"Rocket" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Sallads are the Lettice, Curl'd, Red, Cabbage, and Savoy. The Spinage round and prickly, Fennel, sweet and the common Sort, Samphire in the Marshes excellent, so is the Dock or Wild-Rhubarb, Rocket, Sorrel, French and English, Cresses of several Sorts, Purslain wild, and that of a larger Size which grows in the Gardens; {No Purslain in Indian Fields.} for this Plant is never met withal in the Indian Plantations, and is, therefore, suppos'd to proceed from Cow-Dung, ...
— A New Voyage to Carolina • John Lawson
... "Roadrunner" cartoons. In these cartoons, the famished Wile E. Coyote was forever attempting to catch up with, trap, and eat the Roadrunner. His attempts usually involved one or more high-technology Rube Goldberg devices — rocket jetpacks, catapults, magnetic traps, high-powered slingshots, etc. These were usually delivered in large cardboard boxes, labeled prominently with the Acme name. These devices invariably malfunctioned in violent ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... fastened, while jewels and diamonds of great value were around and suspended from their necks. Harcarrahs, or Brahmin messengers of trust, headed the procession, and seven standard-bearers, each carrying a small green banner displayed on a rocket-pole. After these marched 100 pikemen, whose weapons were inlaid with silver. Their escort was a squadron of cavalry, with 200 sepoy soldiers. They were received by the troops in line, with presented arms, drums beating, and ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... can you see, by the dawn's early light, What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming; Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming? And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there; Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the ...
— Poems of American Patriotism • Brander Matthews (Editor)
... to Venia and Mirla had been primitive affairs in which the dangerous rocket principle was employed, with the terrific effects of acceleration crushing the crews and making landing an even greater hazard than the flight itself. But now, through inconceivable efforts of thought—aye, through ...
— Walls of Acid • Henry Hasse
... quiet signal the leaders rose, spiraling into the upper darkness. Presently all had vanished, zigzagging in an easterly direction. About this time there came a sudden blue flare as a solitary rocket shot upward from beyond the grove of trees that that marked the landing place within the enclosed area that formed ...
— Our Pilots in the Air • Captain William B. Perry
... of experimenting on a rocket designed by Prof. Albert H. Goddard of Clark University, to shriek its way from the earth to the moon, came to a glorious climax recently in an isolated and closely guarded section of Worcester when the rocket tore its flaming way through the air for a quarter-mile with a roar heard ...
— Astounding Stories, March, 1931 • Various
... June are the months in which to look for the nests of that superb bird—the paradise flycatcher (Terpsiphone paradisi). This is known as the rocket-bird or ribbon-bird because of the two long fluttering tail feathers possessed by the cock. The hen has the appearance of a kind of bulbul, being chestnut-hued with a white breast and a metallic blue-black crest. For the first year of their existence the young cocks resemble the hens in appearance. ...
— A Bird Calendar for Northern India • Douglas Dewar
... lead pipe was connected to the cylinder and directed over the parapet into No Man's Land, with the nozzle weighed down by a sandbag. The pioneers stood by the batteries of twenty cylinders each and let off the gas a fixed few minutes after a rocket signal, at which the infantry retired to leave the front line free for the pioneers, who not only ran the risk of gassing from defective appliances but were subjected to almost immediate violent bombardment from the ...
— by Victor LeFebure • J. Walker McSpadden
... close were we, that the enemy were distinctly seen loading their guns above us. After a few broadsides, we brought our starboard broadside to bear on the Fish-market, and our larboard side then looked to seaward. The rocket-boats were now throwing rockets over our ships into the mole, the effects of which, were occasionally seen on the shipping on our larboard bow. The Dutch flag was to be seen flying at the fore of the Dutch Admiral, who, with his squadron, were engaging ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 377, June 27, 1829 • Various
... boats, and by Lieutenant Kellett, of the Starling, while the Nemesis soon got close enough to bring her 32-pounder pivot-guns to bear; and at the same time one of the Larne's boats, under Lieutenant Harrison, made her way outside the island to cut off the junks in the rear. The first Congreve rocket fired from the Nemesis having entered a large junk near that of the admiral, she almost immediately blew up, pouring forth a blaze like the rush of fire from a volcano, and destroying all on board. This so terrified the Chinese that, after a few discharges of round-shot had ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston
... who write me letters seem to get themselves wound up into a sky rocket and then let themselves explode in the last paragraph, and it always upsets my nerves. I was just about to begin to cry again over the last words of the judge, when the only bright spot in the day so far suddenly happened. ...
— The Melting of Molly • Maria Thompson Daviess
... sympathy and weakness. An A.D.C. in tail-coat and gold buttons is no longer a star; he is only a fire-balloon; though he may twinkle in heaven, he can descend to earth. But in the quiet disguises of private life he is the mere stick of a rocket. He is quite of the earth. This scheme of clothing is compatible with the tenderest offices of gaming or love—offices of which there shall be no recollection on the re-assumption of uniform and on re-apotheosis. An A.D.C. in plain clothes has been known to lay the long odds ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... swordfish and had gone out in the small boat to lance it, when the huge fish dived under the craft and shot up from the bottom like a rocket, his sword going through the timbers as though they were paper and striking the boatman with such force that he was killed almost instantly. Boats used often to be sunk by the rushes of a swordfish, but nowadays the greater part of the work ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... night off shore, when freight-laden craft, deceived by beacon lights, are beached upon the treacherous sand or dashed against jagged rocks. The life-savers, with rocket, and gun and line, and breeches-buoys, try in vain, and, as a last resort, grasp the oars of the life-boat and bring to safety one or two of a crew of ten. Sad hearts in homes when the news comes; but it is only one of the scenes in ...
— The Further Adventures of Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks • Charles Felton Pidgin
... sufficient nerve to get into your bathing suit like lightning, and go overboard with a lantern and a rocket or two, with only a state-room door to ...
— The Submarine Boys' Trial Trip - "Making Good" as Young Experts • Victor G. Durham
... and check the enemy. Then when Cockburn came round Blackbeard's Point and opened fire on the American camp he received so warm a welcome from Crutchfield's heavy battery that he was presently glad to escape for shelter behind the Point, and content himself with throwing an occasional shot or rocket ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley
... he chose a spot where the strain was the greatest. Then the axe cleaved the air, the keen blade bit the wood, and the whirling chips played about his head. Deeper and deeper the steel ate into the side of the giant spruce. Suddenly a report like a cannon split the air, the axe was hurled like a rocket out into midstream to sink with a splash into the foaming eddies. Tony turned, leaped like lightning back upon the main body of logs, and started for the shore. But he was too late. With a roar of pent-up ...
— The Fourth Watch • H. A. Cody
... circumference; it was not exactly Charybdis, or the Maelstrom, but rather more like the wave occasioned by the sudden turning of a man-of-war's boat. Being hooked, and having by this time set his nose peremptorily down the stream, he flashed and whizzed away like a rocket. My situation partook of the nature of a surprise. Being on a rocky shore, and having had a bad start, I lost ground at first considerably; but the reel sang out joyously, and yielded a liberal length of line, that saved me from the disgrace of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... said Mike the Angel. "A few minutes ago a bomb was set off in my apartment. I think it was a rocket, and I know it was heavily laced with hydrogen cyanide. That's Suite 5000, Timmins Building, up on 112th Street. I called you because I have a hunch it's connected with the incident at Harry's ...
— Unwise Child • Gordon Randall Garrett
... beneath our feet, hearing an appalling hiss through the open trap-door, a hiss like the first sound of a rocket! ...
— The Phantom of the Opera • Gaston Leroux
... Ridiculous and the sublime Right, whatever is, is Righteous forsaken —overmuch Righteousness and peace —exalteth a nation Ripe and ripe Road, a rough, a weary Roam, where'er I Robbed, lie that is Robbing Peter he paid Paul Hobes and furred gowns hide all Rocket, rose like a Rod, and thy staff —, a chief's a —of empire —, spare the Roderick, art them a friend to Rogue, every inch not fool is Roman, than such a —senate long debate Romans, countrymen, and lovers Rome, palmy state of —, more than the Pope of Romeo, wherefore art thou ...
— Familiar Quotations • Various
... regaining the part of the ridge they had lost, but the French made it so hot for them that they abandoned it, and the contested trenches now lie in No Man's Land. All that night the whole Wood was illuminated, trench light after trench light rising over the dark branches. There would be a rocket like the trail of bronze-red powder sparks hanging for an instant in the sky, then a loud Plop! and the French light would spread out its parachute and sail slowly down the sky toward the river. The German lights (fusees eclairantes), cartridges of magnesium fired ...
— A Volunteer Poilu • Henry Sheahan
... the German submarine had the intention of allowing passengers and crew ample opportunity to save themselves. It was not until the Captain disregarded the order to lay to and took to flight, sending up rocket signals for help, that the German commander ordered the crew and passengers by signals and megaphone to leave the ship within ten minutes. As a matter of fact, he allowed them twenty-three minutes, and did not fire the torpedo until suspicious steamers were hurrying to the aid of the Falaba. ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... thereabout, above the level of the sea. Bless us, what a long bell you must have pulled, to call your top workmen to their nuncheon on the low grounds of Sennaar. Or did you send up your garlick and onions by a rocket? I am a rogue if I am not ashamed to show you our Monument on Fish-street Hill, after your altitudes. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... like the Skylark, and no knowledge of intra-atomic energy. Therefore their space-ships are of the rocket type, and for that reason they can cross only at the exact time of conjunction, or whatever you call it—no, not conjunction, exactly, either, since the two planets do not revolve around the same sun: but when they are closest together. Our solar system is so complex, you know, that unless ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith
... Roy was seldom absent from Aruna's side. They said little, but his presence wrapped her round with a sense of companionship more intimate than she had yet felt even in their happiest times together. While rocket after rocket soared and curved and blossomed in mid-heaven, her gaze reverted persistently to the outline of a man's head and shoulders silhouetted against ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... they went after the whale like a rocket, with a tremendous strain on the line and a bank of white foam gurgling up to the edge of the gunwale, that every moment threatened to fill the boat and sink her. Such a catastrophe is of not unfrequent occurrence, when whalemen thus towed by a whale are tempted to hold on too long; and many ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... her and her fingers busily engaged. Her husband's breath was almost gone by the time he reached the foot of the stairs; consequently his entrance was a trifle less noisy and startling than his sky-rocket flight through the kitchen. It is doubtful if his wife would have noticed even if it had been. She caught a glimpse of him in the mirror, and ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Fireworks are under the direction of William D'A. Ryan, Chief of Illumination. On each occasion a set program is followed consisting of twenty-four numbers. At the opening, a salute of ten detonating bombs and a large rocket announce the event. This is followed by features of the scintillator lights, combinations of these with steam, with smoke bombs and with orange showers and Japanese daylight shells, and by fancy star shells, ...
— The Architecture and Landscape Gardening of the Exposition • Louis Christian Mullgardt
... object was not possibly of human design or manufacture. It had no wings. It left no trail of jet fumes or rocket smoke. It was glittering and mirror-like, and it was shaped almost exactly like two turtle-shells base to base. It was flat and oval. It had no ...
— The Invaders • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... in the roads of Galle and could see the ships at anchor. Tom did not like to venture further in the dark without a pilot, and accordingly told the signal-man to make signals for one, but being impatient he sent up a rocket, besides burning blue lights, a mistake which had the effect of bringing the first officer of the P. and O. steamship 'Poonah' on board, who thought perhaps we had got aground or were in trouble of some sort. He also informed us ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... white rocket is beheld high in the air. It is followed by a second, and a third. There is a pause, during which NAPOLEON and the rest wait motionless. In a minute or two, from the opposite side of the city, three coloured rockets ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... Martian cargo of k-metal was of enormous value and a direct invitation to piracy. Of course there was the attempt at secrecy and the shippers had sent along those guards. His engineer, Tom Farley, was thoroughly reliable, too. But this failure of the control rocket-tubes, missing their destination as a result—there ...
— The Copper-Clad World • Harl Vincent
... man that his first act was to wipe the grime of the stoke-hold off his face and hands. Then he drew a chart from the locker in which he had placed it two hours earlier. Mr. Boyle, who had been attending to the signals both by siren and rocket, joined him. Courtenay pointed to ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... whole ball of fire seemed to rise in air to burst like some gigantic rocket. There was no question in the boys' minds but that the supply of gasoline had ...
— Lost In The Air • Roy J. Snell
... over it, as we see done with judgment and truth by Ruysdael. But to paint the actual play of hue on the reflective surface, or to give the forms and fury of water when it begins to show itself—to give the flashing and rocket-like velocity of a noble cataract, or the precision and grace of the sea waves, so exquisitely modelled, though so mockingly transient—so mountainous in its form, yet so cloud-like in its motion—with its variety and delicacy of color, when every ripple and wreath has ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... partridge act as if she had a broken wing," Jack remarked, quietly; "and flutter along the ground in a way that couldn't help but make one try to catch her; but if you chased after her, it would be to see the old bird take wing pretty soon, and go off like a rocket." ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren
... once with the lantern so that he staggered; and then, whirling it twice round his head, sent it flying far out to sea, where it flared like a roaring rocket and fell. ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... gun-powder, and duck-shot, and 'high-wines,' and ham sand-witches, upon the silvonian banks of the ragin' Kankakee, where the 'di-dipper' tips ye good-bye wid his tail, and the wild loon skoots like a sky-rocket for his exiled home in the alien dunes of the wild morass—or, as Tommy Moore so illegantly describes the ...
— Pipes O'Pan at Zekesbury • James Whitcomb Riley
... below, only waiting for the signal to move up to destroy the rest of the bridge and carry succour to the city; but the incompetent and cowardly Jacobzoon rowed hastily away after the explosion, and the rocket that should have summoned the Zeelanders was never sent up. Parma moved about among his troops, restoring order and confidence, and as the night went on and no assault took place he set his men to work to collect ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... final event to himself [Mr. Burke] has been, that, as he rose like a rocket, he fell ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... as he kept the earphones of his study machine clamped tightly to his ears and listened to a recorded lecture on astrophysics as it unreeled from the spinning study spool. As command cadet of the Polaris unit, Tom was required to know more than merely his particular duty as pilot of a rocket ship. He had to be familiar with every phase of space travel, with a working knowledge of the duties of all ...
— Sabotage in Space • Carey Rockwell
... Holiday in the Manufacturing Districts Coaching trip to Liverpool Coventry English scenery 'The Rocket' The two Stephensons Opening of the railway William Fawcett Birkenhead Walk back to London Patricroft Manchester Edward Tootal Sharp, Roberts and Co. Manchester industry Coalbrookdale The Black Country Dudley Castle Wren's Nest Hill Birmingham Boulton and Watt William ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... an ordinary rocket, is fired from a rifle and is designed for short-range use. It consists of a steel cylindrical shell a few inches long fastened to a steel rod. A parachute is attached to the cardboard container in which the illuminating mixture is packed and the whole is stowed away in ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh
... saw with startled eyes Far off, athwart dim unprotecting skies, Ascending slowly with majestic grace, A lustrous rocket, rising out of space. "Behold the signal of the foe," cried one, The field is lost before the strife's begun. Yet no! for see! yon rays spread near and far; It is the day's first ...
— Custer, and Other Poems. • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... come from the Raffecourt or from the Forges Mill, through the covered roads in the valley-like depressions in the ground. It was the first wave immediately followed by heavy columns. Our artillery fire from the edge of Corbeaux Wood isolated them.... At times a rocket appeared in the air; the call to the cannons, then the marking of the road. The regular ticktack of the machine guns and the cracking of the shells were distinctly heard even among the terrific noises of ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... dear, good soul, as you know; but she's a self-willed little jade, and if I don't do just as she wants me to—if I don't walk her chalk line—presto! she goes off like a rocket. To-night, d'ye see, I came home with the first volume of Prescott's new work on Mexico—a perfect romance of a book, and wanted to read it aloud to Cara. But no, she had something else in her head, ...
— The Two Wives - or, Lost and Won • T. S. Arthur
... the horse's head as soon as he discovered my intention; but I gave him the rein, and he went off like a rocket. I turned towards Parkville, and after going half a mile, I reined up to ascertain whether I was pursued or not. I could hear nothing; so I turned into a by-road, leading to a grove. I had taken this step only to procure a diversion of Tom's plans, ...
— Seek and Find - or The Adventures of a Smart Boy • Oliver Optic
... fixed up as to move its head about, with an expression of exceedingly ridiculous sentimentality, now to the right, now caressingly to the left, as it ascended. The whole Corso rang again with laughter and clapping. The horse-racing at the end was not of much account. The horses start excited by the rocket let off at their tails, and by all the sharp pellets hanging around about them, to say nothing of the howling of the crowd. At six o'clock I was at home and ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... like a violent jar to be awakened so rudely from a trance of love, to turn suddenly from the one you care for most in all the world, and behold the one you have best reason to hate. Nevertheless, it is not in human nature to descend rocket-wise from the ethereal heights of love. I was still in an exalted state of mind when I turned and confronted Locasto. Hate was far from my heart, and when I saw the man himself was regarding me with no particular unfriendliness, I was disposed to put aside for the moment all feelings of ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... his mounted natives and a rocket battery arriving from Rorke's Drift about 10 A.M., took over the command of the camp from Colonel Pulleine. According to the evidence of Lieutenant Cochrane given at the court of inquiry, Colonel Pulleine thereupon stated to Colonel Durnford the orders that he had received, ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... up a rocket the instant the parapet was gained and the enemy aroused. A few more strokes, and the boats would reach the landing-place. Just then a loud hail came from the walls of the fort. Ronald answered, in French, "People from the ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... you are a foxy fellow!" exclaimed even Norem, the Actor, when he ran across him on the street. "Here you go along quietly and say nothing, and all of a sudden you set off a rocket right under our ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... back to Ontario. But there had been good years in between and finally he had begun to move up the hill. Everything in the West moved in the same direction, and now he had a big ranch and some coal mine shares, and building lots in Prairie Park where real estate was going up like a sky rocket. ...
— In Orchard Glen • Marian Keith
... the fix," the colonel said. He was beyond the range of the young man's vision screen. "I've got him. He's still within range, but accelerating fast. We can intercept if we get up a rocket ...
— Double Take • Richard Wilson
... twin-screw steamer, by the beat. I can't make her out, but she must be standing very close inshore. Ah!" as the red of a rocket streaked the haze, "she's standing in to signal before she ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... the bark contains fibrous tissues available for the manufacture of cordage. The root of S. acuta is esteemed by the Hindoos as a medicine, and particularly as a remedy for snake bites. The light wood of these species is used to make rocket sticks. ...
— Catalogue of Economic Plants in the Collection of the U. S. Department of Agriculture • William Saunders
... was clear and calm. At noon Gissing blew the syren, fired a rocket from the bridge, and swung the engine telegraph to STOP. The ship's orchestra, by his orders, struck up a rollicking air. Quickly and without confusion, amid cries of Women and children first! the passengers filed ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... watched that long stretch of gloom with the greatest anxiety. Suddenly from its mystery a rocket flamed into the sky. Three minutes elapsed and another threw far and wide its ominous light. Again there was an interval of three minutes, when a third rocket confirmed the watcher's fears that these were signals. Four minutes passed, and then, from the ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... arrived. Three engines entered the lists for the prize,—namely, the Rocket, by George Stephenson; the Sanspareil, by Timothy Hackworth; and the Novelty, by Ericsson. Both sides of the railway, for more than a mile in length, were lined with thousands of spectators. There was no room for jockeying in such a race, for inanimate matter was to be put in motion, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... laughing like crazy, an' that half-smart Rubero drills him right through the head. I take one shot at the thing, low so's not to hit Movaine, an' then we're all running, I'm halfway to the hall when Cooms tears past me like a rocket. The Duke an' the others are already piling out through the portal. I get to the hall, and there's this terrific smack of sound in the room. I look back ... an' ... ...
— Lion Loose • James H. Schmitz
... master of the colloquial forms of the court language of Europe, yet a dozen classmates who had never seen a French verb before their admission stood above him at the end of the first term. He had gone to the first section like a rocket and settled to the bottom of it like a stick. No subject in the course was really hard to him, his natural aptitude enabling him to triumph over the toughest problems. Yet he hated work, and would often face about with an empty black-board and take a zero and a report for neglect of studies that ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... doubt—read:—"And how all the hollows of that foam burn with green fire, like so much shattering chrysoprase; and how, ever and anon, startling you with its white flash, a jet of spray leaps hissing out of the fall, like a rocket, bursting in the wind, and driven away in dust, filling the air with light; and how, through the curdling wreaths of the restless, crashing abyss below, the blue of the water, paled by the foam in its body, shows purer than the sky through white rain-cloud, while the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... The finest gift in the world is pleasure. Sometimes I think it's better to feed the soul and let the body fast. There is a time in life when one brief sky-rocket can produce more joy than ten pairs ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... elsewhere. An excellent jest, truly, from one whose hospitality is so famous. Well, to fall in with your wishes, we will come ashore this evening, and if the Captain Delgado chances to sight the Queen's ship Crocodile before he sails, perhaps he will be so good as to signal to us with a rocket." ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... because Court had ordered them to keep out of sight of the rioters. They saw Halloran, Slade and Goldsmid at his heels, walking out into the small courtyard that lay between them and safety. Over the wall speaker came a sullen roar, something very like the ragged blast of a rocket whose timing is off. A few gray-clad men in the courtyard saw the approaching warden, surged toward him, screaming at their fellows in ...
— Criminal Negligence • Jesse Francis McComas
... Louise Taine's lips were shaped to deliver an expressive "oh" of admiration, even before the portrait was revealed. As though the painter, in drawing back the easel curtain, gave an appointed signal, that "oh" was set off with the suddenness of a sky-rocket's rush, and was accompanied in its flight by a great volume of sizzling, sputtering, glittering, adjectival sparks that—filling the air to no purpose whatever—winked out as they were born; the climax of the pyrotechnical display being reached in the explosive ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... time for Hecate's enormous power of loin and thigh to tell, and, never losing a moment's view of her game, she sped up the steep mountain side and was soon after seen within fifty yards of the brick all alone, but going like a rocket. ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... "A rocket mortar of light weight," explained Kennedy, then dropped into French as he explained to Armand the manipulation ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... upwards—then kerchuck! Fiz! Snap! Ker—boom! Slug 14's grotesque form Sails out to ride a race upon the storm, Up through the roof, and up into the sky— As if he sought for "cases" up on high, Till like a rocket, or like one who's trusted, He fell again to ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... the rocket bearers, quite over their fright by now, and acting with the nervous steadiness which acute danger brings. One of the sailors from the regular crew of the tug moved along the rail, mounting the fire signals one after the other for shooting. Immediately behind him came Hogan, using ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... dead limbs. But the more his lost strength came back to his body, the more he was aware of the terrible pain in his head. It occurred to him vaguely that when once he opened his eyes, which he would have to do some time, there would be a horrible explosion and his head would go off like a sky-rocket. ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... the various recruiting grounds of the Fijian and Queensland planters and place the labour-traffic under the most rigid supervision." The remark quoted above was then, as it is now, quite a hackneyed one, much used by the gallant officers who commanded the one-gun-one-rocket-tube craft aforementioned. Likewise, the "highly irregular proceedings" were a naval synonym for some of the bloodiest slaving outrages ever perpetrated, but which, however, never came to light beyond being alluded to as "unreliable and un-authenticated statements by discharged ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... women, with ease, were kicking off men's hats; and while watching them I heard that a special display of fireworks had been arranged in Marie's honour, the news having got about that this was her last night at the Elysee. A swishing sound was heard; the rocket rose to its height high up in the thick sky. Then it dipped over, the star fell a little way and burst: it melted into turquoise blue, and changed to ruby red, beautiful as the colour of flowers, roses or tulips. The falling fire ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... signal rocket, Till . . . Barrow, show that locket, That turquoise-studded locket, Which you slipped from out your pocket And are pressing with a kiss! Turquoise-studded, spiral-twisted, It is hers! And I had missed it From ...
— Songs of Action • Arthur Conan Doyle
... me the hundred pounds I will fly like a rocket, captain,' said the young gentleman. 'I keep the appointment instead of the ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... carrying your right arm in a sling so many years.) What a hard, unjust business this is! On the 28th, if Mataafa had moved, he could have still swept Mulinuu. He waited, and I fear he is now only the stick of a rocket. ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Also, the phlogiston has negative weight, as every school child must know. Your liquid sky would sink through it, since negative weight must in truth be lighter than no weight, while nothing else would rise through the layer. And phlogiston will quench the flame of a rocket, as ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... miles an hour, and was urged before the House of Commons not to say so, as he might be thought to be mad. This I have from person who knew the circumstances. Nevertheless, at the trial, I believe the "Rocket" did go at the rate of thirty miles an hour, to the not small astonishment of the world, and especially to the unbelievers in steam as a land agent. The stipulation made was that trains were to be conveyed at the rate ...
— Lectures on Popular and Scientific Subjects • John Sutherland Sinclair, Earl of Caithness
... by for an hour with no result, then sought his bunk once more, cursing all men. Confound the Infantry getting the jumps over a rocket or two! Confound them two times! Then a spark of inspiration glowed within him, glowed and flamed brightly. If his exalted poilus got the wind up over a handful of rockets, how much more ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 23, 1917 • Various
... knows what's happened to my practice," he said. "The blamed thing has gone up like a rocket. It seems to me there must be a great wave of sickness passing over New ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... more I think of it, the less am I displeased. When one reflects that more than half of the enormous crowd came, probably, from tiny villages in France—where a rocket is as rare as an angelic visitation; and, on the carnal side, as beautiful in their eyes—it seems a very narrow-minded thing to object. It is true that you and I connect fireworks with Mafeking night or Queen Victoria's Jubilee; and that they seem therefore incongruous when used ...
— Lourdes • Robert Hugh Benson
... 1784, for the interesting purpose of examining the MSS. used in the Complutensian Polyglot. He there learned that they had all been disposed of, as so much waste paper, (membranas inutiles) by the librarian of that time to a rocket-maker of the town, who soon worked them up in the regular way of his vocation! He assigns no reason for doubting the truth of the story. The name of the librarian, unfortunately, is not recorded. It would have been as imperishable as that of Omar. Marsh's Michaelis, vol. ii. part ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... Sydney Smith and his gallant companions had performed all their operations in darkness, the only light being the flashes of the cannon and muskets playing on them. At length ten o'clock struck—a single rocket ascended into the air. In an instant the fireship and all the trains leading to the different magazines and stores were ignited. The boats lay alongside the former, ready to take off the crew. There was a loud explosion—the priming had ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... murmur, the little bells seemed to chime with notes heard only by the innermost spirit, and the gliding dogs were like strange creatures from some shadowy underworld. At times a pheasant would rise and whirl like a rocket from hillock to hollow, and about midnight a rapturous concert began. On one line of trees a colony of nightingales had established themselves near the heart of the waste. First came the low inquiry from the leader; then two or three ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... going forward so successfully, does not suffer from our present lack of very large rocket engines, which are so necessary in distant space exploration. I am assured by experts that the thrust of our present missiles is fully adequate ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... see we wake up at once. Sure enough there it is ahead, a little island rising like a cliff out of the water. It is evidently deep close in, for we go quite near to it. Just as we are abreast off goes rocket after rocket, and in a moment the scene is transformed as if by magic. A dense mass of shrieking, screaming birds springs to life. The moment before the sun was shining in a clear sky, now in an instant it is obscured as by a thick cloud. You never saw anything like it! The birds on ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... that the last rocket he had seen was fired at an evening fete for the amusement of the audience. The contrast struck him as dreadful. He wondered whether there were any power or infernal population that could be amused by a tragedy such as enacted itself before ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... fact the entire scientific staff of Spindrift Island, had been in a state of excitement for the past few days because of a telegram received from Dr. John Gordon. Dr. Gordon had been on leave for some time, working on a special project at a rocket experimental station in the West. A few days before, Dr. Hartson Brant, Rick's father and head of the Spindrift Scientific Foundation, a world-famous research organization, had received word from Gordon that Rick and Scotty were needed ...
— The Scarlet Lake Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin
... said Blake. "It's too bad you couldn't stay to see them, Martel." He turned in his saddle, and the others reined in as a rocket soared into the night sky and burst with a shower of sparks. Others followed and ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... state policy, and his position with his friends did not suffer at all in consequence of his disclosures. Personally, he exulted in his conduct to the end of his life, and took pleasure in watching and recording Deane's disreputable career and miserable end. "As he rose like a rocket, so he fell like the stick," a metaphor which has passed into a proverb, was imagined by Paine to meet Deane's case. [1] The immediate consequence of Paine's resignation was to oblige him to hire himself out as clerk to an attorney in Philadelphia. In his office, Paine earned ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... course, but as we were within the point we could see nothing. "Give way, boys! Give way! Lay out on your oars, and long stroke!'' said the captain; and stretching to the whole length of our arms, bending back again so that our backs touched the thwarts, we sent her through the water like a rocket. A few minutes of such pulling opened the islands, one after another, in range of the point, and gave us a view of the Canal, where was a ship, under top-gallant-sails, standing in, with a light breeze, for the anchorage. Putting the boat's head in the direction ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... following occurred the greatest eruption of the series. A mushroom-shaped cloud of smoke burst four miles upward in air. The spectacle, one of grandeur, was plainly visible even from the Sacramento Valley. "At night," writes Doctor Diller, "flashes of light from the mountain summit, flying rocket-like bodies and cloud-glows over the crater reflecting the light from incandescent lavas below, were seen by many observers from various points of view, and appear to indicate that much of the material erupted was sufficiently hot to ...
— The Book of the National Parks • Robert Sterling Yard
... vivid star expands down yonder in the uncertain direction that we are taking—a rocket. Widely it lights a part of the sky with its milky nimbus, blots out the stars, and then falls ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... but the Major would not listen; once more he stalked about the room and puffed out clouds of smoke, like a squib or a rocket. The women followed him, ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz
... sure we shalln't do that, my lord! for this same Jeppe is one of the heaviest sleepers in the whole district. Last year they tried setting off a rocket under his head, but when the rocket went off he never even stirred ...
— Comedies • Ludvig Holberg
... night, down yonder by Lokken, the little fishing village with the red-tiled roofs—we can see it up here from the window—a ship has come ashore. It has struck, and is fast embedded in the sand; but the rocket apparatus has thrown a rope on board, and formed a bridge from the wreck to the mainland; and all on board are saved, and reach the land, and are wrapped in warm blankets; and to-day they are invited to the farm at the convent of Borglum. In comfortable rooms they encounter hospitality and friendly ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... they were pointed up. A rocket goes whichever way it is pointed. Rockets in war are fired through a tube, or from a trough. We will use the trough. Set to at once, boys, and make a trough about four feet long, without ends. It must stand ...
— Out on the Pampas - The Young Settlers • G. A. Henty
... Having risen to the grade of engineman, he was employed in the collieries of Lord Ravensworth improving the wagon way and railway planes under ground. In 1814 he completed a locomotive steam-engine, which was successfully tried on the Killingworth Railway. The locomotive "Rocket," constructed by Stephenson and his son Robert, which won the premium of five hundred pounds in 1829, offered by the Liverpool and Manchester Railway Company, ushered in the greatest mechanical revolution since the invention of the steam-engine by Watt. After this Stephenson became a locomotive ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... Navy, Air Forces; Airborne troops, Strategic Rocket Forces, and Military Space Forces are classified as independent combat arms, not subordinate to any of ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... been agreed that Admiral Jacobzoon should, immediately after the explosion of the fire-ships, send an eight-oared barge to ascertain the amount of damage. If a breach had been effected, and a passage up to the city opened, he was to fire a rocket. At this signal, the fleet stationed at Lillo, carrying a heavy armament, laden with provisions enough to relieve Antwerp from all anxiety, and ready to sail on the instant, was at once to force its way ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... Rocket Composition consists of gunpowder 16 parts, by Weight; charcoal, 3 parts. Or, in other words, of nitre, 16 parts; charcoal 7 parts; sulphur, 4 parts. It must not be forgotten that when rockets are charged with the composition, a hollow tube must be left ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... hoped that Haney and the Chief and Mike weren't nervous. He also hoped that nobody had gotten at the fuel for the pushpots, and that the slide-rule crew that had calculated everything hadn't made any mistakes. He was also bothered about the steering-rocket fuel, and he was uncomfortable about the business of releasing the spaceship from the launching cage. There was, too, cause for worry in the take-off rockets—if the tube linings had shrunk there would be some rather gruesome consequences—and there could always be last-minute orders from Washington ...
— Space Tug • Murray Leinster
... black as a setter's mouth within, the gun fire having snuffed the old man's candle out. But we had flint and steel and tinder-box, and when the punk was alight, Jennifer found the candle under foot and gave it me. It took fire with a fizzing like a rocket fuse, and was well blackened with gunpowder. When the flint had failed to bring the firing spark, the old man had set his piece off ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... the "Nocturne in Black and Gold" was again produced, and Mr. WHISTLER was further cross-examined by the ATTORNEY-GENERAL: "The picture represents a distant view of Cremorne with a falling rocket and other fireworks. It occupied two days, and is a finished picture. The black monogram on the frame was placed in its position with reference to the proper ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler
... smells of day were sicklied by cold night, When sentries froze and muttered; when beyond the wire Blank shadows crawled and tumbled, shaking, tricking the sight, When impotent hatred of Life stifled desire, Then soared the sudden rocket, broke in blanching showers. O lagging watch! ...
— Country Sentiment • Robert Graves
... went further. He gave a perfect Brock's benefit of diagrams—exactly like rocket trajectories they were; and the gist of it—so far as it had any gist—was that the blood of puppies and kittens and the sap of sunflowers and the juice of mushrooms in what he called the "growing phase" differed in the proportion of certain elements from their blood ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... by the combined fleets, consisting of five sail of the line, eighteen or twenty frigates and smaller vessels, besides five bomb-vessels and several rocket-boats, carrying in all about one thousand guns. The armament of some of the smaller vessels is not given, but the guns of those whose armaments are known, amount to over nine hundred. The harbor and defences of Algiers had been previously surveyed by Captain Warde, royal navy, under Lord Exmouth's ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... there's one thing more I relate, which is to be admir'd, At five o'clock that afternoon we set their ships on fire. Our rocket-ships and fire-ships so well their parts did play, The Algerines from their batteries were ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... crackers bust Und fill der air mid bowder tust, Und ven you shoots your bistol off, You make a smokes vot makes you cough. A rocket goes up in der sky— Der sthick vos hit ...
— The Rover Boys on Treasure Isle - The Strange Cruise of the Steam Yacht • Edward Stratemeyer
... consideration of the subject, it might be thought that as the comet was dashing along with enormous velocity the tail was merely streaming out behind, just as the shower of sparks from a rocket are strewn along the path which it follows. This would be an entirely erroneous analogy; the comet is moving not through an atmosphere, but through open space, where there is no medium sufficient to sweep the tail into the line of motion. ...
— The Story of the Heavens • Robert Stawell Ball
... the dug-out—ten francs. Trips through trenches, accompanied by trained guides reciting selected passages from the outpourings of our special correspondents—ten francs. At night grand S.O.S. rocket and Very light display—ten francs. While for a further twenty francs the tourist will be allowed to pick up as many souvenirs in the way of rolls of barbed wire, dud bombs and blind crumps as he can stagger away with. By this means the country will be cleared of its explosive ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 6, 1917 • Various
... south-side men have nothing to do with her. But sometimes the vessel shows all her lights and rushes upon the South Pier. Then the men wait for the last lurch and that wallowing crash that they know so well. The rocket is laid, and flies out over the rigging; the brigadesmen haul on their rope, and the basket comes rocking ashore along the line. It is not child's play to stand in the open and work the rocket apparatus; sometimes ...
— The Romance of the Coast • James Runciman
... was the Thames atmosphere that had got into my head, or whether it was SAM WELLER'S unexpected remark, I am unable, to this day, to say. But, somehow or other, my speech had, by this time, gone up. So I went down. If the speech was a rocket, I represented a stick. Perhaps JENKINS may yet wake up to the importance to the civilization of the century of reporting in full CHARLES DICKENS' speech, and BULWER'S, and the rest. If so, I will send them on. PUNCHINELLO, however, was honored as he deserves, ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 7, May 14, 1870 • Various
... Did you hear that sound, like the whistling of a rocket? See! Something has fallen upon the tree-top, breaking several branches! As I live it is the kite! Dead he is, and the blood is spurting from ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... November, between the hours of six and seven in the morning (half-past two at Cumana), some falling-stars which shed a very white light. Soon after, in the direction of south and south-west, luminous rays appeared from four to six feet long; they were reddish, and resembled the luminous track of a sky-rocket. During the morning twilight, between the hours of seven and eight, the sky, in the direction of south-west, was observed from time to time to be brightly illumined by white lightning, running in ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... were seated all about the yard and on the piazza, eating their pink ice-cream, somebody threw up a rocket; and that was the end of the gayest, brightest evening our little friend Flaxie Frizzle had ever known in ...
— The Twin Cousins • Sophie May
... solve the mystery of the disks. We checked a hundred sighting reports, frequently crossing the trail of Project "Saucer" teams and F.B.I. agents. Old records gave fantastic leads. So did Air Force plans for exploring space. Rocket experts, astronomers, Air Force officials and pilot gave us clues pointing to a startling solution. Many intelligent persons—including scientists—believe that the saucers contain ...
— The Flying Saucers are Real • Donald Keyhoe
... to collect behind the French trenches—the active, eager figures of gallant Bretons of the 20th Corps, a crack corps, to whom the task had been assigned of recapturing the fortress. A gun opened far behind, a rocket soared, and then a wave of figures poured over the parapet of the trenches and ten thousand shouting, furious Frenchmen streamed down upon the debris of Douaumont—that "corner-stone" of the defences ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... the morning after the affair in Cato Street. It was the intention of these men to have fired a rocket from Lord Harrowby's house as soon as they had completed their work of destruction; this was to have been the signal for the rising of their friends. An oil shop was to have been set on fire to increase the confusion and collect a mob; then the Bank was to have been attacked ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... report was received from the Netherlands. The day before several persons reported seeing a UFO through high broken clouds over The Hague. The object was rocket-shaped, with two rows of windows along the side. It was a poor report, very sketchy and incomplete, and it probably would have been forgotten except that four nights later a similar UFO almost collided with an Eastern ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... the hues of the spectrum; emeralds from Peru, of varied forms and shapes; rubies from India, red as drops of blood; sapphires from Ceylon, blue and white; turquoises from Persia; Oriental pearls, some rosy, some lead-colored, others black. Those who have at night seen a great rocket burst in the azure darkness of the sky into thousands of colored lights, so bright that they make the eternal stars look dim, can imagine the aspect the ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... dome, the night sky is a beautiful thing, even though Deimos and Phobos are nothing to brag about. If you walk outside, maybe as far as the rocket field, you ...
— Fee of the Frontier • Horace Brown Fyfe
... a pang of joy, that no longer would she need to nerve herself for the cruel journey to the markets in the morning. Chook would drive down in his own cart, and she would be waiting on his return with a good breakfast. They had gone up in the world like a rocket. ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... the screen again. An orangish glow was suffusing the alien ship. A jet slipped in for a rocket shot. The glow pulsed, expanded, touched the jet, and the plane vanished into a rain of wreckage that sped towards ...
— Decision • Frank M. Robinson
... Even now, a rocket moves toward Mars. It reminds us that the world will not be the same for our children, or even for ourselves in a short span of years. The next man to stand here will look out on a scene different from our own, because ours is a time of change—rapid and fantastic change bearing the secrets ...
— U.S. Presidential Inaugural Addresses • Various
... mediate betwixt the factions. He appealed to Beaton, and invoked his assistance to prevent bloodshed. "On my conscience," answered the archbishop, "I cannot help what is to happen." As he laid his hand upon his breast, at this solemn declaration, the hauberk, concealed by his rocket, was heard to clatter: "Ah! my lord!" retorted Douglas, "your conscience sounds hollow." He then expostulated with the secular leaders, and Sir Patrick Hamilton, brother to Arran, was convinced by his remonstrances; but Sir James, the natural ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... The German trenches are about 70 yards away in some places and as much as 400 in others. It is rather exciting wandering about in front of the line, as lights go up every now and then and show a bright white light in the air for a minute or two like a rocket. When one goes up you fall flat and pretend you are a sandbag or a milk-can or a rat. You may meet Fritz on the same job sometimes; I always have a bomb handy to give ...
— Letters from France • Isaac Alexander Mack
... assurance, but long before the leader of a financial movement has got word to his following, wide-spread over the country, it has taken alarm, the rout has begun, and the field is strewn with corpses. A great financial excitement, like a rocket, should soar triumphantly into the air, leaving behind it a comet-like trail of glory, climaxing in a shower of gold; diverted from its course, it runs a mad, brief, tragic career along the earth, spreading ruin ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... "he may not be a genius and he certainly isn't a criminal, but he has about as much stability as a sky-rocket." ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland
... from the crest of the hill! Look! there's a rocket leaps high in the air. By the beat of his gallop, that's nearing us still, That runaway horse has no ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... having ceased, and the men again become fit for action, they anticipated with joy a forward movement. At this time re-enforcements were received from Calcutta; and a regiment of cavalry, a troop of horse-artillery, and a rocket corps were ordered to join. Before, however, the British could advance, they had to dispose of the whole military force of wa, This force now consisted of 35,000 musketeers, 700 Cassay cavalry, and other troops, amounting in the whole to 60,000 men. On the 30th ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... hundred armed men in the palace. We've got about forty minutes to get over there before the rocket goes up." ...
— Gambler's World • John Keith Laumer
... long, fiery day the great bell rang. The bugle sounded again. People ran hither and thither. A rocket flared across the sky, and a ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... the spelling-book was turned. That tricksey little list of "goblin, problem, conduct, rocket, pontiff, compact, prospect, ostrich" finally left but three scholars between Ruth and Julia at the head of the class. One of these was Oliver Shortsleeves, a French Canadian lad whose parents had Anglicised their ...
— Ruth Fielding of the Red Mill • Alice B. Emerson |
