"Fireman" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the Order of Leopold, F.B.S., the originator of our railway system. This eminent engineer is a rare example of a self-taught genius. Born of parents too poor to give him any schooling, at eighteen years of age, when full grown, and following the occupation of a fireman, he was not ashamed to commence his education at an evening school. His steady industry and unconquerable perseverance ultimately won for him a position second to none in his profession. Looking at the influence ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... three common clocks are still hanging; one of them, judging from the time at which it stopped, would seem to have gone for an hour or so after the fall. Great interest had been taken in a poor linnet in a cage, hanging in the wind and rain high up against the broken wall. A fireman got it down alive, and great exultation had been raised over it. One woman, who was dug out unhurt, staggered into the street, stared all round her, instantly ran away, and has never been heard of since. It ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens
... out that two are still in the back-rooms, now blazing fiercely. Up go the firemen again and plunge into the windows right into the flames. A long time elapses. We hold our breath; it seems as if the brave men must have perished. Then there is a cheer as a fireman appears with something in his arms. It is a girl unconscious; gently he lowers her down the ladder, and goes again to help his comrade. They reappear and come down in safety. Are all out now? No; for all at once, at the end of the building furthest from the fire-escape, a woman ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton
... is, next to a marine engine, the most sensitive thing man ever made; and No. .007, besides being sensitive, was new. The red paint was hardly dry on his spotless bumper-bar, his headlight shone like a fireman's helmet, and his cab might have been a hard-wood-finish parlour. They had run him into the round-house after his trial—he had said good-bye to his best friend in the shops, the overhead travelling-crane—the big world was just outside; and the other locos were taking ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... If there is any distinction between secular and sacred, that distinction was unknown at Bethlehem and Nazareth. At Bethlehem the Brethren accounted it an honour to chop wood for the Master's sake; and the fireman, said Spangenberg, felt his post as important "as if he were guarding the Ark of the Covenant." For the members of each trade or calling a special series of services was arranged; and thus every toiler was constantly reminded that he was working not for himself but for God. The number of ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... windows. The great wall of the Bench was awful in its reflection of the labouring flames—it rose out of sight like the flame-tops till the columns of water brought them down. I thought of my father, and of my watch. The two girls were not visible. 'A glorious life a fireman's!' said Temple. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... for a Pittsburgh meat house, was on the ill-fated day express, one car of which was washed away. He narrowly escaped drowning, and tells a horrible tale of his experience on that occasion. The engineer, the fireman and himself, when they saw the flood coming, got upon the top of the car, and when the coach was carried away they caught the driftwood, and fortunately it was carried near the shore and they escaped to the hills. Mr. Palmer walked a distance of twenty miles around the flooded district to a nearby ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... and passed the entire day with uncombed hair, in a dressing-sacque, reading novels, and telling her fortune with cards. The grocer's daughter declared she had met her one evening, at a dancing-hall, seated with a fireman before a salad-bowl full of wine, prepared in ...
— A Romance of Youth, Complete • Francois Coppee
... patents—steam reversed. Too late! for there came a "thud." Jim cursed As the fireman, there in the cab with him, Kinder stared in the face of Jim, And says, "What now?" Says Jim, "What now! I've just ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... back room for certain papers, where he was found by Fireman Carey in an unconscious condition. He is recovering, and ...
— The Cow Puncher • Robert J. C. Stead
... you in," the policeman said good naturedly, and he led him forward to the spot where the engines were playing upon the burning houses. "Is it true, mate," he asked a fireman, "that a woman and two ...
— By Sheer Pluck - A Tale of the Ashanti War • G. A. Henty
... in the discharge of duty than the members of a small-town brass band. The Sleepy Cat musicians held back only until the arrival of the early local freight, Second Seventy-Seven, for their bass horn player, the fireman. When the train pulled up toward the station on a yard track, the band members in uniform on the platform awaited their melodic back-stop, and the fireman, in greeting, pulled the whistle cord for a blast. The switch engine promptly responded and one whistle after another joined in until ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... out at the same time their lawlessness. He says—speaking of Philadelphia—"Almost every company has its war-song, breathing the most barbarous and bloodthirsty sentiments towards some rival association, and describing the glory of the fireman to the destruction of his enemy's apparatus, or worse yet, his life."—He gives the following list of the terrific names of the companies: "Hornets, Snappers, Blood-reds, Bed-bugs, Rock-boys, Buffaloes, Skimmers, Scrougers, Revengers, Knockers, Black-hawks, Pirate-boys, Kill-devils." ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... received that Patrick Shields, an Irishman and probably a British subject, but at the time a fireman of the American steamer Keweenaw, in the harbor of Valparaiso for repairs, had been subjected to personal injuries in that city, largely by the police, I directed the Attorney-General to cause the evidence of the officers and crew of that vessel to be taken ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison
... side, intimate, mutually understanding. Again, a beautiful relation! From the summit of a high kiln in the middle distance, flames shot intermittently forth, formidable. Crockery was being fired in the night: and unseen the fireman somewhere flitted about the mouths of the kiln. And here and there in the dim faces of the streets a window shone golden... there were living people behind the blind! It was all beautiful, joy-giving. The thought of her mother fidgeting for her return home was delightful. The thought of Mr. Cannon ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... morning of the day they were to sail a man applied to Captain Barforth for a position. He said he had been a fireman on an ocean liner, but had lost three fingers in some machinery and ...
— The Rover Boys on Treasure Isle - The Strange Cruise of the Steam Yacht • Edward Stratemeyer
... occupations in which there is danger. It can never be a duty to shirk a duty because it is dangerous. And sometimes it is as much a Christian man's duty to go into, and to stand in, positions that are full of temptation and danger, as it is a fireman's business to go into a burning house at the risk of suffocation. There were saints in Caesar's household, flowers that grew on a dunghill, and they were not bidden to abandon their place because it was full of possible ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... machine flew forwards, and in a few seconds was soaring with its booming hum into the air. Smith glanced down and saw the fireman facing Barracombe, his annoyance being evidently greater than his curiosity. He would have smiled if he could have heard ...
— Round the World in Seven Days • Herbert Strang
... added that the Normandy rescued three American citizens who were members of the crew of the Leo, and names them as Walter Emery, seaman, of Swan Quarter, N.C.; Harry Whitney, steward, of Camden, N.J., and Harry Clark, fireman, of 113 East Fifty-second Street, ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various
... and noiseless—just ghosts scuffling in a fog. Dear me, what would this barren vocabulary get out of the mightiest spectacle?—the burning of Rome in Nero's time, for instance? Why, it would merely say, 'Town burned down; no insurance; boy brast a window, fireman brake his neck!' Why, that ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... bell to a fireman, and brought the boys out of their beds like a shot, and they scrambled into their clothes and were in the living room with ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... dust, heat, the clatter of shovels, grimy, sweating fireman, such as the thought of the furnace room of a ship of war calls to the mind of the landsman, a watertender stood calmly watching the glow of oil jets feeding the furnace fire. Now and then he cast an eye to the gauge glasses. ...
— The Boy Allies with the Victorious Fleets - The Fall of the German Navy • Robert L. Drake
... word to start was given. A man ran along by the train and mounted into his high seat with his horn in his hand ready to blow. The fireman ceased his raking of the glowing fire and every traveller sprang into his seat and looked toward the crowd of spectators importantly. This was a great moment for all interested. The little ones whose fathers were in the train began to call good-bye and ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... note of this discordant din, The gallant fireman from his slumber starts; Reckless of toil and danger, if he win The tributary meed of grateful hearts. From pavement rough, or frozen ground, His engine's rattling wheels resound, And soon before his eyes The lurid flames, with horrid glare, Mingled with murky vapors rise, In wreathy folds ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... says he, and in the course of things he further explained that he was a tugboat fireman, out on a strike, givin' me the follerin' ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... semicircle about it, looking curiously at the palm leaf which lay across the black cover. No one said anything. The baggage man stood by his truck, waiting to get at the trunks. The engine panted heavily, and the fireman dodged in and out among the wheels with his yellow torch and long oilcan, snapping the spindle boxes. The young Bostonian, one of the dead sculptor's pupils who had come with the body, looked about him helplessly. He turned to the banker, the only one of ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather
... is largely due, no doubt, to the fact that the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers is composed of a very select and intelligent class of men. Every engineer must first serve an apprenticeship as a fireman, which usually lasts from four to twelve years. Very few are advanced to the rank of engineer in less than four years. The firemen themselves are selected men who must pass several physical examinations and then submit to the test of as arduous an apprenticeship as modern ...
— The Armies of Labor - Volume 40 in The Chronicles Of America Series • Samuel P. Orth
... Engineer, fireman, brakemen, and passengers cheered him. For Neale the moment was unexpected and simply heart-swelling. Never in his life had he felt so proud. And yet, stinging among these sudden sweet ...
— The U.P. Trail • Zane Grey
... No more dynamite!" screamed a fireman as he ran up Ellis Street past the doomed Flood building at two o'clock on Friday morning, tears standing in ...
— The San Francisco Calamity • Various
... and lower decks, and fired with a diminished charge, lest the shot should pass through, and injure the TEMERAIRE. And because there was danger that the REDOUBTABLE might take fire from the lower-deck guns, the muzzles of which touched her side when they were run out, the fireman of each gun stood ready with a bucket of water; which, as soon as the gun was discharged, he dashed into the hole made by the shot. An incessant fire was kept up from the VICTORY from both sides; her larboard guns playing upon ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... each of its mouths in the black winter darkness. Darius's mentor crept up to the archway of the great hovel which protected the kiln, and pointed like a conspirator to the figure of the guardian fireman dozing near his monster. The boy had the handle-less remains of an old spade, and with it he crept into the hovel, dangerously abstracted fire from one of the scorching mouths, and fled therewith, and the fireman never stirred. Then Darius, to whom the ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... that night, except to refuse the offer to ride inside the car. He preferred the footboard, he said, and explained that as a youth it had been his ambition to be a fireman. ...
— The Book of All-Power • Edgar Wallace
... boats spend much of their idle time in playing cards. Of the passion for gaming, thus excited, an instance has been narrated to us upon the most credible authority, which surpasses the highest wrought fictions of the gambler's fate. A colored fireman, on board a steamboat running between Saint Louis and New-Orleans, had lost all his money at poker with his companions. He then staked his clothing, and being still unfortunate, pledged his own freedom for a small amount. ...
— Scientific American magazine, Vol. 2 Issue 1 • Various
... Guy answered cheerily. "Don't mind my going on with my breakfast, do you? What's it all about? Who's the gentleman with the fireman's helmet on, and what's he ...
— A Maker of History • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... a regularity that must have been discouraging to its human rivals. A train of flat-cars, almost loaded, was on the track of the cut, and a dinky engine attached to them wheezed steam from a safety valve, the engineer and fireman lounging out of the cab window, ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... for it," replied the other. "But say, Jack, if you should be fool enough to go up to get killed on that old engine, you had better take a fireman along with you, for you will not be able to find a helper ...
— Jack North's Treasure Hunt - Daring Adventures in South America • Roy Rockwood
... to the galley, where we could see a light. There he found a belated cook scouring pans by the radiance of two lanterns, and one of these he sought to borrow. The scullion was backward. 'Was it one of the crew?' he asked. And when Jones, smitten with my theory, had assured him that it was a fireman, he reluctantly left his scouring and came towards us at an easy pace, with one of the lanterns swinging from his finger. The light, as it reached the spot, showed us an elderly man, thick-set, and grizzled with years; but the shifting and coarse shadows concealed from us the expression and even ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... wus a fireman on the Cape Fear river boats and a white man's Negro too. We had two children, both died while little. My husband and I spent much of our time with the white folks and when he wus on his runs I slept ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States • Various
... Eastern city called Lakeport, near Lake Metoka, on the shore of which Mr. Bobbsey had a large lumber yard. Once this had caught fire, and Freddie had thought he could put the blaze out with his little toy fire engine. Ever since then Mr. Bobbsey had called the little chap "fireman." ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at Home • Laura Lee Hope
... Three bursting as near together as the ticks of a clock made almost no smoke, as they brought some tree limbs down and tore away a section of a trunk. Then the thunderstorm moved on to another part of the line. Only, unlike the thunderstorms of nature, this, which is man-made and controlled as a fireman controls the nozzle of his hose, may sweep back again and yet again over its path. All depends upon the decision of a German artillery officer, just as whether or not a flower-bed shall get another sprinkle depends upon ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... petroleum ready to be staved in! The wild demons of the Commune are capable of everything; an invention of incendiary firemen is quoted as an example of the diabolical genius which presided over the work of destruction; individuals wearing the fireman's uniform were seen to throw combustible liquids by means of pumps and pails on the burning houses, instead of aiding to ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... who, but little more than four years ago, fell—as nobly for himself as sadly for others—at his chosen post of duty. What, when he first gave his energies—indeed, his whole heart to it, was but the rough and unskilful employment of the fireman, became under Mr. Braidwood's command and his infusing spirit of order and intelligence, as distinguished from reckless daring, a noble pursuit, almost rising in dignity to a profession, and indeed acknowledged as such by many, and significantly, ...
— Fire Prevention and Fire Extinction • James Braidwood
... studying on the same bench with them,—he is as clean, as well-dressed, as well-behaved, as they. Now, five years hence, to what occupation can that colored boy turn? He can be a bootblack, a servant, a barber, perhaps a teamster. He may be a locomotive fireman, but when he is fit to be an engineer, he is turned back. Carpentry, masonry, painting, plumbing, the hundred mechanical trades,—these, for the most part, are shut to him; so are clerkships; so are nineteen-twentieths ...
— The Negro and the Nation - A History of American Slavery and Enfranchisement • George S. Merriam
... state, whilst the Wazir Dandan took up his station before him and the Emirs and Lords of the realm presented themselves and stood in attendance upon him. Then Zau al-Makan called for his comrade, the Fireman, who had befriended him in his wanderings; and, when he came into presence, the King rose to do him honour and seated him by his side. Now he had acquainted the Wazir with all the kindness and good turns which the Stoker had done him; and he found that the wight had waxed fat and burly with ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... to be compared with that of the Forest Guard. A city fireman is only one of a company huddled together in a little house, not greatly busy until the fire telegraph signal rings. But suppose there were only one fireman for the whole city, that he alone were responsible for the safety of every house, that instead of telegraphic signaling he must depend ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Foresters • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... The pity was that he had brought himself to make any concessions to the obsequiousness of the world. As he passed down Michigan Avenue he overtook a shabby laboring man, who begged of him. Sommers found out that he was a striker, a fireman on the Illinois Central, who had lost his job by being blacklisted after the strike. He had walked the streets since the ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... track at a wash-out some miles ahead," explained the engineer. "Took the fireman with her; but I don't know much about it yet. Guess they'll want ...
— Ranching for Sylvia • Harold Bindloss
... "A fireman? What do I want with firemen? Bring in some wood, and, stranger—start up—a hello! thunder and saw mills, what's all that racket ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... boys for hookin' things," added another. "Last v'y'ge I made, there was a fireman we called Sandy, as I'd seen hangin' around my sea-chest jist afore I missed suthin'. So I fixed a fish-hook to the lock, and nex' day Mr. Sandy had a precious sore finger somehow; and from that day for'ard ...
— Harper's Young People, April 6, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... visages; he found nothing menacing for the future in them; for wickedness he had to satisfy himself as he could with the sneering, insolent, clean-shaven mug of some rare American of the b'hoy type, now almost as extinct in New York as the dodo or the volunteer fireman. When he had found his way, among the ash-barrels and the groups of decently dressed church-goers, to the docks, he experienced a sufficient excitement in the recent arrival of a French steamer, whose sheds were thronged with hacks and express-wagons, and in a tacit inquiry ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... kept busy enough, for it was Christmas-eve, and the carols and anthems were to be rehearsed for the last time, and Mrs. Morton's clear soprano voice could not be spared. Indeed, her voice was all that kept Teddie and Clover and Daisy in their neat little box of a house, for their father, a brave fireman, had been killed more than two years before at a fearful fire, and since then their mother had striven hard to maintain her little family by sewing, and singing, and doing whatever work her slender hands could ...
— Harper's Young People, December 23, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... before he found what he was looking for—the body of a little girl who had fallen and been overcome by the smoke. He picked her up and with little difficulty carried her out to the street, where a fireman ...
— The Boy Scout Fire Fighters - or Jack Danby's Bravest Deed • Robert Maitland
... up and down on the floor, pounded frantically on the door, and at last the door was broken open by a stalwart fireman, and Phil made his ...
— The Errand Boy • Horatio Alger
... round the waist and forced her down the stairs, thrust her into the arms of an ascending fireman, and then ran up again, taking three steps at a time. The cry of a child attracted me. I made for a door opposite, and burst it open. The scene that presented itself was striking. Out of four cribs and a cradle arose five cones of bed-clothes, with a pretty little curly head surmounting each cone, ...
— My Doggie and I • R.M. Ballantyne
... this room, with all the care necessitated by his fragility. It was not intended to break his second ear in the hurry of moving. Leon ran to light the fire under the boiler, and M. Nibor created him Fireman, ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... my name and the number of the crack engine of America—as well as the imprint of a greasy thumb—on the register of our roundhouse last Saturday night, the foreman borrowed a chew of my fireman's fine-cut, and ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... the men had been variously busied in attempts to relieve the ship from the pressure of the ice. Pen, Clifton, Bolton, Gripper, and Simpson had this in charge; the fireman and the two engineers came to the aid of their comrades, for, as soon as the engines did not require their attention, they became sailors, and as such could be employed in all that was going ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... reached the station. But seeing the agent surrounded by a group of armed men, the engineer shut off the air and sought to throw his throttle open. His purpose discovered, a quick snapshot from Mitch Lee laid him dead, and, springing into the cab, Mitch soon persuaded the fireman ...
— The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier • Edgar Beecher Bronson
... hid behind a bench till every one had gone and saw 'em crawl out. They bribed a fireman or deck-hand or some one to keep 'em under cover. They got off the boat at the last minute, and ...
— Blindfolded • Earle Ashley Walcott
... in June, 1781, the son of a fireman who tended the pumping engine of the neighbouring colliery, and one of a penniless family of six children. So poor was his father, indeed, that the whole household lived in a single room, with bare floor and mud ...
— Biographies of Working Men • Grant Allen
... which Corny and Rectus and I sat, with Celia, the colored woman; and there were some dingy little sleeping-places, which were given up for our benefit. The captain of the tug was a white man, but all the rest, engineer, fireman and hands—there were five ...
— A Jolly Fellowship • Frank R. Stockton
... the first assistants up on deck; third and fourth and head fireman are down there, and two ...
— Tom Slade on a Transport • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... the only son of a widow, Mrs. Roscoe Dare. Her husband had died several years previous, leaving her a small income, barely sufficient to support herself and her son. It may be added here that Mr. Dare had been a city fireman before his marriage. This, perhaps, accounted in a measure for the interest Herbert took in all alarms ...
— The Young Firemen of Lakeville - or, Herbert Dare's Pluck • Frank V. Webster
... a little farther and I met the brave firemen going home drenched and worn from the big fire. "You coward!" said I to myself, "what if you were a fireman! Something to growl ...
— A String of Amber Beads • Martha Everts Holden
... to have any other employment to occupy their time. The department claims their whole duty. A certain number are required to be always at the engine house. In case of an alarm being sounded during the absence of a fireman from the engine house, he runs directly to the fire, where he is sure to find his company. Everything is in readiness to leave the house at a moment's notice. The horses stand ready harnessed, and ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... successfully in this way requires a plentiful supply of water, at an elevation of from fifty to ninety feet above the bed-rock, [Footnote: This is by no means necessary. The jet can be thrown from below like the fireman's hose playing upon a burning house. I shall return to this highly important subject.] and a rapid slope or descent from the base of the bank of earth to be washed, so that the waste water will run off through the sluices, bearing with it gravel, ...
— To The Gold Coast for Gold, Vol. II - A Personal Narrative • Richard Francis Burton and Verney Lovett Cameron
... the brave man dragged her out of the window, and began his perilous descent. When about half way down, the ladder fell, but its burden was expected, and mattress and bed-clothing saved them from what might have been worse. As it was, the fireman escaped with a few bruises and slight scorching, and Mrs. Hayden with a broken limb. First they feared she was dead, but after a few moments she revived and moaned feebly for husband and children. Little Mabel clung desperately to her mother, and sobbingly told her "only ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson
... "I was fireman under ingeneer Walker on the lokymotive 'Gin'l Borygyard,' what most ginerally hauled Freight No. 2. The ingines goes now by numbers, but we ole hands called ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... revelation; for I had looked upon an engineer and his assistant with some compassion as well as admiration, and have often thought how extremely disagreeable it must be to travel on the engine as they do. Not so Michael Reynolds, the author of this book, who has risen from the rank of fireman to that of locomotive inspector on the London and Brighton railroad. He tells us that a model engineer "is possessed by a master passion—a passion for the monarch of speed." Such an engineer is distinguished, also, for his minute knowledge ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... nation like this to permit these men to become totally disabled or to meet death in the performance of their hazardous duty and yet to give them no sort of reward. If one of them serves thirty years of his life in such a position he should surely be entitled to retire on half pay, as a fireman or policeman does, and if he becomes totally incapacitated through accident or sickness, or loses his health in the discharge of his duty, he or his family should receive a pension just as any soldier should. I call your attention with especial earnestness to this ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... New York and London in his queer stilted way. He had been a fireman on board ship, a teacher of jiujitsu, a juggler, a quack dentist, Heaven knows what else. Driven by the conscientious inquisitiveness of his race, he had endured hardships, contempt and rough treatment with the smiling patience inculcated in the Japanese ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... coats like those worn by the British grenadiers during the American Revolution, pipe-clayed cross-belts, white nankeen breeches, enormous cavalry boots, extending half-way up the thigh, and curious hats of black glazed leather, of a shape which was a cross between a fireman's helmet and the cap of a Norman man-at-arms. They were armed indiscriminately with long pikes and ancient flint-locks, and marched to the music of fife and drum. The leader of the band danced a sort of shimmy as he marched, ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... than a mustard-seed, he had no place where he could—what shall I say?—where he could withdraw. That's it! Withdraw—be alone with his loneliness. He walked by my side very calm, glancing here and there, and once turned his head to look after a Sidiboy fireman in a cutaway coat and yellowish trousers, whose black face had silky gleams like a lump of anthracite coal. I doubt, however, whether he saw anything, or even remained all the time aware of my companionship, because if I had not edged him to the left here, or pulled him ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... importance, the one which makes him generous or indifferent as to the rest. Even those women who pretend that they judge a man by his exterior only, see in that exterior an emanation from some special way of life. And that is why they fall in love with a soldier or a fireman, whose uniform makes them less particular about his face; they kiss and believe that beneath the crushing breastplate there beats a heart different from the rest, more gallant, more adventurous, more tender; ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... The fireman shook his head. "No, sir. I can't let any one through. And if I did 'twould be no good. The staircase is clean gone—a great big stone staircase, too! It's all in bits, just like a lot of rubble. The front of the house ain't touched, but the center and ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... rich, clean and foul, saint and sinner. The quarantine laws tightened. Vessels fled by the harbor mouth under full sail, and melted like helpless compassion upon the fiery horizon. Trains upon the Shore Line shot through and thundered past the station; they crowded on steam; the fireman and his stoker averted their faces as they whirled by. The world turned her back upon Calhoun, and the dying town was shut in with her dead. Only, at long intervals, the Mercy, casting anchor far down the channel, sent up by ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 8 • Various
... they'd had enough of La Chance, but I could feel a sulky underhand rebellion in the bunk house. I ran the ore hauling as best I could, and Macartney doubled up the work in the mill. The ore-feeder acted as crusher-man, too, the engineer was his own fireman, which, with the battery man and the amalgamator, brought the mill staff down to four,—but they were the best of our men. The others Macartney turned to with the rockmen, and in the course of a fortnight he got a few more men from somewhere he wrote to ...
— The La Chance Mine Mystery • Susan Carleton Jones
... the tearful 'Senorita' who has so long knelt and so constantly wagged her doll's head at his side; the mules of the other bandits were upset, and they themselves roughly seized. The full-length statue of P. T. Barnum fell down of its own accord, as if disgusted with the whole affair. A red-shined fireman seized with either hand Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan by their coat-collars, tucked the Prince Imperial of France under one arm and the Veiled Murderess under the other, and coolly departed for the ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... the fireman, and reached out his arms for her just as she fell back fainting. Grasping her firmly, the brave man dragged her out of the window, and began his perilous descent. When about half way down, the ladder fell, but its burden was expected, and mattress and bed-clothing saved them from what might ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson
... see in time from the glare of the sky coming right in my eyes, I gained the lee side of the cook's galley at the forward end of the deckhouse. Here, as I conjectured, I found old Greazer, our lamp-trimmer. This worthy, who was quite a character in his way, was a superannuated fireman belonging to the line, whom age and long years of toil had unfitted for the rougher and more arduous duties of his vocation in the stoke-hold, and who now, instead of trimming coals in the furnaces below, trimmed wicks and attended to the lamps about the ship, on deck and elsewhere. He ...
— The Ghost Ship - A Mystery of the Sea • John C. Hutcheson
... Drowsy warmth was streaming down from the flies, and in the wings, which were lit by vivid patches of light, only a few people remained, talking in low voices or making off on tiptoe. The gasman was at his post amid an intricate arrangement of cocks; a fireman, leaning against the side lights, was craning forward, trying to catch a glimpse of things, while on his seat, high up, the curtain man was watching with resigned expression, careless of the play, ...
— Nana, The Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille • Emile Zola
... stolen back from her. Also he had a secret joy in the fact that his shirt—that is, his outer and most visible shirt—was a coarse garment of blue flannel, a very virile and knightly tabard with large white buttons, which Mother had never let him wear in public. It was such a noble habiliment as a fireman might have worn, or a ...
— The Innocents - A Story for Lovers • Sinclair Lewis
... o'clock at night, as the train slowed up as usual to take water, the engineer and fireman were covered by two of the robbers. The other two—there were only four—cut the express car from the train, and the engineer and fireman were ordered to decamp. The robbers ran the engine and express car out nearly two miles, where, by the ...
— Cattle Brands - A Collection of Western Camp-fire Stories • Andy Adams
... the scalding water leaped out in a stream. Jack stood well forward now and with the hose swept the crowd, as a fireman might sweep a burning building. Driven by the tremendous force of the internal steam, the boiling water knocked the men in front headlong over; then, as he raised the nozzle and scattered the water broadcast over the crowd, wild yells, screams, ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... on duty he was directly in the path of the very worst of the smoke and cinders. Then too the work here was harder than anywhere else on the train; for, in addition to his regular duties as brakeman, he was expected to assist the fireman at water stations, and by shovelling coal down from the rear end of the tender so that it was more easily within his reach. It was for this very reason though that Rod sought the place. He did not wish to remain a brakeman ...
— Cab and Caboose - The Story of a Railroad Boy • Kirk Munroe
... fireman's hat, Charlie?" asked Sue, who was looking for some one to help her pin her dress ...
— Bunny Brown and his Sister Sue Giving a Show • Laura Lee Hope
... referred to by the missing fireman, this particular Chinaman had joined the shades of his ancestors. I think that final blow, which had felled him, had brought his shaven skull in such violent contact with the wall that he had died of the thundering concussion ...
— Tales of Chinatown • Sax Rohmer
... out of her. He says he can stand it if she can. He made her do a mile in 39-1/4 seconds on her trial trip, and claims that about a month ago when he was hauling the grease wagon[1] she did 4-1/10 miles in 2-1/2 minutes, which is at the rate of 98.4 miles an hour.[2] His fireman backs him up, and says he held the stop-watch between stations. The paymaster was so nearly scared to death that time that Newman was warned never to try for his hundred-mile record again without special orders. Now I suppose he considers that he ...
— Cab and Caboose - The Story of a Railroad Boy • Kirk Munroe
... him, and were strung out in irregular groups between him and the timbers. Walking up between the groups came the delegate, with two men, chewing his cigar in silence as he walked. The train was creeping along, the fireman leaning far out of the cab window, closely scanning the track for signs of an obstruction. On the steps between the cars a few passengers were trying to get a view up the track; and others were running ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... while the gaunt Indians, in their fantastic costume, assumed the form of giants striding along apparently on the gleaming surface of the ocean itself. They were outlined with that sharp, black distinctness which is seen when at night a fireman runs along the outer ...
— Adrift in the Wilds - or, The Adventures of Two Shipwrecked Boys • Edward S. Ellis
... $25 for a silver dime. But if this particular dime were of a rare kind and desired by A, a wealthy coin collector, to complete a set, would the consideration be sufficient? An offer shouted from a fourth story window just as the roof is about to fall, in consequence of which offer a fireman at unusual personal risk successfully attempts the rescue. An offer and acceptance for a horse which is afterwards discovered to have been dead at time of sale. A promise made under threat of spreading an infamous report. ...
— Studies in Civics • James T. McCleary
... only, leaving the lower ones free. The Lockwood Cosmetic Stove is a small affair that holds a piece of candle and a baby-size frying-pan, or skillet, and is one device for its purpose that has the approval of fire insurance companies and so will not be objected to by the theatre fireman. There are some heating devices that you are not permitted to use in any theatre, and persistence in their use after being once cautioned has caused ...
— The Art of Stage Dancing - The Story of a Beautiful and Profitable Profession • Ned Wayburn
... of his early days, which he told with great relish, related to his experience as a fireman on a Mississippi ferryboat. His limited knowledge of English was regarded by the captain as a personal affront, and that fire-eating old-timer made it his particular business to let young Pulitzer feel the weight of his authority. At last the overwork and the ...
— An Adventure With A Genius • Alleyne Ireland
... something like a fireman. He had lived so long in an atmosphere of constant alarms and danger, that he was always ready for almost any emergency. His room was equipped with the end in view that he could act ...
— Tom Swift and his Aerial Warship - or, The Naval Terror of the Seas • Victor Appleton
... believe they have got a Catholic one here, but like that one the New York fireman spoke of, I believe "they don't run her now:" Now, although we are surrounded by sand, the greatest part of the town is built upon what was once a very pretty grassy spot; and the streams of pure water that used to poke about it in rural sloth and solitude, now pass through on ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... dealers in the cheap and nasty. "Burning fluid" is usually another name for naphtha, or something worse. Gasoline, naphtha, benzine, kerosene, paraffine, and many other dangerous fluids which make the fireman's vocation necessary are all the product of petroleum. These oils are produced by the distillation or refining of crude petroleum, and inasmuch as the public, especially firemen, are daily brought into contact with them it is proper that they should know something of their properties. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 288 - July 9, 1881 • Various
... the Questions that Engineers will be asked when undergoing an Examination for the purpose of procuring Licenses, and they are so plain that any Engineer or Fireman of ordinary intelligence may commit them to memory in a short time. By STEPHEN ROPER, Engineer. Third ...
— Mechanical Drawing Self-Taught • Joshua Rose
... out to-night," he laughed to the fireman, a young, inexperienced fellow, making his trial trip, and passed on to make his inspection of things in ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 28, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... in lively times for the subjects to be given at the last moment by telegram to Mr. Sambourne; so that his condition of mind during the Thursday following the Dinner may not inaptly be compared to that of an anxious fireman waiting for a "call." The contributions of the rest of the artistic Staff—Mr. du Maurier, Mr. Bernard Partridge, and Mr. E. T. Reed—do not form the subject of Wednesday's cogitation; nor is it true, as has publicly been stated, that when jokes fail it ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... he called to his fireman, who had been out oiling some part of the engine, "the boys are going to put ...
— Bob Chester's Grit - From Ranch to Riches • Frank V. Webster
... hurried trip to California. Here they became restless, and went back at their old trade, thinking that no one even on the Pacific Slope had any right to cause them fear. They held up a train in Tulare county and killed a fireman, but were repulsed. Later arrested and tried, William was cleared, but Grattan was sentenced to twenty years in the penitentiary. He escaped from jail before he got to the penitentiary, and rejoined Emmett ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... Griffith's paper is on the same tack now: an army rotten with venereal disease: overseas or halfseasover empire. Half baked they look: hypnotised like. Eyes front. Mark time. Table: able. Bed: ed. The King's own. Never see him dressed up as a fireman or a ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... have gone through this first course of study, they begin their real fireman's training. They attend more lectures in which they learn how to handle the various ladders and machines which firemen use. They have to learn how a fire engine is put together, what are the uses of every wheel and valve, and how to clean ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 26, May 6, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... along with something inside me all the time till I was as tired as though I had been really pushing it. At one place the train stopped in the middle of a bog—some one had pulled the communication cord—and the guard and the fireman ran along the carriages, using frightful language, only to pull out seven drunken men going home from a fair, in charge of one small boy who was sober. He was explaining that he couldn't wake them up at the last ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... announcing the fire-engine, which in a few seconds went by like a brazen thunderbolt. But quick as it went by, Sunday had bounded out of his cab, sprung at the fire-engine, caught it, slung himself on to it, and was seen as he disappeared in the noisy distance talking to the astonished fireman ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... of a few minutes a small raft, bearing a heaving-line which the yachtsmen had streamed, drifted down upon the tug, clearing the bow by a few feet. Dan leaned out and caught it with his boat-hook, bringing the line aboard. Then he and his fireman tailed on to the end of it, bringing in the attached hawser hand over hand. This they hurried to the stern bitts, taking a pass also around the steam winch. Leaving the fireman to watch it, Dan dashed into the pilot-house and sounded the jingle-bell ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... (not regulation) admits of very little design. It can only be varied by the length of the skirts, which may be either as long as a fireman's, or as short as Duvernay's petticoats. This coat is, in fact, a cross between the dress and the driving, and may, perhaps, be described ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... built the cut between Forrest City and Madison for the road, I was his cook and the first fireman to make the run through the cut. I used to drive a stagecoach over the Old Military Road through Pine Tree on the stage run from Memphis to ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Arkansas Narratives Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... blast of a trumpet, and all the old feelings, which had lain dormant for many years, were revived, and I wished that I had an engine and a brave company, to rush to the rescue. While I stood surveying the flames, I was joined by Fred, an old fireman like myself, but cooler, and ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... was bound to become a railroad man, as his father had been before him. Step by step he worked his way upward, serving first in the Roundhouse, cleaning locomotives; then in the Switch Tower, clearing the tracks; then on the Engine, as a fireman; then as engineer of the Overland Express; and finally ...
— The Girls of Central High on Lake Luna - or, The Crew That Won • Gertrude W. Morrison
... came now all the more inspiring. Mr. Gardner, the superintendent, had frequently given his shoulder an approving tap, and Joe Cuttle, the fireman, often said that "the lad could run the engine as well as any man." But Mr. Kendall, who ought to have been the first to observe and appreciate his son's success, seemed scarcely to have ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XIII, Nov. 28, 1891 • Various
... end of the trouble, for before I had recovered my breath a fireman broke in one of the front windows, and a whole company followed him through, and they dradged hose around, and mussed things all over the house, and then the foreman wanted to thrash me because the house was not on fire, and ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... underground tunnels, infantry action had been suspended for nearly two weeks. Heavy bombardments had been maintained by both sides—those of the Allies being especially deliberate and persistent. As a fireman would sway the nozzle of his streaming hose from side to side, so the Allies poured a continuous, sweeping torrent of shot and shell over the German positions in certain well-defined zones along the line. ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... cultivate their acquaintance in his school and college days, and had admired them only from afar in a diffident way; so when Alfred approached him and begged him once more to come and be introduced he slipped away downstairs to talk with his old boyhood friend, the fireman. ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... was the wholly abandoned railway, but there, sure enough, was a train rattling along at a good rate. I could make out soldiers with guns sitting upon the tender, and presumed that they were with these instruments directing the operations of some Belgian engineer and fireman. In a moment more I saw I was mistaken, for at the throttle was a uniformed soldier, and another comrade in his gray-green costume was shoveling coal into the furnace. One of the guards, seeing me plodding on, smilingly beckoned to me to jump aboard. When I took the ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams
... therefore the least chance of getting the Chinaman. He sat up on a little iron seat attached to the boiler, holding on to the piston for dear life, and every time the whistle went off—and it went off very often—he nearly did the same. The fireman was obliged every other minute to whistle to frighten the cows away from the track. We others were more fortunate, having only to balance ourselves and clutch our neighbor. The least jar would have capsized us all. The Chinamen working on the railroad gazed at us in wonder; but we did not scoop ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone
... sir, you'll have to get hold lower down, so as her waist'll be nearly as high as your shoulder. My brother's a fireman." ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett
... Trunk by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy. It had bright brass bands all over, the woodwork beautifully painted, and everything highly polished, which was the custom up to the time old Commodore Vanderbilt stopped it on his roads. After running about fifteen miles the fireman couldn't keep his eyes open (this event followed an all-night dance of the trainmen's fraternal organization), and he agreed to permit me to run the engine. I took charge, reducing the speed to about twelve miles an hour, and brought the train of seven cars ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... and Miss Blackwell, editors of the Woman's Journal, while reporters were busy getting interviews. They returned to the train laden with flowers, which they distributed, sending buttonhole bouquets to the engineer, fireman and all ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... Don. There were no further objections to hard work. The talk became eager as details were planned. The patrol would practice Wednesday afternoon at troop headquarters. Don would work with Ritter on splints, and Tim and Andy and Bobbie would form a team for artificial respiration, fireman's lift and stretcher work. Wally and Alex would practice straight bandaging at night after Alex had finished his labors at ...
— Don Strong, Patrol Leader • William Heyliger
... was hastily organized among the passengers and, heavily armed, swarmed from the train in quest of the two remaining members of the band, who had been left to guard the engineer and fireman. The miscreants saw them coming, however, and realized that the game was up. They emptied their pistols and then flung themselves upon their horses and galloped off, secure for ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... may be so pathetic that on the hundredth night it is still bringing tears to the eyes of the fireman, but you must not expect to be treated as a serious dramatist. You will see this for yourself if you consider the passage as it should properly have ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, June 10, 1914 • Various
... a fireman in your dreams, signifies the constancy of your friends. For a young woman to see a fireman crippled, or meet with an accident otherwise, implies grave danger is threatening a ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... Together they made their way forward, and by the light of the lamp they saw what had happened. The engine had taken a drift edge-way, had canted up, and then rolled over against the walls of the cutting. Luckily, the carriages had kept the rails. The driver was up to his neck in the snow, but the fireman was not visible. ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... brain and hand had been thirty years in service, lay under his engine, a mangled, inanimate mass of flesh; His fireman, who had looked forward to a place on the engineer's side of a cab as a young soldier dreams of sword and shoulder straps, lay still beside his chief. From the wrecked coaches, above the sound of hissing steam and crackling flames, came groans and shrieks ...
— Their Yesterdays • Harold Bell Wright
... part of the train was without a man to put on the brakes. To go on was death. To stand still was the same. No speed which he could give his train by backing would enable it to escape those uncontrolled cars. He sent his fireman back to the first car, with orders to uncouple the engine. He whistled 'on brakes' to his train, so that it should be held on the grade safely. And he, and the engine alone, went on up that grade, ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford
... American, but as in Texas he seemed to have little to do except to keep the train moving. The auditor, brakeman, and train-boy were Mexicans, in similar uniforms, but of thinner physique and more brown of color. The former spoke fluent English. The engineer was American and the fireman a Negro. ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck
... sunset the Chief came up again. I heard what he said. 'It's overhauling us fast, sir,' he said to the old man. The old man, he stood looking down at the deck. Nobody said anything for a spell. Then a fireman shot through a companion on all fours, scrambled to the bulwarks, and looked out. He began cursing the sun, shaking his fist at it every time it popped over the seas. It was low down. It was funny to hear him. 'So long, chaps,' ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson
... first important occasion I showed myself. I was one of that little band who assaulted the barracks of the firemen of Villette. Only there we made a mistake. We killed a fireman, unnecessarily, I was caught and thrown into prison, but the Government of the Fourth of September liberated us, from which I concluded that we did right to attack those barracks and kill the fireman, ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... wilderness lay the track-end of this railroad pushing across the continent. When Franklin descended from the rude train he needed no one to tell him he had come to Ellisville. He was at the limit, the edge, the boundary! "Well, friend," said the fireman, who was oiling the engine as he passed, and who grinned amiably as he spoke, "you're sure at ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough |
