"Besieged" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... said that they gaed and learned the black art frae the Pope o' Room, wha, I myself heard the minister say, had aye a colleague wi' the Auld Chiel. I dinna ken fou it was, in the tail o' the day, the hale country raise up against them, an' besieged them in the Abbey o' Deer. Ye'll see, my frien'" (by this time mine host considered me as one of his cronies), "tho' we ca' it the abbey, it had naething to do wi' papistry; na, na, no sae bad as a' that either, but just a noble's castle, where they keepit sodgers gaun about ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous
... them from landing. This he did in 882, and we do not find that any Danes landed again in England till 885. In that year part of the army which had been plundering along the coast of Flanders and Holland came over to England, landed in Kent, and besieged Rochester. But the citizens withstood them bravely, and Alfred gathered an army and drove the Danes to their ships. They seem then to have gone to Essex and to have plundered there with their ships, getting help from the Danes who ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... as if wanting an outer skin; and as Thornby Place appeared to him little more than a comprehensive symbol of what he held mean, even obscene in life, his visits had grown shorter and fewer, until now his absence extended to the verge of the second year, and besieged by the belief that he was contemplating priesthood, Mrs Norton had written to her old friend, saying that she wanted to speak to him on matters of great importance. Now maturing her plans for getting her boy back, she stood by the bare black mantel-piece, her head leaning ...
— A Mere Accident • George Moore
... Monsieur Albert, who was always besieged with questions about her, took too much wine. I have seen that happen with him but once—since that time never. He told us about Mademoiselle. She made some inquiries about her brother, and Monsieur Albert was able to tell her his whereabouts. After ...
— A Maker of History • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Whoever wishes to learn how tradition or common report treats historical facts, should compare the Guenther or Etzel of the Nibelungen with the Gundicarius or Attila of history, or Charles the Great crowned by the Pope with the Charlemagne who besieged Jerusalem, or Hruodlandus with Roland, or Arturus with Arthur. Or, to come to later days, we need only recall the wonderful tales of the French journals during the last Franco-German War, and we shall be ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller
... have been spent less pleasantly than it was; for it so chanced that an interlude was introduced, of so interesting a character to all, but more especially to the naturalist Karl, that for a while the proximity of their savage besieger was forgotten, and they scarcely remembered that they were besieged. ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... occasion to prove it, was that they might show less fibre, less tough and dogged resistance, than whites, during a prolonged trial,—a long, disastrous march, for instance, or the hopeless defence of a besieged town. I should not be afraid of their mutinying or running away, but of their drooping and dying. It might not turn out so; but I mention it for the sake of fairness, and to avoid overstating the merits of these troops. As to the simple general fact of courage and reliability ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... Then he was besieged, and as soon as the horse was put up, by three pairs of busy hands, they came to the supper table, whereon was a full two pounds of delicious butter, and sat down with ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... of a rude voice. Through the course of years during which Gaston was to remain in Paris, very close to other people's sins, interested, all but entangled, in a world of corruption in flower (pleasantly enough to the eye), those influences never failed him. At times it was as if a legion of spirits besieged his door: "Open unto me! Open unto me! My sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled!" And one result, certainly, of this constant prepossession was, that it kept him on the alert concerning theories of the divine assistance to man, and the world,—theories of inspiration. ...
— Gaston de Latour: an unfinished romance • Walter Horatio Pater
... quotes authors who affirm that when the Romans were about to besiege a town, they employed their priests to evoke the divinity who presided over it, promising him a temple in Rome, either like the one dedicated to him in the besieged place, or on a rather larger scale, and that the proper worship should be paid to him. Pliny says that the memory of these evocations ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... his arrival in Belgrade, Hartwig created a most exceptional position for himself. The King, Prince Alexander, Pashitch, none of these made any decisions without consulting him first. . . . Every morning his study was besieged by Serbian statesmen who came to ask advice" (The Game of Diplomacy). It is amusing to compare de Schelking's account with an order from Pashitch, November 14, 1912: "Take notice: Our Ministers in Foreign lands are to ...
— Twenty Years Of Balkan Tangle • Durham M. Edith
... so much, that her humble spirit conceived the stricken soul of the woman as of necessity the pursuer; as shamelessly, though timidly, as she herself pursued in imagination the enchanted secret of the mountain-land. She hoped her brother would not supplicate, for it struck her that the lover who besieged the lady would forfeit ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... refuge, until there were over two thousand of them there, terribly crowded and unhappy. Several convents were also packed, and we calculated that we should have two or three thousand to get out of the country. In the morning the Legation was besieged by numbers of poor people who did not know which way to turn and came to us because they had been told that we would take care of them. We were all kept busy; and Leval, smothering his natural feelings, came out of his own accord and talked and advised and calmed the frightened people in their ...
— A Journal From Our Legation in Belgium • Hugh Gibson
... of importance whether to continue the march to Fort King, which post was thought to be besieged by the enemy, or to return to Fort Brooke. To Fort Brooke it was sixty-five miles, and to Fort King forty miles north. A large number of the volunteers were destitute of provisions. It would require five days to reach Fort Brooke, and but ...
— General Scott • General Marcus J. Wright
... came on board, little, brown men in uniform, absurdly self-important. Then the ship was besieged by a swarm of those narrow, primitive boats called sampan, which Loti has described as a kind of barbaric gondola, all jostling each other to bring merchants of local wares, damascene, tortoise-shell, pottery and picture post cards aboard ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... they flirted on the stairs and in every possible nook and corner. Magdalena frolicked little, having her guests to look after; but whenever she rested for a moment there was an obsequious backbone before her. Tiny and Ila were besieged for dances, and ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... madame. As a proof of the truth of this assertion, here are the very keys of all the towns and fortresses we have besieged." ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... they found Mr. and Mrs. Wade, who had with great difficulty escaped, and soon after they heard of the rescue of the Judsons, and welcomed Dr. Price. Rangoon, in the meantime, had been occupied by the English, and then besieged by the Peguans; the mission-house was ruined, and the people dispersed, and Moung Shwaygnong had died of cholera, faithful to the last. The city was to be restored to the Burmese, and the King, though willing to employ Judson ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... Mayence the Palace was literally besieged by Jews, who continually brought manufactured and other goods to show to the followers of the Court; and we had the greatest difficulty to avoid buying them. At last they proposed that we should barter with them; ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... tightened its belt of dilapidated ramparts, when it had bolted itself in like a besieged fortress at the approach of an assault, the most terrible anguish passed over the mournful houses. At every moment, in the centre of the town, people fancied they could hear a discharge of musketry in the Faubourgs. They no longer ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... besiegers and besieged thundered unceasingly from the fortress of Goletta, and as the night darkened the scene with massy clouds, the flames of burning fragments became more visible, and the fiery course of the red bullets was perceptible as they crossed each other in their path, while their effects in fire ...
— The Two Captains • Friedrich de La Motte-Fouque
... This interview was one of the most pathetic experiences of my life. The poor man had not slept for several nights. Then came the crowds of frightened Germans, afraid that they would be arrested. They besieged the German Embassy and our Embassy. I put one of our naval officers in the German Embassy, put the United States seal on the door to protect it, and we began business there, too. Our naval officer has moved in—sleeps there. He has an assistant, a stenographer, a messenger: ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... bosky forests, palaces and war-ships, frowning fortresses and prison vaults - it was a giddy joy. That shop, which was dark and smelt of Bibles, was a loadstone rock for all that bore the name of boy. They could not pass it by, nor, having entered, leave it. It was a place besieged; the shopmen, like the Jews rebuilding Salem, had a double task. They kept us at the stick's end, frowned us down, snatched each play out of our hand ere we were trusted with another, and, increditable as it may sound, used to demand of us upon our entrance, like banditti, if ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... warning of this to the besieged was another volley, which sent bullets through the windows and the crack in the door, without doing the slightest injury. At the same moment four men trailing their rifles appeared from behind the hedge, and, scattering and dodging as they ran, made for the cow ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... missionaries had anticipated immediately followed, and their utmost exertions, as well as those of their new associates, were taxed to satisfy the spiritual wants of the populace. "The Avignonese," says the narrative, "hungered so after the word of God, that the gates of the churches were besieged from three hours before daybreak, by those who flocked to be present at the morning exhortation. The inhabitants of the country and the neighbouring communes walked during a part of the night, in order to secure seats; each anxiously sought to ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes
... platform was cram-full as we drew up, and it was clear at once that all the carriages in the train would be besieged, without regard to class. By some chance, however, ours was neglected, and until the very last moment we seemed likely to escape. The guard's whistle was between his lips when I heard a shout, then one or two feminine ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Again the cry was heard: "Nettenmair! Where is Nettenmair? Where is our helper? Where is our rescuer? Where is the brave fellow? Where is the noble man?" Wind and storm were forgotten. Everybody pushed forward, looking for the man who was being called on all sides. The tower of St. George's was besieged. The carpenter appeared, saying that Nettenmair had lain down in the watchman's room to rest for a few moments. The carpenter was beset with questions. Had he been injured at all? Would his health suffer? The carpenter could tell nothing except that Nettenmair had done ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... Captain Jules was besieged at his little house up the bay, although, as usual, he kept the door fastened against intruders. Half the fishermen and oystermen in the vicinity begged to be permitted to accompany the old sea diver in his descent into the water. ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... exactly the contrary effect. Both the preventive and the disease were of long standing. With De Ruyter in the Thames in 1667, menacing London and the kingdom, the seamen of the fleet flocked to town in hundreds, clamouring for their wages, whilst their wives besieged the Navy Office in Seething Lane, shrieking: "This is what comes of not ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... long from his campaigns, however, for we find that he was soon besieged in the city of Sungkiang with a few men. A relieving force of the Ever-Victorious Army ...
— The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees • Mary Caroline Crawford
... preferred that Joanna should remain under the guardianship of Sir Daniel rather than pass into the clutches of Lord Shoreby; and his mind was made up, if the house should be assaulted, to come at once to the relief of the besieged. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... assent with civil leer, And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike, Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike; Alike reserved to blame, or to commend, A timorous foe, and a suspicious friend; Dreading even fools, by flatterers besieged, And so obliging, that he ne'er obliged; Like Cato, give his little senate laws, And sit attentive to his own applause; While wits and templars every sentence raise, And wonder with a foolish face of praise:— ...
— English Satires • Various
... the foreign Ambassadors. To the savage and ignorant populace the law of nations and the risk of bringing on their country the just vengeance of all Europe were as nothing. The houses of the Ambassadors were besieged. A great crowd assembled before Barillon's door in St. James's Square. He, however, fared better than might have been expected. For, though the government which he represented was held in abhorrence, his liberal ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... holy city of the Jews, belonged originally to the Jebusites, but was captured by David and made his capital; a strong place, built on four hills 2000 ft. above the Mediterranean, enclosed within walls and protected nearly all round by deep valleys and rising grounds beyond; it has been so often besieged, overthrown, and rebuilt that the present city stands on rubbish heaps, the ruins of ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... says that it was a "broad, bold, free, and most picturesque delineation of real characters, manners, and events." He thinks that in the robber barons of the Rhine, with "their forays upon each other's domains, the besieged castles, the plundered herds, the captive knights, the brow-beaten bishop and the baffled liege-lord," Scott found a likeness to the old life of the Scotch border, with its moss-troopers, cattle raids, and private warfare; and that, as Percy's "Reliques" prompted ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... would you care to hear all the latest news from the seat of war? It may interest you to know that the Castle is besieged in most proper fashion. ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... called her by her first name. When she appeared they pursued a course which had been theirs for months. They invariably grinned and cried out: "Hello, Mary, you here again?" Her grey head wagged in many a court. She always besieged the bench with voluble excuses, explanations, apologies and prayers. Her flaming face and rolling eyes were a sort of familiar sight on the island. She measured time by means of sprees, and was eternally swollen ...
— Maggie: A Girl of the Streets • Stephen Crane
... ancient Brinas, was formerly a place of considerable importance. It was in turn besieged and captured by the Goths (532), the Burgundians, the Saracens (732) and the Normans. In 1181 the viscount of Polignac, who had sacked the town two years previously, made public apology in front of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... White's establishment, on Fourth Street, in Newport, where the body was taken to, was one of activity. All day long and up to a late hour at night the place was besieged with people anxious to get a look at the remains of the unfortunate woman. The crowd was composed mostly of men, but there was quite a number of women to be seen among them. Several persons came in and gave descriptions of missing friends, and, if they tallied in any way with the corpse, ...
— The Mysterious Murder of Pearl Bryan - or: the Headless Horror. • Unknown
... which I have recorded it. These were two: First, a belief that I might add some trifle to the history of opium as a medical agent. In this I am aware that I have not at all fulfilled my own intentions, in consequence of the torpor of mind, pain of body, and extreme disgust to the subject which besieged me whilst writing that part of my paper; which part being immediately sent off to the press (distant about five degrees of latitude), cannot be corrected or improved. But from this account, rambling as it may be, it is evident that thus much ...
— Confessions of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas De Quincey
... nature of which he well describes in his Address to the Reader of his Anatomy of Melancholy: 'I hear new news every day, and those ordinary rumours of war, plagues, fires, inundations, thefts, murders, massacres, meteors, comets, spectrums, prodigies, apparitions, of towns taken, cities besieged in France, Germany, Turkey, Persia, Poland, etc., daily musters and preparations, and such like, which these tempestuous times afford, battles fought, so many men slain, monomachies, shipwrecks, piracies, and sea-fights; peace, leagues, stratagems, and fresh alarms.... New ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher
... nose-less,—all hungry and cold, beseeching and submissive, thronged round me, and pressed close to the sbiten. They drank up all the sbiten. One asked for money, and I gave it. Then another asked, then a third, and the whole crowd besieged me. Confusion and a press resulted. The porter of the adjoining house shouted to the crowd to clear the sidewalk in front of his house, and the crowd submissively obeyed his orders. Some managers stepped out of the throng, and took me under their protection, ...
— The Moscow Census - From "What to do?" • Lyof N. Tolstoi
... men, under Mundilas, to escort Datius back to Milan. This expedition set forth probably in April 538, and as soon as it arrived at Milan that city openly proclaimed its defection from Witigis and its allegiance to the Emperor. It was soon besieged by Uraias, nephew of Witigis, by whom in the following year (539) it was taken. The city, we are informed, was rased to the ground, and Bishop Datius escaped to Constantinople. Evidently we have here a continuous chain of events, which makes it impossible for ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... him but did not move him. The songs were brilliant but without meaning. He waited with fierce impatience for Mary to come on, and during this wait he did an inordinate amount of thinking. A hundred new conceptions came into his besieged brain—engaging but by no means confusing him. He perceived that Mary was already as much a part of this high-colored life as she had been of the life of Marmion, quite at ease, certain of herself, and the canon between them widened swiftly. She was infinitely ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... recipe to Planchet. I may be besieged in my turn, and I shall not be sorry for him to be able to let me enjoy the same advantages with which ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... sayled ouer into Africa, who when they approached vnto the shore were repelled by the Barbarians from landing, vntill such time as they had passage made them by the valour of the English archers. Thus hauing landed their forces, they foorthwith marched vnto the royall citie of Tunis, and besieged it. Whereat the Barbarians being dismayed, sent Ambassadours vnto our Christian Chieftaines to treat of peace, which our men graunted vnto them, vpon condition that they should pay a certaine summe of money, and that they should from thencefoorth abstaine from piracies vpon all the coasts ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt
... saw me. In a minute he eyed me over and said: "Why, I have a reward for you." In a second he had me go up stairs to the captain. This raised a great excitement among the passengers; and, in a minute, I was besieged with numerous questions. Some spoke as if they were sorry for me, and said if they had known I was a poor runaway slave they would have slipped me ashore. The whole boat was in alarm. It seemed to me they were consulting ...
— Thirty Years a Slave • Louis Hughes
... The city was closely besieged by land, while the entrance of our ships into the harbor cut off all relief on that side. After a truce to allow of the removal of noncombatants protracted negotiations continued from July 3 until July 15, when, under ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • William McKinley
... outer wall of the town in the places where they wished to plant their battering-rams to make breaches in the walls. They were hindered a great deal in their work, as is usual in such cases, by the sallies of the besieged, who rushed upon them in the night in great numbers, and with such desperate fury that they often succeeded in destroying some of the engines, or setting them on fire before they could be driven back into the town. This continued for some time, until at last ...
— Genghis Khan, Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... article entitled "The New Utopia," dubbed him the "Don Quixote of philanthropy" the St. James's made other remarks scarcely so flattering. He drove at once to Stepney, and found his headquarters besieged by a crowd which his little staff of helpers was wholly unable to cope with, and half-a-dozen reporters waiting to snatch a word with him. Mary watched his entrance with ...
— A Prince of Sinners • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Governor of Tennessee, he issued a great many pardons to men and women confined in penitentiaries or jails in that State. His reputation as a "pardoning Governor" resulted in his being besieged by everybody who had a relative incarcerated. One morning an old negro woman made her way into the executive offices and asked Taylor to pardon her husband, who was in jail. "What's he in for?" asked the Governor. "Fo' nothin' but stealin' a ham," explained the wife. "You ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... history of the district consists in the usual tossing to and fro between the various powers which have at different times been strong in the neighborhood. Cattaro was in the reign of Basil the Macedonian besieged and taken by Saracens, who presently went on unsuccessfully to besiege Ragusa. And, as under Byzantine rule it was taken by Saracens, so under Venetian rule it was more than once besieged by Turks. In the intermediate stages we get the usual alternations of independence ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume VI • Various
... say to me, for those who had a less delicate sense of propriety, who were more importunate, more intruding, and whose forehead was proof against repulse, were more successful. By such people she was besieged; on such she lavished her favours, till report said that she impoverished herself; for a tale of distress, whether feigned or real, if obtruded upon her, she ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... till it has ceased to produce happy men. It is strange to be obliged to impose a holiday like a fast, and to drive men to a banquet with spears. But this shall be written of our time: that when the spirit who denies besieged the last citadel, blaspheming life itself, there were some, there was one especially, whose voice was heard and whose ...
— George Bernard Shaw • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... well known, no tribe or body of troops was believed to be near, and vigilant eyes were posted round the entire lake, watching day and night the slightest movement of those whom it would not be exaggerated now to term the besieged. ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... since!—"at Erlangen, the Serene Dowager snatched up fifty of them into her own House for Christian refection; and Burghers of means had twelve, fifteen and even eighteen of them, following such example set. Nay certain French Citizens, prosperous and childless, besieged the Prussian Commissary to allow them a few Salzburg children for adoption; especially one Frenchman was extremely urgent and specific: but the Commissary, not having any order, was obliged to refuse." [Fassmann, p. 441.] These must have been interesting ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... departure my bungalow was besieged by a mob of blackguards. The Native judge came with them. After a most prodigious quantity of jabbering, of which I could not understand one word, I called the judge, who spoke tolerable English, into my room, and learned from him the nature of the case. I was, and still am, in doubt as to the ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... white-haired man, with his tempers and irritations, was far indeed from Greek joyousness. And yet the Greek sense of beauty, half intellectual, half sensuous, had always seemed to her the strongest force in him. Was it now besieged by something else?—was the Faun in him, at last, after these three years, beginning to feel the bitter grip ...
— Elizabeth's Campaign • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... a family dear to him, and would not even suffer him to visit them when liberty was given him of his prince; to his careful attention to deliver the letters, by which he had unsuspectingly borne the mandate for his own murder; to his heroism when ordered up to the walls of the besieged city, though not supported by the commander in chief; and his noble exertions to subdue the enemies of Israel, amidst which he had bravely fallen! Such reflexions must have filled his mind; nor was it possible that he should have driven ...
— Sermons on Various Important Subjects • Andrew Lee
... friendly darkness. His regiment was ordered to be ready with the earliest dawn to march up to the breach. That day, for the first time, there had been blood on his sword—there the sword lay, a spot on the chased hilt still. He had cut down one of the enemy in a skirmish with a sally party of the besieged and the look of the man as he fell, haunted him. He felt, for the time, that he dared not pray to the Father, for the blood of a brother had rushed forth at the stroke of his arm, and there was one fewer of living souls on the earth because he ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... enjoys great popularity in his province, was en route for Chefoo to negotiate with Sir Thomas Wade, the people of Tien-tsin made the most determined efforts to prevent him from going further. For a time he was literally besieged in his own yamen, and it was only by the publication of a proclamation warning the people that they were guilty of rebellion against the emperor when they hindered the progress of his representatives, that the opposition ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various
... been there for so many, many years. The very carter, or the little tailor working in his shop-window, will tell you (and prove to you by records) that his ancestor stood to the barricade with pike or matchlock when the army of King or Parliament, as the case may be, besieged the sturdy town two hundred years ago. He has a longer pedigree than many a titled dweller in Belgravia. All these people believe in Fleeceborough. When fate forces them to quit—when the young man ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... ordered to Toulon. The French forces here were commanded by General Cartaux, who had learned the science of war painting portraits in Paris. He ought to have been called General Cartoon. He besieged Toulon in a most impressionistic fashion. He'd bombard and bombard and bombard, and then leave the public to guess at the result. It's all well enough to be an impressionist in painting, but when it comes to war the public want ...
— Mr. Bonaparte of Corsica • John Kendrick Bangs
... who had been leading the little boy was immediately besieged with questions, and from his answers they learnt that he had found the child the evening before at the corner of a street, crying bitterly; that he had taken him home, and with some little difficulty had ascertained from him that he belonged to some people ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the place, sir," he said. "It is a walled and fortified city with gates, and the European quarter, where we have been besieged, is surrounded by open gardens, and there are wide roads from the north-west gate. You will find no enemy in the plain; they will have marched in by the north-east gate, the nearest to here. I can take you round unseen to the north-west, where, by a sudden dash of the ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... the corridors and discussed it. Some fled to their rooms and wrote hurried notes home, asking for leave to come back at once. The panic had begun, augmented beyond doubt by the excitement consequent on the return. Miss Ashton was besieged by girls, all anxious to know the exact state of the case, and not a few clamoring for leave to go away, even that very night, from ...
— Miss Ashton's New Pupil - A School Girl's Story • Mrs. S. S. Robbins
... should be the plagues that should ensue; that fire and sword should waste them; that strangers should possess their houses, and chase them from their habitations." This prediction was soon after verified, when the English took and possessed that town, while the French and Scots besieged it in the year 1548. This was the last sermon which he preached, in which, as had for some time been usual with him, he spoke of his death as near at hand; and after it was over, he bade his acquaintance farewel, as if ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... and beyond all price. Vulcan had made this cup, and on it he had pictured how Paris, son of Priam, king in Troy, had carried off Helena, and was pursued in wrath by Menelaus, Helena's lord, together with his brother Agamemnon, at the head of a mighty host; and how the Greeks besieged and stormed Troy town, which the Trojans for their part defended, and when the city was taken, AEneas brought away the cup and gave it to a brother of his ...
— Fleur and Blanchefleur • Mrs. Leighton
... be, that Webster, as a rhetorician, resembled Vauban and Cohorn as military engineers. In the war of debate, he so fortified the propositions he maintained, that they could not be carried by direct assault, but must be patiently besieged. The words he employed were simple enough, and fell short of including the vocabulary of even fifth-rate declaimers; but he had the art of so disposing them that, to an honest reasoner, the position he took appeared to be impregnable. To assail it ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... Macedonia or Gaul in place of another? Or what was the harm if a man obtained soldiers during his consulship? But these are the facts that are harmful and abominable,—that your land should be damaged, allied cities besieged, that our soldiers should be armed against us and our means expended to our detriment: this you neither voted nor intended. Do not, merely because you have granted him some privileges, allow him to usurp what ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. III • Cassius Dio
... graciously filled my heart with this courage ever since I, on the day of the news of our complete defeat (November 10), determined to finish "Egypt." Never, since I projected the five books on Egypt, when besieged on the Capitol by the Pope and his followers, and abandoned by the ministry at Berlin, from January 6th till Easter Sunday, 1838,—never have I worked with such success. Even the Great Exhibition and the visit of the ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... importance to see that it was sufficiently supplied with provisions, and munitions of war to stand a siege. It has been found more than once that, owing to the culpable neglect of subordinates, fortresses when besieged were by no means so well supplied with provisions, powder and shot, as had been supposed. Naturally, the governor of a fortress like this, with a considerable garrison, is too much occupied to personally superintend all these matters, and must ...
— In the Irish Brigade - A Tale of War in Flanders and Spain • G. A. Henty
... Turk) desire to live alone; View every virgin with distrustful eyes, And dread those arts, which suitors mostly prize, Alike averse to blame, or to commend, Not quite their foe, but something less than friend; Dreading e'en widows, when by these besieged; And so obliging, that he ne'er obliged; Who, in all marriage contracts, looks for flaws, And sits, and meditates on Salic laws; While Pall Mall bachelors proclaim his praise, And spinsters wonder at his works and ways; Who would not smile if such a man there be? Who would not ...
— Interludes - being Two Essays, a Story, and Some Verses • Horace Smith
... healthy country laden with abundance of supplies for men and animals, at a time when only two armies in the South were strong enough to offer him any serious opposition, both of them farther from his line of march than he was from his goal when he started, one besieged by Grant in Petersburg, and the other already commencing an aggressive campaign against Thomas in Tennessee! It is equally impossible to speak seriously of the apprehension of some geographers and logisticians that Hood would interfere in some way with Sherman's march through ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... had the night, without any hostile demonstration by the convicts. Smoke curling up from the fort and from a building on the other side of them told the besieged that the enemy had taken up their positions during the night as Ritter had prophesied. Evidently they were willing to wait for their triumph rather than risk any lives by trying to take ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... the former disturbance to the distance of some Streets from the Convent, He did not immediately reach it: When He arrived, the throng surrounding it was so excessive as to prevent his approaching the Gates. In the interim, the Populace besieged the Building with persevering rage: They battered the walls, threw lighted torches in at the windows, and swore that by break of day not a Nun of St. Clare's order should be left alive. Lorenzo had just succeeded in piercing his way through the Crowd, when one of the Gates was forced open. ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... where no fear was: for God hath broken the bones of him that besieged thee; thou hast put them to confusion, because God ...
— The Book of Common Prayer - and The Scottish Liturgy • Church of England
... recognized California as properly within the Union, and the pro-Southern party in Kansas made open war upon the Topeka party in December. Lawrence, the anti-slavery headquarters, was besieged, but the new governor managed to compromise so as to prevent bloodshed, and the two governments of Kansas continued to exist. The Federal Congress was compelled to decide which of the questionable governments ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd
... taken up arms for the purpose of seizing his father's kingdom, in the possession of which his grandfather Louis had not been pleased to confirm him. Charles suddenly learned that his mother Judith was on the point of being besieged in Poitiers by the Aquitanians; and, in spite of the friendly protestations sent to him by Lothair, it was not long before he discovered the plot formed against him. He was not wanting in shrewdness or energy; and, having first provided for his mother's safety, he set about forming an alliance, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... wind. With a gale blowing either up- or down-stream, the Indians could have fired the timber and soon driven them out. This was well understood on both sides. But the besieged knew as well that other methods would be resorted to, and speedily they were developed. The rattling fire that had been kept up ever since the first assault had died away to an occasional shot, when suddenly ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... drawn upon freely, and each of the defenders had a spare rifle at his side. The weapons were piled by their respective holes while the besieged awaited the attack. But a hasty dinner was prepared on the coal-oil stove Of the office, and eaten and digested before there came any move on the part of ...
— The Border Boys Across the Frontier • Fremont B. Deering
... her, and kept out of sight as she directed, while she sent her brother to question him. It turned out that the rider was the same Daily Mail correspondent who had cut his way out of Mafeking in order to send his cables, and that he was now on his way back to the besieged town. The growth of a two weeks' beard had given him such an unkempt appearance as to make even sharp Mrs. Keeley mistake him for a Boer. He had had an interesting if risky ride, which he appeared to have accomplished with energy and dash, if ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... a besieged camp. Laurent, that is my husband," with a bright color, "said I could see it from the gallery, and that it resembled a great show. I went out and found you. At first I thought you were dead. But the Indian woman, Jolette is her Christian ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas
... said Oonamoo, starting down the ridge on his peculiar trot, and moving off toward what may now properly be termed a fort. Upon coming in its vicinity, both exercised the greatest caution in their movements, knowing, as they did, that it was besieged by their deadly enemies. A half-hour's reconnoitering by both showed that there were ten Indians, exclusive of one dead one, collected at one end of the clearing, where each, safely ensconced behind a tree, was patiently waiting for a shot at the Rifleman, whom they now at last believed ...
— The Riflemen of the Miami • Edward S. Ellis
... was, I should have said, commanded by Captain Samuel Hood, a relation of the Admiral's. We knew that we should have plenty of work to do. When we sailed, it was understood that an English force had possession of Toulon, which was besieged by the republicans, who had collected a large army round the city, but it was supposed that they would be kept at bay by the English and royalists. We had been cruising off Toulon, when we were despatched to Malta to bring up supernumeraries for the fleet. We were ...
— Dick Cheveley - His Adventures and Misadventures • W. H. G. Kingston
... of whose treason I have proofs, That Julian, who rejected my commands Twice, when our mortal foe besieged the camp, And forced my princely presence ...
— Count Julian • Walter Savage Landor
... constitutional priests were insulted, driven away, massacred at the foot of the altars. The country churches, closed by order of the National Assembly, were burst open by axes, the nonjuring priests returned to them, urged by the fanaticism of the people. Three cities were besieged and on the point of being burnt down by the country people. The threatened civil war seemed the prelude to the counter-revolution. "See," exclaimed Isnard, "whither the toleration and impunity you have preached, ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... The besieged possessed one musket, and with this they did wonderful execution, for it brought down the van of the quilted cavaliers, who fell from his horse like a sack of corn, when the footmen dashed forward and dragged him and his steed out of harm's way. He had been ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... the last act of the old heroic drama; there, as in the best days of the ancient republics, a besieged people is seen to save itself against all hope, artizans equipping vessels, a Pisani conqueror undergoing imprisonment and only released to renew the victory, a Carlo Zeno, surviving forty wounds, and a doge of seventy years of age; a Contarini, who makes a vow not ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 7 - Italy, Sicily, and Greece (Part One) • Various
... of publicity burnt brightly. Constance's carefully planned follow-up articles appeared, and reporters besieged the Byrds' studio. Unfortunately for Mary, these gentry soon discovered that she was the Danae's original, which fact created a mild succes de scandale. Personal paragraphs appeared about her and her writing, and, greatly embarrassed, she disconnected ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... But the besieged had hardly breathed their breath of relief, before there arose upon the dark air, a din of sound so diabolical that you might believe the gates of hell had suddenly been thrown open. From every point around the fort went up a chorus ...
— Annette, The Metis Spy • Joseph Edmund Collins
... the grotto resembled a besieged city; the cry of the women sounded far and wide. Quickly friends and relatives ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... electoral votes were counted in the Senate—Jackson and his friends found temporary lodgings at the Indian Queen Tavern, commonly known as "the Wigwam." During the next three weeks the old inn was the scene of unwonted activity. Office seekers besieged it morning, noon, and night; politicians came to ask favors or give advice; exponents of every sort of cause watched for opportunities to obtain promises of presidential support; scores of the curious came with no other purpose than to see what a backwoods President ...
— The Reign of Andrew Jackson • Frederic Austin Ogg
... and drove him out of the district. Wyntoun mentions an Earl "Gillandrys," a name which we believe is derived from the common ancestor of the Mackenzies and Rosses, "Gilleoin-Ard-Rois," as one of the six Celtic earls who besieged King Malcolm at Perth in 1160. Skene is also of opinion that this Gillandres represented the old Celtic earls of Ross, as the clan bearing the name of Ross are called in Gaelic Clann Ghilleanrias, or descendants of Gillandres, ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... less appropriately than it did those of the English Edward. Undismayed by the strength and fury of the enemy, he attacked and routed them in a pitched battle, killing their leader with his own hands, invaded Pegu, and besieged its capital; but was finally compelled to retire with considerable loss. The Black Prince was succeeded by "the White King," who reigned peacefully for ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... brave a constituency as any other Senator. I claim nothing more. While I am proud of the part which the soldiers of my own State took in defeating the enemy in the West, I do not claim for them any superiority over the other soldiers of the Republic. The brave men who besieged Donelson, and who, after fighting through the day for three consecutive days, lay each night on the ground without shelter, exposed to the rain and sleet, were chiefly Illinoisans. It was there that ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... degenerate John, as in Jerusalem of old, led their followers against each other, even across their dead that lay unburied in the mouldy death-pens and about their dark and narrow doors, and slew each other as did God's chosen people when besieged by the ...
— Shadows of Shasta • Joaquin Miller
... (Vandoeuvres).—I have just followed Maine de Biran from his twenty-eighth to his forty-eighth year by means of his journal, and a crowd of thoughts have besieged me. Let me disengage those which concern myself. In this eternal self-chronicler and observer I seem to see myself reflected with all my faults, indecision, discouragement, over-dependence on sympathy, difficulty of finishing, with my habit of watching myself feel and live, ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Danube and the Marmora. But fifty years earlier a Russian general had marched from the Danube to the Aegean in three and a half months, nor was his journey by any means a smooth and bloodless one. Diebitch crossed the Danube in May 1828 and besieged Silistria from the 17th of May until the 1st of July. Silistria has undergone three resolute sieges during the century; it succumbed but once, and then to Diebitch. Pressing south immediately, he worsted the Turkish Grand Vizier in the fierce ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... which Liverpool has for a long time past retained, was a long, low, picturesque-looking thatched cottage in the small village of Everton (of toffee notoriety), which went by the name of Prince Rupert's Cottage, from its having been the head-quarters of that fiery leader when he besieged the town from the ridge on which the village is situated. But even this was swept away about six years ago by the proprietor, to allow a street which he had mapped out to abut upon the village at the point it occupied. The project did not ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 441 - Volume 17, New Series, June 12, 1852 • Various
... Jews whom the Christians had harried out of their homes. They had grown in numbers and riches, when the Jew-hate of 1190 broke out in England, as from time to time the Jew-hate breaks out in Russia now, to much the same cruel effect. They were followed and besieged in the castle, and, seeing that they must be captured, they set fire to the place, and five hundred slew themselves. Some that promised to be Christians came out and were killed by their brethren in Christ. In New York the Christians have grown ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells
... good city." She replied "that she had always felt so toward them; she had loved them while at Versailles; she should continue to love them at Paris." "Ah," interrupted a virago, hardier than her companions, "but on the 14th of July you would have besieged and bombarded the city; and on the 6th of October you wanted to flee to the frontier." She answered, in the gentlest tone, that "these were idle stories, which they were wrong to believe; tales like these were what ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... When they were at last compelled to retreat, they seemed to adopt a new and yet more harassing species of attack. A large body assaulted one exposed point of the fortress with such fury as to draw thither as many of the besieged as could possibly be spared from other defended posts, and when there appeared a point less strongly manned than was adequate to defence, that, in its turn, was furiously assailed by a ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... the enemy, the Turks under Omar Pasha had been unexpectedly successful in their resistance to the Russians, whom a little later they decisively defeated at Giurgevo. Silistria had been determinedly besieged by the Russians, and its fall was daily expected. Yet, under the leadership of three young Englishmen, Captain Butler and Lieutenants Nasmyth and Ballard, the Russians were beaten off and the siege raised. The schemes of the Czar against Turkey in ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... enemy's camp. Telling the dream, which may, perhaps, have been the shaping of his own thoughts, that this apparent waste would persuade the barbarians that the garrison could not soon be starved out, this person obtained the consent of the rest of the besieged. Some approved the stratagem, and no one chose to act contrary to Jupiter's supposed advice; so the bread was baked, and tossed down by ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... permanently affecting, as they occurred, its progress and prosperity. Five times its flag has changed; three different sovereignties have claimed its allegiance; and since it has been held by the United States, its government has been thrice transferred. Twice it has been besieged by the Indians, once captured in war, and once ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... besieged with applicants for lessons. Those who could dance a few steps wanted the new steps. Those who could not dance at all wanted to climb aboard ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... about to whisper to Tom Hughes, who was next in the merry jumble that followed the first three precise couples, when there was a tremendous rapping at the studio door, and Hannah Ann in her treasured new hat rushed from Miss Jinny's room, where she had been in ambush, to the besieged portal. ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther
... Celia's aflame, I mean no stricture On his Sir Josh-surpassing picture)— I wish her next, and 'tis the soul Of all I've dropt into the bowl, Her mother's beauty—nay, but two So fair at once would never do. Then let her but the half possess, Troy was besieged ten years for less. Now if there's any truth in Darwin, And we from what was, all we are win, I simply wish the child to be A sample of Heredity, Enjoying to the full extent Life's best, the Unearned Increment Which Fate her Godfather to flout Gave him in legacies of gout. ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... hardly,' said he one morning to Waverley when they had been viewing the Castle—'we shall hardly gain the obsidional crown, which you wot well was made of the roots or grain which takes root within the place besieged, or it may be of the herb woodbind, parietaria, or pellitory; we shall not, I say, gain it by this same blockade or leaguer of Edinburgh Castle.' For this opinion he gave most learned and satisfactory reasons, that the reader may ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... horns, and while a sentinel remained to guard each pile of snowballs and their respective flag-staffs, the rest of the army, having loaded themselves with ammunition, rushed bravely to the attack. Then began a regular snow-storm. The besiegers and besieged pelted away with tremendous energy, till the former were covered with snow from head to foot, while the latter could scarcely show their faces above the walls. Under cover of this heavy fire, or rather ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... the Museum gardens, and were stopped by a set of women, and robbed of all the money they had. The mob had proscribed the mews, for they said, "the king should not have a horse to ride upon!" They besieged the new Somerset House, with intention to destroy it, but were repulsed by some soldiers placed there for ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... besieged, but seldom has a siege been laid to it that at first sight would have appeared more desperate than this. The city is strong in its artificial defences, and Nature lends her force to the native troops within the walls. If they could hold out through the summer, September was likely ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... an unquiet and intolerant scorn, The hollow Puppets of a hollow Age, 10 Ever idolatrous, and changing ever Its worthless Idols! Learning, Power, and Time, (Too much of all) thus wasting in vain war Of fervid colloquy. Sickness, 'tis true, Whole years of weary days, besieged him close, 15 Even to the gates and inlets of his life! But it is true, no less, that strenuous, firm, And with a natural gladness, he maintained The citadel unconquered, and in joy Was strong to follow the delightful Muse. 20 For not a hidden path, that ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... to have warned Pete," said George, not feeling remarkably well pleased at the chance of being besieged as a moonlighter, but yet anxious that his friends should elude arrest where the cartridges and explosive fluid would be sufficient proof ...
— Ralph Gurney's Oil Speculation • James Otis
... and trembled with fear when he saw their arms in the street. If any one thinks this an idle story, there is a fact which serves to prove it true: he was in the town of Haarlem when the Spaniards besieged it, and the magistrates, who knew his weakness, permitted him to flee from the city before they began to fight, doubtless foreseeing that otherwise he would have died of fright. He took advantage of the permission and fled to Amsterdam, leaving his fellow-citizens ...
— Holland, v. 1 (of 2) • Edmondo de Amicis |
