"Stake" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... drove a stake into the beach, and threw stones at it, to see which could knock off the pebble balanced on its top. Several of the ladies joined them in the sport, and shrieked and laughed when they made wild shots with the missiles the men politely ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... ye s'pose ever possessed that old pole-cat to stake a placer claim jest there, 'stead o' somewhere else? The dirt won't pan color, will it?" asked Dad. "That's just what has bothered me, Dad. The only way that I can figure it out is that Williams got some inkling of the prospects of the tunnel from some of Bill's papers or letters. It wasn't two ...
— Buffalo Roost • F. H. Cheley
... sleeps on the banks of rivers. He takes pleasure in staying by such banks. He is freed from every attachment, and from every tie of affection. He merges the existence of his own soul into the Supreme Soul. Standing like a stake of wood, and abstaining from all food he does only such acts as point to Emancipation. Or, he may wander about, devoted to Yoga. Even these are the eternal duties of a follower of the Religion of Nivritti. He lives aloof from ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... of fire in their hands, tried their very best to inveigle and entrap him, but in vain. Once, indeed, he had very nearly fallen into a horrible pit in which, at the very bottom, in the centre, was a dreadful, long, sharp stake, which, had he fallen, would have been driven through his thick body by its own weight, and he would have perished ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... to avoid hardship and suffering. This is not wrong of itself; it is wrong only when it conflicts with the will of God. It is not wrong for you to avoid burning at the stake unless it be God's will that you should thus end your life. If God wills you to burn at the stake you must not seek to avoid the ordeal. If we do not watch carefully and live close to God and keep our body under, the will of sense will grow strong and cause ...
— How to Live a Holy Life • C. E. Orr
... strange mixture of the real and the unreal. Sir Alan Hume-Frazer, fourth baronet, met his death on the hunting-field. His horse blundered at a brook and the rider was impaled on a hidden stake, placed in the stream by his own orders to prevent poachers from netting trout. His wife, nee Somers, a Bristol ...
— The Stowmarket Mystery - Or, A Legacy of Hate • Louis Tracy
... profession that has most at stake in this discussion, and that, indeed, is most involved in its issue, is the ministerial, or clerical, profession. While it was Jewish rabbis who affirmed most positively, in olden time, the unwavering obligations ...
— A Lie Never Justifiable • H. Clay Trumbull
... after another visited by the traveller in the Cevennes; and in the wake of the burnings, pillagings and massacres of that horrible period follows the more horrible period still of the guerilla warfare of the Camisards, quelled by means of the rack, the stake, and the wheel. ...
— The Roof of France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... inducing hallucination for the purpose of seeking information not to be gained by any normal means. I read of its use in China, in Assyria, in Egypt, in Arabia, in India, in Greece and Rome; of how its practitioners in the Middle Ages were looked upon as heretics and burnt at the stake or broken on the wheel; of the famous Dr. Dee, and so down to the present time. The scryers or seers sometimes used mirrors, sometimes vessels filled with water, but usually a polished stone, and beryl was ...
— The Gloved Hand • Burton E. Stevenson
... language had been the rule in the Salamancan juntas of professors, and much of this intemperate tone clung to Luis de Leon. No doubt large allowances should be made for him. He knew that his honour was at stake and that his life was in peril.[90] As he was persuaded—perhaps rightly—he had been brought to this pass mainly through the intrigues of an unscrupulous pair.[91] His provocation was extreme. It was almost to be expected that he should use plain words when referring to ...
— Fray Luis de Leon - A Biographical Fragment • James Fitzmaurice-Kelly
... more excited than he had ever been in the face of the enemy, for the present looked like a case in which his honor was at stake. He felt that it would be his ruin if the Vernon sailed without him. There had been some mistake in his orders, or in those of the commander of the store ship, and he was likely to be the sufferer for it. He rushed ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... burned on my arms and shoulders for not standing erect. The flesh was deep in some places, and the agony I suffered was intolerable. I thought of the stories the Abbess used to tell me years before about the martyrs who were burned at the stake. But I had not a martyr's faith, and I could not imitate their patience and resignation. The sores made on these occasions were long in healing, and to this day I bear upon my person the scars caused by ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson
... of the Prussians (see his other despatch of the same hour and Sir A. Frazer's statement—"Letters," p. 553—"We expected the Prussian co-operation early in the day") as to assume that Napoleon would stake all on an effort against his right; and in that case the Hal force would have crushed the French rear, though it was ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... than the boys anticipated and several times Sid Todd was on the point of giving up the struggle. Perhaps, had he been alone, he might have done so. But, with the others looking on, he felt that his reputation was at stake, and so he worried along, until he suddenly slipped on some rocks ...
— Dave Porter at Star Ranch - Or, The Cowboy's Secret • Edward Stratemeyer
... what was at stake, though I knew. Mr. Mutimer was perfectly open with me. "I have trusted him implicitly," he said, "because I believe him as staunch and true as his brother. I make no allowances for what are called young man's follies: he must be above anything of that kind. ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... in more than one other instance of his career, too earnest in his conviction that principles were at stake in the course which he recommended, to consider whether that course were safe for those on whom he urged it, or even practicable. But Marie Antoinette, as one on whose decision the very lives of her husband and her child might depend, felt bound to consider, in the first place, ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... you wou'd seem to doubt, Shall be to all the world made out, 290 How I've been drubb'd, and with what spirit And magnanimity I bear it; And if you doubt it to be true, I'll stake myself down against you: And if I fail in love or troth, 295 Be you the ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... we. I propose that we rush them. But first I want the pleasure of putting my revolver against the head of that young bully there and the girl, and getting rid of them. Think what's at stake. We must ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... By eleven o'clock everything was finished or going forward briskly. The plum pudding was bubbling in the pot, the turkey—Burton's plumpest—was sizzling in the oven. The shelf in the pantry bore two mince pies upon which Alexina was willing to stake her culinary reputation. And Stephen had gone to the ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... forever into the barren and monotonous way of living and thinking which has always distinguished the half-civilized populations of Asia. This—and nothing less than this, I think—was the practical political question really at stake in the sixteenth century between Protestantism and Catholicism. Holland and England entered the lists in behalf of the one solution of this question, while Spain and the Pope defended the other, and the ...
— American Political Ideas Viewed From The Standpoint Of Universal History • John Fiske
... right now, saving the crops, with or without water. That was chance. Hobbs told me this morning it looked like rain. By the way, I must apologise to him. I said he was a crazy kill-joy. The thing that puzzles me is what became of the owner of that eye. I'll stake my life on it, I saw an eye. 'Gad, it looked right into mine. Queerest ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... a-goin' on smooth and onwrinkled—smiles broke out on every face, about thirty smiles—a half a minute more and it would be done, and done well. When at that tryin' and decisive moment when the fate of our meetin' house wuz, as you may say, at the stake, we heard the sound of hurryin' feet, and the door suddenly opened, and in walked Josiah Allen, Deacon Sypher, and Deacon Henzy followed by what seemed to me at the time to be the hull male part ...
— Samantha Among the Brethren, Complete • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... fancy of Hogarth never sketched the dull historian, in the figure of an ass, plodding to market under his panniers, laden with the fruits of antiquity, and old time driving up the rear, with his scythe converted into an hedge-stake. ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton
... fashion with every form of superstition. He worked under the foundations of priestcraft. But while serving the Reformed cause, he had no sympathy with Reformers. If they would but remain quiet, but keep their peculiar notions to themselves, France would rest! That a man should go to the stake for an opinion, was as incomprehensible to him as that a priest or king should send him there for an opinion. He thought the persecuted and the persecutors fools about equally matched. He was easy-tempered and humane—in the hunting-field he could not bear ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... Presbyterians among the exiles who went to Canada and Nova Scotia. The Revolution was not in any sense a religious war; but religious differences contributed to embitter the conflict, and doubtless made Whigs or Tories of people who had no other interest at stake. ...
— The United Empire Loyalists - A Chronicle of the Great Migration - Volume 13 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • W. Stewart Wallace
... how I am fixed here. I have grown tired of this sort of hostage life, and I am going North with you. So, Barney, I beg of you to be careful, for other lives than your own are at stake. I should be specially hateful to the authorities if I were retaken—for the whole Southern people clamor to have an example made of the assassins of the President, as they ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... Thrale conveys a highly agreeable impression of her; and so does Hogarth's, when she sat to him for the principal figure in "The Lady's Last Stake." She was then only fourteen; and he probably idealised his model; but that he also produced a striking likeness, is obvious on comparing his picture with the professed portraits. The history of this picture (which has been engraved, at Lord Macaulay's suggestion, for this work) will ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... attractiveness materially. The enterprising young business or professional man has no desire to restrict his opportunities by the assumption of the responsibilities that accompany family life. He must be free to stake all his resources on some favourable speculation without the thought that he cannot take chances on impoverishing his wife and children. Or if he has professional aspirations, he must be able to take the long difficult pathway of scientific research ...
— Taboo and Genetics • Melvin Moses Knight, Iva Lowther Peters, and Phyllis Mary Blanchard
... without food, remained in that state for a long time without dying. And the Rishi by his ascetic power not only preserved his life but summoned other Rishi to the scene. And they came there in the night in the forms of birds, and beholding him engaged in ascetic meditation though fixed on that stake, became plunged into grief. And telling that best of Brahmanas who they were, they asked him saying, 'O Brahmana, we desire to know what hath been thy sin for which thou hast thus been made to ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... its consciousness of the existence of all principles of justice, and a familiarity with its own history. The great bulk of the population of New York have no active desire to invade what is right in this anti-rent struggle, having no direct interests at stake; their crime is a passive inactivity, which allows those who are either working for political advancement, or those who are working to obtain other men's property, to make use of them, through ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper
... we all shou'd end his Life, And with a keen-whet Chopping-Knife In a Thousand pieces cleave him, Let the Parliament first him undertake, They'll make the Rascal stink at stake, And so, like a Knave, ...
— Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry • Edmund Goldsmid
... Robespierre was at heart a priest. The suggestion was more than a gibe. Robespierre had the typic sacerdotal temperament, its sense of personal importance, its thin unction, its private leanings to the stake and the cord; and he had one of those deplorable natures that seem as if they had never in their lives known the careless joys of a springtime. By and by, from mere priest he developed into the deadlier ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 1 of 3) - Essay 1: Robespierre • John Morley
... him. Without her, he would fail. The woman herself saw that, and wished it. Why should she hesitate? It was not as if she had only herself to consider. The fate—the happiness of millions was at stake. He looked to her for aid—for guidance. It must have been intended. All roads had led to it. Her going to the house. She remembered now, it was the first door at which she had knocked. Her footsteps had surely been directed. Her meeting with Mrs. Phillips in Madge's rooms; and that ...
— All Roads Lead to Calvary • Jerome K. Jerome
... Orleans. The soldiers called them "wharf rats," "sailors," "longshoremen," "cutthroats," and "gutter snipes." They knew no subordination and defied law and military discipline. While in camp here several of them were shot at the stake. Major Wheat had asked to be allowed to manage his men as he saw best, and had a law unto himself. For some mutiny and insubordination he had several of them shot. Afterwards, when the soldiers heard a volley fired, the word would go out, "Wheat is ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... while we kept our suspicions to ourselves. Then we left Myra with the specialist, who made a temporary examination. In twenty minutes he assured us that he could make nothing of the case, but that he was willing to stake his reputation that there was nothing organically wrong; and he gave us, so far as he dared, distinct reason to hope that she would eventually regain full possession of her lost faculty. So, after general rejoicings all round, in which I quite forgot ...
— The Mystery of the Green Ray • William Le Queux
... my reply to his question with an air which suggested that nothing less important than the well-being of his very existence was at stake. ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... that quite well. Even I would have striven to help when my life was at stake. But the really wonderful thing is that you should have guessed an unknown track in the dark; that you should actually be able to guide a helpless ship through waters so full of dangers that it would be folly to venture in their midst in ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... the lord of the universe. The youth who was none else than the god Mahadeva (the god of the gods), seeing Indra filled with wrath, only smiled, having cast a glance at him. At that glance, however, the chief of the celestials was at once paralysed and stood there like a stake. When the game at dice was over, Isana addressing the weeping woman said, 'Bring Sakra hither, for I shall soon so deal with him that pride may not again enter his heart.' As soon as Sakra was touched by that woman, the chief of the celestials with limbs paralysed ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... so shrewd in their dealings that Russians have christened them the "Jews of Siberia." But although cunning and merciless in business matters this Siberian financier becomes a reckless spendthrift in his pleasures, who will stake a year's income on the yearly Yakutsk Derby (which takes place over the frozen Lena), or squander away a fortune on riotous living and the fair sex. All who can afford it are hard drinkers, and champagne is their favourite beverage. The men of all classes ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... is thus laid down in the Decretals (II, qu. vi, can. Si Quando): "Whenever anyone intervene in a cause where life or state is at stake he must do so, not by a proxy, but in his own person"; and "state" here has reference to freedom or servitude. Therefore it would seem that nothing differentiates a man's state, except that which refers to ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... languages or science. To return from this parenthesis, we say that when no applause nor even recognition is expected, to proceed steadily and alone for its own sake in the work of saving the soul is truer heroism than that which leads a martyr cheerfully to the stake. ...
— Pages from a Journal with Other Papers • Mark Rutherford
... my friend from Venus, though I would have let Nanlo go had she asked me, my own honor is at stake when she seeks to deal me an injury by slipping away in the night, and stealing from me the Vulcan. She is doing evil, and must be punished. The young man, too—indulgent as I am, I can not let him dishonor me thus ...
— The Indulgence of Negu Mah • Robert Andrew Arthur
... to hold in my horse; but seizing the bit with his teeth, laying back his ears, and stretching out his eager neck, he manifestly felt that his honor was at stake; and in less time than I take to write it, the three friends cleared a way for us, and he tore past them all at an appalling speed. They tried for a time to keep within reach of us, but that sound only put fire into his ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton
... how they fall! Whether I grow old or no, By th' effects I do not know; This I know, without being told, 'Tis time to live, if I grow old; 'Tis time short pleasures now to take, Of little life the best to make, And manage wisely the last stake. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... stir! I ask your pardon, Madame, but we have more important matters than this to consider. Madame Risler concerns us no longer. We have to save the honor of the house of Fromont, which alone is at stake, which alone fills my ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... as the Light Country People had defended their borders with implacable determination, so was I determined that they should not invade my world, either. And I was ready to stake my life and even the lives of those I loved here on Mercury in the attempt to ...
— The Fire People • Ray Cummings
... within himself that the others had greater interests in the quest than he—the younger MacKim having at stake the honour of his sweetheart Maud, the elder the life of his young mistress, the last of the Galloway ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... try to get the boat out where it will float. It's such fun to have it bob up and down," replied the girl addressed. She had a long pole and was pushing the boat off from the shore. It was fastened to a stake, so it could only career around a little, and Dimple's friend Callie Spear assured the little girls that it was perfectly secure, and so they gave themselves up to ...
— A Sweet Little Maid • Amy E. Blanchard
... not convinced ; the event was yet uncertain, and my stake was, with respect to earthly happiness, my existence. A compromise occurred to me, which suggested my dispensing with a new passport, and contenting myself with obtaining his signature to my old one, accorded by M. le Chevalier ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... trumpet peal soaring over the heads of a crowd whose teeth were chattering. While the rest of the Cabinet pressed their ears to the ground, Seward thought out a policy, made a forecast of the future, and offered to stake his head on the correctness of his reasoning. This may have been rashness; it may have been folly; but, intellectually at least, it was valor. Among Lincoln's other advisers, valor at that moment was lacking. Contrast, however, was not the sole, nor the surest basis ...
— Lincoln • Nathaniel Wright Stephenson
... identity sufficiently explains the Claimant's explicitness on these points. Melipilla is a long way off; and Boisdale is still further. It may have been supposed that witnesses could not be brought from so far; but vast interests were at stake, and the defendant in the Chancery suit speedily applied for Commissions to go out to South America and Australia to collect information regarding the Claimant's past history. The proposition was strenuously opposed as vexatious, and designed merely ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous
... which to him was that of Liberty and Justice. He wrote two long letters to the London "Times," in which he attempted to make clear to Englishmen and to Europe the nature and conditions of our complex system of government, the real cause of the strife, and the mighty issues at stake. Nothing could have been more timely, nothing more needed. Mr. William Everett, who was then in England, bears strong testimony to the effect these letters produced. Had Mr. Motley done no other service to ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... the principle of authority by bringing in the influence of reasonings and persuasions to make up for its acknowledged inefficiency. It is one of those cases where a force is weakened by reinforcement—as a plant, by being long held up by a stake, comes in the end not to ...
— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... they have stolen, and swagger through the cities they have levied upon the people to build. Do we care to-day whether Charlemagne murdered his enemies with a sword or an axe; do we ask if King Arthur used painless assassination or burned his foes at the stake? Who cares to know that Caesar was a rake, and that William the Conqueror was a robber? They did their work and did it well, and are snugly sitting on their monuments where no moralist can reach them. So those searching for true romance to-day, who regard the ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... former, "the mere circumstance of their having received existence amid these wilds can make them Canadians, they certainly are Canadians; but if the blood of a proud race can make them Britons, such they are. Be they which they may however, I would stake my life on the fidelity of the Granthams—still, the cause of this young officer's absence must be inquired into, and no doubt it will be satisfactorily explained. Meanwhile, let a second ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... I ever set eyes on," replied Ben; "and, if he had had his will, he would have liked to make us all Romanists too, and burn us at the stake, as ...
— The Settlers - A Tale of Virginia • William H. G. Kingston
... the fire flared. Allan saw an open window in the background, and beneath it a slim white form lying, bound and helpless. Fierce joy leaped in him, and fiercer hate, Naomi was as yet untouched, the game was being played for her as stake. He had come in time to ...
— When the Sleepers Woke • Arthur Leo Zagat
... the early Christians and martyrs have gone through what they did if they had been filled with doubts, and had not known whether they were going to heaven or to perdition after they had been burned at the stake? They ...
— The Way to God and How to Find It • Dwight Moody
... fairies—which, at the worst, was a very foolish affair—began to decline. But that decline brought a dark night to thousands of poor, innocent men and women; for then came the era of witchcraft, and persons of every rank, convicted of this imaginary crime, were hurried to the scaffold or the stake. ...
— Wreaths of Friendship - A Gift for the Young • T. S. Arthur and F. C. Woodworth
... indulgence had made almost an instinct, prevented his heeding. He was not accustomed to being denied, this man; and there was no contesting the obvious fact that now a confidence was being withheld. The latent antagonism aroused with a bound at the thought. Something more than mere curiosity was at stake, something which he magnified until it obscured his horizon, warped hopelessly his vision of right or wrong. He was of the conquering Anglo-Saxon race, and this other who refused him was an Indian. Racial supremacy itself hung in the balance: ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge
... any one that will take their paper," said Barbet. "Your book is their last stake, sir. The printer will not trust them; they are obliged to leave the copies in pawn with him. If they make a hit now, it will only stave off bankruptcy for another six months, sooner or later they will have to go. They ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... posted in the immediate vicinity of the barrow, he would have learned that these persons were boys and men of the neighbouring hamlets. Each, as he ascended the barrow, had been heavily laden with furze-faggots, carried upon the shoulder by means of a long stake sharpened at each end for impaling them easily—two in front and two behind. They came from a part of the heath a quarter of a mile to the rear, where furze almost exclusively prevailed ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... heritage from those simple-hearted ancestors to whom the suicide was a soul accurst—a soul impenitent, whose very outer husk of flesh and bones they used to bury at the crossing of the ways, with a sharpened stake to ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... weapons, he gave himself up to what he knew would be certain torture. Had he winced or whined as they tore the nails from his fingers and the hair from his head, the Iroquois would probably have brained him on the spot for a poltroon; but the young man, bound to a stake, pointed to a gathering storm as sign of Heaven's displeasure. The high spirit pleased the Iroquois. They unbound him and took him with them in their wanderings ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... king, "we will not do Madame de la Motte the honor of sending for her to give evidence either for or against you. I cannot stake your honor against the veracity ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... sir, to hear you say this," replied Ernest. "I would myself stake much on Ellis's honour; but how are the other boys to be convinced of this, when one who professes to be a witness is among them, ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... forms, from the sharpening of a stake to the construction of a city or an epic, is one immense illustration of the perfect compensation of the universe. The absolute balance of Give and Take, the doctrine that everything has its price,—and if that price is not paid, not that thing but something ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... disturb my meditations. [Exit Servant.—Ay, it shall be he: Jack Loveby, what think'st thou of a game at piquet, we two, hand to fist? you and I will play one single game for ten pieces: 'Tis deep stake, Jack, but 'tis all one between us two: You shall deal, Jack:—Who I, Mr Justice! that's a good one; you must give me use for your hand then; that's six i'the hundred.—Come, lift, lift;—mine's a ten; ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. II • Edited by Walter Scott
... relates a marvellous tale of his earlier days, and Mr. Oaklands is prepared to visit the most trifling indication of disbelief with the fire and faggots of his indignation. Gentlemen, I hope you are all good and true Fairleghites, or you will assuredly be burned at the stake, to satisfy the bigotry ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... the Augustinian monks on the other, the two pyres were raised—two out of the four had shrunk back into their ignoble confessions. It was the hour of vespers when these two aged and noble men were led out to be burned; they were tied each to the stake. The flames kindled dully and heavily; the wood, hastily piled up, was green or wet; or in cruel mercy the tardiness was designed that the victims might have time, while the fire was still curling round their extremities, to recant their bold recantation. But ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... good, long contest over the snow wall. I seem to remember it all better than I remember any other struggle of my life, although there were some to come in which existence itself was at stake, but boys' mimic fights are not subjects upon which a writer may profitably dwell. It is enough to say that he defended himself very stoutly, hurling the balls which Bob had made for him with great swiftness ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... drunken with beer, of Breca now, told of his triumph! Truth I claim it, that I had more of might in the sea than any man else, more ocean-endurance. We twain had talked, in time of youth, and made our boast, — we were merely boys, striplings still, — to stake our lives far at sea: and so we performed it. Naked swords, as we swam along, we held in hand, with hope to guard us against the whales. Not a whit from me could he float afar o'er the flood of waves, haste o'er the billows; nor him I abandoned. Together we ...
— Beowulf • Anonymous
... slaves of reason, who tread in a circle around their stake as far as the cord of their logic reaches, they ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden
... prettiest, the cleverest girl on the boards, each of whose shows, when she performed alone, would be worth at least three pounds, as much as a whole troupe! He suspected in her the ripe fruit that was bound to drop; and he shook the tree to hasten the fall. He considered his reputation at stake: he, the man with the thirty-six girls, as he was called at the music-hall. He got caught in his own toils and wanted Lily madly, out of revenge and pride ... and jealousy too, for he suspected that Jimmy was courting her; and the idea that he had a ...
— The Bill-Toppers • Andre Castaigne
... ninety-nine guilty should escape than that one innocent should be condemned. Hence the teachings of science and of human and divine law all coincide to protect the sacred rights and the precious interests at stake against an unjust suspicion, which even the doctrine of chances ...
— The Physical Life of Woman: - Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother • Dr. George H Napheys
... motivated the Homestead Act, the Social Security Act, and the G.I. Bill of Rights. And now we will extend this vision by reforming great institutions to serve the needs of our time. To give every American a stake in the promise and future of our country, we will bring the highest standards to our schools, and build an ownership society. We will widen the ownership of homes and businesses, retirement savings and health insurance—preparing our people for the challenges ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various
... faction and the efforts of a people, they may chance to see the government, which they are so nicely weighing, and dividing, and distinguishing, tumble to the ground in the midst of their wise deliberation. Prudent men, when so great an object as the security of government, or even its peace, is at stake, will not run the risk of a decision which may be fatal to it. They who can read the political sky will see a hurricane in a cloud no bigger than a hand at the very edge of the horizon, and will run into the ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... on, holding up a rosy finger. "You are so near-sighted! You are so unimaginative! You do not dream beyond the thing you see. You judge the tale finished while the best has yet to be told. And you stake your faith, your hope, your charity upon this blind human ...
— The Christmas Angel • Abbie Farwell Brown
... preliminary precaution, as we were undeniably showing signs of resentment against such torturing treatment, we were bustled into our barracks. But we could not rest or sleep. The hapless man at the stake was being racked and torn with pain. His shrieks, moans, and groans, echoing and re-echoing through the still hours of the summer evening, sounded so weird, uncanny, and nerve-racking as to make our blood run ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney
... he mused—two who knew of the place and its treasure; but Captain Jacques was, according to the old fisherman's theory, not the kind of man to stick at trifles when such great interests were at stake; and he felt quite satisfied that the two boys would never be seen at Cormorant Crag again. Some accident would happen to them—what accident was no business of his, he argued. They had got themselves into a terrible mess through ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... her. He knew that if he killed Taung S'Ali his men would be so dispirited that when the night came they would fly. There was so much at stake—Iris, wealth, love, happiness, life itself—all depended on his plighted word. Yet his savage enemy, a slayer of women, a human vampire soiled with every conceivable crime, was stalking back to safety with a certain dignified ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... took no care of him; she brought him up like a scullion, and liked better to stake her money at play than to expend it upon her youngest son. This is the ordinary practice of women in ...
— The Memoirs of the Louis XIV. and The Regency, Complete • Elizabeth-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Orleans
... treachery, and such unmasked impudence, that I took pleasure at all times and at all places in making him feel, and others see, the sovereign disdain I entertained for him. I did not allow my private feelings to sway my judgment when public interests were at stake, for when I thought the Duc de Noailles right, and this often occurred, I supported him; but when I knew him to be wrong, or when I caught him neglecting his duties, conniving at injustice, shirking inquiry, ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... who first laid down the maxim that when the State's salvation is at stake there must be no enquiry into the purity of the means employed; only let the State be secured and no one will condemn them.—H. v. TREITSCHKE, ...
— Gems (?) of German Thought • Various
... we beat them out of doors.... That dogs physicians are, thus I infer; They are ne'er sick but they know their disease And find out means to ease them of their grief. Special good surgeons to cure dangerous wounds: For, stricken with a stake into the flesh This policy they use to get it out; They trail one of their feet upon the ground, And gnaw the flesh about where the wound is, Till it be clean drawn out; and then, because Ulcers and sores ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... anything but remarkable for equanimity under trial; but his state of mind was quite different at present, and exhibited itself in entirely different ways. He neither swore nor looked black; his was the anxiety of a man who has some grave interest at stake wherein the better part of his nature ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... contemptuous indifference. At that time the Courts of London and Madrid were beginning to draw closer together in order to withstand the demands of France; but nothing passed between them officially respecting the saving of Louis. Now, where the life of a King was at stake, any communication must have been official, and if it were made through the Spanish ambassador in London, Grenville would certainly have referred to it in his despatches to Madrid.[151] We may therefore dismiss Godoy's story as a cruel and baseless slander, due to the spiteful ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... former visit, in frame, was now nearly completed, and a most beautiful one she was. He told me he would much rather part with life than see her destroyed; and I confess I could fully enter into his feelings on the subject; but as I had no such object at stake, and was not quite enthusiastic enough to fight for a vessel I had no share in, I felt very much inclined to let the natives war among themselves without interference; but as we Europeans had agreed to assist each other, I ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle
... Events that belong to history had contributed yet more to weaken the administration. Randal Leslie's interest became absorbed in politics, for the stake to him was his whole political career. Should Audley lose office, and for good, Audley could aid him no more; but to abandon his patron, as Levy recommended, and pin himself, in the hope of a seat in parliament, to a ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... self-possession, nor even, in all cases, of opportunities to attend to them; but to a sincere desire to avoid even the appearance of selfishness, at moments when the valuable lives of their sailors and soldiers were at stake. And this observation applies with still greater force to the senior officers in both services, whose cabins being upon the upper deck were accessible during the whole day; and where many portable articles of value were deposited, which could have been ...
— The Loss of the Kent, East Indiaman, in the Bay of Biscay - Narrated in a Letter to a Friend • Duncan McGregor
... Danger and the trial would be an excitement to their pallid spirits, possible transportation even seemed a ray of hope, since any thing was better than the town; and in their sinful recklessness, liberty or life itself was little higher looked on than a dice's stake. Moreover, as to all manner of personal pains and penalties, there was every chance of getting off scot-free, provided they lost no time, went not one before the other, but doubly turned queen's evidence at once against their worthy coadjutor and employer. In the hope, then, of ruining him, ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... bullets, they were now ransacking their laboratory for gases that would burst the lungs of our soldiers, and for inflammable oils that would set them afire as if they were criminals tarred and feathered and tied to a stake. Their battleships, built to fight craft of their own kind, or at least fortresses capable of replying to their fire, were now sent out to bombard innocent watering-places lying breast open to the sea. Their ...
— The Drama Of Three Hundred & Sixty-Five Days - Scenes In The Great War - 1915 • Hall Caine
... you will find," said Sherlock Holmes, "that you will play for a higher stake to-night than you have ever done yet, and that the play will be more exciting. For you, Mr. Merryweather, the stake will be some thirty thousand pounds; and for you, Jones, it will be the man upon whom you wish to lay ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... concealed, that in several cases I had a narrow escape from falling into them. They are shaped like an iron furnace, wider at the bottom than the top, and are perhaps fifteen or twenty feet deep so that it would be almost impossible for a person unassisted to get out of one. Formerly a sharp stake was stuck erect in the bottom; but after an unfortunate traveller had been killed by falling on one, its use was forbidden. There are always a few tigers roaming about Singapore, and they kill on an average a Chinaman every ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... "Don't be a goose, Helena. You remember what I told you all in the Roost, don't you? Well, I haven't been living in a Maine village ten days or two weeks for nothing, and what I said then goes now more than ever. Now, don't get sore, kid—there's a big stake up, and if we're going to play the game we've got to play it to the limit. We live perfectly, ultra-proper, decent lives, mentally, morally, physically, till we beat it ...
— The Miracle Man • Frank L. Packard
... very noble Prince, our Lord Eberhard Ludwig, Duke and Ruler of Wirtemberg.' Then a member of the privy council rose, and in solemn tones read the indictment of Friedrich Haberle, the murderer, and Johannes Schwan, the horse-stealer, condemned to be burned at the stake, together with the effigy of the detestable traitor and purloiner of State monies, ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... maze of things, And tossed by storm and flood, To one fixed stake my spirit clings; I ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... inmost soul that he had remained quietly at home and left to warriors the task of capturing the fugitives, but there was no resisting the mandate of the king; besides, his honour and credit as a fetishman was at stake; moreover, no doubt he felt somewhat emboldened by the presence of such a large number of men—there were certainly several hundreds on the ground—so, all things considered, he thought it best to accept the post of leader with a good grace. Stepping quickly ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne
... opportunity. "We do but seek a passage through your room," I said fervently. Good heavens, what had we not at stake! What if she should remain obdurate? "We are in trouble—in despair," I panted. "So, I believe, are you. We will help you if you will first save us. We are boys, but we ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... connected with the Derby family. Two short years before, the great, the brave Sir William Stanley, who, of his own power and interest, raised and brought 3000 horse and foot to the rescue of his prince, when his life, his honour, and his hopes of a throne were at stake; who contributed to his victory, and helped to crown him 'King' in the field; had, by that very sovereign, been sent to the block, merely on account of a doubtful and unguarded expression, reported by a rebel, a traitor, and an ungenerous ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... battlefields are they come, from the flame and ravishment of fair cities, from dim and reeking dungeons, from the rack, the stake, and the gibbet, to pierce the heavens once more with the voice of ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... play with her and talk, and thence away by coach, home, and so to do a little more in my accounts, and then to supper and to bed. Nothing done in the House yet as to the finishing of the bill for money, which is a mighty sad thing, all lying at stake for it. ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... in these years was one long, secret struggle, the fierceness of which only my father suspected, without being able to do anything to help me, poor man - for he really suffered under it with me because his life task was at stake. ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden
... there alone, surrounded by strange people who were acting in so unconcerned a manner. They did not seem to be thinking in the least of what life and death meant to this woman. One young doctor was showing something to another, and they laughed right out loud! The woman whose life was at stake was not impressing them any more than—not any more than that terrible looking little instrument which the nurse handed ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... we had every reason to fear that an immediate stop would be put to all proceedings on our part, as soon as the coroner was introduced upon the scene. But happily for us and the interest at stake, Dr. Fink, of R ——, proved to be a very sensible man. He had only to hear a true story of the affair to recognize at once its importance and the necessity of the most cautious action in the matter. Further, by a sort of sympathy with Mr. Gryce, all the more ...
— The Leavenworth Case • Anna Katharine Green
... with "the universal spider," Louis XI. He took up the defence of the Duke of Brittany at Tours. But Louis was then in no humour to hear Charles's texts and Latin sentiments; he had his back to the wall, the future of France was at stake; and if all the old men in the world had crossed his path, they would have had the rough side of his tongue like Charles of Orleans. I have found nowhere what he said, but it seems it was monstrously to the point, and so rudely conceived that the old duke never recovered the indignity. ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... head). I mustn't judge her. I once listened myself outside a tent when there was a mutiny brewing. It's all a question of the degree of provocation. My life was at stake. ...
— Arms and the Man • George Bernard Shaw
... Pendyce. "What business has she——" He was silent, staring gloomily at the plan of Worsted Skeynes, still unrolled, like an emblem of all there was at stake. "If George has really," he burst out, "he's a greater fool than I took him for! A fool? ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... gave all the prizes (about ten pounds in the aggregate) in money. The great mass of the crowd were labouring men of all kinds, soldiers, sailors, and navvies. They did not, between half-past ten, when we began, and sunset, displace a rope or a stake; and they left every barrier and flag as neat as they found it. There was not a dispute, and there was no drunkenness whatever. I made them a little speech from the lawn, at the end of the games, saying that please God we would do it again next year. They cheered most lustily and dispersed. ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... evidence against Lucien. Come, read me the minutes of his examination that I may see if there is still a way of salvation for us all, monsieur. I do not speak for myself alone—I should quite calmly kill myself—but Monsieur de Serizy's happiness is also at stake." ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... of Seville. He acted as Charles's representative at the court of Rome, and was, less than a year before his death, appointed general of the Inquisition; even in that short time one hundred and twenty persons were burned at the stake, and six hundred more punished in various ways. Loaisa died ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 • Emma Helen Blair
... don't play nobody's hand, or stake anybody's chips, but my own," Irish retorted, the blood showing under the ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... be defended on moral grounds. But vast moneyed interests are at stake. One of the greatest of American fortunes was built upon the brutal, merciless trapping of wild animals for their furs. And in this fall of 1919 the prices of fox, marten, beaver, raccoon, skunk, lynx, muskrat, mink, otter, were higher by double than they had ever been. Trappers were going ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... his products cannot raise potatoes, turnips, or hay. He must raise the less bulky articles, wheat or cotton and he must take from his land all the elements of which wheat or cotton is composed, and then abandon it. In addition to this, he must stake all his chances of success in his year's cultivation on a single crop; and what are the effects of this is seen in the following paragraph in relation to the wheat cultivation of Virginia ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey
... Black Windows? Listen, now, it is the custom of the Fung to allow those who are imprisoned within the idol to walk unguarded upon its back at dawn and sunset. At least, this is their custom with Black Windows—ask me not how I know it; this is truth, I swear it on my life, which is at stake. Now this is my plan. We have with us a ladder which will reach from where we stand to the tail of the idol. Should the foreign lord appear upon the back of the god, which, if he still lives, as I believe ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard |
