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Portcullis   Listen
noun
Portcullis  n.  
1.
(Fort.) A grating of iron or of timbers pointed with iron, hung over the gateway of a fortress, to be let down to prevent the entrance of an enemy. "Let the portcullis fall." "She... the huge portcullis high updrew."
2.
An English coin of the reign of Elizabeth, struck for the use of the East India Company; so called from its bearing the figure of a portcullis on the reverse.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Portcullis" Quotes from Famous Books



... a castle at Menouville," he said. "I know there is, although I've never been there, and I never heard of the place before. When we arrive the drawbridge will be down and the portcullis up. All the men-at-arms will have burnished their armor brightly and will wait respectfully in parallel rows to welcome us as we pass between. His Grace, the Duke of Light Heart, in a suit of red velvet will be standing on the ...
— The Forest of Swords - A Story of Paris and the Marne • Joseph A. Altsheler

... he cried, "is the king's own favourite, and if any harm come to a lock of her hair, I tell you that there is not a living soul within this portcullis who will not die a death of torture. Fools, will you gasp out your lives upon the rack, or writhe in boiling oil, at the bidding ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle

... and fled. Owain pursued him, and followed close upon him, although he was not near enough to strike him with his sword. Then Owain descried a vast and resplendent castle; and they came to the castle gate. The black knight was allowed to enter, but the portcullis was let fall upon Owain, and it struck his horse behind the saddle, and cut him in two, and carried away the rowels of the spurs that were upon Owain's heels. And the portcullis descended to the floor. And the rowels of the spurs and part of the ...
— The Junior Classics, V4 • Willam Patten (Editor)

... the wall were tall slate roofs mossed with silver, a chapel belfry, the top of a keep. A moat filled with wild shrubs and brambles surrounded the place; the drawbridge had been replaced by a stone arch, and the portcullis by an iron gate. I stood for a long time on the hither side of the moat, gazing about me, and letting the influence of the place sink in. I said to myself: "If I wait long enough, the guardian will turn up and show me the ...
— Kerfol - 1916 • Edith Wharton

... But they entered it along with men bringing wares into the town, and none heeded them much, till they came to the very gate, on the further side of a moat that was both deep and clean; but as now the bridge was down and the portcullis up, so that the market-people might pass in easily, for it was yet early in the day. But before the door on either side stood men-at-arms well weaponed, and on the right side was their captain, a tall man with ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris

... Lamberts' Fort Royal. To the right is the approach to the castle by the south gate to the barbican, crossed by a wall, with the middle gate, with the east gate at the extremity of the line. We next approach, the ballium, or castle yard through the Porter's Lodge of two towers with a portcullis. The wall of the castle-yard, it will be seen, has a parapet, and is flanked with towers, and the chapel to the right of the Lodge. East and West of the yard is seen the semi-circular moat or ditch; and on an eminence near the western extremity of the ballium, stands the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 19, No. 531, Saturday, January 28, 1832. • Various

... during the combat, Sir Ivaine followed. But he could not quite catch up with the Black Knight, although gaining on him inch by inch. By the time the castle moat was reached, Sir Ivaine was only five feet behind. The horses thundered one after the other over the bridge. The Black Knight rode under the portcullis, or sharp iron gate, which was raised. The instant he was inside, the portcullis fell, in order ...
— King Arthur and His Knights • Maude L. Radford

... next he might encounter and behold him in his bodily shape. Anon, he and the hermit buried the good knight Sir Perin, and rode on with the damsel till they came to a great castle, whereinto they were about to enter. But when Sir Balin had passed through the gateway, the portcullis fell behind him suddenly, leaving the damsel on the outer side, with men around her, drawing their swords as if ...
— The Legends Of King Arthur And His Knights • James Knowles

... Chester were lords of the place. In the fourteenth century it was fortified with walls of great height and thickness, three miles in circuit and strengthened by thirty-two towers, each of the twelve gates being defended by a portcullis. A parliament was held at Coventry by Henry VI., and Henry VII. was heartily welcomed there after Bosworth Field; while the town was also a favorite residence of Edward the Black Prince. Among the many places of captivity for Mary Queen of Scots ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook

... reigned so long that the portcullis was never lowered; the moats were filled with water; swallows built their nests in the cracks of the battlements, and as soon as the sun shone too strongly, the archer who all day long paced to and fro on the curtain, withdrew to the watch-tower and ...
— Three short works - The Dance of Death, The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitaller, A Simple Soul. • Gustave Flaubert

... impregnable on account of the precipitous slopes of the cliffs. The other side was defended by three stone walls laid out in zigzag shape, with salient and reentrant angles (demi-lunes), like an old-fashioned rail fence, with many doors, each closed by stone portcullis, in each wall. Within the walls was a citadel of three tall towers. The whole constituted ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... got up opposite the mighty rock, which sparkled all over with crystals, he found a narrow bridge, defended by gates and portcullis and towers with loopholes. But the gates stood wide open, and were dropping from their great hinges; the portcullis was eaten away with rust, and clung to the grooves evidently immovable; while the loopholed towers had neither floor nor roof, and their tops were fast filling up their interiors. ...
— The Princess and the Curdie • George MacDonald

... trumpets blow; And, from the platform, spare ye not To fire a noble salvo-shot: Lord Marmion waits below!" Then to the castle's lower ward Sped forty yeomen tall, The iron-studded gates unbarred, Raised the portcullis' ponderous guard, The lofty palisade unsparred, And let ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott

... was really a castle,—not simply a country mansion so called, but a stone edifice with battlements and a round tower at one corner, and a gate which looked as if it might have had a portcullis, and narrow windows in a portion of it, and a cannon mounted upon a low roof, and an excavation called the moat,—but which was now a fantastic and somewhat picturesque garden,—running round two sides ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope

... the entrance of the new prisoner, the clashing of arms, the grating of the heavy portcullis, as it groaned and strained in its ascent, the dull fall of the drawbridge, the voices of men, and the rattling of wheels, awakened the Prince; who, with the natural weariness of a captive, had already retired to rest. Summoning an attendant he demanded ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... an affront to the King, and, leaping from his enormous black charger, he approached the portcullis and with his hand tore the ponderous thing from its sockets and broke ...
— Legend Land, Volume 2 • Various

... her bravery were in vain; the infantry flung themselves into the boats, and regained the town, and Joan and her brave comrades covered their retreat. The Burgundians were coming up in mass upon Compiegne, and Flavy gave orders to pull up the draw-bridge and let down the portcullis. Joan and some of her following lingered outside, still fighting. She wore a rich surcoat and a red sash, and all the efforts of the Burgundians were directed against her. Twenty men thronged round ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume III. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... the portcullis of the castle; the wardour and men-at-arms are there to receive him with full honors, though he comes privately, without his armor or his followers: he wears the civil but costly dress of the period, with no other weapon than ...
— The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney • Samuel Warren

... above and between the Turkish houses. The Castelli of to-day is the principal street of this quarter, running through its centre, and guarded by the gates whose arches remain, valueless and without portcullis, but showing in their present state how strong a defence was needed to assure the patricians in their slumbers against any importunate attempts of their malcontent subjects and fellow-townsmen to clear off the score which the infamous government of the Republic accumulated. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various

... walks, and trees planted for profit and delight. Another passage was on the west side, leading to a dungeon, and forth on to the mere, now filled up with mire and weeds. But the largest passage and most used was, and is, that towards the south and town; there being formerly a portcullis over that gate, which was made in one of the strongest towers, and a drawbridge without, defended by an half-moon of stone, about a man's height, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19. No. 575 - 10 Nov 1832 • Various

... time to return from the donjon, than D'Artagnan placed himself in ambuscade close to the Rue de Petit-Musc, so as to see every one who might leave the gates of the Bastile. After he had spent an hour on the look-out from the "Golden Portcullis," under the pent-house of which he could keep himself a little in the shade, D'Artagnan observed a soldier leave the Bastile. This was, indeed, the surest indication he could possibly have wished for, as every jailer or warder has certain days, and even certain hours, for leaving the ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... postern in the small round tower beside the gateway, knowing that when she came out under the portcullis, the funeral train would be just reaching the other end of the bridge. The little vaulted room in the lower story of the tower was not four steps in width across, from door to door; but it was almost dark, and there the Lady Goda stopped one moment before she went out to meet the mourners. Standing ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford

... jaw, which seems like the long narrow lid of an immense snuff-box, with a hinge at one end, instead of one side. If you pry it up, so as to get it overhead, and expose its rows of teeth, it seems a terrific portcullis; and such, alas! it proves to many a poor wight in the fishery, upon whom these spikes fall with impaling force. But far more terrible is it to behold, when fathoms down in the sea, you see some sulky whale, floating there suspended, with his prodigious jaw, some fifteen ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... the ridge, fronting the North as though still looking, albeit with a seemingly languid interest, for the coming of the Scots who were such inveterate foes of its successive lords. The principal entrance, however, the Barbican, faces southwards to the town, and here the massive gateway, with portcullis complete, and crowned by quaint life-size figures of warriors in various attitudes of defence, conveys the impression that the huge giant is still alert and on guard. The history of Alnwick is the history of the castle and its lords, from the days of Gilbert ...
— Northumberland Yesterday and To-day • Jean F. Terry

... Great and small houses alike are evidently built with a view to defence from within. If you take a country walk anywhere in Normandy you find that the gardens of the country houses have massive gates and high walls, the front door is like a portcullis, and the window shutters are barricades. The smallest cottages have great doors and window shutters, and if there is a garden, it is two to one that the wall is a real wall. And not only in the country districts, but in the towns, pre-eminently ...
— Personality in Literature • Rolfe Arnold Scott-James

... of York. The Collar of Roses and Suns had appendages of the heraldic design which was then called "the king's beast," which with Edward IV. was the white lion of March, and with Richard III. the white boar. When Henry VII. resumed the Lancastrian Collar of Esses, he added to it the portcullis of Beaufort. In the former Lancastrian regions it had no pendant, except a plain or jewelled ring, usually of the trefoil form. All the pendant badges which I have enumerated belong to secular heraldry, as do the roses and suns which form the Yorkist collar. The letter S is an emblem of a somewhat ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 51, October 19, 1850 • Various

... ramparts of Milianah, the chief of the Arab bureau, who was walking with his lady in the cool of the morning, hearing these unusual noises and seeing between the branches the flash of sunlight on the weapons, feared a surprise attack; whereupon he lowered the portcullis, beat the alarm and put the town in a ...
— Tartarin de Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet

... patronage, with which this cultivated American overrode the indignant showwoman; pointed out, for the general benefit of the admiring tourists, the gaps and lapses in her artistic, architectural, and archaeological knowledge; and made mullion and portcullis, and armour and tapestry the pegs for a series of neat discourses on mediaeval history, domestic decoration, ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell

... Somersetshire than the county the other side of the channel. The Dukes of Beaufort seem paramount wherever you go; and in every town, and even in all the villages, there is sure to be a house of entertainment with the royal portcullis on the signpost, and the name of the Beaufort Arms. The domains of the family must be larger than half a dozen foreign principalities; and, from all we heard, the conduct of the present noble Somerset is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various

... carefully swung into the narrow way and soon accomplished the ascent. Passing under a portcullis as mediaeval as that of any Rhenish castle, they stopped in an ancient, stone-flagged courtyard. On every side, thronging about them, they met the vengeful, scowling eyes of men in a frenzy of fear and hate, while a growling murmur of resentment greeted their ears as the mob recognized their ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton

... but on argent, or argent but on or, that illegitimacy should be denoted by a lozenge, and widowhood by a bend, the new science would be just as good as the old science, because both the new and the old would be good for nothing. The mummery of Portcullis and Rouge Dragon, as it has no other value than that which caprice has assigned to it, may well submit to any laws which caprice may impose on it. But it is not so with that great imitative art, to the power of which all ages, ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... emerged sullenly and suddenly from the laughing verdure. The sound of the bugle, the pennon of the knight, the rapid watchword, produced a loud shout of welcome from a score or two of grim soldiery on the walls; the portcullis was raised, and Montreal, throwing himself hastily from his panting steed, sprung across the threshold of a jutting porch, and traversed a huge hall, when a lady—young, fair, and richly dressed—met him with a step equally swift, and fell breathless ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... seem likely that we should be besieged by any force having guns, and I let the matter remain until the tenants should be better off and we could spend our money on such work. However, it is too late now to think of that. I suppose there is a portcullis ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty

... Grace the Lord General, Sir John Robinson, Lieutenant of the Tower, and Sir Richard Brown; and then to have declared for an equal division of lands, &c. The better to effect this hellish design, the City was to have been fired, and the portcullis let down to keep out all assistance; and the Horse Guards to have been surprised in the inns where they were quartered, several ostlers having been gained for that purpose. The Tower was accordingly viewed, and its surprise ordered by boats over ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... mass of now only picturesque ruins, a curious type of the architecture of the thirteenth century. Five of the eight enormous battlemented towers remain, and the flamboyant window of the chapel on the upper floor of the building is still preserved. Traces of the portcullis and drawbridge are visible. Over the gallery is an escutcheon, with a couchant lion holding the arms of Brittany, between two stags, also couchant, at the foot of a tree. The sea that bathed the walls of the castle has been driven back by the accumulation ...
— Brittany & Its Byways • Fanny Bury Palliser

... spoke a language so different from his own, how could he hope to make himself heard? He knew that her family and her immediate friends—Mr. Langhope, the Gaineses, Mrs. Ansell and Mr. Tredegar—far from being means of communication, were so many sentinels ready to raise the drawbridge and drop the portcullis at his approach. They were all in league to stifle the incipient feelings he had roused in Bessy, to push her back into the deadening routine of her former life, and the only voice that might conceivably speak for him was ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton

... Under the glass portcullis of a theatre Amory stood, watching the first great drops of rain splatter down and flatten to dark stains on the sidewalk. The air became gray and opalescent; a solitary light suddenly outlined a window over the way; then another light; then a hundred more danced and glimmered ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald

... above all, Nuernberg, represented the high-water mark of mediaeval civilization as regards town life. On entering the burg, should it have happened to be in time of peace and in daylight, the stranger would clear the drawbridge and the portcullis without much challenge; passing along streets lined with the houses and shops of the burghers, in whose open frontages the master and his apprentices and gesellen plied their trades, discussing eagerly ...
— German Culture Past and Present • Ernest Belfort Bax

... dragon on each side riding on a broomstick, and the devil looking on from the mouth of an alligator, sir.[32] Odd, I think; interesting. Then the corners may be turned by octagonal towers, like the center one in Kenilworth Castle; with Gothic doors, portcullis, and all, quite perfect; with cross slits for arrows, battlements for musketry, machicolations for boiling lead, and a room at the top for drying plums; and the conservatory at the bottom, sir, with Virginian creepers up the towers; ...
— The Poetry of Architecture • John Ruskin

... find the larger and truer happiness of life. Says Jenkin Lloyd Jones, "I would rather live in an alley, stayed all round with human loves, associations and ambitions, than dwell in a palace with drawbridge, moat, and portcullis, apart from the community about me, alienated from my neighbors, unable to share the woes and the joys of those with whom I divide nature's bounty of land and landscape, of air and sky." And along this same line of thinking, Charles Hargrove says: "Brother, ...
— The Girl Wanted • Nixon Waterman

... used to have fights between the beasts, and James I. was very fond of combats between lions and dogs in presence of his court. All these animals were moved several years ago to the Zooelogical Gardens. We passed through strong gates, defended by a portcullis, and on our left we saw what the warden called the Bell Tower, and which was the prison of Bishop Fisher, who was beheaded for not acknowledging Henry VIII. to be the head of the church. I wanted to see the ...
— Young Americans Abroad - Vacation in Europe: Travels in England, France, Holland, - Belgium, Prussia and Switzerland • Various

... a circumstance peculiarly galling to Caleb, who had been wont to exercise over them the same sweeping authority in levying contributions which was exercised in former times in England, when "the royal purveyors, sallying forth from under the Gothic portcullis to purchase provisions with power and prerogative, instead of money, brought home the plunder of an hundred markets, and all that could be seized from a flying and hiding country, and deposited their ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott

... perceive, now, that the drawbridge was up, the portcullis down, and all the bars and shutters of the castle in place. Moreover, in the outer darkness in which he moved, he imagined there roamed lions and wolves and ravening beasts—and he with no guide but ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick

... scene is when his rival for the princess' hand, Count Feodor, attacks him between the portcullis and the ruined chapel, armed with a mitrailleuse, a yataghan, and a couple of Siberian bloodhounds. This scene is what runs the best-seller into the twenty-ninth edition before the publisher has had time to draw a check for the ...
— Options • O. Henry

... with careful eye. Before him lay a moat full sixty feet across and two thirds full of water, with no means of passage save the drawbridge, that hung so high on its chains as to seem almost against the outer portcullis. From the farther edge the wall rose solid and grim, and, as he knew from Sir John, with no opening in all its circuit save the ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott

... old days of chivalry, when every mountain that bathes its shadow in the Rhine had its castle; not inhabited as now by a few rats and owls, nor covered with moss and wallflowers and funguses and creeping ivy. No, no; where the ivy now clusters there grew strong portcullis and bars of steel; where the wallflowers now quiver in the ramparts there were silken banners embroidered with wonderful heraldry; men-at-arms marched where now you shall only see a bank of moss ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope

... ideas. How he would glory in our present prospects! 'Tis strange what a strong confidence I have ever had in the destiny of your house. I felt sure that Providence would not desert us. There is no doubt we must have a portcullis.' ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli

... fell, the grim portcullis rose with creak and rattle, the great gate swung open wide, and into the castle ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks

... came to the open seashore; a pretty little harbour surrounded with quaint-looking houses; two or three white villas in fertile gardens, on a raised road; and, dominating all the scene, a fine old feudal castle, with keep, battlements, drawbridge, portcullis, and all that ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon

... "And darest thou, then, To beard the lion in his den,— The Douglas in his hall? And hopest thou hence unscathed to go? No, by Saint Bride of Bothwell, no!— Up drawbridge, grooms! what, warder, ho! Let the portcullis fall." Lord Marmion turned,—well was his need,— And dashed the rowels in his steed, Like arrow through the archway sprung; The ponderous gate behind him rung: To pass, there was such scanty room, The ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick

... than an hour's drive from Arden to Hale: the village-church clock and a great clock in the Castle stables were both striking twelve as the carriage drove under a massive stone arch, above which the portcullis still hung grimly. It was something like going into a prison, Clarissa thought; but she had scarcely time for the reflection, when the carriage swept round a curve in the smooth gravel road, and she saw the sunny western front of the Castle, glorious in all ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon

... the child when he has entered upon the war-path of getting "something to do." If legitimate means fail, then "let the portcullis fall;" the child must ...
— Children's Rights and Others • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin

... nothing. For in that garth was neither knight nor squire nor sergeant; no spear-head glittered from the wall, no gleam of helm showed from the war-swales; no porter was at the gate; the drawbridge over the deep ghyll was down, the portcullis was up, and the great ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris

... nothing froward or formidable in the aspect of Dublin Castle. It has neither a portcullis nor a drawbridge. People go in and out of it as freely as through the City Hall in New York. There is a show of sentries at the main entrance, and in one of the courts this morning the picturesque band of a Scotch regiment was playing to the delectation ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (1 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert

... to me no more Than an unstringed viol or a harp, Or like a cunning instrument cased up, Or, being open, put into his hands That knows no touch to tune the harmony; Within my mouth you have engaoled my tongue, Doubly portcullis'd with my teeth and lips, And dull, unfeeling, barren ignorance Is made my gaoler to attend on me. I am too old to fawn upon a nurse, Too far in years to be a ...
— How to Write Clearly - Rules and Exercises on English Composition • Edwin A. Abbott

... Crussol above the village of S. Peray at its feet, where is made a very capital sparkling wine, not at all inferior to champagne. There is also there an odd chateau, designed, it is believed, by Marshal Vauban, on the plan of a mimic fortress, with bastions, curtains, glacis, portcullis, and loopholes. It is now the residence of the owner of the great vineyards where the S. Peray ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould

... were quite conscious that their lady would be as good as her word, they at once proceeded to carry her orders into effect. The wheels of the portcullis and drawbridge were oiled, as were the bolts and hinges of the gate. The men were formed up in the courtyard, where presently they were joined by Marjory who had put on a light steel cap and a shirt of mail, and who had armed herself with a light ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty

... patron saints of cities should mould the temper of the people to their own likeness? S. George, the chivalrous, is champion of Ferrara. His is the marble group above the Cathedral porch, so feudal in its medieval pomp. He and S. Michael are painted in fresco over the south portcullis of the Castle. His lustrous armour gleams with Giorgionesque brilliancy from Dossi's masterpiece in the Pinacoteca. That Ferrara, the only place in Italy where chivalry struck any root, should have had S. George for patron, is at ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds

... no way of entering the building, save by walking in through the gate, or climbing the walls with the help of a scaling ladder. The place is much more formidable looking than the battery, being in appearance a strong castle, with dry ditch, drawbridge, and portcullis to the main and, so far as I could see, the only entrance. In plan it is shaped like the letter L, with the angle turned harbour-ward; and it must mount about thirty pieces of ordnance, for I managed to count that number of ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood

... awake, chattering to Kate and Isabel, who were my bedfellows, about some grand play we meant to have the next afternoon, in the great gallery—when all at once we heard a horse come dashing up to the portcullis, past our chamber wall, and a horn crying ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt

... ground floor would stand a siege from the street. The Palazzo Gabrielli, for two or three centuries the chief dwelling of the Orsini, is built in the midst of the city like a great fortification, with escarpments and buttresses and loop-holes; and at the main gate there is still a portcullis which sinks into the ground by a system of chains and balance weights and is kept in ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 1 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford

... raised a warning hand, which compelled the Lord Giovanni to pause; then he rasped out a brisk command to his followers. The winches creaked, and the drawbridge swung up even as with a clank and rattle of chains the portcullis fell. ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini

... circumstances occurred which to Mary's childish imagination were pregnant with evil, and prognosticated nothing less than the day of general doom. The city was in a state of unusual commotion, a report had gained ground that the invader was at hand, some foolish person had caused the massive portcullis of the city gate to be let down, several recruiting parties were parading the streets, two of these she met, and the shrill blasts of a few mounted trumpeters, together with a dense and portentous ...
— Religion in Earnest - A Memorial of Mrs. Mary Lyth, of York • John Lyth

... by a lofty turreted wall, of an architecture to which the pilgrim was unaccustomed: gates with drawbridge and portcullis, square towers, and loopholes for the archer. Sentinels, clothed in steel and shining in the sunset, paced, at regular intervals, the cautious wall, and on a lofty tower a standard waved, a snowy standard, with a ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli

... swarmed with soldiers busy loading or unloading the big vans, or clustered about the commissariat motors while hams and quarters of beef were handed out. As we approached Verdun the cannonade had grown louder again; and when we reached the walls of the town and passed under the iron teeth of the portcullis we felt ourselves in one of the last outposts of a mighty line of defense. The desolation of Verdun is as impressive as the feverish activity of Chalons. The civil population was evacuated in September, and only a small percentage have returned. Nine-tenths ...
— Fighting France - From Dunkerque to Belport • Edith Wharton

... night; that refectory, upon which the architect had bestowed the air, the beauty, and the rose window of a cathedral; that elegant chapel of the Virgin; that monumental dormitory; those vast gardens; that portcullis; that drawbridge; that envelope of battlements which notched to the eye the verdure of the surrounding meadows; those courtyards, where gleamed men at arms, intermingled with golden copes;—the whole grouped ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo

... so destroy the last chance of the thing dying a natural death." Said Philippa:—"I don't believe you want it to"—a construction denounced, we believe, by sensitive grammarians. The Earl let it pass, replying:—"I do not wish it to die a violent death." Her ladyship dropped the portcullis of her mind against a crowd of useless reflections. One was, whether her own relation with this young man's father had died a violent death; and, if so, was she any the worse? The rest were a motley crowd, ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... which is set for the rat on mischief bent, and which has a blade above ready to fall and strike and catch, and which is suddenly released whenever anything, however gently, comes in contact with the spring. In like fashion, beneath the gate there were two springs connected with a portcullis up above, edged with iron and very sharp. If anything stepped upon this contrivance the gate descended from above, and whoever below was struck by the gate was caught and mangled. Precisely in the middle the passage lay as narrow as if it were a beaten track. Straight through ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes

... top. It is curiously turned askew, as if to avoid some obstacle, but the chambers of the tomb of Den do not come near its direction. After nine steps, the straight passage is reached, and then a limestone portcullis slab bars the way, let into grooves on either side; it was, moreover, backed up by a buttress of brickwork in five steps behind it. All this shows that the rest of the passage must have been roofed in so ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 12 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... I reached the gates, we found that Cecil and Lord Rutland were holding a consultation through the parley-window. The portcullis was still down, and the gates were closed; but soon the portcullis was raised, a postern was opened from within, and Sir William entered the castle with two ...
— Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall • Charles Major

... have sunk under their battlements, or rise only with reversed muskets; they have made a white flag of napkins; go beating the chamade, or seeming to beat, for one can hear nothing. The very Swiss at the portcullis look weary of firing; disheartened in the fire-deluge, a port-hole at the drawbridge is opened, as by one that would speak. See Huissier Maillard, the shifty man! On his plank, swinging over the abyss of that stone ditch—plank resting on parapet, balanced ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various

... imagination in England. The Centennial Exhibition had done its deadly work—Abbey and Parsons were dissatisfied—they wanted to see more. Back of the stagecoach times lay the days of the castle. Back of the musket was the blunderbuss, and back of these were the portcullis, the moat, the spear and ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard

... to invite Christina to a conference outside the town. The reception which they met was such as to convince them that the regent's widow possessed, at any rate, a portion of her husband's courage. No sooner did they near the capital than the portcullis was raised and a volley fired upon them from within the walls. Thus discomfited, the ambassadors withdrew, and Krumpen, having insufficient forces to undertake a siege, returned to Upsala, and the Swedish forces that had joined ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson

... of castles, not of rooks. I do not know whence came this custom of calling the most romantic piece on the board by the name of a very ordinary bird, but I, at least, will not be a party to it. I refuse to surrender the portcullis and the moat, the bastion and the well-manned towers, which were the features of every castle with which hitherto I have played, in order to take the field with allies so unromantic as a brace of rooks. You may tell me that "rook" is a corruption of this or that word, meaning something which ...
— If I May • A. A. Milne

... approached the forts — Grimeston in front closely guarded by the Spanish captain — it was seen by the assailants that Redhead had kept his word: the drawbridge across the moat was down and the portcullis was up. Within the fort Lord Willoughby, Vere, and two thousand men were waiting for them. When about fifty had crossed the drawbridge the portcullis was suddenly let fall and the drawbridge hauled up. As the portcullis thundered down Grimeston tripped up the surprised Spaniard, ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty

... less ancient, and yet more devastated by time than the former one. The arcade has fallen in, and it requires some attention to reinstate it. This gate formed three entrances. The two side ways were probably intended for pedestrians; the one in the middle was closed by means of a portcullis sliding in a groove, still visible, but covered with stucco. As the portcullis, in descending, would have, thrown down this coating, we must infer that at the time of the eruption it had not been in use for a long while, Pompeii having ceased to ...
— The Wonders of Pompeii • Marc Monnier

... to the archway was suspended a portcullis of wrought-iron bars. This was the real barrier, for, even if the attacking party succeeded in battering down the outer gate, they would find themselves cooped up in the passageway and exposed to missiles discharged both through the grating and from trap-doors in the vaulted ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen

... few paces behind, and offering his hand to Dame Editha, he led her to the group of archers, while Cuthbert, alone, crossed the drawbridge and entered the portal, the heavy portcullis falling after him. ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty

... PORTCULLIS, a strong grating resembling a harrow hanging over the gateway of a fortress, let down in a groove of the wall in the case of ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... Sebastian. Then the porter raised some difficulties, but the Count of Monte Cristo produced a permit from the governor of Rome, allowing him to leave or enter the city at any hour of the day or night; the portcullis was therefore raised, the porter had a louis for his trouble, and they went on their way. The road which the carriage now traversed was the ancient Appian Way, and bordered with tombs. From time to time, by the light of the moon, which began ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... the castle, crossed the moat by the drawbridge, passed through the arched gateway, under the portcullis, the young folks, and indeed the older ones also, gazing at it with much curiosity, and entered a spacious hall, the walls of which were hung with bows and ancient weapons, and armor such as was worn by warriors ...
— Elsie at the World's Fair • Martha Finley

... rose the towers of Cairncarque. There was a castle indeed!—something to call a castle!—with its huge square tower at every corner, and its still huger two towers in the middle of its front, its moat, and the causeway where once had been its drawbridge!—Yes! there were the spikes of the portcullis, sticking down from the top of the gateway, like the long upper teeth of a giant or ogre! That was a real castle—such as he had read of in books, such as ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... absence of the old peer, young Hopeful spends his time as befits his rank and expectations. He grooms his steed, plays with his hawks, feeds his hounds, and labours diligently to acquire grace and dexterity in the use of arms. At noon the portcullis is lowered, and out shoots a brilliant array of ladies and gentlemen, and falconers with hawks. They bend their course to the river, over which a rainbow is rising from a shower. Yonder young lady is laughing at our stripling squire, who seems half angry, half pleased: they are ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith

... honeysuckle, clove pinks and gilliflowers; the lower parts of the walls were hung with tapestry representing the adventures of Saint George; the mullioned windows had their upper squares filled with glass, bearing the shield of the City of London, that of the Armourers' Company, the rose and portcullis of the King, the pomegranate of Queen Catharine, and other like devices. Others, belonging to the Lancastrian kings, adorned the pendants from the handsome open roof and the front of a gallery for musicians which crossed one end of the ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge

... tower at each corner, but the fortification below consisting of glass; the sham cloister, likewise glass windows, for drawing-room, music-room, and conservatory; and jutting out far in advance, a great embattled gateway, with a sham portcullis, and doors fit to ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge

... John, Lord Muncaster (the first of the family who obtained a peerage), entered into possession of Muncaster Castle, after his elevation in 1793, he found it still surrounded with a moat, and defended by a strong portcullis. The family having of late years entirely resided upon their estate of Wartee in Yorkshire, the house was in so very dilapidated a state that Lord Muncaster was obliged to rebuild it almost entirely, with the exception of Agricola's Tower, the walls of which are nine feet thick. The elevation ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby

... the command of the portcullis guard from two till five to-morrow morning. A lantern hung up on the bridge of Hornos to advise me of your approach—a password between us—and your presence. I presume your Excellency will not yield to any one ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid

... we arrived— after a march of about a mile—at the gates of a most forbidding-looking edifice constructed of heavy blocks of masonry, and which had all the appearance of being a fortress. Passing through the gloomy gateway— which was protected by a portcullis—we found ourselves in a large open paved courtyard, across which we marched to a door on the opposite side. Entering this door, we wheeled to the right and passed along a wide stone passage which conducted us to a sort of guard-room. We were here received by a lanky, cadaverous-looking individual ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood

... blockade &c. (closure) 261. interference, interposition; obtrusion; discouragement, discountenance. impediment, let, obstacle, obstruction, knot, knag[obs3]; check, hitch, contretemps, screw loose, grit in the oil. bar, stile, barrier; [barrier to vehicles] turnstile, turnpike; gate, portcullis. beaver dam; trocha[obs3]; barricade &c. (defense) 717; wall, dead wall, sea wall, levee breakwater, groyne[obs3]; bulkhead, block, buffer; stopper &c. 263; boom, dam, weir, burrock[obs3]. drawback, objection; stumbling-block, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... lifted above the rest, and he fell wounded. He was, as I understood afterwards, the Duke of Bourbon. On another day I shot at and wounded the Prince of Orange. Leaving the Campo Santo I made for the Castle of St. Angelo, just as the castellan was letting down the portcullis. When I found myself on the castle walls, the artillery was deserted by the bombardiers, and I took direction of the fire of the artillery and falcons, and killed a considerable number of the enemy. This made some cardinals and others bless ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton

... machicolated parapets, the long loopholes mantled with ivy, the outsloping basement, against which the battering ram might have long played in vain, the family escutcheon with the arms crumbled from it, the portcullis itself showing its iron teeth above the traveller's head. It was the most perfect part of the building; and when the two ladies entered the great court the scene of ruin was more complete. Many a tower had fallen, leaving large gaps in the inner wall; the ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various

... alone, monseigneur," said the Chancellor Olivier, the Cardinal de Tournon, and Birago, who were stationed outside of the portcullis. ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac

... The black and massive arch of the gateway yawned between two huge square towers; and from a yet higher but slender tower on the inner side, the flag gave the "White Bear and Ragged Staff" to the smoky air. Still, under the portal as he entered, hung the grate of the portcullis, and the square court which he saw before him swarmed with the more immediate retainers of the earl, in scarlet jackets, wrought with their chieftain's cognizance. A man of gigantic girth and stature, who officiated as porter, leaning ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... winds around the time-scarred walls. The wagon stopped at the great gate. A horn sounded from within, the gate swung open, a drawbridge fell with a hideous creaking of machinery, and we passed in, twenty or thirty feet above the snow-drifted moat. Beyond the portcullis a dim door swung open. Some sort of seneschal met us with a light and led us below the twilight arches, where beyond, I could catch glimpses of the baileys and courts and the donjon ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough

... is made of strong slabs of ice, long and so narrow, that a fox can with difficulty turn himself in it, and a wolf must actually remain in the position in which he is taken. The door is a heavy portcullis of ice, sliding in two well-secured grooves of the same substance, and is kept up by a line which, passing over the top of the trap, is carried through a hole at the farthest extremity. To the end of the line is fastened a small hoop of whale-bone, and to this any ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various

... the temper of the people to their own likeness? St. George, the chivalrous, is champion of Ferrara. His is the marble group above the cathedral porch, so feudal in its mediaeval pomp. He and St. Michael are painted in fresco over the south portcullis of the castle. His lustrous armor gleams with Giorgionesque brilliancy from Dossi's masterpiece in the Pinacoteca. That Ferrara, the only place in Italy where chivalry struck any root, should have had St. George for patron, is at ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds

... engineering, and not only twisted you into it and twisted you out of it, to the right, to the left, opposite, under here, over there, in the dark, in the dirt, by the gateway, archway, covered way, dry way, wet way, fosse, portcullis, drawbridge, sluice, squat tower, pierced wall, and heavy battery, but likewise took a fortifying dive under the neighbouring country, and came to the surface three or four miles off, blowing out incomprehensible mounds and batteries among the quiet crops of chicory and beet-root,—from ...
— Somebody's Luggage • Charles Dickens

... elephants to each other, a proof was given by two in the Jardin des Plantes, who had been with difficulty separated during their journey thither from Holland. They were placed in two apartments, divided by a portcullis. The male soon found out that this was fastened only by a perpendicular bolt, which he soon raised, and then rushed into the other room. The joy of the two at meeting can scarcely be described: their cries of joy shook the whole building, and they blew air from their trunks ...
— Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals • R. Lee

... an officer appointed to render the proper salutes, acted as chief mourner, surrounded by weeping mourners, who made the ruins of Janina echo with their lamentations. The guns were fired at long intervals. The portcullis was raised to admit the procession, and the whole garrison, drawn up to receive it, rendered a military salute. The body, covered with matting, was laid in a grave beside that of Amina. When the grave had been filled in, a priest approached to listen to the supposed conflict between the ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... Owain pursued him and followed close upon him, although he was not near enough to strike him with his sword. Then Owain descried a vast and resplendent castle; and they came to the castle gate. And the black knight was allowed to enter, and the portcullis was let fall upon Owain; and it struck his horse behind the saddle, and cut him in two, and carried away the rowels of the spurs that were upon Owains' heels. And the portcullis descended to the floor. And the rowels of the spurs and part of the horse were without, ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch

... circle. According to Henry B. Wheatley, the "room the society dined in, a little Escurial in itself, was most appropriately fitted up: the doors, wainscoting, and roof of good old English oak, ornamented with gridirons as thick as Henry VII's Chapel with the portcullis of the founder. The society's badge was a gridiron, which was engraved upon the rings, glass, and the forks and spoons. At the end of the dining-room was an enormous grating in the form of a gridiron, through which the fire was seen and the steaks handed from the ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley

... was a Protestant; of ancient family and limited means. Where the living scions of the noble stock held their land, and went forth over their acres from under the ancestral portcullis, was more than even Mrs. Rowe had been able, with all her penetrating power in scandal, to ascertain. But the young nobleman was Mr. Mohun's friend—and that was enough. There had been reverses in the family. Losses fall upon the noblest lines; and supposing the Count de Gars in the ...
— The Cockaynes in Paris - 'Gone abroad' • Blanchard Jerrold

... sickle-curve round the base of a high rock, Entrevaux shoots far up into the sky. The river bathes its dark walls, protected by devices dear to the hearts of mediaeval Vaubans. Pepper-castor sentry-boxes jut out over the water; a great drawbridge with portcullis, triple gateway, and neat contrivances for pouring oil and molten lead upon besiegers, alone gives access to the town; while behind the old crowded houses a fortified stairway in the rock leads dizzily ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson

... legible inscription (40 E.R. 1520,) on a shield over the arch: we proceed to another gateway in a spacious square building, whose angles are strengthened by two noble round towers: this opens into the interior area; had several prison rooms, and was armed with a portcullis: but the whole of it is ...
— Brannon's Picture of The Isle of Wight • George Brannon

... to Charlotte, and found, to my surprise, that she had had the same joys and encountered the same disappointments in this delectable country. She, too, had walked up that road and flattened her nose against that portcullis; and she pointed out something that I had overlooked—to wit, that if you rowed off in a boat to the curly ship, and got hold of a rope, and clambered aboard of her, and swarmed up the mast, and got into the crow's-nest, you could just see over the headland, and take ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame

... for minor public documents or for private papers authenticated by public authority. This paper bears a seal having the legend "Sigillum ad causas oppidi Rotterodami", encircling an impression of a castle with portcullis, standing on a shore, with a swan swimming in front of ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various

... was astonished more than ever at the house. It was liker a castle. There was an arched entrance, very solid, all of brick, with the teeth even of a portcullis shewing. An old man came out of a door on our right, as our hoofs rang out; but he made no sign or salute; he took our horses' heads as we dismounted, and I heard ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson

... not fear an undisciplined people in their fury. Your daughter shall be as dear to me as mine own; and in that faith you may prick forth—if, indeed, you will not still, like a wiser man, shut gate, down portcullis, up drawbridge, and let your archers and my crossbows man the wall, and tell the knaves you are not the fool ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... draw-bridge through a gateway covered with ivy, and still guarded as of old, by an ancient portcullis. In the hall of the castle, pannelled with richly carved oak, are religiously guarded the helmet of Cromwell, the armor of the Black Prince, and many historic relics and art treasures. The drawing-room ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton

... it in my power to place on a few copies of each a decisive mark of appropriation. I have chosen for this purpose a device borne by a champion of my name in a tournament at Stirling! It was a gate and portcullis, with the motto CLAUSUS TUTUS ERO. I have it engraved on a seal, as you may remark on the enclosure, but it is done in a most blackguard style. Now what I want is to have this same gateway and this same portcullis and this same motto of clausus tutus ero, which is an anagram of Walterus Scotus ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles

... rebuilded, you, my children, are of course familiar with, for you were all born here. At that date the great central tower alone stood erect amid the universal destruction. A black wolf's head reared itself high above the portcullis. The moat was filled with drift of crumbling years, and the walls, fallen in many places, ran hither and thither in aimless curves and angles, much as ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson

... the high, arched gateway upon the Castle Hill. We will climb those steps, only of course the stones were newer and cleaner then, and less worn by generations of climbing feet. Up them we mount till we reach the gateway with its threatening portcullis, where the soldiers of King Charles the Second, in their jackboots, are walking up and down on guard, determined to keep out all intruders. Intruders we certainly are, seeing that we belong to another generation and another ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin

... grating, slowly up the huge portcullis went, And the draw-bridge over the moat creaking, shrieking, downward bent; On his armor flashed the torch-light, over helmet, cuirass, shield, With its lion d' or couchant upon a stainless ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various

... the arch is charged with the portcullis and foliage alternately; and on the point are the royal arms in a garter, and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 554, Saturday, June 30, 1832 • Various

... was Sir Edward Dalyngrudge, who fought at both Crecy and Poictiers, and must therefore have seen the primitive forerunner of the modern field-gun in use. The walls of the castle now enclose a grassy quadrangle, to which access is gained through a fine gateway, which still retains its outer iron portcullis. The three others, through which an attacking force was obliged to penetrate, have all disappeared. Although it has been stated that the parliamentary forces under Waller captured Bodiam Castle during the Civil War, it seems to be unlikely that such an ...
— What to See in England • Gordon Home

... of the western tower, he reined in his horse. He did not alight, but, approaching so near the wall that he could rest his foot upon an abutment, he stood up, and raised the blind of a window on the ground-floor, made in the form of a portcullis, such as is still ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny

... free to visit every nook of his new home. Pontesordo, though perhaps as ancient as Donnaz, was but a fortified manor in the plain; but here was the turreted border castle, bristling at the head of the gorge like the fangs in a boar's throat: its walls overhung by machicolations, its portcullis still dropped at nightfall, and the loud stream forming a natural moat at its base. Through the desert spaces of this great structure Odo wandered at will, losing himself in its network of bare chambers, some now put to ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... to the cutting on the mountain wall, and it must have been under ground-level for many centuries. They dug deep down, to make the tomb, and then covered up the entrance with earth. When Corkran got to his portcullis, he thought he'd reached the reward of his labours. Well—so he had—the punishment. Here's the heap of stone he used as a fulcrum for his lever. The heap tumbled when he was on the other side, and the slab of rock came down to trap him. We'll have to build up his ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... the northern base of the pillars, we find a very beautiful alabaster monument (11), with the effigy of Sir John Cheyney (died 1509) clad in military garb, and wearing the collar of SS. with the portcullis badge of Henry VII. suspended therefrom. Sir John Cheyney was the standard-bearer of Henry of Richmond at Bosworth Field. To quote from Hall's "Chronicle"—"King Richard set on so sharply at the first brount that he ouerthrew th'erle's ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Salisbury - A Description of its Fabric and a Brief History of the See of Sarum • Gleeson White

... that they could not easily be injured, and could take aim from the top of their turrets, or from their loophole windows. The gates had absolute little castles of their own, a moat flowed round the walls full of water, and only capable of being crossed by a drawbridge, behind which the portcullis, a grating armed beneath with spikes, was always ready to drop from the archway of the gate and close up the entrance. The only chance of taking a fortress by direct attack was to fill up the moat with earth and faggots, and then raise ladders against ...
— The Junior Classics • Various

... the horse stopped at the door of a great house; and, but that he knew the place was ten miles off, my father would have thought he was at Redgauntlet Castle. They rode into the outer courtyard, through the muckle faulding yetts, and aneath the auld portcullis; and the whole front of the house was lighted, and there were pipes and fiddles, and as much dancing and deray within as used to be at Sir Robert's house at Pace and Yule, and such high seasons. They lap off, and my gudesire, as seemed to him, fastened ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various

... bet a doughnut their ears are glued to their doors. What ho! Somebody's at the portcullis. Probably the padre, ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath

... times—and then across the thickening reek a rusty draw was dropped; Thro portcullis sped a quickening Shadow past to where with sickening Feet, befixed by awe I stopped— There she laughed a laugh No devil's ...
— Nirvana Days • Cale Young Rice

... man went in a chariot, splendid in his fine robes of fur, with a gold chain about his neck. And the guards hurried to let down the portcullis for him, and with low bows bade him enter. But when Saint Berach came he wore only his gray monk's robe, all torn and tattered. He was shivering with cold, and weak from having walked so far. So they thought ...
— The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts • Abbie Farwell Brown

... criticism upon, the hymn indicated. He wrote that he quite agreed with my notion of the right mode of serving her; for any other would be as if a besieging party were to batter a postern by means of boats instead of walking over a lowered drawbridge, and under a raised portcullis. ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald

... all the world loves a lover. Besides, it is a glorious morning for a ride. Up, portcullis, down drawbridge!" waving his hand to ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath

... the drawbridge was so well covered with hard-trodden earth, overgrown at the edges with grass, that, in spite of the massive chains connecting it with the gateway, it seemed permanently fixed on the ground. The spikes of the portcullis frowned above in threatening array, but a wreath of ivy was twining up the groove by which it had once descended, and the archway, which by day stood hospitably open, was at night only guarded by two large oaken doors, yielding to a slight ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge

... prowess and daring bravery. In the year B.C. 562, when serving at the siege of a place called Peh-yang [4], a party of the assailants made their way in at a gate which had purposely been left open, and no sooner were they inside than the portcullis was dropped. Heh was just entering; and catching the massive structure with both his hands, he gradually by dint of main strength raised it and held it up, till his friends had made their escape. Thus much on the ancestry of the sage. ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) Unicode Version • James Legge

... bright-eyed things That float about the air on azure wings, Had been less heartfelt by him than the clang Of clattering hoofs; into the court he sprang, Just as two noble steeds, and palfreys twain, Were slanting out their necks with loosened rein; While from beneath the threat'ning portcullis They brought their happy burthens. What a kiss, What gentle squeeze he gave each lady's hand! How tremblingly their delicate ancles spann'd! Into how sweet a trance his soul was gone, While whisperings of affection Made him ...
— Poems 1817 • John Keats

... renovated by Sir WALTER RALEIGH (the tobacconist, not the professor) and brought up to date by OLIVER CROMWELL. It has dungeons (for keeping the butter cool), loop-holes (through which to pour hot porridge on invaders), an oubliette (for bores) and a portcullis. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 10, 1917 • Various

... rampart it would be impossible to dislodge them, because the rock fell sheer below them twenty feet, or it may be more; while overhead it towered three hundred, and so jutted over that nothing could be cast upon them, even if a man could climb the height. And the access to this portcullis place—if I may so call it, being no portcullis there—was through certain rocky chambers ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various

... been aimed against it. But it was in the civil war that it showed itself in its full force. The weakness of the Crown and the strife of political factions for supremacy left the nobles masters of the field; and the white rose of the House of York, the red rose of the House of Lancaster, the portcullis of the Beauforts, the pied bull of the Nevilles, the bear and ragged staff which Warwick borrowed from the Beauchamps, were seen on hundreds of breasts in Parliament or on ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green

... keep on the forest-bound gazed: The drawbridge was down, the portcullis was raised: And true to his hope came the palfrey amain, With his only loved lady, who checked not ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock

... jumbled rocks, beyond the reach of wind and weather. They were of great variety, large, small, wide, narrow; all ready to move into. They were the conies' castles, ready refuges from enemies, their devious passages as effective as drawbridge or portcullis. ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills

... as the best yew hedge. I marvel at thee. A knight might have spoken it, under favour. They stopped her at Warwick—to see what? two old towers that don't match, {105a} and a portcullis that (people say) opens only upon fast-days. Charlecote Hall, I could have told her sweet Highness, was built by those Lucys who came over with Julius Caesar and William the Conqueror, with cross and scallop-shell on ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor

... be it but ten yards. Methought it scarce worth the trouble to mount the mule for to 'light off him again so soon: howbeit, I did as I was bid. Madam Isabel suffered her lord to lift her upon the other; and away hied we for the Castle, our cavaliers a-walking behind. When we 'light, and the portcullis was drawn up, Master Jeronymo prayeth the porter to send word unto the ineffable Lord Comptroller that the English damsel sent hither by the most noble Lady, Dona Catalina (so they call my Lady of Suffolk's Grace) doth entreat for leave to kiss the dust under his ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt

... the picture had become somewhat more sombre. M. Edouard Dangin writes: "Paris has become a veritable city of war. At seven o'clock in the morning, before all the gates of the city, the guard is under arms, the drum beats aux champs, the portcullis is lowered. It is the opening of the gates. At eight o'clock, in all the quarters of the city, the rappel is beaten, all the citizen soldiers who are to relieve the guard on the ramparts and on the minor posts are called to arms. Others are ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton

... portcullis at Strasburg, Max spurred his horse to Yolanda's side. She neither lifted her veil nor gave any sign of recognition. The news of impending war had been discussed, and Max supposed Yolanda was frightened. He spoke reassuringly to ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major

... capital, with two cold fowls, three-quarters of a yard of bread, and a bottle of porter, for Mr. Jorrocks on the journey, and ere another sun went down, the sandy suburbs of Calais saw them toiling towards her ramparts, and rumbling over the drawbridges and under the portcullis, that guard the entrance to her gloomy town. Calais! cold, cheerless, lifeless Calais! Whose soul has ever warmed as it approached thy town? but how many hearts have turned with sickening sorrow from the mirthless tinkling ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees

... pressed up the steep Castle Hill with a number of Hastings folk, followed by the French. We reached the Castle and got into it, but the old portcullis would not close, and in sundry places the walls were broken down. Here we found a number of women who had climbed for refuge, thinking that the place would be safe. Among these was a beautiful and high-born maiden whom I knew by sight. Her father was Sir Robert ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard

... very wrinkled, his expression very anxious and weary. When he remembered the old banker, it was with no self-reproach that he himself was now doing what, in the banker's case, he had held up to Abel's scorn. It was only to remember that the wary old man had shut down the portcullis of the bank vaults, and that loans were getting to be almost impossible. His face darkened. He swore a ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis

... the most magnificent ruin in Germany. The towers, turrets, buttresses, balconies, and fine statues still stand there, proud and bold, even in its ruins. And the portcullis of iron in one of its lofty gateways gave me the first idea how the balance of the enemy could be shut off, after a portion had been admitted into the yard of the fortifications with a view of slaughtering them. The iron bars of this portcullis ...
— The Youthful Wanderer - An Account of a Tour through England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany • George H. Heffner

... been retouched and regilt in the most approved manner; the new, when the books were of any mark, were rich, but never gaudy—a large proportion of blue morocco—all stamped with his device of the portcullis, and its motto, clausus tutus ero—being an anagram of his name in Latin. Every case and shelf was accurately lettered, and the works arranged systematically; history and biography on one side—poetry and the drama on another—law books and dictionaries behind his own chair. The only ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart

... spoke the Latin language, when they reached the gate, called up the guards, and ordered the gate to be opened, for the consul had arrived. The guards, as if awakened at their call, began to be in a hurry and bustle, and exert themselves in opening the gate, which was closed by letting down the portcullis; some raised this with levers, others drew it up with ropes to such a height that the men could come in without stooping. The opening was scarcely wide enough, when the deserters eagerly rushed through the gate, and after about six hundred had got in, the rope being let go by which ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius

... catacomb, that the first gush of fresh air conveyed a sensation almost of new life. The passage had probably been formed in the period when every large building in Paris was a species of fortress; and we had still a portcullis to pass. When we first pushed against it, we felt another momentary pang; but age had made it an unfaithful guardian, and a few stout attacks on its decayed bars gave us free way. We were now under the open sky; but, to our consternation, a new and still more formidable difficulty presented itself. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various

... applied to them all. The old English mansion has its cellars, but never an oubliette, its porch-door always open to welcome a neighbour and to relieve the indigent. It was not insulated by a dyke, and its doors clenched with a portcullis. The spoils of the chase were not a drove of "lifted" cattle taken from a peasant left stark upon his threshold, but foxes' masks and the antlers of deer. The pigeons coo about the English gables and the peacock dreams in the sun on the balustrade of the terrace, as in past ...
— Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe • Sabine Baring-Gould

... was halted by the guard. An officer with a lantern stepped out upon the lowered portcullis. The lieutenant who had captured them rode ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... of semi-barbaric pomp, Albert made arrangements to leave his castle to engage in the perilous holy war against the Saracens, from which few ever returned. A few years were employed in the necessary preparations. At the sound of the bugle the portcullis was raised, the drawbridge spanned the moat, and Albert, at the head of thirty steel-clad warriors, with nodding plumes, and banners unfurled, emerged from the castle, and proceeded to the neighboring convent of Mari. His wife, Hedwige, and their three sons, Rhodolph, Albert and Hartman, accompanied ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott

... the house and gardens. We crossed the drawbridge, which always gives me a sensation of old feudal times and recalls the days of my childhood when I used to sit under the sickle-pear tree at "Cherry Lawn" reading Scott's "Marmion"—"Up drawbridge, grooms—what, Warder, ho! Let the portcullis fall!" wondering what a "portcullis" was, and if I should ever see one ...
— Chateau and Country Life in France • Mary King Waddington

... Garden Tower, as its upper storey opens on that part of the parade ground which was formerly the Constable's Garden. Here Sir Walter Raleigh was allowed to walk during his long imprisonment, and could sometimes converse over the wall with the passers-by. Observe the grooves for working the massive portcullis, which was raised by chains and a windlass. These still exist on the upper floor. Immediately adjoining the gateway ...
— Authorised Guide to the Tower of London • W. J. Loftie

... panoramic view of the country for thirty miles round. It has all the characteristics of a town of the feudal times, with high embattled and loopholed walls, numerous towers, and deep and strong gateways, under which are still to be seen the grooves of the portcullis, the warder's guard-room, and the hooks that supported the ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle

... solid and ornamental portions to the massive ruins from which they had been borrowed or taken. Still, enough had been left to show that the place had once been a mansion of considerable pretensions. The old gateway, with its portcullis and drawbridge, was still standing, while the moat which surrounded the entire building indicated that it had been originally of very capacious dimensions. The roof and most of the walls had long since disappeared; trees grew in ...
— True to his Colours - The Life that Wears Best • Theodore P. Wilson

... a flat hat with a border of the red and white roses of York and Lancaster in satin ribbon,—these made up my costume. There were forty of us in the Tower, mounting guard with drawn swords at the portcullis gate and at the entrances to the lodgings of such as were in hold, and otherwise attending upon unfortunate noblemen and gentlemen who were in trouble. On state occasions, when taking prisoners by water from the Tower to ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala

... did not, in this instance, belie its designation, being, in fact, a massive, gloomy-looking, castellated, stone building, with battlements, turrets, small windows, a moat, a drawbridge, and a portcullis, the lower portion of which showed in the head of the archway that gave access to the interior of the building. The drawbridge was lowered, and, from his coign of vantage, Mildmay saw the professor boldly cross it and walk up to the gate, through which, after a ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood

... of the castle; for the generals Renzo di Ceri and Orazio Baglioni were wounding and slaughtering everybody who abandoned the defence of the walls. [5] By the time we had reached the great gate, part of the foemen had already entered Rome, and we had them in our rear. The castellan had ordered the portcullis to be lowered, in order to do which they cleared a little space, and this enabled us four to get inside. On the instant that I entered, the captain Pallone de' Medici claimed me as being of the Papal household, and forced me to abandon Alessandro, which I had to do, much against my will. ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini

... to the top of the cavern, curled there or passed out into the glen through the briers that dropped like a portcullis. The fagots crackled in the flame, the light danced, the warmth was pleasant. So was the sense of adventure and of solitude a deux. They stretched themselves beside the flame. Alexander produced from his pouch four small red-cheeked apples. They ate and talked, with between their ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston

... castle most of its old defences have not been used for many years, perhaps centuries, and old Ben Martlet sets about restoring them, cleaning up the armour, teaching young Roy the arts of self-defence, by putting him through a course of fencing, by restoring the portcullis and draw-bridge, and by training the men from the ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn

... Hyacinth had been reared, partly in a mediaeval mansion, with a portcullis and four squat towers, near the Chateau d'Arques, and partly in Paris, where the lady had a fine house in the Marais. The sisters had never looked upon each other's faces, Angela having entered upon the troubled scene after ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon

... and the movement of a large troop, which had followed the prince, without its being to be guessed how. The king was conducted to the castle with great pomp, and Fouquet saw him dismount under the portcullis, and speak something in the ear of D'Artagnan, who held his stirrup. D'Artagnan, when the king had passed under the arch, directed his steps toward the house Fouquet was in; but so slowly, and stopping so frequently to speak to his musketeers, drawn up as a hedge, that it might be said he was ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... Castle, and he looked up suddenly as he was conscious of a clang of arms and a confused medley of voices, not in very peaceful tones, breaking in upon his meditations. He now perceived that the drawbridge was thronged with armed men, the portcullis drawn up, and the courtyard beyond ...
— Earl Hubert's Daughter - The Polishing of the Pearl - A Tale of the 13th Century • Emily Sarah Holt

... situated where Downing Street now is. The park was approached by two noble gates, and until the year 1708 the Cock-pit Gate, which opened into the court where Queen Anne lived, was standing. It was surmounted with lofty towers and battlements, and had a portcullis, and many rich decorations. Westminster Gate, the other entrance, was designed by Hans Holbein, and some foreign architect doubtless erected the Cockpit Gate. The scene of the cruel diversion of cock-fighting was, however, obliterated before Anne's time, and the palace, which ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz



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