"Beat back" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fair wind, having waited for it, and were soon out of sight of land; but it did not hold. Bad weather overtook them, contrary winds, driving rain, fog—that overhanging curse of Greenland. They ran far out of their course and had to beat back again; cattle died, provision ran short; to crown all a sickness broke out among the company, whereof near half died. Thorbeorn kept hale and hearty throughout; and Gudrid took no harm. The wet, the clinging ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett
... attached to the staff of General Stewart, whose little force of six-thousand-odd men was suddenly surrounded by a body of fanatical Arabs, nine thousand strong. The British troops formed square, inside which the mounted officers sat directing the desperate defence, that again and again beat back the angry torrent. After some hours' fighting, a soldier in the excitement of the moment got outside the line of the square, and was engaged in a hand-to-hand conflict with a cluster of Arabs. Burnaby, seeing his peril, dashed out to the rescue—"with ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... I do not say that we might not succeed, but we should lose a lot of men in the attempt; it would be hot work even with the ship, attacked by six of these fellows at once. If it was in the night, we might fail to see any of them before they were upon us, and we should have hard work to beat back four or five hundred of them if they all came swarming on deck together. However, we can wait, and the first time the rajah shows any signs of treachery we can pounce upon his fleet. He will not dream that we have discovered ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... westward guarded lest the evacuation of Laulii should prove only the peril of Apia. To-day, in the irritation and alarm of failure, he forgot or despised his previous reasoning, and, though his detachment was beat back to the ships, proceeded with the remainder of his maimed design. The only change he made was to haul down the flag of truce. He had now no wish to meet with Mataafa. Words were out ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... stations. All that day we bombarded enemy Batteries and cross roads and barbed wire. Next morning the Italian Infantry carried Col Valbella and Col d'Echele by assault. The day after they took also Col del Rosso, and beat back very heavy counter-attacks. The Sassari Brigade and a Brigade of Bersaglieri specially distinguished themselves. It was an important and useful success. It considerably improved our line between the Asiago Plateau and ...
— With British Guns in Italy - A Tribute to Italian Achievement • Hugh Dalton
... give up his cause. This she immediately set about in so earnest and pretty a manner that Othello, who was mortally offended with Cassio, could not put her off. When he pleaded delay, and that it was too soon to pardon such an offender, she would not be beat back, but insisted that it should be the next night, or the morning after, or the next morning to that at farthest. Then she showed how penitent and humbled poor Cassio was, and that his offense did not deserve so sharp a check. And when ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... trying question to Harry. "I would undoubtedly return, had I the power," he answered; "but my orders were to carry the boat to the nearest land we can make, where food and shelter can be found. Were I to attempt to return, I should disobey those orders. It might take us also three or four days to beat back to the spot where we left the ship, and we might fail to ...
— The Voyages of the Ranger and Crusader - And what befell their Passengers and Crews. • W.H.G. Kingston
... immediately seized the opportunity. They had left a deep gap in the line, and upon that space Soult forthwith poured a force, which entirely destroyed the communication between the Russian centre and left. The Czar perceived the fatal consequences of this movement, and his guards rushed to beat back Soult. It was on an eminence, called the hill of Pratzen, that the encounter took place. The Russians drove the French infantry before them: Napoleon ordered Bessieres to hurry with the imperial guard to their rescue. ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... so later, as the pinnace slowly beat back to her moorings, a group of women followed by some stragglers of the other sex climbed the hill and seated themselves about the Fort to watch the departure of the Mayflower. Priscilla and Mary Chilton as usual were close together, and Desire Minter ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... deadly. Being secure from flanking movements, since the Border Mounted Rifles were on their right sweeping round Waggon Hill and some companies of the 60th in support, the Manchesters could devote all their attention to that long front, and beat back every attempt of the Boers to cross the valley where a tributary of the Klip River winds past Bester's Farm down to the broad flats by Intombi Spruit. These hostile demonstrations were never very determined or long sustained, and they slackened down to nothing for a ...
— Four Months Besieged - The Story of Ladysmith • H. H. S. Pearse
... force. In the meantime there were frequent skirmishes across the marsh, a few on both sides sallying out between the two camps. Sometimes, however, our Gallic or German auxiliaries crossed the marsh, and furiously pursued the enemy; or on the other hand the enemy passed it and beat back our men. Moreover there happened in the course of our daily foraging, what must of necessity happen, when corn is to be collected by a few scattered men out of private houses, that our foragers dispersing in an intricate country were surrounded by the enemy; by which, though we suffered ...
— "De Bello Gallico" and Other Commentaries • Caius Julius Caesar
... with a stone on his heart, for he was now awake to the fact that he could not say, "Thy will be done." He tried sore to lift up his heart, but could not. Something rose ever between him and his God, and beat back his prayer. A thick fog was about him—no air wherewith to make a cry! In his heart not one prayer would come to life; it was like an old nest without bird or ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... came; and now the Montenegrins moved to meet the attack. Apparently satisfied that there was no question that the center was to be the main objective of the enemy, the Montenegrin staff ordered the bulk of the Balkan army massed there to beat back ...
— The Boy Allies in the Balkan Campaign - The Struggle to Save a Nation • Clair W. Hayes
... the first French cheer I have heard," she continued, feverishly. "They beat back those Prussians and cheered for France! Oh, Jack, there is time yet! France is rising now—France is resisting. We must do our part; we must not wait. Jack, I ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers
... make a night of it," said he to himself, when he realized that it was impossible for him to beat back ...
— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic
... movements in action to this day. The Protestant Reformation was a part of it. That revolt against Rome produced a counter Renaissance in the bosom of the ancient Church herself. In presence of that peril she woke from sloth and corruption, and girded herself to beat back the invading heresies, by force or by craft, by inquisitorial fires, by the arms of princely and imperial allies, and by the self-sacrificing enthusiasm of her saints and martyrs. That time of danger produced the exalted zeal of Xavier and the intense, thoughtful, organizing ...
— A Half Century of Conflict - Volume I - France and England in North America • Francis Parkman
... men evermore Glory; but lay thou this to thy great heart 930 Whereunder in the dark of birth conceived Mine unlit life lay girdled with the zone That bound thy bridal bosom; set this thought Against all edge of evil as a sword To beat back sorrow, that for all the world Thou brought'st me forth a saviour, who shall save Athens; for none but I from none but thee Shall take this death for garland; and the men Mine unknown children of unsounded years, My sons unrisen ...
— Erechtheus - A Tragedy (New Edition) • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... Christians, after the first moment of surprise, met the Saracens with courage redoubled by rage at the treachery of their foes. Guido the Wild, brother and rival of Rinaldo, Griffon and Aquilant, sons of Oliver, and numerous others whose names have already been celebrated in our recitals, beat back the assailants, and at last, after prodigious slaughter, forced them to take shelter within ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... grandson, creator, guide, and guardian of modern civilization, paced with restless, ever-present steps, around the borders of that small world of light which he had built up, half blindly, in the overwhelming dark, and with two-handed blows beat back, with the iron mace of Germany, the savage assaults of Saracen and Sclave, of black Dane and brutal Wendt, and smote on till he died smiting, for order, and law, and faith, and so saved Europe, and, let us humbly hope, his own rude but true soul alive! ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... are they, whose manly breasts Beat back the pride of England's might; Whose stalwart arm laid low the crests Of many an old and valiant knight; When evening came with murderous flame, And liberty was ...
— The Yankee Tea-party - Or, Boston in 1773 • Henry C. Watson
... Scotland, and ended far out into what is now the Atlantic. But these glaciers, vast as they were, were very small compared with the glaciers that streamed out from the mountains of Norway and Sweden. These great glaciers invaded England to the south-west, beat back the glacier ice of Scotland from the floor of the North Sea, overran Denmark, and spread their mantle of bowlder clay ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen
... alone in the moon-lighted dusk of the upper chamber when he closed the door and began to pace a rageful sentry-beat back and forth between the windows. But all unknown to him one of the three fell sisters, she of the implacable front and deep-set, burning eyes, had entered with him to pace evenly as he paced, and to lay a maddening finger on ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... His mind beat back to fugitive memories of Jack's embarrassment when Esther's name had been mentioned in connection with his uncle. Swiftly his brain began to piece the bits of evidence he had not understood ...
— Tangled Trails - A Western Detective Story • William MacLeod Raine
... spectacular naval victory by transporting a force from the garrison of the city to the opposite shore of the Bosphorus, attacking the army encamped there and driving it in rout. Meanwhile the Bulgarian chieftain had responded to Leo's appeal and, relieving the siege of Adrianople, beat back the Saracen army at that point with great slaughter. The fugitives of that army served to throw into panic the troops encamped round the walls of Constantinople, already demoralized by disease, the death of their leaders, and the annihilation of ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... was of two minds! He wanted to beat back the Huns, who had made all this fearful mess; but also he wanted to beat the profiteers who were making messes at home. It happened that Jimmie had reached the army at a trying moment, when there were no American ...
— Jimmie Higgins • Upton Sinclair
... that the Mexicans were about to charge again, and his feeling of exultation passed. He no longer had hope that the defenders of the Alamo could beat back so many. He thought again how few, how very few, ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... was the fighting to begin. The thrushes pecked the blackbirds, and the blackbirds flew at the thrushes, and both beat back the little redbreasts ...
— Terry - Or, She ought to have been a Boy • Rosa Mulholland
... Reckon this'll save your mother's life!" and to Pan's amaze he felt himself crushed in his father's arms. That sort of thing had never been Bill Smith's way. He thrilled to it, and tried again to beat back the remorse mounting higher. His father released him, and drew back, as if suddenly ashamed of his emotion. His face, which he had been trying to control, ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... beat back to Saturday Cove against this wind—not now! She would rack her blamed old ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... The next morning I was ordered with my brigade and Captain McKnight's battery (N. Y.) to cover, as a rear-guard, the retreat of the Third Corps to Manassas Heights via Bristoe Station. My orders were to avoid anything like a general engagement, but to beat back the advancing enemy whenever possible, prevent captures, and baffle him in his endeavors to delay or reach the main column. The successful conduct of a rear-guard of a retreating army, when pursued by an energetic foe, requires not only bravery but skill and tact. After the main ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... They beat back for a short distance, then, separating, dropped down the steep hillside to the creek. In open order, they went forward quietly, slowly; they might come upon 'Kep' Queen's outpost at any turn. Now and then they came in sight of one ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... Boulogne to convoy the flotilla across: or, if the weather prevented this, as was probable in January, he was to pass on to the Texel, rally the seven Dutch battleships and the transports with their 25,000 troops, beat back down the English Channel and return to Ireland. Napoleon counted on the complete success of one or other of Gantheaume's moves: "Whether I have 30,000 or 40,000 men in Ireland, or whether I am both in England and Ireland, ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... soon discovered that, even now, with the boat under canvas, to beat back to the ship was an impossibility; for the boat had not been built for sailing to windward in a strong breeze; she was the ordinary type of ship's longboat, constructed to carry a heavy load in proportion to her dimensions, with a long, flat floor, ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... women still love and hate; still "enjoy the sun" and "live light in the Spring"; still "advance true friends and beat back dangerous foes"—and upon them the same Constellations look down; and upon them the same winds blow; and upon them the same Sphinx glides through the obscurity, with the same ...
— Visions and Revisions - A Book of Literary Devotions • John Cowper Powys
... riseth the glee of the people, and the song and the clank of the cup Beat back from pillar to pillar, to the cloud-blue roof go up; And men's hearts rejoice in the battle, and the hope of coming days, Till scarce may they think of their fathers, and the kings of ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs • William Morris
... yesterday, and so home, and then to the office till night, and then home to write letters, and to practise my composition of musique, and then to bed. We have heard nothing yet how far the fleet hath got toward Portugall, but the wind being changed again, we fear they are stopped, and may be beat back again to the coast ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... night, when Mary Hope was asleep and Belle was dozing beside the stricken woman, Lance saddled Jamie and led Coaley home. And while he rode, black Trouble rode with him and Love could not smile and beat back the spectre with his fists, but hid his face and whimpered, ...
— Rim o' the World • B. M. Bower
... eat or destroy put safely out of their reach, the animals were unharnessed and fed the one meal that was allowed them each day after their work was done. Feeding the dogs was always an interesting function. While one man cut the frozen food into chunks, the rest of us armed with cudgels beat back the animals. When the word was given we stepped to one side to avoid the onrush as they came upon the food, which was bolted with little or no chewing. They will eat anything that is fed them—seal meat, deer's meat, fish, or even old hides. There was always a fight or two ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... me like a child, If thou hast made me for thyself, my God, And lead me up thy hills. I shall not fear, So thou wilt make me pure, and beat back sin With the terrors of thine eye: it fears me not As once it might have feared thine own good image, But lays bold siege at my ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... tumultuous heavings, like ground-swells of an incoming tide, surged over and through the multitude. At times, Presley, lifted from his feet, was swept back, back, back, with the crowd, till the entrance of the Opera House was half a block away; then, the returning billow beat back again and swung him along, gasping, staggering, clutching, till he was landed once more in the vortex of frantic action in front of the foyer. Here the waves were shorter, quicker, the crushing pressure on all sides of his body left him without strength ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... Wilson made President—a very impressive experience indeed. The future—God knows; but I believe in Wilson very thoroughly. Men fool him yet. Men fool us all. He has already made some mistakes. But he's sound. And, if we have moral courage enough to beat back the grafters, little and big—I mean if we, the people, will vote two years and four years hence, to keep them back, I think that we shall now really work toward a democratic government. I have a stronger confidence in government now as an instrument ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... grisly Death desires till he appear; But loathes what he had sought, on nearer sight; So painful seems the cruel pass and drear. Thus, in the sea engulphed, the wretched knight, Repentant of his deed, was touched with fear; And, matchless both for spirit and for hand, Beat back the billows, ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... architecture arose in massy and mountainous strength, axe-hewn, and iron-bound, block heaved upon block by the monk's enthusiasm and the soldier's force; and cramped and stanchioned into such weight of grisly wall, as might bury the anchoret in darkness, and beat back the utmost storm of battle, suffering but by the same narrow crosslet the passing of the sunbeam, or of the arrow. Gradually, as that monkish enthusiasm became more thoughtful, and as the sound of war became ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... the precious moments in probing the stern nature of a heathen," said the stranger. "The object of his people is certain, and, with the aid of the Christian's staff, will we beat back their power. Prudence requireth at our hands, that the lad be secured; after which, will we repair to the ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... a yell from Jack. Could the crew have heard it? At any rate, it was too late for them to beat back from the line of breakers which gleamed ...
— The Underground City • Jules Verne
... crying want of the hour. The one weapon by which we must beat back an evil which threatens appalling ruin. Our service of God must vary with the need of the different ages. At one time He is best served by the pouring out of martyr blood, at another by the building ...
— The Young Priest's Keepsake • Michael Phelan
... frozen in the wood, prevented the flame from obtaining the upper hand as quickly as it would otherwise have done. The area taken possession of by the fire up to the present time was small. The frost in the boarding had stubbornly beat back the leaping, ever-returning flames and it would take time before they could permanently strike root and from their vantage point do further destruction. If they had united in one big flame and overstepped the space below the hole protected by the frost, the fire would soon have grown ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... preservation of her national self as well as for sacred goods of humanity; indeed, for the very progress of true culture. It is from this conviction that she draws her unrelenting force and the absolute certainty that she will beat back the assault of all her enemies. This conviction does not stand in need of any encouragement from abroad; our country absolutely relies upon itself and confides in the strength ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... rushing the first into war to occupy all the coveted districts, including Prizren, before Serbia was ready. Bulgaria would beat back the Turks, and Ferdinand and Nikita share the bulk of the peninsula. The Montenegrins recked nothing of the Serbs, but they miserably miscalculated. The Serbs reached Prizren before ...
— Twenty Years Of Balkan Tangle • Durham M. Edith
... than for myself that I longed for freedom. Though the boon would have been precious to me, above all price, I would not have taken it at the expense of leaving them in slavery. Every trial I endured, every sacrifice I made for their sakes, drew them closer to my heart, and gave me fresh courage to beat back the dark waves that rolled and rolled over me in a ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)
... Dartford to Greenwich and Deptford. With a force now dwindled to 7,000 men, Wyat attacked London Bridge. Driven from there by the Tower guns, he marched to Kingston, crossed the river, resolving to beat back the Queen's troops at Brentford, and attempt to enter the City by Lud Gate, which some of the Protestant citizens had offered to throw open to him. The Queen, with true Tudor courage, refused to leave St. James's, and in a council of war it was agreed to throw ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... of as strong a force as he could command, and attacked a body of Octavius's horsemen. He succeeded in driving these horsemen away from their position, but he was soon driven back in his turn, and compelled to retreat to the city, fighting as he fled, to beat back his pursuers. He was extremely elated at the success of this skirmish. He came to Cleopatra with a countenance full of animation and pleasure, took her in his arms and kissed her, all accoutered for battle as he was, and boasted ...
— Cleopatra • Jacob Abbott
... back, Jim Boyd, the Little Giant and me, and we can do it again. We beat back a whole band of the Sioux nation, and we defy 'em to come on again. And you predicted it, all six of you! And you predict that we'll do it a second ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... come soon," he said, "or our people will not have spirit to beat back the savages the next time they try to ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... of one who knows that still another piece lies hidden, Paul Brennan started to beat back and forth across the trail of ruin. His light swept the ground like the brush of a painter, missing no spot. Slowly and deliberately he went, paying no attention to the creeping tongues of flame that crept along damp ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith
... good-by, and I don't want to tempt you again. Now you're by yourself and you've got your own way to fight. The boys agree with me. We all want to see you make good. We'll all be sorry if you come back to us. But once you've found out that it's no go trying to beat back to good society, we'll be mighty happy to have you with us. In the meantime, we want to do our bit to help Andrew Lanning make up ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... in New York lives, and resistance to conscription should be general in the North, our people will take fresh hope, and make renewed efforts to beat back the mighty armies of the foe—suffering, and more than decimated, as ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones
... she had noticed him when be bowed, or if his chivalric devotion in applauding her when the audience rose to receive her had been more apparent than that of others; whether it had seemed the heroic act of setting forth at the head of her armies, to beat back a German invasion, which it had essentially been, with his instantaneous return as victor, and the Queen's abdication and adoption of republican principles under conviction of his reasoning, and her idolized consecration as the first chief of the Dutch republic. His cheeks ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... beat back the current, yet be not drowned in its waters; Speak with the speech of the world, think with the thoughts of ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... some poor wretch who had been caught lagging and thwacked across the bare shoulders. The fatigue after a time grew intolerably heavy. While the sun smote down through the awning, the heat of their exercise seemed never to pass up through it, but beat back upon their faces in sickening waves, stopping their breath. Of the world outside their den they could see nothing but a small patch of grey sea beyond the hole in which their oar worked. The sweat poured off their chests and ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... "They're beat back," said Burnside. "I shall be off to Toonarbin, and give them warning. I advise you ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... judgment had proved correct. Ill news came both from right and left. Our men, suffering fearfully from the hidden musketry fire, made headway only at a wasteful expense of life. More than one high officer had fallen at the barricades, and Conde, who seemed to be in several places at once, beat back ...
— My Sword's My Fortune - A Story of Old France • Herbert Hayens
... of physical loathing I advanced steadfastly towards where he lay. Shorn of human companions my wretchedness sought a lonely comradeship with the piece of mortal clay. Turning now and again to beat back some skinny hand which snatched my garments, to slap in the face some evil sprite which thrust its sneer upon me, I walked in resolution across the floor. I fancied again I heard the tread of men in the passage. Pleased at the babble of the children of my own imagination, I ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson
... nearly all of them have been annihilated, long ago. Editors are sympathetic and responsive good-citizens, as keenly sensitive regarding their duties as any of the rest of us are, and from the earliest times of protection they have been on the firing line, helping to beat back the destroyers. It is indeed a rare sight to see an editor giving aid, comfort or advice to the enemy. I can not recall more than a score of articles that I have seen or heard of during thirty years in this field that opposed the cause of wild life protection.[K] ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... I were together one day returning home from a preaching tour by a near cut, passing the door of our greatest persecutor, Captain Bernadino, who on seeing us, seized a stick, and running to us, beat back our hordes, crying, 'Back, back, you cannot pass my house.' A plunge of my horse caused my hat to fall off, which he handed me and continued to force our retreat. We returned by way of the home of his son-in-law, who was a baptized ...
— Brazilian Sketches • T. B. Ray
... or three days we cruised about as unsuccessful as before, the weather continuing fine; but the sky giving indubitable signs of the approach of the stormy and rainy season, we beat back along shore to pick up our boats. The wind had been veering about for some time, and at length seemed to have made up its mind to enjoy a stiffish blow out of the south-west. This, of course, would have kicked up a considerable surf on the bar, and as Jenkins had orders, as soon as ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston
... the dark forest that was so close behind every cluster of log houses, attacked the colonists. Three hundred and forty-seven English men, women, and children were slain. But Jamestown and the plantations in its neighborhood were warned in time. The English rallied, gathered force, turned upon and beat back to the forest the Indian, who was now and for a long time to come their ...
— Pioneers of the Old South - A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings, Volume 5 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Mary Johnston
... made by the Englishman, as he threw his masses of daring seamen along his bowsprit, and out of his channels, had nearly taken Griffith by surprise; but Manual, who had delivered his first fire with the broadside, now did good service, by ordering his men to beat back the intruders, by a steady and continued discharge. Even the wary Pilot lost sight of their other foes, in the high daring of that moment, and smiles of stern pleasure were exchanged between him and Griffith as both comprehended, at ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... of light from a store window invited belated passers to covet the bargains offered within; a half-dozen incandescent bulbs, swung on cross-wires at intervals along the street, glowed feebly as if weary with the effort to beat back the darkness clutching at the throat of the town; over the sidewalk in front of the Elite Amusement Parlor an illuminated red and green sign told that Mike Sabota's place was still open; across the porch of the Occidental Hotel and spilling itself on the ground out in ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman
... sails of the Spot Cash, and, with the Black Eagle following, she jockeyed out of the harbour. Presently, when she had laid a course for Cape John and Tilt Cove, the Black Eagle came about and beat back to Conch. ...
— Billy Topsail & Company - A Story for Boys • Norman Duncan
... not fall into the lake. They did not touch its surface. They flew. Flew—and yet it was not flight. It was half-flight. It was scarcely flight at all. Compared with the magnificent, calm, effortless sweep of their girlhood days, it was almost a grotesque performance. Their wing-stumps beat back and forth violently, beat in a very agony of effort. Indeed these stunted fans could never have held them up. They supplemented their efforts by a curious rotary movement of the legs and feet. They could not rise very far above the surface of the water, especially ...
— Angel Island • Inez Haynes Gillmore
... limbs in tepid waters. Feeling himself invigorated and refreshed with the genial warmth about him, he realises out there at sea the fable of Antaeus and his mother Earth. He rises up and attempts to make his port again, and is again, perhaps, as rudely met and beat back from the north-west; but each time that he is driven off from the contest, he comes forth from this stream, like the ancient son of Neptune, stronger and stronger, until, after many days, his freshened ...
— The Ocean and its Wonders • R.M. Ballantyne
... the city to the eastwards and makes his camp at Islip for a while, then on across Cherwell and so to Bletchington and Woodstock, blockading all approaches on the north. Now one sees glitter of steel and gleam of pennon to the west, as Waller is beat back at Newbridge on the Isis, above Eynsham. Scarcely has this scene flitted through the brain, than from far away eastwards, hard by Chinnor, there seems to come a shouting and a noise of horses at the gallop, as Rupert bursts upon the enemy's convoy, ...
— Oxford • Frederick Douglas How
... wait for convoys of whose sailing accounts were received. Having renewed her supply of water at Bergen, in Norway, she returned to the Atlantic, made three captures off the north coast of Ireland, and thence beat back to the Banks, where two stray homeward-bound West Indiamen were at last caught. From there the ship made her way, still with a constant head wind, to Nantucket, off which was captured a British man-of-war ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... intervening time until supper was ready. In a vague way he realized that he had, by deserting the team, betrayed himself to all his comrades as a fellow swayed by petty jealousy; but this thought, which seemed trying to force itself humiliatingly upon him, he beat back and thrust aside, persisting in dwelling on the notion that he had been most shabbily treated ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott
... past the point that they are making, either from carelessness or owing to a mistake in its identity. Now, as sailors know, it is quite impossible for a dhow which is only rigged to run before the monsoon to beat back against it. Therefore we got our boat ready to row for the ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... the rival kings were equally successful. Salobrena, but lately conquered by the Christians, was thrown into a commotion by the first glimpse of Boabdil's banners; the populace rose, beat back their Christian guards, and opened the gates to the last of their race of kings. The garrison alone, to which the Spaniards retreated, resisted Boabdil's arms; and, defended by, impregnable walls, promised an obstinate ...
— Leila or, The Siege of Granada, Book IV. • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... a rain-storm, and the waves swept him away like thistle-down, and beat back at him as he fought through them and stood choked and panting on the other shore. He did not dare stop to rest. The Marcums, too, had crossed the river up at the ford by this time, and were galloping towards him; and Isom started ...
— The Last Stetson • John Fox Jr.
... on the apex, now bending down to beat back the soldiers that still swarmed upward, and then occupying myself in trying to get rid of the few that crawled upon me. I felt no longer any uneasiness on the score of the insects—though I was not a bit better off as regarded the bull, who still ...
— The Bush Boys - History and Adventures of a Cape Farmer and his Family • Captain Mayne Reid
... head. "She is in deep water now, Jack, and the grapnel ain't holding her a bit; she will drift as fast as you can swim. But of course you can try if you like, it don't make any difference to us, for you could never beat back against this wind and tide. What fools we have been, ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... us a long time to beat back, and we were all glad to feel solid ground under our feet once more. After a few days we started again, but luck was against me on this occasion, and inside of twelve hours I missed the steamer no less than three times, which, in the New ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... brought our oil-skins," the captain remarked. "We'll have to beat back, and then there'll be some fun. I wonder if the doctor is a good sailor. My, that was a whopper!" he exclaimed, as a larger wave than usual struck the yacht. "Guess it'll be rougher ...
— Rod of the Lone Patrol • H. A. Cody
... have you leave the wedding; howbeit, if we beat back the Danes, which is a matter in the hands of the Lord of Hosts, both you and I will be ...
— Wulfric the Weapon Thane • Charles W. Whistler
... grey and old, he concentrated days of force into minutes, but little by little, through a strength greater than that strength with which men conquer worlds, a force greater than the force with which the mind's big battles are won, by a force not given many since the first of time, he held away, beat back, the black tides ready to carry him over into that sea of bitterness from which lost souls send out their curses and their jeers ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... sunset," he said thoughtfully. "At that time she was not doing more than four knots. Maybe we are fifty miles from shore, for she may have done better than that, though I doubt it, seeing how wildly she sailed. Now we can hardly beat back there, for we are too few to ...
— A Sea Queen's Sailing • Charles Whistler
... then occurring between a band of burghers and a reconnoitring party from the citadel. Champagny saw with satisfaction that the Antwerpers were victorious. They were skirmishing well with their disciplined foe, whom they at last beat back to the citadel. His experienced eye saw, however, that the retreat was only the signal for a general onslaught, which was soon to follow; and he returned into the city to give the ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... vice,—when the soldiers dismantled her forts to sell the guns to the Turk,—when her sailors rioted on shore and her ships rotted in her ports, she had still military virtue enough to produce that Emo, who beat back the Algerine corsairs from the commerce of Christendom, and attacked them in their stronghold, as of old her galleys beat back the Turks. Alas! there was not the virtue in her statesmen to respond ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... him?" I told him I thought 'twas time to help him, if possible; upon which, opening the inn gates, we sallied out in very good order, about 300 horse. And several of the troops from other parts of the town joining us, we recovered Colonel Spencer, and charging home, beat back the enemy to their main body. But finding their foot drawn up in the churchyard, and several detachments moving to charge us, we retreated in as good order as we could. They did not think fit to pursue us, but they took all the carriages which were ...
— Memoirs of a Cavalier • Daniel Defoe
... man, and then he had a way with him that used to bring people up from the gates of death and fill despairing relatives with hope. His arrival in the sick room, a little man, with brusque, sharp, straightforward manner, seemed in itself to change the whole face of things and beat back the tides of disease. He would not hear that any disease was serious, but he treated it as if it were; he would not allow a gloomy face in a sick room, and his language to women who began to whimper, when he got them outside the room, was such as tom cats would be ashamed of; and he regarded ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... some transporting power; and, as they always move toward the land, their action is landward. They thus beat back, little by little, any detritus in the waters, preventing that loss to continents or islands which would take place if it ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... rushed against Karna only. Like the mountain receiving a vast body of water, Karna, unaided by anyone, received in that battle all those advancing warriors filled with joy and longing for victory. Those mighty car-warriors encountering Karna, were beat off and broken like a mass of water, and beat back on all sides when it encounters a mountain. The battle, however, that took place between them and Karna made the hair stand on end. Then Dhrishtadyumna assailed the son of Radha with a straight shaft in that ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... it had utterly failed to respond to Edmund's call to arms against Canute, and the respite under Edward the Confessor had been frittered away. Angles and Saxons invited foreign conquest by a civil war; and when Harold beat back Tostig and his Norwegian ally, the sullen north left him alone to do the same by William. William's was the third and decisive Danish conquest of a house divided against itself; for his Normans were Northmen with a French polish, and they conquered a country ...
— The History of England - A Study in Political Evolution • A. F. Pollard
... chatted with Mrs. Everard and her husband, and forced myself into sociability with some of the visitors at the hotel, who were disposed to show us friendly attention. I summoned all my stock of will-power to beat back the insidious physical and mental misery that threatened to sap the very spring of my life; and in some of these efforts I partially succeeded. But it was at night that the terrors of my condition manifested ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... wings into the castle if the nearest monsters had not happened to awake and hear the noise of talking and swum to the shore to give battle. The fight was long and hard, and when the king at last beat back his foes another struggle awaited him. At the entrance gigantic bats, owls, and crows set upon him from all sides; but the dragon had teeth and claws, while the queen broke off sharp bits of glass and stabbed and cut in her anxiety to help her husband. At ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... serpent that plunged its fangs into Baruch's brain and hissed one implacable tone, the tone B. The drum roared the same tone; the voices twined about the crucified Jew and beat back ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... the village choir, Your carols on the midnight throw, Oh, bright across the mist and mire, Ye ruddy hearths of Christmas glow! Beat back the dread, beat down the woe, Let's cheerily descend the hill; Be welcome all, to come or go, The ghosts we all can ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various
... jubilant waves, the blood beat back into her arteries. That was why he had resigned, to pay the debt he owed Homer Dinsmore on her account. He had put himself within reach of the law for her sake. Her heart went out to him in a rush. She must see him. She must see him ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... admits that "the most valuable part was still left in New-York when the enemy had effected a landing, drawn a line across the island, and were entering New-York."[59] General Knox later told how "late in the day of the 15th of September, 1776, after the enemy had beat back part of the American troops," Morgan "came over from Powles Hook in a pettiauger, and had her loaded with Hospital stores."[60] Washington personally reported on September 16 that "the retreat was effected with but little loss of Men, tho' a considerable part of ...
— Drug Supplies in the American Revolution • George B. Griffenhagen
... adventured on a shore unknown,[145] Which all admire, but many dread to view: His breast was armed 'gainst fate, his wants were few Peril he sought not, but ne'er shrank to meet: The scene was savage, but the scene was new; This made the ceaseless toil of travel sweet, Beat back keen Winter's blast, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... ends of satire, and one of the proud triumphs of genius, is to unmask the false zealot; to beat back the haughty spirit that is treading down all; and if it cannot teach modesty, and raise a blush, at least to inflict terror and silence. It is then that the satirist does honour to the office of ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... thousand strong. In the last war, a handful of British soldiers sacked Washington city, burned the capitol, the President's house, and the national offices and archives; and no marvel, for thousands of the inhabitants of the District had been "TRANSFORMED INTO ENEMIES." Would they beat back invasion? If the national government had exercised its constitutional "power to provide for the common defence and to promote the general welfare," by turning those "enemies" into friends, then, instead of a hostile ambush lurking in every thicket inviting ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... as Burbridge was drawing near the place. In a very short time the energy and administrative skill of General Echols had placed the department in an excellent condition for defense. But it was the opportune arrival of General Williams which enabled us to beat back all assailants. When we reached Abingdon, we learned that General Breckinridge had arrived and had assumed command. After a short halt, we pressed on and reached Saltville at nightfall to learn that the enemy had been repulsed that day in a desperate attack. ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... of fighting have I battled as I did then, feeling that I alone might hope to reach her side and beat back these foul fiends till help should come to us. The stock of my rifle shattered like glass; but I swung the iron barrel with what seemed to me the strength of twenty men, striking, thrusting, stabbing, my teeth set, my eyes blurring with a mist of blood, ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish
... induce him to make an attack. In such a case, as the rebels were in the highest spirits, in consequence of their recent victory at Chancellorsville, their commander had little doubt of the result. This plan was feasible enough, provided his cavalry could beat back that of Pleasonton and act as a screen to conceal his movements. This they were not in a condition to do after the battle of Brandy Station, and Lee was thus forced to take the route down the Shenandoah Valley, ...
— Chancellorsville and Gettysburg - Campaigns of the Civil War - VI • Abner Doubleday
... to seaward which the gale enforced made it impossible for the schooner to beat back to Hollis where the first of her freight must be discharged until after breakfast the next morning. By that time the three foremast hands who had been obliged to work double watches were fairly stewing ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... serried masses of dim cities, blown Full of the snow that ever shifts and swells, While far above them all their towers of stone Stand and beat back your fierce and tyrannous spells, And hour by hour send out, like voices torn and broken Of battling giants that have grandly spoken, The veering ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman
... To beat back fear, we must hold fast to our heritage as free men. We must renew our confidence in one another, our tolerance, our sense of being neighbors, fellow citizens. We must take our stand on the Bill of Rights. The inquisition, the star chamber, have no place ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... opposite to the point from which they blow; and accordingly, that the wind blowing in the opposite direction hinders the flow of the waters; and the waves of the sea, dashing against the mouth of the river, and coming on with a fair wind in the same direction, beat back the river, and in this manner the Nile becomes full to overflowing. But Anaxagoras, the natural philosopher, says that the fullness of the Nile arises from the snow melting; and so too says Euripides, and some others of the tragic poets. Anaxagoras ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... sound, a splash, and the copious spray of a stream sent over the house from the street fell upon his upturned face. It beat back the smoke. Strength and hope returned. He took another grip on the rafter just as he would ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... them too, for so it chanced that we were but half a mile away when the ship fired her first gun, just as we had given you up and determined to go back; so on we came straight here. Another ten minutes and we should have been too late. We are making for Ramsgate now. We could never beat back to Deal in this wind. I don't know as I ever saw it blow ...
— By Sheer Pluck - A Tale of the Ashanti War • G. A. Henty
... under General Wilkinson, "an unprincipled imbecile," as Scott very properly styled him. It was mismanaged in every possible way, and was a total failure; it was attended with but one battle, that of Chrystler's Farm, in which 1,000 British, with the loss of less than 200 men, beat back double their number of Americans, who lost nearly 500 men and also one piece of artillery. The American army near Lake Champlain had done nothing, its commander, General Wade Hampton, being, if possible, even more incompetent than Wilkinson. He remained stationary ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt
... melted into a black, outshowering mist, and from that mist leaped a giant. Up, up, he towered, tossed whirling arms a hundred feet abranch, shivered, and dissolved into a widespread cataract. The water below was lashed into fury, in the midst of which a mighty death agony beat back the troubled waves of the trade wind. Only then did the muffled double boom of the explosion reach the ears of the spectators, presently to be followed by a whispering, swift-skimming wavelet that swept irresistibly across the bigger surges and lapped the ship's side, ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Italy. Before long the Goths crossed the Julian Alps and entered the rich and defenseless valley of the Po. To meet the crisis the legions were hastily called in, even from the distant frontiers. Stilicho formed them into a powerful army, beat back the enemy, and captured the Visigothic camp, filled with the spoil of Greek cities. In the eyes of the Romans Stilicho seemed a second Marius, who had arisen in an hour of peril to save Italy from ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... one of all the ships we boarded, the first on which we found women, did we meet with any genuine resistance. On that occasion we had two men killed and several injured, and if it had not been for the gallantry of Ballantrae we had surely been beat back at last. Everywhere else the defence (where there was any at all) was what the worst troops in Europe would have laughed at; so that the most dangerous part of our employment was to clamber up the side of the ship: and I have even known the poor souls ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. XII (of 25) - The Master of Ballantrae • Robert Louis Stevenson
... crossed the Muir of Auchterarder. "Ye horss was gud," but the forced pace sorely taxed its strength; so "at ye Blackfurd" he alighted and walked. After he had gone a mile his pursuers overtook and harassed him. They had great advantage, being on horse, while he was on foot; yet Wallace beat back the foremost of them, recovered his ...
— Chronicles of Strathearn • Various
... would to father Zeus and Athene and Apollo, that such as I was when I took Nericus, the stablished castle on the foreland of the continent, being then the prince of the Cephallenians, would that in such might, and with mail about my shoulders, I had stood to aid thee yesterday in our house, and to beat back the wooers; so should I have loosened the knees of many an one of them in the halls, and thou shouldest have been ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A. |
