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Cordon   Listen
noun
Cordon  n.  
1.
A cord or ribbon bestowed or borne as a badge of honor; a broad ribbon, usually worn after the manner of a baldric, constituting a mark of a very high grade in an honorary order. Cf. Grand cordon.
2.
The cord worn by a Franciscan friar.
3.
(Fort.) The coping of the scarp wall, which projects beyong the face of the wall a few inches.
4.
(Mil.) A line or series of sentinels, or of military posts, inclosing or guarding any place or thing.
5.
A rich and ornamental lace or string, used to secure a mantle in some costumes of state.
Cordon sanitaire, a line of troops or military posts around a district infected with disease, to cut off communication, and thus prevent the disease from spreading. Also used figuratively, of a group of neutral states that forms a barrier between two hostile states.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Cordon" Quotes from Famous Books



... rivals from their suit So often, that the folly taking wings Slipt o'er those lazy limits down the wind With rumor, and became in other fields A mockery to the yeomen over ale, And laughter to their lords: but those at home, As hunters round a hunted creature draw The cordon close and closer toward the death, Narrow'd her goings out and comings in; Forbad her first the house of Averill, Then closed her access to the wealthiest farms, Last from her own home-circle of the ...
— Enoch Arden, &c. • Alfred Tennyson

... the squadron, and shortly after were joined by fourteen sail of the line under Lord Nelson. The salutation was heartfelt and most gratifying. The dispositions of the fleet were soon made, and as they were as simple as possible, there could be no mistake. A cordon of frigates were ordered to repeat signals to us from the one nearest the shore, whilst we kept nearly out of sight of the land, and all our ships' sides were ordered to be painted yellow with black streaks, and ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman

... of the long facade of the palace of Famagosta a cordon of soldiers stood motionless, while before them the mounted guard paced slowly to and fro; and across the Piazza, with that impatient, surging crowd between, was faintly heard the steady footfall of the sentinels, measuring and remeasuring with ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... that the cordon of Cos' army completely enclosed the Pyramid of the Moon, the Pyramid of the Sun, the Calle de los Muertos and the other principal ruins, and he now heard the sentinels much more distinctly as they walked back and forth. Straining his eyes he could see two of ...
— The Texan Star - The Story of a Great Fight for Liberty • Joseph A. Altsheler

... on either side; and then cautiously proceeded onward, dropping a canoe, in like manner, every five or six hundred yards, till the extremity of the western coast was reached, the line efficiently manned, and the trapper left to cruise alone over the cordon of boats thus stretched along the shore, to carry any needed intelligence, and make independent observations. It was now dark, and, being a moonless night, all within the shade of the mountains, especially, was wrapt in almost impenetrable gloom; so that the ear, ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson

... girl's speedy death would prove the most felicitous solution of this devouring riddle, which so unexpectedly crossed his smooth path; then what meant the vehement protest of his throbbing heart, the passionate longing to snatch her from disease, and disgrace, and keep her safe forever in the close cordon of his arms? ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... with his staff arrived, proceeding from the sacristy and taking their seats in magnificent chairs placed on strips of carpet. The alcalde wore a full-dress uniform and displayed the cordon of Carlos III, with four or five other decorations. The ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal

... different plan. They began to march around me, sending troops from Vredefort over Wonderheurel to Rhenoster River, and placing camps all along the river as far as Baltespoort, and from there again extending their cordon ...
— Three Years' War • Christiaan Rudolf de Wet

... in width, perfectly valueless for the occupation of man, for the want of sufficient rain to secure the growth of any product. An irrigating canal would make productive a belt as wide as the supply of water could be made to spread over across this entire country, and would secure a cordon of settlements connecting the present population of the mountain and mining regions with that of the older States. All the land reclaimed would be clear gain. If alternate sections are retained by the Government, I would suggest that the retained sections be thrown open to entry under the homestead ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... filled with white faces, some grinning, some exulting, all greatly excited; and a hideous uproar shook the whole place—for the poor souls were all sane in their own opinion —and the whole force of attendants, two of them bleeding profusely from his blows, made a cordon and approached him. But he was too cunning to wait to be fairly surrounded; he made his rush at an under-keeper, feinted at his head, caught him a heavy blow in the pit of the stomach, doubled him up in a moment, and off again, leaving the ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade

... judged to be the abbot, or chief Lama of the monastery—gave orders to his subordinates in a language which we did not understand. His men obeyed him. In a second they had closed us round, as in a ring or cordon. ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen

... "Halt." A cordon of soldiers with bayonets across the road put an end to all appreciation of scenery. The "Halt" was very decisive, as well it might be on such an occasion, and we were surrounded by boys—fair-haired, smiling boys, with whom we laughed ...
— An Account of Our Arresting Experiences • Conway Evans

... must understand, Captain, that she is the greatest State in the Union, and there a'n't nothing like her people for bravery. The political power's got North and West, the old constitution is being dissected to suit the abolitionists, and they're drawing the cordon around us faster and faster; and they're now out like a warrior boldly to the conquest, sounding their voices in the halls of Congress, appealing to human and divine power to protect their nonsense, and bidding defiance to our constitutional rights, Our slaves are our property, protected ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams

... systems away from Warlock. And a patrol lane had been drawn about the Circe system the minute that Survey had marked its second planet ready for colonization. Somehow the beetles had slipped through that supposedly tight cordon and would now consolidate their gains with their usual speed at rooting. First an energy attack to finish the small Terran force; then they would simply ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton

... one of a small class of Englishmen who were received to William's fullest favour, and kept at least as high a position under him as they had held before. William still kept on, marching and harrying, to the north of London, as he had before done to the south. The city was to be isolated within a cordon of wasted lands. His policy succeeded. As no succours came from the North, the hearts of those who had chosen them a king failed at the approach of his rival. At Berkhampstead Edgar himself, with several bishops ...
— William the Conqueror • E. A. Freeman

... flitted bat-like the criminals of the underworld. What they saw, that they took. Growing bolder, they progressed from pocket-picking to holdups, from holdups to looting. The police reserves were all out; they could do little. Favored by obscurity, the thieves plundered. It would have needed a solid cordon of officers to have protected adequately the retail district. Swiftly a guerrilla warfare sprang up. Bullets whistled. Anarchy raised its snaky locks and peered red-eyed through the darkened streets of ...
— The Sign at Six • Stewart Edward White

... silently along the bank of the stream on the night of the 4th of July, they crossed in boats which they seized at a farmhouse and arrived at the palisades wholly unobserved. Half of the force was stationed in the form of a cordon, so that no one might escape. The remainder followed Clark through an ...
— The Old Northwest - A Chronicle of the Ohio Valley and Beyond, Volume 19 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Frederic Austin Ogg

... places in the lead, we attempted to turn them to the left. Stretching out our line until there was a man about every twenty feet, we threw our force against the right point and lead in the hope of gradually deviating their course. For a few minutes the attempt promised to be successful, but our cordon was too weak and the cattle went through between the riders, and we soon found a portion of our forces on either side of the herd, while a few of the boys were riding out of the rush in ...
— The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams

... plains. On the other hand, the fact that the Roman Catholics in Ireland formed the majority of the population prevented the persecution from being strictly carried out. It was comparatively easy for Louis XIV to surround a heretic district with a cordon of soldiers, and then draw them closer together searching every house as they went, seizing the clergy and taking them off to the galleys; but it was impossible to track unregistered priests through the mountains and valleys ...
— Is Ulster Right? • Anonymous

... a huge cordon of police, which had been drawn round the Crinoline, had been mashed beyond recognition, and two regiments of Life Guards razed to the ground, by the devastating Glance of the Wenuses. I passed along King William Street and Prince's ...
— The War of the Wenuses • C. L. Graves and E. V. Lucas

... that I have indicated. Meanwhile, they march as usual through the town to maintain order. Each is ignorant respecting the movements of the rest, and imagines the command to have reference to himself alone; thus in a moment the cordon can be formed, and all the avenues to the palace occupied. Know you the ...
— Egmont - A Tragedy In Five Acts • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... ends of the fan forged ahead and closed in, until the leaders were running almost abreast of the caribou, with fifty or sixty feet separating them from the pursued. Thus, adroitly and swiftly, with deadly precision, the pack had formed a horseshoe cordon of fangs from which there was but one course of flight—straight ahead. For the caribou to swerve half a degree to the right or left meant death. It was the duty of the leaders to draw in the ends ...
— Baree, Son of Kazan • James Oliver Curwood

... poor mortal. The bravest man there, he gazes upon the array before him, without a trace of emotion. The eye that shed tears at the sight of human misery is undimmed by what man can do against him. Beyond the cordon of foes he remarks the wonderful beauty of the scenery, the last he is to look upon. He has made his peace with God and has no other favor to ask of his executioners than that they hasten their terrible task. ...
— John Brown: A Retrospect - Read before The Worcester Society of Antiquity, Dec. 2, 1884. • Alfred Roe

... A cordon of men was made and buckets were interchanged, the full ones descending and the empty ones ascending. The barrels on the beach were thus speedily filled and taken off by a boat's crew. At 11 P.M. darkness came, and it was decided to complete the ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson

... of the late Monsieur de Portenduere remained as he had left it on the day of his death; there was no change except that he was absent. Madame de Portenduere had made the bed herself; laying upon it the uniform of a naval captain, his sword, cordon, orders, and hat. The gold snuff-box from which her late husband had taken snuff for the last time was on the table, with his prayer-book, his watch, and the cup from which he drank. His white hair, arranged in one curled lock and framed, hung ...
— Ursula • Honore de Balzac

... from the east— the almost fatal error of the French General Staff, Paris had been girdled with forts on that side, from those of Ecouen and Montmorency by the distant ramparts of Chelles and Champigny to those of Sucy and Villeneuve—the outer lines of a triple cordon. But on the western side there was next to nothing, and it was a sign to me of the utter unreadiness of France that now at the eleventh hour when I passed thousands of men were digging trenches in the roads and fields with frantic haste, ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs

... almond eyes, and beautiful white teeth. He came to see us straight from the castle, where he had been to see the King. He was very enthusiastic about his Majesty (who is not?). He told us how the King had taken the grand cordon of the Seraphim Order off his own shoulders and hung it on his. The King being a giant, and Prince Chira about the size of a boy of ten, you can imagine how the cordon fitted him. Chira said, "I reached up to about the King's waist, and when the ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone

... day west from Pembina our scouts found some herd's footprints on soggy ground. At once word was sent back to pitch camp on rolling land. A cordon of carts with shafts turned outward encircled the camping ground. At one end the animals were tethered, at the other the hunter's tents were huddled together. All night mongrel curs, tearing about ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut

... course not! Nobody at the Berlin races ever does see anything but the mounted police and the dust. Yes, sir, lay out two dollars in a "card" for the grand stand, and fix it in your hat-band like a turnpike ticket, and you may saunter through the whole police-military cordon; but be one of the crowd, and trust to no other aid than is afforded by your own eyes, and the said cordon will be ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie

... A stream of light went down the graveled walk to the iron gate. Black Riley, McCarthy, and "One-ear" Mike saw, and carelessly drew their sinister cordon closer about ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry

... this time. The crowds in and around the City Hall, where the prisoners were, steadily increased, and the gravest fears were entertained by the officers. Cordon's of police lined the passage-ways from the Mayor's and Superintendent's offices to the cell-rooms below where the prisoners were confined, and every movement was guarded with the most ...
— The Mysterious Murder of Pearl Bryan - or: the Headless Horror. • Unknown

... question, they advanced upon the young man, who was still seated, and taking up the four points of the compass, began squirting him unmercifully with soda-water. Blinded and dripping, the unfortunate young fellow tried desperately to elude the cordon of his persecutors, only to receive a fresh stream in his face at each attempt. Seeing him thus tormented, amid the coarse laughter of these half-drunken "travellers," Mr. Lavender suffered a moment of the most poignant struggle between his principles ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... by two faithful and withered old maids of honour, and a little snuffy spindle-shanked gentleman in waiting, in a brown jasey and a green coat covered with orders—of which the star and the grand yellow cordon of the order of St. Michael of Pumpernickel were most conspicuous. The drums rolled, the guards saluted, and the ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray

... captain in command. At a deliberate walk they came on towards the throng of prisoners and guards at the pit-side. When they were still several hundred yards away, a young Serbian soldier evidently grasped what was preparing. Making a sudden dart, he sprang through the cordon of guards, and was off, running at a surprising speed. The guards shouted, but their rifles, though with bayonets fixed, were not loaded, and it looked for the moment as if he might get clear away. Then the captain of the cavalry ...
— Serbia in Light and Darkness - With Preface by the Archbishop of Canterbury, (1916) • Nikolaj Velimirovic

... long cordon of troops and form them into a large body which could march toward Austria, it was necessary to effect an immense turn round from front to back. Each army had to make an about turn, in order to face Germany, and form columns, to march there by the shortest route. Thus the right ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot

... forehead plates; and undergrowth of smaller creatures dodged and yelped, and helmet faces poised on sinuous, long-jointed necks appeared craning over shoulders and beneath armpits. Keeping a welcome space about me marched a cordon of stolid, scuttle-headed guards, who had joined us on our leaving the boat in which we had come along the channels of the Central Sea. The quick-eyed artist with the little brain joined us also, and a thick bunch ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells

... out of the east stole a sickly grey. It turned slowly into pink, and then suddenly the sea once more was blue and smiling. In the heart of the dancing cordon lay the weirdly camouflaged Doraine, inert, sinister, as still and cold as death. No smoke issued from her stacks to cheer the wretched watchers; no foam, no spray leaped from her mighty bow. She was a great, lifeless thing. Waves ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon

... greatest efficiency during the apogee of Napoleon's power in 1809 and 1810. To check forbidden traffic, which continued on an enormous scale, he annexed Holland to his empire, and threw a triple cordon of French troops along Germany's sea frontier. As a result, in the critical year of 1811 goods piled up in British warehouses, factories closed, bankruptcies doubled, and her financial system tottered.[1] But to bar the tide of commerce at every port from Trieste to Riga was like trying ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott

... world full of ordinary eating mortals, who smacked their lips and said things were good, but who knew no more than one of the Cent Suisses why things were good, or could appreciate the talents of an artiste of the cordon bleu. ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... a popular employer, and whose popularity was now increased by his having, although involuntarily, shared the dangers of his men—stepped from the cage, the enthusiasm was tremendous. The crowd broke the cordon of police and rushed forward, cheering loudly. Mr. Hardinge, after a minute or two, held up his hand for silence, and helped Mr. Brook on to a heap of stones. Although Mr. Brook, as well as the rest, had already recovered much, thanks to the basket ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty

... On the other hand, had Tardivet accompanied them, upon failing to find any trace of the Marquise at Charleroi, La Boulaye could imagine him pushing north along the Sambre, and pressing the peasantry into his service to form an impassable cordon. ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini

... militia emblazoned a very different story behind the cypress breastworks of New Orleans. Besides the thousand men in the fort, Hull had detached five hundred under Colonels McArthur and Cass to attempt to break through the Indian cordon in his rear and obtain supplies. These he now vainly endeavored to recall while he delayed a final reply to ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine

... night began to fall. The rumors of foul play led me to keep a hand hanging loose near my weapon, though the few natives I met seemed friendly enough. Darkness thickened and I was planning to swing my hammock among the trees when I fell upon the hut of Coronado Cordon. It was a sieve-like structure of bamboo, topped by a thick palm-leaf roof, with an outdoor mud fireplace, and crowded with dogs, pigs, and roosted fowls. Coronado himself, attired in the remnants of a pair of cotton trousers, greeted me ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck

... think we ought to start before we are driven to it by hunger. We are revived now, and ought to take advantage of it. To-night we will try to reach the eastern valleys by crossing the cordon of natives under ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne

... their hate of the vanquished foe, the Manono warriors established a cordon around them from the mountain range that traverses the centre of Upolu to the sea, and at last, after many engagements, drove them to the beach, where a final battle was fought. Exhausted, famine-stricken, and utterly disheartened ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke

... quays, so that the troops could march on board. A great crowd of the populace had assembled to view the embarkation. These were with difficulty kept from crowding the troops and impeding their movement by a cordon of soldiers. ...
— The Young Carthaginian - A Story of The Times of Hannibal • G.A. Henty

... answer. With a warm, impulsive gesture she put her arms about the taller woman's neck and, drawing the beautiful face down to her own, kissed her. Beatrice responded, and thus a friendship was sealed—not for life but for death, whose grim cordon was with every moment ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie

... not do this. They intend to make Kansas a free State by legal methods. But in the outcome of the business, there is not the value of a picayune of difference between a Free-soiler and an Abolitionist; for if the Free-soilers succeed in making Kansas a free State, and thus surround Missouri with a cordon of free States, our slaves in Missouri will not be worth a dime apiece. Still we must not hang this man; and I propose that we make a raft and send him down ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler

... feared that the explosion of a torpedo sent against her would damage his own craft, so he allowed her to steam off, and when she was 600 yards away he let go with two torpedoes. The second found its mark, and the S-126 was no more. He immediately went beneath the surface and escaped the cordon of destroyers which immediately searched for him. By October 7 the E-9 was back in Harwich, ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... the Treaty in all its rigour to French Jews, the Duc de Broglie, then French Minister for Foreign Affairs, issued an Ordinance suspending the operation of the Treaty in regard to the offending Canton, and followed this up by severing diplomatic relations and by placing a military cordon on the frontier.[68] The King himself approved the action of his Minister in an energetic speech to a deputation of the Consistoire Israelite. However, in 1835 the Ordinance was withdrawn, and until 1850 the peace was more or less preserved by a ...
— Notes on the Diplomatic History of the Jewish Question • Lucien Wolf

... extensively, not only in agriculture but in stock raising, and that to carry on his business it was necessary to employ quite a small army of laborers, as well as a small colony of dogs, who guarded the sheep during the night, and formed regular cordon around them, into which circle none could enter or depart except the shepherds. In case of an alarm by an invasion of bushrangers, the employees were required to turn out and act as skirmishers to repel ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes

... house, entre cour et jardin, which had once been so grand and noble. A printer now occupied the lower chambers, and a hand painted on the wall pointed to the Pension Magnotte, au premier. Tirez le cordon, s.v.p. ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon

... nominations and opposed Gallatin's financial policy as their interests or whims prompted. Randolph said of Madison at this time, that he was "President de jure only." Besides this domestic strife, the cabinet was engaged in futile efforts to resist the gradually tightening cordon of British aggression. Erskine's amateur negotiations, quickly disavowed by the British government, and the short and impertinent mission of Jackson, who succeeded him and was dismissed from the United States, well ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens

... o'clock the party got in motion again and, an hour after dark, entered a little village among the hills, about five miles north of the town. De la Noue at once placed a cordon of sentries, with orders that neither man, woman, nor child was to be allowed to leave it. Orders were issued, to the startled peasants, that all were to keep within their doors, at the peril of their lives. The horses were picketed in the street, and the ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty

... of the prisoners saw that there was a break in the cordon around them, or they realized that a great battle was putting their guards to flight, for some of them made a rush toward a side where there were no Germans, and succeeded in breaking out—no hard task since part of the fence was shattered by ...
— Air Service Boys in the Big Battle • Charles Amory Beach

... been too nearly crazed to think of this. Her bitterness and anguish broke through the near cordon of sympathy and went out against the whole brutal and careless world that did not care—to legislatures that did not care, to magistrates that did not care, to juries that did not care, to officials that did not care, to drivers that did not care, to the whole city that did not care about ...
— A Cathedral Singer • James Lane Allen

... his street clothes. He halted at the entrance to the long glazed gallery which extends to the operating rooms of the surgical department. Turning suddenly, he saw in the distance and coming his way Inspector Juve, accompanied by the director. He noticed at the same time the cordon of officers preparing to sweep the hospital from end to end. Mechanically, and as if bent on putting a certain distance between him and the new-comers, he turned into the glazed gallery, and reached the far end of it. He ...
— The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantmas" Detective Tales • mile Souvestre and Marcel Allain

... calculating too largely upon the credulity of their countrymen. That the country will be a pandemonium long before any one can reach it from this side is hardly to be doubted, unless, indeed, the United States government shall have been able to establish a blockade and cordon, in which case the new arrivals will have to get back as well as ...
— What I Saw in California • Edwin Bryant

... the hunt slackened. We had pinned the wretched brute into a corner of the island. Moreau, whip in hand, marshalled us all into an irregular line, and we advanced now slowly, shouting to one another as we advanced and tightening the cordon about our victim. He lurked noiseless and invisible in the bushes through which I had run from him during that ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells

... haut; avec 4 enfoncements en forme de niches dans les 4 angles des allies. Ce bastiment.... esloit de charpente mais d'un extraordinairement bien travaille. On y voyait particulierement la cordiliere qui regnati tout autour en forme de cordon. Car la Reyne affectait de la mettre nonseulement a ses armes et a ses chiffres mais de la faire representer en divers manieres dans tous les ouvrages qu'on lui faisait pour elle ... le bastiment estati couvert en forme ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci

... was only blank daylight between cloud and clay. These dead hues were relieved only by one spot of gold—the spark of the candle alight in the window of the lonely tower, and burning on into the broadening daylight. As the group of detectives, followed by a cordon of policemen, spread out into a crescent to cut off all escape, the light in the tower flashed as if it were moved for a moment, and then went out. They knew the man inside had realized the daylight and ...
— The Man Who Knew Too Much • G.K. Chesterton

... forward into the cordon of Indians which surrounded the burning building, glancing hurriedly from face to face, searching for MacNair. Upon the edge of the little clearing which surrounded the storehouse she saw the Louchoux girl ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx

... treading down the grass with their great irresistible feet or wrenching it away with their invincible trunks. It was now that the shikaree was feeling the elephant shortage. Had there been seventy-five instead of only twenty-five, he said, all would be well: he could then form a cordon such as no tiger might break through. For lack of these others, when the time came to turn and advance upon our prey he caused fires to be lighted here and there where the gaps were widest, so that we forged onwards not only to the accompaniment of the shrill ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas

... Arras, in a thousand places, were desperate conflicts, in which the line swayed, trenches were captured and recaptured, men died, and the Kaiser's troops frantically struggled to break their way through the cordon stretched before them. Along the British line the battle of Neuve Chapelle gave opportunity to many a young soldier, and proved to the Germans that British and Indians could fight heroically together. Then the Second Battle of Ypres took ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton

... to do the work itself. Am told off by Chairman to help remove old bricks on the Strand site. Have first to dig snow away to get at bricks. Intense amusement of hostile crowd, from whom we are protected by a cordon of police. Bark my shins badly against wheel of cart. Chairman—who has been extremely energetic in running up and down a ladder with a hod of mortar over his shoulder, which he thinks is bricklaying—falls ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, October 29, 1892 • Various

... on the part of the fire department subdued the flames after but two of the huge shed-like buildings had been destroyed. By noon the fire was controlled; a cordon of special police surrounded the entire plant and in one of the yards a hundred and fifty workmen were corralled under arrest until the federal officers had made an investigation and decided where ...
— Mary Louise and the Liberty Girls • Edith Van Dyne (AKA L. Frank Baum)

... argued the precision of a practised traveller, who had been long accustomed to every resource which change of weather required. A great profusion of narrow ribands or points, constituting the loops with which our ancestors connected their doublet and hose, formed a kind of cordon, composed of knots of blue or violet, which surrounded the traveller's person, and thus assimilated in colour with the two garments which it was the office of these strings to combine. The bonnet usually worn with this showy dress, ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... the company's lodging-houses on the canal, were certain low buildings, warehouses, and on their roofs tense figures could be seen standing out against the sky. The vanguard of the mob, thrust on by increasing pressure from behind, tumbled backward the thin cordon of police, drew nearer and nearer the bayonets, while the soldiers grimly held their ground. A voice was heard on the roof, a woman in the front rank of the mob gave a warning shriek, and two swift streams ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... king considered for a moment, and then answered in the affirmative, at the same time beckoning to a certain chief, an elderly, grey-headed man, and giving him an order; whereupon the chief—whom I assumed to be deep in his monarch's confidence—left his place in the semicircular cordon behind the throne, and, advancing to where the bundle lay at my feet, lifted it reverentially and bore it away to a large, rectangular hut—which I took to be the itunkulu, or king's house—at the far corner of the square, whither Lomalindela and I forthwith followed him. ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood

... permit himself to be removed to a distance with his ultimatum to Napoleon undelivered. When next the Prussian Government heard of their envoy, he was sauntering in Talleyrand's drawing-rooms at Vienna, with the cordon of the French Legion of Honour on his breast, exchanging civilities with officials who politely declined to enter upon ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe

... course of the day Wilmshurst heard the salient facts in connection with the raider's career. She was the Hamburg-Amerika intermediate liner Porfurst, who, after being armed and camouflaged, had contrived to escape the cordon of patrol-boats in the North Atlantic. For three months she had followed her piratical occupation, re-provisioning and re-coaling from the vessels she captured. Whenever her prisoners grew in number sufficiently to cause inconvenience the Porfurst spared ...
— Wilmshurst of the Frontier Force • Percy F. Westerman

... whole night we arrived at the bridge a little after sunrise. How glad we were to find the bridge still unoccupied! We had just reached it in time, for half an hour after we had gone over the British took possession of it. They had now completed their cordon; but ...
— In the Shadow of Death • P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald

... tall ferns and brambles by the wayside, and an advance party of one was thrown out to reconnoitre. The precautions were superfluous, if we knew but all. From the 15th of July, the French patrols had got the hint to be blind. So lax was the cordon on the day we crossed, that a brigade of Carlists, each man with a repeating rifle on his shoulder and two revolvers in his belt, might have gone into Spain and never have had their sight offended by a solitary ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea

... rapped. "I want a police cordon thrown up around this, er, vessel. No newsmen, no sightseers, nobody without my permission. As soon as Army personnel arrives, we'll ...
— Off Course • Mack Reynolds (AKA Dallas McCord Reynolds)

... in progress as I crossed University Place and entered the square. I threaded my way through the silent throng of spectators, but was stopped at Fourth Street by a cordon of police. A regiment of United States lancers were drawn up in a hollow square round the Lethal Chamber. On a raised tribune facing Washington Park stood the Governor of New York, and behind him were grouped the Mayor of New York and Brooklyn, the Inspector-General ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers

... stretched the arc of our cordon. The most distant rider was a speck, and the cattle ahead of him were like maggots endowed with a smooth, swift onward motion. As yet the herd had not taken form; it was still too widely scattered. Its units, in the shape of small bunches, momently grew in numbers. The distant plains were crawling ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White

... prayer to his God, and embraced, as it were, in his mind his poor old mother and his bride, awaited the horrible result, determined to show himself a true child of the forest, and meet his fate like a man. A few minutes more, and he was as if surrounded by a cordon of yellow flames, which, like so many Will-o'-the-wisps, danced about in all directions. These were the eyes of the monsters; the animals themselves, which he could not see, sent forth their horrible yells full in his face, ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle

... which vast line could never be firmly held against them by the enemy when once the Russians had trained and equipped a superior number of men. The German forces were sufficient, as events proved, long to maintain a strict cordon upon the shorter front between the Swiss frontiers and the sea, but upon the other side of the great field, between the Baltic and the Carpathians, they could never hope to establish one continued ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc

... 4th a cordon of police and gendarmes was suddenly picketed all around the missionary quarter in Pyeng-yang, and officials, police and detectives made an elaborate search of the houses. Some copies of an Independence newspaper, ...
— Korea's Fight for Freedom • F.A. McKenzie

... "Crikey!" said a cockney lad of the 47th Division. "I can't help laughing every time I think of them tanks. I saw them stamping down German machine-guns as though they were wasps' nests." The adventures of Creme de Menthe, Cordon Rouge, and the Byng Boys, on both sides of the Bapaume road, when they smashed down barbed wire, climbed over trenches, sat on German redoubts, and received the surrender of German prisoners who held their hands up to these monsters and cried, "Kamerad!" ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs

... pole of my being I am separate from all. There I have broken through the cordon of equality and stand alone as an individual. I am absolutely unique, I am I, I am incomparable. The whole weight of the universe cannot crush out this individuality of mine. I maintain it in spite of the tremendous gravitation of all things. It is small in appearance ...
— Sadhana - The Realisation of Life • Rabindranath Tagore

... disheartening effect on the troops to see that cordon closing in on them in the distance and enveloping them as in the meshes of some gigantic, invisible net. Even Pache and Lapoulle had an opinion ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola

... and not merely idle gewgaws worn in ridiculous imitation of the times when the Nobles and Priests were masters and the people slaves: and that, in all true Masonry, the Knight, the Pontiff, the Prince, and the Sovereign are but the first among their equals: and the cordon, the clothing, and the jewel but symbols and emblems of the virtues required of all ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike

... military and other official minions, and in about twenty minutes they were all wrapped in one red, merciless mass of flame. The country people, on observing this fearful conflagration, flocked from all quarters; but a cordon of outposts was stationed at some distance around the premises, to prevent the peasantry from marking the chief actors in this nefarious outrage. Two gentlemen, however, approached, who, having given their names, were at once admitted to the burning premises. These were Mr. Brown, the ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... ago. Some would have you believe the practice is of common occurrence. The story goes (though for its truth I do not vouch), that having located a crocodile in a reach of the river when the tide has run out, the blacks form a cordon across, and harry it by splashing the water and maintaining a continuous commotion. The crocodile is poked out of secluded nooks beside the bank and from under submerged logs, never being allowed a moment's peace. ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield

... not very reflective politicians in foreign affairs," said Graham; "but those who are must see that France could not, without alarm the most justifiable, contemplate a cordon of hostile states being drawn around her on all sides,—Germany, is, itself so formidable since the field of Sadowa, on the east; a German prince in the southwest; the not improbable alliance between Prussia and the Italian ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... fortunate enough to find Lord and Lady Lansdowne just returned from their tour. They looked at the Pyrenees, but they could not go into Spain, for the yellow fever rages there. A cordon of troops prevent any travellers who might be disposed to brave the danger of the fever, and fire if any attempt is made to pass. Lady Lansdowne would quite satisfy you by her love of the Italian women. Here are Miss Vernon, and Miss Fox, Lord Holland's sister, and Miss ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth

... the Catholic Church—that was the singular spectacle I found when I broke through the military cordon about the proclaimed city ...
— What's the Matter with Ireland? • Ruth Russell

... amongst all this press of people there would be some one to whom Prince Ughtred was known. They reached the station, however, without incident, and amidst ever-increasing enthusiasm. A handsome saloon was drawn up to the carpeted platform, and a cordon of soldiers kept the station clear. In less than five ...
— The Traitors • E. Phillips (Edward Phillips) Oppenheim

... the exception of Father Damaso, and the Spanish employees of the Government. Ibarra was conversing with the Alcalde, for they had become quite friendly from the time the young man paid him some high compliments on his insignia, decorations and cordon. Pride in belonging to an aristocratic family was a weakness of His Excellency. Captain Tiago, the alferez and several wealthy persons, with their shining silk hats, walked along, surrounded by a group of youngsters. Father Salvi followed, the same ...
— Friars and Filipinos - An Abridged Translation of Dr. Jose Rizal's Tagalog Novel, - 'Noli Me Tangere.' • Jose Rizal

... Lord Harry, no!' said the trooper, a young man who saw no reason not to be sociable. 'It's the most surprisin' thing out where he's got to. They've been all round him, reg'lar cordon-like, and he must have disappeared into the earth or gone up in a balloon ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood

... was in a very humble way and lived in a little mud village. There he had a friend, yet poorer than himself, who only attained to prosperity when a plague fell on the village. The sanitary authorities put a cordon around it to prevent the spread of the plague, and hired this man among others to throw disinfectants and things into any drains that happened to exist. Thus Osman Effendi's brother's friend ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 158, April 21, 1920 • Various

... ships were now in the service of the state. Those which remained, were constantly engaged in running across to the Dalmatian coast, and bringing in cargoes of provisions through the cordon of ...
— The Lion of Saint Mark - A Story of Venice in the Fourteenth Century • G. A. Henty

... of her. Mrs. Senator Dixon soon arrived, and remained with her through the night. All through the night, while the horror-stricken crowds outside swept and gathered along the streets, while the military and police were patrolling and weaving a cordon around the city; while men were arming and asking each other, "What victim next?" while the telegraph was sending the news from city to city over the continent, and while the two assassins were speeding unharmed upon ...
— The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth • George Alfred Townsend

... in his family, and this The Corporation knew, It rightly would be valued more Than any cordon bleu. ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton

... — N. outline, circumference; perimeter, periphery, ambit, circuit, lines tournure^, contour, profile, silhouette; bounds; coast line. zone, belt, girth, band, baldric, zodiac, girdle, tyre [Brit.], cingle^, clasp, girt; cordon &c (inclosure) ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... dispatches.—L. Muhlbach, "Life of Frederick the Great."] Having been apprised of the remarkable words of the empress, I began to fear that she might encroach upon Poland without regard to the claims of Austria. Your majesty is aware that the Russian army occupy Warsaw, and that a cordon of Russian troops extend as far ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... voice of Vandersee, and then the completeness of the spider's web could be distinguished. For from up river and down, the silent line of naval seamen drew near, herding the trapped fugitives into a circle that always narrowed in diameter. Then, as the cordon seemed complete beyond escape, the two white men broke into a desperate dash and ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle

... of his hoarded wealth. It was too much to hope that Jugurtha would be caught in such a trap. The alternative prospects at Thala were immediate capture or a siege as protracted as the nature of the territory would permit. In the latter case a cordon would be drawn round the town and a price would probably be put upon the rebel's head. It is strange that the desperate band of deserters did not accompany the king in his flight. There may have been no time for the retreat of so large a force, or the strength ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge

... company with Mr. Lee, Mr. Izard and his lady, Mr. Lloyd and his lady, and Mr. Francois. Saw the grand procession of the Knights du Saint-Esprit, or du Cordon Bleu. At nine o'clock at night, went to the grand convert, and saw the king, queen, and royal family, at supper; had a fine seat and situation close by the royal family, and had a distinct and full view ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner

... rebel cordon around the palace. And if we did, trying to give an alarm would only set the ...
— Gambler's World • John Keith Laumer

... hands and saying his Vidui (death-bed confession), offered him and his violin-case a place in the cellar, but he preferred to climb to the roof, from which with the aid of a small glass, he had a clear view of the cordon drawn round the doomed quarter. A ricocheting cannon-ball crashed through the chimney-pots at his side, but he did not budge. His eyes were glued upon a figure he had espied amid ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill



Words linked to "Cordon" :   cordon off, veal cordon bleu, adornment, series, chicken cordon bleu



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