"Ambuscade" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... voices at once began answering the interpreter. A French officer, returning from the advanced detachment, rode up to Murat and reported that the gates of the citadel had been barricaded and that there was probably an ambuscade there. ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... Sir Walter Ralegh and others.' He thought this a proof that 'it was no matter of treason against her Majesty, but rather a manifestation of the contrary.' Essex gave out that his rising was prompted by a discovery that there was an ambuscade of musketeers placed upon the water by the device of Lord Cobham and Ralegh, to murder him in the way as he passed. Blount, at his trial, confessed there was no foundation for the allegation. In reply to ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... some common sense into her head, but her hair wuz bound up that tight with curl papers that nothin' could git past that ambuscade, so it would seem, but jest the image and the idee of ...
— Samantha at the World's Fair • Marietta Holley
... troops about 11.00 A.M., and passing from one column to another, incautiously rode upon an ambuscade without apprehension, at some distance ahead of his staff and orderlies, and was ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... ambuscade he was thinking no longer of his own safety, but of that of Don Juan and his party. Their critical situation suddenly came before his mind. How were they ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... dark wave of men rushed from the ambuscade, surged up round the car.... swept forward.... she had disappeared! and as Philammon followed breathless, the horses galloped past him madly ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... them all. This fancy pleased my thoughts for some weeks, and I was so full of it that I often dreamed of it, and, sometimes, that I was just going to let fly at them in my sleep. I went so far with it in my imagination that I employed myself several days to find out proper places to put myself in ambuscade, as I said, to watch for them, and I went frequently to the place itself, which was now grown more familiar to me; but while my mind was thus filled with thoughts of revenge and a bloody putting twenty or thirty of them to the sword, ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... there is no difference; it was the chance of the sea, and the ill reward of a humane action—a melancholy end for such a man—like the end of a warrior, not dying Epaminondas-like on the field of victory, but cut off in some poor brawl or ambuscade. But so it was with all these men. They were cut off in the flower of their days, and few of them laid their bones in the sepulchres of their fathers. They knew the service which they had chosen, and they ...
— The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book • Various
... evidently a man of great presence of mind. He put spurs to his horse, and galloped off down the road, partly to escape the danger, but partly also to warn the treasure train, the bells of which were now clanging loudly at a little distance from the ambuscade. ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... the traitor wants; he goes to Charlot and proposes an ambuscade to lie in wait for the two boys and get rid of them; his real purpose being to get rid of the king's son as well as of Huon ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... extract a considerable amount of amusement out of this unexpected happening. He evidently considered that he had been in for more or less luck simply because he happened to be in Fred's company when the other ran into the ambuscade. Colon was not averse to an occasional measure of excitement, and although not all considered a pugnacious fellow, he could at the same time hold ...
— Fred Fenton Marathon Runner - The Great Race at Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... himself in the fort with about two hundred and fifty men. He shortly afterwards sallied out to attack the intrenchments of the Indians, but Pontiac having received intelligence of his intention, laid an ambuscade for him, beat back the troops with great loss, and poor Dalyell fell in the combat that took place near a bridge which still goes by the name of Bloody Bridge. Pontiac cut off the head of Captain Dalyell, and set it upon ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... I think one or two guns had been let off, but happily they did no mischief. We had hailed them several times; but they not hearing, we received no answer, which was the cause of our firing. The boat was then sent on board of her, and she proved to be the Ambuscade man of war, to my no small disappointment. We returned to Portsmouth, without having been in any action, just at the trial of Admiral Byng (whom I saw several times during it): and my master having left the ship, and gone to London for promotion, Dick and I were ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano
... azaleas and almost all the vegetation ceased. Dwarf pines, not big enough to be Christmas trees, grew thinly among loose stones and gravel scaurs. Here and there a big boulder sat quiescent on a knoll, having paused there till the next rain in his long slide down the mountain. There was here no ambuscade for the snakes, you could see clearly where you trod; and yet the higher I went, the more abject and appealing became Chuchu's terror. He was an excellent master of that composite language in which dogs communicate with men, and he would assure me, on his honour, that there was some peril on the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his Pockets were searched, and the Letter was known by the Direction to be one of those which they were order'd to intercept. One of them immediately set out to carry it to him who had appointed the Ambuscade, and he flew to deliver it to Zeokinizul. As the young Bassa appeared to know who was his Rival, suitable Measures were to be taken, and such an Answer sent to him as might throw him into Despair, and make him abandon ...
— The Amours of Zeokinizul, King of the Kofirans - Translated from the Arabic of the famous Traveller Krinelbol • Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crbillon
... crew; In vain their stubborn ardour he would tame, The hand that kindles cannot quench the flame; The wary foe alone hath turned their mood, And shown their rashness to that erring brood: 940 The feigned retreat, the nightly ambuscade, The daily harass, and the fight delayed, The long privation of the hoped supply, The tentless rest beneath the humid sky, The stubborn wall that mocks the leaguer's art, And palls the patience of his baffled art, Of these they had not ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... an admirable spot for an ambuscade. Sanderson saw that there were few places in which his men could conceal themselves, for the hostile force occupied both sides of the defile. Their rifles were still popping, and Sanderson saw two of the Double A force go down before they could ...
— Square Deal Sanderson • Charles Alden Seltzer
... to go that way; it is dangerous for you in the daytime"—it did lend itself to an ambuscade, and persons who knew Wilkes Booth assert having seen him prowling around—"it ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... success of which would unquestionably have ensured the destruction of the Prussian army, counter-orders were issued by the Prince of Eckmuhl, from what motives I know not. General Excelmans alone maintained the battle. He attacked the enemy in advance of Versailles, drove them into an ambuscade, cut them to pieces, and took from them their arms, baggage, and horses. Generals Strulz, Pire, Barthe, and Vincent, colonels Briqueville, Faudoas, St. Amand, Chaillou, Simonnet, Schmid, Paolini, and their brave ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... fascinated, that he had neither eyes nor speech for any one else, though there were dozens of charming girls present. But, I say, Hester! Saw you ever a more frightful place than this, or a more deadly situation for an ambuscade?" ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... longest spell at the crank, of course. He went at his work with a rigid courage. His red-hot anger had cooled down into a shape that was like a bar of forged steel. He meant to make that light revolve if it killed him to do it. He was the captain of a company that had run into an ambuscade. He was going to fight his way through if ...
— The Ruling Passion • Henry van Dyke
... captors, and the deathlike silence that surrounded him. Too vigilant to be taken at unawares, and perhaps long since apprised of the coming of the band, the Indians had resumed their hiding-places in the grass and among the bushes, preparing for the new-comers an ambuscade similar to that they had so successfully practised against Roland's unfortunate party. "Let them hide as they will, detestable miscreants," he uttered to himself with feelings of vindictive triumph; "they will not, this time, have frightened women and a handful of dispirited fugitives ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... his silent reply, for, quick as lightning, he had realised that in another few moments they would be forced to fight in defence, and that it was far better to take the initiative and make the enemy believe that they had fallen into an ambuscade. He gave a short nod, raised his own revolver, glanced at Gedge to see that he was ready, and then roared at the top of ...
— Fix Bay'nets - The Regiment in the Hills • George Manville Fenn
... into an ambuscade, and some of the native artillerymen proving traitors, it was compelled to retire with a very heavy loss of officers and men, and three ...
— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... Bailie called to his son to retire, and the order was obeyed; but the two wounded youths and Bailie Ross's servant were taken prisoners, and carried up the hill, where they were quickly divested of clothes, arms, money, and papers. Easterfearn's son died next morning. The troops faced the ambuscade manfully and are said to have given their fire thrice, and to have beaten the Highlanders from the bushes near them; but, observing at this juncture several parties of the enemy on the neighbouring heights, and being informed ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... would, in some measure, conciliate their favour, and soften their resentment. 21. At first the pride of Bocchus struggled against such a proposal; but a few interviews with Sylla reconciled him to this treacherous measure, and Jugur'tha was given up, being drawn into an ambuscade by the specious pretences of his ally, who deluded him by desiring a conference; and being made a prisoner, he was loaded with chains, and carried by Ma'rius to Rome, a deplorable instance of blighted ambition. 22. He did not long survive his overthrow, being condemned by the senate ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... that, in all its parts; old treaty of Breslau, to be guaranteed, to be actually kept. To me Silesia sure;—from you, Polish Majesty, one million crowns as damages for the trouble and cost this Triple Ambuscade of yours has given me; one million crowns, 150,000 pounds we will say; and all other requisitions to cease on the day of signature. These are my terms: accept these; then wholly, As you were, Empress-Queen and you, and all surviving ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... he could have done; for, despite the discouraging tone of his voice, it seemed joyful to those crouching in concealment; and, yielding to an instinct that they were now saved by the presence of a stanch protector, they rushed from their ambuscade, and in so doing discovered themselves ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... learnt likewise, that the royalists squadron had gone to the port of Santa, to which place he accordingly marched. Aldana got notice of his coming from some Spanish inhabitants of that place, and laid an ambuscade for him, consisting of an hundred and fifty musqueteers, in a place overgrown with tall reeds on the side of the road by which Acosta had to march in his way to Santa. Acosta had certainly fallen into the snare, if he had not fortunately made prisoners of some spies who had been sent ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... effort; and the sound of the hoof may be heard; whereas in nine cases out of ten, a man on foot—that is, such a man as either Rube Rawlings or Bill Garey—will discover the enemy before he is himself seen, or any ambuscade can be attempted. Of course the scout should never advance beyond the possibility of retreating upon ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... certainly insecure with such a fort as Lychnidus untaken in their rear. The garrison of that fort had been reinforced by many cohorts of the regular army who had flocked thither at the general's signal, and with these Sabinianus prepared a formidable ambuscade. He sent a considerable number of infantry round by unfrequented paths over the mountains, and ordered them to take up a commanding but concealed position, and to rush forth from thence at a given signal. He himself started ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin
... was a chant, a saga, a recitation of the glories of his ancestors. The Malhominis had been a proud race,—now they were dwindled to this village of eighty braves. He crooned long tales of famine, of tribal bickerings, of ambuscade and defeat; his voice rustled monotonously ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... them just skinned, for she meant playing a trick upon her father. Then she dug four pits for us to lie in, and sat down to wait till we should come up. When we were close to her, she made us lie down in the pits one after the other, and threw a seal skin over each of us. Our ambuscade would have been intolerable, for the stench of the fishy seals was most distressing {45}—who would go to bed with a sea monster if he could help it?—but here, too, the goddess helped us, and thought of something that gave us great relief, for she put some ambrosia under each man's nostrils, ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... sent for in haste from Paisley. He was in the saddle and away before the bridal party could recover from their first shock of surprise. But even Claverhouse was foiled. His lieutenant, however, had better luck. Colonel Buchan, as he was returning to Paisley by way of Lismahago, came upon an ambuscade of two hundred Covenanters, whose advanced post fired on and wounded one of the soldiers.[46] "They followed the rogues," wrote Claverhouse to Queensberry, "and advertised Colonel Buchan; but before he could come up, our party had ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... which has most attractions for Baden-Powell, and if he had not been locked up in Mafeking all through those precious months at the beginning of the war, it is no idle guesswork to say that we should have lost fewer men and fewer guns by surprise and ambuscade. ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... glory in falling in an ambuscade. It is a death which always implies a little rashness or want of foresight. Often, indeed, he who falls in one meets with but little pity. Those who are not pitied, Raoul, have died to little purpose. Still further, the conqueror laughs, and we Frenchmen ought ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... ago. There was an upward incline, but it was quite easy for the horses. The pass gradually narrowed as they went, and the mountain-sides grew more precipitous, shutting them in like great walls on either side. Little foothold was there for a lurking enemy, and there were no deep gorges where an ambuscade might hide. To defend this part of the pass in the old days must have meant a hand-to-hand struggle in the narrow way. Ellerey noted this as he went. His life in Sturatzberg had made ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... Hoangho. His light cavalry raided past the Chinese capital into the province of Szchuen, and returned laden with the spoil of countless cities. These successes were crowned by a signal victory over the emperor in person. Kaotsou was drawn into an ambuscade in which his troops had no chance with their more active adversaries, and, to save himself from capture, Kaotsou had no alternative but to take refuge in the town of Pingching, where he was closely beleaguered. It was impossible to defend the town for any length of time, and the capture of ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... her veil fall, as if by chance, and I had time to look again upon her face, which was even more beautiful than I had imagined. Her eyes were large and peculiarly black, and fringed by long lashes, which, aided by the collyrium with which they were tinged, formed a sort of ambuscade, from which she levelled her shafts. Her eyebrows were finely arched, and nature had brought them together just over her nose, in so strong a line, that there was no need of art to join them together. Her nose was aquiline, her mouth small, and full of ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... Abbot and his followers arrive, and Robin Hood offers the money to redeem Sir Richard's bond; but, upon a legal quibble, the Abbot declines to receive it—preferring to seize the forfeited land. Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham appear, and Robin and his Foresters form an ambuscade. Sir Richard Lea has been brought in, upon his litter, and Marian stays beside him. Prince John attempts to seize her, but this time he is frustrated by the sudden advent of King Richard—from whose presence he slinks away. The myrmidons of John, however, attack the King, who would oppose ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... experience for the scouts to find the quarry gone when they reached the place where they expected to find him. Pilar's own scouts had found that the ambuscade was destined to fail of its purpose, and the wily leader drew back into the more accessible country. The scouting party did not come in sight of the little brown soldiers. The occasional crack of a Mauser broke the silence of the advance, keeping the Americans in active touch ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... was the battle of Beder. The history of the battle is thus given by Abulfeda: "The apostle, hearing that a caravan of the Meccans was coming home from Syria, escorted by Abu Sofian at the head of thirty men, placed a number of soldiers in ambuscade to intercept it. Abu Sofian, being informed thereof by his spies, sent word immediately to Mecca, whereupon all the principal men except Abu Laheb—who, however, sent Al Asum son of Hesham in his stead—marched out to his assistance, making in all nine hundred ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... "The ambuscade was well-planned, and the Southlanders had enlisted the aid of the Painted Men, to their shame be it said. So our brethren found themselves hemmed in at every point. Yet they sold their lives at a good price, and they are mourning to-day ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... you? As soon as night comes on, you shall order fifteen or twenty men, under the command of your sergeant La Place, to be under arms, and to lay themselves flat on the ground, between this place and the head-quarters." "What the devil!" cried Matta, "an ambuscade? God forgive me, I believe you intend to rob the poor Savoyard. If that be your intention, I declare I will have nothing to say to it" "Poor devil!" said the Chevalier, "the matter is this; it is very likely that we shall win his money. The Piedmontese, ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... the ground was very dry, a cloud of dust had instantly enveloped them, by which means, fortunately, every one of them had escaped unharmed, although on their way they had drawn the fire of more than three hundred Indian rifles, successively discharged at them while passing the lines of the ambuscade. Not thus easily, however, ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... blindness of Bertram, son of Hugo de Jubilet, after the disease had baffled the skill of the Saracen and Christian-Syrian physicians of his day. Now Littre avers that a certain Hugo de Jubilet was involved in an ambuscade in Syria in the year 1227, and that he had a son named Bertram. It is very natural, of course, to conclude that this Bertram was the patient recorded in the book of Gilbert. Kingsford says that Gilbert "met" Bertram in Syria, but ...
— Gilbertus Anglicus - Medicine of the Thirteenth Century • Henry Ebenezer Handerson
... cautiously approached Kief, he left his army in a secluded encampment, and with a few chosen troops floated down the stream in barges, disguised as merchant boats. Landing in the night beneath the high and precipitous banks near the town, he placed a number of his soldiers in ambuscade, and then calling upon the princes of Kief, informed them that he had been sent by the king of Novgorod, with a commercial adventure down the Dnieper, and invited them to ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... light of day could penetrate. The general width was about forty feet, and occasionally it diminished so as not to allow the passage of more than five or six persons abreast. In short, there could be no place in the world better adapted for the consummation of an ambuscade, and it was no more than natural that we should look carefully to our arms as we entered upon it. When I now think of our egregious folly, the chief subject of astonishment seems to be, that we should have ever ventured, under any circumstances, ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... From his ambuscade he looked out upon the approaching canoe. He was puzzled by the slowness of its progress. At times it seemed to stand still, and he could distinguish no movement at all among its occupants. At first he thought they were undecided as to which ...
— Flower of the North • James Oliver Curwood
... is dull! Your horse thinks so, too. He gently tries the reins, and, finding that you offer no resistance, he decides to take a little exercise, and starts off at a canter, keeping away from the wall most piously, avoiding the corners as if some Hector might be in ambuscade there to catch and tame him, and rushing on faster and faster, as you do nothing in particular ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... was held to consider in what manner they should approach the sad and solitary bird, which, unconscious that itself was the object of a formidable ambuscade, stood motionless on a stone, by the brink of the lake, watching for such small fish or water-reptiles as might chance to pass by its lonely station. A brief debate took place betwixt Raoul and the hawk-merchant on the best mode of starting the quarry, so as to allow Lady ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... think long over the best way quickly to awaken the love of the page, and had soon discovered the natural ambuscade in the which the most wary are taken. This is how: at the warmest hour of the day the good man took his siesta after the Saracen fashion, a habit in which he had never failed, since his return from the Holy Land. During this time ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac
... were no enemy within striking reach, well, then this were a pleasant march from Neville to Binch, for that is where I'm told we are going. But, faith, I don't like the sight of this country in which we are being entangled. If Conde has any head, and he is not a fool, he could arrange a fine ambuscade, and catch those mighty and vain-glorious Imperialists and that fool Souches like rats in a trap. Or he might make a sudden attack on the flank and cut our army into two, as you divide a caterpillar ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... fighting among themselves, and man, in his turn, pursuing all kinds of game. He identified nature with woman, both possessing in his eyes an equally deceiving appearance, the same beguiling beauty, and the same spirit of ambuscade and perfidy. The people around him inspired him only with mistrust and suspicion. In every peasant he met he recognized an enemy, prepared to cheat him with wheedling words and hypocritical lamentations. ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... were lying along the lower levels. Sounds, mingled and far ahead, told of the presence of a marching host, and Sergius led his troop on a more oblique course to gain the flank of the foe and lessen the chances of detection and ambuscade. ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... imaginative nor of a romantic turn of mind; but, the circumstances reviewed, it's nothing to his discredit that he entertained a passing suspicion of some curious conspiracy against the girl, thought of an ambuscade, and with quick eyes raked the surroundings for signs of a confederate of ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance
... ambuscade, we moved on, rifles primed and cocked, traversing a wet path bowered by willow and alder, until we reached a cornfield, fenced with split rails. The path skirted this, continuing under a line of huge trees, then ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... cavalry—if such it could be called. Men accustomed from infancy to the saddle and the rifle had seized whatever weapon they were possessed of; and more at home on horseback than on foot, they were, no doubt, ugly enemies in a bush fight, or an ambuscade. Many whole companies had no sabers but those their officers carried, and the very individuality and self-reliance of the men acted as an invincible opponent to drill and discipline. Mounted on horses of all sizes and colors; equipped with all ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... a big man," said the Doctor. "On the whole, he's about our biggest man. An officer who came out of the ambuscade at Fort Duquesne with thirty living men out of three companies and four shot holes in his coat must have an engagement with Destiny. Evidently his work was not finished. You have traveled about some. What is the feeling ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... finished examining his weapons when a cloud of dust slowly advancing in the distance told him that a party of considerable size was on its way towards the ambuscade. He anxiously awaited their approach, and soon recognised Roberval's Picard escort, and the fluttering skirts of the women. If the men in ambush were waiting for them they were doomed, unless he could warn them. To pass from his hiding meant almost instant ...
— Marguerite De Roberval - A Romance of the Days of Jacques Cartier • T. G. Marquis
... perilous situation of Captain Mason became known at the fort, Captain Ogle was sent out with twelve men, to cover his retreat. This party fell into an ambuscade and two-thirds of the number were slain upon the spot. Captain Ogle found a place of concealment, where he was obliged to remain until the end of the siege. Sergeant Jacob Ogle, though mortally wounded, managed to escape, with two ...
— Heroes and Hunters of the West • Anonymous
... but that is not a matter of much consequence the government can stand it. She is bent on capturing me, that is plain; but she will find by and by that what she took for a sleeping garrison was an ambuscade." ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... weeks, travel through Edinburgh up to London. But these reports were vague and contradictory; and the very worst of them was far from coming up to the horrible truth. The Whig version of the story was that the old robber Mac Ian had laid an ambuscade for the soldiers, that he had been caught in his own snare, and that he and some of his clan had fallen sword in hand. The Jacobite version, written at Edinburgh on the twenty-third of March, appeared in the ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... all sides of us we see public and private society broken up, as it were by an earthquake: the noblest and the meanest passions of the human bosom at contention, and the latter often so disguised, that the vile ambuscade is not even suspected till found within the heart of the fortress itself. We have, however, one veritable touchstone, that of the truest observation, "ye shall know a tree by its fruits." Let us look round, then, for those which ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... time the Indians had made themselves thus "completely frightful", it was nearly one in the morning. Then, finding all the Eskimo quiet in their tents, they rushed forth from their ambuscade, and fell on the poor, unsuspecting creatures, unperceived till they were close to the very eaves of the tents. A horrible massacre forthwith took place, while Hearne stood neutral in ...
— Pioneers in Canada • Sir Harry Johnston
... the Moorish cavalry announced that Jugurtha was encamped about two miles in advance. At this report, great dismay fell upon our men; for they believed themselves betrayed by Volux, and led into an ambuscade. Some exclaimed that they ought to take vengeance on him at once, and not suffer such ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust
... cohorts to forage. It having been falsely reported to them that these were ensnared, whilst they march in great haste, in order to support them, without even retaining the author [of the report] who had deceived them, he being a Latin enemy instead of a Roman soldier, they themselves fell into an ambuscade. There, whilst they suffer and commit great havoc, making resistance on disadvantageous ground solely by the valour of the soldiers, the enemy in the mean time in another quarter attacked the Roman camp which was situate on a plain. By their temerity and want of skill, matters were ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... success having passed the Boristhenes, encountered a party of 10,000 Muscovites and 6000 Calmuck Tartars; but they gave way on the first onset and fled into a wood, where the king, following the dictates of his great courage more than prudence, pursuing them, fell into an ambuscade, which, throwing themselves between him and three regiments of horse that were with him, hem'd him in, and now began a very unequal fight.—Many of the gallant Swedes were cut to pieces, and the Muscovites made quite up to his majesty:—two aid-de-camps were killed ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... band which came from the Rue Saint Denis had halted there and had waited. These men were astonished at not being pursued. Had the soldiers feared to follow them into the little narrow streets, where each corner of the houses might conceal an ambuscade? Had a counter order been given? They hazarded various conjectures. Moreover they heard close by, evidently on the boulevard, a terrific noise of musketry, and a cannonade which resembled continuous ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... they wrapt in so much shade, That they may more successful rise, Starting from such soft ambuscade, To catch and kill ...
— Poems • Sir John Carr
... returned home late from the supper-room, and he was sorrowfully walking along the streets of Sion, accompanied by a few disciples and women, when all on a sudden a band of armed men, who were lying in ambuscade in the neighbourhood of Caiphas's tribunal, fell upon them, and laid hands upon Joseph, whereupon his companions fled, uttering loud cries of terror. He was confined in a tower contiguous to the city ...
— The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ • Anna Catherine Emmerich
... I hear the far warble of blown bugles. Again I see the tall, blue smoke of camp-fires ascending from the dim valleys of Wonderland. There steals upon my sense the ghost of an odor from pines that canopy the ambuscade. I feel upon my cheek the morning mist that shrouds the hostile camp unaware of its doom, and my blood stirs at the ringing rifle-shot of the solitary sentinel. Unfamiliar landscapes, glittering with sunshine or sullen with rain, ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... select and disciplined body of his Illyrian troops, proposing to follow them in person, with the remainder of his forces. But the conduct of his lieutenants soon terminated the unnatural contest. By the artful appearances of flight, Constantine was betrayed into an ambuscade, which had been concealed in a wood, where the rash youth, with a few attendants, was surprised, surrounded, and slain. His body, after it had been found in the obscure stream of the Alsa, obtained the honors of an Imperial sepulchre; ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... from any wound. And ever in her mind she cast about For that unnoticed failing in herself, Which made him look so cloudy and so cold; Till the great plover's human whistle amazed Her heart, and glancing round the waste she feared In ever wavering brake an ambuscade. Then thought again, 'If there be such in me, I might amend it by the grace of Heaven, If he would only speak and tell ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson
... friend Dromas, with their contingent, being at the lower end of the flat and far out of bow-shot, were not thus tempted to disobey orders. The ambuscade on the other side of the Swamp had been put under the command of Captain Arkal, with Maikar for his lieutenant. Being entirely ignorant of what was going on, the men of this contingent lay close, ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... catch an Elliott. For a while, in the night and the black water that was deep as to his saddle-girths, he wrought with his staff like a smith at his stithy, and great was the sound of oaths and blows. With that the ambuscade was burst, and he rode for home with a pistol-ball in him, three knife wounds, the loss of his front teeth, a broken rib and bridle, and a dying horse. That was a race with death that the laird rode! In the mirk night, with his broken bridle and his head swimming, he dug his ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... inferior in number to their opponents, and it was beginning to go hard with them, when the remainder of the guerillas, now armed and mounted, came up to their assistance. On perceiving this accession to their adversaries' force, the French thought they had been led into an ambuscade, and retreating in tolerable order to the edge of the wood, at last fairly turned tail and ran for it, leaving several killed and wounded on the ground, and were pursued for some distance by the guerillas, who, however, only succeeded in making one prisoner. This ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX. - March, 1843, Vol. LIII. • Various
... directly in his rear, forgetting their orders, suddenly called out, 'Colonel, the British!' faced about, and putting spurs to their horses, were soon out of sight. The colonel, looking around, discovered that he was in the centre of a powerful ambuscade, into which the enemy had silently allowed him to pass, without his observing them. They lined both sides of the road, and had been stationed there to pick up any straggling party of the Americans that might chance to pass. Immediately on finding they were discovered, ...
— The Yankee Tea-party - Or, Boston in 1773 • Henry C. Watson
... in the purple was the Prince Imperial, whose fate beggars tragedy; who went to gather laurels on an African desert and fell a victim to a savage ambuscade—his beautiful body stuck almost as full of cruel darts as that of the ...
— Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood • Grace Greenwood
... for Sardinia, which they saw on the 23d in the evening, when his lordship sent the Juno with orders for the transports to join him. At sunset, on the 26th, the fleet anchored in the Gulph of Palma; where Lord Nelson found his old friend, Admiral Louis, in the Ambuscade, who had sailed from England the 16th of February. The whole of this night, and the three following days, were employed in clearing transports. On the 29th, the Seahorse brought intelligence that the French fleet were safe in port on Sunday the 24th. The day following, ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison
... castle, knight, and bishop of the opposite army: also, he exhorted the king to make a feint, as if about to march onwards. Sir Launcelot, on perceiving the movement of the monarch, sprang forward to make him a prisoner; but he was surprised by an elephant in ambuscade, from whose castle-bearing back a well-shot arrow pierced his corslet, and inflicted a mortal wound. He fell; but, in falling, he seemed to smile even sweetly, as he thought upon the noble speech of Sir Bohort[224] over the dead body of his illustrious ancestor, ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... and I stepped lightly, so as not to leave much mark, on some dried grass, and made off up the side of the draw, among the bushes. These grew as high as our shoulders, and formed a fine ambuscade. We climbed far enough so that we could see both sides of the draw and the trail in between; and by crawling we picked a good ...
— Pluck on the Long Trail - Boy Scouts in the Rockies • Edwin L. Sabin
... was meditated upon our party. The road, as we advanced, seemed to afford every facility for such an unpleasant interruption. At first it winded apart from the lake through marshy meadow ground, overgrown with copsewood, now traversing dark and close thickets which would have admitted an ambuscade to be sheltered within a few yards of our line of march, and frequently crossing rough mountain torrents, some of which took the soldiers up to the knees, and ran with such violence, that their force could only be stemmed by the strength of two or three men holding fast by each ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... set fire to it, and totally destroyed it. The captain, having arrived at his destination at midnight, with all possible secrecy leaped ashore, and arranged his men and the Pintados [42] Indians whom he had with him in ambuscade near the villages, in order to make the attack upon them at daybreak. However, the natives of this island having been informed of the hostile incursion of the Spaniards, withdrew with their children and wives and all their belongings that they could take with them, to three ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 - Volume III, 1569-1576 • E.H. Blair
... a spot well calculated by nature to form, as it has done, an important rendezvous and ambuscade for the prowling savages of the prairies, and often afforded them, especially the once powerful and murderous Pawnees whose name it perpetuates, a pleasant little retreat or eyrie from which to watch the passing Santa Fe traders, and dash down upon them like ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... victorious. A deep melancholy—ever broken by startled movements, by sudden alarms, by disturbed rest, by stifled sighs—reigns throughout. We are surrounded by such scenes and feelings as might arise among those who had been surprised and encompassed on all sides by an ambuscade, the vast sweep of whose horizon reveals not a single ground for hope, and whose despair had giddied the brain, like a draught of that wine of Cyprus which gives a more instinctive rapidity to all our gestures, a keener point to all our words, a more subtle ...
— Life of Chopin • Franz Liszt
... descriptions. She demanded an account of Billy's furniture, Billy's clothes, Billy's form of exercise. It dawned upon Benham that for some inexplicable reason she was hostile to Billy. It was like the unmasking of an ambuscade. He had talked a lot about Prothero's ideas and the discussions of social reform and social service that went on in his rooms, for Billy read at unknown times, and was open at all hours to any argumentative caller. To Lady Marayne all ideas were obnoxious, a form of fogging; all ideas, she held, ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... the troops was begun. The point chosen was a broad beach fringed with woods near the anchorage of the vessels. Before landing the troops, the ships threw a few shells into the woods, to make certain that they concealed no ambuscade, as in the disastrous affair at Matthias Point. After two dozen shells had burst, mowing down trees, and driving out frightened animals in plenty, but no sharp-shooters, the long-boats put off from the transports bearing the soldiers for the land attack. As soon as six or seven hundred ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... avenged upon the Jesuits. This was the case with a band of Guapalaches, who, coming on Father Espinosa in a wood, attacked and massacred him and all his Indians, and, having cut his body into pieces, left it for the wild beasts to eat. Upon another occasion Father Mendoza fell into an ambuscade, from which he might have escaped had not his horse sunk in a miry stream. Long he defended himself with an Indian shield, but at length was stretched upon the ground and left for dead. During the night he ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham
... of them came out of the wood, with a bow and arrows in his hand, and made signs for the boat to come to the place where he stood. This the officer very prudently declined, as he would then have been within bow-shot of an ambuscade, and after waiting some time, and finding that a conference could be procured upon no other terms, he returned back to the ship. It was certainly in my power to have destroyed many of these unfriendly people, by firing my great guns into the wood, but it would have answered ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... the south, to indicate the strip of woods that he desired to cross. The plan seemed feasible enough. The town, although seemingly near, was over five miles distant. The road by which the guerrilleros had to reach it was much farther. Could Rolfe and his party meet them on this road, by an ambuscade, they would gain an easy victory, although with inferior numbers, and Rolfe wished to carry back to camp a Mexican prisoner. This was the object of the scout, to gain information of the force supposed to be in the rear of our lines. The men, too, were eager for the ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... Joy, "this may not be. If you had caught Master Spikeman, by your own cunning, it might have been different; but it was the white girl and I who devised the scheme, and I told you where to place the ambuscade, which has been successful. Were you to murder this man, the guilt would rest more on Prudence and me than on you, whose savage and un-Christian notions may partly excuse so dreadful ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... would answer him by gobbling like a turkey; that he must meet me at Sand Point at three o'clock sharp, and if he was not there at that time I would know that something was wrong. I also told him to be careful and not run into an ambuscade, but above all not to be taken prisoner. Then I asked him if he could bark like a cayote. His answer was: "Sure, Captain, it's mesilf that can make a bloody cayote ashamed of himself bairking, and I belave ye's is afraid for me, but O'ill tell ye now ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... not simply to establish certain liberties for herself but also—which had certainly not been in her mind before—to keep her husband away from herself. Something latent in the situation had surprised her with this effect. It had arisen out of the quarrel like a sharpshooter out of an ambuscade. Her right to go out alone had now only the value of a mere pretext for far more extensive independence. The ultimate extent of these independences, she still ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... night they ford The hostile stream. The endless earth below, The boundless sky above, they know no day Of their return. Their breasts are ever bared To the pitiless steel and all the wounds of war Unspeakable. Methinks I see them now, Dust-mantled in the bitter wind, a host Of Tartar warriors in ambuscade. Our leader scorns the foe. He would give battle Upon the threshold of the camp. The stream Besets a grim array where order reigns, Though many hearts may beat, where discipline Is all, and life of no account. The spear Now works its iron will, the startled ...
— A Lute of Jade/Being Selections from the Classical Poets of China • L. Cranmer-Byng
... incident in the period was the invasion of Phlius by Iphicrates. He laid an ambuscade, and with a small body of troops adopting a system of guerilla war, took occasion of an unguarded sally of the citizens of Phlius to inflict such losses on them, that though they had never previously received the Lacedaemonians within their walls, they ...
— Hellenica • Xenophon
... now looked through the hole to test the truth of the prognostication. The hour of five completed itself on their watches; the girl again came forward. And then the three in ambuscade could see her pull out her handkerchief and ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... behind the stockade, while the remainder were concealed in ambush near the spring with which the garrison was supplied with water. The most experienced of the defenders understood the tactics of their wily foes, and shrewdly guessed that an ambuscade had been prepared in order to cut off the garrison from access to the spring. The water in the station was already exhausted, and unless a fresh supply could be obtained the most dreadful sufferings were apprehended. It was thought probable that the Indians in ambush would not unmask ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... his way forward in the shelter of a large patch of shadow cast by the orange-trees, dragging himself along, almost, like a thief afraid of an ambuscade. ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... the English on James' Island. One of these expeditions, when Kosciuszko and his companion attacked a party of English woodcutters, has the distinction of being the last occasion on which blood was shed in the American War. They were surprised by an ambuscade, and Wilmot was killed. At length Charleston fell. On December 14, 1782, the American army entered the town in a triumphal procession, in which Kosciuszko rode with his fellow-officers, greeted by the populace with flowers and fluttering kerchiefs and cries of "Welcome!" and "God bless ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner
... place. This they did, but not without suffering much loss; for the man fought for his life and defended himself, slaying many of his enemies. Then they that escaped ran into the camp, saying that Sicinius had fallen into an ambuscade, and had died along with certain others of the soldiers. At the first, indeed, this story was believed; but afterward, when, by permission of the Ten, there went some to bury the dead, they found that none of the dead ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various
... secure the weakened city. He schemed all this with the aid of a Guelph that dwelt in Arezzo as a red-hot Ghibelline. Now, it would have been simple enough for him after this to send the little handful of Florentines against a warned Arezzo and have them cut to pieces by an Aretine ambuscade. But his purpose went further than merely demolishing a number of his enemies. He wanted to win Arezzo, if he could, as well. So, by his machinations, he arranged that the forces of Arezzo should be out to meet and overthrow the adventurous Florentines, ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... his ambuscade with discretion. With a closed carriage and a band of chosen ruffians he had left the palace a good half-hour before the king's messengers, and by the aid of his sister's gold he had managed that their journey should not be a very rapid ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Thay-en-dan-e- gea or Brant, who went with a company of Tories, led by Col. Butler, to intercept General Herkimer, who was reported as coming to the relief of the garrison. At a certain point on the way, where they expected the general would pass, they formed an ambuscade, and though they selected their ground with wisdom, and acquitted themselves with great bravery, they were unable to stand before the invincible courage of the ...
— An account of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha - Red Jacket and his people, 1750-1830 • John Niles Hubbard
... house, of whatever kind it may be, an individual suspected of any crime is arrested, the arrest is held secret. Four or five men are placed in ambuscade in the first room. The door is opened to all who knock. It is closed after them, and they are arrested; so that at the end of two or three days they have in their power almost all the HABITUES of the establishment. And that is ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... must not pass unnoticed, which is, that in America, the major part of which is still an uncleared country, the system of warfare naturally partakes much of the Indian practices of surprise and ambuscade; and the invaders will always have to labour under the great disadvantage of the Americans having that perfect knowledge of the country which ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... disaster; once in Britain, when his fleet was nearly wrecked in a storm; in Gaul, at Gergovia, where one of his legions was put to the rout; and in the territory of the Germans, his lieutenants Titurius and Aurunculeius were cut off by an ambuscade. ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... the French, for the former would then have been the attacking party and have borne the brunt of the battle. As it was, the French commander nearly succeeded in drawing the thousand men that Johnson had sent out to meet him into an ambuscade, and among the slain was brave Colonel Williams, commander of the Provincials in this engagement, and gallant Chief Hendrick, who had accompanied him ...
— "Old Put" The Patriot • Frederick A. Ober
... arrayed against him. One morning, therefore, the party was divided, and half of them sent back to an ambush in the scrub. The natives were allowed to pass on in close pursuit of the advance party. The native dogs, however, scented this ambuscade, and, after their fashion, warned the blacks of the presence of the hidden whites. As they halted, and began handling and poising their spears, one of the ambushed men fired without orders, and the others followed his example. The natives faltered, and those ...
— The Explorers of Australia and their Life-work • Ernest Favenc
... wife, with a view to establishing a strong claim for subsequent reward, bribed Antoine Macquart to lead the Republicans left in Plassans to an attack on the town hall. To meet this he prepared a strong ambuscade, and the Republicans were repulsed with considerable loss. As a result of this treachery, Pierre was regarded by his fellow-citizens as the saviour of the town, and the Government subsequently appointed him Receiver of Taxes, decorating ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson
... and story have found many incidents for treatment in this locality. Not far from the farm where Fuller's daily work was done, the tragedy of Bloody Brook was enacted; the fields which he tilled have their legend of Indian ambuscade and massacre; the soil is sown, as with dragon's teeth, with the arrow-heads and battle-axes of many bitter conflicts; even to the ancient house where, in recent years, the painter's summer easel was set up, a former owner was ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume I. No. VI. June, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... were able to hew these coffins (they are at least twelve feet long by ten feet high), and, having hewn them, to carry them underground (they weigh on an average between sixty and seventy tons), and finally to range them in rows here in these strange chambers, where they stand as if in ambuscade on either side of us as we pass? Each in its turn has contained quite comfortably the mummy of a bull Apis, armoured in plates of gold. But in spite of their weight, in spite of their solidity which effectively ...
— Egypt (La Mort De Philae) • Pierre Loti
... were in camp, and made the same proposition, which they accepted, as they were new in the country and needed horses and mules. The lumbermen joined the Mexicans, and as they could easily discern the course of the Apaches by the clouds of dust, succeeded in forming an ambuscade and fired on the Apaches when they reached the river. The Apaches fled at the fire, leaving the stolen ...
— Building a State in Apache Land • Charles D. Poston
... day after the battle Brennus appeared, leading his army to attack the city. At first, seeing the gates open and no guards on the walls, he feared some ambuscade, as he could not believe that the Romans had so utterly despaired of themselves. When he discovered the truth, he marched through the Colline Gate, and captured Rome, a little more than three hundred and sixty years after its foundation, if we can believe that any accurate record has been kept of ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... the Archbishop's not hopping off just as the pinch was about to fall on him, and this seemed so unfair that his blood boiled at the thought of it. If this was to be so, he must try if he could not fix him by the judicious use of bird-lime or a snare, or throw the salt on his tail from an ambuscade. ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler
... us. The chief of the escort came running to me, and informed me of the cause of their terror, which was that they recognized, by some peculiarity of their headgear, that these men belonged to the tribe of the Dilwas, the most ferocious and unscrupulous of the Bedouin, who had evidently laid an ambuscade for us at this point with the intention of seizing our caravan. When I thought of all my efforts in Abyssinia, of the length of my journey and of the dangers and fatigues which I had endured, I could not bear to think ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... possible ambuscade deterred the listener less than the thought of leaving Nan, from whom he was unwilling to separate himself for a moment. Likewise, the possibility of an attempt to kidnap her in his absence was not overlooked. On the other hand, if the message came from Duke and bore some ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... Heaven, answer the spyglasses, it is a Montgolfier, a Balloon, and they are making signals! Austrian cannon-battery barks at this Montgolfier; harmless as dog at the Moon: the Montgolfier makes its signals; detects what Austrian ambuscade there may be, and descends at its ease. (26th June, 1794, see Rapport de Guyton-Morveau sur les aerostats, in Moniteur du 6 Vendemiaire, An 2.) What will not ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... the valour of the troops: let them only join unanimously in a vigorous attack against a foe, already vanquished in the field, beaten out of their camps, and stripped of their towns, and now trying their last hope by the contrivance of an ambuscade, placing their reliance on the ground they occupied, not on their arms. But what ground was now unsurmountable to Roman valour?" The citadel of Fregellae, and that of Sora, were called to their remembrance, with many other places ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... General George Crook, who is looked upon by the old-timers as perhaps the greatest of our Indian-fighters, led the cavalry against the Apaches. Crook's understanding of the Indian was perfect; and not only was he able to beat the natives at their own game of ambuscade but he thoroughly sympathized with their cause. He knew how Washington and incompetent officers had blundered ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... boys in the vicinity possibly they would take alarm, and hurrying to their concealed biplane make for the far North with all haste; and in this way, if no one knew of their departure the intended ambuscade that night in the vicinity of the railroad pay-car would be ...
— The Aeroplane Boys Flight - A Hydroplane Roundup • John Luther Langworthy
... his six-shooter the while; every sailor grasped his cutlass and kept his revolver ready for action. "I don't half like the look of it," the captain observed, partly to himself. "They seem to be leading us into an ambuscade or something. Keep a sharp lookout against surprise from the jungle, boys; and if any native shows fight shoot ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... passes swift through the darksome glade, And roves o'er the mountains all? It crouches in nightly ambuscade; The hurrah breaks round the foe dismayed, And the Frankish sergeants fall. Should you of the rangers black demand— That is Luetzow's wild ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... of thanks and confidence was passed in full lodge, and so for the time the matter ended. When a few weeks later it was reported in the papers that Wilcox had been shot at from an ambuscade, it was an open secret that McMurdo was still at work upon ...
— The Valley of Fear • Arthur Conan Doyle
... either side, as though they had been waiting purposely to ambuscade him, shot several animals, who charged him without as much ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... before taking refuge inside the walls of the city. An hour after parting from Mr. Chambers I am wheeling briskly down the same road on the eastern slope of the pass where Mukhtar Pasha's ill-fated column was drawn into the fatal ambuscade that suddenly turned the fortunes of the day against them. While rapidly gliding down the gentle gradient, I fancy I can see the Cossack regiments, advancing toward the Turkish position, the unwary and ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... [says Liszt] predominates, intersected by wild movements, melancholy smiles, unexpected starts, and intervals of rest full of dread such as those experience who have been surprised by an ambuscade, who are surrounded on all sides, for whom there dawns no hope upon the vast horizon, and to whose brain despair has gone like a deep draught of Cyprian wine, which gives a more instinctive rapidity to every gesture, a sharper point ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... to be patriots, he was led to turn aside from the road upon which he marched out into a somewhat narrow clearing in the forest near a small work called Fort Keyser, and was killed nearly two miles from Fort Paris, being attacked on every side in what amounted to an ambuscade. ...
— Colonel John Brown, of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, the Brave Accuser of Benedict Arnold • Archibald Murray Howe
... the leadership of a brave and skillful chief named Osceola they resisted the troops sent to coerce them into obedience. The most memorable event of the war was the massacre of Major Dade and about one hundred soldiers in an ambuscade, December 28, 1835. On the same day Osceola with a small party of followers killed and scalped General Wiley Thomson, of the United States army and five of Thomson's friends. Before the opening of hostilities Thomson ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann
... grip of Ulrich's beard, as he was leaning close to the side of the coach to watch his proceedings. Not a stir did the brave old knight make, but sat as still as marble, and even held his breath, lest the ghost might feel it warm upon his hand, and so discover their ambuscade. ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V1 • William Mienhold
... traditions. Sporadic forays, fostered by their ignorant dread of one another or stirred up by rival medicine-men, there may have been between different tribes—and there certainly were between the Indians and the Esquimaux—with ambuscade and slaughter of isolated hunting parties that ventured too far beyond the confines of their own territory; and one such affair would furnish tradition for generations to dilate upon. I have myself found all the men of Nulato ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... back. Montoni arrested his half-extended arm, and, with a significant look, made him return the poinard into his bosom, unseen by all except himself; for most of the party were disputing at a distant window, on the situation of a dell where they meant to form an ambuscade. ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... shots fired. The men in ambuscade tried to escape to the fastnesses of the hills. Some of them stood ground and fought, only to be mown down by the enemy; others were surrounded and made captive; but few actually succeeded in evading the troopers. All were ready to sue for mercy and to ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... tottering step, a bloodless countenance, and a look of horror. Without a word, he pointed to the door; I followed the direction, and saw what might well justify his feelings. The troop of yeomanry had been attacked on their return from patrolling the country; an ambuscade had been laid for them by a large force of the insurgents, in one of the narrow roads which bordered the demesne, and where, from its vicinity, they had imagined themselves secure. As they moved down this defile with their noble commandant at their ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... other portions of the wide field over which the war was raging, Rome had obtained additional successes. Ardaburius, who probably still commanded in Mesopotamia, had drawn the Persian force opposed to him into an ambuscade, and had destroyed it, together with its seven generals. Vitianus, an officer of whom nothing more is known, had exterminated the remnant of the Arabs not drowned in the Euphrates. The war had gone everywhere against the Persians; and it is not improbable that Varahran, before the ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... and Belleville next Saturday, carrying fifty thousand francs of government money to the monks of Saint-Bernard; to which I may add that there is between those two places a spot called the Maison-Blanche, which seems to me admirably adapted for an ambuscade." ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... defeated with considerable loss. These are all the details of this action we have been able to find. Colonel Floyd collected twenty-five men to pursue the Indians, but in spite of all his caution, fell into an ambuscade, which was estimated to consist of two hundred warriors. Half of Colonel Floyd's men were killed, and the survivors supposed that they had slain nine or ten of the Indians. This, however, is not probable; either the number of the Indians engaged, or their loss, is much exaggerated. ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... century. Previously, for an indefinite period, they dwelt on the Kabompo river, 200 m. to the N.E. of their present country, and here the descendants of a section of the tribe which did not migrate still remain, under the name Balokwakwa (men of the ambuscade), formerly known as Aalukolui. That the Barotse at a still more remote period emigrated from the far north-east is indicated by vague tradition as well as by a certain similarity in type and language to some tribes living in that direction, though the fact that natives from Mashonaland ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... had delivered the order, "Forward!" and we were down upon them with a rush. They stood no chance; they turned tail and scattered, we plowing through them as if they had been men of straw. That was our last ambuscade, and it was probably laid for us by that treacherous rascal, the King's own minister and favorite, De ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... Signet of signets from which it was taken. Truly the holy Tanofir, or his Cup, Karema, or his messengers, or the spirits with whom he dwelt, I know not which, had a general's eye and knew how to plan an ambuscade. ...
— The Ancient Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... who wanted my cape and blade would have to get them with some trouble. Then I quickened pace, while they still followed slowly at my heels; this augmented my fear, for I thought I might be falling into an ambuscade, which would have cut me off in front as well as rear. Accordingly, when I was at the distance of a hundred paces from my home, I ran with all my might, and shouted at the top of my voice: "To arms, to arms! out with you, out with you! I am being murdered." In a moment four of my young ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... of vengeance, or the ambition of striking a glorious coup by my capture—have continued the pursuit? If so we might expect to encounter them on their return; or, if first perceived, we might fall into an ambuscade. In either case should they chance to outnumber us—to any great extent—a collision would ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... no surprise, No ambuscade of beauty 'gainst mine eyes From brake or lurking dell or deep defile; No humors, frolic forms — this mile, that mile; No rich reserves or happy-valley hopes Beyond the bend of roads, the distant slopes. Her fancy fails, her wild is all run tame: ...
— The Poems of Sidney Lanier • Sidney Lanier
... the mountains, the raiders had hurriedly driven the cattle into the forest, where they would be out of sight and so could not give warning of the whereabouts of the thieves, and had then hidden themselves behind some rocks along the trail. From their ambuscade they would be able to shoot down their pursuers or capture them ...
— Comrades of the Saddle - The Young Rough Riders of the Plains • Frank V. Webster
... suddenly seized with as strong a desire for active life, as he formerly possessed for easy rest, and he felt himself in no safety except when at a distance from the mansion, for he knew that Ragnar possessed too much honor to entrap him in an ambuscade. ...
— The Home in the Valley • Emilie F. Carlen
... 17th January 1567 Sampiero was slain in an ambuscade laid for him in the defile of Cauro, into which he had been led by forged letters brought him by the monk Ambrosius ...
— Itinerary through Corsica - by its Rail, Carriage & Forest Roads • Charles Bertram Black
... secretly stole over to a point of ambuscade from which he could see the shimmery flash of her dress as she moved about the porch, cavaliered by the odious Jimmy and his fellows. On these nocturnal vigils he heard the note of her heedless laughter while he crouched ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... complained of his sending back his daughter: that he hates him out of fear that he should take possession of the crown of his Shamkhalat: that he implored the Colonel to allow him to kill him in an ambuscade, or to poison him in his food; but that the other consented only to send him to Siberia, beyond the end of the world. In one word, invent and describe every thing cleverly. You were formerly famous for your tales. Do not eat dirt now. And, above all, insist ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... few of them as I could; and especially I was unwilling to hazard the killing of any of our men, knowing the others were very well armed. I resolved to wait, to see if they did not separate; and therefore, to make sure of them, I drew my ambuscade nearer, and ordered Friday and the captain to creep upon their hands and feet, as close to the ground as they could, that they might not be discovered, and get as near them as they could possibly ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... new and terrible danger daunted every heart. Resolved to cut off all communication between Damietta and the camp of the Crusaders, the sultan ordered a number of galleys to be transported overland, to form an ambuscade; and many French vessels were intercepted. For a time, Louis could not comprehend how no arrivals took place, and felt the gravest alarm. Ere long, however, one vessel, belonging to the Count of Flanders, escaped the vigilance ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar
... unknown town. The silence is terrifying in its possibilities. The touch of cold window bars to the exploring hand startles the man like the touch of a toad; the inequalities of the pavement shake his heart into his mouth; a piece of denser darkness threatens an ambuscade or a chasm in the pathway; and where the air is brighter, the houses put on strange and bewildering appearances, as if to lead him further from his way. For Denis, who had to regain his inn without attracting notice, there ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... overtook them, he was red and breathless, but Fran's beribboned hat was clutched triumphantly in his hand. It was he who first discovered the ambuscade. He suddenly remembered, looked across the street, then fell, desperately wounded. The shots would have passed unheeded over Abbott's head, had not Fran called his ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis
... had secured their ambuscade, each lying on the ground at full length, concealed by low, scrubby trees. By a slight turn of the head, each could command a view up the gorge ...
— Adele Dubois - A Story of the Lovely Miramichi Valley in New Brunswick • Mrs. William T. Savage
... little beyond the range of his gun. Whilst in a state of doubt and anxiety as to whether they would approach near enough to be shot, he suddenly observed them raise their heads and swim towards the shore apart from his ambuscade; and, whilst wondering at the cause of so strange a proceeding, his attention was directed to a fox which was skipping about on the shore, and evidently enticing the ducks to approach. This accidental discovery of so weak a point in the nature of the feathered tribe led the sportsman ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... secret code in war. Stray Indians put themselves in touch again with the band by turkey calls in the daytime and by owl or wolf notes at night. The frontiersmen used the same means to trick the Indian band into betraying the place of its ambuscade, or to lure the strays, unwitting, within reach of ...
— Pioneers of the Old Southwest - A Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground • Constance Lindsay Skinner
... full view of the men who lay in ambush. Jugurtha proceeded to the same spot amidst a large retinue of his friends; it had been agreed that all the partners to the conference should come unarmed.[1190] A sign was given, and the men of the ambuscade had sprung from every side upon the mound. Jugurtha's retinue was cut down to a man; the king himself was seized, bound and handed over to Sulla. In a short while he ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... And kindly stoppld the unfinish'd charm But though not changed to owl or bat, Or something more indelicate; Yet, as your tongue has run too fast, Your boasted beauty must not last, No more shall frolic Cupid lie In ambuscade in either eye, >From thence to aim his keenest dart To captivate each youthful heart: No more shall envious misses pine At charms now flown, that once were thine: No more, since you so ill behave, Shall injured Oberon be ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... King, lest never a boat come back from that errand. With their narrow flat-bottomed punts, cut out of a single log, and their leaping-poles, wherewith they fly over dikes of thirty feet in width,—they can ambuscade in those reed-beds and alder-beds, kill whom they will, and then flee away through the marsh like so many horse-flies. And if not, one trick have they left, which they never try save when driven into a corner; but from that, may all ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... once with valor true The attack from an ambuscade, In moral strife, or bloody war, Hath ...
— Our Profession and Other Poems • Jared Barhite
... in India the natives had been won by the diplomatic French, but their aid proved of no avail. The British Parliament sent over General Braddock in 1757, and he perished with a large portion of his army in the celebrated ambuscade from which Washington escaped.[17] For a time French energy made the war seem not unequal; but the number of French in America was small; the home Government of Louis XV seemed wholly lost in sloth and indifferent to the result. The English ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... concealed themselves, before the Matabili in the clump, surprised at not seeing the awnings of the waggons, and suspecting that they had been deceived, came out from their ambuscade; first crawling on all-fours, and as they arrived at the camp, and found only fires burning, rising up one after another. After remaining about a minute in consultation, two of the party were sent back to the river ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... lured into an ambuscade by the Indians, and most of them were killed. Reenforcements were sent to Sudbury. The Indians were driven off; and the next day David Comee was found lying in the water of the river meadow, scalped, and stripped of his armour ...
— Ben Comee - A Tale of Rogers's Rangers, 1758-59 • M. J. (Michael Joseph) Canavan
... comrades, they had, under their officers, Lieutenants Sutherland and MacKay, made a skilful detour in the woods to the rear of the enemy, reaching a point where the road passed from the forest to the open marsh across a small semicircular cove. Here they formed an ambuscade in a thick grove of palmettos which nearly ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... preaching to the desart. The baronet, being a well-bred man, carried his civilities as far as she could in conscience expect, and, if evil tongues are to be believed, some degrees farther; but he was too much a veteran in gallantry, as well as in war, to fall into any ambuscade that she could lay for his affection — While we were absent in the Highlands, she practised also upon the laird of Ladrishmore, and even gave him the rendezvous in the wood of Drumscailloch; but the laird had such a reverend care of his own reputation, that he came attended with the parson ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... I?" she muttered. Still for some moments she continued to look about her in a dazed way; at length she recognised the old woman, and the cottage. Then she remembered, with a moan, what had happened—the ambuscade, the flight, the knife. ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman |
