome at that time of year, that the head-waiter was really responsible, and wouldn't he ...
— A Voyage of Consolation - (being in the nature of a sequel to the experiences of 'An - American girl in London') • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... used this stone for a fastening-pin. The wolf opened his mouth terribly wide, raged and twisted himself with all his might, and wanted to bite them; but they put a sword in his mouth, in such a manner that the hilt stood in his lower jaw and the point in the upper, that is his gag. He howls terribly, and the saliva which runs from his mouth forms a river called Von. There he will lie until Ragnarok. Then said Ganglere: Very bad are these children of Loke, but they are strong and mighty. ...
— The Younger Edda - Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda • Snorre
... hilt of his ashplant, lunging with it softly, dallying still. Yes, evening will find itself in me, without me. All days make their end. By the way next when is it Tuesday will be the longest day. Of all the ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... in twain, leaving him at the mercy of his opponent. On this the doughty Davy, crowing lustily like chanticleer, called upon him to yield; but Archie was so wroth at his misadventure, that, instead of complying, he sprang forward, and with the hilt of his broken weapon dealt his elated opponent a severe blow on the side of the head, not only knocking off the porringer, but stretching him on the ground beside it. The punishment he had received was enough for poor Davy. He made no attempt to rise, and ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... lock of the door, but this was firmly held by bolts without. Thinking that on some future occasion the blade might be useful to him, he pushed the dagger well into the lock, and with a sharp jerk snapped it off at the hilt. Then he concealed the steel within his long boot and cast the ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... demand rose for bigger, fatter newspapers, with comic sections and plenty of purple ink, and the Post's owners found themselves unable to supply it. In fact they had to retort by mortgaging their property to the hilt and cutting expenses to rock-bottom. These were dark days for the Post. That it managed to survive them at all was due chiefly to the personality of Colonel Cowles, who, though doubtless laughable as a political economist, was yet considered to have his good points. But the Hercules-labor ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... produced two swords twenty-six inches long, and pushed them down their throats to the hilt, and then asked Dr. Hawkes to feel the point in their stomachs. Another put a stone in his mouth, and then began to blow out smoke and a cloud of sparks from his nose as well as his mouth. Turning a somerset, he cast the stone on ...
— Across India - Or, Live Boys in the Far East • Oliver Optic
... he muttered to Margaret; "I'll not turn my back on a brace of Spaniards," but he also laid his hand upon the hilt of the sword he wore beneath his cloak, and bade her get ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... the love-lighted hames o' our ain native land— On the bonneted brow, on the hilt of the brand— On the face o' the shield, 'mid the shouts o' the free, May the thistle be seen where the thistle should be! ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume V. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... critical period of life is usually between thirteen and seventeen."—Id. "Generalissimo, the chief commander of an army or military force."—Every Dict. "Tranquilize, to quiet, to make calm and peaceful."—Webster's Dict. "Pommelled, beaten, bruised; having pommels, as a sword-hilt."—Webster et al. cor. "From what a height does a jeweller look down upon his shoemaker!"—Red Book cor. "You will have a verbal account from my friend and fellow traveller."—Id. "I observe ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... temerity that they kept an astonished silence. Now the storm broke. The rumble of angry voices swelled into a roar of fury. An angry mob surrounded the speaker. Several desperadoes leaped forward with deadly intent, and one, Charles Dunn by name, drove his knife to the hilt into the body of the brave man who dared thus openly to ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... right,' said the princess, 'but who wants half a one-horse kingdom that's mortgaged up to the hilt and a bit over?' ...
— Berry And Co. • Dornford Yates
... say that he hoped we should be really brothers, now that we were to meet before an enemy; and the next day out came the declaration of war. When I had read it, I drew my sword, and, as I ran my eye along its cold, sharp blade from hilt to point, I thought how strange was its power to let out a man's life, and turn him, in a moment, into a heap of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... to find him in a state of collapse. Instead of which I found him gaily awaiting me at the station to tell me he had run himself out—or some bosh of the kind—and it was now my innings, and I was to go in and win. On my soul, Olga, he was enjoying himself up to the hilt." ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... of good cheer for today, For there's hot work before us, friends! This sword Shall have no rest, till it be bathed to the hilt In Austrian blood. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... ocean that stretched away before her eyes lay a world she knew nothing of; yet since her earliest childhood her keen mind had told her that the silk with which she was clothed, the jewels that encrusted her dagger-hilt, the ships whose pillage had yielded up these things, must come from lands far distant, more desirable than the maroon country of Jamaica. More, her ears attuned to the whisper or roar of the sea, the sigh or shriek of the winds, carried to her the mutterings of men long held in leash, who ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... short interval, by skilful play, to sweep aside their points and to parry their blows. But it forced him to fight wholly on the defensive, and his age and wounds left no doubt as to the ultimate result. His arm grew tired, and the grip on his sword hilt weakened. . . His enemies pressed him closer and closer. . . A blow got past his guard and pierced his thigh. He had strength for only one more stroke; and he gathered it for a final rush and balanced himself for the opportunity. So fierce was the ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... cats—with now and then a country horse or mule, hitched to the town rack—with these, and a small vial of Gypsy Juice, Archie B., as he expressed it, "had mo' fun to the square inch than ole Barnum's show ever hilt in all ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... Another Oriental, but not as the obsequious Hiram. Here was a lord to command and be obeyed. Gems flashed from the scarlet turban, the green jacket was embroidered with pearls—and was not half the wealth of Corinth in the jewels studding the sword hilt? Tight trousers and high shoes of tanned leather set off a form supple and powerful as a panther's. Unlike most Orientals the stranger was fair. A blond beard swept his breast. His eyes were sharp, steel-blue. Never a word spoke he; but Democrates looked on him with ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... Tawnish, with a shake of the head, "small matter of wonder if I cannot attain unto so high an estate; for I beg you to observe that though I am tolerably efficient in the use of my weapon" (here he laid his hand lightly upon the silver hilt of his small-sword), "though I can tell a spavined horse from a sound one, and can lose a trifle without positive tears, yet—and I say it with a sense of my extreme unworthiness—I have an excessive and abiding ...
— The Honourable Mr. Tawnish • Jeffery Farnol
... the weapon that is lacking," answered Solomon, carrying his hand to the hilt of a dagger that he had hidden in ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - NISIDA—1825 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... fan-tail. The cross of Saint-Michel glittered on his breast; his coarse, strong hands, covered with gray hairs, which had been clasped, had now dropped slightly apart in the slumber to which he had imprudently yielded. The right hand seemed about to fall upon his dagger, the hilt of which was in the form of an iron shell. By the manner in which he had placed the weapon, this hilt was directly under his hand; if, unfortunately, the hand touched the iron, he would wake, no doubt, instantly, and glance at his wife. His sardonic lips, his pointed chin aggressively ...
— Maitre Cornelius • Honore de Balzac
... known by the name of El Gobernador Manco, or the one-armed governor. He in fact prided himself upon being an old soldier, wore his mustachios curled up to his eyes, a pair of campaigning boots, and a toledo[20-2] as long as a spit, with his pocket handkerchief in the basket-hilt. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... Americans was a sham. Especially one of that journalistic tribe that had been sending out reports of German atrocities. Furthermore, it would redound greatly to his professional glory to hand me over to the General with a case proved to the hilt. ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams
... sent forth of the white-armed goddess Hera, whose heart loved both alike and had care for them. She stood behind Peleus' son and caught him by his golden hair, to him only visible, and of the rest no man beheld her.' And at her bidding he mastered his wrath, 'and stayed his heavy hand on the silver hilt, and thrust the great sword back into the sheath, and was not disobedient to the saying of Athene.'[211] The succour of the goddess here only strengthens an inward movement in the mind of Achilles, but we should lose something besides a poetic effect if for that reason we struck her out ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... window at New-College) temperance is confused with mere abstinence, the opposite of Gula, or gluttony; whereas the Greek Temperance, a truly cardinal virtue, is the moderator of all the passions, and so represented by Giotto, who has placed a bridle upon her lips, and a sword in her hand, the hilt of which she is binding to the scabbard. In his system, she is opposed among the vices, not by Gula or Gluttony, but by Ira, Anger. So also the Temperance of Spenser, or Sir Guyon, but ...
— Stones of Venice [introductions] • John Ruskin
... Singh had stood rigid, his hand clenched on the jeweled hilt of his sword, his eyes riveted on the faces of the four men who were thus unconsciously drawing him into the intimate circle of their life. Much that they said was incomprehensible to him. The references to "Napoleon" and to the unknown individual contemptuously ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... heart. She leaned against an aspen tree, stroking her throat with her left hand, swallowing with difficulty. Slowly from her girdle she drew a tiny hunting-knife, her one weapon, and toyed with it. She put the hilt to the tree, the point to her bare breast, and breathed a prayer to We-sec-e-gea, god of the Crees. She had only to throw the weight of her beautiful body on the blade, sink without a moan to the moss, and pass, leaving the ...
— The Last Spike - And Other Railroad Stories • Cy Warman
... before. He was evidently not a person to be trifled with. There was a fixed look about him, and a deliberate coolness, sufficiently indicating a determined character; and a belt around his waist supported a six-shooter and revealed the glittering hilt of ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... bloodshot, his horns tearing up the ground. Alfonso awaited him with a tranquil air; then, when he was only three paces away, he made a bound to one sides and presented instead of his body his sword, which disappeared at once to the hilt; the bull, checked in the middle of his onslaught, stopped one instant motionless and trembling, then fell upon his knees, uttered one dull roar, and lying down on the very spot where his course had been checked, breathed his last without ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... from Erfurth with the intention of assassinating the Emperor; but he wanted the necessary courage for executing the design. He was armed with a large dagger, and was twice sufficiently near Napoleon to have struck him. I heard this from Rapp, who seized Stags, and felt the hilt of the dagger under his coat. On that occasion Bonaparte owed his life only to the irresolution of the young 'illuminato' who wished to sacrifice him to his fanatical fury. It is equally certain that on another occasion, respecting which the author of ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... seemed seven bayonets. These flashed in the air in front of me. Then through my mind flashed the admonition of our bayonet instructor back in Blighty. He had said, "whenever you get in a charge and run your bayonet up to the hilt into a German, the Fritz will fall. Perhaps your rifle will be wrenched from your grasp. Do not waste time, if the bayonet is fouled in his equipment, by putting your foot on his stomach and tugging at the rifle to extricate the bayonet. Simply press the ...
— Over The Top • Arthur Guy Empey
... said, "in the military relation you must also vividly keep up, across all inequalities of rank, a splendid sentiment of common interest and devotion, mutual confidence and affection, or your army will be but a broken weapon, a sword without a hilt." ...
— The Amateur Garden • George W. Cable
... right hand flew to the hilt of his sword. He spoke no word, now, but his face was white, his lips set and stern. The gleam in his eyes boded no good to the men ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Lieutenants - or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers • H. Irving Hancock
... sabre, he threw himself into the sea, then diving like a fish under the shark, he stabbed the weapon into his body up to the hilt. Thus wounded the shark quitted his prey, and turned on the boy, who again and again attacked him with the sabre, but the struggle was too unequal; ropes were quickly thrown from the deck to the father and son; each succeeded in grasping one, and loud rose the cry of joy, "They ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park
... that he knew me instantly, for his countenance turned as pale as ashes with surprise and hatred. He started up, placing his hand instinctively upon his sword-hilt, and glaring at me with a look so deadly, that I thought every moment he would strike his sword into my heart. He said in a kind ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume III. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... a strange and beautiful scene. Siegmund lies down to rest; the fire glimmers fitfully, then blazes up, revealing at the point on the trunk at which Sieglinda had gazed a shining sword-hilt, the blade embedded in the trunk. Still Siegmund does not understand, and the fire dies down; he is beginning to slumber when Sieglinda enters and calls him. He starts up; she has put a sleeping-powder in Hunding's cup, and they are safe; and thus begins ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... not foaming flood Who fears not steel-clad line:— No warrior thou of German blood, No brother thou of mine. Go, earn Rome's chain to load thy neck, Her gems to deck thy hilt; And blazon honour's hapless wreck With all the ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.
... tribesmen were only armed with Martini-Henrys. They nevertheless made excellent practice. Lieutenant R.E. Power was shot through the arm and, almost immediately afterwards, Lieutenant Keene was severely wounded in the body. Luckily, the bullet struck his sword-hilt first or he would have been killed. Two or three men were also wounded here. Those who know the range and power of the Martini-Henry rifle will appreciate the skill and marksmanship which can inflict loss even ...
— The Story of the Malakand Field Force • Sir Winston S. Churchill
... but Beowulf heeds them not, for near him lies Grendel, dead from the wound received the previous night. Again Beowulf swings the great sword and strikes off his enemy's head; and lo, as the venomous blood touches the sword blade, the steel melts like ice before the fire, and only the hilt is left in Beowulf's hand. Taking the hilt and the head, the hero enters the ocean and mounts up to ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... presence. They were presented to her by me. They told Her Majesty that, though they had changed their paymaster, they had not changed their allegiance to their Sovereign or herself, but were ready to defend both with their lives. They placed one hand on the hilt of their swords, and, solemnly lifting the other up to Heaven, swore that the weapons should never be wielded but for the defence of the King and Queen, against all foes, whether foreign ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 6 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... traversed the hall with a hard and sounding step as measured as the ticking of a clock, and placing his skinny hand upon the hilt of an immense long rapier, and stamping with his heel on the floor, he uttered in a horribly disagreeable creaking voice resembling the grating of an engine these words, which dropped in a dry mechanical ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian
... the taxi sank from their high whine to a groan, and the wheels came to the ground before the company office. A man in the Martian army uniform came out. His beetle-browed face was truculent, and his hand rested on the hilt of his neuro-pistol. ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl
... my sword hilt, as one does in some sudden terror, staring at the open mound; while old Thord muttered spells against I know not what, and Kolgrim looked at me, pale ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... sir," replied Everard; and naturally conjecturing the purpose of his antagonist to be hostile, took hold of his rapier with the left hand, and laid the right on the hilt, not displeased at the supposed call; for anger is at least as much akin to disappointment as pity is said ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... him; if angered, it is she who inflames him. In the first quarrel with Atreides, when he stands at pause, with the great sword half drawn, "Athena came from heaven, and stood behind him and caught him by the yellow hair." Another god would have stayed his hand upon the hilt, but Athena only lifts his hair. "And he turned and knew her, and her dreadful eyes shone upon him." There is an exquisite tenderness in this laying her hand upon his hair, for it is the talisman of his life, vowed to his own Thessalian river if he ever returned to ...
— The Queen of the Air • John Ruskin
... tenth year was come to the Spring, when young men and virgins worship Artemis the Bright; and abroad on the plains the crocus was aflower, and the anemone; and the blades of the iris were like swords stuck hilt downward in the earth. A green veil spread lightly over the land, and men might see a tree scorched black upon one side and budded with gold upon the other. Melted snow brimmed Simois and Scamander; cranes and storks built their nests, ...
— The Ruinous Face • Maurice Hewlett
... unsheathing his sword, while Bucklaw laid his hand on the hilt of that which Craigengelt ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... commencement; and, as the man had his cue, and delivered his message with great distinctness and steadiness, the effect on the dependants of the household was very evident. Sir Reginald's face flushed, while Sir Gervaise bit his lip; Bluewater played with the hilt of his sword, very indifferent to all that was passing; while Atwood and the surgeons shrugged their shoulders and smiled. The first of these persons well knew that Tom had no shadow of a claim to ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Evelyn, for there were two photographs in one frame. The second photograph represented a handsome soldier with high regular features and a heavy black moustache; his hand rested on the hilt of his sword; there was a decided likeness between him ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... things, for the hall was not dark yet, because the brands on the hearth were flaming their last, and when Wild-wearer beheld him so gazing, he stood up and looked too for a moment, and then smote his right hand on the hilt of his sword, and turned away and strode up and down the hall as ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris
... muscles of my left arm; the other pricked pretty sharply upon a rib; and the pain of this double stroke forced me to drop my sword and make a snatch at the accursed missile, to pluck it out. 'Twas the work of two seconds at most, and then with a jerk upon the wrist-knot I had the sword-hilt again in my grip; but it let three stout ruffians in upon me to finish me. And this they were setting about with a will when, as I beat up a stroke that threatened to cleave my skull, I heard a voice calling on them to hold, and the lady in scarlet forced her horse between us. As the brute's ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... white beauty of her firm fair hand She clasped the hilt; then severed, one by one, Her gold-flecked purple tresses. Strand on strand, Free e'en as foes had fallen by that blade, Robbed of its massive wealth of curl and coil, Yet like some antique model, rose her head In all its ...
— Poems of Cheer • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... magnificent three-tailed bashaw," was brought within the circle of the quidnuncs of the day, the sayings and doings of the illustrious stranger were chronicled with as much minuteness as if he had been the denizen of another planet. Every hair of his beard, every jewel in the hilt of his khanjar, was enumerated and criticised; while all oriental etiquette was violated by the constant enquiries addressed to him relative to the number of his wives, and the economy of his domestic arrangements. "Mais a present on a change tout cela." The reforms of Sultan Mahmood, the invention ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... bitterly; "the palace of a syce." And I was thinking of it all contemptuously when my hand fell upon the gems which encrusted my sword-hilt, and I felt that Ny Deen must be one of the wealthiest of ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... a rip of torn cloth, a flutter in the air—the flutter as of a bird on the wing—an upturned point was caught in a tangle of white linen, and through the tangle Blaise rammed his sword-blade almost to the hilt and laughed, panting. ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond
... scarcely left his childhood behind. His tunic was of cloth of gold, with the royal arms embroidered upon it. He wore a golden collar round his neck, and his golden girdle held a dagger with a richly-jewelled hilt. A short velvet mantle lined with ermine hung over his shoulder, and was fastened by a clasp richly chased and set with rubies. His face was flushed as if with some great purpose, and his ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... years' bearing. In his hall grew an oak, whose branches spread out in every direction. In that hall, when Volsung's daughter was to be given away to Siggeir, king of Gothland, in came an old guest with one eye. In his hand he held a sword, which at one stroke he drove up to the hilt in the oak. "Let him," said he, "of this company who can pull it out, bear it, and none shall say he bore a better blade." Having said this, he disappeared, and was seen no more. Many tried to possess himself of the sword, but none could draw it from the oak, till Sigmund, ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... of fight are booming, And the barren blood is spilt; Still the banners are up-looming, And the hands are on the hilt; But the old world waxes wiser, From behind the bolted visor It descries at last the ...
— Alcyone • Archibald Lampman
... simple, and the fashion of it between the Asiatic and the European; but he had on his head a light helmet of gold, adorned with jewels, and a plume an the crest.[14] He held his sword drawn in his hand, to defend himself, if I should happen to break loose; it was almost three inches long; the hilt and scabbard were gold, enriched with diamonds. His voice was shrill, but very clear and articulate, and I could distinctly hear it, ...
— Gulliver's Travels - Into Several Remote Regions of the World • Jonathan Swift
... can woo no woman to ruin again and jest at her shame and agony with no man—for none can bear to look at you without a shudder—and you will lie and writhe to be given the coup de grace." He lifted the hilt of his sword and kissed it. "That I swear," he said, "by this first dawning ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... to, so that the knight could not peep through. He is not to be outwitted, however; drew off his buff doublet, took out a gimlet from his pocket, and bored a hole in the door, laid his hat upon the doublet, took his naked sword between his legs, and, resting both hands firmly on the hilt, bent down and placed his eye at the gimlet-hole, through which he could distinctly see all that passed in the room. And the three walked up to the centre of the hall, where the magic lights were burning, ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... breeches of green velvet descended to the knees, and the calves of his legs were encased in deer-skin gaiters fastened by metal buttons. A broad belt of red leather girded his loins. It concealed a small pouch of cartridges, but the hilt of a strong dagger peeped from underneath the belt. His open shirt exposed to view a manly breast. He wore a sort of jacket of the same stuff as the breeches, but faced with crimson, and garnished, after the Spanish fashion, with a number of small silver studs. A high-crowned ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... in his right after the wont of the day, and with his other hand touching his sword-hilt, he led her down the staircase, that by a single turn reached the courtyard of the palace. Here a mob of armed servants, of lacqueys, and footboys, some bearing torches, and some carrying their masters' cloaks and galoshes, loitered to and fro. Had M. de Tignonville been a little more observant, ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... action.[*] The earl of Warwick, dreading the consequences of this disaster, at a time when a decisive action was every hour expected, immediately ordered his horse to be brought him, which he stabbed before the whole army; and kissing the hilt of his sword, swore that he was determined to share the fate of the meanest soldier.[**] And to show the greater security, a proclamation was at the same time issued, giving to every one full liberty to retire, but menacing the severest punishment to those who should discover ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... known it, bedlam reigned inside the fort. While the English had guns, they had very little ammunition. Gunners threw down their fuses and refused to stand up behind the cannon till old Sargeant drove them back with his sword hilt. Men on the walls threw down muskets and declared that while they had signed to serve, they had not signed to fight, 'and if any of us lost a leg, the Company could not make it good.' The Chevalier de Troyes, with banner ...
— The "Adventurers of England" on Hudson Bay - A Chronicle of the Fur Trade in the North (Volume 18 of the Chronicles of Canada) • Agnes C. (Agnes Christina) Laut
... chair at his visitor's disposal, himself resuming his seat at his writing-table, and unfolding the paper Garnache had given him. The newcomer seated himself, hitched his sword-belt round so that he could lean both hands upon the hilt, and sat, stiff and immovable, awaiting the Lord Seneschal's pleasure. From his desk across the room the secretary, idly chewing the feathered end of his goose-quill, took silent stock of the man from Paris, ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... When the dessert had been served, Cogia Hassan was left alone with Ali Baba and his son, whom he thought to make drunk and then to murder them. Morgiana, meanwhile, put on a head-dress like a dancing-girl's, and clasped a girdle round her waist, from which hung a dagger with a silver hilt, and said to Abdallah: "Take your tabor, and let us go and divert our master and his guest." Abdallah took his tabor and played before Morgiana until they came to the door, where Abdallah stopped playing and Morgiana made a low courtesy. ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various
... scimiter, brand, curtana, claymore, smallsword, glaive, broadsword, cutlass, Damascus blade, spadroon, creese. Associated Words: scabbard, sheathe, unsheathe, forte, hilt, sheath, foible, foil, fence, fencer, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... coming forward with long strides, and touching the hilt of the dress-sword hanging at his side—"your highness, I have come to justify myself against the calumnies of my enemies. Will you be pleased to hear me patiently, and not impugn my honor as a gentleman and a count of the empire before you have ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... foot on the dead body, dexterously received the well aimed tomahawk of his powerful enemy on the barrel of his rifle, thus preventing his skull from being cloven by it. In the very attitude of firing the Indian had exposed his body to the knife of Boone, who plunged it in his body to the hilt. This is the achievement commemorated in sculpture over the southern door of the Rotunda in the ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... might be. In a moment the big hole of my hat came into conjunction with my right eye. On my word, it was the stake! How it came there I have never known, but, for some reason, I held to it. I looked neither to right nor left, but sat erect, one hand on the hilt of my sabre, the other in the mane of my horse, knowing full well I was the most hideous-looking creature in the world. If I had come to the gate of heaven I believe St. Peter would have dropped his keys. The straw worked up, and ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller
... drum. When a company nears the reviewing officer they give the salute by bringing their pieces from "right shoulder" to "carry," while on the march, and from "carry" to "present arms" when stationary. The officers raise the hilt of the sword, grasped firmly in the right hand, till the hilt is opposite the chin, the point of the blade extending outward about eighteen inches from the eyes, then, with a quick movement, to the side, the point downward and forward, and kept in this position till the reviewing ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... hand clutched the hilt of the descending knife and the hand of a short, thickset, beetle-browed desperado, was shouted, as he drew a pistol with ...
— Wild Bill's Last Trail • Ned Buntline
... he was grabbing! A colony of them were climbing up his legs and prospecting around, and every time he winced they stabbed him to the hilt—so for a quarter of an hour one group of excursionists after another climbed up Jim's legs and resented even the slightest wince or squirm that he indulged himself with, in his misery. When the entertainment had become nearly unbearable, ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... that, on one occasion, when pushing a sharp sword against Madeleine, not being able to push strongly enough to satisfy her, he placed a book bound in parchment on his own breast, placed the hilt of his sword against it, and pressed with so much force that the cover of the book was quite spoiled by the deep indentation made by the sword-hilt. He adds,—"The instinct of her convulsion caused her sometimes to demand as many as twenty-two swords at a time. These were placed, some ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various
... flawless; his sermons long and fiery; he was always ready to perform those supernumerary duties—weddings, baptisms, and burials—which yielded him what revenue he had, now that his income from the living was mortgaged up to the hilt. Their loyalty held as the loyalty of people will when some great institution of which they are members ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... then, and the others followed, staring about them cautiously, and each man keeping a hand on the hilt of ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • James Stephens
... firelocks, and all manner of deadly weapons, whether European or Oriental; for there are many trophies here of East Indian warfare. I saw Rob Roy's gun, rifled and of very large bore; and a beautiful pistol, formerly Claverhouse's; and the sword of Montrose, given him by King Charles, the silver hilt of which I grasped. There was also a superb claymore, in an elaborately wrought silver sheath, made for Sir Walter Scott, and presented to him by the Highland Society, for his services in marshalling the clans when George IV. came to Scotland. There were a thousand other things, which I knew ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... had been set, although the flaps were wide open and within one of these sat Francisco Alvarez in all the gorgeous attire of a Spanish officer, most fastidious in his taste. The gold on his uniform glittered, the lace on his cuffs was snowy and fresh, and the polished hilt of his small sword gleamed in the firelight. He had the air of one who ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... on a Line, and of an equal Height, that one Shoulder may not be higher than the other, and that they may be both turn'd alike; the Left Hand must be over against the Top of the Ear, the Hilt of the Sword a little above the Hip, turning towards Half Quart, the Thumb extended, pressing the Middle of the Eye of the Hilt, keeping the Fingers pretty close to the Handle, especially the little one, in order to feel the Sword firmer and freer ...
— The Art of Fencing - The Use of the Small Sword • Monsieur L'Abbat
... were a dog. How could she think a man would look at a woman after he had once seen her! And I can never, never speak to her to tell her! Oh, this cannot be borne!" And in his rage Alessandro threw his pruning-knife whirling through the air so fiercely, it sank to the hilt in one of the old olive-trees. He wished he were dead. He was minded to flee the place. How could he ever look the Senorita ...
— Ramona • Helen Hunt Jackson
... ye're to fa', ye'll fa' at the rear o' thae column as sune as at the heid o' it, an' I'm gey sure the first is the mair honourable place." "Had I two score gallant fellows like you and Zenas," broke in Captain Villiers, grasping the hilt of his sword, "with a couple of companies to support us, I'd guarantee the fort would he taken before a week. Something more will come ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow
... the dagger carefully in her bosom leaving the rubies in the hilt exposed, their ruddy reflections attracting the eye to the hidden beauties of her shape. Francine could not bring herself to leave her mistress. When Marie was ready she made various pretexts to follow her. She must help her to ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... and passion of Christ. The straight cross-hilted sword stood leaning against the wall near the great chimney-piece, but the dagger was still at the belt, a marvel of workmanship, a wonder of temper, a triumph of Eastern art, when almost all art was Eastern. The hilt of solid gold, eight- sided and notched, was cross-chiselled in a delicate but deep design, picked out with rough gems, set with cunning irregularity; the guard, a hollowed disk of steel, graven and inlaid in gold with Kufic characters; ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford
... [According to Collins, Lord Carlisle's brother's name was Charles.] my Lord Carlisle's brother, and another unknown; who, they say, had armor on that they could not be hurt, so that one of their swords went up to the hilt against it. They had horses ready, and are fled. But what is most strange, Howard sent one challenge before, but they could not meet till yesterday at the old Pall Mall at St. James's, and he would not to the last tell Jermyn what the quarrel was; nor do any ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... as shooting, they did!" said Robin; "and when Sir Thomas's gentry yeomen would have seen to it—what? Why, my Lord Admiral's master-player clapped his hand to his poniard-hilt, and dared them come and ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... brass hilt of the cutlass, the polished steel whizzed through the air and crashed into the yellow ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon
... aloud, but it was too late. He plunged it to the hilt in his neck; and his life instantly escaped with the stream that gushed from the wound. He was stretched at my feet; and my hands were sprinkled with ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... gnashed his teeth. For a moment his hand clutched at the hilt of his poniard, but ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... General was reproving Reeder, his eyes, instead of looking at the officer, were fixed upon my sword. It was sufficiently magnificent to attract the attention of anyone, certainly of any soldier. The scabbard was of steel, wonderfully engraved, the hilt was of ivory, and the hilt-guard and belt fastenings were all of heavy gold. The General's ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... Ravignani sat, of whom is sprung The County Guido, and whoso hath since His title from the fam'd Bellincione ta'en. Fair governance was yet an art well priz'd By him of Pressa: Galigaio show'd The gilded hilt and pommel, in his house. The column, cloth'd with verrey, still was seen Unshaken: the Sacchetti still were great, Giouchi, Sifanti, Galli and Barucci, With them who blush to hear the bushel nam'd. Of the Calfucci still the branchy trunk Was in ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... Tchertop-hanov flew off his horse, clutched his dagger, ran straddling among the dogs with furious imprecations, snatched the mangled hare from them, and, creasing up his whole face, he buried the dagger in its throat up to the very hilt... buried it, and began hallooing. Tihon Ivanitch made his appearance on the edge of the thicket 'Ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!' vociferated Tchertop-hanov a second time. 'Ho-ho-ho-ho,' his companion ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev
... enthusiastic people the carriage wound, the chief feature of its progress being the formal crossing of the boundary of ancient London at Temple Bar, where the old ceremony of the submission of the city to the sovereign was performed, the Lord Mayor presenting the hilt of the city sword—"Queen Elizabeth's pearl sword,"—presented by the queen to the corporation during a ceremony in 1570. The touching of the hilt by the queen, in acceptance of submission, completed this ceremony, and the carriage rolled on to St. Paul's ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... dainty private room while respectful officials brought the splendours of the Orient to my lordly knees, and lesser buyers hung unattended over the common counters. Except in the purchase of my first gift for my mother—a tiny diamond sword-hilt, in memory of my father—I have ...
— Margarita's Soul - The Romantic Recollections of a Man of Fifty • Ingraham Lovell
... had been thus secured he opened his mouth terribly wide, and twisted himself right and left, and tried his best to bite the Asa folk. He uttered, moreover, such terrible howls that at length the gods could bear it no longer. So they took a sword and thrust it into his mouth, so that the hilt rested on his lower, and the point against his upper jaw. And there he was doomed to remain until the end of All ...
— Told by the Northmen: - Stories from the Eddas and Sagas • E. M. [Ethel Mary] Wilmot-Buxton
... back of each was sticking the handle of a knife, the blade of which was buried in the flesh to the hilt. ...
— The Old Tobacco Shop - A True Account of What Befell a Little Boy in Search of Adventure • William Bowen
... war, with his faithful suit of armour, formerly polished and well gilded, but which, exposed without ceasing to rain and mist, was now eaten up with rust; he had slung on his back, much as one slings a quiver, a broadsword, so heavy that it took two hands to manage it, and so long that while the hilt reached the left shoulder the point reached the right spur: in a word, he was still the same soldier, brave to rashness but brutal to insolence, recognising nothing but right and force, and always ready to use force when he believed himself ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - MARY STUART—1587 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... fellow shriek for quarter, by merely striking him alongside of the face with my fist. While we were securing the men, Colonel Allen and the boy, Nathan Beman, went up stairs to the door of the room in which Captain Delaplace and his wife were sleeping. Allen gave three loud raps with the hilt of his sword on the door, and with his strong voice, ordered the captain to surrender, or the whole garrison should be slaughtered. Our shouting had awakened the captain and his wife, and they sprang to the door. Delaplace appeared ...
— The Yankee Tea-party - Or, Boston in 1773 • Henry C. Watson
... come to me in time, and before he freed his blade; and it nerved my hand. To draw my-blade at such close quarters was impossible, but, dropping the bag which had saved my life, I dashed my hilt twice in his face with such violence that he fell backwards and lay on the turf, a dark stain growing and ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... in the least. It proves the humbug of the Bimetallic position up to the hilt. Of course, you must assume, that the cannibals desire to dress in evening clothes. I confess that has to be considered, and then the question lies in a nutshell. There can't be two opinions ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, February 1, 1890 • Various
... the sword-hilt Arjun placed his swift and trembling hand, Heedless, with a warrior's instinct drew ...
— Maha-bharata - The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse • Anonymous
... told that on a time Athelstane, who was passing jealous of the power of Harald Fairhair, sent a messenger to Norway bearing a precious sword as a gift to King Harald. The sword was done with gold about the hilt and set with dear bought gems, and well tempered in the blade. So the messenger fared to Lade, in Thrandheim, where Harald dwelt, and said he: 'Here is a sword which the King of England sendeth thee, bidding thee take it withal.' So the king took ...
— Olaf the Glorious - A Story of the Viking Age • Robert Leighton
... tightened. He worked his hand under his prone body, feeling for the hilt of his knife. With that he could speedily remove himself from the status of Throg prisoner, and he would do it gladly if there was no hope of escape. Had there been only one charge left in that blaster? Shann ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... feet of the dancers that the tall masked man was watching. He stood in the crowd near the doorway with his hand upon his sword-hilt, a striking figure remarked by many. His large eyes were fixed upon the shoes of the dancers, until, of a sudden, he seemed to discover that for which he was in search, and made his way quickly after a pair who, having finished a dance, were walking ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... thus dark do you grow? What words to yourselves do you mutter thus low, Of "blood" and "an intriguer"? Oh! ye cannot of murder bring down the red guilt On your souls, my brothers, surely! Though I fear—from the hands that are chafing the hilt, And the hints you ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... and angry words exchanged between one and another of the robbers, as to the matter they were hastily discussing, while the old gentleman remained firm, grasping the hilt of his well-tempered sword, and showing to his enemies, by the stern, deep resolve they read in his eye, that they had not yet conquered him. Fortunately their pistols had all been discharged, or they might have shot the brave old man without coming to closer ...
— The Heart's Secret - The Fortunes of a Soldier, A Story of Love and the Low Latitudes • Maturin Murray
... the Thesbe—the ship I yield to you—lies there," he answered, presenting the hilt of his sword. "There lies the first lieutenant, and there the second, and I, the third, ...
— The Rival Crusoes • W.H.G. Kingston
... the brand Excalibur, And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon, Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt: 55 For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks, Myriads of topaz-lights and jacinth-work Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long That both his eyes were dazzled, as he stood, This way and that dividing the swift mind, 60 In act ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson
... a little, and then I groped my way to the door and knocked on it with the hilt of my sword. The dogs began to bark at the back, and the chorus of a drinking-song, which came fitfully from the east wing, ceased altogether. An inner door opened, and an angry voice, apparently an officer's, began ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman
... gone to sleep with his sword in his arms. These two had slumbered in an embrace, but the weapon had been allowed in time to fall unheeded to the ground. The brass-mounted hilt lay in contact with ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... be the pink and silver as I ran along the paths, And he would stumble after, Bewildered by my laughter. I should see the sun flashing from his sword-hilt and the buckles on his shoes. I would choose To lead him in a maze along the patterned paths, A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover, Till he caught me in the shade, And the buttons of his waistcoat bruised my ...
— The Second Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... harboured better friends. Poor fops, Who've slept in down and satin all your years, Within the circle Lanciotto charmed Round Rimini with his most potent sword!— Fellows whose brows would melt beneath a casque, Whose hands would fray to grasp a brand's rough hilt, Who ne'er launched more than braggart threats at foes!— Girlish companions of luxurious girls!— Danglers round troubadours and wine-cups!—Men Whose best parts are their clothes! bundles of silk, Scented ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... datto had placed the hilt of his sword against the flooring of the porch, the point of the weapon up. The younger man knelt swiftly, holding the sword in this position. Drawing back, the Datto Hakkut hurled himself forward with great force, falling upon the point. Then he tottered sideways, tumbling to the floor of the ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Philippines - or, Following the Flag against the Moros • H. Irving Hancock
... guard. Turnbull was busy settling something loose in his elaborate hilt, and the pause was broken ...
— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... morning they rode out in pursuit, one hundred and eighty-two strong, all on horseback, and all carrying long rifles. There was but one sword among them, which Todd had borrowed from Boon—a rough weapon, with short steel blade and buckhorn hilt. As with most frontier levies, the officers were in large proportion; for, owing to the system of armed settlement and half-military organization, each wooden fort, each little group of hunters or hard-fighting ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Two - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1777-1783 • Theodore Roosevelt
... mind; and so upon a day she thought to slay herself and never to live after Sir Tristram's death. And so upon a day La Beale Isoud gat a sword privily and bare it to her garden, and there she pight the sword through a plum tree up to the hilt, so that it stuck fast, and it stood breast high. And as she would have run upon the sword and to have slain herself all this espied King Mark, how she kneeled down and said: Sweet Lord Jesu, have mercy upon me, for I may not live after the death of Sir Tristram de Liones, for he ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... together, if they presumed to attack me. And as for that monstrous animal with which I was so lately engaged (it was indeed as large as an elephant), if my fears had suffered me to think so far as to make use of my hanger (looking fiercely, and clapping my hand upon the hilt, as I spoke) when he poked his paw into my chamber, perhaps I should have given him such a wound as would have made him glad to withdraw it, with more haste than he put it in. This I delivered in a firm ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan
... coolly the attack of the shark, which was one of the largest of its species, and when it charged him, he stepped quickly aside and plunged his knife into its belly up to the hilt. ...
— The Wizard of the Sea - A Trip Under the Ocean • Roy Rockwood
... had his head bent down in sleep. On a golden throne on the further side of the round table was a king of gigantic stature and august presence. In his hand, held below the hilt, was a mighty sword with scabbard and haft of gold studded with gleaming gems; on his head was a crown set with precious stones which flashed and glinted like so many points of fire. Sleep had set its seal on his ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... drew up before the door, and the officials, dismounting, ascended the steps. Finding it locked, Cartwright lifted the hilt of his sword and dealt a blow ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... had grown fiercely black at the recital of her wrong; and he had laid stern hand upon the hilt of his sword. "By this sword which Queen Eleanor gave me!" he said impetuously; "and which was devoted to the service of all womankind, I take oath that Prince John and all his armies shall not ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... bequeathed the good weapon to Thorstein, his son, and Thorstein, To Odin ascended, bequeathed it to Fridthjof. Whenever he drew it, Light filled the hall as when northern lights entered, or lightning flashed through it. Hammered of gold was the hilt, with strange letters 'twas covered; Wonderful mysteries were they in Northland, but known to the people Who dwell near the gates of the sun, where our fathers lived ...
— Fridthjof's Saga • Esaias Tegner
... where it was at the best. A pair of tawdry ruffles dangled at his wrists, while his throat was nearly bare. He had ornamented his hat with a cluster of peacock's feathers, but they were limp and broken, and now trailed negligently down his back. Girt to his side was the steel hilt of an old sword without blade or scabbard; and some particoloured ends of ribands and poor glass toys completed the ornamental portion of his attire. The fluttered and confused disposition of all the motley scraps that formed his dress, bespoke, in a scarcely less degree than his eager and unsettled ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... looked him in the face and edged towards him fingering with his dripping fingers the hilt of his nimble sword. ...
— Time and the Gods • Lord Dunsany [Edward J. M. D. Plunkett]
... colonel Gainey. Just as they turned Richmond corner, Selim had brought his master near enough to his prey to make a stroke at him with his bayonet. By a sudden jerk, it is supposed, the weapon turned; so that when Macdonald drew back the carbine, he left the bayonet up to the hilt in his back. In this way colonel Gainey rode into town, prodigiously to his own and the mortification of his friends the British ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... everything was changed. In the place of that old haftless dagger, connected with so many historic associations personal to myself, I beheld a Turkish yataghan dangling by its belt of crimson silk, while the jewels in the hilt blazed as the lamplight played upon them. In the spot where hung my cherished smoking cap, memorial of a buried love, a knightly casque was suspended on the crest of which a golden dragon stood in the act of springing. That strange lithograph of Calame was no longer a lithograph, but ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery - Riddle Stories • Various
... severely wounded, but he was not bitten, and was able to struggle to his feet, pointing exultingly to the knife, showing that he had buried the blade to the hilt in the tiger's chest, notwithstanding the suddenness of the attack. The natives generally are poor hunters, lacking courage and coolness, both of which qualities this man clearly evinced. A hundred yards further into the jungle from the spot where this struggle took place was found the monster's ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... example, as a straw basket of twelve champagne bottles with two bottles full and ten empty; a box of lump sugar, broken open, with a stain of spilled red wine on some of the white cubes; a roll of new mattresses jammed into a natural receptacle at the root of an oak tree; a saber hilt of shining brass with the blade missing; a whole set of pewter knives and forks sown broadcast on the bruised and trampled grass. But there was no German relic in the lot —you may be sure of that. Farther down, where the sunken road again wound across our path, we passed an old-fashioned ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... here, and brought for our inspection the splendid sword presented by Congress to General Valencia, with its hilt of brilliants and opals; a beautiful piece of workmanship, which does credit to the Mexican artificers. He was particularly brilliant and eloquent in his conversation to-day—whether his theories are right or ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin, A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin; They fitted with never a wrinkle: his boots were up to the thigh! And he rode with a jewelled twinkle, His pistol butts a-twinkle, His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... Charoba: horror, grief, amaze, Pervaded all the host; all eyes were fixed; All stricken motionless and mute: the feast Was like the feast of Cepheus, when the sword Of Phineus, white with wonder, shook restrained, And the hilt rattled in his marble hand. She heard not, saw not, every sense was gone; One passion banished all; dominion, praise, The world itself was nothing. Senseless man! What would thy fancy figure now from worlds? There is no world to those that grieve and love. ...
— Gebir • Walter Savage Landor
... cloth of gold, cloth of silver, gold tissue, or velvet embroidered, as they thought fit. Their gowns were every whit as costly as those of the ladies. Their girdles were of silk, of the color of their doublets. Every one had a gallant sword by his side, the hilt and handle whereof were gilt, and the scabbard of velvet, of the color of his breeches, the end in gold, and goldsmith's work. The dagger of the same. Their caps were of black velvet, adorned with jewels and buttons of ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... ten paces away from us, casting a shadow so deep that the ground it covered looked like a bottomless abyss. But nevertheless, something bright moved in it—perhaps the sheen of that lone light in an upper window reflected on a knife-hilt or a button—something that moved in time ...
— Affair in Araby • Talbot Mundy
... but the carts reminded me of what the guillotine days must have been in France. He shouted "Good-bye," we shouted "Come to us, if you are wounded"; he smiled and bowed, and I cried, "Use that sword!"—whereupon he sprang to his feet and grasped the hilt as though about to commence. Then came other officers; Mr. Scales, Mr. Barblaud, etc., who smiled recognition, stopped the wagon as Phillie handed up a plate of bread and meat, and talked gayly as they divided it, until the Captain rode up. "On, gentlemen! not a moment to lose!" Then the cart ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... Perhaps, after all, the best way to fight a Chimaera is by getting as close to it as you can. In its efforts to stick its horrible iron claws into its enemy the creature left its own breast quite exposed; and perceiving this, Bellerophon thrust his sword up to the hilt into its cruel heart. Immediately the snaky tail untied its knot. The monster let go its hold of Pegasus, and fell from that vast height downward; while the fire within its bosom, instead of being put out, burned fiercer than ever, and quickly ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... his last bullet into place; he grins as his bayonet snaps from the hilt, and he goes to it hand-to-hand with doubled fists, a tag of a song on his lips, for ...
— Private Peat • Harold R. Peat
... of the well into which it might possibly have been thrown, but the fact of this matter proved very difficult to ascertain. Tying a piece of metal—it was an old Portuguese sword-hilt—to a string, they let it down and found that it touched water at a depth of one hundred and twenty feet, and bottom at a depth of one hundred and forty-seven feet. Therefore there were twenty-seven feet of water. Weighting a bucket they sank it until it ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... Gardeur swore he would have revenge upon the spot. With a wild cry and the strength and agility of a panther he twisted himself out of the grasp of the habitans, and drawing his sword, before any man could stop him, thrust it to the hilt through the body of the Bourgeois, who, not expecting this sudden assault, had not put himself in an attitude of ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... was deftly cutting away the white shirt and the undershirt, and soon had the breast exposed. He examined the gem-studded hilt with the ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... clapped her hands with infernal joy in her countenance. She bade him instantly give her his knife, that she might plunge it to the hilt in the bowl of poison, to which she turned with savage impatience. His knife was left in his cottage, and, under pretence of going in search of it, he escaped. Esther promised to prepare Hector and all his companions ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... turned and disappeared. After the lapse of a few moments a dozen words of command were shouted, and upon them followed the sharp click of hilt on scabbard as the ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... little matter how we face it," said the captain, "it'll come to the same thing in the long run, if we don't manage to make it a short run by taking strong measures. (He touched the hilt of a knife which he wore at all times in his belt.) However, we may as well ...
— Shifting Winds - A Tough Yarn • R.M. Ballantyne
... the column, when, lo, his command was not yet astir, though in the rest of the camp breakfast was over, the tents struck, and officers and men were awaiting the signal to fall in. I rapped with my sword-hilt on the tent-pole, and when the dishevelled head of the colonel appeared, his speechless astonishment told the story of some great blunder. I did not stop for particulars, but only said, "Your brigade, colonel, was to have had the place of honor in an ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox |
