"Ascent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... on they went, flying down the long slope before them, dashed across a little stream at its foot in hot pursuit of the last of the horsemen, and on again along a little track on the other side. The ascent was a little steep beyond the stream, but the ponies struggled gamely up, and then another long slope stretched downward before them, beyond which rose a great bank of heather. The hounds had already reached the heather and were breasting ...
— The Drummer's Coat • J. W. Fortescue
... his native state in 1852, he ascended Mount Washington, accompanied by Rev. A.C. Thompson, pastor of the Eliot Church, Roxbury, and while struggling up the steep ascent, the idea came to him that a railroad to the summit was feasable and that it could be made a profitable enterprise. He obtained a charter for such a road in 1858, but the breaking out of the war postponed action till 1866, when a company was formed and the enterprise ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2 • Various
... the stirrup-irons; but it stirred not and the King said to the sage, 'Go and show him its movement, that he also may help thee to thy wish.' Now the Persian bore the prince malice for that he willed not he should have his sister; so he showed him the peg of ascent on the right side [of the horse's neck] and saying to him, 'Turn this pin,' left him. So the prince turned the pin and forthwith the horse soared with him into the air, as it were a bird, and gave not ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous
... the slope when Grant stopped on the brow of the hill to feast his eyes on the scene that lay before him. It burst upon him with the unexpectedness peculiar to the foothill valleys; miles of gently undulating plain, lying apparently far below, but in reality rising in a sharp ascent toward the snow-capped mountains looking down silently through their gauze of blue-purple afternoon mist. At distances which even his trained eye would not attempt to compute lay little round lakes like silver coins on the surface of the prairie; here and there were dark green bluffs of spruce; ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... toward the brow of the hill, and shortly his great war-horse mounted the ascent and disappeared ...
— The Enchanted Island of Yew • L. Frank Baum
... The precipices rise one above another like the steps of a stairway, climbing, climbing up, though the probable intent of the poet is to represent some one as climbing the ascent.] ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... delicate child, and her frolic did not last long. As the ascent became steeper, her breath grew shorter, and she toiled on in a resolute uncomplaining manner after his long, vigorous steps, till he looked round, and seeing her panting far behind, turned to help her, lead her, and carry her, till the top was achieved, and the little ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... in Dunbartonshire, is perhaps the longest specimen of brittle rhymes ever written. They are signed "Thomas Russell, Oct. 3, 1771," and extend to thirty-six lines, being a poetical description of the ascent to Ben Lomond. What would Dr. Watts have said to such a string of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13 Issue 367 - 25 Apr 1829 • Various
... reflected, looking down at her, she reminded him of flower-brimmed, inaccessible mountain-slopes. He must discover some method of ascent; for the music brought her no nearer; he was aware, indeed, that it removed her. She quite forgot him as ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... they had just fought hand to hand without any advantage of position showed the French troops how hopeless was the task before them; and Kleber's grenadiers, who had been victors in unnumbered battles, now positively refused to attempt the ascent of the ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... same time I induced Minna to go with me for our first ascent of the Righi, a feat we both accomplished very energetically on foot. I was very much grieved on this occasion to discover that my wife had symptoms of heart disease, which continued to develop subsequently. ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner
... followed by Nigel, reached a narrow ledge and walked along it a short distance. On coming to the end of the ledge he jumped down into a mass of undergrowth, where the track again became visible—winding among great masses of weatherworn lava. Here the ascent became very steep, and Moses put on what sporting men call a spurt, which took him far ahead of Nigel, despite the best efforts of the latter to keep up. Still our hero scorned to run or call out to his guide to wait, and thereby admit himself ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... the valour!" said I, smiling, as I recognized in the anecdote the first great step which my father had made in the ascent of fortune. ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... into the world again. It was a painful ascent, and when he looked around him, he recognized the interior of his motorboat cabin, heard and felt the throbbing of his motor, and discovered aches and pains that made his extremities tingle. He sat up, but the blackness that seemed to rise around him caused him to fall hastily back ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... Khaled and Abou-Obeidah, to take Jerusalem. For to the Mussulmans, also, Jerusalem was a holy city. Mahomet, it was said, had been thither; it was thence, indeed, that he had started on his nocturnal ascent to heaven. On approaching the walls, the Arabs repeated these words from the Koran: "Enter we the holy land which God hath promised us." The siege lasted four months. The Christians at last surrendered, but only to Omar in person, who came from Medina to receive their submission. ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... reached by a staircase starting from the door near the north-west corner of the north arm of the transept. The steps were originally built of Roman bricks, but at the time of the restoration had fresh treads of stone laid on them, so that the ascent is an easy one; from this staircase one passes along the triforium gallery of the western side of the transept, and then up a staircase in the turret at the north-west angle of the tower to a room whose floor is above ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Saint Albans - With an Account of the Fabric & a Short History of the Abbey • Thomas Perkins
... country becomes much more broken and undulating, while here and there, from the summit of a hill, elevated above the rest, the view which you command is both striking and extensive. At last, the White Mountain, as it is called, lies before you, and by an easy and almost imperceptible ascent, you arrive at its crest. There it will, indeed, be worth your while to pause; for a finer scene of its kind you will rarely look down upon in any country ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig
... alternately of eight and nine steps. Amy had made the calculation, and wondered what was the cause of this arrangement. The ascent was trying, but then no one could contest the respectability of the abode. In the flat immediately beneath resided a successful musician, whose carriage and pair came at a regular hour each afternoon to take him and his wife for a most respectable drive. In this special building no one ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing
... below us, through which the Rocky river wound its course. It was a most singular and wild looking place, and was not inaptly named by the men, the "Devil's Glen;" looking down from the table land we were upon, the valley beneath appeared occupied by a hundred little hills of steep ascent and rounded summits, whilst through their pretty glens, flowed the winding stream, shaded by many a tree and shrub—the whole forming a most interesting ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... me so, and so it was in the beautiful tale in my book—but you have not heard that yet; but we shall be home directly now, and then I will read it you, and you will see how beautiful it is." And in her eagerness Heidi struggled faster and faster up the steep ascent, and they were no sooner at the top than she let go her grandfather's hand and ran into the hut. The grandfather slung the basket off his shoulders in which he had brought up a part of the contents of the trunk which ...
— Heidi • Johanna Spyri
... "Catholicos" in the Greek tongue, because he presides alone over the whole region. Now at a distance of about one hundred and twenty stades from Doubios on the right as one travels from the land of the Romans, there is a mountain difficult of ascent and moreover precipitous, and a village crowded into very narrow space by the rough country about, Anglon by name. Thither Nabedes withdrew with his whole army as soon as he learned of the inroad of the enemy, and, confident in his strength of position, he shut himself ...
— History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8) - The Persian War • Procopius
... in the morning until sunset, they thought lightly of it as fatigue duty after their eleven months of toil and privation in the wilderness. Fort Mackinac was glittering white on the heights above them, and half-way up a paved ascent leading to the sally-port sauntered 'Tite Laboise. All the voyageurs saw her; and strict as was the discipline of the yard, they ...
— The Black Feather - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... travelling five hours, they came to a halt, ravenously hungry. Dinner was cooked and eaten, and then, after dinner, they began their long ascent of Saddleback, for they were going to a lonely little pond on the second highest mountain in the State of Maine. There, at Camp-in-the-Clouds, was a cabin in which Mrs. Reece could sleep, and the girls, too, if they wished, although they ...
— Little Busybodies - The Life of Crickets, Ants, Bees, Beetles, and Other Busybodies • Jeanette Augustus Marks and Julia Moody
... Harper's Ferry, gathered about the base of a round hill and climbing up its steep acclivity; so that it somewhat resembled the Etruscan cities which I have seen among the Apennines, rushing, as it were, down an apparently break-neck height. About midway of the ascent stood a shabby brick church, towards which a difficult path went scrambling up the precipice, indicating, one would say, a very fervent aspiration on the part of the worshippers, unless there was ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... second speed the car toiled upward through the clinging sand. The pace was snail-like. Behind, the horsemen were gaining rapidly. The labored breathing of their mounts was audible even above the noise of the motor, so close were they. The top of the ascent lay but a few yards ahead, and the pursuers were but a few ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... proceeded by the other road, by which, having crossed the river and the creek for the second time, we arrived at the foot of a hill. Here we halted, and his Lordship sent some of the advance-guard ahead to inspect the road, since from what could be seen at the beginning of the ascent it seemed very bad. They went to examine it, and soon word came back that after the first turn the road was better, so we all went up. The truth is that the overflowing courage, spirit, and desire for fighting which possessed the soldiers, those ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 27 of 55) • Various
... Flaminian Way. At Foligno the passes of the Apennines debouch into the Umbrian plain, which slopes gradually toward the valley of the Tiber, and from it the valley of the Nera is reached by an easy ascent beneath the walls of Spoleto. An army advancing from the north by the Metaurus and the Furlo Pass must find itself at Foligno; and the level champaign round the city is well adapted to the maintenance and exercises of a garrison. In the days of the Republic and the Empire, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... only up the steep jungle path, but up a staircase of two hundred steps in which it terminates, the sagacious animal going up quite cunningly. One charm of a tropical jungle is that every few yards you come upon something new, and every hundred feet of ascent makes a decided difference in the vegetation. This is a very grand forest, with its straight, smooth stems running up over one hundred feet before branching, and the branches are loaded with orchids and trailers. One cannot see what ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... inequalities of the surface of which would be hardly perceptible, though the depth of water upon it now varies from 10,000 to 15,000 feet; and there are places in which Mont Blanc might be sunk without showing its peak above water. Beyond this, the ascent on the American side commences, and gradually leads, for about 300 miles, ...
— Discourses - Biological and Geological Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... Colonel Halkett left the room, and Blackburn Tuckham walked in, not the most entirely self-possessed of suitors, puffing softly under his breath, and blinking eyes as rapidly as a skylark claps wings on the ascent. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the issue of royal blood, and it seemed to him that his position with the Queen, Maria Theresa, was a great injustice of fortune; he thought, nevertheless, that he ought to remain some time longer in this post of inferiority, in order to use it as a ladder of ascent. ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... describe the ascent into heaven and the descent into hell in the Credo of his mass in D. Beethoven's music, indeed, is full of tone-painting, and because it exemplifies a double device I make room for one more illustration. It is from the cantata "Becalmed at Sea, and a Prosperous ...
— How to Listen to Music, 7th ed. - Hints and Suggestions to Untaught Lovers of the Art • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... walking with difficulty over the large, loose stones, rounded by the flow of the stream. The ascent was steep, and the torrent of water that poured down through the ravine increased the trials of its passage. But the wrecked wanderer felt that he was safe from the fury of the savage waves. When he came to a flat rock, only a few feet above the beach, upon which he could step out ...
— The Coming Wave - The Hidden Treasure of High Rock • Oliver Optic
... sound came through the orange boughs, and floated to the ears of the Parson, as he wound slowly up the gentle ascent—so sweet, so silvery, he paused in delight—unaware, wretched man! that he was thereby conniving at Papistical errors. Soft it came, and sweet: softer and sweeter—"Ave Maria!" Violante was chanting ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... the only friend I had in Honduras, and as between him and these strangers who had received us so oddly, I felt that, although it would be to my advantage to be friends with the greater number, my loyalty was owing to Aiken. So I scrambled up beside him and panted out with some difficulty, for the ascent was a steep one: "If there is any row, I'm with ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... which extends from the entrance to the door of the lecture-hall. It is finished in light wood, and the design of the staircase is particularly tasteful, while the stairs themselves are very easy of ascent. To the left of the entrance is the Dean's room, 19 x 19, finished in cherry; and next on the left is a part of the library, which is finished in white-wood. In the rear is the lecture-hall, where everything has been done to combine light and air with comfort. The hall is something over fifty-two ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 3, March, 1886 - Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 3, March, 1886 • Various
... offered here and there certain facilities for climbing, though to do so looked like certain death. The men, however, were quite reckless, and knew if they could get to the top they would be safe, so they determined to attempt the rest of the ascent. ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... the dingle, there to wait until he should hear his master's call. Then tightening his belt to make his knife and hatchet more secure, and reassuring himself that Betsy Grumbo was in tip-top "bitin' order," our hero addressed himself to the scaling of the enemy's height. Half the ascent accomplished brought him almost to the brow of the hill, where its slower slope abruptly ended in the steep acclivity which he had just scaled, and here he could distinguish a faint murmur of voices from above. He was slowly ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... Iowa, all of which were ultimately to converge at Council Bluffs. Thence across the coffee-colored Missouri, over rolling prairies, and up the slowly curving line of the Platte, stretched an easily rising ascent, which, engineers affirmed, had been graduated by nature as the most direct and practicable route for the interoceanic railroad. As yet no one of these Iowa lines was complete; but they all had a corporate existence, and their stockholders formed ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various
... "poetic" or "making" force of all, creating a world of its own out of a glance, or a sigh: and the want of passion is perhaps the truest death, or "unmaking" of everything;—even of stones. By the way, you were all reading about that ascent of the Aiguille Verte, ...
— The Ethics of the Dust • John Ruskin
... sauntered out of the cottages, and then, thinking that a visitor had come, under the guidance of Miss Beatrice, to look at the antiquities of the Castle, which was the show place of the neighbourhood, sauntered back again. Then the pair began the zigzag ascent of the rock mountain, till at last they stood beneath the mighty mass of building, which, although it was hoary with antiquity, was by no means lacking in the comforts of modern civilization, the water, for instance, being ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... with its stupendous spectacle as of heaven and hell made visible, naturally produced a profound impression, but it was a very tiring expedition, as apparently it was only Claire who had a chaise a porteurs for the ascent of the cone; Mary and Shelley rode on mules as far as they could go, and Claire was carried all the way in a chair—though this seems scarcely possible—from Resina. How Mary could walk through the cinders up the cone seems ...
— Mrs. Shelley • Lucy M. Rossetti
... supported. The entrance was by a step-ladder, and through a trap-door, against which, when he reached it, Paco gave two very slight but peculiar taps. Thereupon a bolt was cautiously withdrawn, and the trap raised; the muleteer completed the ascent of the steps, entered the loft, and found himself face to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... my forehead, for I understood what he meant, but that was a side issue, and, answering nothing, I scanned the slope for some way of ascent. There was none, and nothing without wings could have gained the valley. ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... every cabbage grower is a disease of the branching roots, producing a bunchy, gland-like enlargement, known in different localities under the name of club foot, stump foot, underground head, finger and thumb. The result is a check in the ascent of the sap, which causes a defective vitality. There are two theories as to the origin of club foot; one that it is a disease caused by poor soil, bad cultivation, and unsuitable manures; the other that the injury is done by an insect enemy, Curculio contractus. It is held ...
— Cabbages and Cauliflowers: How to Grow Them • James John Howard Gregory
... Desire for height appears also in the Egyptian pyramid and the Babylonian ziggurat, but both these had means of ascent to the higher levels. Cf. below, ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy
... surface into rugged ridges. Between them and below were spread the meadowed alpine parks or abandoned cirques—veritable fairylands—which had been carved out by these superhuman agencies eons before. Barely distinguishable was the road by which I had made the circuitous ascent, bending back and forth across the face of an apparently perpendicular wall, while the glacial streams glittering in the sunshine, resembled huge serpents lying in the profound hollows ...
— The Beauties of the State of Washington - A Book for Tourists • Harry F. Giles
... Copperases and removed to Talbot's house. With this event commenced a new era in his existence: he was no longer an outcast and a wanderer; out of alien ties he had wrought the link of a close and even paternal friendship; life, brilliant in its prospects and elevated in its ascent, opened flatteringly before him; and the fortune and courage which had so well provided for the present were the best omens and auguries for ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... begins, "that the descent was eternal; and that I was burying myself in the depths of Erebus: at last, I reached a level place,—and I heard a mournful voice deliver these words, as it were, to the secret centre of the earth—'He will mount that ascent no more!'—Immediately I heard arise towards me, from the depth of invisible abysses, a myriad of formidable voices united in a strange chant—'Let us destroy him! Let him be destroyed! What does he here among the dead? ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Christ imposes heavy responsibilities upon his surviving brethren. The interests of the race of which he was an honored representative are imperilled. Their noble champion has gone up higher; but no waiting Elisha saw the ascent, and cried, 'My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof'; so who can hope to wear his mantle and continue ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... of the "Forty Wazirs" by an author self-termed "Shaykh Zadeh." It is called the "History of Chec Chahabeddin" (Shaykh Shihab al-Din), and it has a religious significance proving that the Apostle did really and personally make the "Mi'raj" (ascent to Heaven) and returned whilst his couch was still warm and his upset gugglet had not run dry. The tale is probably borrowed from Saint Paul, who (2 Cor. xii. 4) was "caught up into Paradise," which in those days was a kind of region that ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... that a watchful care was needed. The smallest divergence from the beaten track would have precipitated the team and cutter into a snow-drift from which it would have been impossible to extricate it without a smash-up. Once safely across this he allowed the horses to climb the opposite ascent leisurely. They had done well—he had covered the distance in less than ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum
... The ascent into the intensely bright moonlight was certainly not good for the nerves of Lightning Speed, and when Hollyhock headed him for the leap which he must take, just for a brief, very brief, moment he hesitated. But he loved his mistress. Ah, how much he loved ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade
... colony, kirk and manse, garden and graveyard, finds harbourage in a grove of rowans, and is all the year round in a great silence broken only by the drone of the bees, the tinkle of the burn, and the bell on Sundays. A mile beyond the kirk the road leaves the valley by a precipitous ascent, and brings you a little after to the place of Hermiston, where it comes to an end in the back-yard before the coach-house. All beyond and about is the great field, of the hills; the plover, the curlew, and the lark cry there; the wind blows as it blows in ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... pacifying her, and she essayed the ascent; then, however, she had to be stopped while the old woman cautioned her about the floor of the garret. They had no real floor—they had laid old boards in one part to make a place for the family to live; it ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... insisted that the vapor was antiphlogistic. Whichever way he went, I think (fair-minded as he is) he must be by this time convinced of his error, and I shall accordingly enter him in my Report as discharged cured. I may add, as an interesting scientific fact, that his ascent was accompanied by such a sudden and violent fall of the barometer (which he had in his lap) that the instrument was broken. This would seem to prove a considerable decrease in the weight of the atmosphere at the moment ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... escape by it were possible. But this attempt, too, was fruitless, for the chimney, built in the old fashion, rose in a perfectly perpendicular line from the hearth, to a height of nearly fourteen feet above the roof, affording in its interior scarcely the possibility of ascent, the flue being smoothly plastered, and sloping towards the top like an inverted funnel; promising, too, even if the summit were attained, owing to its great height, but a precarious descent upon the sharp and steep-ridged roof; ...
— Two Ghostly Mysteries - A Chapter in the History of a Tyrone Family; and The Murdered Cousin • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... quite radiant. I walked the greater part of the way, which was like going up the Monument." On the day the letter was written they had been up to the Mer de Glace, finding it not so beautiful in colour as in summer, but grander in its desolation; the green ice, like the greater part of the ascent, being covered with snow. "We were alarmingly near to a very dismal accident. We were a train of four mules and two guides, going along an immense height like a chimney-piece, with sheer precipice below, when there came rolling from above, with fearful velocity, a block ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... wire Somerset had no difficulty in keeping his course, till he reached a point in the ascent of a hill at which the telegraph branched off from the road, passing through an opening in the hedge, to strike across an undulating down, while the road wound round to the left. For a few moments Somerset doubted and stood still. The wire sang on overhead with dying falls and melodious ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... walk leading to the summer-house branched off in two directions. One path led across the churchyard, immediately up the face of the rock. The other, into which he struck, wound away to the left, with a more gradual ascent, through a pretty shrubbery. Where the two paths joined again, a seat had been made, where he stopped a few moments to rest; and then, following the now single road, he found himself, after scrambling along among steps and slopes of all sorts and kinds, conducted at ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... got to the wall, and had nearly gained half the ascent, when I heard a voice at the garden-door, crying, "Holloa! who is there? who opened the door?" The man received no answer, and the night was too dark for him to distinguish objects at any distance. He therefore returned, ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... and a part of the following morning; then, having climbed a fairly steep ascent, they suddenly found themselves at the border of the wood, and beheld at their feet a plain covered by a yellowish sky, and crossed by four white roads, which lost themselves in the mist. They took ...
— The Miracle Of The Great St. Nicolas - 1920 • Anatole France
... the old man began to ascend the stairs. As he toiled on before, with his palm upon the stair-rail, and his long black skirt, a very gaberdine, overhanging each successive step, he might have been the leader in some pilgrimage of devotional ascent to a prophet's tomb. Not troubled by any such weak imagining, Fascination Fledgeby merely speculated on the time of life at which his beard had begun, and thought once more what a good 'un he was for ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... she hung upon his shoulder, clinging desperately, while he made that perilous ascent. He went up with amazing agility, as if he were entirely unencumbered. She felt the strength of his great frame beneath her, and marvelled. Again the magnetic force of the man possessed her, stilling all fear. She shut her eyes dizzily, but she ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... passage of the great St. Bernard, though so long known by its ancient and hospitable convent, the most elevated habitation in Europe, and in these later times so famous for the passage of a conquering army is but a secondary alpine pass, considered in reference to the grandeur of its scenery. The ascent, so inartificial even to this hour, is loner and comparatively without danger, and in general it is sufficiently direct, there being no very precipitous rise like those of the Gemmi, the Grimsel, and various other passes in Switzerland and Italy, ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... was the gorge, nearer and bleaker rose the mountains, steeper and more palpable became the ascent, keener and crisper grew the air, as the evening fell upon us pursuing our devious way. The valleys were not only insignificant but widely separated by tracts through which the road had with difficulty and at much expense ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... than twelve feet water.[22] There the traveller embarks in a bonjo, (a flat-bottomed boat,) or in a canoe, made of the trunk of a cedar-tree, grown on the banks to an enormous size. The velocity of the downward current is equal to three miles an hour, and greater towards the source. The ascent is consequently tedious; often the rowers are compelled to pole the boat along, a task, under a burning sun, which could only be performed by negroes. In the upper part of the stream the navigation is obstructed by shallows, so much so as to render ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... and all, in a corner of the old haircloth sofa which ran across the end of the room, and, with his hands in his pockets, he sauntered into the china closet and sat down on the little step-ladder that stood there, ready to lead to an ascent to the ...
— Teddy: Her Book - A Story of Sweet Sixteen • Anna Chapin Ray
... children (Centralblatt fuer Nervenheilkunde, January, 1903). In France, rapes and offences against modesty are most numerous in May, June, and July, as Villerme, Lacassagne, and others have shown. Villerme, investigating 1,000 such cases, found a gradual ascent in frequency (only slightly broken in March) to a maximum in June (oscillating between May and July, when the years are considered separately), and then a gradual descent to a minimum in December. Legludic gives, for the 159 cases ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... the meantime, was preparing the apparently lifeless Grace Dodge for the ascent. As he gave the signal those on the roof ...
— The High School Left End - Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron • H. Irving Hancock
... next descent. Meanwhile, the diver, working face downward, is filling the basket with oysters with speed. When the basket is filled or breath exhausted, the diver signals, and is drawn up as rapidly as possible by the rope attached to the basket, and a specially agile diver facilitates the ascent by climbing hand over hand on the line When a man has been in the water half an hour, and made perhaps seven or eight descents, he clambers aboard the boat for a rest and a sunbath, and in a few minutes is taking part in the interminable chatter ...
— East of Suez - Ceylon, India, China and Japan • Frederic Courtland Penfield
... sitteth there His soul within him, like a child that lies Half dreaming, with half-open eyes, At close of a long afternoon in summer— High ruins round him, ancient ruins, where The raven is almost the only comer— Half dreams, half broods, in wonderment At thy celestial ascent Through rifted loop to light upon the gold That waves its bloom in some high airy rent: So dreams the old man's soul, that is not old, But sleepy ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... Jr., though never unkindly, dragged me with him, even to make the balloon ascent at the Porte Maillot on a windy evening. Without embarrassment I confess that I was terrified, that I clung to the ropes with a clutch which frayed my gloves, while Poor Jr. leaned back against the side of the basket ...
— The Beautiful Lady • Booth Tarkington
... you will in imagination to the summit of the Lion's Mound. A flight of 225 stone steps will take us there, a toilsome ascent in this chilling air and this persistent rain. Toward Mont St. Jean, the surface of the ground is rolling, the waves of it high enough to conceal standing men from view. Except the lofty poplars at the road sides, there are no trees. An admirable place for an army on the defensive, you will at once ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 4 (of 10) • Various
... almost as suddenly as it had left them, served to light the travellers in the remainder of the ascent, and called forth from the Mahomedans belonging to the party the morning prayer of Alla Akber, which resounded in long notes among the rocks and ravines, and they continued with better advantage their forced march ...
— The Surgeon's Daughter • Sir Walter Scott
... in snow. The scenery was magnificent, and became every moment more wonderful as we slowly climbed the steep ascent in front of us; range after range of snow-capped mountains disclosed themselves to our view, rising higher and higher into the air, until at last, towering above all, Nanga Parbat[4] in all her spotless beauty was revealed to our ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... meditations is the Wanderer's attention called outwards; for now the Valley closes in abruptly, intersected by a huge mountain mass, the stony water-worn ascent of which is not to be accomplished on horseback. Arrived aloft, he finds himself again lifted into the evening sunset light; and cannot but pause, and gaze round him, some moments there. An upland irregular expanse of wold, where valleys in complex branchings ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... reproduce, their liveliest presentments. That is why when Plato speaks of visible things it is as if you saw them. He who in the Symposium describes so vividly the pathway, the ladder, of love, its joyful ascent towards a more perfect beauty than we have ever yet actually seen, by way of a parallel to the gradual elevation of mind towards perfect [136] knowledge, knew all that, we may be sure—ta erotika —hetton ton kalon ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... hundred miles the line is already available; and in this distance are reckoned forty-four locks, and several noble aqueducts, in an ascent of a ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... Evoluting Energy. Three stages in the elemental side; the mineral kingdom; three stages in the objective physical side—these are the seven links of the evolutionary chain. A descent of spirit into matter, equivalent to an ascent in physical evolution; a re-ascent from the deepest depths of materiality (the mineral) towards its status quo ante, with a corresponding dissipation of concrete organisms up to Nirvana—the vanishing point of differentiated matter. Perhaps a ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... Comfortable quarters for the hut, ice for water, snow for the animals, good slopes for ski-ing, vast tracks of rock for walks. Proximity to the Barrier and to the rookeries of two types of penguins—easy ascent of Mount Terror—good ground for biological work—good peaks for observation of all sorts—fairly easy approach to the Southern Road, with no chance of being cut off—and so forth. It is a thousand pities to have to abandon such ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott
... of an August morning. There were larks singing in the pale blue above his head; a landrail sent up its harsh cry from the meadow on the left; the crow of a cock rose clear from the valley. He looked about him, and rode briskly on down the incline in front of him and up the ascent beyond. He rode again with his company of ghosts—phantoms of people with whom upon this road he had walked and ridden and laughed, ghosts of old thoughts and recollected words. He came to a thick grove of trees, a broken fence, a gateway with no gate. Inattentive ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason
... Laughing Bill ascended Anvil Mountain for a second time, but the exertion did not wind him unduly, for he made the ascent at the end of Don Antonio's tail. He was back in camp for breakfast, and despite his lack of sleep he performed his menial duties during the day with more ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... Serapis, in Alexandria, was most stately and rich, built on an eminence raised by art, in a beautiful spacious square, with an ascent of one hundred steps, surrounded with lofty edifices for the priests and officers. The temple was built of marble, supported with precious pillars, and the walls on the inside were covered with plates of brass, silver, and gold. The idol was of so enormous a size, that its ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... on the mountain banks, the first twenty-five li is by the river. At the half-way place a fearful ascent is experienced, the most notable precipice on the route between Sui-fu and Yuen-nan-fu, up a broad zigzag path, and as I sat at dinner I could see neither top nor bottom owing to the overhanging masses of rock: this is after having negotiated ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... of this may be regarded as the effect of disappointed views and an inverted ambition. Prevented by native pride and indolence from climbing the ascent of learning or greatness, taught by political opinions to say to the vain pomp and glory of the world, "I hate ye," seeing the path of classical and artificial poetry blocked up by the cumbrous ornaments of style and turgid common-places, so ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... to redeem it from the Saracens. Enthusiasm plunged Europe into a thirty years' war over religion. Enthusiasm sent three small ships plying the unknown sea to the shores of a new world. When Napoleon's army were worn out and discouraged in their ascent of the Alps, the Little Corporal stopped them and ordered the bands to play the Marseillaise. Under its soul-stirring strains there were ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... glutinous substance, dried hard in the sun. I could not be so cruel as to break it in pieces, to gratify my curiosity; but I suppose it must have contained some treasure that was dear to them—probably their eggs. They would labor and tug, with their long arms, to roll it up an ascent; and if it rolled back again, they would patiently return, and roll it up, showing an example of perseverance well ...
— Anecdotes for Boys • Harvey Newcomb
... her words, looks, manner and emotions at the time he first pressed his suit upon her. The result was far from satisfactory. She had not met his advances as he had hoped; but rather fled from him—and he had gained her only by pursuit. Her ascent had not come warmly from her heart, but burdened with a sigh. Mr. Dexter felt that though she was his, she had not been fairly ...
— The Hand But Not the Heart - or, The Life-Trials of Jessie Loring • T. S. Arthur
... many places hollows filled with furze and broom; in others little dingles of stunted brushwood. A thicket of the latter description crowned the hill up which the party ascended. The foremost of the band, being the stoutest and most active, had pushed on, and having surmounted the ascent, were out of ken for the present. Gilfillan, with the pedlar, and the small party who were Waverley's more immediate guard, were near the top of the ascent, and the remainder straggled after them at a ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... without another thought of the aged creature toiling up the ascent. No one appeared to ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley
... reminding one of old roofs seen in the French quarter. The lowest story is of stone, plastered, and whitewashed. Such a house is very warm, very durable; and painted by the successive changes of winter and summer, the external appearance is altogether pleasing. Our ascent was gradual; with stately houses one after another, and fruit-trees on the sheltered side. In the balconies, pots of bright-hued flowers, and sometimes a ...
— Scenes in Switzerland • American Tract Society
... She told of the ascent of the mountains of Ersiphonia, the journey to Tartessus, and the war against Masisabal to avenge ...
— Salammbo • Gustave Flaubert
... from the north-west entrance, and shows the character of the groined roof, the supporting pillars, and the entrance to the Bishop's Chapel adjoining, by an ascent of two steps; this Chapel being named from the Tomb of Bishop Andrews, formerly standing in the centre of it. We recommend the reader to a clever paper in the Gentleman's Megazine for the present month, in which the writer proves that Our Lady's Chapel, so far from being an ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19. No. 534 - 18 Feb 1832 • Various
... rope, which does not hold so fast." A loop or hoop embracing the body of the climber and the tree, is a helpful addition. Large nails carried in a bag slung round the waist, to be driven into the bare trunk of the tree, will facilitate its ascent. Gimlets may be used for the same purpose. High walls can be climbed by help of this description; a weight attached to one end of a rope, being first thrown over the wall, and the climber assisting himself ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... set off for the foot of the mountain, our party amounting to about eighty people. The guides led the way, followed by the Europeans; and the Dyaks, with the luggage, brought up the rear. In this order we commenced the ascent. Each person was provided with a bamboo, which was found indispensable; and thus, like a party of pilgrims, we proceeded on our way; and before we had gone very far, we discovered that we were subjected to severe penance. The mountain ...
— Borneo and the Indian Archipelago - with drawings of costume and scenery • Frank S. Marryat
... balloon of Professor Charles. The first aeronaut—Pilatre de Rozier. First ascents in Great Britain; James Tytler and Vincenzo Lunardi. Lunardi's narrative. Dr. Johnson and Horace Walpole on balloons. The Great Nassau. The balloon as a spectacle. Scientific work of James Glaisher. His highest ascent, September 5, 1862. Pioneers of aviation—Sir George Cayley, John Stringfellow. Foundation of Aeronautical Society, 1866. Francis Wenham's paper on aerial locomotion. Fermentation of ideas. The study of soaring birds—Cayley, M. Mouillard. The gliders; stories of ...
— The War in the Air; Vol. 1 - The Part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force • Walter Raleigh
... the boy sees how the notion of property naturally goes back to the right of the first occupant as derived from labour. We should have thought it less troublesome, as it is certainly more important, to teach a boy the facts of property positively and imperatively. This rather elaborate ascent to origins seems an exaggerated form of that very vice of over-instructing the growing reason in abstractions, which Rousseau had condemned ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... year 866—that of Ethelred's ascent of the throne—to the year 887 seem to be the work of one mind. Not a single year is passed over, and to several is granted considerable space, especially to the years 871, 878, and 885. The whole has gained a certain roundness and fulness, because the events—nearly all ...
— Anglo-Saxon Grammar and Exercise Book - with Inflections, Syntax, Selections for Reading, and Glossary • C. Alphonso Smith
... the lot to take the ashes from the altar, took them; and they said to him, "be careful that thou touch not the vessels, till thou dost sanctify thy hands and thy feet from the laver." And the ash dish was placed in the corner between the ascent to the altar and the west of the ascent. No man entered with the priest, and there was no candle in his hand, but he walked toward the light of the fire on the altar. They did not see him, and they did not hear his voice, till they heard the creaking of ...
— Hebrew Literature
... interpretation of the third (and inferior) member of the Prajniki Triad. The Bodhisattwa or Sangha continues to be such until he has surmounted the very last grade of that vast and laborious ascent by which he is instructed that he can 'scale the heavens,' and pluck immortal wisdom from its resplendent source: which achievement performed, he becomes a Buddha, that is, an Omniscient Being, and a Tathagata—a title ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... Whitsuntide Island to the north side of Ambrym is two leagues and a half. This is about seventeen leagues in circuit; its shores are rather low, but the land rises with an unequal ascent to a tolerably high mountain in the middle of the island, from which ascended great columns of smoke; but we were not able to determine whether this was occasioned by a volcano or not. That it is fertile and ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... might be allowed to mention a young lady's legs, on any terms, I would observe of Miss Slowboy's that there was a fatality about them which rendered them singularly liable to be grazed; and that she never effected the smallest ascent or descent, without recording the circumstance upon them with a notch, as Robinson Crusoe marked the days upon his wooden calendar. But as this might be considered ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... I was unaccountably conveyed into the most delicious Place mine Eyes ever beheld, it was a large Valley divided by a River of the purest Water I had ever seen. The Ground on each Side of it rose by an easie Ascent, and was covered with Flowers of an infinite Variety, which as they were reflected in the Water doubled the Beauties of the Place, or rather formed an Imaginary Scene more beautiful than the real. On each Side of the River was a Range of lofty ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... face, stamping with his foot fiercely enough to break a hole through the very earth; though, indeed, it could not exactly be said that the green grass bent beneath him. The figure, noticed as coming behind all the rest, had now surmounted the ascent from the mill, and proved to be an elderly lady with something in ...
— An Old Woman's Tale - (From: "The Doliver Romance and Other Pieces: Tales and Sketches") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... boat-landing was steep, but Mistress Kate had often run like a young deer to the top of it without appreciating its difficulties as she did that evening. On every stepping-stone, each steep ascent, she lingered, in spite of her expressed desire for haste, and each time his strong and steady arm was at her service. She tasted to the full and for the first time ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... I was under the impression that I was going to take part in the inauguration of some score miles of railway, opening out a new route to the Far West. That this was an erroneous idea was more my fault than my misfortune. After trying on foot an ascent from Lynmouth to Lynton, I came to the conclusion that this line of railway was of far greater importance than any other in existence. That the track was rather less than a thousand feet, instead of being rather more ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, 19 April 1890 • Various
... Annapolis. Then he pitched upon a spot for the settlement, and employed his people in clearing the ground for laying the foundations of a town; but some inconveniences being discovered in this situation, he chose another to the northward, hard by the harbour, on an easy ascent, commanding a prospect of the whole peninsula, and well supplied with rivulets of fresh and wholesome water. Here he began to build a town on a regular plan, to which he gave the name of Halifax, in honour of the nobleman who had the greatest share in founding the colony; and before ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... would be the best line of communication between the countries of Central Asia and Sinde; and as far as the Pass is concerned itself, it is quite guiltless of the bad character it holds. It is merely the bed of a winter torrent, and is an easy ascent the whole way through; and during the greater part of the year quite passable for any description, of conveyance; but in consequence of the great number of robbers, from all parts of Beloochistan and Sinde, who infest it, no one thinks of ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... Arrival in the River Nun. Attack of the Natives. Impolitic Conduct of Lander. Return of Richard Lander to Fernando Po. Return of Lander to Attah. Reconciliation of the Damaggoo Chiefs. Abolition of the Sacrifices of Human Beings. Rabba. Ascent of the River Tchadda. Prophecy of King Jacket. Lander wounded by the Natives. Approaching Death of Lander. Death of Richard Lander. Infamous Conduct of Liverpool Merchants. Causes of the Attack. Meeting of the ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... declined over a long, gradual slope. At the bottom of it was a broad, almost dried-out slough. A wooden culvert spanned the reed-grown watercourse. Then the trail made a sharpish ascent beyond, and lost itself behind a distant bush, beyond which again stretched out ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum |
