"Headsman" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... rocks of grey sandstone (like that which overlies coal) and the Rovuma in the distance. Didi is the name of a village whose headsman, Chombokea, is said to be a doctor; all the headmen pretend or are really doctors; however one, Fundindomba, came after me for medicine ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... gnaws the guns, And shattered shells are but the runs Where warring insects cope; And all the headsman's racks and blades And pincers, tools of tyrants' aids, Are ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... have chained and fettered God himself! You have already put one God to death on the cross; I am the second, and you have given me into the hands of the headsman. ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... me? dost know me? was all the maiden said, As she streamed her golden tresses through the half-unkneaden bread, While the sunset light came sheening athwart the oaken floor, And the Headsman chanted his roundelay ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., Issue 31, October 29, 1870 • Various
... countenance. "If I do as you bid, I may not go unrecognized. I say not, 'Spare me this, John Nevil!' I only ask, 'Is it wise?'... Sir Francis Drake is commander here. Four years ago he swore that you were too merciful, that in your place he would have played hangsman to me more blithely than he played headsman to ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston
... frightful instrument called the "Scavenger's daughter," while Simon Renard, scarcely able to repress a smile, interrogates the comical little figure at his leisure. Behind him stands Sorrocold, the surgeon; and in the farther corner Mauger (the headsman), Nightgall, and an assistant torturer, recline against the wall. The feeble rays of the lantern throw an obscure light upon the gloomy walls decorated with the stock in trade of the torturers, thumb-screws, ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... those bloody wars, the poor prisoner was immediately carried by an escort into the presence of the Caliph, who put the alternative in his power of either, on the instant, renouncing his religion, or submitting to the axe of the headsman. Demetrius told his tale with a noble simplicity; and his youth, his open countenance, and stately bearing, so far gained on the heart of Abubeker, that, on his refusal to embrace Mahomedism, he begged of him seriously to consider of his situation, and ordered a delay ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - tailor in Dalkeith • D. M. Moir
... confidences such as his visitor was about to tender him. Rather he seemed fully armed for the defence, especially in the matter of the heavy gold pince-nez, which he held threateningly, after the manner of the headsman of old towards the victim on whom he ...
— Pearl of Pearl Island • John Oxenham
... The form, I looked to have been stirred With pity and approval, rose O'er me, as when the headsman throws Axe over shoulder to make end— I fell prone, letting Him expend His wrath, while thus the inflicting voice Smote me. "Is this thy final choice? Love is the best? 'Tis somewhat late! And all thou dost enumerate ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... of the town. This side of the square was densely filled with citizens, while the men-at-arms of the baron and a large number of knights were gathered behind a scaffold erected in the center. Upon this was a block, and by the side stood a headsman. As Cuthbert was led forward a thrill of pleasure ran through him at perceiving no signs of his followers, who he greatly feared might have been captured in the night, and brought there to ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty
... set down as quixotic. Presumably Peytel had committed the crime in a fit of jealous passion, to punish his wife's adultery. A curious drawing by Balzac exists in the first volume of his general correspondence, in which Gavarni is represented mocking the headsman; and, accompanying the design, is an autograph letter to Dutacq, managing director of the Siecle, referring to an article on the question published by the novelist in ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton
... be had! There is a Place de Greve for sons-in-law of that sort," cried her father; "why, I would guillotine him myself if there was no headsman to ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... this evidence that the hurdy-gurdy sets the world to dancing—like the fiddle in the Turkish tale where even the headsman forgot his business—despite such evidence there are persons who affect to despise its melody. These claim such perceptivity of the outer ear and such fineness of the channels that the tune is but a clack when it gets inside. God pity such! ...
— Journeys to Bagdad • Charles S. Brooks
... tragic actors of which one could best produce his effects by fire and pathos, and the other by the subtlety of his conception. I call that an unprejudiced judgment. And why should not a man be great even as a murderer? From what hangman's noose did you drag out the neck of one, and from what headsman's block did you rescue the other when you ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... information asked, and agreed to cede these lands back to the crown, were led into the white tent, where an ample feast awaited them. Those who refused were dismissed with frowns into the red tent, where they found awaiting them the headsman's fatal block and axe. The hapless guests were ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... a most dutiful daughter-in-law, and with the baby long kept the headsman's ax from descending. But even their restraining power had its limitations. The irk of that "godless" office was being more and more poorly met by Dave. Five times during the fourth year he took ungranted periods of relaxation. The last time the usual draft was not paid. He ...
— Our Nervous Friends - Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness • Robert S. Carroll
... a wry grin. "Certainly. The hands of the felon were amputated at the wrist. Usually with a headsman's ax, I believe." ...
— Nor Iron Bars a Cage.... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... with amazing rapidity. The First Assistant Postmaster-General was J.S. Clarkson, who had been vice-chairman of the Republican National Campaign Committee. The speed with which he cleared the service of Democrats earned him the title "headsman" and is indicated by the estimate that he removed one every three minutes for the first year. When the force of clerks was increased for the taking of the census of 1890, the superintendent of the census office found himself "waist deep in congressmen" trying to ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... Stranger.—The headsman thought so, when he made a ghost of me almost three hundred years ago. I had a character through life of loving a jest, and did not belie it at the last. But I had also as general a reputation for sincerity, ...
— Colloquies on Society • Robert Southey
... life for it. I never received the necklace; I never signed the receipt. Were the headsman here, or the gallows, I ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... upbraiding, condemning, uttering accusations, threatening doom; it cried aloud, and gnashed upon him. All anguish that shakes human souls was gathered there; supplications the most tender, the wrath of kings, the love in a girl's heart pleading with the headsman; then, and after all these, the deeply searching glance a man turns on his fellows as he mounts the last step of the scaffold. Life so dilated in this fragment of life that Don Juan shrank back; he walked up and down the ...
— The Elixir of Life • Honore de Balzac
... the headsman came to Vagn. Now, as he had a dislike to this brave viking, Thorkel rushed at him, holding his sword in both hands. But Vagn threw himself suddenly at Thorkel's feet, whereupon the headsman tripped over him. In a moment Vagn was on his feet, Thorkel's sword in his hand, and before ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... should disperse. In the meantime, another discussion on his fate took place in the Convention. It was proposed to deal with him as he had dealt with better men, to put him out of the pale of the law, and to deliver him at once without any trial to the headsman. But the humanity which, since the ninth of Thermidor, had generally directed the public counsels restrained the deputies from taking ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... to die, but becomes a mere change of condition and of place, to be with Him, which is far 'better.' So an Apostle who was coming within measurable distance of his own martyrdom, even whilst the headsman's block was all but in his sight, said: 'He hath abolished death,' ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... is sometimes granted to the man, who has been faithful in his adherence to Jesus Christ, a gleam of sunshine at eventime, which foretells Heaven's welcome and 'Well done!', before it is uttered. He was no self-righteous braggart, but a very rigid judge of himself, who, close by the headsman's block that ended his life, said: 'I have fought a good fight; I have finished my course; I have kept the faith.' 'Put on the whole armour of God,' and when the time comes to put it off, you will have a peaceful assurance as far removed from despair ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... said, "think of what you're doing to this great capital, of which we are all so justly proud. The Tower has become a disused place, and its historic hill no more reverberates to the merry chopping of the headsman's axe. Temple Bar has gone, and long ago have vanished the heads that used to look wistfully down on the passing chairmen. The chairmen themselves have sped into eternity, and in their place circles the Hansom cab. No more does the lovely, lonely oil lamp ...
— Punch, Vol. 99., July 26, 1890. • Various
... and in two minutes from the time of first observing the whale, three or four boats are down, and are darting through the water with their utmost speed toward their intended victim, perhaps accompanied with a song from the headsman, who urges the quick and powerful plying of the oar, with ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... to the throne, yet are we free? 'Tis not words, I tell thee, but action, swift, sharp and merciless, that will put down our enemies. Fearest thou the block? Did Essex, did Moore, a hundred others whose faith was their life, fear the headsman? Good Percy hath brought us to our senses and surely thou must see ...
— The Fifth of November - A Romance of the Stuarts • Charles S. Bentley
... his face. Flambeau had no weapon, but his large brown hands were resting on the end of the long iron seat. His shoulders abruptly altered their shape, and he heaved the whole huge thing high over his head, like a headsman's axe about to fall. The mere height of the thing, as he held it vertical, looked like a long iron ladder by which he was inviting men to climb towards the stars. But the long shadow, in the level evening light, looked like a giant brandishing the Eiffel Tower. It was the shock of that ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... been the work of a moment to order up a brazier, a pair of pincers, a poker, a headsman and an axe. The instruments of torture waste no time in getting red-hot; and we anticipate the worst. Joseph, however, who has ignored these preparations and maintained an attitude of superbly indifferent aloofness, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, July 1, 1914 • Various
... bowed head and the headsman brought the knife down across the back of his neck, but the knife was nicked and the neck was ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... Castanier dryly. "I have no occasion to fight. I could kill you by a look if I had any mind to do it. I will tell you what it is, youngster; why should I kill you? I can see a red line round your neck—the guillotine is waiting for you. Yes, you will end in the Place de Greve. You are the headsman's property! there is no escape for you. You belong to a vendita of the Carbonari. You are plotting against ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... nobody!" said Mr. Harley feebly, and speaking with difficulty. "I'm not ill; I'll be right in a moment." Then he had Dorothy back into her chair, gazing upon her the while in a stricken way, as though she were hangman or headsman, and he before her for execution. Mr. Harley was held between terror of Storri and shame for what he must say to Dorothy. Wondering what fearful blow had fallen upon them, Dorothy sat facing her father the color ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... This caress of the king, however harmless in itself, had in it for her something dismal and dreadful. It was the involuntary, instinctive touch of the headsman, who examines the neck of his victim, and searches on it for the place where he will make the stroke. Thus had Anne Boleyn once put her tender white hands about her slender neck, and said to the headsman, brought over from Calais specially for her execution: "I pray you strike me well and surely! ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... reasonable strength, and let him fight to a finish if you choose, and I can look on there and applaud the strokes. The war prisoner, being a prisoner, has earned death by natural law, and prefers to get his last stroke in hot blood than to be knocked down by the headsman's axe. And it is any brave man's luxury either to help or watch a lusty fight. But this baiting in the circus between the gates was no fair battle ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... which can give you hope. We are alone on the sixth story. Beneath us are only women, and if you call from the window, I can shoot you dead before your voice can reach the street. Perhaps, though, you do not think of saving yourself, but of ensnaring me. Bah! as if the sight of the headsman would stop me now. Besides, I am prepared for flight. Have you looked at this house? It is not like other houses; it is double, and the room in which we stand has other foundations and walls from this ...
— The Forsaken Inn - A Novel • Anna Katharine Green
... to come to you." Upon this Lucius, returning his fondness, replied, "Do not be melancholy on that account; I can remedy that." Ordering therefore, forthwith, one of those condemned to die to be brought to the feast, together with the headsman and axe, he asked the youth if he wished to see him executed. The boy answering that he did, Lucius commanded the executioner to cut off his neck; and this several historians mention; and Cicero, indeed, in his dialogue de Senectute, introduces Cato relating it himself. But Livy says, that he ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... In Sir Thomas More, for instance, on the scaffold, and Anne Boleyn, in the Tower, when, grasping her neck, she remarked, that it "was too slender to trouble the headsman much." During one part of the French Revolution, it became a fashion to leave some "mot" as a legacy; and the quantity of facetious last words spoken during that period would form a melancholy jest-book of ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... with all his might, even telling the king that such an execution would tarnish his honor, and that reprisals would be made on his own garrisons; and all the nobles joined in entreating pardon for the citizens, but still without effect; and the headsman had been actually sent for, when Queen Philippa, her eyes streaming with tears, threw herself on her knees amongst the captives, and said, "Ah, gentle sir, since I have crossed the sea with much danger to see you, I have never asked you one favor; ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... professor of the headsman's trade, Alike was famous for his arm and blade. One day a prisoner Justice had to kill Knelt at the block to test the artist's skill. Bare-armed, swart-visaged, gaunt, and shaggy-browed, Rudolph the headsman rose ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... he would succeed, and that fields of gold and springs of eternal youth exist only in dreams, where they best belong. It was a cold, gray morning, and Sir Walter was kept standing on the scaffold while the headsman ground his ax, the delay being for the amusement and edification of the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... severe measures in Bretagne; four persons of quality have been beheaded. One of them, who might have escaped by flying to Spain, would not go. When he was asked why, he said it had been predicted that he should die by sea (de la mer). Just before he was executed he asked the headsman what his ...
— The Memoirs of the Louis XIV. and The Regency, Complete • Elizabeth-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Orleans
... Cruentus. He announced his presence by that gentle Rumboldian cough which so many have tried (unsuccessfully) to imitate—short, painstaking yet withal so characteristic of the man. The arrival of the worldrenowned headsman was greeted by a roar of acclamation from the huge concourse, the viceregal ladies waving their handkerchiefs in their excitement while the even more excitable foreign delegates cheered vociferously in a medley of cries, hoch, banzai, ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... and the only place which was not calm was the heart of fallen man. For a few steps from the busy gates and the crowded market is Southampton Green, and there, draped in mourning, stands the scaffold, and beside it the state headsman. ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... got as far as that?" said Claparon. "Gobseck is a banker, just as the headsman is a doctor. The first word is 'fifty per cent'; he belongs to the race of Harpagon; he'll take canary birds at all seasons, fur tippets in summer, nankeens in winter. What securities are you going to offer him? If you want him to take your paper without ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac
... would answer for the rolling billows of the ocean. He said he'd be hanged if it should. So I mentioned that it might perhaps pass for the execution of Mary Queen of Scots. Put George in black for the headsman, bend over the tree and put a frock on it for Mary, let the hatchet stand, and work in the guinea-pig and the factory chimney as mourners. Just as I had got the words out of my mouth, Barker knocked me clean through the picture. My head tore out Washington's ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... on one hand, a powerful, able nobility; on the other, a strong, independent peasantry,—a combination full of pitfalls for a weak ruler, but with equal promise of great things under the master hand. His father had cowed the stubborn nobles with the headsman's axe. Gustav Adolf drew them to him and imbued them with his own spirit. He found them a contentious party within the state; he left them its strongest props in the conduct of public affairs. Nor ...
— Hero Tales of the Far North • Jacob A. Riis
... have an underground communication. We were shown one dark and gloomy cellar far below the level of the fort, known as the execution room, where the criminals, condemned in the Judgment Hall above, received their punishment. The headsman's block was still there, and certain dark stains were pointed out to us by means of the candle carried by the guide, which told their own story. In the centre of this dreary vault was a well whose water was level with the river, into which it opened ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... black and beside it stood the executioner with his arms resting on the handle of his axe. In the ceiling above his head was an iron ring and from this ring depended a rope, the noose of which dangled at the shoulder of the headsman, for it was the benevolent custom of the Court to allow its victim a choice in the manner of his death. It was also a habit of the judges of this Court to sit until the sentence they had pronounced was carried out, and thus there could be no chance of mistake or rescue. No feature of any judge ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... her father's arm, the arm of an old man against the arm of the most brilliant swordsman in Sicily. Theron remembered with a pang the ease and grace with which Hildebrand had wielded the great sword of the headsman on that unhappy morning, and he asked himself, despairingly, what hope there could be for him against such ...
— The Proud Prince • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... Harz Mountains gives way to an enchanted hail in which are seen the most famous courtesans of ancient history—Phryne, Lais, Aspasia, Cleopatra, and Helen of Troy. The apparition of Marguerite appears to Faust, a red line encircling her neck, like the mark of a headsman's axe. We reach the end. The distraught maiden has slain her child, and now lies in prison upon her pallet of straw, awaiting death. Faust enters and tries to persuade her to fly with him. Her poor mind is all awry and occupies itself only with the scenes of her first meeting ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... sublimely, "Beneath the dungeons of the Conciergerie, Madame Roland remembered that night with satisfaction. If Robespierre recalled it in his power, this memory must have fallen colder upon his heart than the ax of the headsman." ...
— Madame Roland, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... word He speakes sheele greedily catch at with a kisse From his soft lipps such as the amorous Fawnes Enforce on the light Satyrs. Let[130] me dy Who, like the palme, when consious that tis void Of fruite and moysture, prostratly doe begg A Charitable headsman. ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... fed With sacramental bread, And sweet with honey of tenderer words than tears To feed men's hopes and fortify men's fears, And strong to silence with benignant breath The lips that doom to death, 190 And swift with speech like fire in fiery lands To melt the steel's edge in the headsman's hands. ...
— Songs of the Springtides and Birthday Ode - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne—Vol. III • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... inflict instant and certain death, there stalked into the arena a grim and fatal form, brandishing a short, sharp sword, and with features utterly concealed beneath its vizor. With slow and measured steps, this dismal headsman approached the gladiator, still kneeling—laid the left hand on his humbled crest—drew the edge of the blade across his neck—turned round to the assembly, lest, in the last moment, remorse should come upon them; the dread signal continued the same: the blade ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... time before seen, had come to the surface was spouting. Tom immediately sprang into the rigging, and on looking out, he saw a whale spouting about a mile to windward. In less than a minute after the people had come on deck half dressed, the boats started away with six men in each, including the headsman and boat's steerer. The captain went as headsman in one, and the first mate in the other. The water bubbled and hissed under the bows of the boats, as the ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... in pity for the youth, The headsman would not rightly ply The weapon, or the gods in truth Had ordered that he should not die, Soon to the king there came report The sword would not destroy his son, The council held thereon was short, The king's look frightened ...
— Ancient Ballads and Legends of Hindustan • Toru Dutt
... exacteth according to his ill- nature.[FN41] Yet I hope from my lord the King and from his benevolence that he suffer the Sworder make over my corpse to my menials for burial, and so shall thy slave be thy sacrifice." Hereat the Monarch commanded the Headsman do as he was desired, and the man, accompanied by the royal pages, took Haykar, whom they had stripped of his outer raiment, and led him away to execution. But when he was certified of coming death, he sent tidings thereof to his wife, Shaghaftini[FN42] ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... and fatal mound! That oft hast heard the death-axe sound, As on the noblest of the land, Fell the stern headsman's bloody hand. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. - 581, Saturday, December 15, 1832 • Various
... was presently discovered who agreed simply for what advertising there was in it to furnish a crate of white roosters, a hatchet and a headsman's block, and to have them in the basement of the ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train
... scandalously abandoned him to the headsman, owes the existence of the party that still upholds his conduct to the dignified manner in which he faced death, a death at which the whole world "assisted," or might have done so. Catiline, we believe, has found no formal defender, but the Catilinarian ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... what strong heart doth the old manhood dwell? Where art thou, Freedom? Look! in Sidney's cell! There still as stately stands the living Truth, Smiling on age as it had smiled on youth. Her forts dismantled, and her shrines o'erthrown, The headsman's block her last dread altar-stone, No sanction left to Reason's vulgar hope, Far from the wrecks expands her prophet's scope. Millennial morns the tombs of Kedron gild, The hands of saints the glorious walls rebuild,— Till each foundation garnished with its gem, ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... all clashed so discordantly with the scene in her memory that for an instant she grew faint and clung to the curtains between which she was passing. That death should leave so little trace, that the spot which one night was occupied by a headsman, the next, should hold a bride, made her fancy reel with horror even while she pulled herself ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... was not ashamed of his chain. And afterwards, so much had he won his way into the Apostle's confidence, and made himself needful for him by his services and his sweetness, that the lonely prisoner, with the gibbet or headsman's sword in prospect, feels that he would like to have Mark with him once more, and bids Timothy bring him with himself, for 'he is profitable to me for the ministry.' 'He can do a thousand things that a man like ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren
... platform of dark greasy boards newly fastened together, but evidently used often before for the same purpose. It was buttressed up against their wall, and extended a clear twenty feet out, with a broad wooden stair leading down from the further side. In the centre stood a headsman's block, all haggled at the top, and ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... executioner, but also the city functionary, in the hope of delaying his execution, the emissaries of the Cardinal secured the services of a condemned felon, who, on a promise of unconditional pardon, consented to fill the office of headsman; and who, between his inexperience and his horror at his unwonted task, performed his hideous functions so imperfectly that it was only on the thirty-fourth stroke that the head of the martyred young man was severed from ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... companies. Or, being armed with their long keen whaling spears, they were as a picked trio of lancers; even as the harpooneers were flingers of javelins. And since in this famous fishery, each mate or headsman, like a Gothic Knight of old, is always accompanied by his boat-steerer or harpooneer, who in certain conjunctures provides him with a fresh lance, when the former one has been badly twisted, or elbowed in the assault; and moreover, ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... broken only by the sounds of sobbing. This man a coward! Every look, every action, gave the lie to such an accusation. Two Bishops stood by him and spoke to him, but their words were inaudible to the greater part of the crowd; and Ketch, the headsman, stood silently by the block, a man hated and execrated from the corridors of Whitehall to the ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner
... sought and have patience with him, till he could pay me. One night, I foregathered with certain of my friends and we sat down to liquor: so we drank and were merry and played at Tab;[FN118] and we made one of us Wazir and another Sultan and a third Torchbearer or Headsman.[FN119] Presently, there came in upon us a spunger, without bidding, and we went on playing, whilst he played with us. Then quoth the Sultan to the Wazir, "Bring the Parasite who cometh in to the folk, without leave or license, that we may enquire ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... prisoner's cell was entered by a Frate—a confessor, who acquainted him that he had been sentenced to death! Expostulation was vain, and his asseverations of innocence and promises of submission to the Grand Duke's will were rudely interrupted by the appearance of the headsman! Forced upon his knees, the unhappy young officer mumbled out his confession, and then the executioner, passing a stout cord about his throat, strangled him—struggling and ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... open, showed that ho had assumed the garments which were to serve his last turn. A tall muscular Nubian slave, who considered himself obviously as the principal person in the procession, bore on his shoulder a large heavy headsman's axe, and, like a demon waiting on a sorcerer, stalked step for step after his victim. The rear of the procession was closed by a band of four priests, each of whom chanted from time to time the devotional psalm ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... inclined. Here I seemed to live in the midst of these wonderful intrigues of long ago. Documents passed through my hands whose very possession at one period meant capital danger, bringing up even now visions of block, axe, and masked headsman. It seemed strange to me that so sinister a man as Lord Rantremly, who, I had heard, cared for nothing but drink and gambling, should have desired to promote this historical research, and, indeed, I soon found he felt nothing but contempt for it. However, he had ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... hard, my lord, I cannot choose My way of cooking. I shall laugh, I vow, In the grim headsman's face, when I remember That I am dying for my lady's love. I leave no one to shed a tear for me; Father nor mother, kith nor kin, have I, To say, "Poor Ritta!" o'er my lifeless clay. They all have gone before me, and 'twere well If I ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... For the headsman's axe seemed to be glimmering in the black darkness ahead, and he shuddered as he recalled once more what he had seen ...
— In Honour's Cause - A Tale of the Days of George the First • George Manville Fenn
... truth I know of nothing better to do," I returned uneasily. "Pish! but I feel as if we were locked in a cell awaiting the headsman." ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... completely recovered from the injury. But in the meantime, the bubble had burst, Sherrifmuir had been fought, Mar's army had been totally routed, the prisons in England and Scotland had been filled with his misguided followers, and the headsman and the hangman were beginning ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... thrill, or if in any manner the party on probation suggested that Madame Siron was not a perfect cook and Monsieur Siron was not a genuine grand duke in disguise, he was interviewed by Bailley Bodmer, the local headsman of the clan, and plainly told that escape ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... in the crowd was bitterly disappointed. This was Boxtel, who had bribed the headsman to let him have Van Baerle's clothes, believing that he would thus ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... heads, and deprecate our wrath by the precipitation of their crane-neck quarterings. Treason they feel to be their crime; each individual carter feels himself under the ban of confiscation and attainder: his blood is attainted through six generations, and nothing is wanting but the headsman and his axe, the block and the sawdust, to close up the vista of his horrors. What! shall it be within benefit of clergy to delay the king's message on the high road?—to interrupt the great respirations, ebb or flood, of the national intercourse—to endanger the safety of tidings, ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... abandonment, for you will not abandon. I thoroughly favor choking the life out of Kurzbold, and one or two of the others, and will myself volunteer for the office of headsman, carrying, as I do, the ax, but let everything be done decently and in order, that a dignified execution may follow on a ...
— The Sword Maker • Robert Barr
... confessed, and are still stubborn," said the judge, "lead them to death instantly." So they were taken out, and the host had to go with them into the circle. When they were taken hold of by the executioner's men, and were just going to be led up to the scaffold where the headsman was standing with naked sword, a coach drawn by four blood-red chestnut horses came up suddenly, driving so fast that fire flashed from the stones, and someone made signs from the window with a white ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers
... must take my leave of you.' When the friends had retired he addressed himself to prayer, having first announced that he died in the faith of the Church of England. When his prayer was done, he took off his night-gown and doublet, and called to the headsman to show him the axe. The man hesitated, and Raleigh cried, 'I prithee, let me see it. Dost thou think that I am afraid of it?' Having passed his finger along the edge, he gave it back, and turning to the Sheriff, smiled, and said, ''Tis a sharp medicine, but one that will cure me ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse
... heightened by the lather, which lather, again, was intensified in its hue by the contrasting sootiness of the negro's body. Altogether the scene was somewhat peculiar, at least to Captain Delano, nor, as he saw the two thus postured, could he resist the vagary, that in the black he saw a headsman, and in the white a man at the block. But this was one of those antic conceits, appearing and vanishing in a breath, from which, perhaps, the best regulated mind is ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... Griffin was a kindly man enough, and not very old; and I suppose that the other constable, as known to his family and friends, was not at all the gloomy headsman he appeared to the boys. When he became constable (they had not the least notion how a man became constable) they heard that his rule was to be marked by unwonted severity against the crime of going in swimming inside ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells
... countryman the right of way. The courage of the latter rose as the danger passed, and as far as he could be heard, he continued to exult in the wildest excesses of insult: "Ah-heigh! brutal executioner! Ah, hideous headsman!" Da capo. I now know that these people never intended to do more than quarrel, and no doubt they parted as well pleased as if they had actually carried broken heads from the encounter. But at the time I felt affronted and trifled ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... Who, headsman, unto thee this power O'er me could give? Thou com'st for me at midnight-hour. Be merciful, and let me live! Is morrow's dawn not time enough? ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... Walter; it shall be as I have said.—Call the headsman. They of Calais have made so many of my men to die, ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... to the scaffold place, Up the ladder he must go:— "O headsman, dearest headsman, do But a ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... Irish history there is no name which touches the Irish heart like that of Robert Emmet. We read, in that eventful record, of men who laid down their lives for Ireland amid the roar and crash of battle, of others who perished by the headsman's axe or the halter of the hangman, of others whose eyes were closed for ever in the gloom of English dungeons, and of many whose hearts broke amid the sorrows of involuntary exile; of men, too, who in the great warfare of mind rendered to the Irish cause services ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various
... out of a lack of news from Brandon, was of a general nature, and the possibility of his death had no place in her thoughts. Nevertheless, for the second time, Brandon had been condemned to die for her sake. The king's seal had stamped the warrant for the execution, and the headsman had sharpened his ax and could almost count the ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... headsman; He stands masked, clothed in red, with huge legs and strong naked arms, And leans on a ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman
... middle-aged man, without encumbrance, who can have an undeniable character from his last situation, as headsman, hangman, and general executioner. He is accustomed to the use of thumbikins and the most approved and fashionable modes of torture; and officiated for many years as superintendent of the wheel of a foreign prince, renowned ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various
... to me?" cried the Duke. "Scorn! have I no headsman whose axe is as sharp as Harold's? and the neck of a captive is not sheathed ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... is as firmly set upon my shoulders as ever. I do verily believe that it must be some mad piece of waggery of that Prince of good fellows, Sir WALTER RALEIGH. The aged Knight is always up to some of his nonsense!" After playing a game of quoits with Lord BALMARINO and the Tower Headsman (whose office is a well-paid sinecure), I returned to Newgate, greatly pleased with my morning's promenade. In the afternoon, entertained the Governor at dinner, who declared that he could never get so good a meal in his own quarters. "Strap ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, Sept. 27, 1890 • Various
... victim's funeral,—how thereupon he was sentenced, and—but I will not relate further. I have always considered the death penalty a matter of policy rather than principle; but the sight of that blood-stained platform, the blood-fed weeds around it, and the vision of the headsman, in his red mantle, looking down upon the bared neck stretched upon the block, gave me more horror of the custom than all the books and speeches which have been said and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various
... dreaded the humiliation that would follow a violation of the oath he had sworn in the presence of his court; so, summoning an executioner, he immediately gave the fatal order; and John was forthwith beheaded in the dungeon. The headsman returned, carrying a dish in which lay the ghastly trophy of the corrupt queen's vengeance. The bloody gift was delivered to Salome, who carried it with inhuman triumph to her mother. Some of John's disciples came, secured the corpse, laid it in a tomb; and bore the ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... other letters on the matter, this M. de la Foret shall stay in my kingdom. I may not be the headsman of one of my faith—as eloquent a preacher as he was a brave soldier. Abiding by the strict terms of our treaty with my brother of France, he shall stay with us in peace, and in our own care. He hath not the eloquence of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... a particularly ferocious aspect, and not unlike the headsman in certain Renaissance pictures which represent executions, tortures, and the like, advanced upon him with an implacable air to take his 'things.' But the harshness of his steely glare was compensated by the softness of his cotton gloves, so effectively that, as he approached Swann, he seemed ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... my hapless life Stand betwixt thee and pleasure,—Duty's knot Shall soon be sever'd by the headsman's knife; And upon memory one crimson blot Shall be the ...
— Poems • Walter R. Cassels
... Rosicrucians, and among them he set to work. In the year 1644 he presided over a Rosicrucian assembly at which Ashmole was present. At this time also Oliver Cromwell is said to have been an accepted Mason, and it was by his intervention that, a year later, Thomas Vaughan was substituted for the headsman at the execution of Archbishop Laud, for the object already described. It was after his compact with Lucifer that the alchemist wrote the "Open Entrance." His activity in the Rosicrucian cause then became prodigious, and the followers of Socinus, apparently all ...
— Devil-Worship in France - or The Question of Lucifer • Arthur Edward Waite
... and Lady Jane to Robert Dudley, all the traitors who had conspired to do this dastardly deed were sent to cool their misguided ardour in the Tower, from which Northumberland, Jane and her husband were led to the headsman's block; while Robert Dudley was among those who were left to languish in durance, and to while away the tedious hours of captivity by carving their emblems and names on the walls of their cells, where they may be seen to this day, or to stroll disconsolately ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... yield up life And leave the sunlight for him, save his wife: Who, even now, down the long galleries Is borne, death-wounded; for this day it is She needs must pass out of the light and die. And, seeing the stain of death must not come nigh My radiance, I must leave this house I love. But ha! The Headsman of the Pit, above Earth's floor, to ravish her! Aye, long and late He hath watched, and cometh at the ...
— Alcestis • Euripides
... my mother," replied the young man, advancing into the room until he was face to face with Lord de Winter, and crossing his arms. "I have asked the headsman of Bethune," he said, his voice hoarse and his face livid with passion and grief. "And the headsman of Bethune gave ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... sleepy, do tell us some of thy pleasant tales," whereupon Shahrazad replied, "With love and good will."—It hath reached me, O King of the Age, that Alaeddin lay that night under a tree beside his pavilion in all restfulness; but whoso weareth head hard by the headsman may not sleep o' nights save whenas slumber prevail over him. He slumbered till Morning showed her face and, when awakened by the warbling of the small birds, he arose and went down to the bank of the river which flowed thereby into the city; and here he again washed hands and ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... they let the ladies come up. When they began to help her with her dress I covered my face—I could not help it. There was such a stillness now that I could hear her beads chink at her girdle. When I looked again, she was ready, with her sweet neck uncovered: all round her was black but the headsman, who wore a white apron over his velvet, and she, in her beauty, and oh! her face was so fair and delicate and her eyes so tender and joyous. And as her ladies looked at her, they sobbed piteously. 'Ne ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... been so very bad,' said the younger journeyman, 'if one only had to suffer death and nothing worse. But these Swedes torture people as the very headsman himself would be ashamed to do. My father died by the dreadful "Swedish Drink," and then they took my eldest brother, and—ah! it's too ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous
... of outcasts, fallen as low as the fancy of man can picture, this voluntary headsman, had treated her without rudeness, but with such absence of even a hint at endearment, with such disdain and wooden indifference, as no human being is treated; not even a dog or a horse, and not even an umbrella, overcoat or hat, but like some dirty, unclean object, for which a momentary, unavoidable ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... the more they gave him to drink, the more he told, speaking of his unfortunate mistress as the lowest of the low. For my part, I confess that she excited my interest, that false Madame Jenkins, who weeps in every corner, implores her husband as if he were the headsman, and is in danger of being sent about her business when all society believes her to be married, respectable, established for life. The others did nothing but laugh, especially the women. Dame! it is amusing when one is in service to see that these ladies of the upper ten have their affronts ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... dynasty, domestic as well as foreign, which may be resident in the towns and cities. So the Jews of Barbary have their chiefs, and the slaves theirs. In Tunis a number of free coloured people, called Waraghleeah, emigrants from the Algerian oasis of Warklah, have also their chief or headsman. This chief has rather large and even discretionary powers, and can order his subjects to be imprisoned by the officers of the sovereign Government of the country. But, of course, this imperium in imperio is subject to the supervision of the supreme Government. The object is apparently ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... the shores of Lake Leman, and the Pass of St. Bernard, Cooper placed as a background for his plot based on the hard old feudal-times law—that (in the canton of Berne) the odious office of executioner or headsman was made a family inheritance. The efforts of the unhappy father and mother to save their son from such a fate make up the pathetic interest of "The Headsman," issued in 1833. The Hospice of St. Bernard so well ...
— James Fenimore Cooper • Mary E. Phillips
... die, then: but we spare thee torture or mutilation. Prepare to meet the headsman within the castle yard, at the third sun-rising ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... think if you had been Sir Walter, instead of sailing to England where you knew that a headsman's axe awaited you, you would have coasted by the shores of the Chesapeake Bay and dropped off quietly where is the home of the canvas-back and the terrapin! Just stepped into one of the jolly-boats and peacefully drifted ashore ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston
... way people do to the headsman. Why, when he found I was coming up from Domremy to volunteer, he asked me to let him come along in my protection, and see the crowds and the excitement. Well, we arrived and saw the torches filing out at the Castle, and ran ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... treason, and sentenced to death by persons who expected that his rank would save him; but the She-wolf of France was resolved on having his blood, and decreed that he should die the next day. Such was the horror at the sentence, that the headsman stole secretly away from Winchester to avoid performing his office, and for four long hours of the 13th of March, 1329, did Earl Edmund Plantagenet stand on the scaffold above the castle gate, waiting till some one could be found to put him to death, ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... Hippy," smiled Grace. "The headsman probably will perform the delicate operation of decapitating you some night ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders Among the Kentucky Mountaineers • Jessie Graham Flower
... puts in quick: 'But you mustn't think, my earl,' says I, 'that we undervallers you. When we remembers the field of Agincourt; and Chevy Chase; an' the Tower of London, with the block on which three lords was beheaded, with the very cuts in it which the headsman made when he chopped 'em off, as well as two crooked ones a-showin' his bad licks, which little did he think history would preserve forever; an' the old Guildhall, where down in the ancient crypt is a-hangin' our Declaration ...
— The Rudder Grangers Abroad and Other Stories • Frank R. Stockton
... left side, stood the royal barber with his retinue of apprentices; and on his right side was seen Nabo the headsman, a nigger of gigantic stature, with his implement of office, an axe, ...
— Tales from the Lands of Nuts and Grapes - Spanish and Portuguese Folklore • Charles Sellers and Others
... a step to the Chapel, and seeing that neither block nor headsman was in waiting he shrugged his shoulders and ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... governor and returned to Paris, whither he was accompanied by the whole of the royal party, which was moreover augmented by the presence of the Duc de Bouillon, who, according to Bassompierre, was as much at his ease, and as arrogant in his deportment, as though he had never incurred the risk of the headsman as a rebel and a traitor. The Court dined at La Roquette, and it was near dusk when they reached the Barriere St. Antoine, where they were met by the corporate bodies. Henry himself rode on horseback, preceded by eight hundred nobles in ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... removed from the prisoner's legs, that he might go to hear mass, commanded his jailer not to let him budge from his cage except to be tortured (gehenne) and the duke wrote a piteous letter, praying for clemency and signing himself le pauvre Jacques. In vain: him, too, the headsman's axe sent to ...
— The Story of Paris • Thomas Okey
... with man,—hope, surprise, bewilderment, disgust, facetiousness. The people in New England finally become facetious about spring. This is the last stage: it is the most dangerous. When a man has come to make a jest of misfortune, he is lost. "It bores me to die," said the journalist Carra to the headsman at the foot of the guillotine: "I would like to have seen the continuation." One is also interested to see how spring is going ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... mounds, shield meeting shield, Stood many Northland sons with swords in hand, One circle standing close within another Unto the top. Upon the judgment seat, A thunder cloud, thy brother Helge sat,— A pallid headsman with a dusky look. And next to him, a seeming grown up child, Sat Halfdan,—-thoughtless, playing with his sword. Then I arose, and, said: "War waiting stands Within thy borders, beating on the shield,— Thy kingdom now, king Helge, is in peril; Give me my sister, and I'll give ...
— Fridthjof's Saga • Esaias Tegner
... kept at this time what are called among whalemen "boatscrew-watches." That is, instead of the sailors being divided at night into two bands, alternately on deck every four hours, there were four watches, each composed of a boat's crew, the "headsman" (always one of the mates) excepted. To the officers, this plan gives uninterrupted repose—"all-night-in," as they call it, and of course greatly lightens the duties of ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... comparing myself with our satirist, and all through, I have had the best of the comparison. Well, well, contagion is as often mental as physical; and I do not think my readers, who have all been under his lash, will blame me very much for giving the headsman a mouthful ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... beloved of them, they all gathered together and taking up arms, came forth their houses and followed the troops, so they might see what was to do. When the officers came with Alaeddin to the palace, they entered and told the Sultan, who immediately bade the headsman go and cut off his head. But the commons, hearing of this his commandment, shut the gates of the palace and sent to say to the Sultan, "This very moment we will overthrow the palace upon thee and ...
— Alaeddin and the Enchanted Lamp • John Payne
... European headsman, He stands mask'd, clothed in red, with huge legs and strong naked arms, And leans on a ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... consequence. Some had lost one or more fingers or toes, others had received gashes in their faces, or arms, or legs, but they had seldom long been laid up, and had willingly again returned to their work. The term "putter," it should be understood, includes the specific distinction of the "headsman," "half-marrow," and "foal." The "headsman," taking the part of conductor, pushes behind. The "half-marrows" drag at the sides with ropes; while a "foal" precedes the train, also dragging by a rope. Mark, however, was not very long employed in this laborious ...
— The Mines and its Wonders • W.H.G. Kingston
... gates and the opposing fighters threaten to dash Danton's every hope of saving by reprieve his "dear one of treasured memory." Indeed, as we have seen, but for frenzied Pierre's maniacal slaughter of the headsman, the fatal blow would now be falling! Neither Danton nor his men, of course, know that. Theirs to struggle on, to confront and conquer fortune, never to despair! Within those iron souls is no such thought ...
— Orphans of the Storm • Henry MacMahon
... I hear is true, rogue," answered Ithobal savagely, "the tormentor and the headsman alone could satisfy all my debt to you. Say, merchant, what return have you made me for that sackful of gold which you bore ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... resumed Stephano, "I will give you that explanation relative to the diamonds which you might have had without bloodshed; but patience and aristocracy are as much at variance as a thief and the headsman. Read this paper, my lord; it is not the worst testimonial which I could produce in ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... unusually early hour, the chains and bolts of the cell were heard to clash and groan, and Damian was startled from a broken sleep, which he had not enjoyed for above two hours. His eyes were bent on the slowly opening door, as if he had expected the headsman and his assistants; but the jailer ushered in a stout man in a pilgrim's habit. "Is it a priest whom you bring me, warden?" said ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... he laboured at his gentle craft all day - "No doubt you mean his Cal-craft," you amusingly will say - But, no—he didn't operate with common bits of string, He was a Public Headsman, ...
— Fifty Bab Ballads • William S. Gilbert
... Revolutionary Tribunal. He could be seen by glimpses between the guardsmen's hats, sitting with hands tied behind his back, his head bared and swaying from side to side, his face to the cart's tail. The headsman stood beside him lolling against the rail. The passers-by had stopped to look and were telling each other it was likely one of the fellows who starved the people, and staring with eyes of indifference. Gamelin, coming closer, caught sight of Desmahis among the spectators; ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... assumption of the Duke's livery in the same scene; or his writing a letter from dictation. In the last scene of Victor Hugo's noble drama, his bearing becomes positively inspired; and his sudden assumption of the attitude of the headsman, in his denunciation of the Duke and threat to be his executioner, is, so far as I know, one of the most ferociously picturesque ...
— Miscellaneous Papers • Charles Dickens
... evil' is a petition which, in its width, fits the close of the prayer better than does the translation of the Revised Version. There seems an echo of the words in Paul's noble confidence while the headsman's axe was so near, 'The Lord will deliver me from every evil work.' Entire exemption from evil of every sort, whether sin or sorrow, is the true end of our prayers, as it is the crown of God's purpose. Nothing less can satisfy our yearnings; nothing less can fulfil the divine desire for us. Nothing ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... torture which the Spaniards were bringing to England in their Armada; and, at the end of the room, sits Queen Elizabeth on horseback, in her high ruff and faded finery. Very likely none of these clothes were ever on her actual person. Here, too, we saw a headsman's block,—not that on which Raleigh was beheaded, which I would have given gold to see, but the one which was used for the Scotch Lords Kilmarnock, Lovat, and others, executed on account of the Rebellion ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... her, knows how dear, How excellent!—but that is by, And now my business is—to die. —Ye towers! within whose circuit dread A Douglas by his sovereign bled; 550 And thou, O sad and fatal mound! That oft hast heard the death-ax sound, As on the noblest of the land Fell the stern headsman's bloody hand— The dungeon, block, and nameless tomb 555 Prepare—for Douglas seeks his doom! —But hark! what blithe and jolly peal Makes the Franciscan steeple reel? And see! upon the crowded street, In motley groups ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... must have destroyed each other, as the Red Indians have done, off the face of the earth. They lived these Norsemen, not to live—they lived to die. For what cared they? Death—what was death to them! what it was to the Jomsburger Viking, who, when led out to execution, said to the headsman, 'Die! with all pleasure. We used to question in Jomsburg whether a man felt when his head was off? Now I shall know; but if I do, take care, for I shall smite thee with my knife. And meanwhile, spoil not this long hair of mine; it is ...
— Lectures Delivered in America in 1874 • Charles Kingsley |
