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More "Trigger" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the car and with my left hand made a grab at him. It was a fruitless attempt. I found my wrist held in a grip of steel. I raised my right with the revolver. I was just a moment late in pulling the trigger, for he knocked up my hand and the bullet went wide. Before I had another chance, he twisted the weapon out of my grasp with a wrench that numbed my arm to the shoulder. How he managed to see in the dark was a mystery to me. He must have ...
— The Motor Pirate • George Sidney Paternoster
... village behind us. What did that mean? It was a mystery to us, but the same idea struck us all, that he had been killed, and that the Prussians were blowing the trumpet to draw us into an ambush. We therefore returned to the cottage, keeping a careful look out, with our fingers on the trigger, and hiding under the branches, but his wife, in spite of our entreaties, rushed on, leaping like a tigress. She thought that she had to avenge her husband, and had fixed the bayonet to her rifle, and we lost sight of her at the moment ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... neck and shoulders seeming to bristle as he turned toward us. As he sank down on his fore feet, I had raised the rifle; his head was bent slightly down, and when I saw the top of the white bead fairly between his small, glittering, evil eyes, I pulled trigger. Half-rising up, the huge beast fell over on his side in the death throes, the ball having gone into his brain, striking as fairly between the eyes as if ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... well, at least, as that point could be estimated by men who were pretty familiar with tigers. The motive power to propel this spear was derived from a green bamboo, so strong that it required several powerful men to bend it in the form of a bow. A species of trigger was arranged to let the bent bow fly, and a piece of fine cord passed from this across the opening about breast-high for a tiger. The intention was that the animal, in entering the enclosure, should become its own executioner— ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... that had been more than usually discouraging in the office and an evening of exasperated misery at home, I got a revolver and some cartridges, locked myself in my room, confronted myself desperately in the mirror, put the muzzle of the loaded pistol to my temple, and pulled the trigger. ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... drag him down to their own level. He drank with them, gambled with them, but he never made a beast of himself, as did some of the others. He always managed to keep his own hands clean, he never lost his own self regard. He was quick on the trigger and in time of overheated argument could go some distance with his fists. Utterly fearless, powerful in physique, he was at all times able to command respect. Above all, he was a respecter of women. He never forgot what his mother once said to him. He was only a lad at the time, ...
— The Easiest Way - A Story of Metropolitan Life • Eugene Walter and Arthur Hornblow
... stop and see if he wos loaded; but I calc'late he was past stoppin'. Wall, he comes up wi' the bar suddently, and the bar looks at him, and he looks at it. Then he runs up, claps the gun to his shoulder, and pulls the trigger; but it wos a rusty old lock, an' no fire came. There was fire come from the bar's eyes, though, I do guess! It ran at him, an' he ran away. Of course Caleb soon came up, an' Bob primed as he ran an' wheeled about, stuck the muzzle of the old musket right into Caleb's mouth, and ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne
... light and so beautifully made that I returned to it again and again while the captain and my father were talking together. It had a long steel barrel with delicate engraving upon it, and a carved stock. I was admiring the spring of the trigger work when Captain Gordon asked me if I was ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... full view of it she made no effort to stop it. She stood looking on with the critical eye of an interested spectator, but her hand was grasping her revolver, nor was her forefinger far from the trigger of it. ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... the trigger. A soundless flash of purple enveloped the tower. Sparks mounted into the air—a cloud of vivid electrical sparks; but mingled with them in a moment were sparks also of burning wood and fibre. Smoke began to roll upward; ...
— Tarrano the Conqueror • Raymond King Cummings
... and tried to push him back, but Guy forced his way past him, and pressing the revolver close to the brute's head pulled the trigger. ...
— The River of Darkness - Under Africa • William Murray Graydon
... operations. See {tune}, {bum}, {hand-hacking}. 2. The active location of a cursor on a bit-map display. "Put the mouse's hot spot on the 'ON' widget and click the left button." 3. A screen region that is sensitive to mouse gestures, which trigger some action. World Wide Web pages now provide the {canonical} examples; WWW browsers present hypertext links as hot spots which, when clicked on, point the browser at another document (these are specifically called {hotlink}s). 4. ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... quickly what the cold would accomplish after lingering hours of torture, yet, facing those pricking ears and the trust of the eyes, he was blinded by a mist and could not aim. He had to place the muzzle of the gun against the roan's temple and pull the trigger. When he turned his back he was the only living thing within the white arms ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand
... 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." Could Mr. Trigger have ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... to have had a more perfect opportunity after a long stalk. Having waited in a position for a minute or two, to become cool and to clear my eyes, I aimed at his shoulder. Almost as I touched the trigger, the antelope sank suddenly upon its knees, in which position it remained for some seconds on the summit of the ant-hill, and then rolled down to the base, dead. I stepped the exact distance, 169 paces. ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... "Bungler!" he cried. "Were you in my troop I would dip your trigger-finger in boiling oil to teach you to shoot! But you weary me, dogs. I must teach you a lesson, must I?" And he lifted a pistol and levelled it. The crowd did not know whether it was the one he had discharged or another, but they gave back with a sharp gasp. "I must teach you, ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... opening sufficiently large to admit of the entrance of any bear that was likely to come that way. The roof was held in this position by a stout lever, which rested across the limb of a convenient tree. A rope led from the other end of the lever, down through a hole in the roof, to the trigger, to which the bait—an ear of corn—was attached. The bear was expected to crawl through the opening and seize the ear of corn; and in so doing, he would spring the trigger, release the lever and the roof would fall down and fasten him ...
— The Boy Trapper • Harry Castlemon
... down on him time enough to blow him in two, and pulled on my trigger, not aimin' to hurt the old sooner, only to snap a bullet between his toes, but she wouldn't work. Old Jedlick he was so rattled at the sight of that gun in my hand he banged loose, slap through the winder into that box of plug back of the counter. I pulled ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden
... Dicky, and Dicky went into our room and fetched the large toy pistol that is a foot long, and that has the trigger broken, and I took it because I am the eldest; and I don't think either of us thought it was the cat now. But Alice and H. O. did. Dicky got the poker out of Noel's room, and told Dora it was to settle the cat with when ...
— The Story of the Treasure Seekers • E. Nesbit
... coming in their direction, cautiously feeling a way through the great bank of mist. It was true that they could pass near without seeing, but chance might bring them straight to the little group. He shifted his fingers to the lock and trigger of his rifle, and looked at the sleeping three whose figures were almost hidden, although they were not a yard away. He felt that they should be awake and ready but in waking, Grosvenor, at least, might make enough noise to draw the ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... 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
... fierce beast turned, gathered itself together, and was about to launch itself upon the boatman in one tremendous bound, when simultaneously there was a sharp click from Brazier's gun, but with no further result, for he had drawn the trigger of his rifled barrel in which there was no cartridge, and a sharp stab on the loins as Shaddy hurled his knife with unerring aim at ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn
... room. There was an ancient guncase on one side, but the racks were empty except for a service pistol hanging by its trigger-guard from the hook. There were some shelves of books on the other side. But the conspicuous thing in the room was an image of Buddha in a glass box ...
— The Sleuth of St. James's Square • Melville Davisson Post
... path below. Further along Watts could see his master, now within a hundred feet of the boulder, and walking very quickly. Then an exclamation of horror broke from him as the kneeling man slowly rose, and pointed his musket full at Channing; but ere the treacherous hand could pull the trigger, the Marine had levelled his piece and fired; without a cry the man spun round, and then pitched headlong to the ground ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... chicken snare consists of a single noose, which rests on two elevated strips of bamboo. The other end of the cord is attached to a bent limb, held down by means of a small trigger, which slips under a cross strip. The game is led onto the trap by scattering grain. The weight of the bird releases the trigger, the bent twig flies up, and ...
— The Tinguian - Social, Religious, and Economic Life of a Philippine Tribe • Fay-Cooper Cole
... him at all events?' enquired the ferocious Jacques. 'Why leave him the possibility of betraying our secret? Marguerite, give me one of my Pistols: A single touch of the trigger will finish ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... exclamations of admiration for the hardihood of those who participated in it were always loud and frequent. But he, too, had a reputation to sustain. The Americans stood grimly silent before him. Harris's finger twitched nervously along the trigger, and a smile played over his thin lips. The man was aching for ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... a short, stocky man leapt out of the darkness and halted before him. As the Padre recognized him his finger left the trigger ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... evening as long as daylight lasted, and once I found him in his shop in the evening, bending low over his bench with a kerosene lamp in front of him. He was humming his inevitable tune and smoothing off with a fine file the nice curves of a rifle trigger. When he had trouble—and what a lot of it he has had in his time!—he worked; and when he was happy he worked all the harder. All the leisurely ones of the town drifted by, all the children and the fools, and often rested in the doorway of his shop. He made them all ...
— Adventures In Friendship • David Grayson
... built especially for that purpose, as he does not commonly fence in the sementeras. The il-tib' is built of two sections of heavy tree trunks, one imbedded in the earth, level with the ground, and the other the falling timber. As the hog enters the sementera, the weight of his body springs the trigger which is covered in the loose dirt before the opening, and the falling timber pins him fast against the lower timber firmly buried in the earth. From half a dozen to twenty wild hogs are annually killed by the people of the pueblo. They are said to ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks
... is everything in the feeling with which one approaches an animal. If one comes timidly, doubtfully, the animal knows it; and if one comes swift, silent, resolute, with his power gripped tight, and the hammer back, and a forefinger resting lightly on the trigger guard, the animal knows it too, you may depend. Anyway, they always act as if they knew; and you may safely follow the rule that, whatever your feeling is, whether fear or doubt or confidence, the large and dangerous animals ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... we walked, I learned some particulars of that terrible device the Lewis gun; how that it could spout bullets at the rate of six hundred per minute; how, by varying pressures of the trigger, it could be fired by single rounds or pour forth its entire magazine in a continuous, shattering volley and how it weighed ...
— Great Britain at War • Jeffery Farnol
... to the missionary and one to Miss McClean, advising her to hide hers underneath her clothing. "You know what they're for?" he asked. "No. You'd gain nothing by putting up a fight. They're loaded. All you've got to do is jerk the hammer back and pull the trigger, and the best way not to miss is to hold the muzzle underneath your chin—this way—keeping the butt well out from you. You make sure when you do that. The only satisfaction you'll have, if it comes to suicide ...
— Rung Ho! • Talbot Mundy
... He pulled the trigger. A tongue of flame leapt forth and burst upon the night with a terrific explosion; and as Caleb fell backwards with the shock, the clumsy engine slipped from his fingers and fell with a clatter ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... revolver lay on the divan, and very eagerly she drew it out, feeling it in the darkness, curling her finger about the trigger. Never in her life had she fired a shot, for her most formidable weapon had been the bows and arrows of the Children's Archery Contest of the English Club, but she felt in herself now that highstrung tensity which at all cost would carry ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... the barrel a V-shaped channel was cut. The channel was not very deep, only enough to receive a tenpenny nail with the head projecting half-way above the sides. A notch was cut across the barrel, through this channel, at the trigger end, and a trigger made of heavy iron wire, bent to the shape shown in Fig. 51, was hinged to the gun by a bolt which passed clear through the stock and through both eyes of the trigger. By using two nuts on the bolt, and tightening one against the other, ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... to decide approximately the whereabouts of his prey by the momentary shaking of a twig. He raised his rifle and covered that twig steadily; his forefinger played tentatively on the trigger; but on second thoughts he refrained. He was keenly conscious of the fact that the beast was doing its work with skill superior to his own. In comparison to his, its movements were almost noiseless. Jack Meredith was too clever a man to be conceited ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... is an irresistible weapon of wholesale murder, and is just as deadly no matter who pulls the trigger. It spreads terror as well as death by its loud discharge, and it leaves little clew as to who is responsible for the shot. Its deadly range is so fearfully great as to put all game at the mercy of the clumsiest tyro. ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America
... rode on the fatal day from Fort William to his home in Appin, the way was lined with marksmen of the Camerons of Lochaber, lurking with their guns among the brushwood and behind the rocks. But their hearts failed them, no trigger was drawn, and when Glenure landed on the Appin side of the Ballachulish Ferry, he said, 'I am safe now that I am out of my mother's country,' his mother having been of clan Cameron. But he had to reckon with the man with the gun, who was lurking in the ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang
... you are," was the reply. "I can manage him myself with a spear, if I can only be in time before he reaches the shore. If not, it's no matter, for I won't allow a trigger to ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... river Tirley, Sir John, married to my sister Times, the, on Italian politics Tito in George Eliot's Romola, merit of Token, meaning of the term Torquay, Landor at compared with Naples Torrens, Mr., as Sir Lucius o'Trigger Tory, process of becoming a Mary Mitford becomes a Tours in France Townsend, C.H. Traditions of Landor in Florence Travel, books of Treguier in Brittany Trewhella, Mr. Trooper, Austrian, falls in streets ...
— What I Remember, Volume 2 • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... the lion glanced back over his shoulder, as, according to my experience, a lion nearly always does before he springs. Then he dropped his body a little, and I saw his big paws spread out upon the ground as he put his weight on them to gather purchase. In haste I pressed the trigger of the Martini, and not a moment too soon; for, as I did so, he was in the act of springing. The report of the rifle rang out sharp and clear on the intense silence of the night, and in another second ...
— Hunter Quatermain's Story • H. Rider Haggard
... and the carved handles 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 ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... 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 ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... urgent motor idea in the focus may be neutralized and made inoperative by the presence of the very faintest contradictory idea in the margin. For instance, I hold out my forefinger, and with closed eyes try to realize as vividly as possible that I hold a revolver in my hand and am pulling the trigger. I can even now fairly feel my finger quivering with the tendency to contract; and, if it were hitched to a recording apparatus, it would certainly betray its state of tension by registering incipient movements. Yet it does not actually crook, and the movement of pulling the ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... remnant of College-day dreams (Its wadding is made of forensics and themes); Ah, visions of fame! what a flash in the pan As the trigger was pulled by ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... Ned said to the grand inquisitor, "that you are not masters of the situation. One touch upon my trigger, and the death with which you threaten me is yours. Now write, as I order you, a pass by which we may be allowed to quit these accursed ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... feud. He was the father of young Jasper, who had threatened his life, and the father of the girl whose contempt had cut him to the quick twice that day. Again her taunt leaped through his heated brain, and his boast to the old miller followed it. His finger trembled at the trigger. ...
— A Cumberland Vendetta • John Fox, Jr.
... of the creatures spinning to the ground. Two more were almost upon me before I could level the weapon and pull the trigger again. I ...
— The Infra-Medians • Sewell Peaslee Wright
... pursued and shot. I made straight for a bend in the slough which was partly filled with water. The opposite bank being lined with willows, some of them began to move a little and I concluded some one was coming through them. Levelling my rifle and with finger on the trigger, I heard some one shout to me not to shoot. It was a white man, who wanted to cross the slough. He ran into the water and mud far enough so that I could reach him and pull him on to the bank. He, ...
— In the Early Days along the Overland Trail in Nebraska Territory, in 1852 • Gilbert L. Cole
... "makings" while the other stood gazing straight before him, the dead cigar still gripped in the corner of his mouth. The scratch of the match roused him and quick as a flash he reached beneath the bar and the next instant had Purdy covered with a six-shooter. With his finger on the trigger Cinnabar Joe hesitated, and in that instant he learned that the man that faced him across the bar was as brave as he was unscrupulous. The fingers that twisted the little cylinder of paper never faltered and the black eyes looked straight into the ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... Grubb! "pitch into him!" and drawing his trigger he accidentally knocked off the bird, while Spriggs discharged the contents of his ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... softly. The automatic he held veered around, till it was pointing directly at the girl. "I wouldn't want to have to shoot Sue—say—through the hand...." His finger tightened perceptibly on the trigger. ...
— Astounding Stories, April, 1931 • Various
... pretty well extirpated since, except in some of the lower parts of the Transvaal. In the earlier days ammunition was costly and hard to procure, and the use had to be husbanded accordingly. It became thus a practice never to pull a trigger unless with intense aim and the certainty of an effective shot. A man would go out stalking for an hour or so with perhaps but one or two charges, and would rarely fail in bringing home the kind of game wanted—either a springbock, blesbock, or wildebeest (gnu). ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... looking at our advance as if we were on review. W. H. rushed forward and grabbed his horse by the bridle, telling him at the same time to surrender. The Yankee seized the reins, set himself back in the saddle, put the muzzle of his pistol in W. H.'s face and fired. About the time he pulled trigger, a stray ball from some direction struck him in the side and he fell off dead, and his horse becoming frightened, galloped off, dragging him through the Confederate lines. His pistol had ...
— "Co. Aytch" - Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment - or, A Side Show of the Big Show • Sam R. Watkins
... this side—just opposite. (Here CULCH., in fingering a siphon which is remarkably stiff on the trigger, contrives to send a spray across the table and sprinkle Miss PRENDERGAST, her brother, and PODBURY, with impartial liberality). Now don't you see him? As playful as ever, isn't he! Don't try to make out it was an accident, ...
— Punch, Or the London Charivari, Volume 101, November 21, 1891 • Various
... PALMERSTON,—It was a hair-trigger affair altogether, but thanks be to God everything has gone off admirably. I was obliged to abandon the plan of trusting the King in a fishing-boat from Trouville. The weather was very stormy; had he attempted to find the steamer, he might have failed, ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... but felt as an electric pulse, are the words of Prescott. Warren, by his side, repeats. The words fly through the impatient lines. The eager fingers give back from the waiting trigger. "Steady, men." "Wait until you see the white of the eye." "Not a shot sooner." "Aim at the handsome coats." "Aim at the waistbands." "Pick off the commanders." "Wait for the ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 5, May, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... hall, restoring to its place the favorite rifle he had intended to use to-day. He could not refrain from testing its perfect mechanism, and at the first sharp crack of the hammer, liberated by a tentative pull on the trigger, little Archie sprang up from his play on the hearth-rug, where he was harnessing a toy horse to Mrs. Briscoe's work-basket by long shreds of her zephyr, and ran clamoring for ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock
... hat, which he said were original, but which I have since found were Milton's; likewise a little bottle labelled laudanum; also a pistol and a sword-stick. He drew the latter, uncorked the former, and clicked the trigger of the pocket fire-arm. He had come, he said, to conquer or to die. He did not die. He wrested from me an avowal of my love, and let off the pistol out of a back window previous to ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... catch a flashing vision of a tall Mexican creeping toward him, a long, slim knife glittering in his upraised hand. The fellow was so close that another step would bring him within striking distance, and without hesitation Buck's finger pressed the trigger. ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... 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 a glimpse of a great shaggy mass, something ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... head cautiously and looked through between the branches of a shrub, you could see him, and Bauldie actually covered him with his rifle. The unconscious farmer knew not that his life hung upon a thread, or, rather, upon Bauldie's trigger. Bauldie looked inquiringly to his chief, for he would dearly have loved to fire a cap, but Speug shook his head so fiercely that the trapper dropped down in his lair, and Speug afterwards explained that the renegade had certainly deserved death, but that it was dangerous to fire ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... passion, such as we read of in Pope. Who would not have expected them to be insipid likenesses of each other? No such thing. Harpagon is not more unlike to Jourdain, Joseph Surface is not more unlike to Sir Lucius O'Trigger, than every one of Miss Austen's young divines to all his reverend -brethren. And almost all this is done by touches so delicate that they elude analysis, that they defy the powers of description, and that we know them to exist only by the ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... a sudden impulse rather than a thought, which made Mrs. P. level the gun at his broad back and pull the trigger. The Indian leaped into the air, and fell back in the water dead, with half a dozen buck-shot through his heart. At the same moment she felt a strong grasp on her shoulder, and heard a deep guttural ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... Pup. "You've got something the style of Beans Middleton, who stood up to me for ten rounds in the days of the old Seventy-second Street gang. I'll train you up some time. You'd do well with the crouching style—good reach, quick on the trigger and all that sort of ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... it is loaded, cocked and pointed at your head, with a half drunken galoot's finger on the trigger, is a powerful ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... Charlie. "I mean you can pull the trigger and the hammer will snap down. Course we only ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue in the Big Woods • Laura Lee Hope
... bullets of the wary guardians. The colonel's horse broke loose one night, and, while browsing around, his long, flowing tail, the colonel's pride, was reduced to an ignominious 'bob' by a bullet, which neatly severed it near the root. Many was the trigger pulled at me, many the bullet sent whizzing at my head, as I returned to camp after an evening in the city. Fortunately, the person fired at was usually safe—any one within the circle of a hundred feet diameter was likely to receive the ball. One evening, ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... see! Sit ye, Martin! Now as to this black ship—first of all she fouls us in the river, the which was no accident, Martin, though just what the motive was I'm yet a-seeking. Second, as she drifted past us whom should I see aboard her but Abnegation Mings and pulled trigger a moment too late, but winged another o' the rogues. Third, when we'd repaired our damage and got us clear of the river what should we see but this same black ship hove short waiting us, for she presently stands after us. And so she's dogged us ever since ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... earnest, and B.-P., on a rock directing the movements of his force, was surrounded by the deafening roar of artillery. In nearly every cave on those hills savages lay with rifle to shoulder, finger on trigger, waiting to pick off the besiegers as they came bounding over the rocks towards them. The Cape Boys never wavered; up they dashed, panting and sweating, to the very mouths of the caves, fired their rifles into the darkness, charged in, to reissue ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... meet them and warn Shatov!" cried Pyotr Stepanovitch, pulling out his revolver. They heard the click of the trigger. ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... such a hurry that he didn't take my automatic," declared Tom. "I guess when he hit me or kicked me I must have closed on the trigger and started the thing going. He left without waiting to take the gun away from me. I'm ...
— Boy Scouts in Southern Waters • G. Harvey Ralphson
... trifling for me to doubt the fatal effects of the discharge; for I was determined to take deadly aim, in hopes that the fall of one man might save the lives of many. But at the very moment when my hand was on the trigger, and my eye was along the barrel, my purpose was checked by M'Leay, who called to me that another party of blacks had made their appearance upon the left bank of the river. Turning round, I observed four ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... for speaking," exclaimed the little Don, levelling a pistol at his head. He pulled the trigger. It missed fire, and before he could again cock the lock, Needham, who had been working his hands free, sprang aft, and with a blow of his fist levelled him with the deck. It was the signal for the Spaniards to set upon them, and they would ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... excited to shout; the surprise seemed to have deprived them of their senses, and they all had the same grin of teeth closed upon the naked blades of their knives, the same stupid stare fastened upon my eyes. I pulled the trigger in the nearest face, and the terrific din of the fight going on above us was overpowered by the report of the pistol, as if by a clap of thunder. The man's gaping mouth dropped the knife, and he stood stiffly long enough for the thought, "I've missed him," ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... and handsome face, for he was a man who could be all things to all men; and the blue eyes sometimes went black, and the smooth, shapely hand that was for ever stroking the long flowing beard, liked too well to feel a trigger in the crook of its forefinger. So I laughingly declined his offer—even when, as an extra inducement, he pointed out to me a very handsome young Marshall Island girl, who would do the station ...
— The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton - 1902 • Louis Becke
... were restrained by others more prudent—not, however, before it had nearly cost one of them his life; having pointed a spear at Mr. Moore, Dugel, whose natural instincts are very destructive, hastily took aim at him, but fortunately pulled the wrong trigger, which just gave his adversary time to lower his weapon; on our mounting our horses they hastily fell back and joined their other companions at their camp, which was just in our line of march; about thirty of them awaited our approach with some tokens of defiance, but most of them decamped ...
— Journals of Australian Explorations • A C and F T Gregory
... the unsuspecting fox disappeared over a knoll, again I came to my senses, and brought my gun to my shoulder; but it was too late, the game had gone. I returned home full of excitement at what I had seen, and gave as the excuse why I did not shoot, that I had my mitten on, and could not reach the trigger of my gun. It is true I had my mitten on, but there was a mitten, or something, on my wits also. It was years before I heard the last of that mitten; when I failed at anything they said, "John had ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus
... the fur, and the thing came on. Bradley fumbled for his gun, and almost dropped it in his excitement. When he finally brought it up into aiming position, his hand was trembling, and his finger could hardly catch the trigger. ...
— Divinity • William Morrison
... can do. I cannot return to Petersburg, to prison.' He threw down his cap, and with the premature feeling of a kind of agonizing, not wholly unpleasant yet powerful tension of the nerves, he put the mouth of the revolver against his breast and pulled the trigger.... ...
— Lectures on Russian Literature - Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenef, Tolstoy • Ivan Panin
... passengers lie down on the decks, and rifling them at leisure. "This money will be but very little among three," whispered Cartouche to his neighbor, as the three conquerors were making merry over their gains; "if you were but to pull the trigger of your pistol in the neighborhood of your comrade's ear, perhaps it might go off, and then there would be but two of us to share." Strangely enough, as Cartouche said, the pistol DID go off, and No. 3 perished. "Give him another ball," said Cartouche; and another was fired ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... a more complicated form of latch with a trigger protruding from the lower part of the door, which is hinged to a wooden shaft, and the shaft in turn is connected with the latch. The fastenings of the trigger to the shaft and the shaft to the latch are made with hardwood pegs ...
— Shelters, Shacks and Shanties • D.C. Beard
... instructions. "Report to the Simonidean Embassy and put yourself at the disposal of Hector Abrams, First Secretary to the Simonidean Prime Minister. But first, hang this stuff on you. This dress sword is a little unusual—the scabbard is rounder than yours, but not noticeably so. It's really a blaster; the trigger is here on the handle as you grasp it. Put on these aide's aguillettes—the metal tips are police whistles. No," seeing Hanlon's questioning look, "we don't expect any trouble today—these are just routine, for we like to be ready ...
— Man of Many Minds • E. Everett Evans
... full on the mate's chest, while, with the forefinger of his right hand, he lightly touched the triggers, "draw your pistols from your belt, and be very careful how you do it— very careful—for if, even by chance, you touch hammer or trigger, ...
— The Madman and the Pirate • R.M. Ballantyne
... the sun, hardened in manner by a coarse life of change and danger, loving the rude woods and the crack of the rifle, living to begin something new every day, striking with the broad and open hand, delicate in nothing but the touch of the trigger, leaving cities in its track as if by accident rather than design, settling again to the steady ways of a fixed life only when it must: such was the American people whose achievement it was to be to take possession of their continent from end to end ere their national government was ...
— Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools - Edited With Notes, Study Helps, And Reading Lists • Various
... except for the environment. All acts, taken apart from their surrounding circumstances, are indifferent to the law. For instance, to crook the forefinger with a certain force is the same act whether the trigger of a pistol is next to it or not. It is only the surrounding circumstances of a pistol loaded and cocked, and of a human being in such relation to it, as to be manifestly likely to be hit, that make the act a wrong. Hence, it is no ...
— The Common Law • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
... to see a second German officer level a revolver straight at his head. The lad ducked and the ball passed harmlessly over his head. Before the German's finger could press the trigger again Hal had raised his ...
— The Boy Allies At Verdun • Clair W. Hayes
... not a trigger was pulled, not a soldier stirred; and their ominous composure seemed to damp the spirits of the assailants. It was not till the French were within forty yards that the fatal word was given, and the British muskets ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... fright of surprise, the black's finger pulled the trigger and his throat loosed an unearthly yell. Knocked forward on his face, he rolled over and grappled with Jerry, who slashed cheek-bone and cheek and ribboned an ear; for it is the way of an Irish terrier to bite repeatedly and quickly rather than ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... a machine gun at my ear. The monstrous arm released the victims, and waved in agony, breaking the thick, clammy branches of the vegetation, and the vast head disappeared. Edmund had fired all the ten shots in his automatic pistol with a single pressure of the double trigger and an unvarying aim, directed, no doubt, at one of the ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... Neopalia I had learned to reserve my opinion. Such were my reflections as I turned to resume my interrupted crawl to safety. But in an instant I was still again—still, and crouching close under the wall, motionless as an insect that feigns death, holding my breath, my hand on the trigger. For the door of the cottage was flung open, and Constantine and Vlacho appeared on ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various
... let us candidly admit that there is one Scotchman who is cheerful,' iii. 387; 'Come, let me know what it is that makes a Scotchman happy,' v. 346; 'He left half a crown to a beggarly Scotchman to draw the trigger after his death,' i. 268; 'Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young,' ii. 194; 'One Scotchman is as good as another,' iv. 101; 'The noblest prospect which a Scotchman ever sees is the high road that leads him to England,' ...
— Life of Johnson, Volume 6 (of 6) • James Boswell
... quietly. "That's why I must insist that you raise your hands. Instantly!" His voice hardened and his finger tightened on the trigger. "Shoot without hesitancy," ...
— The Boy Allies with Haig in Flanders • Clair W. Hayes
... the murderer. But he did not pull the trigger again. Though the weapon had of late been so often in his hands, he forgot, in the agitation of the moment, that his missing once was but of small matter if he chose to go on with his purpose. Were there not five other barrels for him, each making itself ready by the discharge of the other? ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... state in the nerve fibres connected with it. The powder in a loaded gun is such another stock of substance capable of yielding energy in consequence of a change of state in the mechanism of the lock, which intervenes between the finger of the man who pulls the trigger and the cartridge. If that change is brought about, the potential energy of the powder passes suddenly into actual energy, and does the work of propelling the bullet. The powder, therefore, may be appropriately called work-stuff, ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... with his finger crooking to the trigger, paused and saw the two guns in Carson's brown hands trained unwaveringly upon him. There was much deadly determination in Carson's eyes. Again Trevors laughed, ...
— Judith of Blue Lake Ranch • Jackson Gregory
... aimed his revolver at the place where he felt his heart beating, pulled the trigger ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... and looking at the company before him. "Why there's Lieutenant Canfield as sure as I am alive, and if that ain't my dear little daughter yonder, I hope I may never lift my sword for Mad Anthony again. And there's Oonomoo, the best red-man that ever pulled the trigger of a rifle, with a little pocket edition of himself, and grinning Cato too! Why don't you come to the arms of your father, sis, and ...
— Oonomoo the Huron • Edward S. Ellis
... forced him to the 500-meter level. I was very close to him and quite surprised that he had stopped his twisting; but just as I was about to give him the finishing shots, my machine gun stopped. I had pressed down too hard on the trigger mechanism, in the heat of the battle, and this had jammed. The second Frenchman now attacked me, and I escaped while I could. The second fight took place over our lines. The first Frenchman, as I learned later, had gotten ...
— An Aviator's Field Book - Being the field reports of Oswald Boelcke, from August 1, - 1914 to October 28, 1916 • Oswald Boelcke
... up the pistol from the bed upon which she had thrown it and pointing it upward pulled the trigger. Startled by his utterly unexpected action, the meaning of which she could not fathom, she did scream loudly. The next instant the door was thrown open and into the room half clad, sword in hand, burst the Marquis. With him were Sir Gervaise Yeovil and the young ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... gun. The trigger guard was torn from it, and the cylinder crushed as if in some resistless grasp; the stock was twisted, and the barrel bent almost into a circle. The revolver had been crumpled by some terrific force—as a soft clay model of it might have ...
— The Pygmy Planet • John Stewart Williamson
... with difficulty I crept forward, followed closely by my men, through the high withered grass, beneath the dense green nabbuk bushes, peering through the thick covert, with the nerves braced up to full pitch, and the finger on the trigger ready for any emergency. We had thus advanced for about half an hour, during which I frequently applied my nose to within a foot of the ground to catch the scent, when a sudden puff of wind brought the unmistakable smell of decomposing flesh. For the moment ...
— In the Heart of Africa • Samuel White Baker
... steel. There was the old major now. Always before this he had seemed to me to be but pot metal and putty, and here, poised, alert, ready—a wire-drawn, hard-hammered Damascus blade of a man—all changed and transformed and glorified, he was coming down on Dave Dancy, finger on trigger, thumb on hammer, eye on target, ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... passed out of sight between Bartley and Colonel Clifford, for what the young people heard now was quite enough to make what Sir Lucius O'Trigger calls a very pretty quarrel. Bartley, hitherto known to Mary as a very oily speaker, shouted at the top of his voice in arrogant defiance, "You're not a child, are you? You are old enough to read ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... As he pressed trigger, a light sighing eased itself from the slim barrel. Something flicked through the leaves; and, almost on the instant, the phenomenon of the little phosphorescent spot repeated itself, though in a different place from the first one. Captain Alden's and Rrisa's shots produced ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... the whelp as already dead. For Nepeese, at that distance, could send a bullet into an inch square nine times out of ten. And Nepeese, aiming carefully at Baree, pressed steadily with her brown forefinger upon the trigger. ...
— Baree, Son of Kazan • James Oliver Curwood
... which some freak had caused her to conceal in her dress, she made it ready, and, with her finger on the trigger, aimed it at his heart. Like all villains of his caste, he was a coward, and trembled with quaking fear before the flashing eye and resolute look ...
— Ellen Walton - The Villain and His Victims • Alvin Addison
... which commanded the back entrance. As many men, with plenty of ready-loaded rifles, were told off to a room in the opposite wing. Both parties were thus in a position to rake the entrance with a cross fire. Moore gave orders that not a trigger should be pulled till the still invisible assailants had arrived on his side, between the two projecting wings. "Then fire into them, and let every one choose ...
— In the Wrong Paradise • Andrew Lang
... shoulder, aims at the wayfarers whom he has stopped on the road. Generally they kneel down, tender their purses, and the shot is not fired. But the gun is cocked, nevertheless, and, to be certain of this, we have only to look at the shriveled hand grasping the trigger. We are reminded of those swarms of banditti which infested the country under the ancient regime;[3229] the double-girdle of smugglers and receivers embraced within twelve hundred leagues of internal excise-duties, the poachers abounding on the four hundred leagues ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... for Principe (our alias for Porto Rico). If no steamer is ready, charter a sailing vessel. Collect all the information you can in detail, and return without loss of time. N.B. Spare no expense. The "Gatillo" (Spanish for "Trigger") thirsts ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... animals to a stand. They turned their heads, staring intently, making up their minds, their nostrils wide. Kingozi, who had already picked his beast and partially assured his aim, almost immediately squeezed the trigger. ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al
... their shields emboss'd with gold, And the thrusting of their venom'd points upon the foemen told; O deep and large was every gash that mark'd their manly vigour, And irresistible the flash that lighten'd round their trigger; And woe, when play'd the dark blue blade, the thick back'd sharp Ferrara, Though plied its might by stripling hand, it cut into the marrow. Clan Colla,[122] let them have their due, thy true and gallant following, Strength, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... him. I think he did a smart thing. He might have said you were my grandmother, if it would have served you, for that low fellow is as fractious as the devil, and dead sure on the trigger." ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... nothing of the seamy side of life—except, indeed, what they had learned in the war—well educated, brave, generous, sensitive to points of honor, and of engaging manners, these brothers were by all respected, by many loved and by some feared. For they had quick fingers upon the pistol-trigger withal, and would rather fight a duel than eat—nay, drink. Nor were they over-particular about the combat taking the form of a duel—almost any form was good enough. I made their acquaintance by chance and cultivated it for the pleasure it gave me. It was long afterward that I gave a thought ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... 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
... deliberation, begins his march over the sands to the other side. He advances his foreleg, and exposes to view a small spot, denuded of hair, just behind the point of his shoulder; upon this the hunter brings the sight of his rifle to bear; lightly and delicately his finger presses upon the hair-trigger. Quick as thought the spiteful crack of the rifle responds to his slight touch, and instantly in the middle of the bare spot appears a small red dot. The buffalo shivers; death has overtaken him, he cannot tell from whence; ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... might he, Senator Gruff, impart a word of counsel? A question was often a trap to catch the questioner. One should step warily with a question. A man who puts a question should never fail to know the answer in advance. When he pulls the trigger of a question, as when he pulls the trigger of a gun, he must look out for the kick. Many a perfect situation had been destroyed by the wrong question asked in the dark. Senator Gruff begged ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... riding breeches, then swung back before his eyes to vibrate into stillness. It was a bamboo dagger, sharpened to a keen edge and point, hardened by charring in a slow fire. Fastened to a young sapling, it had been bent down over the trail and secured by a trigger his foot had released in passing. Level with his thigh, it had been designed to pierce the abdomen of the Hillmen's natural foes. He bent to examine the glutinous material with which the dagger was poisoned, and paled as ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... officer of the soldiers observing, that he would not order the men to fire, but that he (Shortland) might do as he pleased. I then saw Captain Shortland seize hold of a musket, in the hands of a soldier, which was immediately fired—but I am not able to say whether he or the soldier pulled the trigger. At this time I was endeavouring to get through the gate to the prison-yard—in so doing several stabs were made at me with bayonets, which I evaded. Immediately after the firing became general, and I retreated, with ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... of impatience. He fingered the trigger of his weapon, and then slowly raised it on a line with ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Lord, an' health be yours, Unskaithed by hunger'd Highland boors; Lord grant me nae duddie, desperate beggar, Wi' dirk, claymore, and rusty trigger, May twin auld Scotland o' a life She likes—as ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... him. Thinking it as well to be prepared, he 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 ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... the revolver's bullets crashing home as fast as his finger could press the trigger. At that murderously short range the smashing rain of lead should have dropped a charging gorilla. But for all the effect Gordon's shots had upon the Xoranian, his ammunition might as well have been pellets of paper. Arlok's glossy hide merely, ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... is answered, and then the prophet, in Jehovah's name, bursts into a wonderful song of triumph over the defeated invader. 'I have heard.' That is enough. Hezekiah's prayer has, as it were, fired the fuse or pulled the trigger, and the explosion follows, and the shot is sped. 'Whereas thou hast prayed, ... I have heard,' is ever true, and God's hearing is God's acting in answer. The methods of His response vary, the fact that ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... 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 he gave ...
— The Outdoor Chums on the Gulf • Captain Quincy Allen
... round the lists, shouted by wheezy heralds and taken up by roaring swashbucklers! Perdition overpower such ostentatious wooers! Marry! shall I shoot the amorous feline who nightly iterates his love songs on my roof, and yet withhold my trigger finger from yonder pranksome gallant? Go to! Here is an orange left of last week's repast. Decay hath overtaken it,—it possesseth neither savor nor cleanliness. Ha! cleverly thrown! A hit—a palpable hit! Peradventure ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... Jonathan's rifle had several times covered this savage's dark face; but when he was about to press the trigger Wetzel's fleeting form, also in line with the savage, made it extremely hazardous to ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... monstrous arm released the victims, and waved in agony, breaking the thick, clammy branches of the vegetation, and the vast head disappeared. Edmund had fired all the ten shots in his automatic pistol with a single pressure of the double trigger and an unvarying aim, directed, no doubt, at ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... it!" cried Grubb! "pitch into him!" and drawing his trigger he accidentally knocked off the bird, while Spriggs discharged the contents of ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... its tiny green flame. Kreynborg was using a pocket-gun, one of those small terrible weapons which shoot a projectile barely larger than the graphite of a lead pencil, but loaded with a fraction of a milligram of hexynitrate. Two hundred charges would feed automatically into the bore as the trigger was pressed. ...
— Invasion • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... money, all right," added Fred, "though I will say that when he does spend, he does it royally. He certainly fixed us up in style when he bought the tickets for us to go out to Bill's ranch. He's got a hair-trigger temper, but take him all in all, he's a good ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... hey? looks like it; I've only to touch the trigger here, and your soul's out o' your body. Better promise ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... call those large muskets calivers; the harquebuss was a lighter piece, that could be fired without a rest. The matchlock was fired by a match fixed by a kind of tongs in the serpentine or cock, which, by pulling the trigger, was brought down with great quickness upon the priming in the pan, over which there was a sliding cover, which was drawn back by the hand just at the time of firing. There was a great deal of nicety ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... the missile Jared Long sent a bullet through him, and then, shifting the muzzle of his Winchester toward the line of dusky figures, he blazed away as fast as he could sight the weapon and pull the trigger. ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis
... questioned, of course, but as soon as they learned who he was and that he had nothing to do with you, they would let him go. But if he were with us, say here, when we were pounced upon, and you had no time to pull the trigger of the pistol pointing into that keg of powder in the cupboard, he would be hurried away with us to one of the fortresses, and the chances are that not a soul would ever know what had become of him. Still it cannot be helped now; ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... a deer under my trigger I let him go because he had a funny-shaped horn. Sure, it's the little things that run a gent's ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand
... 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 ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... me do, and in either of these cases we could despatch Jensen and have up our barricade again before help would come to him. All this takes time to tell, but took no time in the thinking, and my finger was upon the trigger when, in the providence of God, something happened which altered every purpose—Jensen's and the others', and mine. There came a great crash through the air loud as immediate thunder, with a noise that seemed to shake ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... sands to the other side. He advances his fore-leg, and exposes to view a small spot denuded of hair, just behind the point of his shoulder; upon this the hunter brings the sight of his rifle to bear; lightly and delicately his finger presses upon the hair-trigger. Quick as thought the spiteful crack of the rifle responds to his slight touch, and instantly in the middle of the bare spot appears a small red dot. The buffalo shivers; death has overtaken him, he cannot ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... of this Spartan band, was now brought into a personal conflict with a powerful and active Wyandotte warrior. The conflict was for a time fierce and desperate, and keenly and anxiously watched by Proctor, with his finger on the trigger of his unerring rifle. Such, however, was the struggle between these fierce and powerful warriors, that Proctor could not shoot without greatly endangering the safety of his captain. Estill had had his arm broken the preceding ...
— Heroes and Hunters of the West • Anonymous
... I'll take the lion," said Hendricks calmly, while the boy, showing no signs of fear, stepped behind his friends. All at once the lion stopped, then gazing a moment at the intruders, galloped off after the cubs, but the lioness still came bounding on. Hendricks on this refrained from pulling his trigger. Maloney fired, the ball struck the savage animal in the neck, but notwithstanding on she came towards him, and in another instant would probably have laid him low on the ground with a blow from her powerful paw. It was fortunate that Hendricks ...
— Hendricks the Hunter - The Border Farm, a Tale of Zululand • W.H.G. Kingston
... denouement which I needed but a slight modicum of common sense to be aware was close at hand. I placed the muzzle of one of the revolvers against the keyhole of the drawer to which my unseen guide had previously directed me, and pulled the trigger. The lock was shattered, the contents of the drawer were at my mercy. I snatched up a bundle of letters, about which a pink ribbon was wrapped. Startled by a noise behind me, immediately following the report of the pistol, ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... for me to doubt the fatal effects of the discharge; for I was determined to take deadly aim, in hopes that the fall of one man might save the lives of many. But at the very moment when my hand was on the trigger, and my eye was along the barrel, my purpose was checked by M'Leay, who called to me that another party of blacks had made their appearance upon the left bank of the river. Turning round, I observed four men at the top of their ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... struck me on the chest as it went down and swept me to the ground. I fell upon my back, and the elephant blundered past me as I lay. More by instinct than anything else I lifted the rifle with one hand and pulled the trigger. It exploded, and, as I discovered afterwards, the bullet struck him in the ribs. But the recoil of the heavy rifle held thus was very severe; it bent my arm up, and sent the butt with a thud against the top of my shoulder and the side of my neck, for the moment quite paralyzing me, and ...
— Maiwa's Revenge - The War of the Little Hand • H. Rider Haggard
... presumed to fly in the face of Providence, after that warning, Mr. Hennage felt that the responsibility must very properly rest on the doctor, for the gambler would have killed him as surely as he had the strength to work his trigger finger. ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... nebber hear a cannon sound so big. De Ku Kluckers 'peared ter hear it too, fer dey comed squar outen h'yer inter de big road. Den I opened up an' let her bark at 'em ez long ez I could see a shadder ter pull trigger on. Wonder ef I hurt enny on 'em. D'yer know, 'Gena, wuz enny on ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... with fury that he thought his heart would burst with the surging blood. Why had the man worked with such energy and such cruel persistence against him? But his wonder quickly passed, because the reason did not matter now. Instead he put his finger on the trigger of the automatic ...
— The Hosts of the Air • Joseph A. Altsheler
... me and see what you've done. Hereafter, O boy! think before you pull the trigger.' It's a pity, but ...
— Darrel of the Blessed Isles • Irving Bacheller
... to his own bungalow and began cleaning a rifle. He told the servant that he was going to shoot buck in the morning. Naturally he fumbled with the trigger, and shot himself through the head— accidentally. The apothecary sent in a report to my chief, and Jevins is buried somewhere out there. I'd have wired to you, Spurstow, if you could ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... are," commanded Dick, an' I stuck in my tracks. "No man is allowed to doubt my deal without havin' something to remind him of it. I ain't a-goin' to kill that snake now; but I do intend to remove his trigger fingers." ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... 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 ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget
... disgustedly upon the sand, rolled his quid into the other cheek, wiped his thin lips with the back of his right hand, then his fingers mechanically sought the trigger guard again and he cast a perfunctory squint ...
— Barbarians • Robert W. Chambers
... remembered the Lawd 'fore ye done it," she said, with a repellent impulse; then she would have given much to recall the reproach. The man was desperate; his safety lay in her silence. A pistol-shot would secure it, and anger would limber the trigger. ...
— Wolf's Head - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... Your life is hanging by a hair trigger that goes off with a feather touch. I give you one more chance. Move hand or foot and the bullet in this gun will pass neatly through your eye. So help me ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... with his air of bravado. "You've been a long time coming to that door. I been sitting back in the bushes watching for you as patient as a cat watches a mouse-hole, with my gun all cocked and my finger on the trigger, ready to pick you off the minute you showed up. Nothing against you personally, but the Black Pearl didn't spare me, so why should I—oh, you needn't reach for your gun. Good old Bob, ain't that what the Pearl calls ...
— The Black Pearl • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... the 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 to ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... never quits his piece while he has any powder in his horn or a bullet in his pouch. I have not drawn a trigger this day, Eau-douce, and shouldn't relish the idea of parting with those reptiles without causing them to remember my name. A little water will not harm my legs; and I see that blackguard, Arrowhead, among the scamps, and wish to send him the wages he has so faithfully ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... 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
... expectancy with which we peeped over the whitened weeds and through the bushes, to catch a glimpse of the gums in some "parf" or at some clearly marked "gap"; our disappointment when we found the door standing open and the trigger set just as we had left it the mormng before; our keen delight when the door was down; the dash for the trap; the scuffle to decide which should look in first; the peep at the brown ball screwed up back at the far end; the delicate ...
— The Long Hillside - A Christmas Hare-Hunt In Old Virginia - 1908 • Thomas Nelson Page
... 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 ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... had left it. It did not seem to hear Tom at all. Fearful of being seen, Tom raised his gun with a very slow and steady aim, and covered the spot just where he thought the heart ought to be. One second he stood thus, but it was long enough for Tom, who pressed the trigger. ...
— Elam Storm, The Wolfer - The Lost Nugget • Harry Castlemon
... rail done bin rub right smoove, en right dar he sot 'im a trap. He tuck'n ben' down a hick'ry saplin', growin' in de fence-cornder, en tie one een' un a plow- line on de top, en in de udder een' he fix a loop-knot, en dat he fasten wid a trigger right in de crack. Nex' mawnin' w'en ole Brer Rabbit come slippin' 'long en crope thoo de crack, de loop-knot kotch 'im behime de fo'legs, en de saplin' flew'd up, en dar he wuz 'twix' de heavens en de yeth. Dar he swung, en he fear'd he gwineter fall, en he fear'd he wer'n't gwineter fall. W'ile ...
— Uncle Remus • Joel Chandler Harris
... her 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
... a coward[787]: 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 after his death[788]!' Garrick, who I can attest from my own knowledge, had his mind seasoned with pious reverence, and sincerely disapproved of the infidel writings of several, whom, in the course of his almost universal gay intercourse with men ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... coming down with the current. It is doubtful if he ever saw a human being before. This sight sent us scrambling in our cases for cameras and firearms; and it was not the game laws, but a rusted trigger on the six-shooter instead, that saved the sheep. He finally took alarm and scampered away over the rocks, and we had no mutton ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb
... self-defense he had amused himself firing at inanimate targets thrown into the air and had perfected himself in the use of firearms without realizing that he had done so. Now indeed would he hunt big game. A slow smile touched his lips as his finger closed gradually upon the trigger. The rifle spoke and a German machine gunner collapsed behind his weapon. In three minutes Tarzan picked off the crew of that gun. Then he spotted a German officer emerging from a dugout and the three men in the bay with him. Tarzan was careful to leave no one in the immediate ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the cabin door close, and Blake's footsteps approaching. Her body did not tremble now. Her forefinger was steady on the trigger. She held her breath—and waited. Blake came to the deadline and stopped. She could see one arm and a part of his shoulder. But that was not enough. Another half step—six inches—four even, and she would fire. Her heart pounded like a tiny hammer ...
— Back to God's Country and Other Stories • James Oliver Curwood
... more than usually discouraging in the office and an evening of exasperated misery at home, I got a revolver and some cartridges, locked myself in my room, confronted myself desperately in the mirror, put the muzzle of the loaded pistol to my temple, and pulled the trigger. ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... his eyes; he saw the avenues under the old trees where his aunt used to take him walking in old days; he saw himself a little child, happy and wondering; he remembered the castles he used to build with strips of plane-tree bark... The trigger was pulled. Jean beat the air with his arms and fell forward face to the ground. The men finished him with their bayonets; then the woman danced on the ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... of these, he broke the end off and rubbed in on the fore-sight very gently, careful not to let it explode, and succeeded in making the little projection so luminous that he could align it with the back-sight and the Arab's body. Then he pulled the trigger, and saw the dark figure leap forward and fall prone. Saw it, indeed, but only in a fraction of a second, for he stole back to the sand ridge, slipping in another ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... came upon him near the south gate. I accosted him, and arrested him. He was as cool as a cucumber, and quick as lightning! Before we could suspect or prevent the action, he whipped a pistol out of his breast-pocket, and presented it at his own head. I seized his arm while his finger was on the trigger; but was too late to save him. He fired! I only changed the direction of the ball, which, instead of blowing off his head, buried itself somewhere in his body. He fell, a crowd gathered, we picked him up, took a leaf of the gate off its hinges, laid him on it, ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... the shortest way of doing this. He, too, was alarmed now. Raising his gun above his head, he pulled the trigger three times in quick succession. As many sharp flashes leaped into the air, and as many ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Texas - Or, The Veiled Riddle of the Plains • Frank Gee Patchin
... galera wagon, stagecoach. gallego Galician. gallina hen. gana appetite, desire, pleasure. ganado cattle. ganancia gain. ganar to gain, win. garrapato pothook. gastar to spend. gatillo trigger. gato, -a cat. gemir to groan. gendarme civil guard, guardsman. genero genus, kind. generoso generous. genio genius, temper. gente f. people, (troops). gesto gesture. girar to gyrate, turn round. gitano gypsy; gitanico (dim.). ...
— Novelas Cortas • Pedro Antonio de Alarcon
... to her face. "I shall take the trap off; you will walk three feet in front of me; if you make it four I blow your brains out; we shall go to Agricole. But right here, just now, before I count ten, you will tell me who sent you here; at the word ten, if I reach it, I pull the trigger. One—two—three—" ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... the women and crouch down in my former hiding place. Then they did what women seldom do—betrayed the fugitive. Calling to the soldiers, they pointed out the place I was in. All four came running, and in a moment were almost on top of me. I presented my revolver and snapped the trigger twice without exploding the cartridges; they were too close or too excited to use their muskets, but all four grappled with me, and ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell
... quick upon the trigger, Priscilla. I would my snaphance went to the aim as lightly and as surely as your ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... at length, 'which is it to be—the revolver, marriage, or the money?' She ominously clicked the trigger, 'I give ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne
... 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 ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... elderly people adjust the organ of vision to any optical instrument in that way. I suppose it is from the instinct of protection to the eye, the same instinct as that which makes the raw militia-man close it when he pulls the, trigger of his musket the first time. He expressed himself highly gratified, however, with what he saw, and retired from the instrument to make ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... they had learned in the war—well educated, brave, generous, sensitive to points of honor, and of engaging manners, these brothers were by all respected, by many loved and by some feared. For they had quick fingers upon the pistol-trigger withal, and would rather fight a duel than eat—nay, drink. Nor were they over-particular about the combat taking the form of a duel—almost any form was good enough. I made their acquaintance by chance and cultivated it for the pleasure it gave me. It was ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... card than I possess. I might urge that by pulling the trigger you would certainly alarm the house and the neighbourhood, and put a halter round your neck. But it strikes me as safer to assume you capable of using a pistol with effect at three paces. With what might happen subsequently ...
— I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the magnet core. When the magnet draws the armature inwardly, the number plate drops and exposes the numeral through the opening in the front of the box. In order to return the number plate to its original position, as shown in Fig. 51, a vertical trigger (M) passes up through the bottom, its upper end being within range of one of the limbs of ...
— Electricity for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... do it, 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
... poor child! you cannot fight; you have never fired a pistol or a gun in your life. Your health was always too delicate for these habits of men; and you could not pull a trigger taking ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... mean it, Davy," he said. "It was all a mistake. They were going away and I was dropping the gun, and somehow I touched the trigger and Lukens fell. They've taken him home, but they'll come back—a hundred of them this time. Oh, ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd
... to be making violent efforts to hurl Ensal off of himself, but this was merely a feint. By skillful maneuvering unknown to Ensal he got hold of his pistol and sought to so aim it that he could shoot Ensal through the heart. Concluding that he now had the pistol at the right angle, he pulled the trigger. The trembling condition of his hand could not insure a steady aim and the pistol falling down sent the bullet crashing into his own side. Ensal leaped up, but Earl lay ...
— The Hindered Hand - or, The Reign of the Repressionist • Sutton E. Griggs
... Indians, dismissed his 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 ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... direction the blood would take when it flowed from the wound. Then, placing himself in proper position, so that the gore would run from and not toward his body, he placed the pistol to the right temple, pulled the trigger and death quickly followed." ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... but the same idea struck us all, that he had been killed, and that the Prussians were blowing the trumpet to draw us into an ambush. We therefore returned to the cottage, keeping a careful lookout, with our fingers on the trigger and hiding under the branches. But his wife, in spite of our entreaties, rushed on, leaping like a tigress. She thought that she had to avenge her husband, and had fixed the bayonet to her rifle. We lost sight of her at ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... my rifle; I scrutinized its every portion; it was in order. Then I leaned over the edge of the car and pointed it downward. I aimed it between his great, earnest eyes, into the very middle of his thoughtful and observant countenance. I pulled the trigger; the explosion ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... any warning, had begun to shriek and whirl, 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 vitals ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... map for our campaign; here are the routes and the plan of attack. We shall at last stand before these Austrians in battle array; and as they dared say of my father, that his gun was ever cocked but the trigger never pulled, we will show them that we are ready to discharge, and thrust down the double eagle from its proud pinnacle. The combat is determined and unalterable; let us be silent and prudent, no one must discover our plans; we will surprise ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... 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 that ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry
... 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 ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... undergrowth was fairly thin ahead of him, he started to crawl along so as, if possible, to get out of the course of the beaters before they should arrive on the spot. Grasping his carbine so that his hand covered the trigger-guard—in order to avoid any accidental discharge in consequence of the trigger becoming caught in some trailing twig—he began to creep forward, making as little noise as possible, and being particularly careful to avoid disturbing ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood
... a scoundrel and a coward; a scoundrel for charging a blunderbuss against religion and morality, a coward because he had no resolution to fire it off himself, but left half-a-crown to a beggarly Scotchman to draw the trigger after his death.' This is strong language, but it is not wholly undeserved. There is something inexpressibly mean in a man countenancing the persecution of his fellow creatures for heterodoxy, while ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... a strange land. | | | |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
... already sighted his gun at the head half-hidden by the rock. He now pulled the trigger, and then, turning, he fired the other barrel, aiming along the side of the canon where the two men seen by his companion must be standing. The head disappeared, and loud cries broke from the other side. The stillness that had reigned in the valley was broken by a ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... To the south a dark object appeared, and grew larger. Morganson became alert. He worked his rifle, ejecting a loaded cartridge from the chamber, by the same action replacing it with another, and returning the ejected cartridge into the magazine. He lowered the trigger to half-cock, and drew on his mitten to keep the trigger-hand warm. As the dark object came nearer he made it out to be a man, without dogs or sled, travelling light. He grew nervous, cocked the trigger, then put it back to half-cock ...
— The Turtles of Tasman • Jack London
... you; don't you shoot! don't you shoot!" screamed Seth Tucket, rushing wildly out of the bushes just as the rebel pulled the trigger. ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... fast. Along the upper edge of the barrel a V-shaped channel was cut. The channel was not very deep, only enough to receive a tenpenny nail with the head projecting half-way above the sides. A notch was cut across the barrel, through this channel, at the trigger end, and a trigger made of heavy iron wire, bent to the shape shown in Fig. 51, was hinged to the gun by a bolt which passed clear through the stock and through both eyes of the trigger. By using ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... finish my sentence, for in obedience to a nod Garcia was dragged back into a chair, and Tom Bulk's sturdy arms pinioned him, but not in time; for, with a cry of rage, he drew the trigger. There was a sharp report, and then, as the smoke floated upward, a wild cry echoed ...
— The Golden Magnet • George Manville Fenn
... tributaries looking like the monster's many legs. I took it into my head to try to shoot from there into the water of Glen Canyon beneath us, and borrowed Bishop's 44-calibre Remington revolver for the purpose. When I pulled the trigger I was positively startled by the violence of the report, a deafening shock like a thousand thunder-claps in one; then dead silence. Next, from far away there was a rattle as of musketry, and peal after peal of the echoing shot came back to us. The interval ...
— The Romance of the Colorado River • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... trigger, ole feller,' cried one. 'He kin hit a turkey's eye at two hundred paces, he kin,' said another. 'He'll burn yer in'ards, shore,' shouted a third. 'Ye'll speak fur warm lodgin's, ef ye bid on thet gal, ye wull,' cried ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No. V, May, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... snatch up the rifle, to sight hastily, blindly, between those two, great greenish eyes. Choking out a strangled sob of desperation, Nelson made his trembling finger close over the cold strip of steel that must be the trigger. ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... of its American Vice-Consul, Julius Van Hee, a hair-trigger politician and a live wire if there ever was one. Van Hee, with his intimate knowledge of four languages and the Yankee knack of being on the right spot at the right time, twice saved blood-shed in the streets of Ghent and in one instance probably ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... He pressed the trigger at just the right time as the buck was rising in the air. And when he saw the deer crash to the ground, although he felt a thrill of satisfaction, cautious Max was not like Steve, rushing headlong forward ...
— With Trapper Jim in the North Woods • Lawrence J. Leslie
... two armed men, both deeply disguised in great black beards, and in good clothes, stepped into this empty little camp. Bending low, looking right, looking left, guns in hand and hand on trigger, they stopped in the centre of the little camp, and looked cautiously up, down, and all around. Seeing no one, hearing nothing, they looked in each others' eyes, straightened up, and, standing their guns against a tree, breathed more freely in the gray twilight. Wicked, beastly-looking ...
— Shadows of Shasta • Joaquin Miller
... what do I care as long as I have their money to pay it with? The killing of that fool boy worries me more than a dozen fines. It was uncalled for, too, but he would butt in, and you fellows were all itching for the chance to finger a trigger. Now the understanding is that you ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams
... "double roll" is executed by taking a six-shooter—let us hope not one of those pitiful toys of the East—upon each forefinger, each weapon so hanging balanced on the trigger-guard and the trigger itself that it shall be ready to turn about the finger as upon a pivot, and shall be ready for instant discharge, the thumb cocking the weapon as it turns; yet so that it shall none the less be discharged only when the muzzle of the weapon is pointed away ...
— Heart's Desire • Emerson Hough
... a good aim, Coxen pulled the trigger. The cap refused to explode. Angrily he lowered the gun, removed the cap and examined it. It looked all right, and there was plenty of priming in the tube. He turned the cap round, and again took ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... down upon him so unfeelingly. He yawned and lay down. "There's nothing else to be done. I can't go back to St. Petersburg, to prison," he thought. A kind of pleasant heaviness spread all over his body. .. He threw away his cap, took up the revolver, and pulled the trigger. ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... weight of the musket made it very awkward for him to handle. Several times he got out of patience with it, and apostrophized it in terms far from complimentary. At last, in one of his awkward maneuvers, he accidentally pulled the trigger. Instantly there was a loud report, followed by a piercing shriek from the road. The charge had entered old Mrs. Payson's umbrella and knocked it out of her hand. The old lady fancied herself hit, and fell backward, kicking ...
— Frank's Campaign - or the Farm and the Camp • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... 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 ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... at about the length of two feet, and was showing his brother how the survivor might do, provided one of the guns should fail; (for they were determined upon going together;) but forgetting, perhaps, in the perturbation of the moment that the gun was cocked, when he touched trigger with the rod the gun fired, and he fell, and died in a few minutes—and was with George in the eternal world, where the slave is free from his master. But poor Isham was so terrified with this unexpected ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... this thought in her mind, Ruth steadied the rifle as best she could and pulled the trigger. The sharp explosion and the shriek of the panther seemed simultaneous. Through the little drift of smoke she saw the creature spring; but it did not spring far. One hind leg hung useless—there was a patch of crimson on the beaten snow—the huge cat, snarling and yowling, ...
— Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp • Alice Emerson
... by masons (in the building-trades). He groped his way along by it to the station of the next officer, who warned him of the deadly consequences of disobedience. Thence he made his way onward, holding to the Clue of Faith—until he touched a trigger of some sort, which let down upon him an avalanche of tinware and such light and noisy articles, which frightened him so that he started to run, and was dexterously tripped by the Deacon Militant and a spearman, and caught in a net held by two others. ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... tempered steel. There was the old major now. Always before this he had seemed to me to be but pot metal and putty, and here, poised, alert, ready—a wire-drawn, hard-hammered Damascus blade of a man—all changed and transformed and glorified, he was coming down on Dave Dancy, finger on trigger, thumb on hammer, eye on target, dominating the ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... begun in earnest, and B.-P., on a rock directing the movements of his force, was surrounded by the deafening roar of artillery. In nearly every cave on those hills savages lay with rifle to shoulder, finger on trigger, waiting to pick off the besiegers as they came bounding over the rocks towards them. The Cape Boys never wavered; up they dashed, panting and sweating, to the very mouths of the caves, fired their rifles into the darkness, charged in, ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... not a moment to calculate chances. The captain pulled the trigger, and the crash of the shot was followed by a howl from the savage, as his uplifted arm dropt to his side, and the spear fell across the face of the sleeper. Henry instantly awoke, and sprang up with the agility of a panther. Before he could observe what had occurred, Keona leapt into the bushes ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... at Joe. "Dash it, if you hadn't been so confoundedly quick on the trigger, I could have ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... the hammer; the spiral main spring, which surrounds the striker, is contained in a hollow in the body. The handle is placed at the rear end of the bolt, and bent down toward the stock, so as to allow the trigger to be reached without wholly quitting hold of the bolt. The extractor is so connected with the bolt head as not to share the rotation of the latter when the handle is turned down into the locking position. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 601, July 9, 1887 • Various
... taut—which was good judgment on his part, for his neck was sore; and his feet being tender, he felt his way carefully and painfully over the metal, as if he feared that at any step he might spring some treacherous, air-trigger trap-door which ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... intellectle part, But you wun't noways du for me athout a change o' heart: Nothun religion works wal North, but it's ez soft ez spruce, Compared to ourn, for keepin' sound," sez she, "upon the goose; A day's experunce'd prove to ye, ez easy 'z pull a trigger, It takes the Southun pint o' view to raise ten bales a nigger; You'll fin' thet human natur, South, ain't wholesome more 'n skin-deep, An' once't a darkie's took with it, he wun't be wuth his keep." "How shell I git it, Ma'am?" sez I. "Attend the nex' camp-meetin'," ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... about to pull the trigger, but he does not. His eyes are drawn away from ASHER, toward the doorway, lower right, where DR. JONATHAN is seen standing, gazing at him. Gradually his arm drops to his side, and DR. JONATHAN goes up to him and takes the pistol from his hand. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... human conduct; illustrating his reflections by his own actions when stirred by emotion. "The loaded gun may be as wise as Solomon was reputed to be," he remarked beneath his hands, "but all the same when some one pulls the trigger the damn thing goes off," and sat up to confront the muzzle of the corporal's rifle, who was ordering him to get up. Birnier rose. But to ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... levelled at her; Lopez had taken deadly aim; his finger was on the trigger; she felt that her last hour had come, and that naught could ...
— A Castle in Spain - A Novel • James De Mille
... Treasury, who had previously stated to his second that he did not intend to fire at his adversary, discharged his pistol in the air. He had been hit by the bullet of his enemy, and did not know that as he fell, by a convulsive movement, he had pulled the trigger of the weapon in ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... the sun for full half of the year, Made each glacier a blizzard blown trap, They strung out volcanoes half way to Japan Each one with a hair trigger cap. They planned for the coast line a system of storms Each equipped with a ninety mile breath And then spread o'er it all the fog that men call The ...
— Rhymes of a Roughneck • Pat O'Cotter
... must haven rained in on us in the next few minutes. How I wanted to crawl out to the trench under the wagons where our men were keeping up a steady but irregular fire! Each was shooting on his own whenever he saw a man to pull trigger on. But mother suspected me, for she made me crouch down and keep right on holding ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... picture cameras had been put in place, Blake to work one and Joe the other, while the automatic, which was operated by clockwork, once the trigger-string was broken, also setting off the continuous flashlight, was set between the two boys, to command a good view of the dam, and of whoever should approach to blow ...
— The Moving Picture Boys at Panama - Stirring Adventures Along the Great Canal • Victor Appleton
... 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
... what seemed to them a safe distance between us, and would stop to watch us curiously within easy rifle shot. Yet I am glad I can record that not a shot was fired at them. Gilbert was wild, for he had in him the hunter's instinct in fullest measure. The trigger of Job's rifle clicked longingly, but they never forgot that starvation broods over Labrador, and that the animal they longed to shoot might some time save the life of one in just such extremity as that reached by Mr. Hubbard and his ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... travelers were courteously dismissed; and as Anton went out he saw the officer wearily throw himself back into an easy-chair, and with bent head begin to play with the trigger of his pistols. ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... unmelodious, save the tones of this sweet little singer. Nothing but starvation or scientific research could justify the slaughter of one of these innocents. I believe I shut my eyes when I pulled the trigger of my gun, and I know my heart gave a regretful thump when I heard the thud of its poor, bleeding body upon the ground. When we started for Franklin Point the next day, Lieutenant Schwatka concluded to follow Toolooah's advice, and keep upon the ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... post of Mataafas, were challenged by an old man with a gun, and mentioned in answer what they were. "Ifea Siamani? Which is the German?" cried the old gentleman, dancing, and with his finger on the trigger; and the commissioners stood somewhile in a very anxious posture, till they were released by the opportune arrival of a chief. It was November the 27th when Leary and Moors completed their absurd excursion; in ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had raised it and his finger was on the trigger, but he did not make its flash cut the darkness for a moment and its report run ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... mouth of the purse, which was bound with massive silver plate, opened and gave admittance to his hand. He made me remark, as if to break short the subject on which Bailie Jarvie had spoken, that a small steel pistol was concealed within the purse, the trigger of which was connected with the mounting, and made part of the machinery, so that the weapon would certainly be discharged, and in all probability its contents lodged in the person of any one, who, being unacquainted with the secret, should tamper ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... or wives at home, whom you hope to meet again, when war and its insanities are over. Oh! for their sakes, show mercy to the defenseless girl who stands here in your power! Do not compel her to shed her own blood! for, sure as you advance one step toward me, I pull this trigger, and fall dead at your feet." And Edith raised the pistol and placed the muzzle to her own temple—her finger ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... repress an involuntary start, albeit he saw what he had half expected to see. The fleshy right hand of Hartley Parrish grasped convulsively an automatic pistol. His clutching index finger was crooked about the trigger and the barrel was pressed into the yielding pile of the carpet. His other hand with clawing fingers was flung out away from the body on the other side. One leg was stretched out to its fullest extent and the foot just ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... begun to shriek and whirl, 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 vitals and ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... electric rifle to his shoulder, Tom pressed the switch trigger. The unseen but powerful force shot ...
— Tom Swift and his Big Tunnel - or, The Hidden City of the Andes • Victor Appleton
... one end of a springy green pole at right angles to its length; the pole is laid horizontally, one end of it being firmly fixed to a tree, and the other (that carrying the spear) bent forcibly backwards and held back by a loop of rattan. This spring is set by means of an ingenious trigger, in such a way that an animal passing through the gap must push against a string attached to the trigger, and so release the spring, which then drives the bamboo spear across the gap with great force. (The drawing (Fig. 22) Will make clear ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... to what they should do to me. On they came nearer and nearer, uttering the most menacing growls. I had, I thought, but one chance—to knock over one of them with one barrel, and the other with the second. I pulled the trigger. The first barrel missed fire; the next did the same. In my agitation when last loading I had forgotten to put on the caps. I had no time even to remedy my neglect. I was completely at the mercy of the angry ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... shy bird, so he had to creep and maneuver to get within gunshot unseen, unheard. He stole from tree to tree, and muffled his footsteps in the long grass so adroitly that, just as he was going to pull the trigger, he stepped light as a feather on a venomous snake. ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... upon 520 His manly paunch with such a force, As almost beat him off his horse. He lost his whinyard, and the rein; But, laying fast hold of the mane, Preserv'd his seat; and as a goose 525 In death contracts his talons close, So did the Knight, and with one claw The trigger of his pistol draw. The gun went off: and as it was Still fatal to stout HUDIBRAS, 530 In all his feats of arms, when least He dreamt of it, to prosper best, So now he far'd: the shot, let fly At random 'mong the ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... his pistol, On its ornamented stock, While his finger feels the trigger And is busy with the lock— The other seeks his ataghan, And clasps its jewell'd hilt— Oh! much of gore in days of yore That ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... surprised to meet him out walking, right here in Philadelphia," said one of the staff. "He'll be disguised, of course, but you could always tell him by the absence of the trigger finger on his right hand. It's missing, you know; shot off when ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... moment to calculate chances. The captain pulled the trigger, and the crash of the shot was followed by a howl from the savage, as his uplifted arm dropped to his side, and the spear fell across the face of the sleeper. Henry instantly awoke, and sprang up with the agility of a panther. Before he could observe what had occurred, Keona leaped ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... to pull the trigger, but he does not. His eyes are drawn away from ASHER, toward the doorway, lower right, where DR. JONATHAN is seen standing, gazing at him. Gradually his arm drops to his side, and DR. JONATHAN goes up to him and takes the pistol from his hand. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... and was about to pull trigger, when the canoe commenced rocking about, as if tossed upon ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... tangled in a snarling heap over the remains of our supper, others crouching on their haunches in a ring, facing us. One of them sprang as Le Brunnec fired, and its hot breath fanned my face before my own finger pressed the trigger. ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... our men for the third time, and, you may take my word for it, one or both of these heroes would have bit the dust at that discharge. But, by Jove, sir, just as they were going to pull trigger, in galloped your adorable daughter, and swooned off her foaming horse in the middle of us,—disarmed us, sir, in a moment, melted our valor, bewitched our senses, and the great god of war had to retreat before little Cupid and the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... pre-arrangement that determined whether the stone from the cliff should fall on point A or point B—the same sort of process that guided the pen to make legible and effective writing instead of illegible and ineffective scrawls—the same kind of control that determines when and where a trigger shall be pulled so as to secure the anticipated slaughter of a bird. So far as energy is concerned, the explosion and the trigger-pulling are the same identical operations whether the aim be exact or random. It is intelligence ...
— Life and Matter - A Criticism of Professor Haeckel's 'Riddle of the Universe' • Oliver Lodge
... the dread speech, his finger presses the trigger; the crack comes, with the flash and ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... surprise she surrendered it without demur, suddenly conscious that he was no more afraid, that he was rapidly assuming comprehensive command of the situation beyond her to gainsay, and that he knew, and knew that she knew he knew, that she had never entertained any real intention of pulling the trigger, however desperate ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... He stood opposite them with his arm outstretched and his finger on the trigger, aiming at the enemy. When Sauverand addressed Florence by her Christian name, he started from head to foot and his finger trembled. What miracle kept him from shooting? By what supreme effort of will did he stifle the jealous ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... poured in, and then, flinging their muskets away, bounded forward sword in hand with a terrific yell. The soldiers had not time to fix their bayonets in the smoking muzzles of their muskets before the claymores were among them and the battle was over.[103] On the left wing scarcely a trigger was pulled: the men broke and ran like sheep. The famous Scots Brigade, in fact, set the example of flight. Their officers behaved like brave soldiers. Balfour, abandoned by his men, defended himself for a time against overwhelming odds, ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... armature keeps its upper end normally away from the magnet core. When the magnet draws the armature inwardly, the number plate drops and exposes the numeral through the opening in the front of the box. In order to return the number plate to its original position, as shown in Fig. 51, a vertical trigger (M) passes up through the bottom, its upper end being within range of one of the ...
— Electricity for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... the bar like a steeplechaser, for I seen 'Curly' grab at the drawer, and I have aversions to witnessing gun plays from the front end. The tenderfoot riz up in his chair, and snatchin' a stack of reds in his off mit, dashed 'em into 'Curly's' face just as he pulled trigger. It spoiled his aim, and the boy was on to him like a mountain lion, follerin' over the table, along the line of ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... elevation and windage under the most diversified conditions, so that I very rarely made use of the sights on my rifle. Nor did I ever need to aim consciously; I just flung the weapon to my shoulder, keeping my eye meanwhile upon my mark, pressed the trigger at precisely the right instant, and—down dropped the quarry: I had in fact by long practice become a dead shot, and could scarcely remember when I had last failed to bring down what I aimed at. Nor did I fail now; as the bird rose it flew straight away ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... a great advance was made by the invention of the arquebus or bow-gun. A spring let loose by a trigger threw the match, which was fastened to it, forward, into the pan which contained the priming. It was from this spring that ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... wouldn't 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 safer without than ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... the safety light 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
... springing 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
... and Barraclough for the answer, and to my amazement saw that the former had his revolver at the level. His finger was on the trigger. I leaped forward and struck it up, and the bullet buried itself in ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson
... too the men of Muideart,[158] While stream'd their flag its bravery; Their gleaming weapons, blue-dyed,[159] That havock'd on the cavalry. Macalister,[160] Mackinnon, With many a flashing trigger there, The foemen rushing in on, Resistless shew'd their vigour there. May fortune free thee—may we see thee Again in Braun,[161] the turreted, Girt with thy clan! And not a man But will get the scorn he merited. Then wine will play, and usquebae From flaggons, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... stop every pleasure boat and search it for me. So ... tell your chauffeur to swing about and make for the flying field. And tell him to drive carefully, by the way. I've still got these guns on a very fine adjustment of the trigger-pressure." ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... upon the head of a drum, and he told the numbers that were thrown up, by bowing his head as many times as there were numbers indicated. He discharged a pistol, by drawing with his teeth a string that was fastened to the trigger. He fired a small cannon by means of a match which was attached to his right foot, and he exhibited no signs of fear at the report of the cannon. He leaped through a hoop several times, with the greatest agility—his master holding the hoop ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... comes all his light canvas, and up goes his mainsail. The man who commands that ship is a right valiant cavalier, and will put up a good fight; therefore, let no man put match to culverin or finger to trigger until I give the word. Now, let the waits play up 'The brave ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... are," was the reply. "I can manage him myself with a spear, if I can only be in time before he reaches the shore. If not, it's no matter, for I won't allow a trigger to be pulled." ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... for a moment when it was well within rifle shot, and drawing his rifle from the toboggan he dropped upon a knee, aimed carefully, and pulled the trigger. The frost-clogged firing pin did not respond, and the wolf, seeming to understand its peril, ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... restoring to its place the favorite rifle he had intended to use to-day. He could not refrain from testing its perfect mechanism, and at the first sharp crack of the hammer, liberated by a tentative pull on the trigger, little Archie sprang up from his play on the hearth-rug, where he was harnessing a toy horse to Mrs. Briscoe's work-basket by long shreds of her zephyr, and ran clamoring for permission ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock
... what had passed out of sight between Bartley and Colonel Clifford, for what the young people heard now was quite enough to make what Sir Lucius O'Trigger calls a very pretty quarrel. Bartley, hitherto known to Mary as a very oily speaker, shouted at the top of his voice in arrogant defiance, "You're not a child, are you? You are old enough to read ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... upper edge of the barrel a V-shaped channel was cut. The channel was not very deep, only enough to receive a tenpenny nail with the head projecting half-way above the sides. A notch was cut across the barrel, through this channel, at the trigger end, and a trigger made of heavy iron wire, bent to the shape shown in Fig. 51, was hinged to the gun by a bolt which passed clear through the stock and through both eyes of the trigger. By using two nuts on ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... his wooden mantelpiece, then I begin to give myself virtuous airs. I have always held, too, that pistol practice should be distinctly an open-air pastime; and when Holmes, in one of his queer humors, would sit in an arm-chair with his hair-trigger and a hundred Boxer cartridges, and proceed to adorn the opposite wall with a patriotic V. R. done in bullet-pocks, I felt strongly that neither the atmosphere nor the appearance of our room was ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... When he stopped sobbing he tried to kill me for hindering his destruction, but I had got the razor in my pocket, and his revolver missed fire. That was lucky, for he managed to stick the muzzle against my chest and pull the trigger just as I got him down. I wished I had brought old Griggs with me, for they say he can bend a good horse-shoe double, even now, and the fellow had the strength of a lunatic in him. It was rather lively for a few seconds, and then he broke down ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... brave. Brave as the bravest. His glance was as keen and his mouth was as silent As a trailer's should be who looks and who listens By day and by night, having no one to talk to. His finger was quick when it handled the trigger, And his eye loved the sights as lightning loves rivers. I've seen him stand up when the odds were against him. Stand up like a man who takes coolly the chances. That proves he was ...
— The Busted Ex-Texan and Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... small a distance of my pillow. What construction could I put upon them? My heart began to palpitate with dread of some unknown danger. Presently, another voice, but equally near me, was heard whispering in answer, "Why not? I will draw a trigger in this business; but perdition be my lot if I do more!" To this the first voice returned, in a tone which rage had heightened in a small degree above a whisper, "Coward! stand aside, and see me do it. I will grasp her ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... faintest contradictory idea in the margin. For instance, I hold out my forefinger, and with closed eyes try to realize as vividly as possible that I hold a revolver in my hand and am pulling the trigger. I can even now fairly feel my finger quivering with the tendency to contract; and, if it were hitched to a recording apparatus, it would certainly betray its state of tension by registering incipient movements. Yet it does not actually crook, and the movement of pulling the trigger is not performed. ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... fight them at once, saying the fellows meant mischief. We declined to camp with them unless they would agree to give up their arms; they pretended they were willing to do so, when one of them put his gun at the breast of our interpreter and pulled the trigger. In an instant a bloody scene ensued; several of Viscarra's men were killed, together with a number of mules. Finally the Indians were whipped and tried to get away, but we chased them some distance and killed thirty-five. Our friendly Pueblos were delighted, ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... he raised his rifle, and, taking aim as well as the darkness would allow him, pulled trigger and fired. ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... enjoy the millions that belong to her of right, in consequence of her sister's death, it is necessary first for her to receive them; but the Duke, it is reported, as the good Duc de Crequi used to say, "Holds back as tight as the trigger of the Cognac cross-bow;" and in fact he has not only refused to give up to his sister what she should take under her sister's will, but he disputes her right to the bank-notes which she had given to the Duchess to take care of for her, when she ...
— The Memoirs of the Louis XIV. and The Regency, Complete • Elizabeth-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Orleans
... cautiously and looked through between the branches of a shrub, you could see him, and Bauldie actually covered him with his rifle. The unconscious farmer knew not that his life hung upon a thread, or, rather, upon Bauldie's trigger. Bauldie looked inquiringly to his chief, for he would dearly have loved to fire a cap, but Speug shook his head so fiercely that the trapper dropped down in his lair, and Speug afterwards explained that the renegade had certainly deserved death, but that it was ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... gritted his teeth and jumped off after Greg. Instantly he knew that he had jumped too hard. He shot away from the orbit-ship like a bullet; the jagged asteroid surface leaped up at him. Frantically he grabbed for the bumper nozzle and pulled the trigger, trying ...
— Gold in the Sky • Alan Edward Nourse
... his left hand and settling his forefinger on the trigger, Kirkwood beamed with pure enjoyment. He found the deference of the older man, tempered though it was by his indomitable swagger, refreshing ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... I seed two elks burst out of the Harricane 'bout one hundred and thirty or forty yards below me. There was an old buck and a doe. I stopped, waited till they got into a clear place, and as the old fellow made a leap, I raised old Bet, pulled trigger, and she spoke out. The smoke blinded me so, that I couldn't see what I did; but as it cleared away, I caught a glimpse of only one of them going through the bushes; so I thought I had the other. I went up, and there lay the old buck kicking. I cut his throat, ...
— David Crockett: His Life and Adventures • John S. C. Abbott
... carried with cartridges in either the chamber or the magazine except when specifically ordered. When so loaded, or supposed to be loaded, it is habitually carried locked; that is, with the safety lock turned to the "safe." At all other times it is carried unlocked, with the trigger pulled. ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... most of the family of the ifs, a peace-maker. My Lady Delacour, I was going to observe that my principal has met with an unfortunate accident, in the shape of a whitlow on the fore-finger of her right hand, which incapacitates her from drawing a trigger; but I am at your service, ladies, either of you, that can't put up with a disappointment with good humour.' I never, during the whole course of my existence, was more disposed to bear a disappointment with good humour, to prove ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... might miss my head, so that I should have time to fire. Then, on my back, with my pistol raised over my head, I forced myself out with every muscle in my body. I leaped to my feet on the instant, quickly glancing round for the madman, swinging my pistol about with my finger hard on the trigger. He was not there, after all. I might have spared myself the trouble. I was alone there in the fern, within earshot of a murmur of voices, talking excitedly. I was not going to spy into any more secrets. I was going to ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... objects which were wasting away. Their disintegration is identical with our own. They have their decay, their ruptures, their tumors, their madnesses. A piece of furniture gnawed by worms, a gun with a broken trigger, a warped drawer, or the soul of a violin suddenly out of tune, such are the ills ...
— Romance of the Rabbit • Francis Jammes
... and Hammett went down in the elevator of the hotel, and out of doors, and into an automobile. Hammett drove, and Peter sat in the rear seat with McGivney, who had the revolver in his coat pocket, his finger always on the trigger and the muzzle always pointed into Peter's middle. So Peter obeyed all orders promptly, and stopped asking questions because he found ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... Greville and Reeve with those of Bolingbroke and Mallet, as painted by Dr. Johnson. Bolingbroke, he had said, was a cowardly blackguard, who loaded a gun which he was afraid to fire off himself, and left a shilling to a beggarly Scotchman to pull the trigger after his death. The inference was inevitable; and though Reeve was neither a Scotchman nor a beggar, he unquestionably felt the sting, coming, as it did, from a friend of more than forty years' standing, Abraham ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton
... explosion of terrifying oaths Lighthouse Harry thrust a shell into the breech of the quick-firing gun. Without waiting to aim it, he tugged at the trigger. Nothing happened! He threw open the breech and gazed impotently at the base of the shell. It was untouched. The ship was ringing with cries of anger, of hate, ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... the work! Gaunt pulled the trigger; there was a blinding flash. The old man stood a moment on the ridge, the wind blowing his gray hair back, then ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 60, October 1862 • Various
... only sensed them. And I want to tell you right now that it got beyond me. It was like killing a man, a conscious, brave man who looked calmly into your gun as much as to say, "Who's afraid?" Then, too, the message seemed so near that, instead of pulling the trigger quick, I stopped to see if I could catch the message. There it was, right before me, glimmering all around in those eyes of his. And then it was too late. I got scared. I was trembly all over, and my stomach generated a nervous palpitation that made me seasick. ...
— Brown Wolf and Other Jack London Stories - Chosen and Edited By Franklin K. Mathiews • Jack London
... I could see him leaping across the marsh toward the gray church with the cracked bell, and as he disappeared by the short cut I pulled the trigger ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith
... time to take aim. The mate and Drew both drew trigger as they entered the cabin, when there was a savage yelling, the place filled with smoke. Then as it rose, Oliver Lane and Panton could be seen lying half fainting upon the cabin floor, and the ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... I put into Moxley's legs turned out for the best after all," said Randy in a roguish tone. "If I hadn't pulled trigger that night Bug Batters would still be treading the path of wickedness, with no ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon
... gotten anywhere. Sure, we can isolate the virus. It grows nicely on monkey lung cells. But that doesn't help. The thing has no apparent antigenicity. It parasitizes, but it doesn't trigger any immune reaction. We can kill it, but the strength of the germicide is too great for ...
— Pandemic • Jesse Franklin Bone
... out of the bush, his yellow teeth bared in a snarl of rage. He wore a bandage across his forehead and came at Kendrick, levelling his rifle. Just as he pulled the trigger he tripped on a root and pitched full length into the open, the gun exploding harmlessly into the ground. Phil had him by the throat in ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... levelled his own pistol. Sturgeon's weapon caught in his pocket, and he tried to pull it loose. The moment he succeeded Gordon stood ready to fire. Twice the hammer of the sergeant's pistol went back almost to the turning-point, and then, as he pulled the trigger again, Macfarlan, first lieutenant, who once played lacrosse at Yale, rushed, parting the crowd right and left, and dropped his billy lightly three times—right, left and right—on Sturgeon's head. The blood spurted, the head fell back between the bully's shoulders, his grasp on his pistol ...
— Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories • John Fox, Jr.
... time to Lejoillie and Carlos to come to my assistance should I miss. I never felt more nervous in my life, for although I believed that I should wound the bear, yet I might the next moment find myself in his embrace, with his jaws applied to my neck. Aiming at his chest, I pulled the trigger, and then leaped back to avoid him should he spring on me. He, however, had been more frightened than I was. When my shot entered his body, he must have been on the point of turning to fly; but the bullet had taken deadly effect, and he had not gone ten paces, when over ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston
... his distorter to bear, he concentrated on the violent pulse needed to trigger the jewel, his mind closed to all else. He turned his ...
— The Weakling • Everett B. Cole
... falls to munching some fragments from his bundle. Jasper folds his arms upon the top of the wall, and, with his chin resting on them, watches. He takes no note whatever of the Minor Canon, but watches Neville, as though his eye were at the trigger of a loaded rifle, and he had covered him, and were going to fire. A sense of destructive power is so expressed in his face, that even Durdles pauses in his munching, and looks at him, with an unmunched something ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... the rifle level across a low branch, drew the stock snug and laid her cheek to it and her steady finger on the trigger. ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... of it. He knew he had been hit some place—in the breast or shoulder perhaps—but as yet felt not the slightest pain. Fire flashed in his very face, now, and this time he smelled the acrid powder; but he had been in motion when the trigger was pressed and the bullet whined away fretfully through the trees. On the heels of the second report came that sickening crack once more, and the face of the man that glared through the smoke at Hiram went red with ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... were enfevered and his lips dry and cracked. He carried a handsome fowling-piece, which presented, at first glance, no feature of dissimilarity to the usual pattern except that trigger and hammer were absent, and the rim of the barrel was not ...
— The Son of Clemenceau • Alexandre (fils) Dumas
... took his gun, and went into the woods a shooting. He spied a Ringdove among the branches of an oak, and intended to kill it. He clapped the piece to his shoulder, and took his aim accordingly. But, just as he was going to pull the trigger, an adder, which he had trod upon under the grass, stung him so painfully in the leg that he was forced to quit his design, and threw his gun down in a passion. The poison immediately infected his blood, and his whole body ...
— Aesop's Fables - A New Revised Version From Original Sources • Aesop
... muttered the old man. "Cap'n Bonnet 'ud clap me in irons if I slew this filthy Ed'ard Teach and robbed him of that enjoyment. I'll pull no trigger save ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... encamped at Central Tura, together with the Arab servants who preferred Hamed's imbecile haste to Thani's cautious advance. Our first night in Unyamwezi was very exciting indeed. The Musungu's camp was visited by two crawling thieves, but they were soon made aware by the portentous click of a trigger that the white man's ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... political warfare. But he had kept his seat, and now at last,—so he thought,—the 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." Could Mr. Trigger have heard the remarks which his patron ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... day of Henriette and Maurice's sentence, they were giving it a preliminary trial. "The trigger's been slipping—not working well," the head fellow explained to the master of ceremonies. Back and forth the terrible guillotine knife hissed and whistled until ...
— Orphans of the Storm • Henry MacMahon
... men seized an arquebuse, and levelled it at the struggling form in the water. He pulled the trigger, but no sooner did the powder splutter in the pan than the gun burst in his hands, and a piece of the metal, entering his brain, laid him dead on ...
— Marguerite De Roberval - A Romance of the Days of Jacques Cartier • T. G. Marquis
... 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 another volley ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... left him quite composed under 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 fell to ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... four days previous, had stood erect—a pillar of life—with an arm like a royal-mast and a thigh like a windlass. But the slightest conceivable finger-touch of a bit of crooked trigger had eventuated in stretching him out, more helpless than an hour-old babe, with a blasted thigh, utterly drained of its brawn. And who was it that now stood over him like a superior being, and, as if clothed himself ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... me, Burke?—she was hasty; she was hasty. It is easier to set forces of love or hate moving than to check them in motion. Sometimes I think, Burke, that people were in certain ways less reckless in the good old days when they had perpetually before their eyes the vision of a hair-trigger God, always cocked and ready to shoot if they crossed the line of duty. But Nelly is coming bravely through a severe test of character. May I offer you ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... fireplace, followed by Elaine and the rest of us. There, in what remained of a package done up roughly in newspaper, was a shot gun with its barrel sawed off about six inches from the lock, fastened to a block of wood, and connected to a series of springs on the trigger, released by a little electromagnetic arrangement actuated by two batteries and leading by wires up along the moulding to the picture where the slightest ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... he had me trapped, with all the deck to dodge about. Just forward of the main-mast I stopped, drew a pistol from my pocket, took a cool aim, though he had already turned and was once more coming directly after me, and drew the trigger. The hammer fell, but there followed neither flash nor sound; the priming was useless with sea-water. I cursed myself for my neglect. Why had not I, long before, reprimed and reloaded my only weapons? Then I should not have been, as now, a mere ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and run the gauntlet of half a dozen sentinels. His wagon is fuller than usual; and the late hour it is now after sunset will of itself excite suspicion. It might test the pluck of a braver man; for the sentries' bayonets are fixed, and their guns at the half-trigger; but he reaches the outer gate in safety. Now St. Patrick help him! for he needs all the impudence of an Irishman. The gate rolls back; the Commandant stands nervously by, but ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... never hunted any game better worth my powder; and to a young man with rare holidays and long working hours, its value was enhanced by the fact that one might bring it down at any turn, if only one kept one's eye alert and one's hand on the trigger. ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... and climbed the cliff. When he got to the top and looked round he found this severely wounded man had not only disobeyed orders and followed him, but had found strength to lug up a box of ammunition with him. "I ordered you not to come," said Aspinall: "I can still pull a trigger, ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton
... 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
... ascertain the direction the blood would take when it flowed from the wound. Then, placing himself in proper position, so that the gore would run from and not toward his body, he placed the pistol to the right temple, pulled the trigger and death ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... their grasp, and a figure that rose partly upright reeled into the fern, while Alton felt the barrel of a rifle under him. He rolled on his side, and clawed for it, almost sightless, with one hand, and laughed harshly as he raised himself a trifle. There was a flash and a concussion, the trigger-guard sank into his nerveless finger, and a smashing amidst the undergrowth was followed by footsteps that were presently lost in the ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... of one 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 ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... illustrating his reflections by his own actions when stirred by emotion. "The loaded gun may be as wise as Solomon was reputed to be," he remarked beneath his hands, "but all the same when some one pulls the trigger the damn thing goes off," and sat up to confront the muzzle of the corporal's rifle, who was ordering him to get up. Birnier rose. But to the ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... 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 within three cables ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... I had begun to 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 the trigger. At the crack of the rifle all the bison turned and raced off at headlong speed. The fringe of young pines beyond and below the glade cracked and swayed as if a whirlwind were passing, and in another moment ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck
... faced. He too heard the steps of the three warriors coming in their direction, cautiously feeling a way through the great bank of mist. It was true that they could pass near without seeing, but chance might bring them straight to the little group. He shifted his fingers to the lock and trigger of his rifle, and looked at the sleeping three whose figures were almost hidden, although they were not a yard away. He felt that they should be awake and ready but in waking, Grosvenor, at least, might make enough noise to draw the ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... of a deaf person who has deaf relatives, the assigned cause of deafness may not be the only cause involved, or indeed the true cause at all. It may be the cause simply in the same sense that the pulling of a trigger is the cause of the expulsion of a bullet from a rifle, or a spark the cause of the explosion of a gunpowder magazine; hereditary influences ...
— Consanguineous Marriages in the American Population • George B. Louis Arner
... captain refused to be drawn. "I'd just like to have a record of any more trips they make." He handed the camera to Raf. "Put that on and don't forget to trigger it if you do go. I don't believe they'll go out tonight. They aren't too fond of being out in the open in darkness. We saw that last night. But keep an eye on them in ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... much bravery to pull a trigger behind a bush," muttered Decoud to himself. "Fortunately, the night is dark, or there would be but little chance of saving ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... hand, the 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
... Their father had been a soldier in the civil war, and in some way the rifle he carried, with his name and the date scratched on the trigger-plate, was sent to the boys by a comrade after his death. Dan, there, was handling it, supposing it unloaded as usual, when it went off and shot his brother, who was leaning over him, right through ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... blamed, if the matter became public; others have a weakness at heart and recoil from the circumstances of death. That is, to some extent, my own experience. I cannot put a pistol to my head and draw the trigger; for something stronger than myself withholds the act; and although I loathe life, I have not strength enough in my body to take hold of death and be done with it. For such as I, and for all who desire to be out of the coil without posthumous scandal, ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson
... latch is seven twelfths of a hole in length and one quarter in thickness. So also its socket-piece. The trigger or handle is three holes in length and three quarters of a hole in breadth and thickness. The trough in the pipe is sixteen holes in length, one quarter of a hole in thickness, and three quarters in height. The base of the ...
— Ten Books on Architecture • Vitruvius
... then clicked shut as his Colt swung down. But he did not shoot; something inside of him held his trigger finger and he swore instead. The idea of a man stealing his horse, being caught red-handed and unarmed, and still possessed of sufficient courage to call his captor a name never tolerated or overlooked in that ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... the first shot every animal in the herd seemed to flatten itself and settle to its work. They did not run—they simply flew across the ground, their legs showing only as a blur. The one I killed was four hundred yards away, and I held four feet ahead when I pulled the trigger. They could not have been traveling less than fifty-five or sixty miles an hour, for they were running in a semicircle about the car while we were moving at forty miles in a ...
— Across Mongolian Plains - A Naturalist's Account of China's 'Great Northwest' • Roy Chapman Andrews
... finger, and wriggled the butt home into his shoulder. Dave watched him in silence; Mills was, he knew, a good shot, and he was now preparing, with all the little tricks and graces of the rifle-range, to pull trigger on the man he had risked—nay, almost thrown away—his life to save from the consequences of ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... the noble authour and his editor. 'Sir, he was a scoundrel, and a coward[787]: 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 after his death[788]!' Garrick, who I can attest from my own knowledge, had his mind seasoned with pious reverence, and sincerely disapproved of the infidel writings of several, whom, in the course of his almost universal gay intercourse with men of eminence, he ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... 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 which ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... done shot 'im, an' he's bad hurt, too. You know dat las' time we went at um? Well, suh, I wuz shootin' at a man right at me, an' he knock my han' down des ez I pull de trigger, an' de ball cotch him right 'twix de hip an' de knee. He call me by my name, an' den it come over me dat we done got mix' up in de shuffle an' dat I wuz shootin' at you. But 'twuz Marse Jack Bledsoe; I know'd 'im time I look at ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris
... the miners wore all the clothing they possessed. Here the terror of the peons was an old American mine-boss rated "loco" among them, who went constantly armed with an immense and ancient revolver, always loaded and reputed of "hair trigger," which he drew and whistled in the barrel whenever he wished to call a workman. A blaze crackling in the fireplace was pleasant during the evening in the manager's house, for "Peregrina" lies even higher above the sea ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck
... 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 being the more destructive, we have found ...
— The Congo and Coasts of Africa • Richard Harding Davis
... moments. D'Esterre first changed his position, moving a 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 ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... crossing, and there imagination stops. The workman can get no farther than his file will go, and you know how that acts to and fro in a straight groove. A pheasant or hare at full speed, a few trees—firs as most characteristic—could be put on the plate, and something else on the trigger guard; firs are easily drawn, and make most appearance for a few touches; pheasants roost in them. Even a coat of arms, if it were the genuine coat-of-arms of the owner's family, would look well. Men have their ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... short) grew taut—which was good judgment on his part, for his neck was sore; and his feet being tender, he felt his way carefully and painfully over the metal, as if he feared that at any step he might spring some treacherous, air-trigger trap-door which would drop ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... Each member of the party carried an automatic pistol and several hand grenades. These were small, hollow containers, of cast-iron, loaded with a powerful explosive, which was set off after a certain trigger or spring or firing pin (according to the type used) was released by the thrower. The explosive blew the grenade to bits, and it was scored, or crisscrossed, by deep indentations so that the iron would break ...
— Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line - The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam • Clarence Young
... did not hear me, or notice the growl of his dog, or feel the vibration of our tread as we both bore down upon him. We should have been too late if it had not been for the life-long habit of the wretch to secure himself from danger or suspicion. With his finger on the trigger, all ready to pull, he paused one moment to raise himself and look about. That moment saved the life of Deborah Shimmin, for the would-be murderer was the next instant under the knee of Fred Harcourt and his throat in his grip, while my hand was over the nipples ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... them has any hobbyhorse, to use the phrase of Sterne. Not one has a ruling passion, such as we read of in Pope. Who would not have expected them to be insipid likenesses of each other? No such thing. Harpagon is not more unlike to Jourdain, Joseph Surface is not more unlike to Sir Lucius O'Trigger, than every one of Miss Austen's young divines to all his reverend brethren. And almost all this is done by touches so delicate, that they elude analysis, that they defy the powers of description, and that we know them ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... fields, and stood again upon a hillock of Peckham Rye, and saw the morning break in beauty and in wonder over London. The vision gained from the foolish and romantic days of his boyhood, steadied his finger upon the trigger after ...
— The Summons • A.E.W. Mason
... and with the few strokes of the drop-hammer, fall a few seconds later, the shaped part of a rifle. Some of the machines were making receivers for the stock, the largest piece of metal, and other small parts like the trigger or the hammer, while still others were preparing the barrels ...
— The Boy With the U.S. Census • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... girl. The knife looked terrible; but it was sheathed and tucked into a belt. Anthony's Browning was in Monny's hand, and hidden only under her serge coat. Out it came, with a warning click of the trigger. And with an astonished, frightened gurgle in his throat the negro ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... the rifle was levelled at her; Lopez had taken deadly aim; his finger was on the trigger; she felt that her last hour had come, and that naught could avail her ...
— A Castle in Spain - A Novel • James De Mille
... distance with the cart we followed in his tracks again, keeping steadily on until we came to the first row of houses beginning the village. Here my brother began to thread his way more cautiously, and in the dark I heard distinctly the click of the trigger ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... too fast now, Dorothy," he cautioned. "This shell proves that Bailey's gun was fired, but it doesn't prove that Bailey's finger pulled the trigger, or that the gun was aimed at Jensen. Bailey might have loaned the rifle to somebody, or he might have fired at a snake, like I did a ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... could breathe even while totally submerged in the water. He strained his left arm against the tentacle that looped it, worked the ray-gun still clasped in his hand in line with the thing's monstrous carcass, and at once, gasping and sick, pulled the trigger clear back. ...
— The Bluff of the Hawk • Anthony Gilmore
... as it was light enough to see, we went out to a little ravine near the meeting- place, and I set up a board for him to shoot at. He would step out, raise that big pistol, and when I would count three he would shut his eyes and pull the trigger. Of course he didn't hit anything; he did not come anywhere near hitting anything. Just then we heard somebody shooting over in the ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... women and crouch down in my former hiding place. Then they did what women seldom do—betrayed the fugitive. Calling to the soldiers, they pointed out the place I was in. All four came running, and in a moment were almost on top of me. I presented my revolver and snapped the trigger twice without exploding the cartridges; they were too close or too excited to use their muskets, but all four grappled with me, and ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell
... me work for all I was worth. If I let up for a minute, they hit me and threatened to k-kill me. That ugly fellow who swore at me the day before was in the boat, and I c-could understand him. He made things very clear, as he jabbed the m-muzzle of his gun into my ribs, and h-held his finger on the trigger. ...
— Ben Comee - A Tale of Rogers's Rangers, 1758-59 • M. J. (Michael Joseph) Canavan
... efficient device for unlocking any door fitted with a spring lock is shown in the accompanying sketches. A fairly stiff spring, A, is connected by a flexible wire cord to the knob B. The cord is also fastened to a lever, C, which is pivoted at D and is released by a magnetic trigger, E, made from the armature and magnet of an old ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
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