"Fordable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... river, the bed of the Chassezac, its largest and longest tributary, is in many places completely dry on the surface—the water being sufficient only to supply the subterranean channels of infiltration—and the Ardeche itself is almost everywhere fordable, even below the mouth of the Chassezac. But in floods, the river has sometimes risen more than sixty feet at the Pont d'Arc, a natural arch of two hundred feet chord, which spans the stream below its junction with all its important affluents. At the height of the inundation of 1857, the quantity ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... by the Federals. During the little alerte mentioned, I saw smoke rising from the bridge, which was soon a mass of flame. Now, this was the only bridge for some miles up or down; and though the river was fordable at many points, the fords were deep and impassable after rains. Its premature destruction not only prevented us from scouting and foraging on the north bank, but gave notice to the enemy of our purpose to abandon the country. Annoyed, and doubtless expressing the feeling in my countenance, ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... more than a hundred marooned cars lined up at Old Oraibi or Moencopi Wash, waiting, perhaps another twenty-four hours, for the ordinarily dry wash to become fordable. One will at least be impressed with the idea that the Snake Dance (a movable date set by the priests from the observation of shadows on their sacred rocks) comes just at the breaking of ...
— The Unwritten Literature of the Hopi • Hattie Greene Lockett
... us was one of a deplorable character. We had reached the banks of a small stream, not over fifty yards in width, but very deep. After going down it for several miles no place could be found that was fordable, and at length we made up our minds to swim across, rather than spend more time in searching for a ford. This was easy enough, as we were all swimmers, and in a few minutes most of the party were safely landed on the ...
— The Hunters' Feast - Conversations Around the Camp Fire • Mayne Reid
... the hole, which looked a very black open gulf. Annaple had thanked the men, and bidden them come to Lescombe the next day to be paid for their assistance. Then they all stood to watch Mark ride through the river, at the shallowest place, indicated both by her and the labourers. It was perfectly fordable, so Annaple's were ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... monotonous miles to the banks of the Rakaia. This river is one of the largest in the province, second only to the Waitaki. It contains about as much water as the Rhone above Martigny, perhaps even more, but it rather resembles an Italian than a Swiss river. With due care, it is fordable in many places, though very rarely so when occupying a single channel. It is, however, seldom found in one stream, but flows, like the rest of these rivers, with alternate periods of rapid and comparatively smooth water every few yards. The ...
— A First Year in Canterbury Settlement • Samuel Butler
... bordering on the rivers are subject to inundations, so the fordable creek becomes in an instant a broad lake, deep and rapidly running. These two riders were talking the common topic—in that famous Blue Grass region where fillies and fill-es, as the voyageur from Canada said in his broken English, ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... passed the night in great uneasiness. All day the weather had threatened to turn to rain, and we have already said how rapidly the Taro could swell; the river, fordable to-day, might from tomorrow onwards prove an insurmountable obstacle; and possibly the delay had only been asked for with a view to putting the French army in a worse position. As a fact the night had scarcely come when a terrible storm arose, and ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... enough to drown, but on the edges it's fordable. The cows will be glad of a drink and a swim after the heat ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Texas - Or, The Veiled Riddle of the Plains • Frank Gee Patchin
... reinforce the 'culls' whom Izard had left behind. The Americans, though working with very creditable zeal, determined to do their best, quite expected to be beaten out of their little forts and entrenchments, which were just across the fordable Saranac in front of Prevost's army. They had tried to delay the British advance. But, in the words of Macomb's own official report, 'so undaunted was the enemy that he never deployed in his whole march, always pressing ...
— The War With the United States - A Chronicle of 1812 - Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • William Wood
... narrow point, called Navy Point, on which was the naval establishment. Where Black River Bay meets the lake, its south shore is prolonged to the west by a projection called Horse Island, connected with the land by a fordable neck. Brown expected the landing to be made upon this, and he decided to meet the attack at the water's edge of the mainland, as the enemy crossed the neck. There he disposed his five hundred militia, placing the regulars under Backus in a second line; ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... manner of reasoning with Hastings, whose fidelity to his master's sons was without suspect: and yet the Devil, who never dissuades by impossibility, taught him to try him. And so he did. But when he found by Catesby, who sounded him, that he was not fordable; he first resolved to kill him sitting in council: wherein having failed with his sword, he set the hangman upon him, with a weapon of more weight. And because nothing else could move his appetite, he caused his head to be stricken off, before he ate his dinner. A greater judgment ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... force must meet with disaster, the Earl of Galway reluctantly ordered the troops under his command to advance. The river was fordable, and they met with no opposition, until they crossed it and formed up in order of battle. The Portuguese horse were now divided on each wing, the British were in the centre; a portion of the Portuguese infantry were on either flank, the rest were in ...
— In the Irish Brigade - A Tale of War in Flanders and Spain • G. A. Henty
... on both sides, and the Spaniards were foiled for that day. But on the next, after a bloody encounter, the Spaniards drove the Indians from the swamp and got possession of the pass, all of which was fordable except about forty paces in the middle, over which there was a bridge of trees made ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... lining the river bluffs with winged death; checked here, helped there by a moraine—as well as you or I may foresee the conduct of a chess-board. He omitted nothing, judged times and seasons, reckoned defences at their worth, knew all the fordable places by the lie of the land, timed cavalry and infantry to rendezvous, forestalled communications, provided not only for his own base, but against the enemy's. All this, of course, without maps, and very much against the systems ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... boundary river, with faces turned toward Texas. The place where they are making passage is not the usual emigrants' crossing—on the old Spanish military road between Natchitoches and Nacogdoches,—but several miles above, at a point where the stream is, at certain seasons, fordable. From the Louisiana side this ford is approached through a tract of heavy timber, mostly pine forest, along a trail little used by travellers, still less by those who enter Texas with honest intent, or leave Louisiana with ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... intended Military Congress, Mavrocordato had consented to accompany Lord Byron, was, as the foregoing letters have mentioned, delayed by the floods,—the river Fidari having become so swollen as not to be fordable. In the mean time, dangers, both from within and without, threatened Missolonghi. The Turkish fleet had again come forth from the Gulf, while, in concert, it was apprehended, with this resumption of the blockade, insurrectionary movements, ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... Loodiana, and paralyse the advance of Lord Gough upon Sobraon. If the British conquered the enemy's lines, the sirdar's army had no retreat; the river was in his rear, and it was in no place easily fordable, nor had he other means of crossing, adequate to the safe retreat of such an army—defeat and destruction were to him the same. It was a day for valour to aid men; life, hope, honour to both armies depended upon the deeds to be ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... became more rugged as the route brought them near Centreville. There were no hills—a bare but not bleak champaign, mostly without houses or farms, as the North knows them. Sluggish brooks became more frequent, but none that were not easily fordable. There were no landmarks to hold the mind to the scene, nor, in case of battle, give the strategists points of vantage for the iron game. About noon, the detached groups stalking a little negligently now over the tedious plains, were ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... path; and down some steep declivities there has been a mild attempt at a cutting. Where we come upon streams of any size or depth, light wooden bridges have been built; and fascines have made some boggy parts fordable in wet weather. Such is our road, and along it we proceed at a hand-gallop for the most part. The jolting may be imagined, it cannot be described; for the four wheels are never by any chance on the same level at one and ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... Dr Solander, with the pinnace and yawl and a party of men. We landed abreast of the ship, on the east side of the river, which was here about forty yards broad; but seeing some natives on the west side, whom I wished to speak with, and finding the river not fordable, I ordered the yawl in to carry us over, and left the pinnace at the entrance. When we came near the place where the people were assembled, they all ran away; however, we landed, and leaving four boys to take care of the yawl, we walked up to ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... victory, than as a determined effort on which everything was to be staked. In all probability this form of action was inevitable in the conditions. The Boers held a strong position, covered in front by a river fordable at only two points. Such a position can hardly be reconnoitred except by attack. It could not be turned except by a long flank march, which, if successful would have occupied several days, during which the camp and railhead would have ...
— Lessons of the War • Spenser Wilkinson
... crossed the Ungerengeri, which here flows southerly to the southern extremity of the valley, where it bends easterly as far as Kisemo. After crossing the river here, fordable at all times and only twenty yards in breadth, we had another mile of the valley with its excessively moist soil and rank growth of grass. It then ascended into a higher elevation, and led through a forest of mparamusi, tamarind, tamarisk, acacia, ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... the English would advance was the old Roman causeway running nearly north and south. The Bannock Burn was fordable from a spot near the Park Mill down to the village of Bannockburn. Above, the banks were too high and steep to be passed; while below, where ran the Bannock through the carse, the swamps prevented passage. The army was therefore drawn up, with its left resting on the sharp ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... Monday as to our departure. The weather was fine at last, but the river flooded. The tortuous nature of its bed necessitated five or six crossings in the course of twelve miles. Were they fordable? was the question. "We shall go and try," was Hobson's final decision. "Try" is the watchword of all true pioneers. We saddled and set forth. Hobson drove the cart, with my portmanteau. During the first part ...
— Six Months at the Cape • R.M. Ballantyne
... hour beyond, turning round a steep rock, the valley presents a very wild and picturesque aspect. To the left, in the mountain, are six chambers cut in the rock; said to be the work of Christians, to whom the greater part of the ancient structures in Syria are ascribed. The river was not fordable here; and it would have taken me at least two hours to reach, by a circuitous route, the opposite mountains. A little way higher up is the Djissr el Souk, at the termination of the Wady; this bridge was built last year, as appears by an Arabic ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... ford. A portion of the infantry first passed, then the wagons were taken over, the rest of the infantry followed, and the cavalry and the elephants brought up the rear. The point where the river was fordable was at a sharp angle, and Hannibal now occupied its outer side. As daylight approached he placed his archers on the banks of the river where, owing to the sharp bend, their arrows would take in flank an enemy crossing the ford, and would also sweep ...
— The Young Carthaginian - A Story of The Times of Hannibal • G.A. Henty
... sure there was. They had forgotten that; and sometimes the ford was not fordable, and it was necessary to go round-about in order to cross a ferry. While they were puzzling over this new ...
— Little Grandfather • Sophie May
... crossing a river, usually insignificant, but swollen by floods and bridged only by half-thawed ice. Yet French resource was far from vanquished. General Corbineau, finding from some peasants that the river was fordable three leagues above Borisoff, brought the news to Oudinot, who forthwith prepared to cross there. Napoleon, coming up on the 26th, approved the plan, and cheeringly said to his Marshal, "Well, you shall be my locksmith and open ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... visible, the grass is gradually trod down, and finally disappears, and thus a road is formed; not, indeed, so good as one of the usual construction, but which answers all the purposes of those who have occasion to make use of it. Wherever there happens to be a stream, or river that is not fordable, it is customary to cut down two or three trees in some spot on its banks, where it is seen that they will reach to the other side of it. Across these, the boughs that are lopped off themselves, or smaller trees felled for the purpose, are laid close together, and over ...
— Statistical, Historical and Political Description of the Colony of New South Wales and its Dependent Settlements in Van Diemen's Land • William Charles Wentworth
... places and feeding grounds, and paths made by the red hunter and warrior. Although hundreds of deer traveled to this lick yearly, they had not originally made the trail. It was an ancient Indian runaway, for the creek was fordable near this point. The tribesmen had used it for generations until it was worn almost knee-deep in the forest mould, but wide enough only to be traveled in single file. Along this ancient trail, and approaching ...
— With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga • W. Bert Foster
... finest harbours in the world, protected by an island as by a natural breakwater. But it had a weak side, and this had been betrayed by fishermen to Scipio. During ebb-tide the water of the shallow pool W. of the town fell so much that it was fordable and the bottom was firm. Of this Scipio took advantage. He first made a feint attack on the N. wall and then led 500 men across the ford, who scaled the W. wall and opened the nearest gate from ...
— Helps to Latin Translation at Sight • Edmund Luce
... village and hamlet, with the canals, the roads, and hollow ways which lead up to them; there is not a river or a rivulet he passes, Trim, but he should be able at first sight to tell thee what is its name—in what mountains it takes its rise—what is its course—how far it is navigable—where fordable—where not; he should know the fertility of every valley, as well as the hind who ploughs it; and be able to describe, or, if it is required, to give thee an exact map of all the plains and defiles, the forts, the ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... famous of temporary toll-ferries was over the trail-crossing of Green River. It was owned by Bill Hickman, a Mormon, and as the river was seldom fordable he reaped a rich harvest of gold from the emigrant trains. His prices for crossing teams depended upon the ability of their owners to pay, varying from five to twenty dollars each. The old ford may still be seen just below the station ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... Ruith-in, or "river island," separated from the rest of Kent and the mainland of Britain by the estuary of the Wantsum, which, though now a small brook, was formerly navigable for large vessels, and in Bede's time was three stadia broad, and fordable only ...
— History Of The Britons (Historia Brittonum) • Nennius
... fire for this purpose, one dark night, on Billingsgate Island, twenty horses which were pastured there, and this colt among them, being frightened by it, and endeavoring in the dark to cross the passage which separated them from the neighboring beach, and which was then fordable at low tide, were all swept out to sea and drowned. I observed that many horses were still turned out to pasture all summer on the islands and beaches in Wellfleet, Eastham, and Orleans, as a kind of common. He also described the killing of what he called "wild hens" here, after they had gone ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... that he was near the edge of the lake. He remembered that between him and the hut there lay a long reach of water, where the lake ran up into a sort of branch or bay. He knew that this bay, even at its neck, was quite shallow and fordable. He had, in fact, waded across it that very day in order to shorten the path. He was just then within a hundred yards of the fording-place; and if the dogs contemplated attacking him, he would be able ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid
... the streets resembled so many torrents, and in most places were not fordable, notwithstanding scores of persons, with the alacrity of mushrooms after rain, had placed themselves at the narrowest parts of the streams, with raised planks, or temporary bridges for crossing. Our load was landed under the arcade ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 330, September 6, 1828 • Various
... judging that, at the point where it crossed the river, the stream was still fordable. When he heard his brother's piteous cries for help, he quaked to think what might have happened to Thad if he had not recognized the presence of Satan in the moral shed-room, and summarily ejected him. The rainfall had been sufficient to aggregate considerable ...
— The Young Mountaineers - Short Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... ladies thought to return to Tarbes as easily as they had come, but they found the streamlets so deep as to be scarcely fordable. When they came to pass over the Bearnese Gave,(1) which at the time of their former passage had been less than two feet in depth, they found it so broad and swift that they turned aside to seek for the bridges. But these being only ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. I. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... miles from Hest Bank, and to show travellers where they may pass with safety. The bed of the river is liable to frequent changes, and a fresh of water after rain may, in a very short time, convert a fordable place into a quicksand. When we came to the river, he got out of the gig, and waded over to ascertain the firmness of the bottom, the water being about knee-deep. Having escorted us a little farther, till we saw the guide for the Kent at a ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... attack approached, these officers made a careful examination of the ground between our trenches and Fort San Antonio de Abad, and, finally, on August 11, Major J. F. Bell, United States Volunteer Engineers, tested the creek in front of this fort and ascertained not only that it was fordable, but the exact width of the ford at the beach, and actually swam in the bay to a point from which he could examine the Spanish line from the rear. With the information thus obtained it was possible to plan the attack intelligently. ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead
... Infantry. To pass a fordable river one move. To change from fours to two ranks half a move. To change from two ranks to extension half a move. To embark into boats two moves for every twenty men embarked at any point. To disembark one move ...
— Little Wars; a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys' games and books • H. G. Wells
... now, and go southeast two miles and you come to the crossing of the Ridge road to Corinth, where you will find General Prentiss's division, before mentioned. Keeping on, you come to Lick Creek. It has high, steep banks. It is fordable at this point, and Colonel Stuart's brigade of Sherman's division is there, guarding the crossing. The brook which gurgles past the church empties into the creek. You see that Prentiss's entire division, and the left wing of McClernand's, is between Stuart's brigade ...
— My Days and Nights on the Battle-Field • Charles Carleton Coffin
... which declines from the Kingani a little, leads through rolling, jungly ground, full of game, to the tributary stream Mgeta. It is fordable in the dry season, but has to be bridged by throwing a tree across it in the wet one. Rising in the Usagara hills to the west of the hog-backed Mkambaku, this branch intersects the province of Ukhutu in the centre, and circles round until it unites with the ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... Zealand are separated from each other by narrow branches of the sea, which are fordable at low water; and it was by such a passage, two leagues in breadth, and till then untried, that the Spanish detachment of one thousand seven hundred and fifty men, under Ulloa and other veteran captains, advanced to their exploit in the midst of dangers greatly increased by ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... of which Stark skilfully took advantage. Peters' corps of Tories were entrenched on the other side of the stream, in lower ground, and nearly in front of the German Battery. The little river, that meanders through the scene of the action, is fordable in all places. Stark was encamped upon the same side of it as the Germans, but, owing to its serpentine course, it crossed his line of march twice on his way to their position. Their post was carefully reconnoitered ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... nothing at all. So we determined to risk the savages and the lions which followed the game into these hot districts, especially as it was not yet the fever season or that of the heavy rains, so that the rivers would be fordable. ...
— Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard
... Cheeseekau started forth, followed in Indian file by his young adventurers, none more eager than Tecumseh. The narrow path, worn smooth by the feet of runners, followed high ground to avoid the dense brush, and led to points where the streams were shallowest and most easily fordable. Every day soon after sunrise the party was journeying through new regions which unfolded beauties ever fresh. At sunset they pitched their tents, lighted their fires, and gathered about them to discuss ...
— Tecumseh - A Chronicle of the Last Great Leader of His People; Vol. - 17 of Chronicles of Canada • Ethel T. Raymond
... were now to penetrate. Rugged paths, narrow passes, gloomy thickets and dark ravines, encountered them in their hourly progress, calling for constant vigilance and the maintenance of all their courage. Rivers, fordable in unfrequent places and overlooked by precipitous banks on either side, crowned most commonly by dense and intricate masses of forest, through which and without a guide, our little army was compelled to pass,—presented opportunities for frequent ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... the forest became marshy. They felt under foot quite a network of liquid threads, which would feed the affluents of the little river. Some of the rills, somewhat large, could only be crossed by choosing fordable places. ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... the entire multitude followed, according to their tribes, having their children and their wives in the midst of them, as being afraid for them, lest they should be borne away by the stream. But as soon as the priests had entered the river first, it appeared fordable, the depth of the water being restrained and the sand appearing at the bottom, because the current was neither so strong nor so swift as to carry it away by its force; so they all passed over the river without fear, finding it to be in the very ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... on travelling about, he frequently comes to very deep hollows, excavated by the various branches of the river, which flow with a very gentle current in large sandy channels. Except after heavy rains, these are almost always fordable, and are commonly sunk fifty or sixty feet perpendicular below the ...
— An Account of The Kingdom of Nepal • Fancis Buchanan Hamilton
... forward as rapidly as his troops could march, and he had a feeling of relief when he came in sight of the river. It was higher than it had been when he crossed it three or four days before, but still fordable; but as his advance guard began to cross, Freeman's battery, operated by young Morton, opened on them from the ambuscade in which it had been concealed. The thing to do, of course, was to charge the battery ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris
... we left Nongoma early in the hope of reaching Ulundi that evening if the Ivuna and Black Umfolozi Rivers proved fordable. As it chanced, although they were high, we were able to cross them, I seated on the horse which two of the Zulus led. Next we tramped for miles through the terrible Bekameezi Valley, a hot and desolate place ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... Buffington Bar, Morgan abandoned his plan of making a watering trough of Lake Erie, and fled north through the tier of river counties, keeping within a few miles of the Ohio. The river was low, but not fordable except at Coxe's Riffle, a few miles below Steubenville. Headed at this point also, he struck across the country and passed through Wintersville, a small village five miles west of Steubenville. ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various |
