"Precipitously" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... hundred feet deep. The view from the bottom was wonderful. We were shut in by steeps of foliage and blossoms from two to three thousand feet high, broken by crags of white marble, and towering almost precipitously to the very clouds. I doubt if Melville saw anything grander in the tropical gorges of Typee. After reaching the other side, we had still a journey of eight hours to the sea, through a wild and broken, yet ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... subsequently was of great service to us during the advance of one infantry division on Bethlehem and Jerusalem. The 1st Australian Light Horse Brigade commanded by General Cox, and the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade under General Meldrum, moved against Tel el Saba, a 1000-feet hill which rises very precipitously on the northern bank of the wadi Saba, 4000 yards due east of Beersheba. Tel el Saba is believed to be the original site of Beersheba. It had been made into a strong redoubt and was well held by a substantial garrison adequately dug in and supported ...
— How Jerusalem Was Won - Being the Record of Allenby's Campaign in Palestine • W.T. Massey
... or broken compagination of the magnetical fabric;" "The effects of their activity are not precipitously abrupted, but gradually proceed to their cessations;" "Some have written rhetorically and concessively, not controverting, but assuming, the question, which, taken as granted, advantaged the illation;" "Its fluctuations are but motions subservient, which winds, shelves, ...
— Noah Webster - American Men of Letters • Horace E. Scudder
... had fallen; Harold, thrown forward a few feet, touched the earth upon the edge of the rocky bank that descended precipitously a hundred feet or more to the river—a few steps further, and horse and rider would have plunged over the verge of ...
— Fort Lafayette or, Love and Secession • Benjamin Wood
... suddenly abate. Unexpectedly my Indian guides turned directly toward land, and ran through a narrow rock-bound passage into a little basin about fifty rods square, surrounded by mountains rising very precipitously from 1500 to 2500 feet in hight, down which were plunging ten cataracts, where the smallest canoe could lie in safety at all times. The west shore is much the boldest, presenting for considerable distances, almost perpendicular-faced mountain walls ...
— Official report of the exploration of the Queen Charlotte Islands - for the government of British Columbia • Newton H. Chittenden
... really a magical appearance, as it rose out from the sea. It is a barren, colossal rock; and had I not learned, from one of the newest works on geography, that it was peopled by about 2,500 souls, I should have supposed the whole island to have been uninhabited. On three sides, the cliffs rise so precipitously from the waves, that all ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... discussed how Mr. Wilson had made his money, what method Mr. Hiemer had employed, and the means resorted to by Mr. Hardy. One related age-old but eternally breathless anecdotes of the fortunes stumbled on precipitously in the Street by a "butcher" or a "bartender," or "a darn messenger boy, by golly!" and then one talked of the current gambles, and whether it was best to go out for a hundred thousand a year or be content ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... not more than he was. It was stopped precipitously by a stick, wielded by my governor. He'd got wind of it. We hadn't much time to make a ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... visited Hawnby a few times; it is most romantically situated about ten miles from Thirsk, rather difficult of access on account of the steep ascents which have to be climbed and precipitously descended before ...
— The Chignecto Isthmus And Its First Settlers • Howard Trueman
... narrow verandah in front, and creepers in bud covering it. Then came a terrace just wide enough for a carriage to drive up; and below, flower-beds bordered with stones found what vantage ground they could between the steep slopes of grass that led almost precipitously down to the stream, where the ground rose equally rapidly on the other side. Moss, ivy, rhododendrons, primroses, anemones, and the promise of ferns were there, and the adjacent beds had their full share of hepaticas ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... the wildest and most romantic parts of Germany, there is a high mountain which is as renowned for the strange stories that are told about it, as for its many natural peculiarities. It is flat on the top, falling off precipitously on every side. In recent times a high tower has been built on the very edge of the rock. Curious to say, the ground on the summit of this mountain is a bog or morass; flat slabs of stone have been placed on it to enable bold tourists to reach ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... to the charge at Gaines' Mill, on the 27th of June, it emerged out of a wood into a large field, which declined toward a ravine through which a stream of water ran, and on the other side of which the ground rose somewhat precipitously to a considerable altitude. It had been wisely chosen for defense, and the opposite high ground was lined with infantry and crowned with batteries. As it was impossible to dislodge the enemy until some diversion should ...
— Reminiscences of a Rebel • Wayland Fuller Dunaway
... the thought of danger asserted itself, and he raised his head and looked sharply around, to see that they were amongst stones and bushes where; the bank went precipitously down to a beautiful winding river flowing amongst abundant verdure. Close by him lay Ingleborough, still fast asleep, and beyond him the other pony, still cropping away at the rich green growth which sprang up among the stones. Then, ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn
... is blocked. He cannot build a new road, for there is no ground on which he can build it. The government has restricted him to a wild-pig trail which runs precipitously up the mountain. I climbed the trail with him, and we had to climb with hands and feet in order to get up. Nor can that wild-pig trail be made into a road by any amount of toil less than that of an engineer, a steam-engine, and a steel cable. But what does the Nature Man care? ...
— The Cruise of the Snark • Jack London
... trees, firs and the Alaska spruce, so useful for fires and torches, fringed the edge of the ice-field, green and verdant in contrast to the gleaming snows of the mountain, which rose in a gentle slope at first, then precipitously, in a dazzling and enchanting combination of colour. It was as if some marble palace of old rose before them against the heavens, for the ice was cut and serrated into spires and gables, turrets and towers, all seeming to be ornamented with fretwork where the ...
— Kalitan, Our Little Alaskan Cousin • Mary F. Nixon-Roulet
... far side by a stone wall, beyond which stretched an open piece of ground until, further up the hill, there was a second wall. At this point there was a sudden change in the slope of the ground, which rose almost precipitously to the crest. Immediately opposite the point where 'B' company issued from the wood a third wall ran up the hill, connecting the two already mentioned. When the attackers reached the far end of the wood, they came under such a well-directed and heavy fire that their progress ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... Before I could reach the path which led down into its depths, I had to pass some way along its side; I had arrived at a part immediately over the scene of the last encounter, where the bank, overgrown with trees, sloped precipitously down. Here I heard a loud sound of voices in the dingle; I stopped, and laying hold of a tree, leaned over the bank and listened. The two women appeared to be in hot dispute in the dingle. "It was all owing to you, you limmer," said the vulgar woman to the other; "had you not interfered, ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... precipitous base a trout-stream rolled along, gurgling and plashing, and winding round huge masses of white spar. The far bank sometimes extended out into natural meadows, where red cattle and wild ponies grazed, and sometimes rose precipitously. At one point, where both banks were equally steep and lofty, the far side was covered by a plantation with a cover of under-wood; but no trees of sufficient magnitude to deserve the name of a wood. This is a spot famous in the annals of a grand sport that soon ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... but beat off their assailants; when passing, however, through the tremendous gorge of Kringellen, the peasantry of the whole surrounding country gathered in the mountains. The road wound along on one side of the gorge. So steep was the hill that the path was cut in solid rock which rose almost precipitously on one side, while far below at their feet rushed a rapid torrent. As the Sinclairs were marching along through this rocky gorge a tremendous fire was opened upon them from the pine forests above, while huge rocks and stones came bounding down ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... spur, to the westward: it is buried in a small forest, particularly rich in plants, and is defended by a stone wall behind: the only road is tunnelled through the sandstone rock, under the wall; and the spur on either side dips precipitously, so that the place is almost impregnable if properly defended. A sanguinary conflict took place here between the British and the Khasias, which terminated in the latter being driven over the precipices, beneath which many of them were shot. The fan-palm, Chamaerops ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... the skipper had to be found, for I must know when I had to come aboard. A perpendicular iron ladder led to her saloon from a hatch, and through unintelligence and the dark I entered that saloon more precipitously than was a measure of my eagerness, picked myself up with a coolness which I can only hope met with the approval of some silent men, watching me, who sat at a table there, and offered my pass to ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson
... as he glanced over the edge of the narrow tableland. The descent was not steep near the top, but farther on it dropped precipitously to the water, crossing the ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... of the pass the mounted troops were checked and the artillery came into action. The position occupied by the Boers was formidable—a long stretch of high rugged hills, with the forward slope ending precipitously. The pass lay over a Nek between two high shoulders of hills. The Boers, exceedingly well posted, occupied the hills on either side of the Nek, taking cover behind the immense boulders ...
— The Record of a Regiment of the Line • M. Jacson
... drops 1,280 feet in a distance of 100 miles, and 130 feet within the city limits, falling precipitously 70 feet in the heart of the business section, over a dam 200 feet wide. On both sides is built the city sloping towards its waters and overlooking the country beyond. Extensive economic developments are taking place, ...
— The Beauties of the State of Washington - A Book for Tourists • Harry F. Giles
... family—to dig the grave on the spot where it was Robert Louis Stevenson's wish that he should lie.... Nothing more picturesque can be imagined than the ledge that forms the summit to Vaea, a place no wider than a room, and flat as a table. On either side the land descends precipitously; in front lies the vast ocean and surf-swept reefs; to the right and ...
— The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson for Boys and Girls • Jacqueline M. Overton
... road it was the same. Nan, with only the faintest, if any application of brakes, would commit herself to lanes which leaped precipitously downwards like mountain streams, zig-zagging like a dog's-tooth pattern, shingled with loose stones, whose unseen end might be a village round some sharp turn, or a cove by the sea, or a field path running to a farm, or merely the foot of one hill and the beginning of the steep pull up ...
— Dangerous Ages • Rose Macaulay
... of this day was made close in-shore, with a range of hills, beautifully wooded and clothed with green grass, sloping abruptly, almost precipitously, into the depths of the fresh-water sea, towering immediately above us, and as we rounded the several capes or points, roused high expectations of some new wonder, or some exquisite picture being revealed as the deep folds disclosed themselves ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... animation of cricket, the more remote parts solitary, the windmill hovering in a corner out of the way of the sunset, and two horsemen and a horsewoman cantering along the edge of the long valley into which the plain dropped precipitously. The sun sank in a white sky, and Evelyn caught the point of one of the ribs of her parasol, so that she could hold it in a better position to shade her eyes, and she saw how the houses stretched into a point, the last being an inn, no doubt the noisy resort of the cricketers and ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... a clay ledge on the edge of the cliff which rose precipitously to a height of 600 feet a few hundred yards from the shore, Mac and Smoky drank in the glory of these rare moments. Both sides were tired, the Turks weary of the carnage and their failure, and the invaders of the hot, waterless hours of waiting, but conscious of ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... on the little reed-thatched roof and the white walls of my new dwelling. In the courtyard, which was surrounded by a wall of rubble-stone, there stood another miserable hovel, smaller and older than the first and all askew. The shore descended precipitously to the sea, almost from its very walls, and down below, with incessant murmur, plashed the dark-blue waves. The moon gazed softly upon the watery element, restless but obedient to it, and I was able by its light to distinguish two ships lying at some distance from the shore, ...
— A Hero of Our Time • M. Y. Lermontov
... of where the watchers were gathered, the glacial heels of the inland mountains step precipitously into the sea and rise to a height of several thousand feet. At the base of these iron rocks, corroded with the rust of interminable ages, the fragments of great floes, like catapults, are tossed by the inrushing sea. Above, in summertime, rises and falls constantly a black mist ...
— The Eternal Maiden • T. Everett Harre
... Dhakuri mountain a magnificent panorama delights the eye. To the north is a deep valley, above which the snow-clad mountains rise almost precipitously. Towering above the observer are the peaks of the highest mountains in British territory. The peaks and 14,000 feet of the slopes are covered with snow. Below the snow is a series of glaciers: these are succeeded by rocks, grass, ...
— Birds of the Indian Hills • Douglas Dewar
... as distinguished from Amberley of the anglers, is a mile from the station and is built on a ridge. The castle is the extreme western end of this ridge, the north side of which descends precipitously to the marshy plain that extends as far as Pulborough. Standing on the castle one sees Pulborough church due north—height calling unto height. The castle is now a farm; indeed, all Amberley is a huge stockyard, smelling of straw and cattle. It is sheer Sussex—chalky soil, ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... descent. The road plunged down, steep and straight, into a considerable valley. There, on the opposite slope, a little higher up the valley, stood Crome, his destination. He put on his brakes; this view of Crome was pleasant to linger over. The facade with its three projecting towers rose precipitously from among the dark trees of the garden. The house basked in full sunlight; the old brick rosily glowed. How ripe and rich it was, how superbly mellow! And at the same time, how austere! The hill was becoming steeper and steeper; he was gaining speed in spite of his brakes. He loosed his grip ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley
... had the steamer been made fast than a ledge of rocks was pointed out to us, rising precipitously some distance from the pier. "Can't you see it?" again and again asked our guide, renewing his endeavor to dispel our distressing stupidity. At length "it" appeared to us, and we stood mute with ...
— The Lake of the Sky • George Wharton James
... up and see him," I said. We ascended the dark staircase—the rest of the household were plunged in slumber—turned the handle of the bedroom door, and could just make out in the darkness a little figure in pyjamas, leaning precipitously out of ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... and they set out across a strip of gravel strewn with boulders. Here and there networks of stranded branches had to be floundered through, and the ragged ends rasped their dilapidated boots and bruised their legs. Then, where the bluff rose almost precipitously from the water, they crept along slippery ledges, or waded through the shallower pools, with the white rapid roaring down a few yards outshore of them. There were places where a slip would have meant destruction, but that was nothing unusual and time was too precious ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... and fro, making himself acquainted, with the exception of Christian Europe, with the greater part of the known world. He touched, in many directions, the borderland of darkness, beyond which the earth fell off precipitously into chaotic depths which no mortal might explore. Having reached home again after uncounted perils, he sat down to tell the story of his adventures. Many of his notes had been lost by the way, and he was obliged to depend mainly on his memory; but as this is a faculty which all genuine ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various
... rifle shot poured down the street, a rush of feet followed; and Plon fled precipitously to his den, double-bolted his door, and rolled his mattress round him for protection. Marie Didier slowly turned her head, and, as if recognising the wisdom of his advice, felt her way along the wall and groped up the dark staircase. No one had lit the small ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various
... did so promptly. The questioning eyes of both Ross and Sol roamed round the forest and finally and simultaneously the two uttered a low cry of pleasure. They had come into rocky ground and they had been ascending. Before them was a hill with a rather steep ascent, and dropping off almost precipitously ...
— The Young Trailers - A Story of Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... talked with Johnson concerning the location of the wreck, Gregory found time to note the towering cliffs which rose precipitously from the blue-green sea. Somewhere along that rock-crusted coast, he reflected bitterly, Diablo had claimed another of the Lang boats only a few months ago. Somewhere among the white-crested rocks his father and Bill Lang had met their death. He ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton
... to avoid the hullaballoo that shooting was sure to create on shore. Action had been forced upon him rather precipitously, but he was ready. Leaning forward, he had the two amazed oarsmen covered with ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... but it brought no answer, so after a moment she gathered up her things and started towards the bank. I watched her disappear among the trees; then, my fear of missing the steamer growing stronger than the dread of terrifying her, I followed. The trail drops precipitously around the lower falls, you remember, and I struck the level where the river bends at the foot of the cataract, with considerable noise. I found myself in a sort of open-air parlor flanked by two tents; rustic seats under a canopy of maple boughs, hammocks, a percolator bubbling on a sheet-iron ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... of the Jaulan, with almost level top and steep flanks, furrowed by rocky ravines, descending precipitously to a strip of smooth, green shore. Behind us the mountains are more broken and varied in form, lifted into sharper peaks and sloped into broader valleys. The whole aspect of the scene is like a view in the English Lake country, say on Windermere or Ullswater; only there are no forests ...
— Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land - Impressions of Travel in Body and Spirit • Henry Van Dyke
... semicircular bays, each about a mile and a quarter wide. At the extreme point of the lozenge-shaped promontory stands the ruined castle which named the town Scar-burgh, with the sea washing the rocky base of its foundations on three sides. Steep cliffs run precipitously down to the narrow beach that fringes these bays around, and on the cliffs is the town of Scarborough, while myriads of fishing-vessels cluster about the breakwater-piers that have been constructed to make ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... Tipai Mukh, only eighty-four miles from Cachar, until the 9th December, which will give an idea of the enforced slowness of our progress. Tipai Mukh proved a very suitable place for our depot: it was situated at the junction of two rivers, the Tipai and the Barak; thickly-wooded hills rose precipitously on all sides, but on the right bank of the Barak there was sufficient level space for all our requirements. With the help of local coolies, the little Gurkhas were not long in running up hospitals and storesheds; bamboo, the one material used in Lushailand for every ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... for they are the last expiring protest of the Mendip chain against its final submergence in the sea. The Steep Holm, the nearer and more conspicuous of the two islets, 5 m. from the coast, is little better than a barren rock rearing its huge bulk precipitously, nearly 300 ft. above the waves. It is almost inaccessible, but has perhaps for this reason occasionally afforded an asylum to refugees from the mainland, although the statement that Gildas found security in this retreat appears to be an error. There still remain some fragments ...
— Somerset • G.W. Wade and J.H. Wade
... at the front, it is on the same level as the market-place; the back of the house, on the contrary, descends precipitously into the garden, where there are thick old walls and foundations. The situation is thus quite romantic; just beside it is the old nunnery, with its dentated gables, and not far off the ruins, in whose depths the common people believe that there resides ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... would appear, from a comparison of the thermometrical tables kept by Dr. Daubeny with those of Dr. Bennet for the same winter, that the range of temperature at Menton is nearly 3 more than at San Remo. The climate is warm and dry, but from the protecting ranges not rising precipitously as at Menton, the shelter from the northerly winds is less complete. At the same time the vast olive groves screen the locality from cold blasts and temper them into healthful breezes, imparting a pleasing freshness to the atmosphere, ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black
... high, composed of sand and dead coral. The average depth surrounding the islands was 20 and 23 fathoms, being the same level as that of the great flat or plain on which they rest, and which extends out from the mainland, shelving off at the outer edge of the southern part of the Abrolhos almost precipitously to no bottom with 250 fathoms. We now proceeded southward, to examine the opening between Easter and Pelsart Groups, and to complete the extremity of the northern part of ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes
... the lake. The boys looked around with much interest. There was a real mountain on the far shore of the lake, part of which came down to the water very precipitously. The small islands in the lake made it more picturesque. They soon rounded a point of land and came full on the camp lying before them. With its line of tents, the smoke curling up from the fire, and the beauty of the forests in the background, it made ...
— Bob Hunt in Canada • George W. Orton
... loneliness one could image oneself in the temperate zones. The peculiarity of the scenery is, that the hills, which rise to a height of about 4,000 feet, are wall-like ridges of grey or coloured rock, rising precipitously out of the trees and grass, and that these walls are broken up into pinnacles and needles. At the Pali (wall-like precipice), the summit of the ascent of 1,000 feet, we left our buggy, and passing through a gash in the rock the celebrated ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... been pitched upon for the depot at the higher extremity of the last lagoon—an irregular triangular-shaped piece of water about a mile long by half a mile wide, with four small islands pretty evenly distributed over its surface. The largest of these rose somewhat precipitously from the water's edge to a height of about fifty or sixty feet—quite high enough, at all events, to be above the level of the miasmatic fogs which gather on the surface of the water toward evening— and on the very summit of this island, deliciously embowered with noble trees, were placed ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... must be chopped down level, and then steps cut all round the rock. It took a solid hour to pass that rock. Here was a great bluff of ice, with snow so loose and at such a sharp angle about it that passage had to be hewed up and over and down it again. On either side the ridge fell precipitously to a glacier floor, with yawning crevasses half-way down eagerly swallowing every particle of ice and snow that our axes dislodged: on the right hand to the west fork of the Muldrow Glacier, by which we had journeyed hither; on the left to the east fork of the same, ...
— The Ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley) - A Narrative of the First Complete Ascent of the Highest - Peak in North America • Hudson Stuck
... to ballet, a gravely executed change in the proportions of the tableau. They stood, a drooped and huddled group, cowering beneath the tree, in nude dejection, in the suggestion of a wary crouch, uncertain whether to flee precipitously, or freeze to make themselves as small and inconspicuous ...
— Eight Keys to Eden • Mark Irvin Clifton
... precipices rose higher and seemed to overhang, the channel grew narrower, the light grew fainter, until at last all around me grew dark. I was floating at the bottom of a vast chasm, where the sides seemed to rise precipitously for thousands of feet, where neither watery flood nor rocky wall was visible, and where, far above, I could see the line of sky between the summits of the cliffs, and watch the glowing stars. And as I watched them there came to me the thought that this was my last sight on earth, ...
— A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder • James De Mille
... agitated and I said no more. But four times in that first walk, did I descend almost precipitously into declivities amongst the bricks, risin' simultaneously ...
— Samantha at Saratoga • Marietta Holley
... carried away the platforms and stagings which had been erected for the seats of the spectators. A scene of indescribable tumult and confusion ensued. The emperor and empress, with the guests and spectators, fled precipitously together, and all narrowly escaped being ...
— Nero - Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... natural stratum of rock that projected many feet beyond the base of the pile. Immediately in front of the recess, or cave, was a little terrace, partly formed by nature, and partly by the earth that had been carelessly thrown aside by the laborers. The mountain fell off precipitously in front of the terrace, and the approach by its sides, under the ridge of the rocks, was difficult and a little dangerous. The whole was wild, rude, and apparently incomplete; for, while looking among the bushes, the sheriff found ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... to the camp was very wild. It led through jungles of dense underbrush, where monkeys scolded at us, and where wild pigs, with startled grunts, bolted precipitously for the thicket. A deep ravine would be bridged by a fallen tree. The Iligan-Marahui road now penetrates the wildest country in the world, and the most wonderful. Turning abruptly from the coast about five miles from Iligan, it winds among the rocky hills through forests of mahogany and ebony, ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... more difficult now, as the ship had not stopped listing. The deck leaned so precipitously that they had to grasp the hand-rail, and work themselves by this means slowly around to the upper side. Tim moved with the coolness of a veteran. Jeb scrambled with the ...
— Where the Souls of Men are Calling • Credo Harris
... the country over which the British had to advance. He therefore proposed to hold the ground, now to be occupied, in a similar manner. In the centre, Magersfontein Hill, a grim and rock-bound kopje, rises precipitously from the veld and dominates the plain, six miles in width, which stretches from its foot to the Modder River bridge. From this hill the Boer line extended five miles north-west to Langeberg farm along the foot of a series of kopjes, in some places sufficiently well defined to be marked ...
— History of the War in South Africa 1899-1902 v. 1 (of 4) - Compiled by Direction of His Majesty's Government • Frederick Maurice
... is the hush of night, and all between Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear, Mellowed and mingling, yet distinctly seen, Save darkened Jura,[329] whose capt heights appear Precipitously steep; and drawing near, There breathes a living fragrance from the shore, Of flowers yet fresh with childhood; on the ear Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, Or chirps the grasshopper one ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... a third small island, exceeding both the others in elevation: its sides fall precipitously to the sea, and the upper surface describes a horizontal line thickly clothed with beautiful trees. As its circumference is only three miles and a half, it can hardly be the same that La Perouse has called Calinasseh. Probably he did not observe this island at all, but ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue
... church-tower and red roofs reflected in the waters of a winding lake, it looks what it is now, a very peaceful spot. But if you go about its narrow streets you come upon many relics of the town's eventful past. It comes as a surprise to find that the side towards the south, towards Austria, descends precipitously to the River Losnice, a striking contrast to the placid lake which first greeted you. This lake was called Jordan, the city Tabor, by those who, following the teaching of Hus, ordered their lives and thoughts by Holy Writ. The Hussites under their leader [vZ]i[vz]ka, one of the ablest generals ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
... was here nearing the gorge through which it had to pass before the country opened out again at the back of the front range. I came upon it quite suddenly on reaching the brink of a great terrace, the bank of which sloped almost precipitously down towards it, but was covered with grass. The terrace was some three hundred feet above the river, and faced another similar one, which was from a mile and a half to two miles distant. At the bottom of this huge yawning chasm, rolled the mighty river, and I shuddered at the thought ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... line of march to-day, the main chain of the Black or Laramie hills rises precipitously. Time did not permit me to visit them; but, from comparative information, the ridge is composed of the coarse sandstone or conglomerate hereafter described. It appears to enter the region of clouds, which are arrested in their course, and lie in masses along ...
— The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, Oregon and California • Brevet Col. J.C. Fremont
... was answered by a slender, frightened girl. She was so shy that she could only nod for me to enter. I offered my card and folder, smiling to reassure her, but she retreated precipitously into a far corner and sat staring at me beseechingly with big grey eyes that seemed the only striking feature of her small ...
— City of Endless Night • Milo Hastings
... of the little yard, and situated perhaps fifty feet from the edge of the high sand bluff leading down precipitously to the beach, was a shingled building, whitewashed, and with a door, painted green, and four windows on the side toward the road. A clamshell walk led from the gate to the doors. Over the door was a sign, very neatly lettered, as follows: "J. EDGAR W. WINSLOW. MILLS FOR SALE." In the lot ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... was at its northern end, where it rose out of the rich alluvion of the soil, literally a rock of some forty feet in perpendicular height, having a summit of about an acre of level land, and falling off on its three sides; to the east and west precipitously; to the south quite gently and with regularity. It was this accidental formation which had induced the captain to select the spot as the site of his residence; for dwelling so far from any post, and in a place so difficult of access, something ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... on the top of a hill, which is not only naturally strong, but the approaches to it are fortified. The hill ascends from the plain in a gentle slope for several hundred yards, it then rises quite precipitously for about a hundred and fifty feet. The total height of the hill above the plain is probably not far ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen |
