"Trigger" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... there later, unconscious, badly wounded, his hand still on the trigger of the gun he had worked with such success. He was carried back to the rest billet and thence to a hospital. Everywhere the story of the boy's heroism ...
— The Children of France • Ruth Royce
... Neither would determine, nor would preponderance of weapons determine. It was not yet perceived that such clan-people were not Tribe-People, and thus could not know the meaning of Council, nor weigh consequence, nor realize in their new-found cleverness that a single arrogant act would trigger ...
— The Beginning • Henry Hasse
... our front pretty thoroughly with mines, consisting of large shells buried with caps that would explode at the touch of a foot on a trigger, and we awaited the approach of the Federal force that had been ...
— A History of Lumsden's Battery, C.S.A. • George Little
... those lines of thought Sir George was not, perhaps, conscious in his peril, yet, fetching back, he could trace them as they had worked. Seeking a solution by measures not violent, he had been given sore spears, whereon his finger tightened at the trigger, and he was a wound automaton; fixed, stern, a fate on feet, bearing down upon the chief in the shelter of ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... you knew where there was a gun, would that make you want to put it up agin your head and pull the trigger?" ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand
... risked the count's. There was one moment when my hand was on my trigger, and my soul very near the sin of justifiable homicide. But my tale is done. The count is now on the river, and will soon be on the salt seas, though not bound to Norway, as I had first intended. I could ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... comprehensive glide from sleep to waking of the savage. In the night-light he made out a dark object in the midst of the grass and brought his gun to bear upon it. A second croak began to rise, and he pulled the trigger. The crickets ceased from their sing-song chant, the wildfowl from their squabbling, and the raven croak broke midmost and ...
— The Faith of Men • Jack London
... what seemed to be hours, the catapult crew cranked their awkward weapon to the trigger-point again and sent another rain of spikes ...
— Hunters Out of Space • Joseph Everidge Kelleam
... alteration of the military flint-lock to the percussion musket was easily accomplished by replacing the powder pan by a perforated nipple, and by replacing the cock or hammer which held the flint by a smaller hammer with a hollow to fit on the nipple when released by the trigger. On the nipple was placed the copper cap containing the detonating composition, now made of three parts of chlorate of potash, two of fulminate of mercury and one of powdered glass. The detonating cap thus invented and adopted, brought about the invention of the ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... few yards away raised his rifle and blew his head off. Young Brown broke down at this—they had just done in his wounded pal: "Oh, look! Look what they've done to Davie," and fell to weeping. And with that another put the muzzle of his rifle against the boy's head and pulled the trigger. ...
— The Escape of a Princess Pat • George Pearson
... Billy. It's to save you torture, old fellow, just to save you useless suffering, Billy." He drew his pistol from his belt, took careful aim just behind the pony's ear, and, turning his head away, pulled the trigger. ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... He pulled the trigger of his automatic again and again as he rushed forward. By some strange trick of fate the figure reeled for a second and one of its arms dropped swinging to its side. The bullet had entered a joint. Had it in some way deranged the mechanism, causing the Automaton to turn in its tracks and confront ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey
... observed, that as we advanced to charge Johnson's poltroons, one of the party, a resolute fellow, presented his gun to my breast and drew the trigger. Happily, in the very instant of its firing, lieutenant Jossilin knocked it up with his sword; and the ball grazing my shoulder, bursted through the side of ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... those complex ideas which are not visible in the action itself; the intention of the mind, or the relation of holy things, which make a part of murder or sacrilege, have no necessary connexion with the outward and visible action of him that commits either: and the pulling the trigger of the gun with which the murder is committed, and is all the action that perhaps is visible, has no natural connexion with those other ideas that make up the complex one named murder. They have their union and combination only from ...
— An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume II. - MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books III. and IV. (of 4) • John Locke
... against his chest, Dartie had pulled the trigger several times. It was not loaded. Dropping it with an imprecation, he had muttered: "For shake o' the children," and sank into a chair. Winifred, having picked up the revolver, gave him some soda water. The liquor had a magical effect. Life had illused him; ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... these several places may, perhaps, set several parts of these little Animals at work, even as in the contrivance of killing a Fox or Wolf with a Gun, the moving of a string, is the death of the Animal; for the Beast, by moving the flesh that is laid to entrap him, pulls the string which moves the trigger, and that lets go the Cock which on the steel strikes certain sparks of fire which kindle the powder in the pann, and that presently flies into the barrel, where the powder catching fire rarifies and drives out the bullet which kills the Animal; in all ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... back! Or hear me!—for five years I've worked among you, and mended and patched the holes you've drilled through each other's carcasses—Keep back, I say!—or the next man that pulls trigger, or steps forward, will get a hole from me that no surgeon can stop. I'm sick of your bungling ball practice! Keep back!—or, by the living Jingo, I'll show you where a ...
— The Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... advise yuh to go ridin'," Jim said thoughtfully. "This here gun's kinda techy, anyway, unless you're used to a quick trigger. Yuh might be ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... hyar Injun," continued Seth, without noticing Mr Rawlings' explanatory interruption, "rushed on to me like a mad bull in fly time, and seein' as how he meant bizness; I drawed the trigger again, but missed him, and he flung his tommyhawk, which cotched my fut, and brought me to the ground as slick as greased ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... had crossed were musketeers, the remainder pikemen. The latter formed the front line behind the rampart, their spears forming a close hedge around it, while the musketeers prepared to fire between them. By the order of Count Brahe not a trigger was pulled until the cavalry were within fifty yards, then a flash of flame swept round the rampart, and horses and men in the front line of the cavalry tumbled to the ground. But half the musketeers had fired, and a few seconds later ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... his teeth in his fury, and, snatching a rifle from one of his Indians who were near him, aimed it at Claude, and pulled the trigger. ...
— The Lily and the Cross - A Tale of Acadia • James De Mille
... haven't the nerve. There's nothing to you. You're just a cheap crook, and that's all. You wouldn't find the nerve to pull that trigger in a ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... adjusting his helmet and giving him his injection. He never felt the rocket tilt into firing position, and while he slept, the Kharands language, with all its vocabulary and grammar, became part of his subconscious knowledge, needing only the mental pronunciation of a trigger-symbol to bring it into consciousness. The pilot was already unfastening and raising his helmet when he opened his eyes. Dalla, beside him, was sipping a cup ...
— Time Crime • H. Beam Piper
... "Anyway, we shant begin it. If it comes to a fight, though," he said, with a look at the men under the scooping rim of his helmet, "we can drive the whole six thousand of 'em into the East River without pullin' a trigger." ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... and turned. Dick levelled his pistol instantly at Austin, with murderous hate in his eyes, and drew the trigger. The pistol clicked harmlessly. Austin, self-conscious, did not raise his pistol. But Dick, broadening his chest, glared at ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke
... | | | |She extradited herself Tuesday night with a revolver| |shot in the temple. In the yard back of her | |foster-parents' home at 5319 West Twenty-fifth | |Street, Cicero, with one arm around the loyal Fritz,| |she put the revolver to her head and pressed the | |trigger....[48] | ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... discover hidden stores, and, digging them up out of the snow, carefully smooth the surface over again; that it will avoid every trap set for itself, and, going round to the back of spring guns, gnaw through the string connected with the trigger before it drags away the bait. It follows up the lines laid down by the trappers, taking the martens out, and devouring them, or hiding what it cannot eat, and by wearying out the patience of the hunters, compel them to strike a ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... slain nobody whom they had not been positively directed by their commanding officer to slay. That subordination without which an army is the worst of all rabbles would be at an end, if every soldier were to be held answerable for the justice of every order in obedience to which he pulls his trigger. The case of Glencoe was, doubtless, an extreme case; but it cannot easily be distinguished in principle from cases which, in war, are of ordinary occurrence. Very terrible military executions are sometimes indispensable. Humanity itself ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... snipping of wire-cutters is heard, each time being followed perhaps by a slight "ping" as the strained wire separates. The ensuing silence is almost heart-breaking, for in contrast something else may at any instant be increasing its tension, a sentry's trigger-finger. One stormy night, when in hospital, I had reason to believe that an officer would make an attempt in that part of the camp at a given hour, so had an excellent chance of watching operations, which was not wasted. I went to the window and settled ...
— 'Brother Bosch', an Airman's Escape from Germany • Gerald Featherstone Knight
... nest was resting on; we fired again, and the bullet passed through the nest without touching the bird. I then asked the king to allow me to try his Whitworth, to which a little bit of stick, as a charm to secure a correct aim, had been tied below the trigger-guard. This time I broke the bird's leg, and knocked him half out of the nest; so, running up to the king, I pointed to the charm, saying, That has done it—hoping to laugh him out of the folly; but he took my joke in earnest, ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... lest some eye might be spying her action even through the thick blinds, she took the weapon in her hand and held it up so that she might feel, if possible, how it would be with her when she should attempt the deed. She looked very narrowly at the lock, of which the trigger was already back at its place, so that no exertion of arrangement might be necessary for her at the fatal moment. Never as yet had she fired a pistol;—never before had she held such a weapon in her hand;—but ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope
... around, leveled the automatic's muzzle at the hole in the idol's eye, sighted carefully, and squeezed the trigger. And as the explosion boomed through the vast chamber outside, he veered the gun in a different aim ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... the West, Western—of the old, bad West of informal vendetta, when a man's increase of years might lie squarely on his quickness in the "draw"; when he went abundantly armed by day and slept lightly at night—trigger fingers instinctively crooked. Of course such days have very definitely passed; wherefore the engaging puzzle of certain survivals in Jimmie Time—for I found him still a two-gun man. He wore them rather consciously sagging from his lean hips—almost pompously, it seemed. Nor ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... back upon him as he swung the pistol into line with one of the jelly-masses. He barely pressed the trigger before the charging brutes knocked him ...
— Zehru of Xollar • Hal K. Wells
... merry chap As ever made a trigger snap, And ne'er a bird its wing could flap— And get away; Whenever Barber smashed a ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... my cabin. It was located aft, on the stern deck-space, near the stern watch-tower. A small metal room, with a desk, a chair and bunk. I made sure no one was in it. I sealed the lattice grill and the door, set the alarm trigger against any opening of ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various
... their bullets crashed through the crowded Southern ranks. The Winchesters were on the flank of the defenders, where they could get a better view, and although they also were firing as fast as they could reload and pull the trigger, they saw the great column pause ...
— The Sword of Antietam • Joseph A. Altsheler
... upon him that the distance between him and the bear loomed up before him now as almost hopelessly long. If he only had a rifle, instead of his shotgun! But it was the last hope, and whispering a prayer to God to send the bullet straight, with nerves as tense as steel, he pulled the trigger. ...
— Bobby of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... cannot defend that right, I can retire cheerfully with my little family into the boundless woods of America, which are sure to afford freedom and subsistence to any man who can bait a hook or pull a trigger." ...
— Benjamin Franklin, A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago - American Pioneers and Patriots Series • John S. C. Abbott
... that I was not frightened, but that I considered that it was an awful moment. The second to my adversary then came up and asked me whether I would make an apology, which I refused to do as before: they handed a pistol to each of us, and my second showed me how I was to pull the trigger. It was arranged that at the word given, we were to fire at the same time. I made sure that I should be wounded, if not killed, and I shut my eyes as I fired my pistol in the air. I felt my head swim, and thought I was hurt, but fortunately I was not. The pistols were loaded again, and we ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... doctor agreed, "a hair-trigger! And his father understands him about as well as—as Danny there understands Hebrew! I think it's a case of Samuel and his father over again. Dr. Lavendar, do you suppose anybody will ever know what those ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland
... beginning to show how entirely he was the son of his father. For the older Devereau had grown up from a handsome, dark-skinned, reticent boy into a moody and cynical skeptic who, at the age of thirty, had put the muzzle of his own revolver against his temple and pulled the trigger, because as he phrased it, "he was tired of the game." The skepticism was already there in Garry Devereau's slow smile. And Caleb often felt that the boy's black eyes were looking through and beyond, rather than at him. The bond of mutual understanding ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... each other, penitently. "Yes," interposed the Judge with delicate tact, "ye see the Right and Left Bower almost quarreled to see which should be the first to fire for ye. I disremember which did"—"I never touched the trigger," said the Left Bower, hastily. With a hurried backward kick, the Judge resumed, "It ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... a steady line, and the men between the elephants grew every moment more excited. For the action of the animals proved that it was no false alarm, and in the momentary glances I had from right to left, I saw that the rajah and Brace were waiting, with finger on trigger, for a shot at the striped monster creeping on ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... quietly loaded his gun, and then rose up to reconnoiter. Holdfast sprung forward, and Edward, looking in the direction, perceived Corbould partly hidden behind a tree, with his gun leveled at him. He heard the trigger pulled, and snap of the lock, but the gun did not go off; and then Corbould made his appearance, striking at Holdfast with the butt-end of his gun. Edward advanced to him and desired him to desist, or it would be the worse ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... in one of Gerald Griffin's novels, there is a scene in which a young Irish student, fresh from his scholastic ethics, amazes the company at his father's table, who are all devout believers in the virtues of the hair-trigger, by an eloquent declamation against the folly and the sin of duelling. At last one of the set gets sufficient breath to call him a coward. The hot Irish blood is up in an instant, a tumbler is thrown at the head of the doubter of his courage, and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... fire. Singling out one of Stuart's men, he covered that cavalier with his revolver, and probably, in another instant, would have ended his career; but, just as his finger gave the final pressure upon the trigger, his horse, riddled with bullets, fell dead under him, the shot flew wide of its mark, and he ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... doom was close. Twice, when the rustler chief had sauntered nearer to the cabin door, as if to enter, Hare had covered him with the rifle, waiting, waiting for the step upon the threshold. But Holderness always checked himself in time, and Hare's finger eased its pressure upon the trigger. ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... wrote them down, and the time they occupied. I soon got into the way of doing all this in a very methodical and automatic manner, keeping the mind perfectly calm and neutral, but intent and, as it were, at full cock and on hair trigger, before displaying the word. There was no disturbance occasioned by thinking of the forthcoming revulsion of the mind the moment before the chronograph was stopped. My feeling before stopping it was simply that ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... however, was at his belt, and his hand reached for it. But the range was already too far for any hope of accurate pistol fire. His hard eyes gazed along the short, black barrel. His steady finger pressed back against the trigger. ...
— The Sky Line of Spruce • Edison Marshall
... Cause! but mark the men— Mark the planted statues, then Draw trigger on them if ...
— Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War • Herman Melville
... knew it, he felt it. However, he was brave, since he did wish to fight! He was brave, since.... The thought that budded never took form, even in his own mind; for, opening his mouth wide he brusquely thrust the barrel of his pistol into his throat, and pulled the trigger.... ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... a pistol from his sash, and, taking aim full at the skipper's breast, he pulled the trigger. Fortunately, the weapon snapped and did not explode. The ruffian held it a moment in his hand, and then letting it rest upon the table, he said, with a ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood! They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years, Till, now, on the stroke of midnight, Cold, on the stroke of midnight, The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... sat in the old familiar woods and dreamed of the happy long ago, until a gang of blackbirds, spluttering in a neighboring treetop woke me. And when I rose from the log and threw myself into the shape of an interrogation point, and touched the trigger, at the crack of my rifle old bullfrogg shot into the pond; the hoot-owl "scooted" into his castle in the trunk of an old hollow tree; the blackbirds cut the "asymptote of a hyperbolical curve" in the air; the squirrel fell to the ground at my feet, with a bullet through his brain, and ...
— Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales • Robert L. Taylor
... Julien pressed the trigger, as if in obedience to that order, incorrect, but too natural to be even noticed. The weapon was discharged, and the three spectators at the window of the bedroom uttered three simultaneous exclamations on seeing Gorka's arm fall and his hand drop ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget
... mistaken, I thought I heard the click of a trigger," he said to Grevin, after getting behind the trunk of a large tree, where the notary, uneasy at his friend's sudden movement, ...
— An Historical Mystery • Honore de Balzac
... under this window, which he realized must be almost over Shorty's head. It was but the work of an instant to grasp Pat's gun and stick its nose well through the little half moon of an opening in the shutter, pointed straight over Shorty's head into the woods, and pull the trigger. ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... stood upon the window- seat, looking out of the window. Another boy came along, and, taking up the gun, not knowing that it was loaded and primed, took deliberate aim at the face of the girl, and pulled the trigger. But God, in mercy, caused the gun to miss fire. Had it gone off, the girl's face would have been blown all to pieces, I never can think of the danger she was in, even now, without trembling. The girl did ...
— The Child at Home - The Principles of Filial Duty, Familiarly Illustrated • John S.C. Abbott
... sportsmen pulled trigger almost simultaneously. The baronet and the colonel had each selected the same spot, the eye, as the object of their aim, and both had been equally successful, the shell in each case passing upward through the eyeball into the brain, exploding there and causing instant death. ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... indeed!" cried Morrison emphatically, breaking in. "With modern industrial conditions hung on a hair trigger as they are, it's as though a boy had exploded a fire-cracker in the works of a watch. That means his whole fortune gone. Old Peter put everything into coal. Austin will not have a cent—nothing but those Vermont scrub forests of his. What a mad thing to do! But it's been ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... stillness, watching the light tracery of shadow and sun on that smooth sward, only now and then roused by the fleet rush of a deer through the wood, or the brisk chatter of a plume-tailed squirrel, till one hears a distant, sharp, clucking chuckle, and in an instant more pulls the trigger, and upsets a grand old cock, every bronzed feather glittering in the sunshine, and now splashed with scarlet blood, the delicate underwing ground into down as he rolls and flutters; for the first shot rarely kills at once with an amateur; ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... the telephone place fling down his book and grab a pistol from I don't know where. He stepped out into the street and fired three shots into the air as fast as he could pull the trigger. And as he done so they was a light flashed out in a building way down the railroad track, and shots come answering from there. Men's voices began to yell out; they was the noise of people running along plank sidewalks, and windows opening in the dark. Then with a rush ...
— Danny's Own Story • Don Marquis
... the gravest sources of restlessness in the world. Touchiness, when it becomes chronic, is a morbid condition of the inward disposition. It is self-love inflamed to the acute point; conceit, WITH A HAIR-TRIGGER. The cure is to shift the yoke to some other place; to let men and things touch us through some new and perhaps as yet unused part of our nature; to become meek and lowly in heart while the old sensitiveness is becoming ...
— Addresses • Henry Drummond
... it is loaded, cocked and pointed at your head, with a half drunken galoot's finger on the trigger, is a ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... scruple—in a word, to be the foes of all mankind, strangers in their family, men whom any person may slay if he can; in the village they are dangerous neighbours, and in meeting them you must keep your hand on the trigger; but in war one ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... alone. If he did it, that involved—Pah! what was in a word? Men died every day. He had quite resolved: Judith and he had talked the matter over all night. But if Frazier were a younger man, and could fight for it! Perhaps he was armed: Soule's face flashed: he stooped and broke the trigger of his gun, and then went on with a much less heavy step. They would be more even now. He wanted to reach the bridge by dawn, and meet his brother. If he refused to help him, he would send him away, and wait for Frazier alone. About nine ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... in an instant he saw that they had strangely bridged the distance between his wife and himself. He felt her close on him, like a panting foe; and her answer was a flash that showed the hand on the trigger. ...
— The Touchstone • Edith Wharton
... load the rifles, and hand them to me, and let me fire them." But they can load all the four rifles, and he can not fire half as fast as they can load; and I say to the mother, "Can you shoot?" She says, "Let me try;" and she takes a gun, and points it at the wolves, and pulls the trigger, and I see one of them throw his feet up in the air. "Ah!" I say, "I see you can shoot! You keep the rifle, and fire it yourself." And I say to the oldest daughter, "Can you shoot?" "I guess I can," ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... five months of thrashing to and fro in the wintry North Atlantic a torpedo sped across her bows and she knew her chance had come. Instantly her alarm signals, quietly given, brought all hands to action stations, some in deck-houses, others in hen-coops, but each with his finger on the trigger or his hand on a ready spare shell. Presently the submarine broke surface and fired a shot across the Q ship's bow. On this the well-trained crew ran about in panic, while the captain screeched at them and waved his arms about like mad. Then the submarine came up ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... as he usually did, the spaniel circled away to where it narrowed, and leaped across it in his run. Then St. Remi, drawing a pistol from his holsters, fired at and shot his faithful companion, averting his eyes as he touched the fatal trigger, and galloping rapidly away from the death-cry that smote upon his ear; and, as he dashed the spurs into his reeking horse, he invoked maledictions on the money which was the cause of this unfortunate journey. The money! but where was it? Suddenly he pulled up his harassed steed, and the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... attendants, left the Indian trail, and struck out for the Forks by compass, with Gist as his companion. A misguided red man, hoping for glory from the white chief's scalp, prepared an ambush, and as Washington passed within a few paces, pulled the trigger on him. He did not know that the destiny of half the world hung upon his aim; but indeed the bullet was never molded that could draw blood from Washington. The red man missed; and the next moment Gist had him helpless, with a knife at his throat. But no: the man who could pour ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... I expected,' he remarked, speaking more to himself than to me. 'There is a slight dent on the top of the window-frame. It is of such a nature as to be made only by the trigger of a pistol falling from the nerveless hand of a suicide. He intended to throw the weapon far out of the window, but had not the strength. It might have fallen into the carriage. As a matter of fact, it bounced ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... only piece of foolishness you have n't committed already!" replied Louisa, with a biting satire that would have made any man let go of the trigger in case he had gone so far as ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... fumbled at the open window. Finger on trigger, Banneker held up his flashlight in his left hand and irradiated the spot. He saw the hand, groping, and on one of its fingers something which returned a more brilliant gleam than the electric ray. In his crass amazement, the agent straightened up, a full mark for murder, staring ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... through the tangle. About half-way up I jumped to the top of a high, conical rock, and thence by good luck caught sight of the lion's great yellow head advancing steadily about eighty yards away. I took as good a sight as I could and pulled trigger. The recoil knocked me clear off the boulder, but as I fell I saw his tail go up and knew that I had hit. At once Clifford Hill and I jumped up on the rock again, but the lion had moved out of sight. By this time, however, the sound of the shots and the smell of blood had caused the dogs ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... Soeur Laurent, referring to Madame Guix. "Wonderful—afraid of nothing. Once at the beginning of the invasion she was put against the wall and a brute of a German aimed and pulled the trigger of a gun he had found in a corner. She had accidentally covered it with a wounded man's great coat! He accused her of hiding arms! Then in the thick of the battle, she went out into the German lines and sought a doctor for our men—feeling herself incompetent. The whole German medical staff ...
— My Home In The Field of Honor • Frances Wilson Huard
... decided, Frank raised his gun a trifle further, so that it bore on the tops of the cabbage palms beyond. Then his finger pressed the trigger, and with the sudden report ...
— The Outdoor Chums on the Gulf • Captain Quincy Allen
... stationary steam-engine accompanying it, the great iron weight which was dropped upon the piles to drive them into the river bed was elevated by means of a windlass and mule power. The weight, once lifted, was released by means of a trigger connected by a cord with a post, where a man driving the mule around could pull it. The arrangement was primitive ...
— The Wolf's Long Howl • Stanley Waterloo
... completion of his eighth year," he says, "in the absence of his father, a flock of wild turkeys approached the new log cabin; and Abraham, with a rifle gun, standing inside, shot through a crack and killed one of them. He has never since pulled the trigger on ...
— Eclectic School Readings: Stories from Life • Orison Swett Marden
... his side coat-pocket a cocked revolver and laid it on the table. So that was the kind of persuasion that it had been necessary to apply to secure Mr. Grenelli's attendance. One is apt to yield the point when he feels a pistol-barrel prodding him in the ribs, and it is no great trick to set a trigger-catch with the weapon ...
— The Gates of Chance • Van Tassel Sutphen
... advancing assailants. There were shouts and screams of pain in answer, and the line hesitated. I gave them the remaining cartridge, and, seizing the smaller weapon from Luella, fired as rapidly as I could pull the trigger. ...
— Blindfolded • Earle Ashley Walcott
... pace towards the left hand, and then stepped towards O'Connell. His object was to induce him to fire, more or less, at random. He lifted his pistol, as if about to fire. O'Connell instantly presented, pulled the trigger, and the ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... by its trigger guard and stood towering above the little German, who at once began to read the letter, translating the simple words into English. The gang of rovers stood in ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... sneering Madge Scarlet realized that she was. It was a most humiliating position. Once the woman thought of making a quick spring, but a pressure of the trigger was all that was necessary to send a bullet on ...
— Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective - Or, The Crime of the Midnight Express • Frank Pinkerton
... sunset, when, just as I emerged from a tangled thicket, I perceived an Indian on his knees at a clear, sparkling spring, from which he was slaking his thirst. Instinctively I placed my rifle to my shoulder, drew a bead upon the savage and pulled the trigger. Imagine, if you can, my feelings as the flint came down and was shivered to pieces ...
— Autobiography of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black Hawk • Black Hawk
... doctor clutched his revolver, with his finger on the trigger. In spite of his pledged word, he did not hesitate. If the adversary touched the end of the bed, the shot would be fired ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc
... occasionally met local sports carrying guns together with slow-matches of smouldering brown paper. They are remarkable weapons, with single iron barrels some four feet and a half long, about twenty bore and without stocks, but having pistol handles. There are no locks or springs, the hammer and trigger being in one piece, working through the handle on a rivet. The hammers have slits in them as if to hold flints, but which really are intended for the slow-match. Sometimes these men had good bags of snipe, but only ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready
... ran to the place where the pistol was lying, snatched it up, took aim, fired.... But before he touched the trigger, his arm twitched upwards; the ball whistled over Masha's head. She looked at him over her shoulder without stopping, and went on, swinging as she walked, as ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev
... terminated in flat steel butts which would have cracked the pate of any highwayman if the shot missed fire. As Colwyn anticipated, the pistols were muzzle-loaders. The cock, which laid over considerably, was in the curious form of a twisted snake. When the trigger was pulled the head of the snake fell on ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... you've been goin' around ever since January loaded up to the muzzle with spite and sure-thing vengeance, same as an old-fashioned horse pistol used to be loaded with powder and ball, it must be kind of hard, just as you're set to pull trigger, to have to quit and swaller the whole charge. Liable to give you dyspepsy, if nothin' ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... his steady rifle barrel, was saying again, "Pray, pray for me, girl." As the words left his lips, his finger pressed the trigger, and the quiet of the hills was broken by the sharp ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... He sez they 'd ough' to stan' right up an' let us pop 'em fairly (Guess wen he ketches 'em at thet he 'll hev to git up airly), Thet our nation 's bigger 'n theirn an' so its rights air bigger, An' thet it 's all to make 'em free thet we air pullin' trigger, Thet Anglo Saxondom's idee 's abreakin' 'em to pieces, An' thet idee 's thet every man doos jest wut he damn pleases; Ef I don't make his meanin' clear, perhaps in some respex I can, I know thet "every man" don't mean a nigger or a Mexican; An' there 's another thing ...
— The Biglow Papers • James Russell Lowell
... the landing on Mercury with squadron guns pointed at their heads. Of course, they found that a sun-side landing wouldn't have hurt the ship. The whole affair was pretty well hushed up, but it produced bad feeling between the Special Order Squadrons and the spacemen. "Trigger happy space bums," the spacemen called them, ...
— Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet • Blake Savage
... groaned Roger; but the girl threw back her head and laughed with relief and gratitude for the chance of merriment until the virgin morning seemed filled with song. Higgins' hair-trigger laughter rumbled deep accompaniment; and, as always, the engineer's merriment forced itself upon Roger, and he joined in, while the silver of the girl's tones pealed above both, tinkling in the sun-kissed palms above, rolling out over the purple water, out to the ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... pistol!" shrieked Will, who was fingering his camera nervously from a point somewhat in the rear; and they immediately heard the little suggestive click that announced the pressure of a finger on the trigger. ...
— The Outdoor Chums After Big Game - Or, Perilous Adventures in the Wilderness • Captain Quincy Allen
... cutting to and fro with his terrible campilan, and before any one could prevent, he had felled two troopers. With a howl, Lewis plunged into their midst, pistol leveled, but before he could pull the trigger, the Moro buried the sword in his own ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... where Dick directed his gaze, and, in an instant, the cowboy had his weapon out and leveled. His finger was even pressing the trigger when he laughed silently and thrust the .45 back in its leather case. "Why didn't you ...
— The Boy Ranchers on the Trail • Willard F. Baker
... period at which I require some strength of mind to confess my weakness. I had a gun, the worn-out trigger of which often went off unexpectedly. I loaded this gun with three balls, and went to a spot at a considerable distance from the great Mall. I cocked the gun, put the end of the barrel into my mouth, and ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... the captain, furiously, as he deliberately pointed the pistol at the cabin boy, and prepared to pull the trigger. ...
— Facing the World • Horatio Alger
... triumphant. "You purty liar! jest you wait till I've had my dram!" An old lustre mug stood upon the shelf. He filled this almost to the brim, then lifted it from the board. There was a sound from by the door, familiar enough to Steve—namely, the cocking of a trigger. "You put that mug down," said the voice of his hostess, "or I'll put a bullet through you! Shut that cupboard door. Go and sit ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... the door, brought over one of the makeshift chairs and placed it in front of Molly, seating himself. His alcohol-laden breath reached her nauseatingly and she turned her head aside. As if a trigger had been released Plimsoll's face became inflamed with a passionate fury. The veins on face and neck swelled and writhed like little blue ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... He knew that the only rock of safety left to him was the code. There is no doubt that, had he been alone, the matter would have been settled quickly with Sam Durkee in the usual way; but he had something at his side that kept still the trigger-finger of both. It seemed likely ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry
... of the men, Ben Jones, was instantly levelled at the chief, and he was just about to pull the trigger, when Mr. Stuart exclaimed, “Not for your life! not for your life, you will bring destruction upon ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... a slim man of near forty who had rarely fired a shot in sport, never in anger, and a stoutly built irascible Irishman, for whom a good shot meant lynching or lasting opprobrium. Visions of Bob Acres and Sir Lucius O'Trigger flit before us. We picture Tierney quoting "fighting Bob Acres" as to the advantage of a sideways posture; and we wonder whether the seconds, if only in regard for their own safety, did not omit to insert bullets. The ludicrous side of the affair soon dawned on contemporaries, witness ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... was now in his favor, he swung his legs over the seat—a T-bar at the bottom of the rod which swung down from the drive mechanism—grasped the rod, and pulled the starting trigger. ...
— Where I Wasn't Going • Walt Richmond
... hand down to the lock of the gun, and drew back the trigger. Cautiously as it was done, he could not prevent a slight clicking sound, which, perhaps, struck the ear of the Solitary, for he turned his head and moved in the chair. The Indian slunk to the edge of the window, so as to conceal his person from any one within ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... skipping up and down like a roo, and his brother used to sit in the chimney nook with his book and sic-like trash—But the lad was like a loaded hackbut, which will stand in the corner as quiet as an old crutch until ye draw the trigger, and then there is nothing but flash and smoke.—But here comes my prisoner; and, setting other matters aside, I must pray a word with you, Sir Sub-Prior, respecting him. I came on before to treat about him, but I ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... by his head. In an overpowering rage he whirled about, throwing his rifle to his shoulder. A man detached from the group was lowering his arm; and, holding the sights hard on the other's metal-buttoned, twill jacket, Howat pulled the trigger. There was only an answering ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... and a vicious snap in the air, it rolled upon its back, four feet pawing furiously, and then fell limp upon its side. I stooped, panting, and pressed my pistol to the dreadful, shimmering head, but it was useless to press the trigger. ...
— Hound of the Baskervilles • Authur Conan Doyle
... scarcely pulled a trigger, Says I, 'Boys,' says I, I 'aint got a mite of vigor,'— So I skulked and tried to fly, But was booted by a nigger, And back ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... grow very anxious lest the others should take alarm, the bull likewise appeared on the edge of the glade, and stood with outstretched head, scratching his throat against a young tree, which shook violently. I aimed low, behind his shoulder, and pulled trigger. At the crack of the rifle all the bison, without the momentary halt of terror-struck surprise so common among game, turned and raced off at headlong speed. The fringe of young pines beyond and below ...
— Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches • Theodore Roosevelt
... could gather, he was all ready to pull the trigger, looking down into this here frowning muzzle before a mirror; and then something about his whiskers in the mirror must of caught his eye. Anyway, another work of self-destruction was off. So he come in and helped with lunch. Then he told me he'd like to take some time ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... was a scoundrel and a coward: a scoundrel for charging a blunderbuss against religion and morality; a coward, because he had not resolution to fire it off himself, but left half a crown to a beggarly Scotchman to draw the trigger at ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... approach now as the creature passed over the grass. Suddenly, like a dark, drifting shadow, the huge bulk loomed up once more before me, making for the entrance of the cave. Again came that paralysis of volition which held my crooked forefinger impotent upon the trigger. But with a desperate effort I shook it off. Even as the brushwood rustled, and the monstrous beast blended with the shadow of the Gap, I fired at the retreating form. In the blaze of the gun I caught ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... ease and comfort of an unopposed return was to repay him for everything. Alas! how all this was changed; how his spirits sank within him, when he received that high-toned letter from his confidential agent, Mr. Trigger, in which he was invited to suggest the name of a colleague! "I'm sure you'll be rejoiced to hear, for the sake of the old borough," said Mr. Trigger, "that we feel confident of carrying the two seats." ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... pots. An officer of the W.A.F.F.'s, in a fight in the bush in South Nigeria, had one of these things fired at him from a distance of fifteen feet. He told me all that saved him was that when the native pulled the trigger the recoil of the gun "kicked" the muzzle two feet in the air and the native ten feet into the bush. I bought a Tower rifle at the trade price, a pound, and brought it home. But although my friends have offered to back either end of the gun as ...
— The Congo and Coasts of Africa • Richard Harding Davis
... democracy is not a quick-trigger war-engine and can't be made into one. When the quick-trigger engines get to work, they forget that a democracy does not consider fighting the first duty of man. You can bend your energies to peaceful pursuits or you can bend them to war. It's hard to do ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II • Burton J. Hendrick
... going straight to one of the windows to throw back the shutters, when a sharp click brought him round on his heels as if he had been shot. In a far corner of the room, in a dark doorway, stood a shadow. The click was that of a trigger. ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... to myself, for no one was yet stirring, and I walked on, with a slouching, dogged gait. The gray shooting-jacket was on my back, and from the end of my brother's rifle hung a small bundle of my clothes. My fingers worked moodily at the stock and trigger, and I thought that this indeed was the way to begin life, with a gun ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... As he raised it Rainey grappled with him. Carlsen pulled trigger, and the bullet smashed through the skylight above them, while Rainey forced up his arm, twisting it fiercely with both hands until the gun ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... was no response. The girl had fallen back in a swoon, and a twitching of her fingers showed that even now her half-conscious mind was busy trying to find the trigger of the ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... hadn't thought you'd keep yours open. You slept all night, sir, you and Mr. Dawes, while I rode alongside with finger on trigger every minute." ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King |
