"Corselet" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... arranged between the landlord and Don Quixote that the watch over the armor should take place in the courtyard of the inn. Don Quixote placed his corselet and helmet by the side of a well from which the carriers drew water, and, grasping his lance, commenced to march up and down before it like a sentinel on duty; and as the hours wore by and the march continued, the landlord called other persons to watch the performance, explaining that the ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... hero of an old Scandinavian legend. Sigurd discovered Brynhild, encased in a complete armor, lying in a death-like sleep, to which she had been condemned by Odin. Sigurd woke her by opening her corselet, fell in love with her, promised to marry her, but deserted her for Gudrun. This ill-starred union was the cause of ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... week the friar made two visits to my house and each time when he left, beneath his outer robe, he wore a corselet and carried a heavy short sword and helmet. We discovered my wife had converted each helmet into a store room which I robbed ...
— Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The Searchlight • Mathew Joseph Holt
... her tricks for summoning her swains, the male, on his side, is provided with an optical apparatus suited to catch from afar the least reflection of the calling-signal. His corselet expands into a shield and overlaps his head considerably in the form of a peaked cap or eye-shade, the object of which appears to be to limit the field of vision and concentrate the view upon the luminous speck to be discerned. Under this arch are ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre
... portals Of thy narrow rustic cell, Where so long immured, thy body Was to feeling a wild beast, Was to sufferance what the rock is, And that 'gainst thy sire and country Thou hast gallantly revolted, And ta'en arms, I come to assist thee, Intermingling the bright corselet Of Minerva with the trappings Of Diana, thus enrobing Silken stuff and shining steel In a rare but rich adornment. On, then, on, undaunted champion! To us both it is important To prevent and bring to nought This engagement and betrothal; First to ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... They in ranks Sat all, where stood the fiery steeds of each, And where his radiant arms lay on the field. Illustrious Alexander his bright arms Put on, fair Helen's paramour. [17]He clasp'd 390 His polish'd greaves with silver studs secured; His brother's corselet to his breast he bound, Lycaon's, apt to his own shape and size, And slung athwart his shoulders, bright emboss'd, His brazen sword; his massy buckler broad 395 He took, and to his graceful head his casque Adjusted elegant, which, as he moved, Its bushy crest waved dreadful; last he seized, Well ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... the door opened again, and on the threshold appeared a young man in a plumed hat and corselet, carrying a naked sword in one hand and a lanthorn in the other. Behind him I caught the gleam of steel from the ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini
... continuing to visit her, and while M. Tilleren was in Rouen news was brought him that Houdetot had actually beaten M. de Catheville's servants in trying to get into the house. This was too much; so Tilleren "took a corselet of beaten iron (hallecrest) and a crossbow with a long bolt, and took a companion, named Justin, armed with a helmet and a long-handled axe, with five or six others." The gang, who evidently meant to make sure of their ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... stirred by a strong feeling of joy with which was also awe. Both men were accoutred in the fashion which the pictured records show was usual with the Aztec warriors, and one of them—as was indicated by his head-dress and by the metal corselet that he wore—was a chief; and they challenged us sharply, yet with gladness in their tones, in the ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier
... the warp than woof, probably from want of appliance for driving the threads of the weft close enough, as they do not appear to have lays as we have for this purpose. Pliny refers to the remains of a linen corselet, presented by Amasis, king of Egypt, to the Rhodians, each thread of which was composed of 365 fibres: "Herodotus mentions this corselet, and another presented by Amasis to the Lacedaemonians, which had been carried off by the Samians. It was of linen, ornamented with numerous figures ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... his good lady Marion that had borne him an only manchild which on his eleventh day on live had died and no man of art could save so dark is destiny. And she was wondrous stricken of heart for that evil hap and for his burial did him on a fair corselet of lamb's wool, the flower of the flock, lest he might perish utterly and lie akeled (for it was then about the midst of the winter) and now Sir Leopold that had of his body no manchild for an heir looked upon him his friend's son and was shut up in sorrow for his forepassed happiness ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... warrior-host emeigeth, Casque, and corselet, spear, and shield; As the tide of red ore ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... in simple attire, but composed of excellent materials. His vest was of dark velvet, slashed, but not embroidered; and on his breast he wore a jazeran, or mailed cuirass, which was not only lighter than a steel corselet, but was equally proof against poniard or pike. In his broad leather belt were stuck two pairs of pistols, and a long dagger; a heavy broadsword also hung by his side. His black boots came up nearly to the knee—in contravention of the prevailing fashion of that age, when ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... Prague still keeps up its warrior look, and swaggers about with its rusty corselet and helm, though both sadly battered. There seems to me to be an air of style and fashion about the first people of Prague, and a good deal of beauty in the fashionable circle. This, perhaps, is ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... sark^, smock, shift, chemise; night gown, negligee, dressing gown, night shirt; bedgown^, sac de nuit [Fr.]. underclothes [underclothing], underpants, undershirt; slip [for women], brassiere, corset, stays, corsage, corset, corselet, bodice, girdle &c (circle) 247; stomacher; petticoat, panties; under waistcoat; jock [for men], athletic supporter, jockstrap. sweater, jersey; cardigan; turtleneck, pullover; sweater vest. neckerchief, neckcloth^; tie, ruff, collar, cravat, stock, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... Isabel would have given anything for lessons in this art; if her brilliant friend had been near she would have made an appeal to her. She had become aware more than before of the advantage of being like that—of having made one's self a firm surface, a sort of corselet of silver. ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 2 (of 2) • Henry James
... account. The first notable example of a roving troop existing for the sake of pillage, and selling its services to any bidder, was the so-called Great Company (1343), commanded by the German Guarnieri, or Duke Werner who wrote upon his corselet: 'Enemy of God, of Pity and of Mercy.' This band was employed in 1348 by the league of the Montferrat, La Scala, Carrara, Este, and Gonzaga houses, ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... figure which that Guardsman cut haunts me still. His pipeclayed gloves clutched wildly at holster and cantle as he went over. Down came the gleaming helmet crashing upon the pavement, and with a calamitous rattle and bang the whole complicated structure of corselet, scabbard, carbine, cross-belts, spurs and boots went into the inside corner of the archway, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various
... steel spear-head up to the very gauntlet. The horse of Sir Kenneth recoiled two or three yards and fell on his haunches; but the rider easily raised him with hand and rein. But for Conrade there was no recovery. Sir Kenneth's lance had pierced through the shield, through a plated corselet of Milan steel, through a SECRET, or coat of linked mail, worn beneath the corselet, had wounded him deep in the bosom, and borne him from his saddle, leaving the truncheon of the lance fixed in his wound. The sponsors, heralds, and Saladin himself, descending from his throne, crowded around the ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... had stirred my blood, or the fierce toil of war nerved my sinews, did, with fondest memory of bygone hours, entreat me to remain. I have seen her, who, when my country called me to the field, did buckle on my harness with trembling hands, while the tears fell thick and fast down the hard corselet scales—I have seen her tear her gray locks and beat her aged breast, as on her knees she begged me not to return to Carthage! and all the assembled senate of Rome, grave and reverend men, proffered the same request. The puny torments which ye have in store to welcome me withal, ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... shiny like satin; the eyes, of a reddish brown, glowed in a circle of silver. Over a little jet band, on the top of his head, three little soft eyes peeped out like those which the young observer had already noticed in the other fly. The brown trunk of this one seemed more delicate; his bronze corselet, reflecting like emerald, was garnished with fine hairs, like the down which the fresh morning spreads over beautiful fruits. The belly of the insect, which showed itself between and through the transparent wings, was of a beautiful shining ...
— Piccolissima • Eliza Lee Follen
... offensive, because singularly grotesque, example of the abuse at its height, occurs in the Hotel des Invalides, where the dormer windows are suits of armor down to the bottom of the corselet, crowned by the helmet, and with the window in the ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... of Lindos two stone statues and a corselet of linen of marvellous fineness;* and Hera of Samos received two wooden statues, which a century later Herodotus found still intact. The Greeks flocked to Egypt from all quarters of the world in such considerable numbers that the laws relating ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 9 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... was Roland, red with bloodshed: Red his corselet, red his shoulders, Red his arm, and ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt
... displeased us; but, keeping their tracks constantly in sight, we followed them, although we were often deceived. We went through dense woods, and over swamps and marshes, with the water always up to our knees, greatly encumbered by a pike-man's corselet, with which each one was armed. We were also tormented in a grievous and unheard-of manner by quantities of mosquitoes, which were so thick that they scarcely permitted us to draw breath. After going about half a league under these circumstances, and no longer knowing where ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Vol. 2 • Samuel de Champlain
... Captain. Buried in thought he seemed, with his hands behind him, and pausing 5 Ever and anon to behold his glittering weapons of warfare. Hanging in shining array along the walls of the chamber,— Cutlass and corselet[5] of steel, and his trusty sword of Damascus,[6] Curved at the point and inscribed with its mystical[7] Arabic sentence, While underneath, in a corner, were fowling-piece, musket, and matchlock.[8] 10 Short of stature he was, but strongly built and athletic, ...
— Narrative and Lyric Poems (first series) for use in the Lower School • O. J. Stevenson
... moment the king forgot everything except that, he was parting with what he loved best in all the world. He caught the child in his arms, pressed her to his bosom, and burst into tears. Yes; though he was a brave man, and though he wore a steel corselet on his breast, and though armies were waiting for him to lead them to battle, still his heart melted within him, and he wept. Christina, too, was so afflicted that her attendants began to fear that she would ...
— Biographical Stories - (From: "True Stories of History and Biography") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... to threaten the enemies of Egypt. His finely-shaped, swarthy features are adorned, or disfigured, by an artificial beard, which is fastened on by a strap passing up in front of the ears. His tall slender body is covered, above his corselet, with a robe of fine white linen, a perfect wonder of pleating; and round his waist passes a girdle of gold and green enamel, whose ends cross and hang down almost to his knees, terminating in two threatening cobra heads (Plate 4 and Cover Picture). On either side ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Ancient Egypt • James Baikie
... had grown hard and stiff from infrequent use and too small, having been made for her when she was younger. I also felt most uncomfortable in my good clothes, which were ever outgrown and held me like a corselet. At last the house door was locked and we drove the two miles to the church, silent and serious as became our Sunday clothes and our equipage. We felt strange to ourselves and not at ease. When the meeting was over I had a sudden ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... corselet, too, with gimp buttons," says Polinka, bending over the gimp and sighing for some reason. "And have you any ...
— The Darling and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... brought back Agard wounded to death and slow-dying. And we burned his body on a great pyre, with Elgiva, in her golden corselet, beside him singing. And there were household slaves in golden collars that burned of a plenty there with her, and nine female thralls, and eight male slaves of the Angles that were of gentle birth and battle-captured. And there were live hawks so burned, ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... feel either hunger or weariness; nay, he would only acknowledge enough of the latter to give a perfect charm to rest under such auspices. Eustacie had dispatched her motherly cares promptly enough to be with him again just as in taking off his corselet he had found that it had been pierced by a bullet, and pursuing the trace, through his doublet, he found it lodged in that purse which he had so long worn next his heart, where it had spent its force against the ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Coriolanus, depict him. Having described, in those compressed sinewy phrases which Shakespeare has at command, the change in his nature, he adds, "When he walks, he moves like an engine, and the ground shrinks before his treading. He is able to pierce a corselet with his eye; he talks like a knell, and his hum is a battery. He sits in his state, as a thing made for Alexander. What he bids be done is finished with his bidding: he wants nothing of a god but eternity and a heaven ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... mien, To catch thy gaze, and uttering graceful words To charm thy ear; while his sly imps, by stealth, Twine around thee threads of steel, light thread on thread, That grow to fetters; or bind down thy arms With chains concealed in chaplets. Oh! not yet May'st thou unbrace thy corselet, nor lay by Thy sword; nor yet, O Freedom! close thy lids In slumber; for thine enemy never sleeps, And thou must watch and combat till the day Of the new earth and heaven. But wouldst thou rest Awhile from tumult and the frauds of men, ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... most gracious sir, here I am!" cried Burgsdorf's rough voice, and with clashing sword and glittering corselet Conrad von Burgsdorf entered the room. The Electoral Prince nodded to him, and then turned to the painter, who humbly and with lowered head had crept away toward the door. "Master Nietzel," he said, with a condescending wave of the hand, "go now, and be careful ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... cutting the rock with picks or mattocks, lest by their blows they should reveal to the enemy what they were doing, but scraping it very persistently with sharp instruments of iron. And in a short time the work was done, so that a man wearing a corselet and carrying a shield was able to go through at ...
— Procopius - History of the Wars, Books V. and VI. • Procopius
... them by peace better than by war. When the Union emerges from the battle-smoke,—her crest towering over the ruins of traitorous cities and the wrecks of Rebel armies, her eye flashing defiance to all her evil-wishers, her breast heaving under its corselet of iron, her arm wielding the mightiest enginery that was ever forged into the thunderbolts of war,—her triumph will be grand enough without her setting fire to the stubble with which the folly of the Old World has girt its thrones. No deeper humiliation could be asked ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 78, April, 1864 • Various
... seem to stir it nor did her white dress flutter, and on her beautiful face was stamped a look of awful rage and agony, the rage of betrayal, the agony of loss. In her right hand she held a knife, and from a wound in her breast the red blood ran down her golden corselet. She pointed to Jeekie with the knife, she opened her arms to Alan as though in unutterable longing, then slowly raised them upwards towards the fading glory of the sky above—and ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... ere the conspirators suddenly surround the Tribune, and there, in the presence of the assembled people, they simultaneously draw their daggers, and strike him repeatedly. This dastardly attempt at murder utterly fails, however, as the Tribune wears a corselet of mail beneath the robes of state, and his guards quickly disarm and secure the conspirators while the people loudly clamour for their execution by the axe, a burly blacksmith, Cecco, acting as their ...
— Stories of the Wagner Opera • H. A. Guerber
... whistled. "I'd like to see the pill that would go through that!" It was, in fact, a medieval corselet of finest steel mesh, capable of ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train
... house, and his servant, who was a freeborn woman, taken from Megalopolis after his wife's death, offering, as usual, to do the service he needed on returning from war, though he was very thirsty, he refused to drink, and though very weary, to sit down; but in his corselet as he was, he laid his arm sideways against a pillar, and leaning his forehead upon his elbow, he rested his body a little while, and ran over in his thoughts all the courses he could take; and then with his friends set on at once ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... resplendent plumes he was plucking out and casting to the winds, as though they had been common feathers; and his whole action betokened that he had no more regard for those grand tail feathers and that gorgeous purple corselet, than if it had been a goose, or an old turkey-cock that ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... the coat of mail that Virata's eldest son, the heroic Sanksha, put on was impenetrable and made of burnished steel, and decked with a hundred eyes of gold. And it was thus that those god-like and mighty warriors by hundreds, furnished with weapons, and eager for battle, each donned his corselet. And then they yoked unto their excellent cars of white-hue steeds equipped in mail. And then was hoisted Matsya's glorious standard on his excellent car decked with gold and resembling the sun or the moon in its effulgence. And other Kshatriya ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... would be a turtle dove, my helmet a wine bowl, my plume a woven chaplet, my spear a dice box, my corselet a downy robe; where I'd be given a couch for a horse, with a bad, bad girl beside me for ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius
... asunder in the desperate resistance. Then, at last, when his head almost touched the ground, Darius groaned and his limbs relaxed. Instantly Zoroaster threw him on his back and kneeled with his whole weight upon his chest,—the gilded scales of the corselet cracking beneath the burden, and he held the king's hands down on either side, pinioned to the floor. Darius struggled desperately twice and then lay quite still. Zoroaster gazed down ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... for him as cradle set Her husband's rusty iron corselet; Whose jangling sound could hush her babe to rest, That never plain'd of his uneasy nest; Then did he dream of dreary wars at hand, And woke, and fought, and won, ere ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... morn Niam roused Oisin, and she buckled on him his golden-hilted sword and his corselet of blue steel inlaid with gold. Then he put on his head a steel and gold helmet with dragon crest, and slung on his back a shield of bronze wrought all over with cunning hammer-work of serpentine ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston
... watching, a dozen feet from Yorke, who leaned carelessly on his rifle. Jerry struggled into the dress by slow degrees, for the sun was burning hot, then got the cuffs clipped tightly about his wrists while Dailey and Birch fastened on the heavy corselet. The sixteen-pound boots came next, and very comical indeed the old quartermaster looked, with his white hair blowing in the wind and his blue eyes as eager and lively as those of ...
— The Pirate Shark • Elliott Whitney
... deceived,—if, above all, I am ever seduced, or led blindfold into one of those snares which priestcraft sometimes lays to the cost of honour,—why, I shall have a sword, which I shall never be at a loss to use, and it can find its way through a priest's gown as well as a soldier's corselet." ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... is worn a jacket of some gay color and confined in front by silver clasps; or it may be simply a leathern corselet joined together by stitches. In either case the waist is incased as it were in a straight jacket, which being put on at the age of ten or even younger, and worn constantly until the marriage night, restrains the fulness ...
— Life of Schamyl - And Narrative of the Circassian War of Independence Against Russia • John Milton Mackie
... and the sooner the better, your worship. I had rather mount guard, for a week, in steel helmet and corselet, with breast, back, culet, gorget, tasses, sword, musket and bandoliers, in the hottest sun that ever roasted a blackamoor, or stand up to my knees, six months, in snow, without my mandilion, than lie a day longer in that ace—I mean ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... concentrated upon an easel, where a canvas stood untouched as yet save for three or four outlines in chalk. The daylight scarcely reached the remoter angles and corners of the vast room; they were as dark as night, but the silver ornamented breastplate of a Reiter's corselet, that hung upon the wall, attracted a stray gleam to its dim abiding-place among the brown shadows; or a shaft of light shot across the carved and glistening surface of an antique sideboard covered with curious silver-plate, or struck out a line of glittering dots among the raised threads ...
— The Unknown Masterpiece - 1845 • Honore De Balzac
... chase for pyrophores. They are "cocuyos," or luminous flies, which the stylish put in their hair, like so many living gems. These insects which throw a bright and bluish light from two spots situated at the base of their corselet, are very numerous in South America. Cousin Benedict then counted on making a large collection, but Hercules did not leave him time, and, in spite of his recriminations, the negro brought him to the halting-place. That was because, when Hercules had orders, he executed them with ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... Sibyl. She is armed, for she is the prophetess of Roman fortitude;—but her faded breast scarcely raises the corselet; her hair floats, not falls, in waves like the currents of a river,—the sign of enduring life; the light is full on her forehead: she looks into the distance as in a dream. It is impossible for art to gather ...
— Ariadne Florentina - Six Lectures on Wood and Metal Engraving • John Ruskin
... weapon, while the followers of both knights drew back to watch the combat. Delivering the senseless Joan Du Bois to a retainer, the Templar knight plunged fiercely down upon his opponent, cutting left and right at his visor and corselet, in his progress. The black warrior parried the murderous strokes with infinite skill, and as his antagonist was employed in drawing his rein to check his steed, dealt him a blow upon the bridle arm, which split his mail and caused his limb to drop useless by his side. Infuriated with pain, ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... foster-brothers of Thorgils, Halldor and Ornolf. And a very trustworthy fellow you are. But have you now told the tale of all the men you saw?" He answered, "I have but little to add now. Next there sat a man and looked out of the circle; he was in a plate-corselet and had a steel cap on his head, with a brim a hand's breadth wide; he bore a shining axe on his shoulder, the edge of which must have measured an ell in length. This man was dark of hue, black-eyed, and ...
— Laxdaela Saga - Translated from the Icelandic • Anonymous
... heard the clash of arms on the stairs and the shouting of the assailants, the Marquis ordered De Chaves to close the door; then he sprang to the wall, tore from it his corselet and endeavored to buckle it on his person. De Chaves unwisely attempted to parley, instead of closing the door and barring it. The assailants forced the entrance, cut down De Chaves, and burst into the room. Pizarro gave over the attempt to fasten his breastplate, and seizing a sword and ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... had bound Hamayoun, the son of Baber, to her cause by a curious ceremony: she having sent him the Rakhi (bracelet), and he having bestowed on her the Katchli (corselet), he was bound, in consequence of this bond, to assist the lady in any time of need. Too late to save Chitor, he retook it, and restored Bikramajit to the throne; but the guardian goddess had turned her face from the doomed city, and its final fall was at hand. ...
— A Holiday in the Happy Valley with Pen and Pencil • T. R. Swinburne
... he met one who had claimed to be a philosopher. It was Jared Chick, stalking along the sidewalk in his home-made armor. He held a box of stove-polish in one hand and a brush in the other, and as he strolled he was giving his corselet and such parts of the armor as he could handily reach a glossy coat—a gleaming and burnished surface. On his helmet in place of a crest Knight Chick bore aloft a metal banneret ...
— The Landloper - The Romance Of A Man On Foot • Holman Day
... that rests with the spur on his heel, As the guardsman that sleeps in his corselet of steel, As the archer that stands with his shaft on the string, He stoops from his toil to the garland ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... they took them could dart them as javelins. These archers, amidst the rugged ground and narrow paths, approached so near and drew the bow with such surprising force, resting one extremity of it on the ground, that several Greek warriors were mortally wounded even through both shield and corselet[58] into the reins,[59] and through the brazen helmet into their heads; among them especially, two distinguished men, a Lacedaemonian named Kleonymus and an Arcadian named Basias. The rear division, more roughly handled than ...
— The Two Great Retreats of History • George Grote
... the great man. They left the litter and entered a large shop. There Augustus bought many gifts for the young man—new arms, a beautiful corselet, a girdle of the look of knitted gold—for the Roman wore a girdle in Judea—articles of apparel suited to the climate of the Far East. The shop had filled with people, who tried to cover their curiosity by ...
— Vergilius - A Tale of the Coming of Christ • Irving Bacheller
... murder. Brynhild at first laughs aloud at Gudrun's frantic grief, but later her joy turns into sorrow, and she determines to share Sigurd's death. In vain they try to dissuade her; donning her gold corselet, she pierces herself with a sword and begs to be burned on Sigurd's funeral pyre. In dying she prophesies the future, telling of Gudrun's marriage to "Atli" and of the death of the many men ...
— The Nibelungenlied • Unknown
... as of flame: swollen the skin, His features hidden, swollen all his limbs Till more than human: and his definite frame One tumour huge concealed. A ghastly gore Is puffed from inwards as the virulent juice Courses through all his body; which, thus grown, His corselet holds not. Not in caldron so Boils up to mountainous height the steaming wave; Nor in such bellying curves does canvas bend To Eastern tempests. Now the ponderous bulk Rejects the limbs, and as a shapeless trunk Burdens ...
— Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars • Lucan
... off the gyves. A bearded man, Arm'd to the teeth, art thou; one mailed hand Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow, Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarr'd With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs Are strong with struggling.... Oh! not yet, Mayst thou unbrace thy corselet nor lay by Thy sword; nor yet, O Freedom! close thy lids In slumber; for thine enemy never sleeps, And thou must watch and combat till the day Of the new ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... they blew trumpets, clashed cymbals, and fired volleys of useless musketry. When the Christians had ended their devotions and stood to their guns, or in their ordered ranks, each galley, in the long array, seemed on fire, as the noon-tide sun blazed on helmet and corselet, and pointed blades and pikes with flame. The bugles now sounded a charge, and the bands of each vessel began to play. Before Don John retired from the forecastle to his proper place on the quarter-deck, it is said by one of the officers, who had written an account of the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... the General!" And looking, we saw a lonely figure in the distance galloping by the Marais de St. Hilaire. Then he turned the angle of the great priory. There was a flash of his red plume, a glitter of sunlight on his corselet, and ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... grown Had long exchanged the corselet for the gown: In peace forgotten the commander's art, And learned to play the politician's part,— To court the suffrage of the crowd, and hear In his own theatre the venal cheer; Idly he rested on his ancient fame, And was the shadow of a mighty ...
— Post-Augustan Poetry - From Seneca to Juvenal • H.E. Butler
... "and thou, Simon, hear me. I loved thy father, and knew the upright noble spirit that arrayed him against us. Heaven is my witness that I would have given my life to have been able to save him on yon wretched battle-field. But he fell in fair fight, in helm and corselet, like a good knight. Peace be with him! Surely in this land of pardon and redemption his son and nephew may cease to seek one another's blood for his sake! Cheer thy brother by letting him feel his brave deed hath not been fruitless. Free thou shalt go—do what thou wilt; ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... show themselves worthy sons of the lines of Guzman and Mendoza, Benavides and Salazar. Don Juan, arrayed in complete steel, stood by the flagstaff of the consecrated standard. Along the bulwarks four hundred Castilian arquebusiers in corselet and head-piece represented the pick of the yet unconquered Spanish infantry. The three hundred rowers had left the oars, and, armed with pike and sword, were ready to second them, when the musketry ceased and the storming of the Turkish galleys ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... affairs—Mohammedans, even, in well-tolerated companionship with Christian cavaliers; some of them with faces blackened and robes tattered by the corroding breath of centuries, others fresh and bright in new red mantle or steel corselet, the exact doubles of the living. And wedged in with all these were detached arms, legs, and other members, with only here and there a gap where some image had been removed for public disgrace, or had fallen ominously, as Lorenzo's had done six months before. It ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... full moral beauty of the love and truth which are the constant associates of all that is even most weak and erring in the character of its hero, and pass over the rude adventure and scurrile jest in haste—perhaps in pain, to penetrate beneath the rusty corselet, and catch from the wandering glance the evidence and expression of fortitude, self-devotion, and universal love. So, again, with the works of Scott and Byron; popularity was as instant as it was deserved, because there is in ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... roof hung four immense helmets, the ornaments of martial brows; to-day the birds of Venus, the doves, cooing, fed their young in them. In the stable a great cuirass extended over the manger and a corselet of ring mail served as a chute through which the boy threw down clover to the colts. In the kitchen the godless cook had spoiled the temper of several swords by sticking them into the oven instead of spits; with a Turkish ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz
... I hymned, my prince; but thee now, Castor, will I sing, O son of Tyndarus, O lord of the swift steeds, O wielder of the spear, thou that wearest the corselet of bronze. ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang
... mail that bite of sword O'er clashing shield in fight withstood must follow its dead lord. Never again shall corselet ring as help the warriors bear ...
— The Translations of Beowulf - A Critical Biography • Chauncey Brewster Tinker
... other. Drogo's lance grazed his opponent's casque: the unknown knight drove his missile through corselet and breast, and Drogo went down crashing from his steed. The combat went sweeping on past them, the desperate foes fighting as they rode. Edward and his horsemen, less and less in number each minute, still riding for the priory, straining every nerve to reach ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... Ribaut, "through the multitude of all kind of fish." Indians were running along the beach, and out upon the sand-bars, beckoning them to land. They pushed their boats ashore and disembarked,—sailors, soldiers, and eager young nobles. Corselet and morion, arquebuse and halberd, flashed in the sun that flickered through innumerable leaves, as, kneeling on the ground, they gave thanks to God, who had guided their voyage to an issue full of promise. The Indians, seated gravely under ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... captain, dressed in his buff coat, with a corselet beneath it, accompanied the governor and councillors. Laying his hand upon his sword hilt, he would declare that the only method of dealing with the red men was to meet them with the sword drawn and ...
— Grandfather's Chair • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... that day, and many a false corselet was broken, and many a white streamer dyed with blood, and many a horse left without a rider. The Misbelievers called on Mahomet, and the Christians on Santiago, and the noise of the tambours and of the trumpets was so great that ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... sate Governor Bradford; men, matrons, and maidens fair, Miles Standish and all his soldiers, with corselet and sword, were there; And sobbing and tears and gladness had each in its turn the sway, For the grave of the sweet ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck
... a moment to fold me in a masculine hug. But her bosom might have been encased in an iron corselet for all the tenderness it conveyed. "God bless you, Harry Brooks, and try to be a man!" Her embrace relaxed, and with a dry-sounding sob she let me go as I caught the coachman's hand and was swung up to my seat; and with that we were off and up the ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... much inferior to our modern fire-arms; since it was exhausted by a single discharge, at the distance of only ten or twelve paces. Yet when it was launched by a firm and skilful hand, there was not any cavalry that durst venture within its reach, nor any shield or corselet that could sustain the impetuosity of its weight. As soon as the Roman had darted his pilum, he drew his sword, and rushed forwards to close with the enemy. His sword was a short well-tempered Spanish blade, that carried a double ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... something distorted and hunchbacked about them; and when one saw them passing in the distance, and climbing up some road to the horizon, they resembled the insects which are called, I think, termites, and which, though with but little corselet, drag a great train behind them. But they travelled at a very rapid rate. The post-wagon which set out from Arras at one o'clock every night, after the mail from Paris had passed, arrived at M. sur M. a little before five o'clock in ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... a noble charger, with a general's truncheon in her hand, a corselet of polished steel laced on over her magnificent apparel, and a page in attendance bearing her white-plumed helmet, she rode bare-headed from rank to rank with a courageous deportment and smiling countenance; and amid the affectionate plaudits and shouts of military ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... a word, according to Clarke, descriptive of their peculiar habit. Their corselet, and the mail worn under it, were of a piece, and put on together. To them therefore the cincture or belt of ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... tournament, in which the good fortune of his lance was to win him a king's daughter for his bride, he might have claimed to be an admirable and interesting hero. Was he, indeed, a less respectable adventurer, that for steel he had to substitute French polish, for surcoat and corselet, broadcloth and cambric—that the battle he was to wage must be fought out by tenacity of purpose and ingenuity of brain, rather than strength of arm and downright ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... drum rolled on, and stirred our blood to fresh extravagance that night. The clarion sound and clang of corselet and buckler were heard from many a hamlet of the soul, and many a knight was arming for the fight behind the ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... master of Calatrava, whose burnished armor, emblazoned with the red cross of his order, made him a mark for the missiles of the enemy. As he was raising his arm to make a blow an arrow pierced him just beneath the shoulder, at the open part of the (1) corselet. The lance and bridle fell from his hands, he faltered in his saddle, and would have fallen to the ground, but was caught by Pedro Gasca, a cavalier of Avila, who conveyed him to his tent, where he died. The king and queen and the whole kingdom mourned his death, for he ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... surround the morass with nets extending a mile in height, on various parts of which net the company disposed themselves, floating in the air like so many spiders upon their cobwebs. Magog, at my command, put on a kind of armour that he had carried with him for the purpose, corselet of steel, with gauntlets, helmet, &c., so as nearly to resemble a mole. He instantly plunged into the earth, making way with his sharp steel head-piece, and tearing up the ground with his iron claws, and found not much difficulty therein, as morass in ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... watch the combat, only breathe Short fits of prayer, at every stroke a breath. And he, she dreaded most, bare down upon him. Aim'd at the helm, his lance err'd; but Geraint's, A little in the late encounter strain'd, Struck thro' the bulky bandit's corselet home, And then brake short, and down his enemy roll'd, And there lay still; as he that tells the tale Saw once a great piece of a promontory, That had a sapling growing on it, slide From the long shore-cliff's windy walls to the beach, And there lie still, and yet the sapling grew: So lay the man ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... the tinkle of chained mail in Hawberk's shop. But it was not so fascinating, and the dull sparkle of the moonlight on the water brought no such sensations of exquisite pleasure, as when the sunshine played over the polished steel of a corselet on Hawberk's knee. I watched the bats darting and turning above the water plants in the fountain basin, but their rapid, jerky flight set my nerves on edge, and I went away again to walk aimlessly to and fro ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... an idea of 'complete armor.'" Corselet Breast [plate or piece]. Back [ditto]. Culet (?). Gorget [throat-piece]. Tussis ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames
... of the innkeeper, a very corpulent and therefore a very pacific man, who, upon seeing so ludicrous an object, armed, and with accoutrements so ill-sorted as were the bridle, lance, buckler, and corselet, felt disposed to join the damsels in demonstrations of mirth; but, in truth, apprehending some danger from a form thus strongly fortified, he resolved to behave with civility, and therefore said, "If, Sir Knight, you ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... was distinguished for great physical strength and agility. When he first joined the troop of Braccio, he could race, with his corselet on, against the swiftest runner of the army; and when he was stripped, few horses could beat him in speed. Far on into old age he was in the habit of taking long walks every morning for the sake of exercise, and delighted ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... they took the mighty greaves, And loosed the woven corselet from his side, And bathed his feet and brought ...
— Parsifal - A Drama by Wagner • Retold by Oliver Huckel
... of pale-yellow, in the manner of a corselet with wide, up-and-down stripes, a stiff ruff and buttons of topaz. There is a narrow frilled stripe on the edge of the collar, and also on the close-fitting sleeves. The trunks are short, wide-slashed, and of a ...
— Mogens and Other Stories - Mogens; The Plague At Bergamo; There Should Have Been Roses; Mrs. Fonss • Jens Peter Jacobsen
... to do; and her aged father retired to his armory, and donned his ancient war-worn corselet. It had borne the shock of a thousand lances ere this, but it was now so tight as almost ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Ormond-Butlers, one even of the great duke who fled to France; and there were pictures of the Varicks before they mingled with us Irish—apple-cheeked Dutchmen, cadaverous youths bearing match-locks, and one, an admiral, with star and sash across his varnish-cracked corselet of blue steel, looking at me with pale, ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... King-of-Glory against this Grendel a guard had set, so heroes heard, a hall-defender, who warded the monarch and watched for the monster. In truth, the Geats' prince gladly trusted his mettle, his might, the mercy of God! Cast off then his corselet of iron, helmet from head; to his henchman gave, — choicest of weapons, — the well-chased sword, bidding him guard the gear of battle. Spake then his Vaunt the valiant man, Beowulf Geat, ere the bed be sought: — "Of force in fight no feebler I count me, in grim war-deeds, ...
— Beowulf • Anonymous
... spoke, he buried his frank, good-natured countenance in an iron headpiece, and Rose hastened to help him adjust his corselet. ...
— Betty's Bright Idea; Deacon Pitkin's Farm; and The First Christmas - of New England • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Part of a British gold corselet found at Mold, now in the British Museum 9 (From ...
— A Student's History of England, v. 1 (of 3) - From the earliest times to the Death of King Edward VII • Samuel Rawson Gardiner
... in a manner so bizarre, as to indicate some of the wild fancies peculiar to the knights of that period. His armour was ingeniously painted, so as to represent a skeleton; the ribs being constituted by the corselet and its back-piece. The shield represented an owl with its wings spread, a device which was repeated upon the helmet, which appeared to be completely covered by an image of the same bird of ill omen. But that which was particularly calculated to excite surprise in the spectator, was the great ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... uncertain whether to accept or refuse the challenge of Bradamante, Marfisa buckled on her coat of mail, and rode out in his stead to meet the foe. Bradamante felt in her heart who the knight was with the plume of blue and shining golden corselet, and hate burned in her soul as fiercely as in the breast of ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various
... the wave. By and by the red man ceased to drink of my unfailing rill. Beings with pale faces came to me to quench their thirst; bearded lips were moistened with my diamond drops; and I looked up upon iron corselet and steel hauberk, and faces harder than either. But the old Puritans gave me form and substance—a 'local habitation and a name.' The spirit of the fountain was wedded to its present tabernacle. The dwellings of ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... his weapon, shouting words of defiance: "Indeed, thou hadst faith, O friend of the Burgundians, 15 That the hand of Hagena had held me in battle, Defeated me on foot. Fetch now, if thou darest, From me weary with war my worthy gray corselet! It lies on my shoulder as 'twas left me by Aelfhere, Goodly and gorgeous and gold-bedecked, 20 The most honorable of all for an atheling to hold When he goes into battle to guard his life, To ...
— Old English Poems - Translated into the Original Meter Together with Short Selections from Old English Prose • Various |
