"Trigger" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Treasury, who had previously stated to his second that he did not intend to fire at his adversary, discharged his pistol in the air. He had been hit by the bullet of his enemy, and did not know that as he fell, by a convulsive movement, he had pulled the trigger of the weapon in ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... the sun for full half of the year, Made each glacier a blizzard blown trap, They strung out volcanoes half way to Japan Each one with a hair trigger cap. They planned for the coast line a system of storms Each equipped with a ninety mile breath And then spread o'er it all the fog that men call The ...
— Rhymes of a Roughneck • Pat O'Cotter
... must haven rained in on us in the next few minutes. How I wanted to crawl out to the trench under the wagons where our men were keeping up a steady but irregular fire! Each was shooting on his own whenever he saw a man to pull trigger on. But mother suspected me, for she made me crouch down and keep right on holding ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... picture cameras had been put in place, Blake to work one and Joe the other, while the automatic, which was operated by clockwork, once the trigger-string was broken, also setting off the continuous flashlight, was set between the two boys, to command a good view of the dam, and of whoever should approach to blow ...
— The Moving Picture Boys at Panama - Stirring Adventures Along the Great Canal • Victor Appleton
... Dick levelled his pistol instantly at Austin, with murderous hate in his eyes, and drew the trigger. The pistol clicked harmlessly. Austin, self-conscious, did not raise his pistol. But Dick, broadening his chest, glared at ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke
... what seemed to them a safe distance between us, and would stop to watch us curiously within easy rifle shot. Yet I am glad I can record that not a shot was fired at them. Gilbert was wild, for he had in him the hunter's instinct in fullest measure. The trigger of Job's rifle clicked longingly, but they never forgot that starvation broods over Labrador, and that the animal they longed to shoot might some time save the life of one in just such extremity as that reached by Mr. Hubbard and his ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... travelers were courteously dismissed; and as Anton went out he saw the officer wearily throw himself back into an easy-chair, and with bent head begin to play with the trigger of his pistols. ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... unmelodious, save the tones of this sweet little singer. Nothing but starvation or scientific research could justify the slaughter of one of these innocents. I believe I shut my eyes when I pulled the trigger of my gun, and I know my heart gave a regretful thump when I heard the thud of its poor, bleeding body upon the ground. When we started for Franklin Point the next day, Lieutenant Schwatka concluded to follow Toolooah's advice, and keep upon the ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... post of Mataafas, were challenged by an old man with a gun, and mentioned in answer what they were. "Ifea Siamani? Which is the German?" cried the old gentleman, dancing, and with his finger on the trigger; and the commissioners stood somewhile in a very anxious posture, till they were released by the opportune arrival of a chief. It was November the 27th when Leary and Moors completed their absurd excursion; in ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had raised it and his finger was on the trigger, but he did not make its flash cut the darkness for a moment and its report run ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... mouth of the purse, which was bound with massive silver plate, opened and gave admittance to his hand. He made me remark, as if to break short the subject on which Bailie Jarvie had spoken, that a small steel pistol was concealed within the purse, the trigger of which was connected with the mounting, and made part of the machinery, so that the weapon would certainly be discharged, and in all probability its contents lodged in the person of any one, who, being unacquainted with the secret, should tamper ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... or wives at home, whom you hope to meet again, when war and its insanities are over. Oh! for their sakes, show mercy to the defenseless girl who stands here in your power! Do not compel her to shed her own blood! for, sure as you advance one step toward me, I pull this trigger, and fall dead at your feet." And Edith raised the pistol and placed the muzzle to her own temple—her finger ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... repress an involuntary start, albeit he saw what he had half expected to see. The fleshy right hand of Hartley Parrish grasped convulsively an automatic pistol. His clutching index finger was crooked about the trigger and the barrel was pressed into the yielding pile of the carpet. His other hand with clawing fingers was flung out away from the body on the other side. One leg was stretched out to its fullest extent and the foot just ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... begun to shriek and whirl, cutting to and fro with his terrible campilan, and before any one could prevent, he had felled two troopers. With a howl, Lewis plunged into their midst, pistol leveled, but before he could pull the trigger, the Moro buried the sword in his own vitals and ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... electric rifle to his shoulder, Tom pressed the switch trigger. The unseen but powerful force shot ...
— Tom Swift and his Big Tunnel - or, The Hidden City of the Andes • Victor Appleton
... one end of a springy green pole at right angles to its length; the pole is laid horizontally, one end of it being firmly fixed to a tree, and the other (that carrying the spear) bent forcibly backwards and held back by a loop of rattan. This spring is set by means of an ingenious trigger, in such a way that an animal passing through the gap must push against a string attached to the trigger, and so release the spring, which then drives the bamboo spear across the gap with great force. (The drawing (Fig. 22) Will make clear ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... the trigger the Irishman dropped his hand. Slowly he looked from face to face of his companions—a dazed expression on his own countenance, as though he were awakening from a dream. The child, clinging to the Seer with one hand and pointing with the other, said again: ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... to what they should do to me. On they came nearer and nearer, uttering the most menacing growls. I had, I thought, but one chance—to knock over one of them with one barrel, and the other with the second. I pulled the trigger. The first barrel missed fire; the next did the same. In my agitation when last loading I had forgotten to put on the caps. I had no time even to remedy my neglect. I was completely at the mercy of the angry ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... shy bird, so he had to creep and maneuver to get within gunshot unseen, unheard. He stole from tree to tree, and muffled his footsteps in the long grass so adroitly that, just as he was going to pull the trigger, he stepped light as a feather on a venomous snake. ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... upon 520 His manly paunch with such a force, As almost beat him off his horse. He lost his whinyard, and the rein; But, laying fast hold of the mane, Preserv'd his seat; and as a goose 525 In death contracts his talons close, So did the Knight, and with one claw The trigger of his pistol draw. The gun went off: and as it was Still fatal to stout HUDIBRAS, 530 In all his feats of arms, when least He dreamt of it, to prosper best, So now he far'd: the shot, let fly At random 'mong the ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... his pistol, On its ornamented stock, While his finger feels the trigger And is busy with the lock— The other seeks his ataghan, And clasps its jewell'd hilt— Oh! much of gore in days of yore That ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... surprised to meet him out walking, right here in Philadelphia," said one of the staff. "He'll be disguised, of course, but you could always tell him by the absence of the trigger finger on his right hand. It's missing, you know; shot off when ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... moment to calculate chances. The captain pulled the trigger, and the crash of the shot was followed by a howl from the savage, as his uplifted arm dropped to his side, and the spear fell across the face of the sleeper. Henry instantly awoke, and sprang up with the agility of a panther. Before he could observe what had occurred, Keona leaped ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... to pull the trigger, but he does not. His eyes are drawn away from ASHER, toward the doorway, lower right, where DR. JONATHAN is seen standing, gazing at him. Gradually his arm drops to his side, and DR. JONATHAN goes up to him and takes the pistol from his hand. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... and was about to pull trigger, when the canoe commenced rocking about, as if tossed upon ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... tangled in a snarling heap over the remains of our supper, others crouching on their haunches in a ring, facing us. One of them sprang as Le Brunnec fired, and its hot breath fanned my face before my own finger pressed the trigger. ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... our men for the third time, and, you may take my word for it, one or both of these heroes would have bit the dust at that discharge. But, by Jove, sir, just as they were going to pull trigger, in galloped your adorable daughter, and swooned off her foaming horse in the middle of us,—disarmed us, sir, in a moment, melted our valor, bewitched our senses, and the great god of war had to retreat before little Cupid and the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... pre-arrangement that determined whether the stone from the cliff should fall on point A or point B—the same sort of process that guided the pen to make legible and effective writing instead of illegible and ineffective scrawls—the same kind of control that determines when and where a trigger shall be pulled so as to secure the anticipated slaughter of a bird. So far as energy is concerned, the explosion and the trigger-pulling are the same identical operations whether the aim be exact or random. It is intelligence ...
— Life and Matter - A Criticism of Professor Haeckel's 'Riddle of the Universe' • Oliver Lodge
... the dread speech, his finger presses the trigger; the crack comes, with the flash and ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... surprise she surrendered it without demur, suddenly conscious that he was no more afraid, that he was rapidly assuming comprehensive command of the situation beyond her to gainsay, and that he knew, and knew that she knew he knew, that she had never entertained any real intention of pulling the trigger, however desperate ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... He stood opposite them with his arm outstretched and his finger on the trigger, aiming at the enemy. When Sauverand addressed Florence by her Christian name, he started from head to foot and his finger trembled. What miracle kept him from shooting? By what supreme effort of will did he stifle the jealous ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... poured in, and then, flinging their muskets away, bounded forward sword in hand with a terrific yell. The soldiers had not time to fix their bayonets in the smoking muzzles of their muskets before the claymores were among them and the battle was over.[103] On the left wing scarcely a trigger was pulled: the men broke and ran like sheep. The famous Scots Brigade, in fact, set the example of flight. Their officers behaved like brave soldiers. Balfour, abandoned by his men, defended himself for a time against overwhelming odds, ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... armature keeps its upper end normally away from the magnet core. When the magnet draws the armature inwardly, the number plate drops and exposes the numeral through the opening in the front of the box. In order to return the number plate to its original position, as shown in Fig. 51, a vertical trigger (M) passes up through the bottom, its upper end being within range of one of the ...
— Electricity for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... the bar like a steeplechaser, for I seen 'Curly' grab at the drawer, and I have aversions to witnessing gun plays from the front end. The tenderfoot riz up in his chair, and snatchin' a stack of reds in his off mit, dashed 'em into 'Curly's' face just as he pulled trigger. It spoiled his aim, and the boy was on to him like a mountain lion, follerin' over the table, along the line of ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... elevation and windage under the most diversified conditions, so that I very rarely made use of the sights on my rifle. Nor did I ever need to aim consciously; I just flung the weapon to my shoulder, keeping my eye meanwhile upon my mark, pressed the trigger at precisely the right instant, and—down dropped the quarry: I had in fact by long practice become a dead shot, and could scarcely remember when I had last failed to bring down what I aimed at. Nor did I fail now; as the bird rose it flew straight away ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... a great advance was made by the invention of the arquebus or bow-gun. A spring let loose by a trigger threw the match, which was fastened to it, forward, into the pan which contained the priming. It was from this spring that ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... wouldn't advise yuh to go ridin'," Jim said thoughtfully. "This here gun's kinda techy, anyway, unless you're used to a quick trigger. Yuh might be safer without than ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... the safety light was now in his favor, he swung his legs over the seat—a T-bar at the bottom of the rod which swung down from the drive mechanism—grasped the rod, and pulled the starting trigger. ...
— Where I Wasn't Going • Walt Richmond
... springing back upon him as he swung the pistol into line with one of the jelly-masses. He barely pressed the trigger before the charging brutes knocked him ...
— Zehru of Xollar • Hal K. Wells
... and Barraclough for the answer, and to my amazement saw that the former had his revolver at the level. His finger was on the trigger. I leaped forward and struck it up, and the bullet buried itself in ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson
... too the men of Muideart,[158] While stream'd their flag its bravery; Their gleaming weapons, blue-dyed,[159] That havock'd on the cavalry. Macalister,[160] Mackinnon, With many a flashing trigger there, The foemen rushing in on, Resistless shew'd their vigour there. May fortune free thee—may we see thee Again in Braun,[161] the turreted, Girt with thy clan! And not a man But will get the scorn he merited. Then wine will play, and usquebae From flaggons, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... stop every pleasure boat and search it for me. So ... tell your chauffeur to swing about and make for the flying field. And tell him to drive carefully, by the way. I've still got these guns on a very fine adjustment of the trigger-pressure." ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... upon the head of a drum, and he told the numbers that were thrown up, by bowing his head as many times as there were numbers indicated. He discharged a pistol, by drawing with his teeth a string that was fastened to the trigger. He fired a small cannon by means of a match which was attached to his right foot, and he exhibited no signs of fear at the report of the cannon. He leaped through a hoop several times, with the greatest agility—his master holding the hoop ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... comes all his light canvas, and up goes his mainsail. The man who commands that ship is a right valiant cavalier, and will put up a good fight; therefore, let no man put match to culverin or finger to trigger until I give the word. Now, let the waits play up 'The brave ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... are," was the reply. "I can manage him myself with a spear, if I can only be in time before he reaches the shore. If not, it's no matter, for I won't allow a trigger to be pulled." ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... for a moment when it was well within rifle shot, and drawing his rifle from the toboggan he dropped upon a knee, aimed carefully, and pulled the trigger. The frost-clogged firing pin did not respond, and the wolf, seeming to understand its peril, ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... restoring to its place the favorite rifle he had intended to use to-day. He could not refrain from testing its perfect mechanism, and at the first sharp crack of the hammer, liberated by a tentative pull on the trigger, little Archie sprang up from his play on the hearth-rug, where he was harnessing a toy horse to Mrs. Briscoe's work-basket by long shreds of her zephyr, and ran clamoring for permission ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock
... what had passed out of sight between Bartley and Colonel Clifford, for what the young people heard now was quite enough to make what Sir Lucius O'Trigger calls a very pretty quarrel. Bartley, hitherto known to Mary as a very oily speaker, shouted at the top of his voice in arrogant defiance, "You're not a child, are you? You are old enough to read ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... upper edge of the barrel a V-shaped channel was cut. The channel was not very deep, only enough to receive a tenpenny nail with the head projecting half-way above the sides. A notch was cut across the barrel, through this channel, at the trigger end, and a trigger made of heavy iron wire, bent to the shape shown in Fig. 51, was hinged to the gun by a bolt which passed clear through the stock and through both eyes of the trigger. By using two nuts on ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... his wooden mantelpiece, then I begin to give myself virtuous airs. I have always held, too, that pistol practice should be distinctly an open-air pastime; and when Holmes, in one of his queer humors, would sit in an arm-chair with his hair-trigger and a hundred Boxer cartridges, and proceed to adorn the opposite wall with a patriotic V. R. done in bullet-pocks, I felt strongly that neither the atmosphere nor the appearance of our room was ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... When he stopped sobbing he tried to kill me for hindering his destruction, but I had got the razor in my pocket, and his revolver missed fire. That was lucky, for he managed to stick the muzzle against my chest and pull the trigger just as I got him down. I wished I had brought old Griggs with me, for they say he can bend a good horse-shoe double, even now, and the fellow had the strength of a lunatic in him. It was rather lively for a few seconds, and then he broke down ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... brave. Brave as the bravest. His glance was as keen and his mouth was as silent As a trailer's should be who looks and who listens By day and by night, having no one to talk to. His finger was quick when it handled the trigger, And his eye loved the sights as lightning loves rivers. I've seen him stand up when the odds were against him. Stand up like a man who takes coolly the chances. That proves he was ...
— The Busted Ex-Texan and Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... small a distance of my pillow. What construction could I put upon them? My heart began to palpitate with dread of some unknown danger. Presently, another voice, but equally near me, was heard whispering in answer, "Why not? I will draw a trigger in this business; but perdition be my lot if I do more!" To this the first voice returned, in a tone which rage had heightened in a small degree above a whisper, "Coward! stand aside, and see me do it. I will grasp her ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... faintest contradictory idea in the margin. For instance, I hold out my forefinger, and with closed eyes try to realize as vividly as possible that I hold a revolver in my hand and am pulling the trigger. I can even now fairly feel my finger quivering with the tendency to contract; and, if it were hitched to a recording apparatus, it would certainly betray its state of tension by registering incipient movements. Yet it does not actually crook, and the movement of pulling the trigger is not performed. ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... fight them at once, saying the fellows meant mischief. We declined to camp with them unless they would agree to give up their arms; they pretended they were willing to do so, when one of them put his gun at the breast of our interpreter and pulled the trigger. In an instant a bloody scene ensued; several of Viscarra's men were killed, together with a number of mules. Finally the Indians were whipped and tried to get away, but we chased them some distance and killed thirty-five. Our friendly Pueblos were delighted, ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... he raised his rifle, and, taking aim as well as the darkness would allow him, pulled trigger and fired. ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... enjoy the millions that belong to her of right, in consequence of her sister's death, it is necessary first for her to receive them; but the Duke, it is reported, as the good Duc de Crequi used to say, "Holds back as tight as the trigger of the Cognac cross-bow;" and in fact he has not only refused to give up to his sister what she should take under her sister's will, but he disputes her right to the bank-notes which she had given to the Duchess to take care of for her, when she ...
— The Memoirs of the Louis XIV. and The Regency, Complete • Elizabeth-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Orleans
... cautiously and looked through between the branches of a shrub, you could see him, and Bauldie actually covered him with his rifle. The unconscious farmer knew not that his life hung upon a thread, or, rather, upon Bauldie's trigger. Bauldie looked inquiringly to his chief, for he would dearly have loved to fire a cap, but Speug shook his head so fiercely that the trapper dropped down in his lair, and Speug afterwards explained that the renegade had certainly deserved death, but that it was ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... gritted his teeth and jumped off after Greg. Instantly he knew that he had jumped too hard. He shot away from the orbit-ship like a bullet; the jagged asteroid surface leaped up at him. Frantically he grabbed for the bumper nozzle and pulled the trigger, trying ...
— Gold in the Sky • Alan Edward Nourse
... his left hand and settling his forefinger on the trigger, Kirkwood beamed with pure enjoyment. He found the deference of the older man, tempered though it was by his indomitable swagger, refreshing ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... I seed two elks burst out of the Harricane 'bout one hundred and thirty or forty yards below me. There was an old buck and a doe. I stopped, waited till they got into a clear place, and as the old fellow made a leap, I raised old Bet, pulled trigger, and she spoke out. The smoke blinded me so, that I couldn't see what I did; but as it cleared away, I caught a glimpse of only one of them going through the bushes; so I thought I had the other. I went up, and there lay the old buck kicking. I cut his throat, ...
— David Crockett: His Life and Adventures • John S. C. Abbott
... carried with cartridges in either the chamber or the magazine except when specifically ordered. When so loaded, or supposed to be loaded, it is habitually carried locked; that is, with the safety lock turned to the "safe." At all other times it is carried unlocked, with the trigger pulled. ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... most of the family of the ifs, a peace-maker. My Lady Delacour, I was going to observe that my principal has met with an unfortunate accident, in the shape of a whitlow on the fore-finger of her right hand, which incapacitates her from drawing a trigger; but I am at your service, ladies, either of you, that can't put up with a disappointment with good humour.' I never, during the whole course of my existence, was more disposed to bear a disappointment with good humour, to prove ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... might miss my head, so that I should have time to fire. Then, on my back, with my pistol raised over my head, I forced myself out with every muscle in my body. I leaped to my feet on the instant, quickly glancing round for the madman, swinging my pistol about with my finger hard on the trigger. He was not there, after all. I might have spared myself the trouble. I was alone there in the fern, within earshot of a murmur of voices, talking excitedly. I was not going to spy into any more secrets. I was going to ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... objects which were wasting away. Their disintegration is identical with our own. They have their decay, their ruptures, their tumors, their madnesses. A piece of furniture gnawed by worms, a gun with a broken trigger, a warped drawer, or the soul of a violin suddenly out of tune, such are the ills ...
— Romance of the Rabbit • Francis Jammes
... and Hammett went down in the elevator of the hotel, and out of doors, and into an automobile. Hammett drove, and Peter sat in the rear seat with McGivney, who had the revolver in his coat pocket, his finger always on the trigger and the muzzle always pointed into Peter's middle. So Peter obeyed all orders promptly, and stopped asking questions because he found ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... Greville and Reeve with those of Bolingbroke and Mallet, as painted by Dr. Johnson. Bolingbroke, he had said, was a cowardly blackguard, who loaded a gun which he was afraid to fire off himself, and left a shilling to a beggarly Scotchman to pull the trigger after his death. The inference was inevitable; and though Reeve was neither a Scotchman nor a beggar, he unquestionably felt the sting, coming, as it did, from a friend of more than forty years' standing, Abraham ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton
... explosion of terrifying oaths Lighthouse Harry thrust a shell into the breech of the quick-firing gun. Without waiting to aim it, he tugged at the trigger. Nothing happened! He threw open the breech and gazed impotently at the base of the shell. It was untouched. The ship was ringing with cries of anger, of hate, ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... the work! Gaunt pulled the trigger; there was a blinding flash. The old man stood a moment on the ridge, the wind blowing his gray hair back, then ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 60, October 1862 • Various
... only sensed them. And I want to tell you right now that it got beyond me. It was like killing a man, a conscious, brave man who looked calmly into your gun as much as to say, "Who's afraid?" Then, too, the message seemed so near that, instead of pulling the trigger quick, I stopped to see if I could catch the message. There it was, right before me, glimmering all around in those eyes of his. And then it was too late. I got scared. I was trembly all over, and my stomach generated a nervous palpitation that made me seasick. ...
— Brown Wolf and Other Jack London Stories - Chosen and Edited By Franklin K. Mathiews • Jack London
... I could see him leaping across the marsh toward the gray church with the cracked bell, and as he disappeared by the short cut I pulled the trigger ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith
... time to take aim. The mate and Drew both drew trigger as they entered the cabin, when there was a savage yelling, the place filled with smoke. Then as it rose, Oliver Lane and Panton could be seen lying half fainting upon the cabin floor, and the ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... I put into Moxley's legs turned out for the best after all," said Randy in a roguish tone. "If I hadn't pulled trigger that night Bug Batters would still be treading the path of wickedness, with no ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon
... gotten anywhere. Sure, we can isolate the virus. It grows nicely on monkey lung cells. But that doesn't help. The thing has no apparent antigenicity. It parasitizes, but it doesn't trigger any immune reaction. We can kill it, but the strength of the germicide is too great for ...
— Pandemic • Jesse Franklin Bone
... out of the bush, his yellow teeth bared in a snarl of rage. He wore a bandage across his forehead and came at Kendrick, levelling his rifle. Just as he pulled the trigger he tripped on a root and pitched full length into the open, the gun exploding harmlessly into the ground. Phil had him by the throat in ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... levelled his own pistol. Sturgeon's weapon caught in his pocket, and he tried to pull it loose. The moment he succeeded Gordon stood ready to fire. Twice the hammer of the sergeant's pistol went back almost to the turning-point, and then, as he pulled the trigger again, Macfarlan, first lieutenant, who once played lacrosse at Yale, rushed, parting the crowd right and left, and dropped his billy lightly three times—right, left and right—on Sturgeon's head. The blood spurted, the head fell back between the bully's shoulders, his grasp on his pistol ...
— Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories • John Fox, Jr.
... time to Lejoillie and Carlos to come to my assistance should I miss. I never felt more nervous in my life, for although I believed that I should wound the bear, yet I might the next moment find myself in his embrace, with his jaws applied to my neck. Aiming at his chest, I pulled the trigger, and then leaped back to avoid him should he spring on me. He, however, had been more frightened than I was. When my shot entered his body, he must have been on the point of turning to fly; but the bullet had taken deadly effect, and he had not gone ten paces, when over ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston
... his distorter to bear, he concentrated on the violent pulse needed to trigger the jewel, his mind closed to all else. He turned his ...
— The Weakling • Everett B. Cole
... falls to munching some fragments from his bundle. Jasper folds his arms upon the top of the wall, and, with his chin resting on them, watches. He takes no note whatever of the Minor Canon, but watches Neville, as though his eye were at the trigger of a loaded rifle, and he had covered him, and were going to fire. A sense of destructive power is so expressed in his face, that even Durdles pauses in his munching, and looks at him, with an unmunched something ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... the rifle level across a low branch, drew the stock snug and laid her cheek to it and her steady finger on the trigger. ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... of it. He knew he had been hit some place—in the breast or shoulder perhaps—but as yet felt not the slightest pain. Fire flashed in his very face, now, and this time he smelled the acrid powder; but he had been in motion when the trigger was pressed and the bullet whined away fretfully through the trees. On the heels of the second report came that sickening crack once more, and the face of the man that glared through the smoke at Hiram went red with ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... were enfevered and his lips dry and cracked. He carried a handsome fowling-piece, which presented, at first glance, no feature of dissimilarity to the usual pattern except that trigger and hammer were absent, and the rim of the barrel was not ...
— The Son of Clemenceau • Alexandre (fils) Dumas
... took his gun, and went into the woods a shooting. He spied a Ringdove among the branches of an oak, and intended to kill it. He clapped the piece to his shoulder, and took his aim accordingly. But, just as he was going to pull the trigger, an adder, which he had trod upon under the grass, stung him so painfully in the leg that he was forced to quit his design, and threw his gun down in a passion. The poison immediately infected his blood, and his whole body ...
— Aesop's Fables - A New Revised Version From Original Sources • Aesop
... muttered the old man. "Cap'n Bonnet 'ud clap me in irons if I slew this filthy Ed'ard Teach and robbed him of that enjoyment. I'll pull no trigger save ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... encamped at Central Tura, together with the Arab servants who preferred Hamed's imbecile haste to Thani's cautious advance. Our first night in Unyamwezi was very exciting indeed. The Musungu's camp was visited by two crawling thieves, but they were soon made aware by the portentous click of a trigger that the white man's ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... political warfare. But he had kept his seat, and now at last,—so he thought,—the ease and comfort of an unopposed return was to repay him for everything. Alas! how all this was changed; how his spirits sank within him, when he received that high-toned letter from his confidential agent, Mr. Trigger, in which he was invited to suggest the name of a colleague! "I'm sure you'll be rejoiced to hear, for the sake of the old borough," said Mr. Trigger, "that we feel confident of carrying the two seats." Could Mr. Trigger have heard the remarks which his patron ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... day of Henriette and Maurice's sentence, they were giving it a preliminary trial. "The trigger's been slipping—not working well," the head fellow explained to the master of ceremonies. Back and forth the terrible guillotine knife hissed and whistled until ...
— Orphans of the Storm • Henry MacMahon
... men seized an arquebuse, and levelled it at the struggling form in the water. He pulled the trigger, but no sooner did the powder splutter in the pan than the gun burst in his hands, and a piece of the metal, entering his brain, laid him dead on ...
— Marguerite De Roberval - A Romance of the Days of Jacques Cartier • T. G. Marquis
... crossed were musketeers, the remainder pikemen. The latter formed the front line behind the rampart, their spears forming a close hedge around it, while the musketeers prepared to fire between them. By the order of Count Brahe not a trigger was pulled until the cavalry were within fifty yards, then a flash of flame swept round the rampart, and horses and men in the front line of the cavalry tumbled to the ground. But half the musketeers had fired, and a few seconds later another volley ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... left him quite composed under fire. Singling out one of Stuart's men, he covered that cavalier with his revolver, and probably, in another instant, would have ended his career; but, just as his finger gave the final pressure upon the trigger, his horse, riddled with bullets, fell dead under him, the shot flew wide of its mark, and he fell to ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... four days previous, had stood erect—a pillar of life—with an arm like a royal-mast and a thigh like a windlass. But the slightest conceivable finger-touch of a bit of crooked trigger had eventuated in stretching him out, more helpless than an hour-old babe, with a blasted thigh, utterly drained of its brawn. And who was it that now stood over him like a superior being, and, as if clothed himself ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... me, Burke?—she was hasty; she was hasty. It is easier to set forces of love or hate moving than to check them in motion. Sometimes I think, Burke, that people were in certain ways less reckless in the good old days when they had perpetually before their eyes the vision of a hair-trigger God, always cocked and ready to shoot if they crossed the line of duty. But Nelly is coming bravely through a severe test of character. May I offer you ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... fireplace, followed by Elaine and the rest of us. There, in what remained of a package done up roughly in newspaper, was a shot gun with its barrel sawed off about six inches from the lock, fastened to a block of wood, and connected to a series of springs on the trigger, released by a little electromagnetic arrangement actuated by two batteries and leading by wires up along the moulding to the picture where the slightest ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... he had me trapped, with all the deck to dodge about. Just forward of the main-mast I stopped, drew a pistol from my pocket, took a cool aim, though he had already turned and was once more coming directly after me, and drew the trigger. The hammer fell, but there followed neither flash nor sound; the priming was useless with sea-water. I cursed myself for my neglect. Why had not I, long before, reprimed and reloaded my only weapons? Then I should not have been, as now, a mere ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and run the gauntlet of half a dozen sentinels. His wagon is fuller than usual; and the late hour it is now after sunset will of itself excite suspicion. It might test the pluck of a braver man; for the sentries' bayonets are fixed, and their guns at the half-trigger; but he reaches the outer gate in safety. Now St. Patrick help him! for he needs all the impudence of an Irishman. The gate rolls back; the Commandant stands nervously by, but ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... never hunted any game better worth my powder; and to a young man with rare holidays and long working hours, its value was enhanced by the fact that one might bring it down at any turn, if only one kept one's eye alert and one's hand on the trigger. ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... and climbed the cliff. When he got to the top and looked round he found this severely wounded man had not only disobeyed orders and followed him, but had found strength to lug up a box of ammunition with him. "I ordered you not to come," said Aspinall: "I can still pull a trigger, ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton
... extradited herself Tuesday night with a revolver| |shot in the temple. In the yard back of her | |foster-parents' home at 5319 West Twenty-fifth | |Street, Cicero, with one arm around the loyal Fritz,| |she put the revolver to her head and pressed the | |trigger....[48] | ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... ascertain the direction the blood would take when it flowed from the wound. Then, placing himself in proper position, so that the gore would run from and not toward his body, he placed the pistol to the right temple, pulled the trigger and death ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... their grasp, and a figure that rose partly upright reeled into the fern, while Alton felt the barrel of a rifle under him. He rolled on his side, and clawed for it, almost sightless, with one hand, and laughed harshly as he raised himself a trifle. There was a flash and a concussion, the trigger-guard sank into his nerveless finger, and a smashing amidst the undergrowth was followed by footsteps that were presently lost in the ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... of one of the men, Ben Jones, was instantly levelled at the chief, and he was just about to pull the trigger, when Mr. Stuart exclaimed, "Not for your life! not for your life, you will bring ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... illustrating his reflections by his own actions when stirred by emotion. "The loaded gun may be as wise as Solomon was reputed to be," he remarked beneath his hands, "but all the same when some one pulls the trigger the damn thing goes off," and sat up to confront the muzzle of the corporal's rifle, who was ordering him to get up. Birnier rose. But to the ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... and fro in the wintry North Atlantic a torpedo sped across her bows and she knew her chance had come. Instantly her alarm signals, quietly given, brought all hands to action stations, some in deck-houses, others in hen-coops, but each with his finger on the trigger or his hand on a ready spare shell. Presently the submarine broke surface and fired a shot across the Q ship's bow. On this the well-trained crew ran about in panic, while the captain screeched at them and waved his arms about like mad. Then the submarine came up within three cables ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... I had begun to grow very anxious lest the others should take alarm, the bull likewise appeared on the edge of the glade, and stood with outstretched head, scratching his throat against a young tree, which shook violently. I aimed low, behind his shoulder, and pulled the trigger. At the crack of the rifle all the bison turned and raced off at headlong speed. The fringe of young pines beyond and below the glade cracked and swayed as if a whirlwind were passing, and in another moment ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck
... faced. He too heard the steps of the three warriors coming in their direction, cautiously feeling a way through the great bank of mist. It was true that they could pass near without seeing, but chance might bring them straight to the little group. He shifted his fingers to the lock and trigger of his rifle, and looked at the sleeping three whose figures were almost hidden, although they were not a yard away. He felt that they should be awake and ready but in waking, Grosvenor, at least, might make enough noise to draw the ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... of a deaf person who has deaf relatives, the assigned cause of deafness may not be the only cause involved, or indeed the true cause at all. It may be the cause simply in the same sense that the pulling of a trigger is the cause of the expulsion of a bullet from a rifle, or a spark the cause of the explosion of a gunpowder magazine; hereditary influences ...
— Consanguineous Marriages in the American Population • George B. Louis Arner
... captain refused to be drawn. "I'd just like to have a record of any more trips they make." He handed the camera to Raf. "Put that on and don't forget to trigger it if you do go. I don't believe they'll go out tonight. They aren't too fond of being out in the open in darkness. We saw that last night. But keep an eye on them in ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... much bravery to pull a trigger behind a bush," muttered Decoud to himself. "Fortunately, the night is dark, or there would be but little chance of saving ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... hand, the doctor clutched his revolver, with his finger on the trigger. In spite of his pledged word, he did not hesitate. If the adversary touched the end of the bed, the shot would be fired ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc
... Their father had been a soldier in the civil war, and in some way the rifle he carried, with his name and the date scratched on the trigger-plate, was sent to the boys by a comrade after his death. Dan, there, was handling it, supposing it unloaded as usual, when it went off and shot his brother, who was leaning over him, right through ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... blamed, if the matter became public; others have a weakness at heart and recoil from the circumstances of death. That is, to some extent, my own experience. I cannot put a pistol to my head and draw the trigger; for something stronger than myself withholds the act; and although I loathe life, I have not strength enough in my body to take hold of death and be done with it. For such as I, and for all who desire to be out of the coil without posthumous scandal, ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson
... latch is seven twelfths of a hole in length and one quarter in thickness. So also its socket-piece. The trigger or handle is three holes in length and three quarters of a hole in breadth and thickness. The trough in the pipe is sixteen holes in length, one quarter of a hole in thickness, and three quarters in height. The base of the ...
— Ten Books on Architecture • Vitruvius
... then clicked shut as his Colt swung down. But he did not shoot; something inside of him held his trigger finger and he swore instead. The idea of a man stealing his horse, being caught red-handed and unarmed, and still possessed of sufficient courage to call his captor a name never tolerated or overlooked in that ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... the first shot every animal in the herd seemed to flatten itself and settle to its work. They did not run—they simply flew across the ground, their legs showing only as a blur. The one I killed was four hundred yards away, and I held four feet ahead when I pulled the trigger. They could not have been traveling less than fifty-five or sixty miles an hour, for they were running in a semicircle about the car while we were moving at forty miles in a ...
— Across Mongolian Plains - A Naturalist's Account of China's 'Great Northwest' • Roy Chapman Andrews
... finger, and wriggled the butt home into his shoulder. Dave watched him in silence; Mills was, he knew, a good shot, and he was now preparing, with all the little tricks and graces of the rifle-range, to pull trigger on the man he had risked—nay, almost thrown away—his life to save from the consequences of ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... the noble authour and his editor. 'Sir, he was a scoundrel, and a coward[787]: a scoundrel, for charging a blunderbuss against religion and morality; a coward, because he had not resolution to fire it off himself, but left half a crown to a beggarly Scotchman, to draw the trigger after his death[788]!' Garrick, who I can attest from my own knowledge, had his mind seasoned with pious reverence, and sincerely disapproved of the infidel writings of several, whom, in the course of his almost universal gay intercourse with men of eminence, he ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... little Animals at work, even as in the contrivance of killing a Fox or Wolf with a Gun, the moving of a string, is the death of the Animal; for the Beast, by moving the flesh that is laid to entrap him, pulls the string which moves the trigger, and that lets go the Cock which on the steel strikes certain sparks of fire which kindle the powder in the pann, and that presently flies into the barrel, where the powder catching fire rarifies and drives out the bullet which kills the Animal; in all which ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... done shot 'im, an' he's bad hurt, too. You know dat las' time we went at um? Well, suh, I wuz shootin' at a man right at me, an' he knock my han' down des ez I pull de trigger, an' de ball cotch him right 'twix de hip an' de knee. He call me by my name, an' den it come over me dat we done got mix' up in de shuffle an' dat I wuz shootin' at you. But 'twuz Marse Jack Bledsoe; I know'd 'im time I look at ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris
... the miners wore all the clothing they possessed. Here the terror of the peons was an old American mine-boss rated "loco" among them, who went constantly armed with an immense and ancient revolver, always loaded and reputed of "hair trigger," which he drew and whistled in the barrel whenever he wished to call a workman. A blaze crackling in the fireplace was pleasant during the evening in the manager's house, for "Peregrina" lies even higher above the sea ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck
... pots. An officer of the W.A.F.F.'s, in a fight in the bush in South Nigeria, had one of these things fired at him from a distance of fifteen feet. He told me all that saved him was that when the native pulled the trigger the recoil of the gun "kicked" the muzzle two feet in the air and the native ten feet into the bush. I bought a Tower rifle at the trade price, a pound, and brought it home. But although my friends have offered to back either end of the gun as being the more destructive, we have found ...
— The Congo and Coasts of Africa • Richard Harding Davis
... moments. D'Esterre first changed his position, moving a pace towards the left hand, and then stepped towards O'Connell. His object was to induce him to fire, more or less, at random. He lifted his pistol, as if about to fire. O'Connell instantly presented, pulled the trigger, and ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... crossing, and there imagination stops. The workman can get no farther than his file will go, and you know how that acts to and fro in a straight groove. A pheasant or hare at full speed, a few trees—firs as most characteristic—could be put on the plate, and something else on the trigger guard; firs are easily drawn, and make most appearance for a few touches; pheasants roost in them. Even a coat of arms, if it were the genuine coat-of-arms of the owner's family, would look well. Men have their ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... short) grew taut—which was good judgment on his part, for his neck was sore; and his feet being tender, he felt his way carefully and painfully over the metal, as if he feared that at any step he might spring some treacherous, air-trigger trap-door which would drop ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... Each member of the party carried an automatic pistol and several hand grenades. These were small, hollow containers, of cast-iron, loaded with a powerful explosive, which was set off after a certain trigger or spring or firing pin (according to the type used) was released by the thrower. The explosive blew the grenade to bits, and it was scored, or crisscrossed, by deep indentations so that the iron would break ...
— Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line - The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam • Clarence Young
... the missile Jared Long sent a bullet through him, and then, shifting the muzzle of his Winchester toward the line of dusky figures, he blazed away as fast as he could sight the weapon and pull the trigger. ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis
... did not hear me, or notice the growl of his dog, or feel the vibration of our tread as we both bore down upon him. We should have been too late if it had not been for the life-long habit of the wretch to secure himself from danger or suspicion. With his finger on the trigger, all ready to pull, he paused one moment to raise himself and look about. That moment saved the life of Deborah Shimmin, for the would-be murderer was the next instant under the knee of Fred Harcourt and his throat in his grip, while my hand was over the nipples ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... them has any hobbyhorse, to use the phrase of Sterne. Not one has a ruling passion, such as we read of in Pope. Who would not have expected them to be insipid likenesses of each other? No such thing. Harpagon is not more unlike to Jourdain, Joseph Surface is not more unlike to Sir Lucius O'Trigger, than every one of Miss Austen's young divines to all his reverend brethren. And almost all this is done by touches so delicate, that they elude analysis, that they defy the powers of description, and that we know them ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... fields, and stood again upon a hillock of Peckham Rye, and saw the morning break in beauty and in wonder over London. The vision gained from the foolish and romantic days of his boyhood, steadied his finger upon the trigger after ...
— The Summons • A.E.W. Mason
... and with the few strokes of the drop-hammer, fall a few seconds later, the shaped part of a rifle. Some of the machines were making receivers for the stock, the largest piece of metal, and other small parts like the trigger or the hammer, while still others were preparing the barrels ...
— The Boy With the U.S. Census • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... girl. The knife looked terrible; but it was sheathed and tucked into a belt. Anthony's Browning was in Monny's hand, and hidden only under her serge coat. Out it came, with a warning click of the trigger. And with an astonished, frightened gurgle in his throat the negro ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... the rifle was levelled at her; Lopez had taken deadly aim; his finger was on the trigger; she felt that her last hour had come, and that naught could avail her ...
— A Castle in Spain - A Novel • James De Mille
... distance with the cart we followed in his tracks again, keeping steadily on until we came to the first row of houses beginning the village. Here my brother began to thread his way more cautiously, and in the dark I heard distinctly the click of the trigger ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... too fast now, Dorothy," he cautioned. "This shell proves that Bailey's gun was fired, but it doesn't prove that Bailey's finger pulled the trigger, or that the gun was aimed at Jensen. Bailey might have loaned the rifle to somebody, or he might have fired at a snake, like I did a ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... could breathe even while totally submerged in the water. He strained his left arm against the tentacle that looped it, worked the ray-gun still clasped in his hand in line with the thing's monstrous carcass, and at once, gasping and sick, pulled the trigger clear back. ...
— The Bluff of the Hawk • Anthony Gilmore
... as it was light enough to see, we went out to a little ravine near the meeting- place, and I set up a board for him to shoot at. He would step out, raise that big pistol, and when I would count three he would shut his eyes and pull the trigger. Of course he didn't hit anything; he did not come anywhere near hitting anything. Just then we heard somebody shooting over in the ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... women and crouch down in my former hiding place. Then they did what women seldom do—betrayed the fugitive. Calling to the soldiers, they pointed out the place I was in. All four came running, and in a moment were almost on top of me. I presented my revolver and snapped the trigger twice without exploding the cartridges; they were too close or too excited to use their muskets, but all four grappled with me, and ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell
... me work for all I was worth. If I let up for a minute, they hit me and threatened to k-kill me. That ugly fellow who swore at me the day before was in the boat, and I c-could understand him. He made things very clear, as he jabbed the m-muzzle of his gun into my ribs, and h-held his finger on the trigger. ...
— Ben Comee - A Tale of Rogers's Rangers, 1758-59 • M. J. (Michael Joseph) Canavan
... efficient device for unlocking any door fitted with a spring lock is shown in the accompanying sketches. A fairly stiff spring, A, is connected by a flexible wire cord to the knob B. The cord is also fastened to a lever, C, which is pivoted at D and is released by a magnetic trigger, E, made from the armature and magnet of an old ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics |
