"Cuirass" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was over Esmond entered the room, where he knew several of the gentlemen present, and there sat my young lord, having taken off his cuirass, his waistcoat open, his face flushed, his long yellow hair hanging over his shoulders, drinking with the rest; the youngest, gayest, handsomest there. As soon as he saw Esmond, he clapped down his glass, and running towards his friend, put both his arms round ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... earth, shall rush upon and devour all within his reach; the genii of fire shall ride forth, clothed in flame, and lead on the giants to the storming of Asgard. Heimdall sounds his trumpet, which echoes through all worlds; the gods fly to arms; Odin appears in his golden casque, his resplendent cuirass, with his vast scimitar in his hand, and marshals his heroes in battle array. The great ash tree is shaken to its roots, heaven and earth are full of horror and affright, and gods, giants, and heroes are ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... haughty outline of her curved lips, her massive shoulders and deep chest, her domineering expression, and listened to her imperious voice, doubts assailed me. I could believe that she had led an army of amazons in cuirass and buckler, but my imagination refused to picture her in a silken train smiling at gallants from behind her fan; and surely, I thought, no one in the whole world ever went tripping to a ball in such strange and monstrous headgear ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... great element of success. Every one can recall how nearly fatal to the French at Bylau and Marengo was their great inferiority in artillery. We may also refer to the great gain of the heavy French cavalry in the resumption of the cuirass, which they had for so long thrown aside. Every one knows the great advantage of the lance. Doubtless, as skirmishers lancers would not be more effectual than hussars, but when charging in line it is a very different affair. How many brave cavalry soldiers have ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... with himself Lord Ruthven, an idle and dissolute sybarite, who under the circumstances promised to push his devotion so far as to wear a cuirass; then, sure of this important accomplice, he busied himself with finding ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... in the scanty studio of my friend. Dijon and I have sat by the hour, and gazed upon that company of images. The severe, the frisky, the classical, the Louis Quinze, were there—from Joan of Arc in her soldierly cuirass to Leda with the swan; nay, and God forgive me for a man that knew better! the humorous was represented also. We sat and gazed, I say; we criticised, we turned them hither and thither; even upon the closest inspection they looked quite like statuettes; and yet nobody would ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... his wife were furtively leaving the room, perhaps because poetry bored these simple folk, but it may have been because Orlando, having no further use for his arms, was punctuating his speech by throwing away first la Durlindana, next his shield, then his helmet, his cuirass, front and back, his leggings, ...
— Castellinaria - and Other Sicilian Diversions • Henry Festing Jones
... Ballybarry. There was a carrousel, or tournament, held at this period, in imitation of the antique meetings of chivalry, in which the chevaliers tilted at each other, or at the ring; and on this occasion I was habited in a splendid Roman dress (viz., a silver helmet, a flowing periwig, a cuirass of gilt leather richly embroidered, a light blue velvet mantle, and crimson morocco half-boots): and in this habit I rode my bay horse Brian, carried off three rings, and won the prize over all the Duke's gentry, and the nobility of surrounding countries who had come to ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... equipments, they might not also exchange their emblematic attendants. The modern mode of duel, without defensive armour, began about the reign of Henry III. of France, when the gentlemen of that nation, as we learn from Davila, began to lay aside the cumbrous lance and cuirass, even in war. The increase of danger being supposed to contribute to the increase of honour, the national ardour of the french gallants led them early to distinguish themselves by neglect of every thing, that could contribute to their personal safety. Hence, duels began to be fought by the combatants ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... penetrating as far as the third oar, and delivered a withering fire from his arquebuses. The Christians had all the advantage of armour and firearms, and fired behind bulwarks; the Turks were unprotected by cuirass or helmet or bulwark, and most of them had bows instead of guns. Colonna's volleys decided the fate of the Fanal, and 'Ali Pasha departed this life. An hour and a half had sufficed to disperse the Ottoman right and to overpower the flagship ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole
... interlock, so that the two jaws are brought close together, the teeth in the upper jaw of the Amazonian cayman pass by the lower series outside of them. The latter has therefore much less power. It has a ventral cuirass as well as dorsal, and it is web-footed, while the crocodile has the toes free—another mark of inferiority. Sluggish on land, the alligator is very agile in its element. It never attacks man when on his guard, but it is cunning enough to know when it may do this with safety. It lays its eggs (about ...
— The Andes and the Amazon - Across the Continent of South America • James Orton
... royal dignity should be compromised by failure, never repaired to a siege, till it had been reported to him by the most skilful officers in his service, that nothing could prevent the fall of the place. When this was ascertained, the monarch, in his helmet and cuirass, appeared among the tents, held councils of war, dictated the capitulation, received the keys, and then returned to Versailles to hear his flatterers repeat that Turenne had been beaten at Mariendal, that Conde had been forced to raise the siege of Arras, and that the only warrior ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... resistance. The other and more formidable of the two still held out under the brave Inca noble who commanded it. He was a man of an athletic frame, and might be seen striding along the battlements, armed with a Spanish buckler and cuirass, and in his hand wielding a formidable mace, garnished with points or knobs of copper. With this terrible weapon he struck down all who attempted to force a passage into the fortress. Some of his own followers who proposed a surrender he is said to have ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... when they came quite near to him, one on each side, and spoke slowly and clearly in their determined way, the tremendous Markos felt his bravery shrink within him till it seemed to rattle like a dry pea shaken in a steel cuirass, and the amount of money he actually advanced on the ring was considerable; he even consented to let Gambardella seal the six jars of Samos wine, which formed part of the loan, with the heavy brass seal ring the Bravo wore, on which was engraved the Bear of the Ursuline ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... becomes her dignity, and looking crushed by it? Giselle's gown was of point d'Alencon, old family lace as yellow as ancient parchment, but of inestimable value. Her long corsage, made in the fashion of Anne of Austria, looked on her like a cuirass, and she dragged after her, somewhat awkwardly, a very long train, which impeded her movement as she walked. A lace veil, as hereditary and time-worn as the gown, but which had been worn by all the Monredons at their weddings, the present dowager's included, ...
— Jacqueline, v2 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)
... not keep her eyes off the beautiful chain cuirass which had once upon a time been worn by one of Pundita's forebears, a ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath
... plain cuirass and gorget so severely simple that it might have been mistaken for the guise of one of Cromwell's officers, who were ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler
... made by Teniers. A stately statue of Queen Anne stands in the library. There are costly collections of enamels, plaques, and miniatures; on the walls are huge paintings by Sir James Thornhill, one representing the great duke, in a blue cuirass, kneeling before Britannia, clad in white and holding a lance and wreath; Hercules and Mars stand by, and there are emblem-bearing females and the usual paraphernalia. We are told that Thornhill was paid for these at the rate of about six dollars per square yard. The ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... Saffredent; "it is because our worth is often tried. Still our shoulders are sensible of having worn the cuirass so long." ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. V. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... the captain, two negroes assisted our heroes to put on their apparel, and clothed them in thick waterproof made of India rubber, which formed trousers and vest, the trousers terminating in a pair of shoes with lead soles; a cuirass of leather protected the chest from the pressure of the water, and allowed ...
— The Wizard of the Sea - A Trip Under the Ocean • Roy Rockwood
... glanced aside with a contemptuous air, apparently at some giggling girls, who seemed to be eyeing her clothes. And the latter were indeed remarkable enough—a very loose skirt of white satin, on which all the animals of Noah's Ark were embroidered in gaudy colors; a jacket of gold cloth, like a cuirass, with sleeves of red velvet, yellow slashed; a very high cap on her head, with a mighty ruff of stiff white linen around her neck, which also had around it a silver chain hung with all kinds of coins, cameos, and curiosities, among them ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... pulled all the way to the hall-door, and into the glow of the great beech-wood fire; a ruddy light which shone upon many a sporting trophy, and reflected itself on many a gleaming pike and cuirass, belonging to days of old, when gentlemanly sport for the ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... his Holiness is too prudent to go in search of adventures. We are no longer in the days of Julius II., who donned the cuirass, and buckled on the sword of the flesh, and sprang himself into the breach. But why should not the Head of the Church do as Pius V., who sent his sailors with the Spaniards and Venetians to the battle of Lepanto? Why ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About
... asked whether he might lead away the dog of Hades he did not longer oppose him. But he imposed the condition that Hercules should become master of Cerberus without using any weapons. So the hero set out, protected only with cuirass and ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... beautifully coloured fish of the Chaetodon genus. What riches to our eyes were contained in the canoes of these poor Indians! Broad spreading leaves of Vijao* (* Heliconia bihai.) covered bunches of plantains. The scaly cuirass of an armadillo (Dasypus), the fruit of the Calabash tree (Crescentia cujete), used as a cup by the natives, productions common in the cabinets of Europe, had a peculiar charm for us, because they reminded us that, having reached the torrid ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... obeyed, and when the soldier came up, desired to be conducted to his commanding-officer. I was immediately brought where a circle of officers, sitting upon the grass, seemed in attendance upon one of superior rank. He wore a cuirass of polished steel, over which were drawn the insignia of the ancient Order of the Thistle. My friend Garschattachin, and many other gentlemen, some in uniform, others in their ordinary dress, but all armed and ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... proportion to their success, the Spaniard slowly returned home. With the licence accorded to him, he entered the Cardinal's chamber somewhat abruptly, and perceived him in earnest conversation with a Cavalier, whose long moustache, curled upward, and the bright cuirass worn underneath his mantle, seemed to betoken him of martial profession. Pleased with the respite, Alvarez hastily withdrew: and, in fact, the Cardinal's thoughts at that moment, and for that night, were bent upon other subjects than those ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... dangers which had beset him. The suit of armour was a handsome one, and had been doubtless stripped off from the body of some knight or noble murdered by the freebooters. The leg pieces Malcolm laid aside, retaining only a cuirass, back piece, and helmet, as the full armour was too ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... wood was flesh and blood to him. Cutting a piece from it would have been like cutting off a limb. He was armed, and he kept constant guard, without minding the cold, the snow, or the ice, which stiffened his clothing as if it covered it with a granite cuirass. Duke understood him, and followed him, ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... attacked, and he would have despised the thought of calling to his guards. But when Zoroaster's hand went out to seize him, he was ready. With a spring like a tiger, he flew at the strong man's throat, and sought to drag him down, striving to fasten his grip about the collar of his cuirass, but Zoroaster slipped his hand quickly under his adversary's, his sleeve went back and his long white arm ran like a fetter of steel about the king's neck, while his other hand gripped him by the middle; so they held each other like wrestlers, ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... his antagonist a delicate frustrating science. Rotherby, a fine swordsman in his way, soon saw that here was need for all his skill, and he exerted it. But the prodigious rapidity of his blade broke as upon a cuirass against the other's light, ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... placed at the head of the table, and attracts our attention first. He is dressed in black velvet, his breast covered with a cuirass, on his head a broad-brimmed black hat with white plumes. He is comfortably seated on a chair of black oak, with a velvet cushion, and holds in his left hand, supported on his knee, a magnificent drinking-horn, surrounded by a St. George destroying the dragon, and ornamented ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Don Quixote de la U.V.M., Knight of the patent-leather gaiters, terrible in his bright rectangular cuirass of tin (once a tea-chest), and his glittering harpoon; his doughty squire, Sancho Panza; and a dashing young lady, whose tasteful riding-dress of black cambric, wealth of embroidered skirts and undersleeves, and bold riding, took ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... fringe of grass, let him pluck it, but without breaking ranks, without dropping out of the squadron of which the leader must always keep his eyes on the flaming sonorous star. But if he put the little flower in the strap above his cuirass, not to look at it himself, but for others to look at, away with him! Let him go with his flower in his buttonhole and ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... armor] bulletproof vest, armored vest, buffer, corner stone, fender, apron, mask, gauntlet, thimble, carapace, armor, shield, buckler, aegis, breastplate, backplate[obs3], cowcatcher, face guard, scutum[obs3], cuirass, habergeon[obs3], mail, coat of mail, brigandine[obs3], hauberk, lorication[obs3], helmet, helm, bassinet, salade[obs3], heaume[obs3], morion[obs3], murrion[obs3], armet[obs3], cabaset[obs3], vizor[obs3], casquetel[obs3], siege cap, headpiece, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... escaped to the woods. It was late in the night. Fourneaux, with twenty men armed to the teeth, knocked fiercely at the commandant's door. Forcing an entrance, they wounded a gentleman who opposed them, and crowded around the sick man's bed. Fourneaux, armed with steel cap and cuirass, held his arquebuse to Laudonniere's breast, and demanded leave to go on a cruise among the Spanish islands. The latter kept his presence of mind, and remonstrated with some firmness; on which, with oaths and menaces, they dragged him from his bed, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, August, 1863, No. 70 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... capacious size were prepared, and in each was placed instead of its quota of wine a stalwart warrior, fully armed with sword, shield, helmet, and cuirass. Each cask was then covered with a linen cloth, and ropes were fastened to its sides for the convenience of the carriers. This done, sixty other men were chosen as carriers, and dressed as peasants, though really they were trained soldiers, and each ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... wine, the slaves bore him home drunken. In the morning Mardonius said Xerxes ordered him to serve in the cavalry guards, a post full of honour and chance for promotion. Glaucon did not resist. Mardonius sent him a silvered cuirass and a black horse from the steppes of Bactria,—fleet as the north wind. In his new armour he went to the chambers of Artazostra and Roxana. They had never seen him in panoply before. The brilliant mail became him rarely. ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... Finding the ears of her husband deaf, she diverted her treachery from her brother against her lord, hiring bravoes to cut his throat while he slept. Scot was told about this by a waiting-woman, and retired to bed in his cuirass on the night on which he had heard the deed of murder was to be wrought upon him. Ulfhild asked him why he had exchanged his wonted ways to wear the garb of steel; he rejoined that such was just then his fancy. The agents of the ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... back, baffled. Mary's ignorance was an impenetrable cuirass; she would not try to understand, she could not even realise that she might possibly be mistaken. Quite seriously she thought that what she ignored could be hardly worth knowing. People talk of the advance of education; there may be a little among the lower classes, but it is inconceivable ...
— The Hero • William Somerset Maugham
... covered with a sort of helmet, the neck is almost the only part in which they can be wounded. They have another kind of corslet, made like the corsets of our ladies, of splinters of hard wood interlaced with nettle twine. The warrior who wears this cuirass does not use the tunic of elk-skin; he is consequently less protected, but a great deal more free; the said tunic being ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... them. The soldiers swarmed up from the river to resume their clothes; and here you could behold depicted by the master's godlike hands one hurrying to clasp his limbs in steel and give assistance to his comrades, another buckling on the cuirass, and many seizing this or that weapon, with cavalry in squadrons giving the attack. Among the multitude of figures, there was an old man, who wore upon his head an ivy wreath for shade. Seated on the ground, in act to draw his hose up, he was hampered by the wetness of his legs; ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... his head, in a gorgeous suit of the most superb Milan armour, made of steel, inlaid and embossed with gold, which was wrought into the fantastic taste called the Arabesque. Around his neck and over his polished cuirass, hung his master's order of the Golden Fleece, one of the most honoured associations of chivalry then known in Christendom. A handsome page bore his helmet behind him, a herald preceded him, bearing his letters of credence ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... two incidents connected with the Mole of Puteoli afford! The Roman Emperor, glittering like the morning star in purple mantle and jewelled cuirass, riding on his charger across the solid road that to humour his own caprice had been flung across the buoyant waters, accompanied by soldiery, by music, and by bands of wealthy sycophants; and the Apostle, poor, in bonds, ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... if you insist on not doffing your cuirass, you may find an opportunity of wearing it. The storm thickens. The city of London are ready to hoist their standard; treason is the bon-ton at that end of the town; seditious papers pasted up at every ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... 175: "Occurrebat sagittae, obvius erat ei penetranti."—Heyne. But it is better to understand, "where the plates of the cuirass meet ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... Happily Frank was not asked either of these questions. He and Andrew (who, in a tattered cloak and with a pair of brogues on his feet, looked like a Highland scarecrow) were soon perceived by the sentries and conducted to the presence of the commanding officer, evidently a man of rank, in a steel cuirass, crossed by the ribband of the Thistle, to whom the others seemed to pay great deference. This proved to be no other than his Grace the Duke of Montrose, who in person had come to conduct the operations against ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... she, with a look of doubt, "you have much influence over warriors, brave men and generals! Beneath your cuirass must beat a noble heart; you are an old General who knows nothing of the ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... feathers, and a shield and a lance and a sword. His armor and his weapons were all, I am almost sure, of quite different periods. The shield was thirteenth century, while the sword was of the pattern used in the Peninsular War. The cuirass was of the time of Charles I., and the helmet dated from the Second Crusade. The arms on the shield were very grand—three red running lions on a blue ground. The tents were of the latest brand approved of by our modern ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit
... stepping forward and putting Abenali's work into the master's hand. The Condottiere was in raptures. He pronounced it as perfect a weapon as Gouzalo de Cordova himself could possess; showed off its temper and his own dexterity by piercing and cutting up an old cuirass, and invited the bystanders to let him put it to further proof by letting him slice through an apple placed on the open ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Netherlands, and after his return had been made a captain in the Lifeguards, and a Gentleman of the Bedchamber. Vandyke has left portraits of the father and the son; the one a bald-headed, alert, precise-looking old warrior, with the cuirass and gauntlets of elder warfare; the other, the very model of a cavalier, tall, easy, and graceful, with a gentle reflecting face, and wearing the long lovelocks and deep point lace collar and cuffs characteristic of Queen Henrietta's Court. Lindsay was called ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... in the authorized version of the Bible, 'And a target' or gorget 'of brass,' are rendered, in all the earlier versions, 'And a shield of brass.' Perhaps a cuirass; it was evidently defensive brass armour, worn between ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... sea, the Hippogrif descended; and his feet no sooner touched the ground than Prince Roger leaped from his back, and made fast his bridle to the stem of a spreading myrtle-bush. Then he took off his helmet and cuirass, and went to bathe his face and hands in the cool waters of the brook; for his pulses were throbbing from his swift ride, and he wanted nothing so much as an hour or two of repose. Such rapid flying through the ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... the invention of guns, the English archers are spoken of as excelling those of all other nations; and an ancient writer affirms that an English arrow, with a little wax upon its point, would pass through any ordinary corselet or cuirass. It is uncertain how far the archers with the long-bow could send an arrow; but the cross-bowmen could shoot their quarrels to the distance of forty rods, or the eighth part of a mile. For a more general and extended notice of the history ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 264, July 14, 1827 • Various
... military weapons known afterward to the Greeks,—especially the spear and bow, which were the most effective offensive weapons known to antiquity or the Middle Ages. Some of their warriors were clothed in coats of brass equal to the steel or iron cuirass worn by the Mediaeval knights of chivalry. They had the battle-axe, the shield, the sword, the javelin, the metal-headed arrow. One of the early Egyptian kings marched against his enemies with six hundred thousand infantry, twenty thousand cavalry, and twenty-three thousand chariots of war, each ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume III • John Lord
... among the hundred thousand men who filled that plain. If I were wounded, I should be placed in hospital, in the hands of ignorant and careless surgeons. I called to mind what I had heard of operations. My heart beat violently, and I mechanically arranged, as a kind of rude cuirass, my handkerchief and pocketbook upon my breast. Then, overpowered with weariness, my eyes closed drowsily, only to open the next instant with a start at some new thought ...
— How The Redoubt Was Taken - 1896 • Prosper Merimee
... Emperor rode, sunk in sad thought, his fingers twisted in his long white beard which flowed over his cuirass, his eyes filled with tears. Behind him galloped his knights—strong men though they were, every one of them with a sob in his throat, a prayer in his heart, for Roland, ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... six of carabineers, and the Bed Lancers of the Guard—into the whirlpool of his renewed assault, and this time the mass, though it came forward more slowly, was almost double in area. Gleaming with lance and sword and cuirass, it undulated as it crossed the broken slopes, till it seemed a sea, shining with 10,000 points of glancing steel, in motion. The British squares, on the reverse slope, as they obeyed the order, "Prepare to receive cavalry!" and fell grimly into formation, could hear ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... and so surprised to see his ladylove so beautiful, and so well-prepared for the encounter, that he lost his strength and sense, and had not force enough left to draw his dagger, and try whether it could penetrate her cuirass. Of kissing, and cuddling, and playing with her breasts, he could do plenty; but ...
— One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories - Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles • Various
... one or two spare horses, enabled them to advance and to retreat with a rapid diligence, which surprised the security, and eluded the pursuit, of a distant enemy. [37] Their poverty of iron prompted their rude industry to invent a sort of cuirass, which was capable of resisting a sword or javelin, though it was formed only of horses' hoofs, cut into thin and polished slices, carefully laid over each other in the manner of scales or feathers, and strongly sewed upon an under garment ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... opinion, ought to wear the cuirass; this is the only relic of ancient defence which we are advocates for keeping up, and we do so upon the score of utility. It is rather heavy for the men, but only so because they are not accustomed to wear it in a judicious manner; it is of real service to the arm in question, and is the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... carelessly back from it-apparently the likeness of a man about forty years of age and it had a charming air of nobility and lofty pride, tempered with benevolence and tenderness, which was inexpressibly attractive. The portrait was only half-length—the breast being covered with a steel cuirass, richly inlaid with gold, which was partly concealed by a white scarf, loosely knotted over it. Isabelle, despite her great alarm and anxiety, could not long withdraw her eyes or her thoughts from ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... arrow, and feeling pain he reared upright and threw Masistios off; and when he had fallen, the Athenians forthwith pressed upon him; and his horse they took and himself, as he made resistance, they slew, though at first they could not, for his equipment was of this kind,—he wore a cuirass of gold scales underneath, and over the cuirass he had put on a crimson tunic. So as they struck upon the cuirass they could effect nothing, until some one, perceiving what the matter was, thrust into his eye. Then at length he fell and died; and by some means the other ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 2 (of 2) • Herodotus
... decide to share our solitude. Our friend is so poetical, so witty, so charming. He has but one fault, that of being a civilized Don Quixote de la Mancha; instead of the helmet of Mambrino he wears a Gibus hat, a Buisson coat instead of a cuirass, a Verdier cane by way of a lance. Happy nature! in which the heart is not sacrificed to the intellect; where the subtlety of a diplomate is united to ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin
... feasted on the day of the conversion of St. Paul, and 1,500 lights offered in the church. The country was filled with Italian prelates. An Italian Archbishop of Canterbury, coming to St. Paul's, with a cuirass under his robes, to demand first-fruits from the Bishop, found the doors closed in his face; and two canons of the Papal party, endeavouring to install themselves at St. Paul's, were in 1259 killed by ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... "fought with missiles; the Franks sword in hand. Clovis met and with his own hand slew Alaric in the fray; at the moment of striking his blow two Goths fell suddenly upon Clovis, and attacked him with their pikes on either side, but he escaped death, thanks to his cuirass and ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... who wear the cuirass, a piece of defensive armour, covering the body from the neck to ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... He was dressed in a crimson doublet, with chausses, or breeches, of yellow satin. Over his shoulders was thrown a cassock or mantle of rich brocade, and a sopravest of the same materials concealed his cuirass. By his side, close girt, he wore a Moorish scimitar, and beneath his bonnet his hair was confined by a cap or headdress ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott
... had slain the laidly worm, And her offspring all had kill’d; Escaped the knight to the morning light, With heavy cuirass ...
— King Diderik - and the fight between the Lion and Dragon and other ballads - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise
... fashion, stating that within an hour after the delivery of the Privy Seal they "came Ryottously with the nowmbre of xii persons, with bowis arrowes longe sperys in maner and furme of warre." In another place he details their armour and arms saying that they were arrayed with "Cures (cuirass) Corsettes (armour for the body) Brygendyns, Jakkys, Salettis (a light helmet), Speris, Bowes, Arrowes, Sourdis, byllys and Launcegays, (a small lance) with other maner of wepyns defencive." As Sir Roger and his wife rode towards Scarborough they met "Sir Rauf Ivers, which in Curtes (courteous) ...
— The Evolution Of An English Town • Gordon Home
... shock of this fall rushed through their veins like strange blood, hissing as it seemed, and full of scorching sparks. Their pain was like an electric discharge. The loud, heavy step of a man-at-arms sounded on the stairs with the iron clank of his sword, his cuirass, and spurs; a soldier presently ...
— The Exiles • Honore de Balzac
... unseen, but most real, Presence wrapping us round! It is only when our faith in it has fallen asleep that any earthly good allures, or any earthly evil frightens us. To be sure, in our thrilling consciousness, that we dwell with Jesus is an impenetrable cuirass that blunts the points of all arrows and keeps the breast that wears it unwounded in the fray. The world has no voices which can make themselves heard above that low sovereign whisper: 'I am with you always, even to the end of the world'—and ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... picturesque as we raced over the glistening surface, which flashed like a burnished cuirass beneath the rays of the rising sun. Now we approach a spot where seemingly the waters from some violent blast or other had been in a state of foam and commotion, when a stern frost transformed them into a solid mass. Pillars and blocks of the shining ...
— Russia - As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Various
... Histoire du Romantisme in which Gautier tells how he went to the tailor to arrange for the most spectacular feature of his costume is lively and amusing. He spread out the magnificent piece of cherry-colored satin, and then unfolded his design for a 'pour-point,' like a 'Milan cuirass.' Says Gautier, using always his quaint editorial we, 'It has been said that we know a great many words, but we don't know words enough to express the astonishment of our tailor when we lay before him our plan for a waistcoat.' The man of shears had doubts as to his ...
— The Bibliotaph - and Other People • Leon H. Vincent
... sometimes accompanied by another personage, named Chin Chia, 'Mr Golden Cuirass.' Like K'uei Hsing and Chu I he has charge of the interests of scholars, but differs from them in that he holds a flag, which he has only to wave in front of a house for the family inhabiting it to be assured that among their descendants will be some who will win literary honours and ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... Orsini bade him surrender and have no fear. And he yielded himself up, and they took him away through the smoking house, slippery with blood. They found also John Philip Savelli, and they stripped him of the cuirass he wore, and setting their swords to him, bade him cry, 'Long live Orsini!' And he answered, 'I will not say it.' Then they wounded him deep in the forehead and smote off both his hands, and gave him many wounds in face ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... window, and seeing the armour of the man she abhorred, she flew in despair to the Chinese trunk, and took out the fatal javelin, which darted, at her wish, to pierce her dear Rustem through a joint in his cuirass. He gave a bitter cry, and in that cry the Princess thought that she recognized the voice of her ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... was an ideal soldier of the time; tall, brawny, gray-headed, rough, full of strange oaths acquired here and there and yonder in the wars and treasured as if they were decorations. He had been used to the camp all his life, and to his notion war was God's best gift to man. He had his steel cuirass on, and wore boots that came above his knees, and was equipped with a huge sword; and when I looked at this martial figure, and heard the marvelous oaths, and guessed how little of poetry and sentiment might be looked for in this quarter, I hoped ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... son had wrought much harm, Apollo slew him in the forefront of the battle, and gave glory unto Hector. Therefore now come I a suppliant unto thy knees, if haply thou be willing to give my short-lived son shield and helmet, and goodly greaves fitted with ankle-pieces, and cuirass. For the armour that he had erst, his trusty comrade lost when he fell beneath the men of Troy; and my son lieth on the earth with anguish ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... chiefly in his own portraits that Rembrandt had the satisfaction of painting the rich and fanciful costumes he loved so well. He wore in turn all sorts of hats and caps, many jewels and ornaments, and every variety of mantle, doublet, and cuirass. In this he was somewhat like an actor taking the parts of many different characters. Sometimes he is an officer with mustaches fiercely twisted, carrying his head with a dashing military air. Again he is a cavalier ...
— Rembrandt - A Collection Of Fifteen Pictures and a Portrait of the - Painter with Introduction and Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll
... there entered a bevy of staff officers, all green and gold and blue and silver, clustered about a huge man in the full regalia of a general, his crimson plumes nodding above his golden helmet, his crimson cloak dangling about his golden cuirass, his gilt kilt-straps gleaming over his crimson tunic-skirt. There was no mistaking that incredible expanse of face, seemingly as big as the body of an ordinary man, those bleary gray eyes under the shaggy eyebrows, ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... stepped the Count of Aquila in full armour, sword at side and dagger on hip, carrying his head-piece on the crook of his left arm. Behind him towered the bulk of Fortemani, his great face flushed with a strange excitement, a leather hacketon over his steel cuirass, girt, too, with sword and dagger, and carrying his shining morion in his hand. Last came Lanciotto and Zaccaria, both fully equipped ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... secret from my stepfather was impossible. I had vainly endeavored for months to find the flaw in his armor of dissimulation; I had but broken not one dagger, but twenty against the plates of that cuirass. If I had had all the tormentors of the Middle Ages at my service, I could not have forced his fast-shut lips to open, or extorted an admission from his woebegone and yet ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... evenings up the hill-path and made halt This side the coppice at a certain gate? For by that chance which ever serves ill ends, Within the slanted shadow of The Towers The maid Griselda dwelt. Her gray scarred sire Had for cloth doublet changed the steel cuirass, The sword for gardener's fork, and so henceforth In the mild autumn and sundown of life, Moving erect among his curves and squares Of lily, rose, and purple flower-de-luce, Set none but harmless squadrons in the field— Save now and then at tavern, ...
— Wyndham Towers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... shouts of the combatants without, the loud orders given by the leaders on the walls, the crack, as the stones hurled by the mangonels struck the walls, and the ring of steel as the arrows struck against steel cap and cuirass. ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty
... is still worked through leather at Guzerat. See Birdwood, p. 284, Ed. 1880. Marco Polo mentions this embroidery 600 years ago. Bk. iii. chap. xxvi. (Yule). The hunting cuirass of Assurbanipal (pl. 1) appears to be so worked, and of such materials. Also see Wilkinson, "Ancient Egyptians," vol. iii. p. 130. This gold for weaving was beaten ...
— Needlework As Art • Marian Alford
... helmet, and his cuirass, and all his clothes, and stood among the youths of Larissa, while all wondered at him, and said, 'Who is this young stranger, who stands like a wild bull in his pride? Surely he is one of the heroes, the sons of the ...
— The Heroes • Charles Kingsley
... shown in Fig. 5. This weapon is also about 1 ft. long with wood handle and steel embossed blade. A sixteenth century German poniard is shown in Fig. 6. The blade and ornamental crossbar is of steel, with both edges of the blade sharp. The handle is of wood. A German stiletto, sometimes called cuirass breakers, is shown in Fig. 7. This stiletto has a wood handle, steel crossbar and blade of steel with ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... the Armenian Christian, with his dark flowing robes, and mild demeanour, and serene visage. Here strutted the lively, affected, and superfine Persian; and there the Circassian stalked with his long hair and chain cuirass. The fair Georgian jostled the ebony form of the merchant of Dongola ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli
... where they had come finally to settle and drop out of remembrance. There is a lady in white satin and a ruff; a gentleman whose legs have faded out of view, with a peaked beard, and a hawk on his wrist. There is another in a black periwig lost in the dark background, and with a steel cuirass, the gleam of which out of the darkness strikes the eye, and a scarf is dimly discoverable across it. This is that foolish Sir Guy Mardykes, who crossed the Border and joined Dundee, and was shot through the temple at Killiecrankie and whom more prudent and whiggish scions of the Mardykes family ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 3 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... pans, praying-chairs, soldiers, country butter, umbrellas and other sun- shades, girl-porters waiting to be hired with baskets at their backs, and one weazen little old man in a cocked hat, wearing a cuirass of drinking-glasses and carrying on his shoulder a crimson temple fluttering with flags, like a glorified pavior's rammer without the handle, who rings a little bell in all parts of the scene, and cries his ...
— Reprinted Pieces • Charles Dickens
... wore sword and dagger; but to be found with a gun or pistol in the palace, or even in the town, subjected them to a sentence of death. To wear a casque or cuirass was punished with imprisonment. The laws of politeness were equally strict. If one man used insulting words to another, the offense was construed as being given to the king; and the offender was obliged to solicit pardon of his majesty. If one threatened ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... instead of that he was wearing, so help me, red tights cross-gartered with strips of gold-blue tinsel-cloth, a green doublet gold-trimmed and to top it a ruff, and he was trying to fit onto his front a bright silvered cuirass that would have looked just dandy maybe on one of the ...
— No Great Magic • Fritz Reuter Leiber
... hoped that I was a free man again, when there was a soft thudding in the snow behind me, and a heavy man upon a great black horse came swiftly after me. My first impulse was to put spurs to Violette. My second, as I saw a long black beard against a steel cuirass, was to halt and ...
— The Adventures of Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... their meeting in the chapel of Engaddi sent a thousand recollections through Sir Kenneth's brain, and convinced him that the message delivered by the dwarf was genuine. The rosebuds, withered as they were, were still treasured under his cuirass, and nearest to his heart. He paused, and could not resolve to forego an opportunity, the only one which might ever offer, to gain grace in her eyes whom he had installed as sovereign of his affections. The dwarf, ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... the third outdoes the hardest work of Donatello by its realism. Verocchio's "David," a lad of some seventeen years, has the lean, veined arms of a stone-hewer or gold-beater. As a faithful portrait of the first Florentine prentice who came to hand, this statue might have merit but for the awkward cuirass and kilt that ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... tears. This nervous sensibility which brought to the front all the qualities of her soul and mind, tenderness, courage, delicacy, pride, modesty, gave her face at the same time an expression so varied, so winning in all its moods, that the grave, sombre assembly of judges let fall the brazen cuirass of impassive integrity and the leaden cope of hypocritical virtue. If Edmee had not triumphantly defended me by her confession, she had at least roused the greatest interest in my favour. A man who is ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... opened with a sudden pong, and out there came three ostrich feathers in a gold crown, surrounding a beautiful shining steel helmet, a cuirass, a pair of spurs, finally a ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... doublet, drew his armor around him, mounted his steed ever ready, and was one of the first to dash into the densest of the foe. Twelve armored horsemen were immediately at his side. The arrows and javelins of the natives glanced harmless from helmet and cuirass, while every flash of the long, keen sabres was death to an Indian, and the proud war-horses trampled the ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... b-o-u-d-o-i-r,) and was waited upon by handsome pages, and took her airing on a dappled-gray palfrey, attended by trusty and obsequious grooms; when Sir Knight, followed by his sturdy henchmen, rode forth in gay and gaudy attire, with glittering helmet and cuirass, and entered the lists, and bravely fought for his fair lady's fame. She spoke with fervid eloquence, and with a glibness that betrayed a very recent perusal of the tournament-scene in Ivanhoe. I was about to reply, and say something in behalf ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... the progress of society is secured, and man is spared the humiliation of witnessing again scenes like those which followed the destruction of the Roman Empire. Now look to the warriors of modern times; you see the spear, the javelin, the shield, and the cuirass are changed for the musket and the light artillery. The German monk who discovered gunpowder did not meanly affect the destinies of mankind; wars are become less bloody by becoming less personal; mere brutal strength is rendered of comparatively ...
— Consolations in Travel - or, the Last Days of a Philosopher • Humphrey Davy
... professor; "but be wise, Signor Bucciolo—be wise and think more than once what you are about." "Trust me for that," said the scholar, a little piqued: "I shall go well provided, and not walk into the mouth of danger unarmed." And away he went, furnished with a good cuirass, a rapier, and a stiletto in his belt. He was no sooner on his way than the professor slipped out quietly after him, dogging his steps closely, until, trembling with rage, he saw him stop at his own house-door, which, on a smart tap being given, was quickly opened ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... directed his attention to the Sikels, in the interior of the island, and took several of their towns, but from one of them he met with desperate resistance, find came near losing his life from a wound by a spear which penetrated his cuirass. This repulse caused the Carthaginians to rally in the west of the island, under Magon, with an army of eighty thousand. But he was repulsed by Dionysius, and concluded a truce with him, which gave the latter leisure to ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord
... swords and various other spoils of war found on the spot, were offered for sale by some boys and eagerly bought up as relics. My brother-in-law made a purchase of a helmet, sword and cuirass, intending to hang it up in his hall. For my part I have seen, and can see no reason whatever to rejoice at this event. I fear it is ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... the rein, Down drops the casque of steel, The cuirass leaves his shrinking side, The spur his ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... directions, for Rake to catch as he could, in the softest and sleepiest of tones, Bertie Cecil drank a glass of Curacoa, put his tall, lithe limbs indolently off his sofa, and surrendered himself to the martyrdom of cuirass and gorget, standing six feet one without his spurred jacks, but light-built and full of grace as a deer, or his weight would not have been what it was in gentleman-rider races from the Hunt steeple-chase at La Marche to the Grand ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... he did it in the following way. He painted a naked man with his back turned, at whose feet was a most limpid pool of water, wherein he painted the reflection of the man's front. At one side was a burnished cuirass that he had taken off, which showed his left profile, since everything could be seen on the polished surface of the piece of armour; and on the other side was a mirror, which reflected the other profile of the naked ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 04 (of 10), Filippino Lippi to Domenico Puligo • Giorgio Vasari
... Chobham by way of getting them acclimatized to the trials and vicissitudes of wind and weather. This step leads of course to a number of little pleasantries. In one cartoon we see an officer of household cavalry parting his hair in front of his cuirass, whilst a soldier servant brings him his shaving water in a bucket; another, entitled A Cold in the Head, represents an officer in this melancholy condition, who requests his servant to bring him his bucket of gruel as "sool as he has tallowed his loze." John, in fact, had been aroused from ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... surprise]. Black hair—not brown, black; clear pink and white complexion; large, deep violet eyes with a remarkable poise to them."—Here I continued the description for him: "Slight of figure; a full, honest waist, without a suggestion of that execrable death-trap, Dame Fashion's hideous cuirass; a little above middle height; deliberate, and therefore graceful, in all her movements; carries herself in a way to impress one with the idea that she is innocent, without that time-honoured concomitant, ignorance; half girl, half woman; shy, yet strong; and in a word, very beautiful—that's ...
— The Darrow Enigma • Melvin L. Severy
... earthquakes shook not from their poise, appear To shiver in the deep and voluble tones Rolled from the organ! Underneath my feet There lies the lid of a sepulchral vault. The image of an armed knight is graven Upon it, clad in perfect panoply— Cuishes, and greaves, and cuirass, with barred helm, Grauntleted hand, and sword, and blazoned shield. Around, in Gothic characters, worn dim By feet of worshippers, are traced his name, And birth, and death, and words of eulogy. Why should I pore upon them? This old tomb, This effigy, ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant
... tight-fitting cuirass Is but a useless mass, It's made of steel, And weighs a deal, This tight-fitting cuirass Is but a useless mass, A man is but an ass Who fights in a cuirass, So off, ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... were heavy cavalry wearing helmet and cuirass (two plates fastened together for the protection of the breast ...
— Memoirs of a Cavalier • Daniel Defoe
... protect life also, a heavy silk scarf bandage is placed round the throat, completely protecting the jugular vein and the carotid artery. The right arm, which in this peculiar fencing is used to parry the cut in tierce, is also protected by bandages, and the body is covered by a leathern cuirass, heavily padded, from the middle of the breast to the knees. It will be seen that the whole head, excepting the eyes, is exposed, as well as the chest and shoulders. Thrusting is forbidden as well as the cut in second, below guard, but the latter ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford
... light. Moreover, factions are blind men, who aim straight, errors are excellent projectiles, striking skillfully, and with all the violence that springs from false reasoning, wherever a want of logic in those who defend the right, like a defect in a cuirass, ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... parrot-feathered arrows. Over the mould, swarming among the venomous fruit, innumerable crabs make a sound almost like the murmuring of water. Some are very large, with prodigious stalked eyes, and claws white as ivory, and a red cuirass; others, very small and very swift in their movements, are raspberry-colored; others, again, are apple-green, with queer mottlings of black and white. There is an unpleasant odor of decay in ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... nature, the best shape is undoubtedly that which she has given it. To endeavor to render it more elegant by artificial means is to change it; to make it much smaller below and much larger above is to destroy its beauty; to keep it cased up in a kind of domestic cuirass is not only to deform it, but to expose the internal parts to serious injury. Under such compression as is commonly practiced by ladies, the {105} development of the bones, which are still tender, does not take place conformably to the ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... Revolution. She was a fearless horsewoman, and had been seen facing great dangers at the battle of Jena. When she rode before her troops in her helmet of polished steel, shaded by a plume, in her glittering golden cuirass, her tunic of silver stuff, her red boots with gold spurs, she resembled Tasso's heroines. The soldiers burst into cries of enthusiasm, as they saw their warlike Queen; before her were bowed the flags she had embroidered ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand
... infantryman's defensive weapons tells us that to be able to march, maneuver, and fight efficiently in this armor implies that the Athenian soldier is a well-trained athlete. The whole panoply weighs many pounds.[*] The prime parts in the armor are the helmet, the cuirass, the greaves, and the shield. Every able-bodied citizen of moderate means has this outfit hanging in his andronitis, and can don it at brief notice. The HELMET is normally of bronze; it is cut away enough in front to leave the face visible, but sometimes a cautious ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis
... grass, and laid a finger upon his lip; and at the touch of the small finger the man trembled through all his length of limbs, and lay still. Up the road rose a cloud of dust and the sound of determined feet, and presently a martial figure came in sight, clad in bronze and leather helmet and cuirass, and carrying an oblong shield and a short, broad-bladed sword of double edge. Short yet agile, a soldier every inch, he looked neither to the right nor to the left, but marched steadily and purposefully upon ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... said Monte Cristo, "as the Orientals do not confine themselves, as did Mithridates, to make a cuirass of his poisons, but they also made them a dagger. Science becomes, in their hands, not only a defensive weapon, but still more frequently an offensive one; the one serves against all their physical ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... thought of tragic idyl, and of flight and hot pursuit, And the jingle of the bridle, and cuirass, and spur on boot, As our horses's hooves struck showers from the flinty bowlders set In freshet ways with writhing reed ...
— Nye and Riley's Wit and Humor (Poems and Yarns) • Bill Nye
... was a painting of a girl over the mantel and that the girl was Mary Ogden. He stepped forward eagerly, almost holding his breath. The portrait ended at the tiny waist, and the stiff satin of the cuirass-like bodice was softened with tulle which seemed to float about the sloping shoulders. The soft ashen hair, growing in a deep point on the broad full brow, was brushed softly back and coiled low on the long white neck. The mouth ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... the Cardinal donned sword and cuirass and led out the royal army to the support of the Duke of Mantua, a French nobleman who had inherited an Italian duchy and found his rights disputed by both Spain and Savoy. Louis XIII accompanied Richelieu and showed ...
— Heroes of Modern Europe • Alice Birkhead
... Apuleius, Petronius, and Lucian have similar stories. The Emperor Sigismund convoked a council of theologians in the fifteenth century who decided that wer-wolves did exist. (2) Byrny (A.S. "byrne"), corslet, cuirass. (3) "Norns came to him." Nornir are the fates of the northern mythology. They are three—"Urd", the past; "Verdandi", the present; and "Skuld", the future. They sit beside the fountain of Urd ("Urdarbrunur"), which is below one of the ...
— The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga) - With Excerpts from the Poetic Edda • Anonymous
... on each side of the wide table aisle, and now I could see that their horny armour covered shoulders and backs, ran across the chest in a knobbed cuirass, and at wrists and heels jutted out into curved, murderous spurs. The webbed hands and feet ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt
... swirling by in miraculous limousines; legless cripples flopping on hands and leather pads; thin-whiskered students in velveteen; walrus-moustached veterans in broadcloth; keen-faced old prelates; shabby young priests; cavalrymen in casque and cuirass; workingmen turned horse and harnessed to carts; sidewalk jesters, itinerant vendors of questionable wares; shady loafers dressed to resemble gold-showering America; motor-cyclists in leather; hairy musicians, blue gendarmes, baggy red zouaves; ...
— The Guest of Quesnay • Booth Tarkington
... silver gates lay winged bulls, and the king's body-guard-their dress consisting of a gold cuirass under a purple overcoat, and the high Persian cap, their swords in golden scabbards glittering with jewels, and their lances ornamented with gold and silver apples, were stationed in the court of the palace. Among them the band of ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... two or three times when you was here years ago," said Mrs. Lowe, standing before her straight and tall in her faded calico gown, which fitted her uncompromisingly like a cuirass. Mrs. Lowe's gowns, no matter how thin and faded, always fitted her in that way. Stretched over her long flat-chested figure, they seemed to acquire the consistency of armor. "You ain't changed any as I can see," ...
— Jane Field - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... resounding on all sides. I had then never heard such a sound; I was extremely terrified, and ordered my companions to ascend the minaret, read the Koran, praise God, and recite the call to prayer,—which they did. We now perceived a man who had approached us: he was armed, and wore a cuirass. He saluted us, and we begged him to inform us who he was. He gave us to understand that he was the Kadi of the Mussulmans of the place, and added: "When I heard the reading of the Koran and the call to prayers, I trembled for your safety, ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various
... the inutility of retaining the ringed hauberk. The thighs and legs were no longer covered with double-chain mail, and the arms only partially. A back-plate was added, which, with the breast-plate, formed a cuirass. During the use of mixed armour, the arms, thighs, knees, and legs were covered with plates of metal; and for the hands were invented gloves of plate, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 583 - Volume 20, Number 583, Saturday, December 29, 1832 • Various
... bent—the Spaniards raised a shout—Muza seemed stricken from his horse. But the blow of the heavy falchion had not touched him: and, seemingly without an effort, the curved blade of his own cimiter, gliding by that part of his antagonist's throat where the helmet joins the cuirass, passed unresistingly and silently through the joints; and Alonzo fell at once, and without a groan, from his horse—his armour, to all appearance, unpenetrated, while the blood oozed slow and ...
— Leila, Complete - The Siege of Granada • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... that. The spider simply was upon the wasp without seeming to go there; but the wasp was not there, or, rather, her vital spot wasn't. She had kicked herself round on her side, like a cart-wheel, lying flat, with her feet, and the spider's jaws struck only hard cuirass. Before the spider, leaping back, wolf-like, could lunge in her lightning second stroke, the wasp was on her feet, a live ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... have always been the same as I am now, but didn't know it merely. And something has fallen away, that used to cover me up in the past.... Yes, that's it: for now I can feel all those desires that used to pass me by as if deflected by a cuirass of insensibility.... Now I can feel how they touch my body and my soul, filling me with qualms and passions. The earth seems full of adventure. The sky seems radiant with flames. And it is as if I could see myself stand waiting with ...
— The Lonely Way—Intermezzo—Countess Mizzie - Three Plays • Arthur Schnitzler
... has heard it said that his Majesty used great precautions against being poisoned, which statement must be placed beside that concerning the cuirass proof against bullet and dagger. On the contrary, the Emperor carried his want of precaution only too far. His breakfast was brought every day into an antechamber open to all to whom had been granted a private audience, and ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... based on a leather foundation, hence the name cuirass, was derived from cuir (leather). In a former book I have alluded to the armour of the nomadic tribes, which is described by Pausanias as coarse coats of mail made out of the hoofs of horses, split, and ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... debates will improve them. I had as soon see a woman a dragoon as a politician: not a Hussar; for I have seen a lady of our land make a very dashing hussar, without forfeiting one charm as a woman. No: I mean a "Heavy," with jackboots and cuirass, helmet and horse-hair; and to this condition will the novelty of the thing, if it becomes a fashion, possibly degrade ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... the best all-round sportsmen I know," the Crow announced, "and he has one of the kindest hearts. I have known him since he was a toddler. His mother was one of the beauties, when I first put on a cuirass." ...
— The Reason Why • Elinor Glyn
... through the loggia with Caesar's helmet and sword, snatched from Britannus, who follows her with a cuirass and greaves. They come down to Caesar, she to his left hand, Britannus ...
— Caesar and Cleopatra • George Bernard Shaw
... disguises, including large masks; and their war-dress, formed of a thick doubled leathern mantle of elk or buffalo skin, frequently with a cloak over it, on which the hoofs of horses were strung, makes an almost impervious cuirass. Their love for music, general lively dispositions, except from provocation, but determination in avenging insult or ...
— Handbook to the new Gold-fields • R. M. Ballantyne
... go to business on a damp or wet morning is a very elaborate affair. He puts on wash-leather socks over his stockings, and India-rubber shoes above his boots, and wears under his waistcoat a cuirass of hare-skin. Besides these precautions, he winds a thick shawl round his throat, and blocks up his mouth with a large silk handkerchief. Thus accoutred, and furnished besides with a great-coat and ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... suffered so great loss, and they began to give way. And my Cid, seeing King Fariz, made towards him, smiting down all who were in his way; and he came up to him, and made three blows at him; two of them failed, but the third was a good one, and went through his cuirass, so that the blood ran down his legs. And with that blow was the army of the Moors vanquished, for King Fariz, feeling himself so sorely wounded, turned his reins and fled out of the field, even to Teruel. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... was mounted upon an able horse, fit for military service, and for the great weight which he had to carry, and his rider occupied his demipique, or war-saddle, with an air that showed it was his familiar seat. He had a bright burnished head-piece, with a plume of feathers, together with a cuirass, thick enough to resist a musket-ball, and a back-piece of lighter materials. These defensive arms he wore over a buff jerkin, along with a pair of gauntlets, or steel gloves, the tops of which reached up to his elbow, and which, like the rest of his armour, ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... gun-banging, flag-waving, incense-burning, trumpets pealing, drums rolling, and at the close, received by the voice of six hundred choristers, sweetly modulated to the tones of fifteen score of fiddlers. Then you saw horse and foot, jack-boots and bear-skin, cuirass and bayonet, National Guard and Line, marshals and generals all over gold, smart aides-de-camp galloping about like mad, and high in the midst of all, riding on his golden buckler, Solomon in all his glory, forsooth—Imperial Caesar, with his crown over ...
— The Second Funeral of Napoleon • William Makepeace Thackeray (AKA "Michael Angelo Titmarch")
... duty to bear the helmet or shield of his lord, to lead his war horse, to lace his helmet, to belt and buckle his cuirass, to help him to vest in his iron panoply, with pincers and hammer; to keep close to his side in battle, to succour him fallen, to avenge him dead, or ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... Balisarda's lightest blows, Nor helm, nor shield, nor cuirass could avail, Nor strongly tempered plate, nor ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... is superadded to these means of defence consists of five principal pieces, viz., a casque or cap, with a mask large enough to leave a proper space between it and the asbestos cap; a cuirass with its brassets; a piece of armour for the trunk and thighs; a pair of boots of double wire-gauze; and an oval shield 5 feet long by 2 1/2 feet wide, made by stretching the wire-gauze over a slender frame of iron. All these pieces are made of iron wire-gauze, having ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini
... secretly when he could not; yet still preserved his friendship. After enduring many years the loss of his rank and his country, from the injustice of the Duke of York, he, at the age of seventy, assumed again his long-neglected sword and cuirass, and came over with the Prince of Orange, who was so fond of him that he carried him in his own ship. The influence of Lord Stair in party was increased by that of his son Sir John Dalrymple, a man distinguished above all by the beauty of his person, and the power ...
— The Jacobite Rebellions (1689-1746) - (Bell's Scottish History Source Books.) • James Pringle Thomson
... hoods, in charge of sundry groups of children dressed in black, with red or blue stripes according to the colleges to which they belonged; a few officials from the academy, fat and bald, listened to the mass standing, bending their heads over their cuirass. In this scattered assemblage, listening to the music, stood out the pupils from the school of noble ladies, some of them quite girls, others proud-looking young women in all the pride of their budding beauty, looking on with glowing eyes, all dressed in black ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... a light cuirass protecting the front of the body; brigantine, a jacket quilted with iron (also spelt 'brigandine'); gorget, a metal covering for the throat; mace, a heavy club, plain or spiked, designed to ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott
... The English horsemen's foaming ranks Forced their resistless way. Then to the musket-knell succeeds The clash of swords—the neigh of steeds - As plies the smith his clanging trade, Against the cuirass rang the blade; And while amid their close array The well-served cannon rent their way, And while amid their scattered band Raged the fierce rider's bloody brand, Recoiled in common rout and fear, Lancer and guard and cuirassier, ...
— Some Poems by Sir Walter Scott • Sir Walter Scott
... other vizored and in armor. But it is often only to conceal the craven heart that beats beneath the brazen cuirass. ...
— Hints for Lovers • Arnold Haultain
... stamp," he said, "one is never the stronger except sword in hand. So long as Aramis continued a soldier, there was hope of getting the better of him; but since he has covered his cuirass with a stole, we are lost. But what can Aramis' object possibly be?" And D'Artagnan plunged again into deep thought. "What does it matter to me, after all," he continued, "if his only object is to overthrow M. Colbert? And what ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... ermine—men wearing doublet, jack-coat, pourpoint; men in turban and caftan, men covered with mail of all kinds—armour of leather, of fibre, of lacquer, of quilted silk, of linked steel, Milanaise, iron cuirass; the emblazoned panoply of the Mongol paladins; Timour Melek's greaves of virgin gold; men of all nations and of all ages who fashioned or executed human law, from Moses to Caesar, from Mohammed to Genghis Kahn and the Golden ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers |
