"Dirk" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... near this place by The connivance of the late HENDRIK DIRK UYS A Minister of God Who thrice took the oath of neutrality And Piet his ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... officer. His coat was red, with facings of another color, underneath which was partially displayed a handsome vest and ruffled shirt. About his waist passed a broad wampum belt, in which were confined a brace of silver mounted pistols, another pair of less finish and value, a silver handled dirk, a scalping knife and tomahawk, on whose blades could be seen traces of blood. Around his neck was a neatly tied cravat, and dangling in front of his vest a gold chain, which connected with a watch hid in a pocket of his breeches, whence depended a larger chain of steel, supporting ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... forfeited estates of his family and from the clan of which he was head. Success was instantaneous. Within a few weeks Fraser was at the head of some 1500 men. They wore the Highland dress, with a sporran of badger's or otter's skin and carried musket and broadsword; some of them wore a dirk at their own cost. Among the officers were no less than five Simon Frasers,[3] three or four each of Alexander Frasers and John Frasers, and a good many other Frasers, among them a young Ensign, Malcolm Fraser, destined to rule one of the seigniories at Malbaie for more than half a century. Other ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... to the garments of the low country, and, while perfectly decent, yet look ancient exceedingly. On Sundays, however, he made the best of himself, and came out like a belated and aged butterfly—with his father's sporran, or tasselled goatskin purse, in front of him, his grandfather's dirk at his side, his great grandfather's skene dhu, or little black hafted knife, stuck in the stocking of his right leg, and a huge round brooch of brass—nearly half a foot in diameter, and, Mr Graham ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... with a particular and positive interest in their most foreign customs and their most foreign externals. The man who made a romance of the Scotch High-lander made a romance of his kilt and even of his dirk; the friend of the Red Indians was interested in picture writing and had some tendency to be interested in scalping. To take a more serious example, such nations as Serbia had been largely commended to international consideration by the study of ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... awa' frae Scotia's mountains, Far frae a' that 's dear to dwall, Mak's my e'en twa gushin' fountains, Dings a dirk in my puir saul. Braes o' breckan, hills o' heather, Howms whare rows the gowden wave, Blissful scenes, fareweel for ever! I maun seek ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... of heat, Strong sons of Europe, in a far dim year, Faced ghastly foes, and felt the alien spear! There, in a later dawn, by shipless waves, The tender grasses found forgotten graves.*4* Far in the west, beyond those hills sublime, Dirk Hartog anchored in the olden time; There, by a wild-faced bay, and in a cleft, His shining name the fair-haired Northman left;*5* And, on those broad imperial waters, far Beneath the lordly occidental star, Sailed Tasman down a great and glowing space Whose softer lights were like ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... knight, yclept of Golden Cyrcle! Why in the devil don't one dirk all? Where now's your chivalrie?' 'Goode sir,' quod he, 'twas ne for fight I hied me out ilk murkie night, It was ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... was, however, unavailing to prevent assaults. The most serious instance of this kind was the act of an Irish ruffian, who so far forgot the traditions and sufferings of his own people as to cast himself upon Drayton with a huge dirk and cut off a piece of his ear.[6] For a few moments all the horrors incident to riot and bloodshed were in evidence. The air was filled with the screams of terrorized women and children and the curses and threats of vengeful men. The whole was a struggling, swaying mass, which for ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various
... certain night the old man told him the green round hill, where the fairies kept the boy, would be open, and on that date the smith, having provided himself with a Bible, a dirk, and a crowing cock, was to proceed to the hill. He would hear singing and dancing, and much merriment going on, he had been told, but he was to advance boldly; the Bible he carried would be a certain safeguard ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... dirk which he usually carried with him, and in the excitement of the moment inflicted a slight wound on Isaac's hand. The cut was not serious, but Isaac would not allow it to be properly treated, and subsequently died from ...
— The War Chief of the Six Nations - A Chronicle of Joseph Brant - Volume 16 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • Louis Aubrey Wood
... arrayed himself in a somewhat worn dress of Kennedy's, with the belt and dirk he had carried under his scholar's garb now without, and a steel cap that his cousin had procured for him on his head. With a parcel in his arms of Kennedy's gear, he might pass for a servant sent from home to meet him; and so soon as this disguise ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... mayor, Dirk Wessels, recorder, Jan Wendal, Jan Jansen Bleeker, Claes Ripse, David Schuyler, Albert Ryckman, aldermen, Killian Van Rensselaer, justice, Captain Marte Gerritse, justice, Captain Gerrit Teunisse, Dirk Teunisse, justices, Lieutenant ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick
... was exhibiting to a number of gentlemen, who happened to be collected together in a druggist's store, some weapons which he claimed to have taken from Captain Pate in Kansas. Among them was a two-edged dirk, with a blade about eight inches long, and he remarked that if he had a lot of those things to attach to poles about six feet long, they would be a capital weapon of defense for the settlers of Kansas.... When he came to make the contract, ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... the ground. He was somewhat stunned by the blow, but the sight of his brother triumphantly splashing through the shallows aroused him. He arose, and seizing the first stone that came to hand hurled it after Laurence, swearing fraternally that he would smite him in the brisket with a dirk as soon as he caught him for that dastard blow. The first stone flew wide, though the splash caused the mule to shy into deeper water, to the damping of his rider's legs. But the second, being better aimed, took the animal fairly on the rump, and, fetching ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... put out a shaking hand in protest. Already a fool of a servant had presented his dirk to her. In a twinkling—before we could stop her—Fiammetta had pried ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... ground. The youth, who had just fired his piece into the bosom of a tory, seeing his father's danger, flew to his aid, and with the butt of his gun knocked out the brains of the officer, at the very instant he was lifting his dirk for the destruction of ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... he was deep within the heart of the forest he thought he heard hurried footsteps behind him. He felt for his dirk and turned round. The moon's beams pierced the trees and fell upon a glistening pool of water where a wildcat was slaking its thirst. There was naught else that ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... wriggles and twists; and that is all. They have no weapons capable of contending with the assassin's dagger. I should like to see the huntress grappling with an imposing adversary, one as crafty as herself, an expert layer of ambushes and, like her, bearing a poisoned dirk. I should like to see the bandit armed with her stiletto confronted by another bandit equally familiar with the use of that weapon. Is such a duel possible? Yes, it is quite possible and even quite common. On the one hand we have the Pompili, the protagonists who are always victorious; ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... Merode, twisting round in the darkness and reaching blindly for the haft of his dirk. "Nom ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... delegates. They could not resist it nor turn their backs upon it, since, unlike other ancient fortresses, it is but a stone's throw from the front windows of all the hotels. They might mean never so well, but they would end by buying dirk hat-pins and claymore brooches for their wives, their daughters would all run after the kilted regiment and marry as many of the pipers as asked them, and before night they would all be shouting with the ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... Dirk; but they'll want all their discipline when they come to meet our men. For anything we know we may be the two last white men left in India; but when the news gets to England there will be such a cry throughout the land that, if it needed a million men to win back the country, ...
— In Times of Peril • G. A. Henty
... complete. It was only when he saw the finished costume, with the vivid hues of the tartan seemingly modified into comparative sobriety by the multitude of silver fittings, the cairngorm brooches, the philibeg, dirk and sporran that he was fully and absolutely satisfied with his choice. At first he had thought of the Royal Stuart dress tartan, but abandoned it on the MacCallum pointing out that if he should happen to be in the neighbourhood of Balmoral it might lead to complications. The MacCallum, ...
— Dracula's Guest • Bram Stoker
... doctor could bow his usual assent there entered a pretty little page, very daintily attired in a fancy dress of green and silver. Twirling his richly chased dirk with one tiny white hand, and at the same time playing with a pet curl which was picturesquely flowing over his forehead, he advanced with ambling gait to Miss Gusset, and, in a mincing voice and courtly phrase, summoned her to ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... confusion prevailed; and two gentlemen, who, as I afterwards learned, were officers belonging to a Spanish vessel then in port, fell into a dispute and got into a fight, during which one of them stabbed the other with a dirk-knife, inflicting a ...
— My Life: or the Adventures of Geo. Thompson - Being the Auto-Biography of an Author. Written by Himself. • George Thompson
... as good citizens, but dad's temper gets worse every year. Can I stay around here more or less, or do I have to go out into the world, branded as a criminal, because an old fool fell into a basket of his own eggs? Say, now, answer up quick," and the bad boy sharpened a match with a big dirk knife and picked fig seeds out ...
— Peck's Bad Boy With the Cowboys • Hon. Geo. W. Peck
... not a bit altered since I first went to sea, when I was so proud of that,' said Harry, taking up his midshipman's dirk, which formed a trophy ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... toasting-fork away and get a cutlass, boy, as Dugdale has. Of what use do you suppose a dirk would be in a hand-to-hand fight with a great burly Spaniard? Why, none at all. I can't understand, for my part, why such useless tools are supplied for active service! Get a good honest cutlass, boy; something that you can trust your life to. And look sharp ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... it had the same spirit too. They were Bavarians—all new troops, and nearly all young fellows. Their accouterments were bright and their uniforms almost unsoiled, and I saw that each man carried in his right boot top the long, ugly-looking dirk-knife that the Bavarian foot-soldier fancies. The Germans always showed heat when they found a big service clasp-knife hung about a captured Englishman's neck on a lanyard, calling it a barbarous weapon because of ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... women were dark, they had regular features and brilliant eyes, and finely formed hands. There is spirit, also, in this class, for one of them has since been pointed out to me in the streets, as having drawn a dirk upon a young officer who presumed upon ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant
... race that works, yet cannot work, Yodels, but cannot yodel right, Such as, unhelp'd, with rusty dirk, I vow that I could ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to find him dead. Then a second discovery was made. Report was necessary to his lordship. Here all was found closed against reception. On making their way into the inner room Shu[u]zen was found, clad all in white, the bloody dirk in hand, the body fallen forward on the ceremonial mats. He had cut his belly open, on retiring for the night. All now was in confusion. Should the karo[u] be awaited. None knew this exile to the Ko[u]shu[u] fief, beyond his reputed morose ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... to die." A friendly neighbour passing by O'erheard our damsel's lamentation; And kindly offered consolation: "If death, sweet maiden, be thy bent, "I'll aid thee in thy sad intent." Throwing her down, he drew his dirk, And plunged it in the maid,—a work You'll say was cruel,—not so Jane, Who even seemed to like the pain, And hoped to be thus stabbed again. Amid the weary world's alarms, For some e'en death will have its charms; "If this, my friend, is how you kill, ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... well understood among the crew, and filled their minds with apprehension. Presently he comes on deck, a perfect figure of fun, his face blacked, his hair and whiskers curled, his belt stuck full of pistols; chewing bits of glass so that the blood ran down his chin, and brandishing a dirk. I do not know if he had taken these manners from the Indians of America, where he was a native; but such was his way, and he would always thus announce that he was wound up to horrid deeds. The first ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. XII (of 25) - The Master of Ballantrae • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to Holland, and there he encountered Dirk Hammerhand, from whom to take a buffet was never to need another, and bought from him his famous mare Swallow, the price agreed on being the half of what Hereward had offered and a box ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... journey to Madrid from the heart of the Highlands of Scotland. In one important particular, however, did Donald's outfit on this occasion, differ from that adopted on ordinary occasions. On the present, he equipped himself in the full costume of his country—kilt, plaid, bonnet and feather, sword, dirk, and pistols; and thus arrayed, his appearance was altogether very striking, as he was both a stout and exceedingly ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton
... teeth—you know pirates are always evil-faced. By the way, did you ever know how the expression 'armed to the teeth' originated? Well, you see, after a pirate has stuck his belt full of pistols and cutlasses, and has both hands full of guns, he just chucks a dirk in his mouth and then, of course, he is armed to the teeth. Singular how you fellows are always drawing on my fund of general information. ...
— A Voyage with Captain Dynamite • Charles Edward Rich
... cylindrical abdomen were taken for eyes, a position rectified by Walckenaer as above and by Kirby in his Bridgewater Treatise where he gives a copy of the French figure of this singular spider—Two Crustacea, one (Ocypode convexus) from Dirk Hatterick's and the other (Pagurus clibanarius) from Shark Bay, are all the Annulose animals described or figured as coming from New Holland, from the pitiable circumstance ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey
... at the army officer with new respect. He had always been inclined to think of the Frontier Guards as a gang of scientifically illiterate dirk-and-pistol bravos. He fiddled for a while with instruments on the panel; an automatic computer figured the distance to the planet, the boat's velocity, and the time ...
— Genesis • H. Beam Piper
... here dignified with the name of village, we saw a number of Greeks waiting the return of Otho: each wore a gaily coloured kerchief on the head; an embroidered jacket; a shawl encircling the waist; red greaves; a dirk; and a long gun, ornamented with gold, slung over the shoulder. Their wild fearless demeanour struck me as more characteristic of the freebooter, than the soldier of a regular government. Yet seldom have I seen more elegant ...
— Journal of a Visit to Constantinople and Some of the Greek Islands in the Spring and Summer of 1833 • John Auldjo
... plant: many charms and legends were considered to be connected with the tree, and the duration of the family of Hay was said to be united with its existence. It was believed that a sprig of the mistletoe cut by a Hay on Allhallowmas eve, with a new dirk, and after surrounding the tree three times sunwise, and pronouncing a certain spell, was a sure charm against all glamour or witchery, and an infallible guard in the day of battle. A spray gathered in the same manner was placed ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... fall to nuss him Who now like a tiger wuz takin' my life. 'Hol' on, my dear Josh! Hol' on, my dear boy!' No further I got, fer his hands clutched my throat— I squirmed myself loose, but grapplin' my coat He throwed me ag'in, now a madman, indeed. His dirk-knife wuz raised. I said, 'Do yer best. I've give you now all that I ever possessed But life. Take it now if you ...
— Trail Tales • James David Gillilan
... "Edgar Poe being absent, Arthur Pym being dead, I had only one thing to do; to find the man who had been the fellow-traveller of Arthur Pym, that Dirk Peters who had followed him to the very verge of the high latitudes, and whence they had both returned—how? This is not known. Did they come back in company? The narrative does not say, and there are obscure points in that part of it, ...
— An Antarctic Mystery • Jules Verne
... had been replaced by an expensive electric drive. There had been much interest manifested in the installation of the modern motor, and Quin, with his natural love of machinery, had rejoiced that his duties as shipping clerk required him to be present at the unpacking. He and Dirk, the foreman, never tired of discussing the perfection of each particular feature. But a few days after the departure of the installation foreman, the new motor burnt out, necessitating the shutting down of the factory and ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... seeming truth and trust Did crafty observation; And secret hung, with poison'd crust, The dirk of Defamation: A mask that like the gorget show'd, Dye-varying on the pigeon; And for a mantle large and broad, He ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... it be a lass, she shall wear a golden ring; And if it be a lad, he shall fight for his king: With his dirk and his hat and his little jacket blue He shall walk the quarter-deck as his daddie used ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... thou not lived long enough in my shop to know that a blow will breed a brawl; that a dirk will cut the skin as fast as a needle pierces leather; that I love peace, though I never feared war, and care not which side of the causeway my daughter and I walk upon so we may keep our road in peace ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... his father an Italian, his mother a Genevese; studied and practised medicine, came to Paris as horse-leech to Count d'Artois; became infected with the revolutionary fever, and had one fixed idea: "Give me," he said, "two hundred Naples bravoes, armed each with a good dirk, and a muff on his left arm by way of shield, and with them I will traverse France and accomplish the Revolution," that is, by wholesale massacre of the aristocrats; he had more than once to flee for his life, and one time found shelter in ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... sword, placed a pistol in his belt, disclosing in this movement, which opened his doublet a little, the fine rings of a coat of mail, destined to protect him from the first dagger-thrust of an assassin. After which he took a Scotch dirk in his left hand, and then turning to Athos, "Are you ready, ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... the west coast of Australia one is struck by the large number of Dutch names which are jotted down the coast. There is Hoog Island, Diemen's Bay, Houtman's Abrolhos, De Wit land, and the Archipelago of Nuyts, besides Dirk Hartog's Island and Cape Leeuwin. To the extreme north we find the Gulf of Carpentaria, and to the extreme south the island which used to be called Van Diemen's Land. It is not altogether to be wondered at that almost to the ...
— The Story of Geographical Discovery - How the World Became Known • Joseph Jacobs
... bad boy. Killed a policeman onct. Wears a dirk knife in his boots, saw him to-day looking in ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... himself in his full chieftain's suit to meet them. The eagle's feather in his Glengary gave to his great stature the last grace. The tartan and philibeg, the garters at his knee, the silver buckles at his shoulder, belt, and shoon, the jewelled mull and dirk, had all to these poor fellows in this last hour a proud and sad significance. As he stood on the steps to welcome them, the wind colored his handsome face and blew out the long black hair which fell curling on ...
— Scottish sketches • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... attend upon them with unusual deference and ceremony. Their appearance was altogether horrible, they wore leather aprons, which were sprinkled all over with blood, they had large horse pistols in their belts, and a dirk and sabre by their sides. Their looks were full of ferocity, and they spoke a harsh dissonant patois language. Over their cups, they talked about the bloody business of that day's occupation, in ...
— The Stranger in France • John Carr
... recognize and to honor talent, made the dreaming story-teller a surveyor in the custom-house, thus opening to him a new range of experience. From the society of phantoms he stepped upon Long Wharf and plumply confronted Captain Cuttle and Dirk Hatteraick. It was no less romance to our author. There is no greater error of those who are called "practical men" than the supposition that life is, or can be, other than a dream to a dreamer. Shut him up in a counting-room, barricade him with bales of merchandise, and ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... boy got so excited that he went up stairs for his plaid and dirk, and dressed himself up in them, apologising that he could not appear in the full grab of old Gaul, in honor of his new-found relative, as his daughter had cut up his old kilt for 'trews for the barnies' during his absence from ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... by his journal, a very exact and curious map was made of all these new countries. But his voyage was never published entire; and it is very probable that the East India Company never intended it should be published at all. However, Dirk Rembrantz, moved by the excellency and accuracy of the work, published in Low Dutch an extract of Captain Tasman's Journal, which has been ever since considered as a very great curiosity; and, as such, ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton
... Sit you down, old friend; Your pipe I'll serve, your bottle I'll attend. 'Tis many a year since you and I have known Society more pleasant than our own In our brief respites from excessive work— I pointing out the hearts for you to dirk. What have you done since lately at this board We canvassed the deserts of all the horde And chose what names would please the people best, Engraved on coffin-plates—what bounding breast Would give more satisfaction if at rest? But never mind—the ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... engaged at Drury Lane, he had resolved to make his first appearance in the part of Young Norval, in the tragedy of "Douglas." He writes: "I had provided for the purpose, before I left Edinburgh, a Highland dress, accoutred cap-a-pie with a broadsword, shield, and dirk, found upon the field of Culloden. But here, as usual, fresh impediment arose Lord Bute's administration, from causes unnecessary here to enter upon, was become so unpleasing to the multitude, that anything confessedly ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... "Dirk Harvey bids you keep your courage up," said Nabley; "not to be downcast. It is quite time enough to be down upon our luck when we find out that the worst is true. The boys may ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... of horsemen on their road to the little borough-town were preceded by Niel Blane, the town-piper, mounted on his white galloway, armed with his dirk and broadsword, and bearing a chanter streaming with as many ribbons as would deck out six country belles for a fair or preaching. Niel, a clean, tight, well-timbered, long-winded fellow, had gained the official situation of town-piper of—by his merit, with all the emoluments thereof; namely, ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... either of us in that tongue-play. But since Messer Robusti has measured our wit for his portrait, Even he has grown shyer of using his tongue than he once was. Have you not heard the tale? Tintoretto was told Aretino Meant to make him the subject of one of his merry effusions; And with his naked dirk he went carefully over his person, Promising, if the poet made free with him in his verses, He would immortalize my satirical friend with that pencil. Doubtless the tale is not true. Aretino says nothing about it; Always ...
— Poems • William D. Howells
... him of anything of the kind," said Maternus gently, "just drive your dirk good and far into him and be done with him. I'll be on the lookout for any hanky-panky from Hedulio. If I see the wrong look in his eye or the wrong expression on his face I'll make a quick end of him. I'll tolerate no treachery after ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... beautiful—holding up his hands, and repeating the words "Beautiful, beautiful! they are all beautiful together! There is Bana beautiful! his box is beautiful! and his medicine beautiful!"—and, saying this, led us in to see his women, who at my request were grouped in war apparel—viz., a dirk fastened to the waist by many strings of coloured beads. There were from fifty to sixty women present, all very lady-like, but none of them pretty. Kaggao then informed me the king had told all his Wakungu he would ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... proverb?—'Better kind fremit, than fremit kindred.' ['Better kind strangers than estranged kindred.' The motto is engraved on a dirk, belonging to a person who had but too much reason to choose such a device. It was left by him to my father. The weapon is now in my possession. S.] I will find out that man, which, methinks, should be no difficult task, since he is so wealthy as mine host bespeaks ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... stand on end. I waited for him to pass, but I think his instinct must have told him I had paused, for he began to turn over the shells with his ugly nose, as if searching for something. My single weapon was a small dirk, as we kill ...
— Prince Lazybones and Other Stories • Mrs. W. J. Hays
... the stirrup, and Joris and he, I galloped, Dirk galloped, we galloped all three. 'Good speed!' cried the watch as the gate bolts undrew, 'Speed' echoed the ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... way; he lived on the plain food of the clansmen, oatmeal porridge and oatcake, milk from the cows, and beef from the herds; he ran and wrestled and hunted with his foster-brothers, and learnt woodcraft and warlike skill, broadsword play and the use of dirk and buckler, from his foster-father. More than all, he won a devoted following in the clan, for a man's foster-parents were almost dearer to him than his own father and mother, and his foster-brethren were bound to fight and die for him, and to regard him more than their own ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt
... produces its ruffians. At the age of fifteen he entered a counting-room, when his quick mercurial temperament soon rendered him expert at its minor functions. Three years had hardly elapsed when, in a moment of passion, he drew his dirk, (a weapon he always carried) and, in making a plunge at his antagonist, inflicted a wound in the breast of a near friend. The wound was deep, and proved fatal. For this he was arraigned before a jury, tried for his life. He proved the accident by an existing friendship-he ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... approached even to his side without disturbing his slumbers. The head of the prisoner lay rudely pillowed on a billet of wood, one hand protecting his face from its rough surface, and the other thrust in his bosom, where it rested, with a relaxed grasp, on the handle of a dirk. Although he slept, and that heavily, yet his rest was unnatural and perturbed. His breathing was hard and quick, and something like the low, rapid murmurings of a confused utterance mingled with his respiration. The moment had now arrived when the character of Cecilia Howard appeared ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... and Porteous swinging in the wind, and Madge Wildfire, full of finery and madness, and her ghastly mother.—Again, there is Meg Merrilies, standing on her rock, stretched on her bier with "her head to the east," and Dirk Hatterick (equal to Shakspeare's Master Barnardine), and Glossin, the soul of an attorney, and Dandy Dinmont, with his terrier-pack and his pony Dumple, and the fiery Colonel Mannering, and the modish old ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... standis dirk Halds the light from your Parroche Kirk, Your forestairs makis your houses mirk Like na country but here at hame Think ye not shame, Sa little policie to work In hurt and sklander ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... love to be a Turk with an Oriental smirk and an ornamental dirk, and a tendency to shirk when the others go to work; for the workers I can't bear 'em and I'd rather run ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... too, stealing out from the rear of the stage, a small, compact wedge of men wearing those same red buttons; and the prow of the wedge was Fighting Dave Dancy, the official bad man of a bad county, a man who packed a gun on each hip and carried a dirk knife down the back of his neck; a man who would shoot you at the drop of a hat and provide the hat himself—or at least so ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... on high Headlong fall'n break through, and lie With their prey in piteous wise, And no film on their dead eyes. Matted branches grind and crash, Into darkness dives the flash, Stabs, a dread gold dirk of fire, Loads the lift with splinters dire. Then a pause i' the deadly feud— And ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... was told, he begged for his son in law's "swate-lukin' roifle," and was as cheerful as if a wedding was in progress. Finally, Timotheus got the fowling piece and the Squire looked to the priming of his pistols. Mr. Nash, of course, had both revolver and dirk knife concealed somewhere about his person. Then Mr. Errol conducted family prayers, the children were sent to bed, the ladies briefly informed of the situation, and the garrison bidden a ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... support; the divine could see no danger threatening his country except from the alleged infidelity of a few leading radicals; the timid citizen, with no fixed political opinions, was overawed by the bluster of Southern bullies, shuddered at the sight of pistol and dirk-knife, and only asked "to be let alone"; while the thoughtless votary of fashion, readily accepting the lordly bearing and imperious air of the planter as the highest evidence of genuine aristocracy, reasoned, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... shows at its worst. There the vendetta flourishes; and the Camorra and its sinister analogue, the Black Hand, but too realistically remind us that thousands of these swarthy criminals have found refuge in the dark alleys of our cities. Even in America the Sicilian carries a dirk, and the "death sign" in a court room has silenced many a witness. The north Italians readily identify themselves with American life. Among them are found bakers, barbers, and marble cutters, as well as wholesale fruit and olive oil merchants, ...
— Our Foreigners - A Chronicle of Americans in the Making • Samuel P. Orth
... youth's appearance at this period is thus described by one of his adherents: "The Prince was at this time bare-footed, had an old black kilt-coat on, philabeg and waistcoat, a dirty shirt, and a long red beard, a gun in his hand, and a pistol and dirk by his side." ...
— Secret Chambers and Hiding Places • Allan Fea
... came upon the scene towards the end of the sixteenth century. Dirk Vorlkertsz Coornhert had written a very able refutation of the dogma of predestination. The Town Council of Amsterdam ordered Jacob Arminius to Write a book against Coornhert's work. But behold! when Arminius settled down to the task, and ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough
... of the latter that a speedy and terrible revenge followed. The stalwart sons of the MacNab, urged by their wrathful sire, whose hint in the words—"The night is the night if lads were but lads," almost amounted to a command, equipped themselves with dirk, pistol, and claymore, raised a boat on their shoulders, and carrying it by night all the way from Loch Tay across the hills by Glentarken, launched it stealthily on Loch Earn, and taking the Neishes by surprise are said to have killed them all, except one boy, who made good his escape. ...
— Chronicles of Strathearn • Various
... contained in this palace of art, which is 158 feet long, 63 feet wide, and 22 feet high. Here are examples of the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds, de Mytens, Tintoretto, Teniers, Snyders, Bassano, Wyck, de Vos, Greffier, Francks, Berghem, Zucchero, Wootton, Breughel, Dirk Maas, Netscher, Gagnacci, Gerard Honthorst, Van der Meulen, Rigaud, Vandyke, Holbein, Kneller, Lely, Dahl, M. Shee, Knapton, West, Jansen, Verelst; in fact not only in the picture-gallery, but in all parts of the Abbey are scattered treasures of art and vertu. Among the interesting curiosities ...
— The Portland Peerage Romance • Charles J. Archard
... of goods, they are not permitted quietly to bring out their surplus furs, and sell them to whom they please. He says that he saw a remarkable instance of this at Point au Pins, on his way out, where young Holiday drew a dirk on an Indian on refusing to let him take a pack of furs from his canoe. He said, on speaking of this subject, "I wish my father to take away the sword that hangs over us, and let us bring down our furs, and sell them to whom ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... of October arrived here the ship 'Endraght', of Amsterdam; first supercargo Gilles Miebas Van Luck; Captain Dirk Hartog, of Amsterdam. She set sail again on the 27th of the same month. Bantum was second supercargo; ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes
... making a collection of poems for young people, one which he finally completed with the aid of Miss Lucy Larcom. We got down from the shelf Longfellow's "Poets and Poetry of Europe," and looked it over together. "Annie of Tharaw" was a great favorite of his, and the poem by Dirk Smit, on "The Death of an Infant," found his ready appreciation. Whittier easily fell from these into talk of Burns, who was his master and ideal. "He lives, next to Shakespeare," he said, "in ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields
... Massacre of Glencoe, beside the brawling river: and a woman, stolen by the fairies, returned for an hour to her husband, who became very unpopular, as he neglected the means for her rescue; I think he failed to throw a dirk over her shoulder. Every now and then mysterious lights may be seen, even by the Sassenach, speeding down the road to Callart on the opposite side of the narrow sea-loch, ascending the hill, and ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang
... said Joe, sharply. "If so be as Dirk said he'd come, be it half-a-hunder' years, he'll stan' to 't. I knowed Dirk. Many's the clam we toed out o' th' inlet yonner. He's not the sort to hang round, gnawin' out the old folk's meat-pot, as some I ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... humiliating attitude popularly indicative of prayerful supplication. Smith walked slowly up behind him, relieved him of two automatics and a dirk. ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert W. Chambers
... cartridge-pouches that I examined were completely filled, showing that their possessors had not fired a single round; others had but one cartridge missing. There were fragments of clothing, hair, blankets, murderous bowie and dirk knives, spurs, flasks, caps, and plumes, dropped all the way through the thicket, and the trees on every hand were riddled with balls. I came upon a squirrel, unwittingly shot during the fight. Not those alone who make the war must feel the war! At one of the mounds ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... and wise princess, fearing in advance some unfortunate adventure for Bonne—the more so as the constable was as ready to brandish his broadsword as a priest to bestow benedictions—the said queen, as sharp as a dirk, said one day, while coming out from vespers, to her cousin, who was taking the holy water ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... and approached him, paper in hand. I think for a few moments the idea of personal danger possessed him, and the vision of a concealed dirk or pistol swam before his eyes, which he shielded with his hand, while he placed a chair between us; and, truth to say, there was murder in my heart, and in my eyes as well, I suppose, even if ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... said, found a dirk of his when he crossed the land of Apalache years later, seeking empire. But the tribes could or would tell nothing of the lost Greek and the negro slave. The latter was killed by the people called Natchez, ...
— The Flute of the Gods • Marah Ellis Ryan
... life, my Lord, an' health be yours, Unskaithed by hunger'd Highland boors; Lord grant me nae duddie, desperate beggar, Wi' dirk, claymore, and rusty trigger, May twin auld Scotland o' a life She ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... subdued and coy at first, so I took heart, never dreaming she'd wear her dirk in the house. But say! That woman was raised on raw beef. Before I could wink she had it out; it has an ivory hilt, and you could split a silk thread with it. I suppose she didn't want to spoil the parlor furniture with me, although I'd never have ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... quickly over the dead bodies, which failed now to terrify us, to the fore part of our felucca, we discovered that the shot which had hit us had started a plank, and that the water leaked in with every lap of a wave. So now, our wits quickened by our peril, we took a scimitar and a dirk from a dead janizary, to cut away the cordage that lashed us to the fallen mast, to free us of that burden and right the ship if we might. But ere we did this, Dawson, spying the great sail lying out on the water, bethought him to hack out a great sheet as far as we could reach, ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... shelter, I have shed a man's blood in a fray; Oh swear that you will not betray me, By your dirk, by the dear light of day!" And the prayer in his kindness he answered, But aghast heard the voices that cried; "Your cousin lies slain! Can a stranger Have passed ...
— Memories of Canada and Scotland - Speeches and Verses • John Douglas Sutherland Campbell
... knife ur a pistol; 'n' ef a feller was ever killed, it was kinder accidental, by a Barlow. I reckon folks got use' to weepons 'n' killin' 'n' bushwhackin' in the war. Looks like it's been gittin' wuss ever sence, 'n' now hit's dirk 'n' Winchester, 'n' shootin' from the bushes all the time. Hit's wuss 'n stealin' money to take a feller-creetur' s life ...
— A Cumberland Vendetta • John Fox, Jr.
... marry you right off the reel.' And I took him in my arms and kissed him on what Tim would call the spur o' the moment. Then Jack ups with a glass o' ale—it were in the kitching, miss—and he jumps on to a chair and draws his navy dirk. 'Here's the way,' he cries, 'that they tosses cans in the service. And I'll give you a toast,' ...
— As We Sweep Through The Deep • Gordon Stables
... the old, old shop, Where I printed the Punktown Dirk, And the toil and stress with the darned old press That always ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason
... naked, save a tattered Pair of scarce decent trowsers—went to work, And in the fire his recent rags they scattered, And dressed him, for the present, like a Turk, Or Greek—that is, although it not much mattered, Omitting turban, slippers, pistol, dirk,— They furnished him, entire, except some stitches, With a clean shirt, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... shouts far away and the throb of hoofs, and the ground game was pouring out of the undergrowth and dispersing in all directions. Once a boar ran past, grumbling as he went, turning a wicked and resentful eye on the placid gentleman in green who sat on the ground, but who felt for his long dirk as he saw the fury on the brute's face and the foam on the tusks. But the pig thought discretion was best, and hurried on complaining. More than one troop of deer flew past, the does gathered round ...
— The King's Achievement • Robert Hugh Benson
... while Knox was conducting himself thus, nobody ventured to put a dirk or a bullet into him—despite the obvious strength of the temptation in many quarters—proves that he was by far the most potent human being in Scotland. Darnley, Moray, Lennox were all assassinated, when their day came, though the feeblest of the three, Darnley, had ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... is that we should only carry a beggarly little dirk," said Bob Roberts to himself, as he tried to look sneeringly at the young ensign before him; for the latter came across the deck with rather a swaggering stride, and ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... leaves from a lilac bush. Robin learned that if you laid a leaf flat on the seat of a bench you could prick beautiful patterns on the leaf's greenness. Donal had—in his rolled down stocking—a little dirk. He did the decoration with the point of this while Robin ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... Margaret, how from the very first he disliked Captain Reid. He was second lieutenant in the ship—the Orion—in which Frederick sailed the very first time. Poor little fellow, how well he looked in his midshipman's dress, with his dirk in his hand, cutting open all the newspapers with it as if it were a paper-knife! But this Mr. Reid, as he was then, seemed to take a dislike to Frederick from the very beginning. And then—stay! these are the letters ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... knocking at the gate; and opening it, he saw a stranger, with torn clothing and kilt besmeared with blood, who, in a breathless voice, begged for asylum. He went on to say that he had killed a man in a fray, and that the pursuers were at his heels. Campbell promised to shelter him. 'Swear on your dirk!' said the stranger; and Campbell swore. He then led him to a secret recess in the ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... there is," replied Roscoe gravely, "and I thought I'd tell you when we were by ourselves. That cousin of mine, Dirk Roscoe, has been done for. He was found this morning in a back drain, in one of the gullies, with the stab of ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker |
