"Picket" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... wagons, and beef-cattle driven along for the use of the men. These animals subsisted entirely by grazing. To secure them from straying off at night, they were driven into corrals formed of the wagons, or tethered to an iron picket-pin driven into the ground about fifteen inches. At the outset of the expedition many laughable scenes took place. Our horses were generally wild, fiery, and unused to military trappings and equipments. Amidst the fluttering ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... sent Cote with a force of four or five hundred men south to Rouse's Point, on the boundary-line, to secure more arms and ammunition from the American sympathizers. On his way south Cote encountered a picket of a company of loyalist volunteers stationed at Lacolle, and drove it {122} in. On his return journey, however, he met with greater opposition. The company at Lacolle had been reinforced in the meantime by several companies of loyalist militia from Hemmingford. As the rebels appeared the loyalist ...
— The 'Patriotes' of '37 - A Chronicle of the Lower Canada Rebellion • Alfred D. Decelles
... token.' So they cut off the Marquess's right hand, and Cogia, after shaking it, put it in his vest. When he was well upon his way to the mountain road, Giafar sat down on a bank of violets, ate some bread and dates, then went to sleep in the sun. So afterwards he was found by a picket of soldiers from Sidon, who also found all of their lord but his right hand. They took Giafar ibn ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... of May was given to Schofield and McPherson to get into position, and on the 7th General Thomas moved in force against Tunnel Hill, driving off a mere picket-guard of the enemy, and I was agreeably surprised to find that no damage had been done to the tunnel or the railroad. From Tunnel Hill I could look into the gorge by which the railroad passed through ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... the soldiers. A mob of men and boys, encouraged by the sympathy of the inhabitants, made a constant practice to insult and provoke them. The result to be expected soon followed. After numerous fights with straggling soldiers, a serious collision at length took place: a picket guard of eight men, provoked beyond endurance by words and blows, fired into a crowd, killed three persons and dangerously wounded five others." "The story of the 'Boston massacre,' for so it was called, ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson
... breakfast, a strong picket of wolves watched all around the camp, feasting their greedy eyes from a distance on my elk-meat. When we started from camp, a hundred or more of them followed us, often coming quite close to the back pony, and biting and quarrelling about the elk that was never to be their meat. When we halted, ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... is a servant house at the rear of a white family's residence. A gate through an old-fashioned picket fence led into a spacious yard where dense shade from tall pecan trees was particularly inviting after a long walk in ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... important event in his life. In a commendable effort to increase his income he had laid out a small vegetable garden in the rear of his father's house, and here on a Saturday morning, while down on his knees weeding carrots, he chanced to look up and discovered a young lady gazing at him through the picket fence. She was a few years his junior, and a stranger in Sequoia. Ensued the ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... murmured into the receiver of the telephone which communicated with the watchful picket of the Marston & Waller offices. "Who? Oh, she may come in ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... the heavy front door of the jail behind him when a half dozen horsemen, followed by a crowd of men on foot, came round a bend in the road and drew near the jail. They halted in front of the picket fence that surrounded the building, while several of the committee of arrangements rode on a few rods farther to the sheriff's house. One of them dismounted and rapped on ...
— The Wife of his Youth and Other Stories of the Color Line, and - Selected Essays • Charles Waddell Chesnutt
... three sides of a parallelogram, the open portion of the court in the centre, facing the cliff. A strong picket served to make a defence against bullets on that side; while the dead walls of solid logs were quite impregnable against any assault known in forest warfare, but that of fire. All the windows opened on the court; while the single outer door was picketed, and otherwise protected by the ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... that bein' housed up like to 'a' drove her crazy at first, an' they was so tarnation fussy that she felt like a hobbled pony in a stampede. They wouldn't even let her picket her ponies out in what they call the campus, which she said was just drippin' fat with rich grass, an' nary a hoof to graze it. Why, they even had fool notions about havin' certain hours about goin' to bed, an' even when you had ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... furious. The disaster was due to his own carelessness in having contented himself with placing two pickets in advance of the village, and permitting the whole remainder of his force to retire to bed. Consequently the picket, on riding in upon the approach of the enemy, were unable to awake and call them to arms before the Roundheads were upon them. In his anger he turned upon Harry, and fiercely demanded why he had not sent him news of the ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty
... do it, Bill," cried the Trapper; "I can't do it. I am doin' picket duty on the top of this box, with a big hole under me and another pig under ...
— Holiday Tales - Christmas in the Adirondacks • W. H. H. Murray
... nay, their demolition by the modern iconoclast—have they no teachings? How many phases in the art of the builder and engineer, from the high-peaked Norman cottage to the ponderous, drowsy Mansard roof—from Champlain's picket fort to the modern citadel of Quebec—from our primitive legislative meeting-house to our stately Parliament Buildings ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... active service in the numerous outpost and picket encounters, which marked the autumn and winter of 1861, while the army under General McClellan was organizing on the banks of the Potomac. There he distinguished himself by his firmness and vigilance, as well as ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... drove up two carriages and a large automobile, and out of the automobile climbed a well-dressed woman who took a bundle of the pamphlets from the girl picket and began passing them about among the people. Two policemen who stood in front of the crowd took off their helmets and accompanied her. The crowd cheered. Frank came hurrying across the street to where Sam stood in front of the barber shop and ...
— Windy McPherson's Son • Sherwood Anderson
... on the picket fence he inhaled their freshness, gazing up into the sunny foliage of the ancient trees, elms, maples, and one oak so aged and so magnificent that, awed, his eyes turned uneasily again toward the house to reassure himself ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... house and its surroundings showed the urgent need of a caring hand. Stones were missing from the chimney, and shingles from the roof. The frame was out of repair and there were only traces left of former coats of paint. Of the picket fence which had once bounded her possessions in front, not even a post remained. Years before, the slats had begun to decay, until the dilapidation became an eyesore to even Miss Elizabeth herself. But when the cow-boys in search ...
— The Little Gold Miners of the Sierras and Other Stories • Various
... they can graze—hens eat grass—and scratch, and enjoy themselves to their heart's content, in all seasons, when the ground is open and they can scratch into, or range over its surface. Some people—indeed, a good many people—picket in their gardens, to keep hens out; but we prefer an enclosure to keep the hens in, at all seasons when they are troublesome, which, after all, is only during short seasons of the year, when seeds are planted, or sown, and grain and vegetables are ripening. Otherwise, they may ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... Dan?" I questioned cautiously; for all I could feel reasonably assured of just then was that behind any rock or tree in our front there might be crouching a Federal picket. ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... not gone very far when I came across three more balls hanging over a shop. In I went, and saw a long counter, with a sort of picket-fence, running all along from end to end, and three little holes, with three little old men standing inside of them, like prisoners looking out of a jail. Back of the counter were all sorts of things, piled up and labeled. Hats, and caps, and coats, and guns, and swords, and canes, and chests, ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... Cincinnati to the mouth of the Big Miami, opposite which we were to settle. Here was some cleared land, and one or two log cabins, but they had been deserted on account of the Indians. My father rebuilt the cabins, and inclosed them with a strong picket. It was early in the spring when we arrived at the mouth of the Big Miami, and we were soon engaged in preparing a field to plant corn. I think it was not more than ten days after our arrival, when my father told us in the morning, that, from the actions ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... of Inspector Loup had the same effect upon Mlle. Fouchette that the unexpected appearance of the general of an army might have upon a sleepy picket-guard or a man off post. Inspector Loup was to her a sort of human monster—a moral devil-fish—that not even the cleverest could escape if he chose to ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... the wailing mourners on the bleak hillside, with the November clouds hanging low and trailing their wet streamers. A "jolt-wagon" had carried the coffin in lieu of a hearse. Saddled mules stood tethered against the picket fence. The dogs that had followed their masters started a rabbit close by the open grave, and split the silence with their yelps as the first clod fell. He recalled, too, the bitter voice with which his mother ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... two that didn't volunteer for a listening picket one night, and I felt so ashamed of them that I ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 30, 1917 • Various
... stirring, had been dismissed to their tents; the fatigue-parties had been despatched for rations, water, fuel—in a word, the ordinary daily duties of the camp had commenced, when the sharp rattle of musketry rang out angrily, and well sustained in the direction of our foremost picket on Shell Hill. ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... day of the funeral scarcely half of the usual force of workmen appeared at the Mill. The men who did choose to work were forced to pass a picket line of strikers who with jeers and threats and arguments sought to ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... superior officers, and influential partisans of Don Carlos, stood near him, walked up and down the room, or lounged at the windows that looked out upon the winding, irregular street of the village. In the court-yard of the house, a picket of lancers sat or stood near their horses, which were saddled and bridled, and ready to turn out at a moment's notice; a sentry paced up and down in front of the door, and on the highest points of some hills which rose behind the village, videttes were seen stationed. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... other means available, information as to what was going on within the Confederate lines. To do the work required, necessitated an increase of my command, and the Seventh Kansas Cavalry was therefore added to it, and my picket-line extended so as to cover from Jacinto southwesterly to a point midway between Rienzi and Booneville, and then northwesterly to the Hatchie River. Skirmishes between outposts on this line were of frequent occurrence, with small results to either ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 2 • P. H. Sheridan
... go out until the day, until the morning break, Out to the winds' untainted kiss, the waters' clean caress. I will forget my ankle-ring and snap my picket-stake. I will revisit my ...
— Songs from Books • Rudyard Kipling
... the afternoon of the 17th of March a picket of Cossacks, consisting of only forty men, took possession of a town recently flourishing, and containing a population of 124,000, but ruined and reduced to 80,000 inhabitants by the blessing of being united to the French Empire. On the following day, the ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... battles and sieges, of picket and skirmishing, of camp life and marching, are wrought out with thrilling detail, making the story truly fascinating; while, in connection with this, useful and practical information respecting men and places is conveyed, and a proper spirit of morality and patriotism inculcated."—Notices ...
— The Angel Children - or, Stories from Cloud-Land • Charlotte M. Higgins
... on. A picket squad swung up the middle of the street, turned, and went marching toward the sunset. The corner house was a warehouse fitted for a hospital. Faces showed at the windows; when, for a moment, a sash was lifted, a racking cough ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... bowered beneath vines, bright with the most vivid of the commoner flowers. They were crazily picturesque with their rough stone chimneys, their roofs of shakes, their broad low verandahs, and their split-picket fences. On these verandahs sat patriarchal-looking men with sweeping white beards, who smoked pipes and gazed across with dim eyes toward the distant blue mountains. When Welton, casually and by the way, mentioned ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... retire owing to serious outflanking movement on part of the Blues. Sorry, but that's the worst of being picket. The natural intuition which characterizes all BSS will enable you to discern our ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... kindly housewife plucked a nosegay for us. Her white columbines she calls "granny's mutches;" and indeed they are not unlike those fresh white caps. Dear Robbie Burns, ten inches high in plaster, stands in the sunny window in a tiny box of blossoming plants surrounded by a miniature green picket fence. Outside, looming white among the gillyflowers, is Sir Walter, and near him is still another and a larger bust on a cracked pedestal a foot high, perhaps. We did not recognize the head at once, and asked 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
... absence. When I'm on the spot I prefer to play picket-duty myself. I may be eccentric. But that's one of my notions, and I've an idea it's one of ...
— Mrs. Red Pepper • Grace S. Richmond
... deep in meadow grass and surrounded by a low picket fence over which the ball was often batted, both by members of the home team and by ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson
... Louisville, for the Confederate army under General Bragg was near at hand menacing it. There was great excitement about this time, as we were unaccustomed to the work, and it went odd. While remaining at Louisville, the Eighty-sixth went on picket for the first time. Its acts and thoughts on this occasion were certainly novel, and furnished a fund of great amusement in its after career. The regiment was just beginning to experience many of the roughs and cuffs incidental to the opening scenes of soldier life. Diarrhea became a ...
— History of the Eighty-sixth Regiment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry, during its term of service • John R. Kinnear
... proper place for the murder. This was chosen in a long stretch of forest, and two men were despatched to the village of Sutranja, farther on the road, to see that no one was coming in the opposite direction, while another picket remained behind to prevent interruption from the rear. By the time they reached the appointed place, the Bhurtots (stranglers) and Shamsias (holders) had all on some pretext or other got close to the side of the persons whom they were ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... fiendishly clever knot, and hurled it in the general direction of a front porch that flashed past on his right. Never slowing, Gary threw the next paper entirely across the street. He chuckled as it cleared a picket fence. "Bang, bang!" he blurted. His red shirt, with a picture of a mounted cowboy on the back, ballooned ...
— Stopover Planet • Robert E. Gilbert
... little mite that had probably been abandoned by a heartless mother, possibly while escaping from the prospective mess-kettle of a Confederate picket. ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... story it would tell. Not only did they initiate such men as Alexander Hamilton and John Marshall, the immortal Chief Justice, but they made the spirit of Masonry felt in "times that try men's souls"[157]—a spirit passing through picket-lines, eluding sentinels, and softening the ...
— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton
... with the usual clinker-like fragments of smashed coral, not only coco-palms and mikis but also fig-trees flourished, all of a delicious greenness. Of course there was no blade of grass. In front a picket fence divided us from the white road, the palm- fringed margin of the lagoon, and the lagoon itself, reflecting clouds by day and stars by night. At the back, a bulwark of uncemented coral enclosed us from the narrow ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson
... trunks are opened, and their letters read. At the barriers in Paris they find "inspectors" posted by the Commune, under the pretext of protecting them against prostitutes and swindlers. There, they are taken possession of, and conducted to the mayoralty, where they receive lodging tickets, while a picket of gendarmerie escorts them to their allotted domiciles.[1125]—Behold them in pens like sheep, each in his numbered stall; there is no fear of the dissidents trying to escape and form a band apart: one of them, who comes to the Convention and asks for a separate hall for himself and his adherents, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... though it was not his usual cheery laugh. 'He'll be a cleverer fellow than I take him for if he gets past that picket, will George.' ...
— Sarah's School Friend • May Baldwin
... hazards of a great struggle,—to furnish an Anti-Republican party of reconstructionists with a bridge for Slavery to reach a Northern platform, to frown at us again from the chair of State. The Federal picket who perchance fell last night upon some obscure outpost of our great line of Freedom has gone up to Heaven protesting against such cruel expectations, wherever they exist; and they exist wherever apathy exists, and old hatred lingers, and wherever minds are cowed and demoralized by the difficulties ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various
... night at the San Juan picket with the American troops has been adjusted without prejudice. Our preparations ought to ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester
... with green blinds and a tiny front porch, stood beside the road, its back to the lake. There were five acres or so of ground around the house, set off by a white picket fence. At the gate a pine tree stood. There were oaks and lilac bushes in the front yard. Through the leaves, Lydia saw the blue ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... Potomac," they say, "Except now and then a stray picket Is shot, as he walks on his beat, to and fro, By a rifleman hid in the thicket. 'Tis nothing: a private or two, now and then, Will not count in the news of the battle; Not an officer lost,—only one of the men, Moaning ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... on picket on the cold, stormy night to guard you against surprise, did you creep up and warm their congealing blood with an infusion of the white man's Government? When, with a wild hurrah, on the 'double-quick,' they rushed upon the enemy's guns, and bore your flag where men fell ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... This provision is, in accordance with our philosophy, founded on Christian principles and the dictates of healthy humanity, for pickets are not active belligerents, and can oppose no force to the stealthy attacks made on them by unseen enemies. To kill a picket is like fighting an unarmed man, a child or a woman. It is eminently right according to the selfish and silly philosophy of writers on national law, but inhuman, and therefore wrong, according to our philosophy, which is founded on Christian ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... the ending of this speech at the time, but had good cause to remember it before midnight. On they pushed past the picket guard and on to a side road which it was said would bring them around to the north side of Maasin. Both were in fairly good humor by this time, and the major told many an anecdote of army life which ...
— The Campaign of the Jungle - or, Under Lawton through Luzon • Edward Stratemeyer
... Sunday an advance party of 1500 Boers, with artillery, pushed south of Ingagane, but the greater portion of this commando retired later in the day on Newcastle. A Boer force which had been concentrating at De Jager's Drift captured six Natal policemen. A picket of the King's Royal Rifles Mounted Infantry has exchanged a few shots with the enemy. This has ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... Dranesville, concluding: 'You will keep a good lookout upon Leesburg, to see if this movement has the effect to drive them away. Perhaps a slight demonstration on your part would have the effect to move them.' McClellan desired Stone to make demonstrations from his picket line along the Potomac, but did not intend that he should cross the river, in force, for the purpose of fighting. Late in the day Stone reported that he had made a feint of crossing, and at the same time had started ...
— History and Comprehensive Description of Loudoun County, Virginia • James W. Head
... a flying battery that had been quickly sent to retard the enemy's centre and give Carr's division time to deploy. Osterhaus met the cavalry returning, and threw his detachment against the advancing line. The picket posted at Elkhorn tavern, where Carr was to deploy, was attacked and driven back, and Carr's division had to go into line under fire. Osterhaus found himself opposed to the corps of McCulloch and McIntosh, and was about being overwhelmed ...
— From Fort Henry to Corinth • Manning Ferguson Force
... gratitude, poor devil. I told Adler a long fortune—purposely so long that I could not finish it; promised to come to him on guard, that night, and tell him the really important part of it—the tragical part of it, I said—so must be out of reach of eavesdroppers. They always kept a picket-watch outside the town—mere discipline and ceremony—no occasion for it, no ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... was ordered to the front by way of Harper's Ferry. When we arrived at the Ferry I was the first officer detailed for a two-days' turn of picket duty ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith
... his stupefaction, his own horse was galloping in circles, his picket rope dragging, and the boss herder was swearing with a belated malignity which was ludicrous. He swept together into one steady outpour all the native and alien oaths he had ever heard in a long and eventful career among profane persons. When Mose ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... chance to send a force out of the Palace Gate near the Hotel Dieu, by which the assailants had passed, and to attack them in the rear. For this duty Colonel Caldwell was told off and he took with him Nairne and his picket of about thirty men. The force plodded through the deep snow in the tracks of the enemy who, about daybreak, were astonished to find themselves shut in by British forces at each end of the Sault au Matelot. A hand to hand fight followed. The Americans took refuge in the houses ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... stature but very thickset, with their wide smooth faces, loose clothing of sheepskin with the wool outside, with their long coarse hair flying in the wind, and their uncouth shouts in a barbarous tongue, are much like savages. They sing wild chants as they picket their sheep in long double lines at night, and with their savage mastiffs sleep unsheltered under the frosty skies under the lee of their piled-up saddlebags. On three nights I camped beside their caravans, and ...
— Among the Tibetans • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs Bishop)
... no doubt regarding the matter, now; the men Dick had heard talking were British soldiers doing picket duty. ...
— The Dare Boys of 1776 • Stephen Angus Cox
... Chinese, having successfully sapped right under one of the remaining fortified houses, had blown it up with a huge charge of black gunpowder. D——, the French commander, R——, the Austrian Charge d'Affaires, the same indomitable volunteer D——, and a picket of four French sailors were in the house, and were buried in the ruins. Hardly had the echoes of the first explosion died away, when a second one blew up another house, and out of the ruins were lifted, ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... concerned. Each greatcoat, precisely rolled, was strapped with its encircling poncho at the pommel. Each blanket, as snugly packed, with the sidelines festooned upon the top, was strapped at the cantle. Lariat and picket pin, coiled and secured, hung from the near side of the pommel. The canteen, suspended from its snap hook, hung at the off side. Saddle-bags, with extra horse shoes, nails, socks, underwear, brushes and comb, extra packages of carbine and revolver cartridges and minor ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King
... well officered and well disciplined in its meager and limited proportions. The result was that, through the captain's arrangements, the king, on arriving at Melun, saw himself at the head of both the musketeers and Swiss guards, as well as a picket of the French guards. It might almost have been called a small army. M. Colbert looked at the troops with great delight: he even wished they had been a third more ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... cooked and served by Martha Vesey, an elderly, efficient and appallingly neat widow, whom Insall had discovered somewhere in his travels and installed as his housekeeper. Janet paused with her hand on the gate latch to gaze around her, at the picket fence on which he had been working when she had walked hither the year before. It was primly painted now, its posts crowned with the carved pineapples; behind the fence old-fashioned flowers were in bloom, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... agony through flies, that he committed suicide. You know animals will do that. I've read of horses and dogs drowning themselves. This horse had been clipped, and his tail was docked, and he was turned out to graze. The flies stung him till he was nearly crazy. He ran up to a picket fence, and sprang up on the sharp spikes. There he hung, making no effort to get down. Some men saw him, and they said it was a ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders
... plain clothes were accordingly sent with him in the direction where he stated the English to be; but when they stopped for refreshment at a village on the way they were suddenly pounced upon by a picket of English dragoons, who had been sent there for the purpose. After a time the spy pretended to the two officers that he had made the guard drunk and that they could now make their escape, and leading them stealthily to the stable showed them two of the dragoons lying in ...
— The Bravest of the Brave - or, with Peterborough in Spain • G. A. Henty
... was accelerated by the sounds of the navy-guns, which became more and more distinct, though we could see nothing. At a plantation near some Indian mounds we met a detachment of the Eighth Missouri, that had been up to the fleet, and had been sent down as a picket to prevent any obstructions below. This picket reported that Admiral Porter had found Deer Creek badly obstructed, had turned back; that there was a rebel force beyond the fleet, with some six-pounders, and nothing between us and the fleet. So I sat down on the door-sill of a cabin to rest, ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... white mare, plodded slowly along the snowy country road by the picket fence, and turned in at the snow-capped posts. Ahead, roofed with the ragged ermine of a newly-fallen snow, the Doctor's old-fashioned house loomed gray-white through the snow-fringed branches of the trees, a quaint iron lantern, which was picturesque by day and luminous and ...
— When the Yule Log Burns - A Christmas Story • Leona Dalrymple
... in command at Iuka, to furnish the Eleventh with an escort to Corinth. On the evening of October first I found that an escort could not be secured for two or three days, as Colonel Crocker had only enough men present for guard and picket duty. ...
— A Battery at Close Quarters - A Paper Read before the Ohio Commandery of the Loyal Legion, - October 6, 1909 • Henry M. Neil
... but with a party of Danes after them; and but for our arrow flights from the earthworks, they would have had to fight, and lose what they brought. After that Hubba knew what we needed, and sent a strong picket to keep us from ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... thrown into the kettle, which was already boiling, pipes were lighted, and a general feeling of comfort experienced. The horses had been picketed close at hand, each man having cut or pulled a heap of grass and placed it before his beast; beside which, the picket ropes allowed each horse to crop the grass growing in a small circle, of which he was ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... had finally come to relieve his mind. "I seemed to be back in that pile of ruins that used to be Happenchance, the played-out mining camp. From that claim of the professor's stretched a row of nuggets, clear from the Picket Post Mountains to Gold Hill. They were big nuggets, too, running all the way from one the size of my hat to a whole lot as ...
— Frank Merriwell, Junior's, Golden Trail - or, The Fugitive Professor • Burt L. Standish
... ever closing his eyes, till Mohun returned. The latter looked fresh and alert; he had slept for the time he had allotted to himself quite calmly and comfortably; the old habits of picket-duty had taught him to watch or ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... is one of the greatest industries of the world to-day, amounting to millions of dollars annually. The usefulness of India rubber is thus described in the North American Review: "Some of our readers have been out on the picket-line during the war. They know what it is to stand motionless in a wet and miry rifle-pit in the chilly rain of a southern winter's night. Protected by India rubber boots, blanket and cap, the picket-man is in ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... caught at this idea in the hope of being promoted to the position of an officer at no distant date; but I had never been habituated to discipline. I was sent to a small fortress on the frontiers; Rolf was my lieutenant, and he did not spare me either hard work or picket duty. To cut it short, I had enlisted for five years, and I did not stay five months. One fine morning I walked off altogether. I was caught, and I wounded an under-officer in self-defence; the charge ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... of the Socialist Party is to seize the powers of government and thus prevent them from being used by the capitalists against the workers. With Socialists in political offices the workers can strike and not be shot. They can picket shops and not be arrested and imprisoned.... To win the demands made on the industrial field it is absolutely necessary to control the government, as experience shows strikes to have been lost through the interference of courts and militia. The same functions of government, ...
— Socialism As It Is - A Survey of The World-Wide Revolutionary Movement • William English Walling
... skirmisher, and finally arrived in front of Tom Osby's adobe. The tired horses stood in the sun still hitched to the wagon, and Curly, out of pity, made it his first business to hunt under the wagon seat for the picket ropes and halters. He then began to search for the oats bag, but while so engaged his attention was attracted by something whose nature we, at a distance, could not determine. With a swift glance into the back of the wagon, and ...
— Heart's Desire • Emerson Hough
... a corporal, and fourteen men of the Twelfth Regiment of the Line had been sent out to occupy a house on the main highway. They would be at least a half of a mile in advance of any other picket of their own people. Sergeant Morton was deeply angry at being sent on this duty. He said that he was over-worked. There were at least two sergeants, he claimed furiously, whose turn it should have been ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... will send a picket with you to see you safely to the ford," said the colonel. "Now, off at once, and bring the forage as ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn
... of St. Anne in one breath, and invocations of a personage not mentioned in the cure's "petee cat-ee-cheesm" in the next breath, and imprecations that their "souls might be smashed on the end of a picket fence,"—the voyageur's common oath even to this day,—the boatmen stored goods fore, aft, and athwart till each long canoe sank to the gunwale as it was gently pushed out on the water. A last sign of the cross, and the ...
— Pathfinders of the West • A. C. Laut
... spirits. We found out exactly where the enemy was, and declined to have anything further to do with him for the time being. But in finding him we had to clear the ground and drive in the pickets. One picket had been posted at the end of a loop in a chain of valleys. The road we followed skirted the base of one range of hills. The house which served as the headquarters of the picket was on the other side. A meadow as level as a board stretched between. I remember seeing ...
— The Creed of the Old South 1865-1915 • Basil L. Gildersleeve
... was in the pig's path, and he bore a stout fence-picket. For the first time in his experience in raiding these particular premises, his pigship had met with a foe worthy of his attention. Four girls, an old lady, and an ancient colored retainer, in giving chase heretofore, merely lent spice ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... bubbling, dancing brook, and you came out upon the tiniest orchard in the world, a one-storied house with a red porch, and a great sweet-brier bush thereby; while up the hill-side behind stretched a high picket fence, enclosing huge trees, part of the same brook I had crossed here dammed into a pond, and a chicken-house of pretentious height and aspect,—one of those model institutions that are the ruin of gentlemen-farmers and the delight of women. I had to go into the farm-kitchen for the poultry-yard ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... Cape Diamond. The first barrier on this side, at the Pot Ash, was defended by a battery, in which a few pieces of artillery were mounted; about two hundred paces in front of which was a block-house and picket. The guard placed at the block-house being chiefly Canadians, after giving a random and harmless fire, threw away their arms, and fled in confusion to the barrier. Their terrors were communicated to those ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... position from Kiretch Tepe Sirt, bench mark 2; Sulajik; Yilghin Burnu, with right flank thrown south to connect with Birdwood at Kazlar Chair. Godley has picket between Kazlar Chair and Damakjelik Bair, whence his line runs South-east to the spur South of Abdel Rahman Bair, thence South-west to square 80 D, South-east again to within 300 yards of Point 161 on Chunuk Bair, and thence back to the ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton
... had fighting blood in his veins. What is more to the point, he had a Mauser revolver in his pocket. He jerked it out, and, despite a second shot from the picket, prepared to ride down upon the party. An instant later half a dozen revolvers were blazing away at him. Hobbs turned at once and rode in the opposite direction, whirling to fire twice at the unfriendly group. Soon he was out of range and at leisure. He saw the futility of any attempt ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... gearings and spoil the best of all your stock of shirts, yet through it all maintain that sweet composure, that gentle calm befitting such events; if you can sound a bugle-note of triumph when steering straight against a picket-fence; if you can keep your temper, tongue, and balance when on your back beneath your car you pose, and, struggling there to fix a balky cog-wheel, you drop a monkey-wrench across your nose; if you can smile as gasoline ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher
... report, Excellence, that the investigation infers that the attack was only made with the purpose of freeing the sons of chiefs, for the picket has been slain but all the others are unhurt ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... night a nervous picket set the camp in uproar by challenging a phantom of his imagination. We were all impatient as hounds in leash. Since they would not come up and give us battle we wanted to be off and have it out with them. And the people were tired of delay. The cry of 'ste'boy!' ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... allowed to deserving men and a limited number of officers. Work was found for the rank and file in drill and outpost duty sufficient to prevent idle habits. The commissariat was closely watched, and fresh rations more frequently issued, which much improved the health of the army. The system of picket-duty was more thoroughly developed, and so vigilantly carried out as to impress its importance upon, as well as teach its ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... made his fire and unpacked his horses. He confined his riding horse with a picket rope; the others he turned loose. Then he cooked a simple meal for himself and the gaunt servant at ...
— The Sky Line of Spruce • Edison Marshall
... 10, 1865, and was sent to San Diego, Texas; but I never was in a battle. And they was only one time when I felt anyways skittish. That was when I was a new recruit on picket duty. And it was pitch dark, and I heard something comin' th'ough the bushes, and I thought, 'Let 'em come, whoever it is'. And I got my bayonet all ready, and waited. I'se gittin' sorta nervous, and ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: The Ohio Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... camped near us and had picketed his mule out but did not know I had a mule so near like his. Johnnie saw the Irishman's mule picketed out about half way between our camp and our herd, and he pulled up the picket and started on to the camp with the mule. Pretty soon the angry old Irishman came up behind Johnnie and knocked him down for trying to steal his mule. Johnnie ran into camp and got my carbine and started for the Irishman, I ran after him and asked him what he was "up to" and he told me ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus
... the straw at the bottom of the ambulance, and soon the steady, monotonous tramp of the guard lulled me also to rest. We approached the Confederate lines just at sunrise. A flag of truce was unfurled, and at once answered by an officer on picket-duty. A short parley ensued. At a word of command the Federal guard fell back and were replaced by Confederates. A moment later, I, with my charges, descended, to be greeted with enthusiasm, tempered with the most chivalrous respect, by the "boys in gray," who proved to be members of the battalion ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers
... A picket enclosure, mounted with cannon, protected the humble buildings erected for the use of the first settlers on what is now the Custom-house Square. The little stream—not much more than a rivulet except in spring—which for many years rippled between ...
— Canada • J. G. Bourinot
... marching on In a wider field than ours; Those bright battalions still fulfil The scheme of the heavenly powers; And high brave thoughts float down to us, The echoes of that far fight, Like the flash of a distant picket's gun Through the shades of ...
— Pike County Ballads and Other Poems • John Hay
... picket, were hastening to the sentry's support, their progress marked by a lantern held by a ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... time. Arrest all his friends and associates. Look for a man in a rubber coat. I saw him fire. There's a boy, too," he added, after a moment's pause, "about fourteen years old. He was hiding at the corner. I think he must have been their picket; at ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... He had some time since decided upon his course, and as soon as he was a short distance away from the clump of trees, he set out at a brisk walk, and made no effort at concealment. He did not care, now, if he were halted by a British picket ...
— The Dare Boys of 1776 • Stephen Angus Cox
... had just splashed into the water, and I nodded a good-bye to the boy-fighter, thinking how much pleasanter it was for my friend the Captain to address him with unanswerable arguments and crushing statements in his own tent than it would be to meet him on some remote picket and offer his fair proportions to the quick eye of a youngster who would draw a bead on him before he had time to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various
... suggestive and solemn thing to see a man standing guard by night. It thrilled through me, as at the gate of an arsenal in Charleston, the question once smote me, "Who comes there?" followed by the sharp command: "Advance and give the countersign." Every moral teacher stands on picket, or patrols the wall as watchman. His work is to sound the alarm; and whether it be in the first watch, in the second watch, in the third watch, or in the fourth watch, to be vigilant until the daybreak flings its "morning glories" of blooming ...
— The Abominations of Modern Society • Rev. T. De Witt Talmage
... together at Pine Tree Ranch, on the side porch of the neat little white farmhouse, over which the vines were trained and from which the well-kept lawn and flower-bordered walks rolled away to the white picket fence. It was a late August evening, which had merged from sunset into moonlight so softly and quietly that one hardly knew when the one began and the other ended. Job, in old coat and overalls and a broken straw hat, just as he had come ...
— The Transformation of Job - A Tale of the High Sierras • Frederick Vining Fisher
... Civil War furnished him a host of subjects which he treated with a patriotic fervor that went straight to the heart of an overwrought people. "The Returned Volunteer," "The Picket-Guard," "The Sharp-shooters," "The Camp-fire," "One More Shot," and many others, came from his studio in rapid succession. They were all thoroughly American, and some were even admirably sculptural. They, ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... some rumor about his hittin' the sunrise trail," said Wyatt. "Ef he goes, I stay. I'm a li'l' fed up on Jim Plimsoll lately. He pulls too much on his picket line to suit me. Ef he's got a yeller stripe on his belly, I'm quittin'. Some day he's goin' to git inter a hole that'll sure test his standard. Me, I may be a bit of a wolf, but I'm damned ef I ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... a picket fence. It's the telegraph poles you see, and they are no nearer together than on another railroad. But we're ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Locomotive - or, Two Miles a Minute on the Rails • Victor Appleton
... the Hogue ahead of the Aboukir, and the Cressy about four hundred yards on her port beam. As soon as it was seen that the Aboukir was in danger of sinking, all the boats were sent away from the Cressy, and a picket boat was hoisted out without steam up. When cutters full of the Aboukir's men were returning to the Cressy, the Hogue was struck, apparently under the aft 9.2 magazine, as a very heavy explosion took place immediately. Almost directly after the Hogue was hit we observed a periscope on our ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... than before. "It's all over," he said briskly. "The first warehouse is gone; the second will go, but they'll save the others easily enough, now that you have pointed out that the lines may be utilized otherwise than as adjuncts of performances on the high trapeze!" They were standing by a picket-fence, and he leaned against it, overcome by mirth in which she did not join. Her gravity reacted upon him at once, and his laughter was stopped short. "Will you not accept me as an escort to your home?" ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington
... vain for rows of tents, for the horses at the picket line, for the flags that marked the head-quarters, the commissariat, the field telegraph, the field post-office, the A. S. C., the R. M. A. C., the C. O., and all the other combinations of letters of ...
— Notes of a War Correspondent • Richard Harding Davis
... says, suddenly pulling up his mule; "leastwise, not a-straddle o' these hyar conspikerous critters. Whether the sogers hev goed down inter the valley or no, they're sartin to hev left some o' the party ahind, by way o' keepin' century. Let's picket the animals out hyar, an' creep forrad afut. That'll gie us a chance o' seeing in, ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... set your nerves to millin', Boggs, it's easy. Whenever you-all hears a dog mournin' an' howlin' like them hound-pups does last night, that's because he smells somethin' he can't locate; an' nacherally he's agitated tharby. Now yereafter, never let your imagination pull its picket-pin that a- way, an' go to cavortin' 'round permiscus—don't go romancin' off on any of them ghost round-ups you're addicted to. Thar's the whole groosome myst'ry laid b'ar; them pups merely smells things they can't locate, ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... you should not be permitted to join this command. I want you to understand, though, that every man admitted to it is chosen solely for personal merit, and not through friendship or any influence, political or otherwise, that he may possess. Now you may take that horse to the picket-line, see that it is properly cared for, and report at my quarters ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... large, comfortable white house, that had been heretofore hidden by great trees, came into view. Timothy drew nearer to the spotless picket fence, and gazed upon the beauties of the side yard and the front garden,—gazed and gazed, and fell desperately in love at ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... kept along pretty easily, seeming just in their glory, all this being new work to them. After some little firing from the cannon the enemy retreated into the town, which was well fortified. We placed an outlying picket of some three hundred men to watch the enemy's manoeuvres, while the body of our army encamped in the rear in a line stretching from sea to sea, so that the town standing upon a projecting piece of land, all communication from the mainland was cut off. The ...
— The Autobiography of Sergeant William Lawrence - A Hero of the Peninsular and Waterloo Campaigns • William Lawrence
... one at any price and bought six, ate them one after the other without the pretense of a halt and moodily shied the last skin at a sparrow, realizing then with a shock that the negro had already untied the mule from the picket fence. The precipitancy of it all made him slightly uncomfortable. Either the negro was too lazy to bargain or the offer was out of all proportion to the mule's ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... commander of his wish to speak with him, having information of importance of communicate. He was admitted, and, having been heard, the colonel bestowed on him the vacant post of lieutenant of the corps, and directed him to be ready, with a picket-guard, to march, at eight o'clock in the evening, to the spot he had occupied the night before, where he was to place his hat and coat upon the stump, and then lie in ambush for the intruders. Accordingly, the party proceeded, and obeyed ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... that watches us softly, as the shadows glide down in the yard; That shall go with my soldier to battle, and stand with my picket on guard. Spirits of loving and lost ones—watch softly with Harry to-night, For to-morrow he goes forth to battle—to arm him for Freedom ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... bushes were small inclosures containing graves, sometimes no more than one. They were recognized as graves by the discolored stones or rotting boards at head and foot, leaning at all angles, some prostrate; by the ruined picket fences surrounding them; or, infrequently, by the mound itself showing its gravel through the fallen leaves. In many instances nothing marked the spot where lay the vestiges of some poor mortal—who, leaving "a large circle of sorrowing ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce
... unfortunate victim on the ground. A length a loud shout, and the firing of musketry on the skirts of the wood, awoke me to a sense of the real danger of my situation. I forced my way through the thickets, and saw a skirmish between a large mass of armed men, and a picket of troops in a village on the borders of the wood. There was now no time to be lost. I returned to the spot where the body lay, placed my hand on its forehead, to ascertain whether any remnant of life lingered there; found all cold; and, remounting my horse, wound my dreary ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... being posted, the remainder of the regiment rested for the night in barns, sheds, or whatever offered shelter. Lively sensations must have coursed through the breasts of those who were now for the first time called to perform the duties of the night picket—a duty always trying, and particularly so now, in that we supposed we were in the near presence of a watchful and enterprising foe, who was advancing in ...
— Our campaign around Gettysburg • John Lockwood
... discretion and accustomed to bet among strangers, got on five Naps more with different parties, who to "prevent accidents" submitted to deposit the money with the Countess, and all things being adjusted, and the course cleared by a picket of infantry, Mr. Jorrocks ungirded his sword, and depositing it with his frock-coat in the cab, walked up to the fifty yards he was to have for start. "Now, Colonel," said the Yorkshireman, backing him to the mound, so that he might leap on without ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... news spread quickly. A man had been stationed on the roof as picket. He shouted, "Hallelujah! Abe Lincoln is nominated. Fire the cannon!" The frenzy of joy spread to the immense throng of citizens outside the wigwam, then through the city, then through the state, then through ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham
... a German oath. He had had his journey for nothing, then. The man's answers were only too likely to be true. It was what he might have expected. But at least he would search the house and make sure. Leaving a picket at the front door and another at the back, the sergeant and he drove the trembling butler in front of them— his shaking candle sending strange, flickering shadows over the old tapestries and the low, oak-raftered ceilings. They searched the ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... coming from shade and picket—for midday had been warm—into the fields and along the hedges, and were fluttering from one fence-rail to another ahead of them and piping from the bushes by the wayside and the top of ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.
... where Haviland's camp began, the men of the nearest picket were playing chuck-farthing. Duty deprived them of the spectacle in the Place d'Armes, and thus, as soldiers, they solaced themselves. Through the bulrush stems John heard their ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... about my picket, And whether I'm in touch with whom; I want to lie in yonder thicket, I only wish to touch the bloom; And when men agitate about their flanks And say their left is sadly in the air, I hear the missel-thrush and murmur, "Thanks, I wish ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various
... all the old regiments which had been through the Peninsular campaign and the disastrous retreat under Pope, was frightfully reduced in numbers: only three hundred and seventy were around the standards out of the eleven hundred who first took the field. Many had fallen on picket or been cut off singly, more by disease, but alike doing their duty, unmentioned and unnoticed. A larger number were yet suffering from overwork and sickness; and the regiment would in time recruit to seven hundred, from men now disabled, if there should ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... party for Union cavalry, fired on them killing a captain and a sergeant. The Confederate commander immediately turned his horse and sought safety at another point, but he had not progressed far before he drew the fire of another picket ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... in the Royal Audiencia of Mexico; Melchor Joseph de Foncerrada and Andres Alvarez Calderon, state's attorney; there being in the cathedral the most illustrious and reverend Archbishop, His Excellency Gabriel de Aristizabal, the municipal council and religious communities, and a complete picket with draped banner, and taking the wooden box covered with plush and gold trimmings, in the interior of which was the box of gilded lead, which contained the remains exhumed on the preceding day, the President Joaquin ...
— Santo Domingo - A Country With A Future • Otto Schoenrich
... too," Dias said. "You had better begin; Jose and I will picket the mules and hobble the llamas. If they were to make off, we should have a lot ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... to the officers of the Union fleet that the enemy had a ram up the river, it does not appear that any preparation for defence had been made, or plan of action adopted. Even the commonplace precaution of sending out a picket-boat had not been taken. The attack, therefore, was a surprise, not only in the ordinary sense of the word, but, so far as appears, in finding the officer in command without any formed ideas as to what he would do if she came ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan
... moments he came upon two horses standing asleep, tethered by long ropes to picket-pins. One of these he released and led back to his own. Then he remounted and rode on. Again he circled wide of his destination, and this time struck into the woods that lined the river. His way now lay down the black aisles of tree trunks which he pursued until he came to a spot he was evidently ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... not very many years ago that I used to play at picket; there was a gentleman of your robe, a dignitory of Lincoln, very well known and remembered in the ordinaries, but being not long since dead, I will save his name. Now I used to play pieces, and this gentleman would always go half-a-crown ...
— Andrew Marvell • Augustine Birrell
... icicles no longer dropped a cold fruitage from barren branch and spray; and the roadside trees relapsed into stony quiet, so that the sound of horse's hoofs breaking through the thin, dull, lustreless films of ice that patched the furrowed road, might have been heard by the nearest Continental picket a ...
— Thankful Blossom • Bret Harte
... mile, Rose Ransome opening the garden gate of the pretty, vine-covered cottage near the bridge, and the Monroe girls, Sarah and Martha, in a desperate hurry now, flying up the twilight quiet of North Main Street to the long picket fence, the dark, tree-shaded garden, and the shabby side-doorway ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris
... says he, holding up his finger. "I will take my revenge how and when I please. We are enough of the same family to understand each other, perhaps; and the reason why I have not had you arrested on your arrival, why I had not a picket of soldiers in the first clump of evergreens, to await and prevent your coming—I, who knew all, before whom that pettifogger, Romaine, has been conspiring in broad daylight to supplant me—is simply this: that I had not made up my ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... at Mahamdiya till August 26th, occupying the inner picket line at night, and training by day. On that date the Brigade moved to er Rabah, a large palm grove, a mile or so north of Katia, which it closely resembled. After reveille at 3.45 a.m., and breakfast at 4.30, the Battalion moved off at six, reaching er Rabah at 11, but not being able to move into ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... two ships steamed slowly to the north. Mac landed horse-picket, and for four hours he paced a length of the boat-deck up and down past fifty horses' heads, while the wind howled mournfully in the rigging and the ship swayed easily to the swell. Morning broke, with a dull sky, a ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... inflexible in my views regarding the distribution of wealth in the world. Some of the best-known people in the country were openly taking the ground that the poor man was not getting a "square deal." To sympathize with organized labor was no longer "bad form," some society women even doing picket duty for Jewish ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... the other side, but what I knew all his peculiar characteristics, and idiosyncrasies. For illustration of this idea, as we were approaching Atlanta, my division had the advance of the Army of the Ohio the morning we came in sight of the city. My advance guard captured a rebel picket post, and one of the men captured, had a morning paper from Atlanta, in which was Johnston's farewell order to his troops, and Hood's order assuming command. I had been three years at West Point with Hood, he having graduated ...
— Personal recollections and experiences concerning the Battle of Stone River • Milo S. Hascall
... command after this feat, and to complete his glories of Long Island and Breed's Hill, at Philadelphia! A friend, to be sure, crossed in the night to say the enemy's army was being ferried over, but he fell upon a picket of Germans: they could not understand him: their commander was boozing or asleep. In the morning, when the spy was brought to some one who could comprehend the American language, the whole Continental force had ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... perfect, according to any recognized standard, then all the trees would be alike, and would cease to be attractive and picturesque. We keep all perfect things out of pictures, because they are formal and tasteless. A bran new cottage, with a picket fence around it, and every thing cleaned up about it, is too perfect to be picturesque. An old, tumble-down mill, with rude and rotten timbers, and a wheel outside, is decidedly picturesque, because its imperfections make it informal. ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb
... history, a story of the war as seen by a private in the ranks, not by one who, as a favored spectator, could survey the movements of a whole army at a glance, and hence could, must, individualize brigades, divisions, army corps. It is the war in field, woods, underbrush, picket-post, skirmish-line, camp, march, bivouac. During 1864 no memorandum was kept, and a diary kept during the spring of 1865 was lost, within a year after the close of the war. Hence I have depended on memory alone, aided in fixing dates, etc., by reference ...
— In The Ranks - From the Wilderness to Appomattox Court House • R. E. McBride
... rather pretty duel, sir. Don't ride over the bridge.' A picket shot from the left singing over my head rather emphasized his warning. 'It would not be fair—you would ride right into my pickets.' It was an unusual bit ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell |
