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More "Missile" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... functionaries of the place, surrounded the house in which he was, avowing that they had come to arrest him by order of some person exercising the chief authority. While parleying with them he was wounded by a missile from the crowd. A boat dispatched from the American steamer Northern Light to release him from the perilous situation in which he was understood to be was fired into by the town guard and compelled to return. These incidents, together with the known character of the population ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... must get him into a boat. I fear he is wounded." Wenlock was obeying his commander, when just at that moment he felt a severe pang, and was conscious that a missile of some sort had passed through his side. In spite of his wound, however, he followed the captain. The earl was seated at the table, with a handkerchief over ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... caught his victim up, holding him overhead and sending the bravo, heels first, into the face of another scoundrel. The man, struck by this human missile, went to earth dazed, and with a broken ...
— Dave Darrin on Mediterranean Service - or, With Dan Dalzell on European Duty • H. Irving Hancock
... day—a hundred and a hundred years ago it was—he had gone to chase a deer. The deer fled into a cave. He followed with his hounds and his sword, his trumpet and his missile-ball. He went astray and fell asleep in the Cave. And when he wakened up, his hounds were heaps of dust beside him. He went into the world, and he found that his companions were dead for a hundred and a hundred years and ...
— The Boy Who Knew What The Birds Said • Padraic Colum
... a perfectly rounded form. It may be made in such a shape as will offer less resistance to the air in flight, but its actual propulsion through space does not depend on how it is made, but on the power which propelled it, and such a missile is a ...
— Aeroplanes • J. S. Zerbe***
... little—nothing more than the rifles and sword bayonets of the two or three men who constituted the garrison, a circumstance which seemed to occasion them much disappointment. They were particularly earnest and pressing in their inquiries for hand-grenades, a species of missile which they had supposed was always kept "in stock" in such places. They could scarcely believe that there were none to be had. Some charges of grape-shot which they laid hands on might be, they thought, the sort of weapon they were in quest of, and they proceeded to dissect ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various
... but he made it so much a matter of earnest to see the bruise of the old Election missile on her fair arm, that, with a pardonable soft blush, to avoid making much of it herself, she turned her sleeve a little above the wrist. He took ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Talley, as he examined the missile. "I was sure that no mere ball of snow could break that heavy window. To put such a stone in a snowball was little less than criminal," he went on gravely. "If that had hit any one on the temple it would ...
— The Radio Boys Trailing a Voice - or, Solving a Wireless Mystery • Allen Chapman
... who, as you know, are always 'there,' 'Sous les Ponts de Paris,' 'Madelon' and other sentimental compositions, and if by accident, in your desire to please, you were prone to compare them to the heroes of Homer, it's more than likely your pains would be rewarded by the first missile on which they could lay their hands and launch in your direction. They ...
— With Those Who Wait • Frances Wilson Huard
... me as I stood thus helpless against my howling tormentors, chief of whom was the great fellow I have mentioned, who (by reason of height and length of arm) struck me oftenest; once indeed when (beside myself with fury) I raised my head to curse him, he took me a blow in the mouth with some vile missile that set ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... leaves, here and there, shone like pale jewels of pink, amber, and violet. The mirror-like surface of the river was blurred with twisting spirals of mist, silvery and opalescent, through which the dim-seen figure of a duck in straight flight shot like a missile. ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... disposed in the top of a rank alder, trying to look as much like a crowded branch as his supple, shining form would admit, the old vengeance overtook him. I exercised my prerogative, and a well-directed missile, in the shape of a stone, brought him looping and writhing to the ground. After I had completed his downfall and quiet had been partially restored, a half-fledged member of the bereaved household came ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... recal with what unexampled ingenuity, we laboured to befit the snow white egg for a rare tenant—attar-gul. Well do we remember how that face, usually so cloudless, became darkened almost to a frown, as our heart's mistress saw the missile approach her. What a radiant smile bewitched us, as it burst on her lap, and filled the air with its fragrance! Truly we had ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... the archdeacon, handing the offensive missile to his father-in-law; 'I am not going to be the bearer of his love letters. You are her father, and may do as you ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... such a moment. But when the word is out, the worst is over; and a fellow with any good-humour at all may pass through a perfect hail of witty criticism, every bare place on his soul hit to the quick with a shrewd missile, and reappear, as if after a dive, tingling with a fine moral reaction, and ready, with a shrinking readiness, one-third loath, for a repetition ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... twenty yards another such gap yawned in the ground. And Chester, rising, hurled a missile from ...
— The Boy Allies with Haig in Flanders • Clair W. Hayes
... Death, Rejoice in thee; and hail with loudest shouts The auspicious era when deep-searching Art From out the hidden things in Nature's store Cull'd thy tremendous powers, and tutor'd Man To chain the unruly element of Fire At his controul, to wait his potent touch: To urge his missile bolts of sudden Death, And thunder terribly his vengeful wrath. Thy mighty engines and gigantic towers With frowning aspect awe the trembling World. Destruction, bursting from thy sudden blaze Hath taught the Birds to tremble ...
— An Essay on War, in Blank Verse; Honington Green, a Ballad; The - Culprit, an Elegy; and Other Poems, on Various Subjects • Nathaniel Bloomfield
... The bomb was round shaped and rather larger than a cricket ball. A black tube affair an inch or two long projected from it and emitted, when lit, a jet of hissing, spitting sparks. The bomb-thrower seized the missile quickly, stepped clear of the sheltering corner of the trench, threw the bomb, and jumped back under cover. A couple of bullets slapped into the wall of the trench, and ...
— Action Front • Boyd Cable (Ernest Andrew Ewart)
... falling of the second missile, the third one fell, landing near Madrid, Spain. The Spaniards, having received news of the El Paso and Peking tragedies, avoided the ugly mass of rock as though it were a dreaded pestilence. In every way its action was similar to that ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 • Various
... the ponderous missile was swift and sure until a projection on the side of the cliff was reached, when with a terrific concussion the bowlder glanced. It suddenly shot outward like a cannon ball, and was carried fairly over the ...
— Jack North's Treasure Hunt - Daring Adventures in South America • Roy Rockwood
... his horn, Silenus's ass sent forth a martial bray, and the maenads leapt shrill-voiced on the foe, girt with serpents and baring now the steel of their thyrsus-heads. In a moment Indians and elephants turned and fled disordered, before even a missile could carry across; and the end was that they were smitten and led captive by the objects of their laughter; they had learnt the lesson that it is not safe to take the first report, and scorn an enemy of ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... made his landing, and where he allowed himself to be worshipped as a god, is about in its original condition, having been repaired in recent years. When Captain Cook attempted to seize the King as a prisoner, the natives naturally rallied to the King's defense. A stone or other missile struck Cook on ...
— Archeological Investigations - Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 76 • Gerard Fowke
... followed, rolling slowly but steadily in his direction. Ruggedo threw his sceptre at them, and then his ruby crown, and then he drew off his heavy golden sandals and hurled these at the advancing eggs. But the eggs dodged every missile and continued to draw nearer. The King stood trembling, his eyes staring in terror, until they were but half a yard distant; then with an agile leap he jumped clear over them and made a rush for the passage that led ...
— Tik-Tok of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... decisive struggle in the open, but they always seemed to be stealing something which belonged to the men who were engaged in the struggle. And apart from this they were so indifferent in their practice of archery that they drew the bowstring only to the breast[5], so that the missile sent forth was naturally impotent and harmless to those whom it hit[6]. Such, it is evident, was the archery of the past. But the bowmen of the present time go into battle wearing corselets and fitted out with greaves which extend up to the knee. From the right side hang ...
— History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8) - The Persian War • Procopius
... gave one look at the place where the German missile had fallen, not ten feet away, and then, with a shrug of his ...
— The Moving Picture Boys on the War Front - Or, The Hunt for the Stolen Army Films • Victor Appleton
... unexpected and sudden, disconcerted the enemy, and, at the first onset, decided the victory. He was the first to introduce the Indian war-whoop in his battles with the savages, the Tories, and the British. More harmless than the leaden missile, it was not less efficient, and was always the precursor and attendant of victory. The prisoners at King's Mountain said, "We could stand your fighting; but your cursed hallooing confused us. We thought the mountains had regiments, ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... found them, immediately. Those weaknesses are everywhere apparent, for they are physical. You're one of a dying race, Littlejohn. Mankind's days are numbered. There's no need for grandiose schemes of reactivating warheads in buried missile-centers, of loosing thermo-nucs upon the world. Merely by killing off the central council here in New Chicagee, we can accomplish our objective. A dozen men die, and there's not enough initiative left to replace them. It's as simple as that. And ...
— This Crowded Earth • Robert Bloch
... leaden missile sang through the air. It flattened against a rock in front of which the ...
— The Young Engineers in Mexico • H. Irving Hancock
... more effective disguise about the extended form. But an unforeseen and in the circumstances rather horrible interval followed, for Creake, in accordance with some detail of his never-revealed plan, continued to shower missile after missile against the panes until even the unimpressionable ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... barrel and made for accuracy in shooting. He now took a lump of resinous gum from his charm-bag and rubbed it on the point of the arrow until the latter was covered with a thick, black coat, resembling old beeswax. A cap of a joint of slender bamboo was fitted over the end of the missile to prevent the rain from washing away the supposed poison, and it was ready to be ...
— The Black Phantom • Leo Edward Miller
... saw the bear reaching wildly for the wall of the pen, clawing frantically in his eagerness to climb over and get away. She had given him a lesson, that was clear; but she was resolved to give him a good one while she was about it. Swinging far forward, she launched her terrible missile straight upon his huge hind-quarters just as they went over the wall. But at the same moment she lost her balance. With an indignant yell she plunged downward into ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... he was in the ways of society. Such an accusation, however, remained perforce under an open verdict. Too many of those who might have decided against him had delicate glass-houses of their own to care for, and it would likely prove a treacherous missile that would aim at the well-propped reputation of ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... forlorn hope, before it had accomplished its purpose, he rushed forward, killed the commanding officer with his own hand, and seizing the colours, led them back, undismayed, by a grove of pikes and a shower of missile weapons. With desperate but successful valour he carried the redoubt and escaped with life. All this passed under the immediate observation of Cromwell, whose retentive memory never forgot any signal action, and whose discriminating policy generally placed the man ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... other than speculation and circulation, the newspapers had soon begun to refer authoritatively to these "ghost rockets" as guided missiles, and implied that they were from Russia. Peenemunde, the great German missile development center and birthplace of the V-l and V-2 guided missiles, came in for its share of suspicion since it was held by the Russians. By the end of the summer of 1946 the reports were widespread, ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... by shafts of lurid fire. Masses of metal shot in all directions, leaving a trail of sparks behind them; bits of shell shrieked past my head and buried themselves in the walls and sandbags. One large missile fell in an open space about forty feet on my left, and exploded with a deafening, ear-splitting crash. At the same moment another exploded directly in front of me. Instinctively I ducked my head. The blinding ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... order they halted on the brink, and from it wounded the Germans with every kind of missile; while, if any of them escaped from death of that kind by the celerity of their movements, they still sunk to the bottom from the weight of their ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... that again," he thought; "the next time they will use a charge of grape. I must keep my eye upon the gun; the smoke will apprise me—the report arrives too late; it lags behind the missile. That is a ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... big gentleman in spectacles, but his bravery had inspired him with a very genuine feeling of respect, so, when his practiced ear detected a shell coming their way, he had acted the part of a friend and placed the civilian in a safer position. The missile landed some ten paces from where they were and exploded, covering them both with earth and debris. The citizen kept his feet and received not so much as a scratch, while the officer had ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... Rama by his prowess slew Ravana in battle. Here also is narrated the story of Savitri; then Karna's deprivation by Indra of his ear-rings; then the presentation to Karna by the gratified Indra of a Sakti (missile weapon) which had the virtue of killing only one person against whom it might be hurled; then the story called Aranya in which Dharma (the god of justice) gave advice to his son (Yudhishthira); ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... extraordinary effect on Richard Haddon. For a boy to be kicked, or clouted, or tweaked by strange men is the fortune of war—it is a mere everyday incident, the natural and accepted fate of all boys, and is swiftly resented with a jibe or a missile and forgotten on the spot; but to be taken in cold blood by one strange man, not a schoolmaster or in any way privileged, and deliberately and systematically larruped with a belt under the eyes of another, is burning shame. It tortured all Dick's senses into revolt, and awakened in him a hatred ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... he had escaped only by a successful and ingenious stratagem. At length, wearied with contention, he took up his abode in Protestant Switzerland, where he passed in quiet the latter years of his useful and honored life.[9] It was while here that he compiled this book, and sent it as a missile into the camp of his opponents, the enemies of freedom of thought and of the right of private judgment. From this time Pasquin's fame became universal. The words pasquil or pasquinade were adopted info almost every European tongue, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... windows possessed nervous systems. Nor must this probable apprehension on the part of cats and the like be thought mere superstition. Cats have superstitions, it is true; but certain actions inspired by the sight of a boy with a missile in his hand are better evidence of the workings of logic upon a practical nature than of ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... wish. I also hope for him a misfortune at night. That returning all-fevered from horse practice, he may meet an Orestes,[259] mad with drink, who breaks open his head; that wishing to seize a stone, he, in the dark, may pick up a fresh stool, hurl his missile, miss ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... room. A man's figure was framed in the lighted window—a bloated bulk that he knew was Spulvedo. A flame shot from that figure into his very face. The missile struck the roof close to his side and splattered shingle and dirt in his face. Without hesitation, he straightened his own arm and fired point blank at the living mark. Spulvedo emitted a stifled shriek and ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... round wildly in the direction from which the dazzling missile had come, and saw that at this point the sable facade of fir and pine was interrupted by a smaller road at right angles; which, when he turned it, brought him in full view of the long, lighted house, with a lake and fountains in front of it. Nevertheless, he did not look at this, ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... pulled at Dorking. SWINBURNE was, I regret to say, pagan in his views, but, unlike some pagans, he was incapable of adhering to the golden mean. ARISTOTLE, I feel certain, would never have condescended to the use of such a missile, and it is beyond "imagination's widest stretch" to picture, say, the late Dr. JOSEPH COOK, of Boston, the present Lord ABERDEEN, or the Rev. Dr. Donald McGuffin acting in such a wild ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 13, 1917 • Various
... of the hall he was standing with the instrument in his hands, clutching it with the stupidity of a man who has been struck by an unexpected and unexplainable missile. His face had gone to a grayish white, and his hands trembled as he set the receiver on the hook. His eyes were bulging from emotion and he kept wetting his lips as he stood in ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... he cut fusion and watched on the altimeter dial the battle between gravity and inertia. Near the Mississippi delta he was wrenched in a sharp maneuver as the De-Meteor suddenly took over. He was fortunate to see the streaking missile glow brightly and flare out of existence in the thin regions of atmosphere miles ...
— A Fine Fix • R. C. Noll
... missile struck the seventh rib of right side and glanced off, leaving a horizontal scar 2-1/4 inches long and one-half inch wide, ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland
... Control Regime (MTCR) established-16 April 1987 aim-to arrest the proliferation of missiles (unmanned delivery vehicles of mass destruction) by controlling the export of key missile technologies and equipment members-(28) Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, NZ, Norway, Portugal, Russia, South ...
— The 1998 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... without violence, so judging that the head was barbed, and that tearing would be dangerous, he at once made a bold cut down into the flesh, parallel with the flat of the arrow head, and then pressing it gently up and down, he drew the missile forth. He followed this up by carefully washing out the wound with clean water, and finally, before bandaging, ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... great brute launched his massive stone-tipped spear, and I raised my shield to break the force of its terrific velocity. The impact hurled me to my knees, but the shield had deflected the missile and I was unscathed. Jubal was rushing upon me now with the only remaining weapon that he carried—a murderous-looking knife. He was too close for a careful bowshot, but I let drive at him as he came, without taking aim. My arrow pierced the fleshy part of his ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... was usually commenced by the light troops, who skirmished with missile weapons; the hasta'ti then advanced to the charge, and if defeated, fell back on the prin'cipes; if the enemy proved still superior, the two front lines retired to the ranks of the tria'rii, which being composed of veteran troops, generally turned the scale. But this order was not always ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... creature gave another of its alarming growls. Hardly thinking what he was doing, Billy, startled by a shrill caterwaul, which followed the growl, flung his lighted torch full at the eyes, and heard a screech that sounded as if his blazing missile had struck its mark. ...
— The Ocean Wireless Boys And The Naval Code • John Henry Goldfrap, AKA Captain Wilbur Lawton
... feather at the nock, and while the rear binding started an inch or more from the butt of the arrow, the feather drooped over the nock. This gave a pretty effect and seemed to add to the steering qualities of the missile. ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... were places where things were not so tranquil. By this time there were already troops in motion in long trains of personnel-carrying trucks. There were mobile guided missile detachments moving at top speed across state lines and along the express highway systems. Every military plane in the coastal area was aloft, kept fueled by tanker planes to be ready for any sort of offensive or defensive action that might be called for. The short wave ...
— Operation Terror • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... from the men as they rapidly obeyed orders, and not a man seemed to flinch as the long gun of the English schooner sent forth its heavy missile again, this time to strike the water some distance ahead and then rise and go crashing amongst the trees, whose leaves could be seen to ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... situation rapidly, and perceived that in any contest his round body would inevitably suffer from friend and foe alike. He was not even sure but that he would be used as a missile, a sort of ponderous pillow swung at one end. So he replied briskly, 'Yes, I am being carried as you see, dear brethren; I don't care ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... any one was hurt; at least, no one fell. The captain observed the riflemen with the utmost intensity; and as soon as the missile had spent its power, the men sprang part way up the hill, and placed themselves behind the trees. The first company had obtained a footing on the hard ground, and the first thing they did was to form and march at the double-quick towards the hill ...
— A Lieutenant at Eighteen • Oliver Optic
... on the wall, the top of which was all frayed and crumbled by the action of the towing ropes. The fat Frenchman, who was good-naturedly tipsy, picked up a loose half brick and tossed it after the departing Slasher. The missile took him between the shoulders, and he, turning in wrath, flung out one windy buffet at his assailant, and toppled him over the bridge into the canal. There was a momentary flurry, and then a bystander lent the immersed Frenchman one end of a barge-pole, and he was drawn to the side, ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray
... discretion of your captain and officers. Precedent—the decision of the courts—has decided the privilege of a captain or officer to punish insolence or lack of respect from a sailor with a blow—of a fist or missile; but, understand me now, a return of the blow makes that man a mutineer, and his prompt killing is justified by the law of the land. Is this plain to you? You are here to answer and obey orders respectfully, adding the word 'sir' to each response; you are never to go to windward of an officer, ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... that no one dares to resist or ill-treat them. Hence, access to the town is often difficult; for should one of the apes take a dislike to any unlucky traveller, he is sure to be assailed by the whole community, who follow him with all the missile weapons they can collect, such as pieces of bamboo, stones, and dirt, making at the same time a most hideous howling. Of the danger attending a meeting with enemies of this description, the following ...
— Anecdotes of Animals • Unknown
... with grease and lowered from a drum to a few yards above the spot where the bomb was destined to fall. To this plummet adhered fragments of various objects, animate or other, which the explosion of the missile hurled into the air. Such a fragment the Captain was now extending for my observation. I admitted that to my uninitiated eye it closely resembled a portion of the outer surface of a cow or some kindred animal. "You are indeed ignorant," ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. CL, April 26, 1916 • Various
... on a previous occasion Redmond demonstrated his ability to think and act quickly. He upheld that reputation now. Like a flash he ducked behind Slavin's broad shoulders and backed into the passage. Picking up at random the first missile available—to wit—an empty soda-water bottle, he tip-toed swiftly along the passage to a door opening into the bar lower down. This practically brought him broadside-on to his man. A moment he peered and judged his distance then, drawing ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall
... banged the mizzen shrouds to port, and then came swooping back across the deck, to slam against the starboard shrouds. The clanging, tethered missile it bore on its end seemed to be searching for a victim. When the boom met the starboard shrouds in its headlong rush, ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... Only a dog, and with a "shoo!" he thought to scare the creature off. The yellow eyes went from the fire to his face, a red tongue slithered out over the black nose, and the dog sat down again. All round were the white breasts of the pack, as they sat in silence and stared. He searched about for a missile, found an empty cartridge, and threw it. A dog leapt up and sniffed. The circle ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... "soaker" of a snowball in his left ear while hurrying to the gymnasium. He did not know who threw the missile, but was satisfied in his mind that it came from ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... Irrigated land: NA km2 Environment: occasionally subject to typhoons; two archipelagic island chains of 30 atolls and 1,152 islands Note: Bikini and Eniwetok are former US nuclear test sites; Kwajalein, the famous World War II battleground, is now used as a US missile test range ...
— The 1993 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... more than contusions," said the operator, bending his gaze in every direction in vain, in quest of the hand from which the missile had been hurled. "It must be meteoric; there is no living ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... many things in a patois he had never learned in the provincial school, went back to the milk-room. The lynx ventured to show his head, and a flat-iron dented the floor close beside it. Then the animal circled the room, dodged another missile, and hid in a ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... fitted into a peg which enters the tip of the shaft. The peg is secured to the shaft by twine made of the fibres of pineapple leaves, the twine being some thirty or forty yards in length, and neatly wound round the body of the arrow. When the missile enters the shell, the peg drops out, and the pierced animal descends with it towards the bottom, leaving the shaft floating on the surface. This being done, the sportsman paddles in his montaria to the place, and gently draws the animal by the twine, humouring it by giving it the ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... Bluebird," she said aloud, "please hurry up!" By and by her eyes rested upon Sahwah, silhouetted against the sky on top of the diving tower. Picking up a big dry pine cone from the floor of the Crow's Nest, she took careful aim and sent it sailing downward in a swift, curving flight. The prickly missile hit Sahwah squarely in the back of the neck. She started violently and threw up her arms, while the spyglass fell into the water with a loud splash. Hinpoha laughed a ringing laugh when she beheld the effect of her ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Maine Woods - Or, The Winnebagos Go Camping • Hildegard G. Frey
... was far from being a calm one. He fidgetted in his chair and finally rolled his paper into a hard wad and threw it at the counter as if it had been a missile. ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... drawback, that she had now got somewhat crazy in her fastenings, and made rather more water in a heavy sea than her one little pump could conveniently keep under. As the fitful gust struck her headlong, as if it had been some invisible missile hurled at us from off the hill-tops, she stooped her head lower and lower, like old stately Hardyknute under the blow of the "King of Norse," till at length the lee chain-plate rustled sharp through the foam; but, like a staunch Free Churchwoman, the lowlier she bent, the more steadfastly ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... though the king at last put the Mamelukes to flight, his loss was dreadful. The Nile rose and cut off his return. He lost great part of his troops from sickness, and was horribly harassed by the Mamelukes, who threw among his host a strange burning missile, called Greek fire; and he was finally forced to surrender himself as a prisoner at Mansourah, with all his army. He obtained his release by giving up Damietta, and paying a heavy ransom. After twenty years, in 1270, he attempted another crusade, which was still more unfortunate, ...
— History of France • Charlotte M. Yonge
... was armed, it appeared, with a fission-throwing weapon in one hand and some sort of tranquilizer—I deem it to have been a Stollgratz 16—in the other; moreover, he wore an invulnerability belt. The police aboriginals were attempting to strike him with missile weapons, which the belt deflected. I neutralized his shield, collapsed him and stored him in my carry-all. "Not an Adjuster," I asserted my father, but he had already perceived that this was so. I left him to neutralize and collapse the police aboriginals while I zeroed in on the portatron. ...
— The Day of the Boomer Dukes • Frederik Pohl
... fair with fierce and fastened lips, Clear eyes, and springing muscle and shortening limb— With chin aslant indrawn to a tightening throat, Grave, and with gathered sinews, like a god,— Aimed on the left side his well-handled spear Grasped where the ash was knottiest hewn, and smote, And with no missile wound, the monstrous boar Right in the hairiest hollow of his hide Under the last rib, sheer through bulk and bone, Peep in; and deeply smitten, and to death, The heavy horror with his hanging shafts Leapt, and fell furiously, and from raging lips Foamed out the latest wrath of all his life. ...
— Atalanta in Calydon • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... Germany uses a Mauser rifle, with a bullet of millimeters caliber, steel and copper coated. Great Britain's missile is the Lee-Enfield, caliber 7.7 mm., ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... up the injured window, and crimson with rage he leaned far out and flung half a broken bottle at the group below. All heads ducked, but the ragged missile only just ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... chambers than the Turk wiped his mouth after his tea and opened his Evening Hate. There was the distant boom of a shell. Before we could realise what the sound was, and say "Hallo! they've begun," the missile had exploded among the stores on the beach. That was my baptism of fire. Without the least hesitation I copied Major Hardy and Monty, and went flat on my face behind some brushwood. Only Doe, too proud to take cover, remained standing, and then blushed ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... be a work of many weeks' duration, when the imperfect implements at the natives' disposal are taken into consideration. In the first place, his missile must be perfectly straight, and of the hardest wood; and no bough, however large, would fulfil these requirements, so it must be cut out bodily from the stem of an iron-bark tree, and the nearer the heart he can ...
— Australian Search Party • Charles Henry Eden
... game as could well be designed, had either driver been less skilled, but it was safe enough now. Gerard was laughing as he drove, when the first tiny missile rattled ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... fair do," said Mr. Thomas Marvel, sitting up, taking his wounded toe in hand and fixing his eye on the third missile. "I don't understand it. Stones flinging themselves. Stones talking. Put yourself ...
— The Invisible Man • H. G. Wells
... face to face with his judge. He has been deprived of his cap, and of everything else "which may be employed as, or contain, a missile." (They think of everything in ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay
... rumours had spread through the city, and on the way back the troops were mobbed. They were pelted with every kind of missile and many were hurt, though none seriously; and it understates the truth to say that they were in no danger. They had their bayonets, and from time to time made thrusts at their assailants. At last, on the quays, at a place called Bachelor's ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... of all the earth, God rest the lady fowl that gave thee birth! Fit missile for the vilest hand to throw— I freely tender thee mine own. Although As a bad egg I am myself no slouch, Thy riper years thy ranker worth avouch. Now, Pickering, please expose your eye and say If—whoop!— (Exit ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... the spear, he missed both squirrel and tree, losing his missile far among the tangled undergrowth of the jungle. However, it could be but a few steps within the forbidden labyrinth. The women were all about in the field. There were warriors on guard within easy hail, and so little Tibo boldly ventured ...
— Jungle Tales of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... "Nice gentle missile, wasn't it? So like a man! Course, the boy never got over it. But he's the only one I can recommend at all. He painted my house for me last spring. It looks real ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... information from popular writings, where the doctrines were very imperfectly laid down; so that some of his book is occupied in demolishing constructions of straw, unrecognisable by professed physicists except as caricatures at which they also might be willing to heave an occasional missile. ...
— Life and Matter - A Criticism of Professor Haeckel's 'Riddle of the Universe' • Oliver Lodge
... promise. The monkey at first took no notice of the crab's complaints, but at last he picked out the hardest, greenest persimmon he could find and aimed it at the crab's head. The persimmon is as hard as stone when it is unripe. The monkey's missile struck home and the crab was sorely hurt by the blow. Again and again, as fast as he could pick them, the monkey pulled off the hard persimmons and threw them at the defenseless crab till he dropped dead, covered with wounds all over his body. There he lay a ...
— Japanese Fairy Tales • Yei Theodora Ozaki
... at that instant screamed over the ruin; the young girl raised her head with simple curiosity—not a particle of fear evidently—to watch the course of the missile; and, as the youth executed the like manoeuvre, they both became aware of my presence at ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... started out, but O'Brine stopped them. "Use one long-range screen for scanning high space toward Mars. Let me know the minute you get a blip, because it probably will be that Consops cruiser. Have the missile ports cleared ...
— Rip Foster in Ride the Gray Planet • Harold Leland Goodwin
... of Edward I, 1272, down to that of James II, 1688." In glass cases, and in forms of trophies on the walls, we find arms and armor of the old Romans, of the early Greeks, and Britons, and of the Anglo-Saxons. Maces and axes, long and cross bows and leaden missile weapons and shields, highly adorned with metal figures, all tend to make more vivid the word-pictures of the historian. Of the small burial-ground in this Tower, Macaulay writes: "In truth there is no sadder spot on earth than this little cemetery. ...
— Questionable Amusements and Worthy Substitutes • J. M. Judy
... powder-magazine, so suddenly blazed up the anger of Quadaquina, when he felt the touch of the rod. He jumped back as though bitten by a snake, and snatching up a stone, hurled it with all his strength at Ohquamehud. It was well that the Indian leaped behind a tree near which he stood, else the missile, with such true aim and vindictive force was it sent, might have proved fatal. As soon as the stone was thrown, the Indian stepped up to the boy, who stood trembling with passion, but observing no intention on the part of the latter to renew his violence, ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... discerned a litter of metal fragments. From such of the scraps as retained any shape at all, I figured that they had been part of the protective casing of a gun mounted somewhere above. The missile which wrecked the gun flung its armor down here. I searched my brain for a simile which might serve to give a notion of the present state of that steel jacket. I didn't find the one I wanted, but if you will think of an earthenware pot which has been thrown from a very high building upon ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... with the aid of a stick and Lennox's arm, while Dickenson was rolling up a cigarette composed of the very last dust of his tobacco, ready to hand it to the captain, who suffered a good deal still from the bullet wound, the missile having passed right through his thigh. They had to pass two of their men, seated upon a rock in a shady corner, one of them being minus his right leg, which had been removed half-way between knee and hip; the other was recovering very slowly from a bullet wound in the face, an injury which had mended ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn
... are not more remarkable and peculiar in their construction than general in their use on every shore of New Holland. The spear is thrown by means of a woomera which is a slight rod about three feet long having at one end a niche to receive the end of the spear. The missile is shot forward by this means with great force and accuracy of direction; for by the peculiar method of throwing the spear the woomera affords a great additional impetus from this most ingenious lengthening of the ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... in train, I set me down to work upon one of the arrows; for I was anxious to see what sort of a fist I should make of them, knowing how much would depend upon the balance and truth of the missile. In the end, I made a very fair one, feathering it with its own leaves, and truing and smoothing it with my knife; after which I inserted a small bolt in the forrard end, to act as a head, and, as I conceived, give it balance; though whether I was right in this latter, I am unable to ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... at the window, as though some missile had struck it, followed by a plentiful, falling sound, as light, though, as if a shower of sand were being sprinkled from a window overhead; then the fall spread, took on an order, a rhythm, became liquid, loud, drumming, musical, innumerable, ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... smart cobs stepping to the music of jingling harness, with bandy-legged grooms on the boot, and beside her some perfectly tailored creature in a glistening top-hat. It was a gallant picture, and one in which there was no part for me. Metaphorically I hurled at it a missile of the common clay of which, after all, we were both made. Surely fishing was a subject on which her ideas ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd
... one to see. He fitted an arrow to the string and glanced at the man and woman. Between her breast and arm the flesh of the man's side showed white. Keen bent the bow and drew back the arrow to its head. Twice he did so, calmly and for certainty, and then drove the bone-barbed missile straight home to the white flesh, gleaming yet more white in the dark-armed, ...
— Children of the Frost • Jack London
... that moment one of the youngsters flung a butternut at the Major, who caught the missile deftly and shot ...
— The Tale of Major Monkey • Arthur Scott Bailey
... woodsman's shaft, master!" quoth Roger, turning the missile over in his hand ere he gave it to Beltane, "no forester doth wing his ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... a strictly temporary star, but even from a quarter-million-mile distance it was incredibly bright. It was a bomb, blasting a metal-foil flimsy which the electronic brain of a missile-rocket could only perceive as an unidentified and hence enemy object. Bomb and rocket and flimsy metal foil turned together to ...
— A Matter of Importance • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... be short and soon over, for nothing would persuade her to go back in the boat with Hugh again. She raised her arm; and the sound of a shot was sent over the water, followed simultaneously with a sharp, splintering sound, as the little leaden missile tore its way along the stern of ...
— Miss Dexie - A Romance of the Provinces • Stanford Eveleth
... the big picture of the huntsman winding a horn with a dead boar between his legs, and his legs—well, his legs in stockings. And here is the little picture of a raw mutton-chop, in which Such-a-one knocked a hole last summer with no worse a missile than a plum from the dessert. And under all these works of art so much eating goes forward, so much drinking, so much jabbering in French and English, that it would do your heart good merely to peep ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and began silently manufacturing snowballs. He packed the soft substance as hard as he could while circling it about in his palms and rounding it into shape. When the missile suggested a 12-pound shot he laid it at his feet, with the ...
— Deerfoot in The Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... that this brave fellow turned his back directly on the cook, and set off walking for the beach. But he was not destined to go far. With a cry, John seized the branch of a tree, whipped the crutch out of his arm-pit, and sent that uncouth missile hurtling through the air. It struck poor Tom, point foremost, and with stunning violence, right between the shoulders in the middle of his back. His hands flew up, he gave a sort of gasp, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his armour. But little he knew of courts of law and the penetrating art of cross-examination, which could make a hole in the triple-plated coat of fraud, hypocrisy, and cunning. I was in no such panoply. I fought only with my little pebblestone and sling, but took good aim, and then the missile ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... bottle off the counter as he ran; and as the bartender made a leap he hurled the missile at him with all his force. It just grazed his head, and shivered into a thousand pieces against the post of the door. Then Jurgis started back, rushing at the man again in the middle of the room. This time, in his blind frenzy, he came without a bottle, ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... explosive upon the printing machines of The Times, and returning securely to Calais for another similar parcel. They are things neither difficult nor costly to make. For the price of a Dreadnought one might have hundreds. They will be extremely hard to hit with any sort of missile. I do not think a large army of under-educated, under-trained, extremely unwilling conscripts is going to be any good ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... one of the first on Shorty's heels. I saw Nosey Murphy pause long enough to throw his knife at the mate. The missile went wide, with a metallic clang struck the brass tip of one of the spokes of the Elsinore's wheel, and clattered on the deck. The second mate, with his empty revolver, and Bert Rhine with his sheath-knife, fled ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... pressed the switch-trigger of the electric rifle, for previous experience had taught him that it was sometimes the best thing to awe the natives in out-of-the-way corners of the earth. But the young inventor quickly elevated the muzzle, and the deadly missile went hissing through the air over the head of a native Indian who, at that ...
— Tom Swift in the Land of Wonders - or, The Underground Search for the Idol of Gold • Victor Appleton
... bounds they gave from side to side struck the whole parsonage house community with a panic. The women screamed; the rector foamed; the squire hallooed; and the men seized bellows, poker, tongs, and every other weapon or missile that was at hand. The uproar was universal, and the Squire never before or after felt himself so great a hero! The death of the fox itself was ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... the torpedo vessel Vesuvius got under way, and after circling round the doomed hulk discharged a Whitehead against the netting from her under-water bow torpedo tube at an approximate range of 50 yards. As on former occasions, the missile was one of the old 16 inch pattern, but it was understood that the charge of gun cotton had been reduced to 87 lb., so that the net protection should not bear a greater strain than would be the case in actual hostilities. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 601, July 9, 1887 • Various
... trailer of line rose on a long graceful curve. The reel sang. Every member of the crowd unconsciously leaned forward in attention. But the resistance of the wind and the line early made itself felt. Slower and slower hummed the reel. There came a time when the missile seemed to hesitate, then fairly to stand in equilibrium. Finally, in an increasingly abrupt curve, it descended into the sea. By a good three hundred yards the shot had failed to carry the line ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... point, fitted into a peg which enters the tip of the shaft. The peg is secured to the shaft by twine made of the fibres of pineapple leaves, the twine being some thirty or forty yards in length, and neatly wound round the body of the arrow. When the missile enters the shell, the peg drops out, and the pierced animal descends with it towards the bottom, leaving the shaft floating on the surface. This being done, the sportsman paddles in his montaria to the place, and gently draws the animal by the twine, humouring it by giving ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... consequence of which order they halted on the brink, and from it wounded the Germans with every kind of missile; while, if any of them escaped from death of that kind by the celerity of their movements, they still sunk to the bottom from the weight ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... merit and demerit. There's the big picture of the huntsman winding a horn with a dead boar between his legs, and his legs—well, his legs in stockings. And here is the little picture of a raw mutton-chop, in which Such-a-one knocked a hole last summer with no worse a missile than a plum from the dessert. And under all these works of art so much eating goes forward, so much drinking, so much jabbering in French and English, that it would do your heart good merely to peep and listen at the door. One man ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... who were shovelling away on the housetops were jovial and full of glee; calling out to one another from the parapets, and now and then exchanging a facetious snowball—better-natured missile far than many a wordy jest—laughing heartily if it went right and not less heartily if it went wrong. The poulterers' shops were still half open, and the fruiterers' were radiant in their glory. There were great, round pot-bellied ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... have gorged the poor devil with every species of insult? and why you took such surprising pains to supply me with what I had so little need of—another enemy? That you were helpless against them? "Here is my last missile," say you; "my ammunition is quite exhausted: just wait till I get the last in— it will irritate, it cannot hurt him. There—you see!—he is furious now, and I am quite helpless. One more prod, ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the enjoyment of a ranking officer on his own quarter-deck. They were, however, well understood by Sandy's sons, who constituted the port and starboard watches of the smack, and who were in constant awe of the old man-of-war's-man, who did not hesitate to enforce his orders with any missile that ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 • Various
... long. The sun blazed high and higher. Then a grey battery, just in front of this strip of woods, opened with a howitzer. The shell went singing on its errand, exploded before one of the triple tiers. The plateau answered with a hundred-pounder. The missile came toward the battery, overpassed it, and exploded above the wood. It looked as large as a beehive; it came with an awful sound, and when it burst the atmosphere seemed to rock. The men lying on the earth beneath jerked back their heads, threw an arm over their eyes, made a dry, clicking ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... which was his special weapon, was a short strong spear or pike, with a shaft of cornel-wood, and an iron point. It was common for him to carry two such weapons, one of which he used as a missile, while he retained the other in order to employ it in hand-to-hand combat with the enemy. It was a stout manageable weapon, and though no match for the longer and equally strong spear of the Macedonian cavalry, was preferred by Xenophon to the long weak reed-lance ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson
... which he had escaped only by a successful and ingenious stratagem. At length, wearied with contention, he took up his abode in Protestant Switzerland, where he passed in quiet the latter years of his useful and honored life.[9] It was while here that he compiled this book, and sent it as a missile into the camp of his opponents, the enemies of freedom of thought and of the right of private judgment. From this time Pasquin's fame became universal. The words pasquil or pasquinade were adopted info almost every ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... when bursting may well be called. Naturally, efforts were made early in the war to lessen the danger by armouring the body of the machine sufficiently to protect the aviator and his engine—for if the aviator escaped a shot which found the engine, his plight would be almost as bad as if the missile had struck him. ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... spear at Ajax, but the weapon struck where two belts crossed upon the hero's breast, overlapping each other, and he escaped unhurt. Then the son of Telamon struck at the Trojan leader. His weapon was a heavy stone, one of many that lay around, which were used as props for the ships. The missile, hurled with giant force and true aim, smote the Trojan on the breast and felled him like a ...
— The Story of Troy • Michael Clarke
... much good. It might produce some short, joking, half-affectionate reply, but would not draw from him that serious word which was so necessary for the success of her scheme. Therefore she had told him that she intended to prepare a serious missile. Should this pleasant little message of love miscarry, the serious missile would still be sent, and the miscarriage would occasion ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... archdeacon, handing the offensive missile to his father-in-law, "I am not going to be the bearer of his love-letters. You are her father and may do as you think ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... seeming to look at him, flicked the long lash of his whip dexterously, and a little spurt of dust came from the hardware man's trousers, not far below the waist. He was not made of hardware: he raved, looking for a missile; then, finding none, commanded himself sufficiently to shout after the rapid dog-cart: "Turn down your pants, you would-be dude! Raining in dear ole Lunnon! Git ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington
... as of some object being hurled through the air. The boy experienced a stinging sensation on his right cheek, as the missile grazed it, and a stone the size of a man's hand clattered to the rocks several feet ahead of him, rolling over and over, finally toppling from ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Rockies • Frank Gee Patchin
... are supported by the free-will offerings of pilgrims, that no one dares to resist or ill-treat them. Hence, access to the town is often difficult; for should one of the apes take a dislike to any unlucky traveller, he is sure to be assailed by the whole community, who follow him with all the missile weapons they can collect, such as pieces of bamboo, stones, and dirt, making at the same time a most hideous howling. Of the danger attending a meeting with enemies of this description, the following is a melancholy instance. Two young cavalry officers, belonging to the Bengal army, having occasion ...
— Anecdotes of Animals • Unknown
... examination of the Bradley Patent Imperishable Army Sausage, we find that it is eminently suitable for certain well-defined purposes. If it should be introduced to warfare as a missile, we could calculate with precision that its projection from a gun into a besieged town would instantly induce the garrison to evacuate the place and quit; but the barbarity which would be involved in subjecting even an enemy to direct contact with the Bradley Sausage is so frightful that we shrink ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)
... battery swept in curves that stirred the heart; it made halts as dramatic as the crash of a wave on the rocks, and when it fled onward, this aggregation of wheels, levers, motors, had a beautiful unity, as if it were a missile. The sound of it was a war-chorus that reached into the ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... The heavy measure had escaped from his hands, splashing the wine high upon the wall. Paradou caught it. 'And you?' he roared to his wife, giving her the same name in the feminine, and he aimed at her the deadly missile. She expected it, ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... sprung up like a wild cat when the missile hit him. Luckily he was flustered by the bouncing of the loaf on the table and off again clean into Margaret's lap, or the ready trigger would surely have been drawn in earnest. Then Margaret promptly took the edge off his anger by saying with menacing sweetness, "I'm sorry the fun has gone further ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... allowed himself to be worshipped as a god, is about in its original condition, having been repaired in recent years. When Captain Cook attempted to seize the King as a prisoner, the natives naturally rallied to the King's defense. A stone or other missile struck ...
— Archeological Investigations - Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 76 • Gerard Fowke
... was round shaped and rather larger than a cricket ball. A black tube affair an inch or two long projected from it and emitted, when lit, a jet of hissing, spitting sparks. The bomb-thrower seized the missile quickly, stepped clear of the sheltering corner of the trench, threw the bomb, and jumped back under cover. A couple of bullets slapped into the wall of the trench, and ...
— Action Front • Boyd Cable (Ernest Andrew Ewart)
... Scotch saw that the vessels had run aground, they assembled together, and advancing against the Norwegians, attacked them with missile weapons. They, however, defended themselves gallantly under cover of their ships; the Scotch made several attempts, at different times, but killed few, tho' many were wounded. King Haco, as the wind was now somewhat abated, sent in some boats with a reinforcement, as ...
— The Norwegian account of Haco's expedition against Scotland, A.D. MCCLXIII. • Sturla oretharson
... For no good reason, other than speculation and circulation, the newspapers had soon begun to refer authoritatively to these "ghost rockets" as guided missiles, and implied that they were from Russia. Peenemunde, the great German missile development center and birthplace of the V-l and V-2 guided missiles, came in for its share of suspicion since it was held by the Russians. By the end of the summer of 1946 the reports were widespread, ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... quart pot?" exclaims her exasperated husband, looking helplessly about him and finding no missile within his reach. "Will somebody obleege me with a spittoon? Will somebody hand me anything hard and bruising to pelt at her? You hag, you cat, you dog, you brimstone barker!" Here Mr. Smallweed, wrought up to the highest pitch by his own eloquence, actually throws Judy at her grandmother ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... a-tingle, even while with hurried hands he cut open the shirt at the brawny throat and felt for fluttering heart-beat or faintest sign of life. Useless. The shot-hole under the left eye told plainly that the leaden missile had torn its way through the brain and that death must have been instantaneous. The soldier's arms and accoutrements, the horse's equipments, were gone. The bodies lay unmutilated. The story was plain. Separated in some way from ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King
... Ornamented Doorway, paid for by the Usher's two sons, was estimated at L48 13s., but this was exclusive of the Niche and the Statue of Edward VI which it contained. This Statue was an object of the frequent missile and was so often cast down that it was at last removed. On the outside of the Library Wall is a Coat of Arms belonging to the Nowell family and underneath is the extract from the Charter "Mediante Johanne Nowell." One relic of James Carr's School remained, the stone slab with ...
— A History of Giggleswick School - From its Foundation 1499 to 1912 • Edward Allen Bell
... walk. In the midst of this confusion, while yet thousands of the invaders were still on the Serbian side of the river, just as dawn was breaking, there came a deep report, the hissing of a flying steel missile, and a shell dropped in the middle of one of the pontoon supports, hurling timber and human beings up into the air. The confusion now became a wild panic. Some tried to return to the Serbian shore, others fought on. Dozens of the struggling figures rolled over the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... at him as though it were a missile. The term was one of scorn, used only in speaking of the worst of the whiskey-traders. He took it coolly, his strong white teeth flashing in a ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... already perched on the top of the high bookcase, with his thumb at his nose in token of derision. I flung the poker at him, and missed. I fired the bootjack. In a blind rage I flew from place to place, and snatched and hurled any missile that came handy; the storm of books, inkstands, and chunks of coal gloomed the air and beat about the manikin's perch relentlessly, but all to no purpose; the nimble figure dodged every shot; and not only that, but burst into a cackle of sarcastic and triumphant laughter as I sat down ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... few seconds with the back door and finally tore it completely from its hinges. He darted out into the yard, hurling the broken woodwork full at Brenchfield as the latter was swinging his lariat. Hanson followed his missile and, for a short space, it looked as if the Mayor's last moment had arrived. But numbers counted again and, fortunately for the big Swede, he could not be in two places at once. Royce Pederstone's rope landed deftly over his head and brought ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... well-furnished, airy room, with people moving about in it; I knew none of them, but we were on friendly terms, and talked and laughed together. Quite suddenly I was struck somewhere in the chest by some rough, large missile, fired, I thought, from a gun, though I heard no explosion; it pierced my ribs, and buried itself, I felt, in some vital part. I stumbled to a couch and fell upon it; some one came to raise me, and I was aware that other persons ran hither and thither seeking, I thought, ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... The missile vanished; and had any astronomer been looking at that world's third and outermost moon at the moment, he might have seen a tremendous flash of light, a cloud of dust, and the formation of a new and different crater among the ...
— The Galaxy Primes • Edward Elmer Smith
... stupefied the Syracusans, believing that nothing was able to resist that violence and those forces. But when Archimedes began to ply his engines, he at once shot against the land forces all sorts of missile weapons, and immense masses of stone that came down with incredible noise and violence, against which no man could stand; for they knocked down those upon whom they fell, in heaps, breaking all their ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch
... should vanish, according to rule, in a flash of fire and brimstone. Just then he saw the goblin rising in his stirrups, and in the very act of hurling his head at him. Ichabod endeavoured to dodge the horrible missile, but too late. It encountered his cranium with a tremendous crash—he was tumbled headlong into the dust, and Gunpowder, the black steed, and the goblin rider, ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... hand. Here is the long history of Rama in which is shown how Rama by his prowess slew Ravana in battle. Here also is narrated the story of Savitri; then Karna's deprivation by Indra of his ear-rings; then the presentation to Karna by the gratified Indra of a Sakti (missile weapon) which had the virtue of killing only one person against whom it might be hurled; then the story called Aranya in which Dharma (the god of justice) gave advice to his son (Yudhishthira); in which, besides is recited how the Pandavas after having obtained a ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... his tent confident and happy. On the tower meantime Constantine and the Genoese beheld the smoke leap forth and curtain the gun, and right afterward they heard the huge ball go tearing past them, like an invisible meteor. Their eyes pursued the sound—where the missile fell they could not say—they heard a crash, as if a house midway the city had been struck—then they gazed at each other, and ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... and by using his bat (ridiculously narrow as it was for the purpose) as a shield, to preserve his life and limbs from the dastardly attack that had been made on both, to leave the full force of the deadly missile to strike his wicket instead of his leg; and to end the innings, so far as his side was concerned, by being immediately bowled out. Grateful for his escape, he was about to return to the dry ditch, when he was peremptorily stopped, and told that the other side was 'going in,' and ...
— The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices • Charles Dickens
... music of jingling harness, with bandy-legged grooms on the boot, and beside her some perfectly tailored creature in a glistening top-hat. It was a gallant picture, and one in which there was no part for me. Metaphorically I hurled at it a missile of the common clay of which, after all, we were both made. Surely fishing was a subject on which her ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd
... distinct from the weapon which he used in close fight. He discharged his shot, threw away his gun, and fell on with his sword. This was the work of a moment. It took the regular musketeer two or three minutes to alter his missile weapon into a weapon with which he could encounter an enemy hand to hand; and during these two or three minutes the event of the battle of Killiecrankie had been decided. Mackay therefore ordered all his bayonets to be so formed that they might be screwed upon the barrel without ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... to pulse in the air above the spot where the missile sank. I was about to pronounce the diagnosis of "a dud," when someone cried, "My God, General, they've turned hell loose this time!" The whole atmosphere for a quarter of a mile radius about the fatal bomb quivered as over a heated ...
— The Sword and the Atopen • Taylor H. Greenfield
... darkened, the storm increased. The wind roared among the rocks like the rattling of a thousand carriages over a paved street; and there were times when, after a sudden pause, the blast struck the cottage, as if it were a huge missile flung against it, and pressed on its roof and walls till the very floor rocked, and the rafters strained and shivered like the beams of a stranded vessel. There was a ceaseless patter of mingled rain and snow—now lower, now louder; and the fearful ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... learns that Tom Gray is in the feudist country. Tom's tent found, but he is missing. Nora's missile hits the wrong man. The Overland Riders seek refuge in a cave. Fresh disasters befall them. Fighting ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders Among the Kentucky Mountaineers • Jessie Graham Flower
... into great danger, by the retreat of the forlorn hope, before it had accomplished its purpose, he rushed forward, killed the commanding officer with his own hand, and seizing the colours, led them back, undismayed, by a grove of pikes and a shower of missile weapons. With desperate but successful valour he carried the redoubt and escaped with life. All this passed under the immediate observation of Cromwell, whose retentive memory never forgot any signal action, and whose ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... his chair, so that his head came below its back, while Morgan's hand shot out and snapped off the electric lamp on the table, throwing the room into darkness. Aside from the slight cracking of the window glass, and the dull crash as the missile struck the plastered wall, there ...
— The Sheridan Road Mystery • Paul Thorne
... sthrong as Gin'ral Crownjoy's camp th' day iv th' surrinder an' almost as sthrong as th' pollytics iv Montana. Th' men that handles it is cased in six inch armor an' played on be a hose iv ice wather. Th' gun that shoots it is always blown up be th' discharge. Whin this deadly missile flies through th' air, th' threes ar-re withered an' th' little bur-rds falls dead fr'm th' sky, fishes is kilt in th' rivers, an' th' tillyphone wires won't wurruk. Th' keen eyed British gunners an' corryspondints watches it in its hellish ...
— Mr. Dooley's Philosophy • Finley Peter Dunne
... unexpected and so thoroughly startling in this mode of salutation in so peaceful a place, that Ralph leaped two or three feet in his fright, and at the same time saw the hole in the brim of his hat, which showed how near the deadly missile had come to him. ...
— Ralph Gurney's Oil Speculation • James Otis
... velocity than thirty feet per second would cause the golden missile to fly only part way around, while a greater velocity would give it an elliptical instead of a circular orbit, and in this ellipse it would continue to revolve around the asteroid in the ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putnam Serviss
... to his feet, drawing back his right arm and hurling, the throwing-stick giving added velocity to the spear. Beside him, he was conscious of Analea rising and propelling her spear. His missile caught the little bearded pony in the chest; it stumbled and fell forward to its front knees. He snatched another light spear, set it on the hook of the stick and darted it at another horse, which reared, biting at the spear with its teeth. Grabbing the heavy stabbing-spear, he ran forward, ...
— Genesis • H. Beam Piper
... picked the missile up. Then he moved to the window and looked out. There was no one about. The evening shadows were rapidly deepening, but he was sure there was no one about. He turned back to the door where there was still sufficient light for his purposes. ...
— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum
... perfect condition, and gave the word. The crash that followed was terrific. One of the massive missiles went home, and stayed there, no amount of inducement availing to bring it out again to face the battle. The other, however, behaved as a British missile should, and exploded in the heart of the hostile fleet. The result was terrific. French, German and Russian Admirals by the thousand were destroyed, their scattered fragments literally darkening the face of the sun, and a mixed ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 3rd, 1891 • Various
... the King, as he seized a boot-jack from the hands of BISMARCK and hurled it at me with all his strength. I burst the back of my coat dodging the missile, which did not, however, interrupt the rapid utterance ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2, No. 36, December 3, 1870 • Various
... Tommy. "We're going up. I'm going to fight the fleet with bullets. They don't have missile-weapons here, and Aten will know the ...
— The Fifth-Dimension Tube • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... or not Sears did not stop to consider. He intended to shock them to the fullest extent of the word's meaning. At his feet was a stick, almost a log, part of the limb of a pear tree. He picked up this missile and hurled it at the marauders. It missed them but it struck in the squash bed and tore at least six of the delicate young squashlings from their moorings. Kendrick plunged after it—the hens separating as he advanced and rejoining ...
— Fair Harbor • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... For when the chance did come to do something, there was no doubt about the thing to be done. The thunderbolt fell from the clear heights of heaven; it had not been tossed about and lost like a common missile in the market-place. The matter is worth mentioning, because it has a moral for a much larger modern question. A wise man's attitude towards industrial capitalism will be very like Lincoln's attitude towards slavery. That is, he will manage to endure capitalism; ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... gun sent its missile through the cutter's squaresail. Another shortly afterwards made a second hole, but did no ...
— The Rival Crusoes • W.H.G. Kingston
... his promise. The monkey at first took no notice of the crab's complaints, but at last he picked out the hardest, greenest persimmon he could find and aimed it at the crab's head. The persimmon is as hard as stone when it is unripe. The monkey's missile struck home and the crab was sorely hurt by the blow. Again and again, as fast as he could pick them, the monkey pulled off the hard persimmons and threw them at the defenseless crab till he dropped dead, covered with wounds all over his body. ...
— Japanese Fairy Tales • Yei Theodora Ozaki
... your tongue." So much of my Tennessee shooting-blood rose to my face that it is a wonder it didn't drip; but I was cold enough to have hit at forty paces if I had had a shooting-iron in my hand. As it was the coldness was the only missile that I had, but I used it ...
— The Melting of Molly • Maria Thompson Daviess
... as he was returning by way of the curtain, he beheld a fat pigeon sunning itself on the top of the wall. He paused to gaze at it; where he stood the rampart was cracked and a piece of stone was near at hand; he gave his arm a jerk and the well-aimed missile struck the bird squarely, sending it ...
— Three short works - The Dance of Death, The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitaller, A Simple Soul. • Gustave Flaubert
... knew that, to the man firing, his fall might have seemed a hit, that he had beaten the missile by the space of a wink. He heard more broken boughs, as if his assailant were clumsily, assuredly, clambering out of ambush, and he shifted silently into position, rifle set down, both guns ready. There came a strange thrashing sound, a groan of mortal anguish, silence. If this was a trick ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... of what has happened to you. You seemed to me to be soaring far up in the blue—to be, sailing in the bright light, over the heads of men. Suddenly some one tosses up a faded rosebud—a missile that should never have reached you—and straight you drop to the ground. It hurts me," said Ralph audaciously, "hurts me as ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 2 (of 2) • Henry James
... dangerous a game as could well be designed, had either driver been less skilled, but it was safe enough now. Gerard was laughing as he drove, when the first tiny missile rattled against his car. ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... by a loud roar from the jingal. The fallen dacoit had trained it perfectly before he dropped, and a comrade now touched off the piece. At the next moment a terrific crash rang through the building. The heavy missile had lighted full on the point where the door was secured by the stout bar, had smashed its way through door and bar and hurled the door open. As the portal flew back, there was a tremendous yell from the edge of the jungle. ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore
... Albert Hall at Gray's big League of Nations meeting in May, listening to Clynes's reasons why they died. I can hear dear old Peter Clancy on why he died. 'Democracy? A cleaner world? No. Why? I suppose I died because I inadvertently got in the way of some flying missile; I know no other reason. And I suppose I was there to get in its way because it's part of belonging to a nation to fight its battles when required—like paying its taxes or keeping its laws. Why go groping for far-fetched reason? Who wants democracy, any ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay
... me it was going to be a demonstration against a building," said the Professor. "I had to know that much to prepare the missile. I pointed out to him that I had hardly a sufficient quantity for a completely destructive result, but he pressed me very earnestly to do my best. As he wanted something that could be carried openly in the hand, I proposed to make use of an old one-gallon copal varnish can I happened to have ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... heavens were split by shafts of lurid fire. Masses of metal shot in all directions, leaving a trail of sparks behind them; bits of shell shrieked past my head and buried themselves in the walls and sandbags. One large missile fell in an open space about forty feet on my left, and exploded with a deafening, ear-splitting crash. At the same moment another exploded directly in front of me. Instinctively I ducked my head. The blinding flash and frightful noise for the moment stunned me, and I could taste ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... minute by so many thousands of miles, came the Thing they were sending us, the Thing that was to bring so much struggle and calamity and death to the earth. I never dreamed of it then as I watched; no one on earth dreamed of that unerring missile. ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... ray!" Arcot commanded sharply, moving the ship to one side at the same time. Instantly, the guided missile turned and kept ...
— Islands of Space • John W Campbell
... the grouped men and horses around the battery, and for a moment I thought the missile had struck among us. There was a splutter, as of shivering metal flying about, and, with a sort of intuition, the whole regiment rose and ran. I started to my feet and looked for my horse. His ears were erect, his eyeballs distended, and his nostrils were tremulous ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... unfavourable field of battle. The only advantage we appeared to have over the assailants was that the breach which they had effected in the walls was steep in its ascent, and the loose stones either fell down upon them, or gave way under their feet, while we plied them with every kind of missile: this was our only defence, and all we had to prevent the enemy marching into the works, if works they ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... back, certain of Orsini's men following them closely and throwing firebrands upon them as they dashed through the postern gate. That was the great disaster and tragedy of the day, for the tower in which the fugitives had sought shelter was the powder-magazine and a spark from the fiery missile thrown, guided by the evil one, found its way to a little trail of the devil's dust, which had been scattered on the stairs, and so fired the mine in that ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... whiteness again—the edge of the marble slab that was the entry door, reflecting the blazing light at a different angle. Behind it, McGillis's tightly grinning face. Under McGillis's face, the stab of blue-white light reflected a glancing ray from the old-fashioned solid-missile service pistol that Jason had insisted all four men arm themselves ...
— Zero Data • Charles Saphro
... had spread through the city, and on the way back the troops were mobbed. They were pelted with every kind of missile and many were hurt, though none seriously; and it understates the truth to say that they were in no danger. They had their bayonets, and from time to time made thrusts at their assailants. At last, on the quays, at a place called Bachelor's ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... found he could hurl a rock with his good right arm, man learned about trajectory—the curved path taken by a missile through the air. A baseball describes a "flat" trajectory every time the pitcher throws a hard, fast one. Youngsters tossing the ball to each other over a tall fence use "curved" or "high" trajectory. In artillery, where trajectory is equally important, there are three main types of cannon: ...
— Artillery Through the Ages - A Short Illustrated History of Cannon, Emphasizing Types Used in America • Albert Manucy
... of "explosive" bullets, which makes the "man in the street" so indignant, it is worth mentioning that, as far as I am aware, not a single instance of the employment of such a missile came under the notice of our medical staff with Lord Methuen's column. I do not for one instant deny that occasionally such bullets may have been fired at our troops, but it is clear that the utmost confusion prevails about the ...
— With Methuen's Column on an Ambulance Train • Ernest N. Bennett
... and she still kept true to her old character, with but this drawback, that she had now got somewhat crazy in her fastenings, and made rather more water in a heavy sea than her one little pump could conveniently keep under. As the fitful gust struck her headlong, as if it had been some invisible missile hurled at us from off the hill-tops, she stooped her head lower and lower, like old stately Hardyknute under the blow of the "King of Norse," till at length the lee chain-plate rustled sharp through the foam; but, like a staunch Free ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... mortal hostility towards the human race did she discharge this missile, that Clennam was quite at a loss how to defend himself; the rather as he had been already perplexed in his mind by the honour of a visit from this venerable lady, when it was plain she held him in the utmost abhorrence. He could not but look at her with disconcertment, as she ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... see. And when the maddened driver, wrought to desperation, hurls into their midst a stick or stone, hoping fervently and vengefully that it may break a neck or a leg, they leap nimbly into the air with "put-putterings" of surprise and rebuke, and then advance cautiously upon the missile and examine it. ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... Newton and Pascal, and John Locke and John Howard, have had these weapons hurled against them. Nay, in these very times we have seen a noted champion hurl these weapons against John Milton, and with it another missile which often appears on these battle-fields—the epithets of 'blasphemer' and 'hater of the Lord.' Of course, in these days these weapons though often effective in disturbing the ease of good men and though often powerful in scaring women, are somewhat ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... glee. He has done up his work, no doubt, and now is off for a frolic. I lie here, not a stone's throw from him, watching his merry antics, and rejoicing to think how free from fear he is, when all at once the leaves of his tree are cut by a flying missile, and the next second I see my gay fellow tumble headlong from the bough, and fall in a helpless little heap on the grass. I start up in affright, and hear a passing boy call out to another, over ...
— How to Cook Husbands • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... Roby was limping along with the aid of a stick and Lennox's arm, while Dickenson was rolling up a cigarette composed of the very last dust of his tobacco, ready to hand it to the captain, who suffered a good deal still from the bullet wound, the missile having passed right through his thigh. They had to pass two of their men, seated upon a rock in a shady corner, one of them being minus his right leg, which had been removed half-way between knee and hip; the other was recovering very slowly from a bullet wound in ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn
... the natural curve of the feather at the nock, and while the rear binding started an inch or more from the butt of the arrow, the feather drooped over the nock. This gave a pretty effect and seemed to add to the steering qualities of the missile. ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... no mistaking the nature of the missile-a regulation Martini-Henry "picket." About five hundred yards away a country-boat was anchored in midstream; and a jet of smoke drifting away from its bows in the still morning air showed me whence the delicate attention had come. Was ever a respectable gentleman in such an impasse? The ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... Hilbrough. Then Millard remembered Mr. Hilbrough's apprehension of diphtheria, and that Robert had come from the infected house. He would send Mrs. Callender's note by a messenger. But, on second thought, the note would be a more deadly missile in Hilbrough's eyes than Robert, who had not gone beyond the vestibule of the Callender house. He therefore sent a note by a messenger, stating the case, and received in return permission to open all letters addressed to Mrs. ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... paymaster called for boiling water, the Indians watched him swallow his effervescing mixture with unmoved faces. When he hurled a ball of clay, charged with fulminating powder, at a tree, missed his mark, and caused the missile to fall harmlessly in the water, they gazed at him pityingly. When, an hour later, he strolled over to their camp-fire and carelessly tossed what appeared to be a stone into it, they drew back a few paces, watched the play of colored flames that followed, ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... his bravery had inspired him with a very genuine feeling of respect, so, when his practiced ear detected a shell coming their way, he had acted the part of a friend and placed the civilian in a safer position. The missile landed some ten paces from where they were and exploded, covering them both with earth and debris. The citizen kept his feet and received not so much as a scratch, while the officer ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... was getting ready for casting off, when one of the natives came on board. Captain Hindhaugh looked about for something to throw at the visitor, and only the difficulty of selecting an efficient missile from a large and varied assortment prevented him from letting ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... yet, and icy film Glazed the deep ruts. The swarthy smith worked hard, And working sang; the wheelwright toiled close by; An armourer next to these: through flaming smoke Glared the fierce hands that on the anvil fell In thunder down. A sorcerer stood apart Kneading Death's messenger, that missile ball, The Lia Laimbhe. To his heart he clasped it, And o'er it muttered spells with flatteries mixed: "Hail, little daughter mine! 'Twixt hand and heart I knead thee! From the Red Sea came that sand Which, blent with viper's poison, makes thy flesh! Be thou ...
— The Legends of Saint Patrick • Aubrey de Vere
... practised, and you have to offend a man very grievously to get him to disgorge his treasure. In this country, except among ladies in comparatively humble circumstances, anything like this fluent, explicit, detailed, and sincere cursing, aimed, missile-fashion, at a personal enemy, is not found. It was quite common a few centuries ago; indeed, in the Middle Ages it was part of the recognised procedure. Aggrieved parties would issue a father's ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... important commercial aviation base, now used by US military, some commercial cargo planes, as well as the US Army Space and Strategic Defense Command for missile launches ...
— The 1996 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... always remarkable for great boldness, and great presence of mind. All the time that he had appeared so indifferent to what was going on, he had been looking slily about for some missile or weapon of defence, and at the very instant when the swords were drawn, he espied, standing in the chimney-corner, an old basket-hilted rapier in a rusty scabbard. At one bound, my uncle caught it in ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... or more I am furiously seeking in my mind for a word, for a term of abuse, for one compendious verbal missile that shall smash this man for ever. It has to express total inadequacy of imagination and will, spiritual anaemia, dull respectability, gross sentimentality, a ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells
... madly into the labyrinth of moving carriages and cabs; and it was then that Lettice saw her, less than three yards away, and apparently in the act of hurling a missile from ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... Balder, the bloody god, Othin's son. High above the fields (i.e. the surface of the earth) grew a mistletoe, slender and very beautiful. From a shaft (or 'stem') which appeared slender, came a dangerous sorrow-bringing missile (i.e. the shaft became a ... missile); Hodr proceeded to shoot. Soon was a brother of Balder born. He, Othin's son, proceeded to do battle when one day old. He did not wash his hands or comb his head before he brought Balder's antagonist on to the pyre. But Frigg in Fen-salir ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... to drinking. 'As they drank, the destructive flame of dissension was kindled amongst them by mutual collision, and fed with the fuel of abuse. Infuriated by the divine influence, they fell upon one another with missile weapons and when these were expended, they had recourse to the rushes growing high. The rushes in their hands became like thunderbolts and they struck one another with them fatal blows. Krishna interposed to prevent them but they ...
— The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry • W. G. Archer
... torpedo boat, PT boat; torpedo-catcher, war castle, H.M.S.; battleship, battle wagon, dreadnought, line of battle ship, ship of the line; aircraft carrier, carrier. flattop[coll.]; helicopter carrier; missile platform, missile boat; ironclad, turret ship, ram, monitor, floating battery; first-rate, frigate, sloop of war, corvette, gunboat, bomb vessel; flagship, guard ship, cruiser; armored cruiser, protected cruiser; privateer. [supporting ships] tender; store ship, troop ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... immersion alongside the launch; and, if necessary, may be discharged from this protected position. The gun is a seamless brass tube of about forty feet in length, manipulated by the artillerist in the manner of an ordinary cannon. Its noiseless discharge sends the missile with great force, conveying the powerful explosive within it, which is itself discharged internally upon contact with the deck of a vessel or other object upon which it strikes, through the explosion of a percussion fuse in the point of the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 446, July 19, 1884 • Various
... ascertain who had thus rudely assailed him— anxiously, too, for he was in some dread of seeing a savage spring from the bushes close by. On turning, he at once beheld the missile that had rent his jacket-sleeve lying on the sand beside him. It was no stone, but a round or slightly oval-shaped ball, as big as a ten-pound shot, of a deep-green colour, and covered all over with spurs like ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... aboriginals before him. He was armed, it appeared, with a fission-throwing weapon in one hand and some sort of tranquilizer—I deem it to have been a Stollgratz 16—in the other; moreover, he wore an invulnerability belt. The police aboriginals were attempting to strike him with missile weapons, which the belt deflected. I neutralized his shield, collapsed him and stored him in my carry-all. "Not an Adjuster," I asserted my father, but he had already perceived that this was so. I left him to neutralize and collapse the police aboriginals while I zeroed in on the portatron. ...
— The Day of the Boomer Dukes • Frederik Pohl
... we are going to say," observes Pliny, "is marvellous, but it may easily be tested by experiment. If a person repents of a blow given to another, either by hand or with a missile, he has nothing to do but to spit at once into the palm of the hand which has inflicted the blow, and all feeling of resentment will be instantly alleviated in the person struck. This, too, is often verified in the case of a beast of burden, when brought on its haunches ...
— Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson
... sharp attack, and there was "considerable artillery activity" on the part of the German guns. Such activity was spoken of in the trenches as "raising the lid off Hell." There was a lull after about an hour's rain of every kind of missile that man has invented to batter his brother with. Then the Huns came on in earnest. Some reached the trenches only to be met with a murderous fire: they fell in little huddled heaps in the blood and the mud and the slime of the trenches. But the whole ...
— War and the Weird • Forbes Phillips
... superior slope of each. The place was very quiet, not more than two dozen shells came our way daily, and it was there that I saw a shell in air, the only shell in flight I have ever seen. It was dropping to earth behind the parados and I had a distinct view of the missile before ducking to avoid the splinters flung out by the explosion. Hundreds of shells have passed through the sky near me every day, I could almost see them by their sound and felt I could trace the line made ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill
... into this loophole which struck the rock on one side, glanced and entered the Indian's eye, passing out at the back of his head—a veritable carom shot. This tree was girdled with bullets, and the plucky Indian who lay behind it is said to have killed five of the soldiers before the fatal missile searched him out. ...
— The Battle of the Big Hole • G. O. Shields
... order to bring his feet into play, his jaws being momentarily helpless. His abdominal muscles were in splendid order. Like a lynx, Sourdough drew in and up his powerful hind quarters, and, as if they had been a missile launched from a catapult, slashed his two hind feet along Jan's belly, as a carpenter might rip a board down ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... Mrs Pods that she did so, for her resigned eyes beheld the globe of the cabin lamp pitched off its perch by a violent lurch and coming straight at her. Thus she had time to bow to circumstances, and allow the missile to pass over her head into the bosom of Lady Tower, where it was broken to atoms. The effect of mutual concession was so strong on Mrs Pods and Mrs Tods, that the former secretly repented having wished that one of Mrs Tods' little sons might fall down the hatchway and get maimed for life, while ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... mainsail being furled, and something moving in the iron cage on the gabia or maintop, know that a petard will soon be dropped in your midst from the main peak, and probably a heavy stone or bomb from the opposite end of the long lateen yard, where it serves the double purpose of missile and counterpoise. Now is the time to keep your distance, unless you would have a hole in your ship's bottom. The Corsairs, indeed, are very wily in attack and defence, acquainted with many sorts of projectiles,—even submarine torpedoes, which a diver will attach to the enemy's keel,—and they ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole
... absolute ill-treatment at the hands of the public. The young girls were perfectly sincere, in their rude way, but this did not prevent men from offering them every insult malice could devise, and making them a target for every missile at hand. So little does the public think for itself in cases like this, that at the opening of the performance had some well-known person given the signal for applause, the whole audience would, in all probability, have been delighted and made the ...
— Worldly Ways and Byways • Eliot Gregory
... away. The destroyer, in accordance with custom, headed for the spot, and had about reached it when the skipper, Commander Walter H. Vernon, sighted a torpedo running at high speed near the surface, and about 400 yards away. The missile was headed straight for the midship section of the war-ship. Realizing the situation, the commanding officer rang for the emergency full speed ahead on both engines, put the rudder hard over, and was just clear of the torpedo's course when ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... the bigger boys in the back seats, cherishing pleasant memories of the "fun" they had under Miss Seabury's easy-going rule, attempted to repeat their performances of the previous term. But the very first "spitball" which spattered upon the blackboard proved a disastrous missile ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... town when he crossed the plaza to his quarters. Matak, silent as ever but of more cheerful countenance, set the table. At his second laconic announcement Terry rose and crossed to the dinner table, and as he seated himself a white missile was tossed through the open window by an unseen hand and landed with a thud on the bare floor. Matak brought it to him, and unwrapping the paper from about the pebble Terry read the note. It was from the secreto whom he ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... Ajax, son of Telamon. In turns they took their stand; Epeius first Uprais'd the pond'rous mass, and through the air Hurl'd it, amid the laughter of the Greeks. Next came Leonteus, scion true of Mars; The third was Ajax; from whose stalwart hand Beyond the farthest mark the missile flew. But when the valiant Polypoetes took The quoit in hand, far as a herdsman throws His staff, that, whirling, flies among the herd; So far beyond the ring's extremest bound He threw the pond'rous mass; loud were the shouts; And noble Polypoetes' ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... interesting minor dangers are also the province of the hamaca. Once, in the tropics, a great fruit fell on the elastic strands and bounced upon my body. There was an ominous swish of the air in the sweeping arc which this missile described, also a goodly shower of leaves; and since the fusillade took place at midnight, it was, all in all, a somewhat alarming visitation. However, there were no honorable scars to mark its advent; and what is more important, from all my hundreds of hammock nights, I have ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... arm, but he made it so much a matter of earnest to see the bruise of the old Election missile on her fair arm, that, with a pardonable soft blush, to avoid making much of it herself, she turned her sleeve a little above the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... presently they got the boat afloat, and slid down to her in hurried clusters by the davit falls, and then unhooked and rowed away from the steamer's side in a skelter of haste. Coals and any other missile that came handy were showered upon them by the Krooboys who manned the rail, to which they replied with a few vicious revolver shots; and then the ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... the tail, which is as bright as cotton bursting from the pod, I killed one once more by impulse than anything else. It ran from under my feet when I had a knife in my hand. I threw it at the rabbit, and to my surprise knocked it over, for I am a very bad shot with that sort of missile. ...
— A Tramp's Notebook • Morley Roberts
... words passed his lips some missile, from its peculiar sound I judged it was the leg off an iron pot, hurtled past my head, fired evidently from a smoothbore gun with a large charge of bad powder. Then I remembered the war-horn and all ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... wave, carrying on its crest a lump of ice about the size of a flour barrel, threw its burden on the deck of the vessel, raking it from stem to stern, the captain, who had barely been missed by the grating missile, agreed that in a vessel with such a low rail and of such defective naval principles, it would be better perhaps to sail under the water than on top of it, and so he went below, took off his pea-jacket with the silver ...
— The Great Stone of Sardis • Frank R. Stockton
... not a few of his shipmates out of the world; still, as he had faith in the gun's power of endurance, he risked it without remark, and taking good aim once more fired. Never had he made a better shot. The missile swept the deck of the schooner, carrying off the heads of three of her crew, and killing and wounding others—though this was unknown at the time. The instant effect was to make her skipper haul down his colours and put the schooner about with her head off the ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... faction, mingled with the opposing ranks, and made their way to the engine without its being noticed that they did not belong to that side. Thus they managed to cut the ropes of the affair, so that not another missile could be discharged from it. As the sun was rising the soldiers of the third legion, called the Gallic, that wintered in Syria but was now by chance in the party of Vespasian, suddenly according to custom saluted the Sun God. The followers of Vitellius, suspecting ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio
... welcome tidings that his rival had unwillingly "paired" with him for the morrow's festivities. He ceased roaring at his sons and daughters and throwing his bandages at his wife's head; it must be stated that he never employed any more dangerous missile even in moments of supreme irritation. Robert Wainwright's bark was on all occasions worse than his bite, and though recently his bark had been very loud indeed, no one in the little household was in the least scared by it. This evening, ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)
... fired at him point blank." This usually is intended to mean directly, or at short range. But point blank means the point at which the line of sight is crossed downward by the trajectory—the curve described by the missile. ...
— Write It Right - A Little Blacklist of Literary Faults • Ambrose Bierce
... reputation as an evil disposed witch proved quite the contrary. Nanny, for such was her name, was leaning, or rather sitting, against a bank at the road side, shaking occasionally her crutch at her tormentors, and muttering a heavy curse as missile after missile fell thickly around her. The shouts of laughter proceeding from the annoying children, as she tried in vain to rise, and impotently threatened, made her imprecations come doubly bitter; ...
— Ellen Duncan; And The Proctor's Daughter - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... "Sz-z-z-zz!" the leaden missile sang through the air. It flattened against a rock in front of which the young chief engineer ...
— The Young Engineers in Mexico • H. Irving Hancock
... the direction from which the dazzling missile had come, and saw that at this point the sable facade of fir and pine was interrupted by a smaller road at right angles; which, when he turned it, brought him in full view of the long, lighted house, with a lake ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... little room for doubt that the sculptor has truthfully caught one of the rapidly changing positions which the exercise involved. Having passed the discus from his left hand to his right, the athlete has swung the missile as far back as possible. In the next instant he will hurl it forward, at the same time, of course, advancing his left foot and recovering his erect position. Thus Myron has preferred to the comparatively easy task of representing the athlete at rest, bearing some symbol of victory, the far more ...
— A History Of Greek Art • F. B. Tarbell
... this beautiful day, under God's holy sunshine, as busily at work as Satan himself could wish in learning how to butcher their fellow-creatures and acquire the true scientific method of impaling a forlorn Mexican on a bayonet, or of sinking a leaden missile in the brain of some unfortunate Briton, urged within its range by the double incentive of sixpence per day in his pocket and the cat-o'-nine-tails on ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... merely of seconds, and with a few touches Carrados spread the dressing-gown to more effective disguise about the extended form. But an unforeseen and in the circumstances rather horrible interval followed, for Creake, in accordance with some detail of his never-revealed plan, continued to shower missile after missile against the panes until even the unimpressionable ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... furious at this insolence as he considered it, took a cup and threw it at the Caliph, who easily avoided a missile from the hand of a drunken man. It hit against the wall, and broke into a thousand pieces. Scheih Ibrahim, still more enraged, then went out to fetch a stick. The Caliph at that moment clapped his hands, and the vizir and the four slaves entering took off the fisherman's dress and put ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Andrew Lang.
... bombs consisted of a perforated steel nose-piece, a tail to keep it falling straight and a cylindrical body which contained a tube of thermit packed around with mineral wax containing potassium perchlorate. The fuse was ignited as the missile was released and the thermit, as it heated up, melted the wax and allowed it to flow out together with the liquid iron through the holes in the nose-piece. The American incendiary bombs were of a still more malignant type. ...
— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson
... seemed in the least alarmed, and in a few moments the mother regained possession of her chair and senses, when her first act of sanity was to hurl the bottle Thisbe had applied to her nostrils at the poor woman's head with such force, that, had she not dodged the missile, it must have inflicted ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... moving fast. The worst of it is that it's going to take time to get in the airlock and unload our guided missiles and get them in the Platform's launching-tubes. I'd guess an hour. One bomb should get both of us above the Bay of Bengal, but we won't be set to launch a guided missile in defense until we're nearly ...
— Space Tug • Murray Leinster
... moment of parting. Often after a fairly amicable half-mile together we suddenly split into hostile ranks, and warred with true tribal frenzy as long as we could find a stone or a clod to serve as missile. I had no personal animosity in this, I was merely a Pict willing to destroy my ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... order the elephants to hold up their trunks and open their mouths, and then the men would try to toss pieces of gingerbread in. The elephants were always ready to do this when ordered, though their mouths, when they opened them, were so small that the people very seldom succeeded in aiming the missile so that it ...
— Rollo in Paris • Jacob Abbott
... might at length have been worn out by the activity of his foeman, suddenly seized the mace which hung at his saddle-bow, and, with a strong hand and unerring aim, hurled it against the head of the Emir, for such and not less his enemy appeared. The Saracen was just aware of the formidable missile in time to interpose his light buckler betwixt the mace and his head; but the violence of the blow forced the buckler down on his turban, and though that defence also contributed to deaden its violence, the Saracen ...
— The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book • Various
... offered at table under the name and reputation of potatoes, are such that, if you could suppose the company to be composed of Centaurs and Lapithae, or any other quarrelsome people, it would become necessary for the police to interfere. The potato of cities is a very dangerous missile; and, if thrown with an accurate aim by an angry hand, will fracture any known skull. In volume and consistency, it is very like a paving-stone; only that, I should say, the paving-stone had the advantage in point of tenderness. And upon this horrid ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... man, infuriated by drink and evil passions, threw the bottle at his father's head. The dangerous missile fell, crashing upon one of his temples, shivering it into a hundred pieces. A heavy, jarring fall too surely marked the fearful consequences of the blow. When we gathered around the fallen man, and made an effort to lift him ...
— Ten Nights in a Bar Room • T. S. Arthur
... danger by armouring the body of the machine sufficiently to protect the aviator and his engine—for if the aviator escaped a shot which found the engine, his plight would be almost as bad as if the missile had struck him. ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... affords an interesting example of naval tactics in antiquity. The trireme was regarded as a missile to be hurled with sudden violence against the opposing ship, in order to disable or sink it. A sea fight became a series of maneuvers; and victory depended as much on the skill of the rowers and steersmen as on the bravery of the soldiers. The Persians at Salamis had ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... writings, where the doctrines were very imperfectly laid down; so that some of his book is occupied in demolishing constructions of straw, unrecognisable by professed physicists except as caricatures at which they also might be willing to heave an occasional missile. ...
— Life and Matter - A Criticism of Professor Haeckel's 'Riddle of the Universe' • Oliver Lodge
... resist, if you would not suffer the calamities of war and the insolence of the enemy, it must be thought the part of a good soldier to seek for safety under the shelter and protection of walls more especially since so many missile weapons and machines have been most ingeniously invented to besiege cities with. Indeed to neglect surrounding a city with a wall would be similar to choosing a country which is easy of access to an enemy, or levelling ...
— Politics - A Treatise on Government • Aristotle
... in a voice loud enough to be heard a block, "get up on that tender, have your men load their rifles, and shoot the first d——d man that raises a hand or throws a missile. And you," this to the engineer, "shove that reverse lever over and ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... that instant screamed over the ruin; the young girl raised her head with simple curiosity—not a particle of fear evidently—to watch the course of the missile; and, as the youth executed the like manoeuvre, they both became aware of my ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... bring his feet into play, his jaws being momentarily helpless. His abdominal muscles were in splendid order. Like a lynx, Sourdough drew in and up his powerful hind quarters, and, as if they had been a missile launched from a catapult, slashed his two hind feet along Jan's belly, as a carpenter might rip a board down with ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... even then to be careful of the aim, for the herd, as Shakespeare tells us, at once recognised the sound of a cross-bow: the jar of the string, tight-strained to the notch by the goat's-foot lever, the slight whiz of the missile, were enough to startle them and to cause the rest to swerve and pass out of range. Yet the cross-bow was quiet indeed compared with the gun which took its place. The cross-bow was the beginning of shooting ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... Silenus's ass sent forth a martial bray, and the maenads leapt shrill-voiced on the foe, girt with serpents and baring now the steel of their thyrsus-heads. In a moment Indians and elephants turned and fled disordered, before even a missile could carry across; and the end was that they were smitten and led captive by the objects of their laughter; they had learnt the lesson that it is not safe to take the first report, and scorn an enemy of whom ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... 'tis not so, Like charcoal, brimstone and salpetre. I'll touch you off now in short metre. 'Tis long since first your eye, my man, Along the rifle barrel ran; The "crotch" or "globe" was all the same, If you could only see the game. Or the "bulls-eye," the missile flew Into its centre straight and true, In the old days when practiced eye Was light, shade and trajectory. Does your keen eye obey your will, Is your hand quite as steady still As when you knocked the turkey's o'er, At twenty rods in days of yore? My blessing day and night upon The memory ...
— Recollections of Bytown and Its Old Inhabitants • William Pittman Lett
... spears, impenetrable even to the men-at-arms of the age, though well mounted, and arrayed in complete proof. It may easily be conceived, therefore, that their ranks could not be broken by the disorderly charge of Highland infantry armed for close combat only, with swords, and ill furnished with missile weapons, and having ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... natives are not more remarkable and peculiar in their construction than general in their use on every shore of New Holland. The spear is thrown by means of a woomera which is a slight rod about three feet long having at one end a niche to receive the end of the spear. The missile is shot forward by this means with great force and accuracy of direction; for by the peculiar method of throwing the spear the woomera affords a great additional impetus from this most ingenious lengthening of the arm ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... late in the afternoon, and no sooner had we thrown down our kit into these grave-like chambers than the Turk wiped his mouth after his tea and opened his Evening Hate. There was the distant boom of a shell. Before we could realise what the sound was, and say "Hallo! they've begun," the missile had exploded among the stores on the beach. That was my baptism of fire. Without the least hesitation I copied Major Hardy and Monty, and went flat on my face behind some brushwood. Only Doe, too proud to take cover, remained standing, and then blushed self-consciously ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... the utmost precipitation in two directions, one division toward Chartres and the other toward Ivry. The whole Royalist army hung upon their rear, assailing them with every available missile of destruction. The Duke of Mayenne fled across the Eure. Thousands of his broken bands were crowding the shore, striving to force their way across the thronged bridge, when the Royalist cavalry, led by the monarch himself, was seen in the distance spurring furiously ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... the presence, up stream, of Geirrod's daughter Gialp, and rightly suspecting that she was the cause of the storm, he picked up a huge boulder and flung it at her, muttering that the best place to dam a river was at its source. The missile had the desired effect, for the giantess fled, the waters abated, and Thor, exhausted but safe, pulled himself up on the opposite bank by a little shrub, the mountain-ash or sorb. This has since been known ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... out of my mouth than an arrow whistled through the air. For a moment the dreadful thought seized me that one of them had been struck; but the missile was quivering in the woodwork above their heads. They quickly retreated, and I heard the door closed behind them. I calculated the spot from which the arrow had been shot, and with the help of my companions, training ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston
... "No, sir. No guided missile. Whoever drove that ship was right on board. And that ship was good. It could climb as fast as we could dive, and no human could have taken the accelerations and the turns it made. Whoever drove it learned fast, too. He ...
— The Invaders • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... of iron, were an obvious and formidable missile weapon. Thus, at the assault of Rochemiglion "They within cast out great barres of iron, and pots with lyme, wherewith they hurt divers Englishmen, such as adventured themselves too far."—Froissart, ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... through the gloom until, in the ditch, his fingers closed over a ten-pound stone. One smashing blow on the head, with this missile, would bring a swift and merciful end ...
— His Dog • Albert Payson Terhune
... late. Before the lever controlling the steam windlass that released the anchor could be shoved over, another shell plunged through the thin iron plates in the bows, smashing a steam pipe, and jamming the hawser gear by its impact. The missile burst with a terrific report. A sailor was knocked overboard, the carpenter was killed outright, two other men were seriously wounded, and Hozier received a blow on the forehead from a flying scrap of metal that stretched ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... and contrary to precedent. A dog, a human hand armed with a missile, a furious minatory face—these things were not present to account for the breach of etiquette. Vaguely he perceived this, conscious only of inexplicability; but he himself also ceased, ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... then cleared his throat with the sound of a strongly-driven wood-rasp catching on an old nail, and sent the result whirling from his mouth at a butterfly on a stem of lignum—sent it with such accurate calculation of the distance of his object, the trajectory of his missile, and the pace of his horse, that the mucous disc smote the ornamental insect fair on the back, laying it out, never to rise again. This was but a ceremonious prologue, intended to deepen the impression ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... Army (PLA): comprises ground forces, Navy (including naval infantry and naval aviation), Air Force, and II Artillery Corps (strategic missile force), People's Armed Police Force (internal security troops, nominally a state security body but included by the Chinese as part of the "armed forces" and considered to be an adjunct to ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... Both in land and sea fights the commanders appear to have been protected from missile weapons,—stones, arrows, spears,—by a shieldburg: that is, by a party of men bearing shields surrounding them in such a way that the shields were a parapet, covering those within the circle. The Romans had a similar military arrangement ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... the word is probably cognate with "bale," Teutonic in origin, cf. also Lat. follis, and Gr. [Greek: palla]), any rounded body, particularly one with a smooth surface, whether used for games, as a missile, or applied to such rounded bodies as the protuberance at the root of the thumb or the big toe, to an enarthrosis, or "ball socket" joint, such as that of the hip or shoulder, and the like. A ball, as the essential feature ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... lips some missile, from its peculiar sound I judged it was the leg off an iron pot, hurtled past my head, fired evidently from a smoothbore gun with a large charge of bad powder. Then I remembered the war-horn and ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... impute the higher faculties to even the lowest forms of animal life. Much in our own lives is purely automatic—the quick reaction to appropriate stimuli, as when we ward off a blow, or dodge a missile, or make ourselves agreeable to the opposite sex; and much also is ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... he should do. Examination showed that it was a painful and dangerous shoulder shot. He cleared away the stains, washed the hole, plucked the threads of cloth out of it, turned the man on his face and, with two quick slashes of a razor, cut out the missile ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... use of "explosive" bullets, which makes the "man in the street" so indignant, it is worth mentioning that, as far as I am aware, not a single instance of the employment of such a missile came under the notice of our medical staff with Lord Methuen's column. I do not for one instant deny that occasionally such bullets may have been fired at our troops, but it is clear that the utmost confusion prevails about the ...
— With Methuen's Column on an Ambulance Train • Ernest N. Bennett
... spread the dressing-gown to more effective disguise about the extended form. But an unforeseen and in the circumstances rather horrible interval followed, for Creake, in accordance with some detail of his never-revealed plan, continued to shower missile after missile against the panes until even the ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... an arm and leveled at Brand something that looked rather like an elongated, old-fashioned flashlight. Brand involuntarily ducked. The clear glass panel between them and the mob outside gave him a queasy feeling of being exposed to whatever missile might ...
— The Red Hell of Jupiter • Paul Ernst
... doubt that the sculptor has truthfully caught one of the rapidly changing positions which the exercise involved. Having passed the discus from his left hand to his right, the athlete has swung the missile as far back as possible. In the next instant he will hurl it forward, at the same time, of course, advancing his left foot and recovering his erect position. Thus Myron has preferred to the comparatively easy task of representing ...
— A History Of Greek Art • F. B. Tarbell
... that a ladylike retort?" Corrie queried, freeing himself from the silken missile. "Tell her ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... the girl; and the young countryman turned aside just in time to escape the full force of the missile. It grazed the side of his head, however, with such violence as to bring him to his knees, and the blood spread throbbing out of the long cut like a scarlet veil. The drummers whipped their horse to a gallop, ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... nature of the weapon concerned, the wound is of the punctured, contused, and lacerated variety. Its severity depends on the size, shape, and velocity of the missile, the range at which the weapon is discharged, and the part of the ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... the great fellow I have mentioned, who (by reason of height and length of arm) struck me oftenest; once indeed when (beside myself with fury) I raised my head to curse him, he took me a blow in the mouth with some vile missile that set my very ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... beginning to rattle on Pitt's Olympian Dwelling-place,—high really as Olympus, in comparison with others of the kind, but which unluckily is made of GLASS like the rest of them! The slinger of this first resounding little missile, Walpole informs us, was "one Mauduit, formerly a Dissenting Teacher,"—son of a Dissenting Minister in Bermondsey, I hear, and perhaps himself once a Preacher, but at present concerned with Factorage of Wool on the ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... resounded through the village. Hearing the fatal signal, the Indians, attending upon their masters, assailed them with whatever missile they could command. Some seized upon pikes and swords; others snatched up the pots in which meal was stewing at the fire, and beating the Spaniards about the head, bruised and scalded them at the same time. Some caught up plates, pitchers, jars, and the pestles ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... about that, Lee. I don't know what the truth is; I probably never shall. But I know that my government did not launch that missile. During the first days after yours began coming in, I talked to people who had been in the Kremlin at the time. One had been in the presence of Klyzenko himself when the news of your bombardment arrived. He said that Klyzenko was absolutely stunned. We always believed that your ...
— The Answer • Henry Beam Piper
... the word. The canvas covering was torn off the gun and cast aside, the train-tackles were manned, and a minute afterward a fifteen-second shrapnel went shrieking toward the brig, all the privateer's men standing on tiptoe to watch the effect of the shot. To Marcy's great delight the missile struck the water far short of the mark, ricocheted along the surface a few hundred yards farther, and finally exploded, throwing up a cloud of spray, but doing no harm to the brig, which never loosened tack or sheet, but held gallantly on her way. A moment after the shrapnel ...
— Marcy The Blockade Runner • Harry Castlemon
... car, in which the hand of the driver has to be perpetually on the steering-gear, and his eye perpetually on the alert, the pilot engine seemed to be flung forward like a missile, guided by its own velocity, and clinging to the endless rails with its wheels as with iron claws. With the rush as of wind, with the roar as of a cataract, with the rocking as of an earthquake, the throbbing thing of iron sprang and ...
— The International Spy - Being the Secret History of the Russo-Japanese War • Allen Upward
... to offend a man very grievously to get him to disgorge his treasure. In this country, except among ladies in comparatively humble circumstances, anything like this fluent, explicit, detailed, and sincere cursing, aimed, missile-fashion, at a personal enemy, is not found. It was quite common a few centuries ago; indeed, in the Middle Ages it was part of the recognised procedure. Aggrieved parties would issue a father's curse, an orphan's curse, and so ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... thoughts whirl giddily, Verging towards dreams. Starting, I shake my bed;— Loud thumps my heart,—rises on end my hair! A murder-screech, and yells of frantic fury, Under my very window,—a duet Of fiendish hatred, battle to the death,— 'T is enough to enrage a man! Missile I seize, Not caring what, and with a savage "Scat!" That scrapes my throat, let drive. I would it were A millstone! Swiftly through the garden beds And o'er the fence on either side they fly; I to my couch return, but not to sleep. Weary I toss, and think 't is almost dawn, So ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various
... further share in the conversation. The canoe had drifted closer to the ship. It was about eighty yards distant when the Indian who was on his feet suddenly whirled a sling, and sent a stone crashing through the window of the music-room. The heavy missile, which, when picked up, was found to weigh nearly half a pound, just missed Tollemache, who was the first to take note of the sharp warning given by Suarez, but failed, nevertheless, to dodge ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... the monkey to remember his promise. The monkey at first took no notice of the crab's complaints, but at last he picked out the hardest, greenest persimmon he could find and aimed it at the crab's head. The persimmon is as hard as stone when it is unripe. The monkey's missile struck home and the crab was sorely hurt by the blow. Again and again, as fast as he could pick them, the monkey pulled off the hard persimmons and threw them at the defenseless crab till he dropped dead, covered with wounds all over his body. There ...
— Japanese Fairy Tales • Yei Theodora Ozaki
... ill-treatment at the hands of the public. The young girls were perfectly sincere, in their rude way, but this did not prevent men from offering them every insult malice could devise, and making them a target for every missile at hand. So little does the public think for itself in cases like this, that at the opening of the performance had some well-known person given the signal for applause, the whole audience would, in all probability, have been delighted and made the ...
— Worldly Ways and Byways • Eliot Gregory
... witness it might have seemed that the missile materialized out of the air, the effect being better than ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... "with Dutch courage," as the saying went, the manner of which was to broach a cask of rum and drink your fill. On the approach of the press-boats pandemonium broke loose. The maddened crew, brandishing their cutlasses and shouting defiance, assailed the on-coming boats with every description of missile they could lay hands on, not excepting that most dangerous of all casual ammunition, broken bottles. The Shrewsbury's mate fell, seriously wounded, and finding themselves unable to face the terrible ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... learns the various sounds and calls of birds and beasts. Never wearing eye-glasses, until very late in life, and then only for reading, he was able, when standing behind or directly before a cannon, to see the missile moving as a black spot on the invisible air, and from a side view to perceive the short plug of condensed air in front of a ball, which is now clearly revealed by instantaneous photography. He soon noted how the variation in the charge of powder, and the ...
— Charles Carleton Coffin - War Correspondent, Traveller, Author, and Statesman • William Elliot Griffis
... fourth truss, and making for the fifth. Guillaume, dimly seeing the fourth truss not thrown, but left in its place, discharged another shot at it. The fifth truss caught him in the side and drove him against the wooden block. He turned swiftly in the direction whence the missile came, and fired again. He was half dazed, his eyes and ears seemed full of the dust of the straw. He fired once again at random, swearing savagely; and before he could recover aim his arm was seized from behind, his neck was caught in a vigorous garotte, and he ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope
... few seconds, and in less time than it takes to tell, the young man, whose name was Van Renner, found himself face to face with a huge grey wolf. Quick as thought, he fitted an arrow to his bow, and shot. The missile struck the wolf in the side, and with a howl of pain the wounded creature turned tail and fled ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... shrill "F-r-r-r" and flew right over the boat. A clean-shaven pilot sat motionless, his hands on the wheel; below him an observer gazed downward, waiting. Suddenly the latter lifted a bomb and threw it into a tube. The missile flashed in the air and plunged into the sea at the very side of the boat. One of the crew fired his rifle, and the observer threw up his leather-covered arms with outspread fingers. Slowly circling under the fire of the ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... hampered by bodily ailments and the deep discouragements of those who should have aided him. Pitted against the trained minds and the wealth of other nations, he had gone forth a very David to battle, and, like David, the simplicity of his missile had given him the victory. Other telegraphs had been devised by other men; some had actually been put into operation, but it would seem as if all the nations had held their breath until his appeared, and, sweeping all the others from the field, ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse
... the soldiers, and this was kept up with wonderful activity—the women and children supplied the men with the materials—the stones in the streets were at once picked up—old walls were pulled down—every article that would answer for a missile was brought into use; an iron pot, which had been flung with immense violence by the handle, struck the second officer in command in the face, and dashed his brains out. Immediately that either part of the square battalion ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... from the enemy's guns passed high over my head. I well remember the screech of that missile as it cut through the air and lost itself in the distance. "Too high, Captain Bledsoe," exclaimed our artillery officer, as he planted a shell among the Rebel gunners. In firing a half-dozen rounds the Rebels obtained our range, and then used their guns with ...
— Camp-Fire and Cotton-Field • Thomas W. Knox
... unwieldy weapons, with the imperfect mechanical appliances then used for loading them, prevented her doing the injury that might have been expected. One shot struck square, breaking through the port side of the armor; but even so the missile itself did not enter the vessel, a strong evidence of the power of the Tennessee to resist a single shot. But she was not equally invulnerable to the sustained and continuous hammering of even lighter projectiles. The Winnebago's turrets, being out of order, could not ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... thing about him, he found food of all sorts where Bompard and La Touche had found nothing; he brought in crabs and cray-fish and penguins eggs, he brought down rabbits with stones. That was his great art. A stone in the hand of Raft was a terrible missile and ...
— The Beach of Dreams • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... projected at him like a missile, and he sat down on the ground between the guards who were trying to hold him up and ...
— The Black Feather - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... nothing in it but doggerel,—generally very dull doggerel,—we might wonder at the applause it obtained, if we did not recollect how fiercely the two great parties engaged each other. In a riot, any stick, stone, or ignoble fragment of household pottery is valuable as a missile weapon. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... in Jim Felton rose on the instant. "Pelt him, Ches! Pelt him!" he cried, and let fly the rock in his hand by way of illustration. A wild animal seems to have little idea of a missile. ...
— The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch • Henry Wallace Phillips
... It was a strictly temporary star, but even from a quarter-million-mile distance it was incredibly bright. It was a bomb, blasting a metal-foil flimsy which the electronic brain of a missile-rocket could only perceive as an unidentified and hence enemy object. Bomb and rocket and flimsy metal foil turned ...
— A Matter of Importance • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... sudden too. Only a couple of minutes before, he had been discussing plans with Waterman, who had urged him to be more than ordinarily careful in carrying out the instructions from Headquarters, and yet here he was accused of communicating with the enemy, and seen by a trustworthy soldier to throw a missile ...
— Tommy • Joseph Hocking
... persuade her to go back in the boat with Hugh again. She raised her arm; and the sound of a shot was sent over the water, followed simultaneously with a sharp, splintering sound, as the little leaden missile tore its way along the stern ...
— Miss Dexie - A Romance of the Provinces • Stanford Eveleth
... successful chase, and governed by the fierce resolve that his betrayer should not escape him. For an instant he stopped. It was only to pick up a huge stone. Then he ran on again, and, careless whether Dubois fired or not, he flung the missile at him. ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... Silvio took the chalk and corrected the score again. The officer, heated with wine, play, and the laughter of his comrades, considered himself grossly insulted, and in his rage he seized a brass candlestick from the table, and hurled it at Silvio, who barely succeeded in avoiding the missile. We were filled with consternation. Silvio rose, white with rage, and ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various
... left the natural curve of the feather at the nock, and while the rear binding started an inch or more from the butt of the arrow, the feather drooped over the nock. This gave a pretty effect and seemed to add to the steering qualities of the missile. ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... with but this drawback, that she had now got somewhat crazy in her fastenings, and made rather more water in a heavy sea than her one little pump could conveniently keep under. As the fitful gust struck her headlong, as if it had been some invisible missile hurled at us from off the hill-tops, she stooped her head lower and lower, like old stately Hardyknute under the blow of the "King of Norse," till at length the lee chain-plate rustled sharp through the foam; but, like a staunch Free Churchwoman, the lowlier she bent, the ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... magnetic attraction which glass has for the missile of the juvenile thrower, the orchid-house, on the opposite side of the path from the pear-tree, drew the errant stone ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... Hradzka was to drag the dead cow out of the stable, dig a hole, and bury it. This Hradzka did, carefully examining the wound in the cow's head—the weapon, he decided, was not an energy-weapon, but a simple solid-missile projector. ...
— Flight From Tomorrow • Henry Beam Piper
... pleasant pastimes on the plains of Ida. When they had tired of leaping and foot-racing and tilting, they placed Balder before them as a target again; and, as each threw his weapon toward the shining mark, they laughed to see the missile turn aside from its course, and refuse to strike the honored one. But blind Hoder stood sorrowfully away from the others, and did not join in any of their sports. Loki, seeing this, went to ...
— The Story of Siegfried • James Baldwin
... the creature gave another of its alarming growls. Hardly thinking what he was doing, Billy, startled by a shrill caterwaul, which followed the growl, flung his lighted torch full at the eyes, and heard a screech that sounded as if his blazing missile had struck ...
— The Ocean Wireless Boys And The Naval Code • John Henry Goldfrap, AKA Captain Wilbur Lawton
... a small piece of paving-wood, dexterously hurled by the dirty-faced boy, who seemed to be finding time hang rather heavily on his hands. It took a passing citizen in the small of the back, but when he swung round to detect the source of the missile the boy was on his knees again ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... time wild rumours had spread through the city, and on the way back the troops were mobbed. They were pelted with every kind of missile and many were hurt, though none seriously; and it understates the truth to say that they were in no danger. They had their bayonets, and from time to time made thrusts at their assailants. At last, ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... chuckled gleefully as the jerked leaf returned to it. As a boy he fashioned a larger and permanent toy, surreptitiously using his father's stone tomahawk and shell knife, while the old man was after wallaby with a waddy. As a young man, hunting or fighting, he found his boyish toy a very effective missile. Even for a straight shot it had a longer range and far higher velocity, with less strength expenditure, than the waddy or nulla-nulla; and its homing flight had practical if not frequent uses. In his childhood, adolescence and maturity the ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... shovelling away on the housetops were jovial and full of glee, calling out to one another from the parapets, and now and then exchanging a facetious snowball—better-natured missile far than many a wordy jest—laughing heartily if it went right, and not less heartily if it went wrong. The poulterers' shops were still half open, and the fruiterers' were radiant in their glory. There were great, round, potbellied baskets of chestnuts, ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... so exasperated the minister that he flung a book at Tammas. The scene that followed was one that few Auld Licht manses can have witnessed. According to Tammas the book had hardly reached the floor when the minister turned white. Tammas picked up the missile. It was a Bible. The two men looked at each other. Beneath the window Mr. Byars's children were prattling. His wife was moving about in the next room, little thinking what had happened. The minister held out his hand for the Bible, but Tammas ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... crumpled nose of the flitter and punched its button with the tip of the needler barrel. Then he threw a rock at the dangling belt. The stone landed, taking the wide protective band with it to the ground. That force field which should have warded off the missile was ...
— Voodoo Planet • Andrew North
... nearly choked, and spluttered out: "You're a liar; I'm not hit in the back." But there was a gash in the back where the exploding missile had torn away and carried out portions of my lung and bits ...
— Private Peat • Harold R. Peat
... terrified. Never before had they heard the report of a gun. They knew not what had struck down their chief. No missile had been seen. None could be found. The savages were very superstitious. They thought this must be the work of witchcraft; that they were attacked by evil spirits, whose power was invincible. They had seen the lightning flash, ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... to scale, are covered with armed men, who throng to the part of the wall against which the attack is to be directed, and stand there ready with spears, javelins, rocks, and every other conceivable missile, to hurl upon the heads of the ...
— Pyrrhus - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... ripped a cleat loose; then, laying about him with this weapon, he cleared a space. It was already difficult to distinguish friend from foe, but he saw Alton Clyde go down a short distance away and made a rush to rescue him. His pine slat splintered against a head, he dodged a missile, then struck with the fragment in his hand, and, snatching Clyde by the arm, dragged him out from under foot. Battered and bruised, the two won back to Emerson's first position, and watched the tide ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... one dares to resist or ill-treat them. Hence, access to the town is often difficult; for should one of the apes take a dislike to any unlucky traveller, he is sure to be assailed by the whole community, who follow him with all the missile weapons they can collect, as pieces of bamboo, stones, and dirt, making at the same time a most hideous howling. Of the danger attending a meeting with enemies of this description, the following is a melancholy ...
— A Hundred Anecdotes of Animals • Percy J. Billinghurst
... that was the entry door, reflecting the blazing light at a different angle. Behind it, McGillis's tightly grinning face. Under McGillis's face, the stab of blue-white light reflected a glancing ray from the old-fashioned solid-missile service pistol that Jason had insisted all four men arm ...
— Zero Data • Charles Saphro
... advance and cause them to recoil. These intrepid colonists, with cool, unerring aim, wasted not a bullet. Every report of the musket was the death of an Indian. The savages, thus repulsed, took refuge behind trees and rocks, and with great bravery pressed and harassed the English with every missile of savage warfare. A rear-guard was now appointed, under Captain Underhill, which kept the savages at a distance, while the whole party marched slowly toward the vessels, which ...
— King Philip - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... defence of a free press. The question now is, Did he act within the constitution and the laws? The men who fell in State Street, on the 5th of March, 1770, did more than Lovejoy is charged with. They were the first assailants upon some slight quarrel, they pelted the troops with every missile within reach. Did this bate one jot of the eulogy with which Hancock and Warren hallowed their memory, hailing them as the first martyrs in the cause of American liberty? If, sir, I had adopted what are called Peace principles, ...
— American Eloquence, Volume II. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... own comrades over the edge. McNeir had his thigh broken by a pike, and was dragged back after the first rush was over; and the mate of the bark was near to drowning, being rescued, indeed, by Graham, the tanner. Mr. Hood stood white in the gangway, dodging a missile now and then, waiting his chance, which never came. For many of the sailors were captured and carried bodily to the "Rose and Crown" and the "Three Blue Balls," where they became properly drunk on Jamaica rum; others made good their escape on board. And at length the bark cast off again, amidst ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... at her window, and down the ladder, and had it well on the way back to the hooks on Jerrold's fence when seized and challenged by the officer of the day. Mad terror possessed him then. He struck blindly, dashed off in panicky flight, paid no heed to sentry's cry or whistling missile, but tore like a racer up the path and never slackened speed ...
— From the Ranks • Charles King
... of cavalry; [91] and in all perilous emergencies, their warriors were so conscious of their ignorance, that they chose to dismount from their horses and fight on foot. Unpractised in the use of pikes, or of missile weapons, they were encumbered by the length of their swords, the weight of their armor, the magnitude of their shields, and, if I may repeat the satire of the meagre Greeks, by their unwieldy intemperance. Their independent spirit disdained the yoke of subordination, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... was coming, and the instant the missile left the hand of Lone Bear, he dropped flat on his side, as if smitten by a thunderbolt. The shouting Pawnees, who were some distance behind, supposed his skull had been cloven by the fiercely-driven tomahawk, but it was ...
— Footprints in the Forest • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... the formicary is constructed, the defenders, projecting their terminal segments as far into space as possible, eject formic acid in the direction of the enemy. Like shrapnel from machine guns, the liquid missile sweeps a considerable area. Against the sunlight it appears as a continuous spray, and should one infinitesimal drop descend into the eye the stoutest mortal will blink. Attacks are made singly and in detachments. Heroes actually hurl themselves from the branches, and, ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... mortars proper, and most of the "fish-tail" family, are somewhat similar to ordinary artillery shells in that they are made of steel or iron and designed to burst into small fragments, each of which constitutes a deadly missile. On the other hand, the "mines" thrown by the Minenwerfer, are merely light sheet-metal containers for heavy charges of high explosives (T. N. T. or tri-nitro-toluol as a rule), and depend for their effectiveness on the ...
— The Emma Gees • Herbert Wes McBride
... They did not. One missile was blasted as the cover of its launcher-tube opened. Another was blown in half when partly out of its tube and a third actually rammed a sinking bomb and vanished with it when ...
— Talents, Incorporated • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... a "soaker" of a snowball in his left ear while hurrying to the gymnasium. He did not know who threw the missile, but was satisfied in his mind that it came from either Glutts ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... (so called, it bears bunches of scarlet nutlets) - which grew upon the brink. As I so swung, I received a crack on the head that knocked me all abroad. Impossible to guess what tree had taken a shy at me. So many towered above, one over the other, and the missile, whatever it was, dropped in the stream and was gone before I had recovered my wits. (I scarce know what I write, so hideous a Niagara of rain roars, shouts, and demonizes on the iron roof - it is pitch ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... thirty paces short of the ladder he stopped. From that spot he hurled his first rock. His was a young, powerful arm and the missile sped upward as if shot from a catapult. It struck the face of the cliff a short distance above the head of the climber and glanced off to go hurtling down among the ...
— Quill's Window • George Barr McCutcheon
... that a ruined man was sure to play in 1830 when his name in politics was 'the courageous Cerizet.' He was sent off into a very snug little sub-prefecture. Unluckily for him, it is one thing to be in opposition—any missile is good enough to throw, so long as the flight lasts; but quite another to be in office. Three months later, he was obliged to send in his resignation. Had he not taken it into his head to attempt to win ...
— A Man of Business • Honore de Balzac
... myself had been amused by them many a time. In a book which I had read only a few days before our cold-dinner party a shop-woman, annoyed with an omnibus conductor, had thrown a superannuated orange at him. It had found its billet not on him but on a perfectly inoffensive spectator. The missile, said the writer, "'it a young copper full in the hyeball." I had enjoyed this when I read it, but now that Fate had arranged a precisely similar situation, with myself in the role of the young copper, the fun of the thing appealed ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse
... figure of the big gentleman in spectacles, but his bravery had inspired him with a very genuine feeling of respect, so, when his practiced ear detected a shell coming their way, he had acted the part of a friend and placed the civilian in a safer position. The missile landed some ten paces from where they were and exploded, covering them both with earth and debris. The citizen kept his feet and received not so much as a scratch, while the officer had both ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... Leonardo da Vinci and by him attributed to Archimedes.[8] The Congreve rocket is said to have an Eastern origin, Sir William Congreve having observed its destructive effects when employed by the forces under Tippoo Saib in the Mahratta war, on which he adopted and improved the missile, and brought out the invention ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... moment my fingers clutched the empty air he was already perched on the top of the high bookcase, with his thumb at his nose in token of derision. I flung the poker at him, and missed. I fired the bootjack. In a blind rage I flew from place to place, and snatched and hurled any missile that came handy; the storm of books, inkstands, and chunks of coal gloomed the air and beat about the manikin's perch relentlessly, but all to no purpose; the nimble figure dodged every shot; and not only that, but burst into a cackle of sarcastic and triumphant laughter as I sat down ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... agitated last night, by the passage between Mr. Biddle, of Pittsburgh, and Mr. Downing, of Florida. Mr. D. exclaimed "do you impute falsehood to me!" at the same time catching up some missile and making a demonstration to advance upon Mr. Biddle. Mr. Biddle repeated his accusation, and meanwhile, Mr. Downing ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... throw light on this. If a javelin thrower or a marksman should aim at a target, from which a line was drawn straight back for a mile and should err in aim by only a finger's breadth, the missile or the bullet at the end of the mile would have deviated very far from the line. So would it be if the Lord did not, at every moment and even the least fraction of a moment, look to what is eternal in foreseeing and making provision ...
— Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence • Emanuel Swedenborg
... chances of avoiding it, and on the wisdom of now drawing his weapon and cutting his way through the mob, there came from the door a call of "Hold! hold!" and a young officer dashed in, his arm raised against the brutal missile in the hands of the ticket-of-leave man, whose Chauvinism was a matter of absinthe, natural evil, and Gabrielle Rouget. "Wretches! scum of France!" he cried: "what is this here? And you, Gabrielle, do you ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... own independent commander; but the undersigned, moved by the considerations adverted to above, may be willing to stipulate that if the city should by capitulation be garrisoned by a part of his troops no missile shall be fired from within the city or from its bastions or walls upon the castle, unless the castle should previously fire upon the city. The undersigned has the honor to tender his distinguished opponent, his Excellency the general and commander in chief of Vera Cruz, the assurance ...
— General Scott • General Marcus J. Wright
... impartial, none the less does Verdanna essay to taunt and provoke Dominora; yet not with the like result. Perceive you, Braid-Beard, that the trade-wind blows dead across this strait from Dominora, and not from Verdanna? Hence, when King Bello's men fling gibes and insults, every missile hits; but those of Verdanna are blown back in its teeth: her enemies jeering her ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... on its way, and Mr. Ambleton, the gunner, fully justified the reputation he had earned, though the missile only ploughed up the earth in front of the party on the fort. But then Lieutenant Fourchon proved that he was a wise and a prudent man, as well as a brave one, for he retreated from the exposed position with his men. It was almost sure death for them to remain there, ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... Kensington Gardens. An enormous dimple had been made by the impact of the projectile, which lay almost buried in the earth. Two or three trees, broken by its fall, sprawled on the turf. Among this debris was the missile; resembling nothing so much as a huge crinoline. At the moment we reached the spot P.C. A581 was ordering it off; and Henry Pearson, aged 28 (no fixed abode), and Martha Griffin, aged 54, of Maybury Tenements, were circulating among the crowd offering ...
— The War of the Wenuses • C. L. Graves and E. V. Lucas
... this—a bombardment by the Huns?" yelled Fred, and promptly returning by sending a sneaker at his cousin. But the footwear struck Randy, who promptly returned the missile and followed it up with a book and ...
— The Rover Boys in the Land of Luck - Stirring Adventures in the Oil Fields • Edward Stratemeyer
... time Colonel Gansevoort himself had come up, and thus we understood that he was to direct the firing. If our cannon could carry a missile to the place of torture, then certain it was the red-skinned brutes would receive a lesson well calculated to surprise those who were left alive after the piece had ...
— The Minute Boys of the Mohawk Valley • James Otis
... himself unable to effect his design, he sent back orders for raising another fleet, and, with the troops which he had, marched into Peloponnesus, and laid siege to the city of Messena. In attacking which place, he was in danger of death; for a missile from an engine struck him in the face, and passed through the cheek into his mouth. He recovered, however, and, as soon as he was in a condition to take the field, won over divers cities which had revolted from him, and made an incursion into Attica, where he took Eleusis and Rhamnus and wasted ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... from Theodoric could arrive, but his soldiers, confident in their power to beat the Franks unassisted, began to revile their king's over-caution and his father-in-law's delay, and forced Alaric to fight.[102] The Goths began hurling their missile weapons, but the daring Franks rushed in upon them and commenced a hand-to-hand encounter, in which they were completely victorious. The Goths turned to flee, and Clovis, riding up to where Alaric was fighting, slew him with ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin
... flashing downward in a long slant toward the beleaguered Third City, and from the flying vessel there was launched toward the city's central lagoon a torpedo. No missile this, but a capsule containing a full ton of allotropic iron, which would be of more use to the Nevian defenders than millions of men. For the Third City was sore pressed indeed. Around it was one unbroken ring of boiling, exploding water—water billowing upward with searing, blinding ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith
... miles south of the Manhattan Project's headquarters at Los Alamos, New Mexico. Today this 3,200 square mile range, partly located in the desolate Jornada del Muerto Valley, is named the White Sands Missile Range and is actively used ...
— Trinity [Atomic Test] Site - The 50th Anniversary of the Atomic Bomb • The National Atomic Museum
... had greeted Mutimer's appearance at the window were followed by a steady roar, mingled with scornful laughter at his speedy retreat; only a few saw or suspected that he had been gravely hit by the missile. Then the tumult began to change its character; attention was drawn from the house to the advancing police, behind whom came a band of Mutimer's adherents, led by Redgrave. The latter were cheering; the ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... The ceaseless flashing of the great guns, lighting up with a lurid glare the dense clouds of smoke that hang over the scene of battle; the roar of the artillery; the shriek of the shell as it leaves the cannon's mouth, slowly dying into a murmur and a dull explosion, as, with a flash of fire, the missile explodes far away,—combine to form a picture, that, despite the horrors of wounds and death, rouses the enthusiasm and admiration of the beholder. When viewed from the deck of one of an attacking fleet, the scene is even more impressive. At each discharge of the great guns, the vessel reels ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... exists in wounds made by firearms, according to the distance from which the death-dealing missile comes, was seen when the physicians began to examine the last of the murdered men. The ball that had caused the latter's death had scarcely crossed a yard of space before reaching him, and his wound was not ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... hold up their trunks and open their mouths, and then the men would try to toss pieces of gingerbread in. The elephants were always ready to do this when ordered, though their mouths, when they opened them, were so small that the people very seldom succeeded in aiming the missile so ...
— Rollo in Paris • Jacob Abbott
... it banged the mizzen shrouds to port, and then came swooping back across the deck, to slam against the starboard shrouds. The clanging, tethered missile it bore on its end seemed to be searching for a victim. When the boom met the starboard shrouds in its ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... heard the great clamor, The war-trumpet winding. One did the Geat-prince [50] Sunder from earth-joys, with arrow from bowstring, 50 From his sea-struggle tore him, that the trusty war-missile ...
— Beowulf - An Anglo-Saxon Epic Poem • The Heyne-Socin
... Little need have you to do aught save look at them. Here is a gift for you," and with that he hurled a spear with so true an aim that, if Osmund had not stooped like a flash, his share in the fight would have come to an end there and then. As it was, the missile struck another man between the shoulders and laid him on ...
— Vandrad the Viking - The Feud and the Spell • J. Storer Clouston
... sheltered from all danger, at least for a time, when a bolt of lightning, as he at first thought it, shot from the nearest group of foes, flashed over his head, and striking what remained of the roof, stood trembling in it, an arrow of blazing fire. The appearance of this missile, followed, as it immediately was, by several others discharged from the same tow, confirmed the soldier's resolution to remove the females, while it greatly increased his anxiety; for although there was little fear that the flames could be communicated from the arrows to the ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... automobile, and was now standing up in the seat, from which position he could dominate the throng. "Arrest that man!" he shouted again, pointing his finger; and three of the guards leaped into the crowd at the spot indicated. The man who had thrown the missile started to run, but he could not go fast in the crowd, and in a moment, as it seemed, the guards had him by the collar. He tried to jerk away, and they struck him over the head, and laid about them to keep the rest of the throng at ...
— Jimmie Higgins • Upton Sinclair
... Would it still kick and show temper, then?" cried Seriosha, seizing a dictionary and throwing it at the unfortunate boy's head. Apparently it never occurred to Ilinka to take refuge from the missile; he merely guarded his ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... although their strength is but feeble, and with difficulty drive him out, when he is satiated with food, so then at length the magnanimous Trojans and far-summoned allies continually followed Ajax, the mighty son of Telamon, striking the middle of his shield with missile weapons. And Ajax, sometimes wheeling about, was mindful of impetuous might, and checked the phalanxes of the horse-breaking Trojans, but again he would turn himself to fly. But he prevented all from advancing to the swift ships, ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... which includes the Ground Forces, Navy (includes Marines and Naval Aviation), Air Force, Second Artillery Corps (the strategic missile force), People's Armed Police (internal security troops, nominally subordinate to Ministry of Public Security, but included by the Chinese as part of the "armed forces" and considered to be an adjunct to the PLA ...
— The 1996 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... A man's figure was framed in the lighted window—a bloated bulk that he knew was Spulvedo. A flame shot from that figure into his very face. The missile struck the roof close to his side and splattered shingle and dirt in his face. Without hesitation, he straightened his own arm and fired point blank at the living mark. Spulvedo emitted a stifled shriek ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... along at a lively clip, and rising too, at the moment that shot sounded, and the leaden missile whizzed past so close to them. Almost through sheer instinct Frank instantly shifted his lever, and started the biplane upward on a slant that was the limit, and ...
— The Airplane Boys among the Clouds - or, Young Aviators in a Wreck • John Luther Langworthy
... Misgiving dubo. Mishap malfelicxo. Misinform malsciigi. Mislay erarigi, negxustmeti, trompi. Mislead erarigi. Mislead (deceive) trompi. Misplaced negxustloka. Misprint preseraro. Misrepresent falsreprezenti. Miss manki. Miss Frauxlino. Missile jxetarmilo. Missing manka. Mission misio. Missionary misiisto. Mist nebuleto. Mistake eraro. Mistaken, to be trompigxi. Mistletoe visko. Mistress (house) mastrino. Mistress (lover) amantino. Mistress (school) instruistino. Mistrust malfido. Mistrust ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... Miss Mackenzie with uncommon ardor tried To hit the mark, the missile flew exceptionally wide, And, before her eyes astounded, On a fallen maple's trunk Ricochetted, and rebounded In the rivulet, and sunk! Matilda, greatly frightened, In her grammar unenlightened, Remarked: "Well now I ast yer! Who'd ...
— Grimm Tales Made Gay • Guy Wetmore Carryl
... Captain Jack, coolly, examining the missile, then dropping it carelessly into his pocket. "Some fellow fired an accidental shot, very likely, and is at this moment the most scared man at Spruce Beach. What's the use of jumping on anyone just because he had ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Spies - Dodging the Sharks of the Deep • Victor G. Durham
... over our heads. I had just taken my place in the cavalry ranks when a shell from the enemy's guns whizzed over our heads with a long and spiteful shriek. One of the horses attached to a caisson was in the path of the fiery missile, and the next instant the animal's head was severed entirely from his neck. The deathly silence was now broken, and more shot and shell followed in quick succession, plowing through the startled air and falling with destructive force among the Union troops. This iron ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... but nothing unmanageable; the cliffs on either side keep off the worst of the force. It is queer to feel moving air after eighteen days in a ship. It takes six minutes to unpack and expand the boat and by that time it is ten minutes since the missile hit and the ...
— The Lost Kafoozalum • Pauline Ashwell
... a tortoise living in the basement, of which Goujon had made rather a pet, and the negro would sometimes use this animal as a missile, flinging it at the little Frenchman's head. On one such occasion the tortoise struck the wall so forcibly as to break its shell, and then Goujon seized a shovel and rushed at his tormentor with such blind fury that the latter made a bolt of it. ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison
... effect. But the mischief had been done, and the crowd was surging round the lonely redoubt where we sat. Besides, I could see that for all his clever talk the meeting did not like the look of him. He was as mild as a turtle dove, but they wouldn't stand for it. A missile hurtled past my nose, and I saw a rotten cabbage envelop the baldish head of the ex-deportee. Someone reached out a long arm and grabbed a chair, and with it took the legs from Gresson. Then the lights suddenly went out, and we retreated in good order by the platform door with ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... Dave caught his victim up, holding him overhead and sending the bravo, heels first, into the face of another scoundrel. The man, struck by this human missile, went to earth dazed, and with ...
— Dave Darrin on Mediterranean Service - or, With Dan Dalzell on European Duty • H. Irving Hancock
... smile we dreamt over by night. Well do we recal with what unexampled ingenuity, we laboured to befit the snow white egg for a rare tenant—attar-gul. Well do we remember how that face, usually so cloudless, became darkened almost to a frown, as our heart's mistress saw the missile approach her. What a radiant smile bewitched us, as it burst on her lap, and filled the air with its fragrance! Truly we ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... to by an alteration in the direction taken by the weapon. The torpedo may be set so as to dive from the surface at any desired interval; but, of course, an appearance in the form of at least a flash is necessary to enable the operator to judge in what direction he is sending his missile. Small torpedo-boats, not manned but sticking to the surface, may be used in the same manner. Each one no doubt runs a very great risk of being hit by shot or shell aimed at them; but out of half a dozen, discharged at short intervals, it would ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... struggle in the open, but they always seemed to be stealing something which belonged to the men who were engaged in the struggle. And apart from this they were so indifferent in their practice of archery that they drew the bowstring only to the breast[5], so that the missile sent forth was naturally impotent and harmless to those whom it hit[6]. Such, it is evident, was the archery of the past. But the bowmen of the present time go into battle wearing corselets and fitted out with greaves which extend up to the knee. From the right side hang their arrows, from the ...
— History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8) - The Persian War • Procopius
... recreation consists in flying but a few hundred feet above the enemy's trenches, and raking them with his machine-gun to show his absolute contempt for their marksmanship. I have seen them in impotent fury fire at him every missile they had, including "pine-apples" and "minnies"; but he bears a charmed life, for, though he returned and repeated his performance four times for our benefit, he did not receive a scratch. I went over the German lines with him for instruction in aerial observation. He said to me: "Do ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... was still warmth in the corpse when the men first discovered it. An arrow had pierced her breast. Evidently she had been conscious that friends were near, and was trying to make her escape when the missile of death produced the ...
— The Life and Adventures of Kit Carson, the Nestor of the Rocky Mountains, from Facts Narrated by Himself • De Witt C. Peters
... him, for at that moment one of the youngsters flung a butternut at the Major, who caught the missile deftly and shot it ...
— The Tale of Major Monkey • Arthur Scott Bailey
... crowd for a while, and then, on a desperate venture, carelessly snapped a peanut shell and hit his Heart's Desire on the chin. He seemed to be looking a thousand miles away in another direction than that which the missile took. He waited nearly a minute—a long, ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... with a sack of dynamite." The lawyer crooked his arm across his face; a missile from the white void had splashed near by and water sprayed him. "You have told me that Latisan is no longer in Flagg's service. I'm not depending now on law, Mr. Craig, I'm depending on ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day
... meat-tub—then empty—with food, While a tree-top near by he was leisurely viewin'' He spied the short ears and sharp eyes of old Bruin, Peering out 'mid the branches—a sight worth a dollar When the rifle is charged and the stomach is hollow; So he drew a bead on him, and sent him a missile, Which Brain perceived, by an ominous whistle, Was very near taking him plump in the eye, But he dodged just in time, and ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... broken open, and the assault made on every part of the walls. Though the Samnites, before they saw the assailants on the works, had possessed courage enough to oppose their approaches to the city, yet now, when the action was no longer carried on at a distance, nor with missile weapons, but in close fight; and when those, who had with difficulty gained the walls, having overcome the disadvantage of ground, which, they principally dreaded, fought with ease on equal ground, against an enemy inferior in strength, they all forsook ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... nearly eleven o'clock on Sunday night before they were ready to start on their errand. Meantime Aggie had done two turns at the foreign clubs, and John Storm had led a procession through Crown Street and been hit by a missile thrown by a "Skeleton," whom he declined to give in charge. At the corner of the alley he stopped to ask Mrs. Pincher to wait up for him, and the girl's large eyes caught sight of the patch ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... Henri and his men waited for perhaps half an hour, during which time the fusillade from the men of the 24th Brandenburg Regiment sent a hail of bullets in their direction. They thudded against the bags continuously, while often enough a missile would strike the concrete ceiling of the chamber, and, ricochetting from it, would mushroom against the opposite wall; some even struck the walls limiting the stairway on either side, and, breaking off at a tangent and exploding from the impact, ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
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