"Picket" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and Joel and Dell were excused, to water and picket the horses. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself," resumed Forrest, "brow-beating that boy. Considering my hard luck, I've fallen into angels' hands. These boys are darling fellows. Now before you leave, square yourself with ...
— Wells Brothers • Andy Adams
... that it brought out the entire household. It was getting dark, but sufficiently light to see one approaching on horse back. The dogs were called off, and he heard a voice exclaim ride up. A very handsome picket fence surrounded the house, and upon arriving at the gate he was met by a fine looking old English gentleman, who invited him to dismount and have his horse stabled. Thanking him for his kindness, he at once dismounted, and taking the extended hand of the old ...
— The Dismal Swamp and Lake Drummond, Early recollections - Vivid portrayal of Amusing Scenes • Robert Arnold
... reached Hedgesville, the point on the Potomac where it was designed to cross. Here they bivouacked for the night, a select party of some thirty men being sent across the river, their purpose being to capture the Federal picket on the Maryland side. In this they failed, but the picket was cut off from its reserve, so that the fugitives were not able to report the attack. Day had not dawned when all the men were in their saddles, and as soon as word of the result of the night's enterprise was received, the foremost troops ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... lips— Kiss clean from the fumes that were, And gulls shall herald waking days With news of far-seen water-ways All warm, and passing fair. They've cast the shore-lines loose at last And coiled the wet hemp down— Cut picket-ropes of Kedar's tents, Of time-clock task and square-foot rents! Good luck to you, old town! Oh, Africa is calling back Alluringly and low And few they be who hear the voice, But they obey—Lot's wife's the choice, And we must ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... Joe unwrapped the lead-rope from the saddle horn and took the horses away to picket, he wondered what wonderful adventure she would have to relate, for she seemed able to extract entertainment from nearly anything. By the time he returned she had removed her hat, gloves and spurs, washed her dust-streaked face, smoothed her hair, slipped on an enveloping ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... in three years, and naturally humour broke out all over me. When joy spreads its wings in my vitals, I sound like a boy with a stick running past a picket-fence. Not so Morrow. He slopped over the sides of his seat, like he'd ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... saw him doing picket duty in Fairfax County. When Stuart was promoted to brigadier general, and Captain Jones took his place as colonel of the First Virginia, Mosby became the latter's adjutant. There should have been ...
— Rebel Raider • H. Beam Piper
... serious outflanking movement on part of the Blues. Sorry, but that's the worst of being picket. The natural intuition which characterizes all BSS will enable you to discern our ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... the boys crossin' the old ford," he said quietly. "Goin' to picket the other bank, I reckon. There's likely to be some more comin' down the opposite way from the bridge. That's Lacy's idea—to ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish
... I also go occasionally on long tours through the camps, talking with the men, etc.; sometimes at night among the groups around the fires, in their shebang enclosures of bushes. I soon get acquainted anywhere in camp, with officers or men, and am always well used. Sometimes I go down on picket with the ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs
... no!' says he, holding up his finger. 'I will take my revenge how and when I please. We are enough of the same family to understand each other, perhaps; and the reason why I have not had you arrested on your arrival, why I had not a picket of soldiers in the first clump of evergreens, to await and prevent your coming—I, who knew all, before whom that pettifogger, Romaine, has been conspiring in broad daylight to supplant me—is simply this: that I had not made up my mind how I ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... building was 7000 dollars, and the additions have made it worth about 3000 dollars more. At first all was swamp and stumps, but the earth taken from the excavations helped to fill up the low spots, and in time, after considerable labour, the place began to look quite presentable, and a picket fence was put up along the roadway in front. On the side nearest the river were the carpenters cottage and shop (in one), which have already been mentioned, on the right, and on the left another cottage of the same dimensions, ...
— Missionary Work Among The Ojebway Indians • Edward Francis Wilson
... of the Choctaws when you leave? Will they be sufficient to picket and scout on the other side of the river far enough to give notice of any advance of the enemy down the river? I do not wish it to be generally known that Cabell's forces are under my command, but ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel
... picked men, and felt a just pride in wearing the blue. As fast as we obtained enough recruits they were formed into regiments, officered and sent to the front. When men became scarce in the city we made trips into the country, often going beyond the Union picket line, and generally reaping a harvest of slaves. These expeditions brought an element of danger into our lives, for our forage parties were fired into by the enemy more than once, but we always succeeded in bringing back our men with us. The black ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... up, and started off a-courtin'. Wal, the parson come to the house, and he war tickled to pieces with the looks o' things outside, 'cause the house is all well shingled and painted, and there ain't a picket loose nor a ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... reason why you should not be permitted to join this command. I want you to understand, though, that every man admitted to it is chosen solely for personal merit, and not through friendship or any influence, political or otherwise, that he may possess. Now you may take that horse to the picket-line, see that it is properly cared for, and report at my quarters in half ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... missed the bright warmth on the piazza, and began to walk back and forth by way of keeping warm. A gravelled path led to the gate and on either side was a row of lilac bushes, the bare stalks tipped with green. A white picket fence surrounded the yard, except at the back, where the edge of the precipice made it useless. The place was small and well kept, but there were no flower beds except at the front of the house, and there were ...
— Lavender and Old Lace • Myrtle Reed
... into a hearty roar, and were then escorted through the gate-way and over the drawbridge beyond the strong picket stationed by the earthwork. Here ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn
... ever closing his eyes, till Mohun returned. The latter looked fresh and alert; he had slept for the time he had allotted to himself quite calmly and comfortably; the old habits of picket-duty had taught him to watch or ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... a loud and endless humming arose from the great blue crowds bivouacked in the streets. From time to time a sharp spatter of firing from far picket lines entered this bass chorus. The smell from the smouldering ruins floated on ...
— The Little Regiment - And Other Episodes of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... guns. Federal artillery occupied the fort, and the lines immediately in front of it were held by the "Department Battalion," composed of the clerks in the various government offices in Richmond, who had been ordered out to meet an emergency. Just before sundown the detail for picket duty was formed, and about to march out to the picket line, the clerks presenting quite a soldierly appearance. Suddenly bang! went a gun in the fort, and a shell came tearing over. Bang! again, and bang! bang! and more shells exploding. Pow! pow! what consternation! In an instant ...
— Detailed Minutiae of Soldier life in the Army of Northern Virginia, 1861-1865 • Carlton McCarthy
... the scrub to a strip of green grass beyond which were the great trees, the palms, and the festooned vines of a watercourse. Two bush bucks plunged into the thicket as we approached, and fifteen or twenty mongooses sat up as straight and stiff as so many picket pins ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... (let me admit it frankly) we were to a great degree selfish. As you are aware, the essence of humor is surprise: we found a delicious humor in our campaign of surprising woebegone humanity in moments of crisis. For instance, we used to picket the railway terminals to console commuters who had just missed their trains. We found it uproariously funny to approach a perspiring suburbanite, who had missed the train (let us say) to Mandrake Park, and to press upon him, with the compliments of the Corporation, ...
— In the Sweet Dry and Dry • Christopher Morley
... small stature but very thickset, with their wide smooth faces, loose clothing of sheepskin with the wool outside, with their long coarse hair flying in the wind, and their uncouth shouts in a barbarous tongue, are much like savages. They sing wild chants as they picket their sheep in long double lines at night, and with their savage mastiffs sleep unsheltered under the frosty skies under the lee of their piled-up saddlebags. On three nights I camped beside their caravans, and walked round their orderly lines of sheep and their neat walls of saddlebags; and, ...
— Among the Tibetans • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs Bishop)
... music," said the old chief, "when you came up. Some of our young men have gone up, indeed, to the picket yonder, to hear the harper sing, whose voice you catch sometimes, ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale
... with him leaped ashore, and clambered up the steep hill, holding by the roots and boughs of the maple, spruce and ash trees, that covered the declivity, and with but little difficulty dispersed the picket which guarded the height. At daybreak General Wolfe, with his battalions, stood on the plains of Abraham. When the news was carried to Montcalm, he said, "They have at last got to the weak side of this miserable garrison; we must give battle, and crush them before mid-day." Before ten ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... August 26th, occupying the inner picket line at night, and training by day. On that date the Brigade moved to er Rabah, a large palm grove, a mile or so north of Katia, which it closely resembled. After reveille at 3.45 a.m., and breakfast at 4.30, the ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... Just then the picket gave a low, earnest whistle, and they were aware of a policeman standing statue-like under the lamp on the opposite corner, and apparently unaware of their existence. He was looking, sphinx-like, past them towards ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... shouted down the rocky flanks of the ravine. There is instant response in the neigh of excited horses, the clatter of iron-shod hoofs. Through the dim light the men go rushing, saddles and bridles in hand, each to where he has driven his own picket pin. Promptly the steeds are girthed and bitted. Promptly the men come running back to the bivouac, seizing and slinging carbines, then leading into line. A brief word of command, another of caution, and then the whole troop is mounted and, following its leader, rides ghost-like up a ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... sah, Ah reckon he thought it was acco'din to military etiquette, sah. It am de custom in military camps to set a picket an' all presume he argued from ...
— The Hilltop Boys on the River • Cyril Burleigh
... and not wending hitherward at all. Poor Loudon, alas, must have got beaten!" Upon which Daun really did try, at least upon Ziethen; but could do nothing. Poured cavalry across the Stone-bridge at the Topferberg: who drove in Ziethen's picket there; but were torn to pieces by Ziethen's cannon. Ziethen across the Schwartzwasser is alert enough. How form in order of battle here, with Ziethen's batteries shearing your columns longitudinally, as they march up? Daun recognizes the impossibility; wends back through Liegnitz to his Camp again, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... his nose violently, snapped his gold snuff-box, and waddled to the window, where, below, in the early dusk, torches and rush-lights burned, illuminating the cavalry horses tethered along their picket-rope, and the trooper on guard, pacing his beat, musket ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... we had to live in, I tell you we had a tough affair, a picket concern, you might say no house a-tall. The beds was one of your own make; if you knowed how to make one, you had one, but of course the chillen slept on the floor, patched ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... I didn't like this change, that Mr. Hopewell had kinder inoculated me with other guess views on these matters, so he began to throw up bankments and to picket in the ground, ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... that when he reminded her of it now she felt it more keenly than ever; but not with anger, only with sad pain. She did not say so; she did not need to. Fritz Nettenmair was like a man in a magnetic sleep; from the leaf of a tree, from a picket in the fence, from a white wall he read, with closed eyes, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... were sent on to select a proper place for the murder. This was chosen in a long stretch of forest, and two men were despatched to the village of Sutranja, farther on the road, to see that no one was coming in the opposite direction, while another picket remained behind to prevent interruption from the rear. By the time they reached the appointed place, the Bhurtots (stranglers) and Shamsias (holders) had all on some pretext or other got close to the side of the persons whom they ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... Clark, which may be found on some of the present-day maps. The huts were built of logs, and were arranged in two rows, four rooms in each hut, the whole number being placed in the form of an angle, with a stockade, or picket, across the two outer ends of the angle, in which was a gate, kept locked at night. The roofs of the huts slanted upward from the inner side of the rows, making the outer side of each hut eighteen feet high; and the lofts of these were ...
— First Across the Continent • Noah Brooks
... A picket enclosure, mounted with cannon, protected the humble buildings erected for the use of the first settlers on what is now the Custom-house Square. The little stream—not much more than a rivulet except in spring—which for many years rippled between green, mossy banks, now struggles ...
— Canada • J. G. Bourinot
... shrivelled by an autumn wind. By mid-afternoon the Belgians and Germans were in places barely a hundred yards apart, and the rattle of musketry sounded like a boy drawing a stick along the palings of a picket-fence. During the height of the battle a Zeppelin slowly circled over the field like a great vulture awaiting a feast. So heavy was the fighting that the embankment of a branch railway from which I ...
— Fighting in Flanders • E. Alexander Powell
... places only had the brigands, to break through the line of watch-fires which might have betrayed them, resolved to kill the sentinels. Against one picket, Djemboulat proceeded himself, and he ordered another Bek to creep up the bank, pass round to the rear of the picket, count a hundred, and then to strike fire with a flint and steel several times. It was said and done. Just lifting his head above the edge of the bank, Djemboulat ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... their three captors, came in sight of the Canadian volunteers, they beheld a scene which was much more military than the Fenian camp. They were promptly halted and questioned by a picket before coming to the main body; the sentry knew enough not to shoot until he had asked for the countersign. Passing the picket, they came in full view of the Canadian force, the men of which looked very spick and span in uniforms which seemed painfully new in the clear light of the fair June morning. ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... a good way to the westward, and, as we fancied, clear of the enemy, when, on doubling a high rock, round which the path led, we came suddenly upon a picket. Owing to the precautions we had taken, however, they did not hear or see us until almost within a dozen paces. To leap on our horses and dig our spurs into their flanks, was the work of a moment; and before ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston
... great deal to do. Out-lying and in-lying pickets every night, the same as if we were in the presence of an enemy. This is a very pleasant climate at present, though excessively cold at night-time, as we feel to our cost when on picket, sleeping in the open air, with nothing but our cloaks to cover us; and some nights the dew is excessively heavy, which is very unhealthy, and has laid me up for the last few days with an attack of rheumatism. However, I hope to be out ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... other remedy. Before I go to sleep, I'll picket the horses close beside me; and if you steal away on foot during the night, I'll ride you down a few hours after daybreak. I think you understand me. There's nothing more to ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss
... did they initiate such men as Alexander Hamilton and John Marshall, the immortal Chief Justice, but they made the spirit of Masonry felt in "times that try men's souls"[157]—a spirit passing through picket-lines, eluding sentinels, and ...
— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton
... ashore in the Dardanelles, the crew being captured by Turks; two British picket boats, under a heavy fire, then torpedo and destroy the stranded vessel to prevent her ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... were ordered back from Johnstown, are very indignant at Adjutant General Hastings, who gave the order. They claim that General Hastings not only acted without a particle of judgment, but when they offered to act as picket, do police duty or anything else that might be required of them, they state that they were treated ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... picket rope. As his fingers closed on that he thought fast. Just as the Mattocks and the Forbeses were Union, the Barretts were, or had been, Southern in sympathy. Most of Kentucky was divided that way now. But what might ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... feel like a cow tethered to a picket, so that I can't reach the bit of grass sward. ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... by reappearing in her working-gown, but shod with strong, low-heeled shoes. "Good evening, Mr. Forest Ranger," she said, smiling, yet perturbed. "I didn't recognize you at first. Won't you 'picket' and come in?" She said this in the tone of one consciously assuming ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... early and I rehearsed mentally the stage business for the drama about to be enacted when Bunch crept through the picket lines. ...
— Back to the Woods • Hugh McHugh
... Staff and the Winter Palace, evidently without any plan. Kerensky gave an order to open the bridges; three hours passed without any action, and then an officer and five men went out on their own initiative, and putting to flight a picket of Red Guards, opened the Nicolai Bridge. Immediately after they left, however, some sailors closed ...
— Ten Days That Shook the World • John Reed
... sentinel, but Colonel Winchester replied promptly that they belonged to Buckner's Kentuckians and had been sent out to examine the Union camp. He passed it off with such boldness and decision that they were gone before the picket had ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler
... with violet deepening into purple, with purple flushing into rose, with rose shining into silver, and glowing into gold. The straggling line of black picket-fence below, that had faded away with the stars, came back with the sun. What was that object moving by the fence? Jenny raised her head, and looked intently. It was a man endeavoring to climb the pickets, ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... parts of this island, and we are of the grooms of King Mihrjan[FN10] and under our hand are all his horses. Every month, about new-moon tide we bring hither our best mares which have never been covered, and picket them on the sea-shore and hide ourselves in this place under the ground, so that none may espy us. Presently, the stallions of the sea scent the mares and come up out of the water and seeing no one, leap ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... for heat.) Ppt shall have a great Bible. I have put it down in my memlandums(4) just now. And DD shall be repaid her t'other book; but patience, all in good time: you are so hasty, a dog would, etc. So Ppt has neither won nor lost. Why, mun, I play sometimes too at picket, that is picquet, I mean; but very seldom.—Out late? why, 'tis only at Lady Masham's, and that is in our town; but I never come late here from London, except once in rain, when I could not get a coach. We have had very ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... turn tender and jesting, they went verse by verse through that immortal ode in which Horace and Lydia extol with such grace the charms of their new loves, and end by adding a postscript to their old ones. As they reached the corner of the street a rather strong picket of soldiers suddenly issued ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... and idiosyncrasies. For illustration of this idea, as we were approaching Atlanta, my division had the advance of the Army of the Ohio the morning we came in sight of the city. My advance guard captured a rebel picket post, and one of the men captured, had a morning paper from Atlanta, in which was Johnston's farewell order to his troops, and Hood's order assuming command. I had been three years at West Point with Hood, he having graduated in 1853, in ...
— Personal recollections and experiences concerning the Battle of Stone River • Milo S. Hascall
... traffic of Wisconsin Avenue. The longer wing, toward the back, had a back door that opened onto Water Street. The space between the house and Wisconsin Avenue had been made into a neat oblong flower garden, fenced off from the sidewalk by box shrubs and a white picket fence. Behind it, along the other side of the long wing, lay a meticulously arranged vegetable garden ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... rare stroke of luck. Surely the new master and mistress could not fail to recognize so great a service. Something of a similar nature once happened in the old master's time. Then it was a horse that had been impaled on a picket fence. The one who found the horse and had it carted home received from Eric of Falla a reward of ten rix-dollars; And that despite the fact that the beast was so badly injured that Eric had ...
— The Emperor of Portugalia • Selma Lagerlof
... able to outstrip me in speed, fast runner as I deemed myself; and if overtaken, I could expect nothing but more cruel treatment than I had yet experienced. Besides, although I did not know it at the time, the valley had but two entrances, and these were constantly guarded by a watchful picket. But at the time I thought of none of these things—"drowning men will catch at straws," says the old adage—and my hastily formed plan seemed to me to promise success. Having formed my resolution I was necessitated ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... always on the skirmish line. She would interview the married women who could not leave home and children, get their approval of her plans and then go to the front. Once or twice a year she would gather her hosts for a big battle, but the rest of the time she did picket duty, acted as scout and penetrated alone the enemy's country. Between meetings she would find her way home, make over her old dresses and on rare occasions get a new one. This she called "looking after the externals." Then, as her ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... marching on In a wider field than ours; Those bright battalions still fulfil The scheme of the heavenly powers; And high brave thoughts float down to us, The echoes of that far fight, Like the flash of a distant picket's gun Through the shades ...
— Pike County Ballads and Other Poems • John Hay
... him, but granted a warrant in his behalf against Gilbert, Corrill, and two other Mormons for false imprisonment, and they were locked up.* Thrown on their own resources for defence, the Mormons now armed themselves as well as they could, and established a night picket service throughout their part of the county. On Saturday night, November 2, a second attack was made by the mob on Big Blue and, the Mormons resisting, the first "battle" of this campaign took place. A sick woman received a pistolshot wound in the head, and one of the Mormons a wound in the ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... coach, down to wagons and carts, filled with women and children, some in finery and some in rags, for it was the People's president." The great square which now separates the Capitol and the Library of Congress was in Jackson's day shut in by a picket fence. This enclosure was filled with people—"a vast agitated sea"—while in all directions the slopes of Capitol Hill were thickly occupied. At noon watchers on the west portico, looking down Pennsylvania Avenue, saw a group of gentlemen issue from the Indian Queen and thread ...
— The Reign of Andrew Jackson • Frederic Austin Ogg
... the picket fence he inhaled their freshness, gazing up into the sunny foliage of the ancient trees, elms, maples, and one oak so aged and so magnificent that, awed, his eyes turned uneasily again toward the house to reassure himself that ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... negotiations proceeding with the enemy, the British outpost line lay in full view of, and only "one shout's distance," as the Pathans expressively call it, from the enemy. And outside the line of infantry outposts lay a cavalry picket of twenty ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband
... most beautiful stream of water runs about forty feet below us with the clearest and coldest of water. One of our first occupations in the morning is to take the animals down to water, and afterwards to picket them in amongst the long grass, growing in great profusion and height during the short summer on all the foot hills and wherever there is an open space. The first afternoon we were up here we went for a ride round Imogene basin, and were delighted with the wild flowers, which are quite ...
— A Lady's Life on a Farm in Manitoba • Mrs. Cecil Hall
... picket guard, that night. Brigade guard mount took place in the woods at sunset. Our regimental Band, led by the veteran Joe Greene, played his familiar piece, "The Mocking Bird." Our company was marched ...
— History of Company F, 1st Regiment, R.I. Volunteers, during the Spring and Summer of 1861 • Charles H. Clarke
... only Sam Williams and Penrod. Hence, it behooved these two to be wary, lest they be wiped out altogether; and Sam was dismayed indeed, upon cautiously scouting round a corner of his own stable, to find himself face to face with the valorous and skilful Verman, who was acting as an outpost, or picket, of the enemy. ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... letter, so pull yourself together. I am here with twenty others of the 7th I.Y. on outlying picket, and although the affair began rather joylessly, we are getting on very well now. By way of parenthesis, it is more than passing strange that whenever I try to write a letter somebody always starts singing. At present, a man of the Dorsets is lifting his voice in anguish ...
— A Yeoman's Letters - Third Edition • P. T. Ross
... able to do so, Captain Putnam learned the names of the twelve cadets who had been on picket duty between midnight and six o'clock that morning. These cadets were marched to one of the classrooms and interviewed one at a time in ...
— The Rover Boys on the River - The Search for the Missing Houseboat • Arthur Winfield
... itself close against the wall. Then some fire-arms, saddles, and artillery trappings were hidden away in dark corners, and a lay figure, clothed in fatigue cap and blue overcoat, and which had done duty as "a picket" during the day, was wheeled around with its face to the wall, where it stood guard over Fred's famous picture ofb"The Last Gun at Appomattox." His final touches were bestowed on the grate-fire and the coal-scuttle, both of which were replenished ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... stone-paved court, and feeling extremely glum, had been amazed to see the line of guards, who usually sat on a bench, with a sentry or picket, or whatever they called him, parading up and down before them—Nikky was amazed to see them one by one leaping into the air, in the most undignified manner. Nikky watched the performance. Then he stalked over. They ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... news arrived at Murfreesboro that the rebel general, Forest, was about to make an attack on the place, which news was verified by General Forest capturing the picket guard and dashing into the town soon after the news arrived, with a mounted force of 1,500 men. A part of this force charged upon the camp of the Seventh Pennsylvania, then reformed, and charged upon the Ninth Michigan Infantry, which made a gallant defense and repulsed ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau
... of labour in its most insolent assumptions. The "rights" of property, the "right" to strike, the "right" to collective bargaining, the "right" to shut down an essential industry or to "walk out" and then picket the place so that it may not be reopened, the "right" to vote and hold office and do any fool thing you please so long as it is within the law, these are applications of what I mean when I speak of a gross fallacy that has come into being and has stultified our intelligence while bringing ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram
... about the neck, with a slipnoose which would tighten around the throat if pulled. With a man on each side holding these ropes, the mule was released from his other bindings and allowed to rise. With more or less difficulty he would be conducted to a picket rope outside and fastened there. The delivery of that mule was then complete. This process was gone through with every mule and wild horse with the ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... preternatural powers. She hurried back to the house, and searched every room in a bewildered sort of fashion, finding nothing. As she came out again, her eye caught sight of a kitchen chair in the corner of the yard. They had climbed the picket fence, then. Yes; Atlantic, while availing himself of its unassuming aid, had left a clue in a fragment of his trousers. She opened the gate, and ran breathlessly along the streets to that Garden of Eden where joy had always hitherto awaited her. Some instinct of fear or secrecy led her to go ...
— Marm Lisa • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... apple tree, and bring out pipes and sangaree. The air was still, and heavy with the flowers' scent, and the sun was dipping behind the low eaves of the house. It was so natural to be there that I scarce realized all that had happened since last I saw the back gate in the picket fence. Alas! little Patty would never more be smuggled through it and over the wall to Marlboro' Street. Mr. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... saw an old red brick house with a great white porch across the front and a green lawn all about it. A white picket fence went all around the lawn, and as Grandpa stopped the horses before the gate, three people came out. There was a tall, thin young man who went to the horses' heads, a little girl with flaming red hair who looked about fourteen years old, and a tall, thin old lady with ...
— Sunny Boy in the Country • Ramy Allison White
... Yet the soil of the lowlands is of extraordinary fertility, and the climate, though humid, deals kindly with the Anglo-Saxon constitution. Nor is this all; for, advanced from it north and south, like picket-stations, are Norfolk isle and the Auckland group, which, if they have no other attractions, certainly have this great one, good harbors. And it requires no prophet's eye to see, that, when England needs posts farther eastward, she will ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... see him, Miss Betsy?" he asked, touching his mink-skin cap, as Miss Lavender crawled through the nearest panel of the lofty picket fence. ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor
... "There's no way of discovering the confounded stuff. We can't go ahead with a microscope and a chemical laboratory to analyze every blade of grass along the route for Paris green. The best we can do is to take our chances and keep going north. But I think we'd better establish outside picket lines which will stay well in advance, and off to the flanks. If it can be done, this system will succeed in at least frightening them off for a while. Everybody prepare to stand extra ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... any thing; all he does is without any Intention at all." Upon which she bade me to go for an Impudent fellow; and I doubt not, had I been under her Husband's orders, would have had me set upon the Picket on the Parade for my free speaking; but we Tower Warders were not amenable to such Slavish Discipline; and, indeed, General Williamson, who stood by, was pleased to laugh heartily at my answer, and gave me a crown to drink the King's health, bidding me, however, take care what I was about, and see ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... before. "It's all over," he said briskly. "The first warehouse is gone; the second will go, but they'll save the others easily enough, now that you have pointed out that the lines may be utilized otherwise than as adjuncts of performances on the high trapeze!" They were standing by a picket-fence, and he leaned against it, overcome by mirth in which she did not join. Her gravity reacted upon him at once, and his laughter was stopped short. "Will you not accept me as an escort to your home?" he said formally. "I do not know," she returned simply, the sort of honest trouble in ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington
... has already been made; it is marvellous that any occupant of it should have survived a minute, so riddled and shattered is it. Officers of Iris, which was in trouble ahead of Vindictive, describe Captain Carpenter as "handling her like a picket-boat." ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... vague forebodings. Emergency orders, that morning, detailed Lance with a detachment for the Railway Workshops, where passive resisters were actively on the war-path. Roy, after early stables, was dispatched with another party, to strengthen a cavalry picket near the Badshahi Mosque, on the outskirts of the city, where things might be lively in the course ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... town. The thrifty merchants of this Scottish trading center built well, and their dwellings abound in architectural interest, but really great houses are rare. On the 700 block of Prince Street, behind a picket fence, guarded by a tall magnolia and several gnarled box trees stands what is called in England a "Georgian cottage," which in ...
— Seaport in Virginia - George Washington's Alexandria • Gay Montague Moore
... effect of these combined sorrows had not seemed to be immediate (one month had seen both); though a half-year had elapsed before all sociability was lost in extreme self- absorption, and a full one before he took down the picket-fence which had hitherto been considered a sufficient protection to his simple grounds, and put up these boards which had so completely isolated him from the rest of the world, it was evident enough to the friends who recalled his look ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green
... pulls her picket pins, your thoughts go back thru years To Outside, Home, and Sweetheart, and this last thought sort of cheers; You recollect the days you spent beneath a Southern sky And with regret you now remember they all ended with good-by. It's the same old world-wide feeling that comes to man ...
— Rhymes of a Roughneck • Pat O'Cotter
... expedition proved completely successful. Provisions were conveyed in wagons, and beef-cattle driven along for the use of the men. These animals subsisted entirely by grazing. To secure them from straying off at night, they were driven into corrals formed of the wagons, or tethered to an iron picket-pin driven into the ground about fifteen inches. At the outset of the expedition many laughable scenes took place. Our horses were generally wild, fiery, and unused to military trappings and equipments. Amidst the fluttering of banners, the sounding of bugles, the rattling ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... like our childhood days. You used to put notes in the old apple tree—do you remember?—asking Janey and me to meet you two hours before sundown at the end of the picket fence." ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... rather pretty duel, sir. Don't ride over the bridge.' A picket shot from the left singing over my head rather emphasized his warning. 'It would not be fair—you would ride right into my pickets.' It was an unusual bit ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... resource, he set about swiftly supplying this need. In the dull days of inaction, when the armies lay supine and only occasionally the monotony was broken by the engagement of distant skirmishers or a picket line was driven in on the main body, he had learned to play a game at cards much in vogue at that period, though for no greater hazards than grains of corn or Confederate money, almost as worthless. In the realization now that the same ...
— The Lost Guidon - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... scrollwork around the diminutive front porch. The color was indescribable, blending well into the surroundings either day or night. It had a cheerful, decent look, but very tiny. There was a small yard about it with a picket fence, and a leafless lilac bush. A cheerful barberry bush flanked the gate on either side. The front door was open into a tiny hall and beyond the light streamed forth from a glass lamp set on a pleasant dining-room table covered with a red cloth. Betty stepped inside the gate and ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... Take him as he was. Born in France, on the banks of the Rhone near Avignon, he came as a youth to Canada, whence he drifted on the tide of adventure this way and that, until at last he found himself, with a wife, at Post Vincennes, that lonely picket of religion and trade, which was to become the center of civilizing energy for the great Northwestern Territory. M. Roussillon had no children of his own; so his kind heart opened freely to two fatherless and motherless waifs. These ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... the main road in a cloud of dust. It sped on the fleeting tires of a high-powered motor which flew from its dust-grey hood a red flag with two white stars. It blew into the villages and out, through the billets and cook tents, mess halls, and picket lines. The ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... my absence. When I'm on the spot I prefer to play picket-duty myself. I may be eccentric. But that's one of my notions, and I've an idea it's one ...
— Mrs. Red Pepper • Grace S. Richmond
... you pull yore picket-pin and travel to a new range?" he asked. "They're no kind of people for you to be knowin'. Get out to God's country where men are white and poor folks get half ...
— The Big-Town Round-Up • William MacLeod Raine
... gamesters of both houses great discontent. Our parsons agree here, as those did at Trent, Dan's forehead has got a most damnable dent, Besides a large hole in his Michaelmas rent. But your fancy on rhyming so cursedly bent, With your bloody ouns in one stanza pent; Does Jack's utter ruin at picket prevent, For an answer in specie to yours must be sent; So this moment at crambo (not shuffling) is spent, And I lose by this crotchet quaterze, point, and quint, Which you know to a gamester is great bitterment; But whisk shall revenge me on you, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... we rode along, Down the dark of the mountain gap, To visit the picket-guard at the ford, Little dreaming of any mishap, He was humming the words of some old song: "Two red roses he had on his cap, And another he bore at ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... good!" said the warden, distinctly. Byram crept through the picket fence and lay close, ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... born a Belgian, and gave his story in broken French, broken in words as well as grammar, for he had been imbibing something stronger than water. It appeared that his valiant self and two others equally brave—one a Frenchman, the other a Prussian—had been selected to serve as a picket, or avante garde, as he termed it, some distance from the fort, at a place called the "Barrier." When at midnight they heard the approach of the enemy. "Je mette mon fusil a mon bras," he said; "et a le Francais je di, Prenez—garde! A le Prusse"—hesitating—"Prenez ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay
... much so that, but for the patches of dull red still visible beneath the eaves and round the windows, one would have been loth to believe the old house had all been of a deep red. The high road lay between the house and the long stretch of meadow-land which separated it from the river. The picket fence in front of the dwelling was in rather a dilapidated condition, and the gate, being minus a hinge, hung awry. Many tall sunflowers stood in the narrow strip of ground between the front fence and the house, and they were about all I could see in the way ...
— Walter Harland - Or, Memories of the Past • Harriet S. Caswell
... wigwam on stilts looked most inviting just then, and we yielded to the seduction. We got off, and throwing ourselves at full length on the grass, allowed our horses to graze close to us, without taking the trouble to picket them. ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... about fifteen hundred men in all, who were stationed at Belmont, across the river, were attacked, about seven o'clock, A.M., by General McClernand, with a little over seven thousand men, according to Union authorities. It was a complete surprise to us. At first we thought it was a picket skirmish with the cavalry; but soon Frank Cheatham, our brigadier, came galloping through the camp, bare-headed, in shirt and pantaloons, ordering us to "fall in," saying that the "enemy were murdering the sick men in their tents across the river." The report thus started soon took this form: ...
— Thirteen Months in the Rebel Army • William G. Stevenson
... suppose he could be made to take a hand with you, sir—two-handed picket or ekkarty, you being seedy and keeping indoors—just to pass the time. For all we know, he may be one of them ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... riding on the surface near the Fleet Flagship's quarter, rose like a flying gull, circled in wide spirals over the Fleet and sped seawards. Across the lanes of water, armed picket-boats, with preternaturally grave-faced Midshipmen at their wheels, picked their way amongst the traffic of drifters, cutters under sail, hooting store carriers and puffers from ...
— The Long Trick • Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... opposite which we were to settle. Here was some cleared land, and one or two log cabins, but they had been deserted on account of the Indians. My father rebuilt the cabins, and inclosed them with a strong picket. It was early in the spring when we arrived at the mouth of the Big Miami, and we were soon engaged in preparing a field to plant corn. I think it was not more than ten days after our arrival, when my father ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... compared with its capacity of receiving the force of the powder. The point of the cone was found objectionable in practice, and was gradually brought to the curve of the now universally used sugar-loaf missile or flat-ended picket ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... sure. Sorry I can't oblige you in return,—very; but you'll just have to turn tail and drive back again. That bit of paper says 'Pass the bearer,' and the bearer's already passed. You can't get two men through this picket on one man's pass, not if one is a nigger and t'other a skunk; ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... here," observed Cribbens, "but we can't turn the horses loose. We'll have to picket 'em with the lariats. I saw some loco-weed back here a piece, and if they get to eating that, they'll sure go plum crazy. The burro won't eat it, but I ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... is that river over which we passed in our scamper with Lady Jersey; it was all solitary. Three hundred yards beyond is a second ford; and there—I came face to face with war. Under the trees on the further bank sat a picket of seven men with Winchesters; their faces bright, their eyes ardent. As we came up, they did not speak or move; only their eyes followed us. The horses drank, and we passed the ford. "Talofa!" I said, and the commandant of the picket said "Talofa"; and then, when we were ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... A picket frozen on duty— A mother starved for her brood— Socrates drinking the hemlock, And Jesus on the rood. And millions who, humble and nameless, The straight hard pathway trod— Some call it Consecration, And others call it ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... followed the Champion and several others through the streets and just beyond the village came to a very high picket fence, built all of marble, which seemed to divide the great ...
— The Patchwork Girl of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... shelter of the ravelin, to pick up the wounded, and bear them within the walls for surgical help. They were so near he could see their faces, could hear them speak; yet he durst not make any sign to them when he lay within range of the French picket's fire. ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. III • Elizabeth Gaskell
... it comes to that the American flag is sacred to the insurgents; but if there is any fighting it will be on the picket line only, ...
— A Voyage with Captain Dynamite • Charles Edward Rich
... sudden bend of the St. Charles. Here lay a canoe or skiff; and, paddling across the narrow stream, Le Jeune saw on the meadow, two hundred yards from the bank, a square inclosure formed of palisades, like a modern picket fort of the Indian frontier. [ 1 ] Within this inclosure were two buildings, one of which had been half burned by the English, and was not yet repaired. It served as storehouse, stable, workshop, and bakery. Opposite stood the principal building, a structure of planks, ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... a servant house at the rear of a white family's residence. A gate through an old-fashioned picket fence led into a spacious yard where dense shade from tall pecan trees was particularly inviting after a long walk in ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... people stole away through the woods to a little hill beyond the cemetery, quite far out of hearing or ken of anybody; and there prayed, and sang too, and "praised God and shouted," as my informant told me; not neglecting all the while to keep a picket watch about their meeting-place, to give the alarm in case anybody should come. So under the soft moonlight skies and at depth of night, the meetings which I had supposed broken up, took new life, and grew, and lived; and prayers did not fail; ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... the lee of the picket fence which bounded Maitland Camp on the west, Paddy the cook communed with himself, and Weldon and Carew communed ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... vain, so Bob left a picket of five men under Old Dick to keep the narrow path, bidding them fell a tree or two so that their branches might lie towards and hinder an attack from the enemy, before hurrying back with fourteen men ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... attach themselves to the rocks; herefrom prognostication of the weather.—View from on high when one stands above the clouds. The landscape seems to lie before one like a great lake, from which islands stand forth.—In the summer, cascades everywhere in the mountains.—Chamois graze in flocks, the picket (Vorgeis) piping in case of danger.—Weather signs: Swallows fly low, aquatic birds dive, sheep graze eagerly, dogs paw up the earth, fish leap from the water. 'The gray governor of the valley (Thalvogt) is coming'; when this or that ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... from the tuba root, known to scientists as Cocculus indicus. When a Dyak village is in need of food the entire community, men, women and children, repairs to a stream in which fish are known to be plentiful. Across the stream a sort of picket fence is erected by planting bamboos close together. In the center of this fence is a narrow opening leading into an enclosure like a corral, the walls of which are made in the same fashion. When this part of the preparations has been completed a party of natives proceeds up-stream ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... After him came a lean tall boy who answered to the name of Napoleon. There was a midget of a child, desperately sooty in the face either from battle or from fire-tending, who was presented as Wee Jaikie. Last came the picket who had held his pole at Dickson's chest, a sandy-haired warrior with a snub nose and the mouth and jaw of a pug-dog. He was Old Bill, or, ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... fiendishly clever knot, and hurled it in the general direction of a front porch that flashed past on his right. Never slowing, Gary threw the next paper entirely across the street. He chuckled as it cleared a picket fence. "Bang, bang!" he blurted. His red shirt, with a picture of a mounted cowboy on the back, ballooned in the early ...
— Stopover Planet • Robert E. Gilbert
... spread behind closed doors, or to join a band that, risking the sudden creak of a treacherous step, went down the stairs and out to wend their way with other sweltering bands across the moonlit ways, through negro settlements, where frantic dogs bayed at the sticks they rattled over the picket fences, to the banks of the canal for a cooling frolic in the none too ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... taking place a soldier rode in that had been on picket duty and said to the Gen., "I saw some covered wagons going into camp down on Deer Creek about five miles from here. Where do you suppose ...
— Chief of Scouts • W.F. Drannan |
