"Terrific" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... straight ahead. Far in the distance a great wall loomed skyward to a terrific height. So vast was it and so remote, at first it had escaped the eye altogether. An incredibly high range of mountains, glowing with a faint rose blush under the touch of the setting sun. Against the sky were many peaks, each of them tipped with curious and sparkling ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... a quarter of an hour off we went. The enemy returned the fire from our batteries in good style, and there was a regular row. They pointed their "Long Tom," a fifty-two pounder, towards us, and sent the shot over our heads and a little to our left. The ball made a terrific row rushing over us. Whilst we were marching down to the attack the fire on both sides was at its height. The noise was fearful, and the whole scene the grandest and, at the same time, the most awful I ever witnessed. I caught ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... last the bright dawn shows us our advantage. The Moor sees his loss and loses courage suddenly, and, seeing a reinforcement which had come to assist us, the ardor for conquest yields to the dread of death. They gain their ships, they cut their cables, they utter even to heaven terrific cries, they make their retreat in confusion and without reflecting whether their kings can escape with them. Their fright is too strong to admit of this duty. The incoming tide brought them here, the outgoing tide carries them away. Meanwhile their ...
— The Cid • Pierre Corneille
... see the enemy's soldiers pouring over the wall and advancing vigorously toward them. With rare strategy the Riverbeds, instead of approaching by the front, had come up the hill on the back road, crept along under cover of barns and fences until the school-house lot was reached, and now, with terrific shouts, were crossing the stone-wall to hurl themselves impetuously on ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene
... eyes closed, than everyone in the boat thought he saw, just opposite his own eyes, a terrific human head rising above the water; not like the head of a swimmer, but planted upright on the surface of the river, and keeping pace with the boat. Each turned to his neighbour to show him the cause of his terror, ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... when I had to abandon the wind-swept heights and flounder through the soft snow of the canyons. Through narrow passes I had to crawl, so terrific was the wind that poured through the channel like a waterfall. Nothing short of a Kansas cyclone can match the velocity of a mountain-top gale. All day I stemmed its tide, which sapped my strength, bowled me over and ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... that of Stuart, has had its tragedy, offering a fearful lesson to sovereigns and a terrific example to subjects. It has had, also, its restoration; and, if report may be credited, the parallel will not rest here: for there are those who assert that as James was supplanted on the throne of England by a relative while yet the legitimate and unoffending ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... elbowed his way through a crowd which ringed the city hall that afternoon, was impressed by the terrific tight-lipped determination of those faces all about him. It was as though San Francisco had but one thought, one straight, relentless purpose—the punishment of crime by Mosaic law. The prisoners in the county jail appeared to sense this wave of retributive ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... soil they inherit is to them and their posterity protected from the base arts so frequently devised to over-reach their simplicity. By what new principle are they to be prohibited from defending their property? If their warfare, from being different to that of the white people, be more terrific to the enemy, let him retrace his steps—- they seek him not—and cannot expect to find women and children in an invading army. But they are men, and have equal rights with all other men to defend themselves and their property when invaded, more especially when they ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper
... portrait of their district hero, which caused them both to chuckle derisively. The Honorable Mr. Laneway figured on the flyleaf as an extremely cross-eyed person, with strangely crooked legs and arms and a terrific expression. He was outlined with red and blue pencils as to coat and trousers, and held a reddened scalp in one hand and a blue tomahawk in the other; being closely associated in the artist's mind with the early ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... Phil clutched at the side of her berth. By this time she was wider awake. "What a terrific storm!" she thought to herself. "I hope we won't be blown away." Phil turned over on her pillow. It was incredible that everybody else should be asleep when the wind made such a noise. Besides, the boat was moving; ...
— Madge Morton's Secret • Amy D. V. Chalmers
... to discover the woman who had hired her abroad, as the victim of the plot really knew nothing about that procuress. This girl was restored to her home in Germany none the worse for her terrific adventure, and a few weeks later refunded her travelling expenses. But how many must there be who have never heard of the Salvation Army, and can find no milkman to help them out of their vile prisons, for such places are ...
— Regeneration • H. Rider Haggard
... mostly broncos, on the outside—an arrangement that turned out well in view of a stampede that took place. The occasion of the stampede (and there is nothing more fearful than a stampede of maddened animals) was a terrific thunderstorm, which transformed the prairie into a sea of electric flame and sent bolts crashing into the zariba amidst the horses that were tied to the wagons. Sergt.-Major Sam B. Steele (that was then his rank), who was riding near this enclosure, thus vividly described ...
— Policing the Plains - Being the Real-Life Record of the Famous North-West Mounted Police • R.G. MacBeth
... low slow way of speaking when in great displeasure was a terrific thing, and so was the set look of her handsome mouth and eyes. Kate burst into a violent fit of crying, and was sent away in dire disgrace. When she had spent her tears and sobs, she began to think over her ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Peter said. It was a pity that Hilary always so disliked any work he had to do. Work—a terrific, insatiable god, demanding its hideous human sacrifices from the dawn of the world till twilight—so Hilary saw it. The idea of being horrible, all the concrete details into which it was translated ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... and at the precisely correct instant he cut his drive and released his largest bomb. Then, so rapidly that it was one blur of speed, he again kicked on his eight G's of drive and started to whirl around as only a speedster or a flitter can whirl. Practically unconscious from the terrific resultant of the linear and angular accelerations, he ejected the two smaller bombs. He did not care particularly where they lit, just so they didn't light in the crater or near the observatory, and he had already made certain ...
— The Vortex Blaster • Edward Elmer Smith
... The explosion was terrific; its effect appalling. The glare lit the whole city for a brief second with a light like a stormy sunset, then upon us showered great pieces of iron and stone with mangled human limbs, the debris of a gateway that for centuries ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... A terrific crash of thunder drowned out the last words. Billy sprang forward in alarm, and away went the wagon over rocks and decaying ...
— Young Auctioneers - The Polishing of a Rolling Stone • Edward Stratemeyer
... through the dust. Bill Craven, on his horse at one side of the corral, saw it coming straight toward him, and tried to whirl his noose. Too late. The outlaw was upon him; his own pony, rearing, was caught unbalanced; and Bill himself instinctively leaned backward in the saddle. There was a terrific impact; the pony was struck squarely on the left fore-quarter; and horse and rider went down together in a heap against the fence. Then over them went the outlaw, trampling them as he leaped and clambered, taking the top plank with him as he landed outside the corral on his head and knees. ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... he has seen. They may be offenders against morals and the social order, but they are human beings over whom the waters of civilization seem to sweep with relentless flood. The frightful waste of life and energy seems inexcusable. And it is as though some mill dam had burst and was flowing in a terrific torrent down a river bed along which a few are drawn ...
— The Man in Court • Frederic DeWitt Wells
... that which has been suggested with the Scandinavian mythology. That mythology is of so marked and peculiar a character that it has not been distinctly traced out of the great circle of tribes of the Indo-Germanic family. Odin and his terrific pantheon of war gods and social deities could only exist in the dreary latitudes of storms and fire which produce a Hecla and a Maelstrom. These latitudes have invariably produced nations whose influence has been felt in an elevating power ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland
... have to some extent removed the seal of secrecy from my lips. The death of a certain royal sovereign makes it possible for me to divulge things hitherto undivulgeable. Even now I can only tell a part, a small part, of the terrific things that I know. When more sovereigns die I can divulge more. I hope to keep on divulging at intervals for years. But I am compelled to be cautious. My relations with the Wilhelmstrasse, with Downing Street and the Quai d'Orsay, are so intimate, and ...
— Frenzied Fiction • Stephen Leacock
... up, steadily, strongly; his head came level with his hands; he peered over the edge of the cliff. The strain was terrific. The careless smile was gone from his lips. In that instant he no longer ignored what lay behind him; he knew the suspense of the gambler who pauses after he has thrown before he lifts the dice-box ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... improbable for him to believe, and one night, just as he was going to bed, a new idea came to him, an idea so splendid that it prevented for a long time his going to sleep, and even after he was asleep he dreamed the whole night through that he was having a terrific fight with a huge bear, and when he awoke in the morning and thought that his dream might very likely prove a reality, he hardly knew how to contain himself ...
— Paul the Courageous • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... thou in the foam of thy brow, And yet the warm blood in my bosom grows chill; For awful art thou and terrific, I vow, In the roar of ...
— Targum • George Borrow
... doth bear, If e'er the Prince of Darkness herdsman were, These cattle black were his by surest right, Like things but seen in horrid dreams of night. The steeds are swathed in trappings manifold, The armed knights are grave, and stern, and cold, Terrific too; the clench'd fists seem to hold Some frightful missive, which the phantom hands Would show, if opened out at hell's commands. The dusk exaggerates their giant size, The shade is awed—the pillars coldly rise. Oh, Night! why are these ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... St. Beuve, the privileged circle at Coppet after making an excursion returned from Chambery in two coaches. Those arriving in the first coach had a rueful experience to relate—a terrific thunder-storm, shocking roads, and danger and gloom to the whole company. The party in the second coach heard their story with surprise; of thunder-storm, of steeps, of mud, of danger, they knew nothing; no, they had forgotten earth, and breathed a purer air; such a conversation ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... to the fays who glide by moon-light through the oaks of Windsor, than to those who haunt the solitary heaths and lofty mountains of the North. The fact at least is certain; and it has not escaped a late ingenious traveller, that the character of the Scottish Fairy is more harsh and terrific than that which is ascribed to the elves of our sister kingdom.—See STODDART'S View of Scenery and Manners ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... ruled well and wisely and his people prospered. But at last trouble came in the ravages of a terrible dragon, and once more Beowulf was called forth to a terrific combat. ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... to her feet. He caught her hand and replaced her; his face was so white that it shone, there was a wild glitter in his eye, and the smile that brooded over her had something in it absolutely terrific. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... the Sophie Sutherland before the wind and sea. He had long since forgotten his mangled fingers. The bandages had been torn away, and the cold, salt spray had eaten into the half-healed wounds until they were numb and no longer pained. But he was not cold. The terrific labor of steering forced the perspiration from every pore. Yet he was faint and weak with hunger and exhaustion, and hailed with delight the advent on deck of the captain, who fed him all of a pound of cake-chocolate. It ...
— Dutch Courage and Other Stories • Jack London
... partake with me. {87a} In mine own imperial majesty will I descend upon the earth, and alone will I devour all therein contained; henceforth no man shall there be found to worship the Most High." Thereon he gave one terrific flying leap to start—a blaze of living fire, but the hand overhead whirls the terrible dart so that he trembles notwithstanding his rage, and ere he had gone far, an invisible hand drags the brute back by the chain for all his struggles; his rage becomes sevenfold ...
— The Visions of the Sleeping Bard • Ellis Wynne
... just then unexpectedly from another quarter—there was a sudden battering sound. Something went past them through the branches with a crashing noise. It was terrific, the way it smashed and clattered overhead, making a clapping rattle that died away into the distance with strange swiftness. They jumped; their hearts stood still a moment. It was so horribly close. But the stillness that followed the uproar was far worse than the noise. It felt ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... With terrific yells the throng of natives, waving curved swords, spears, and clubs, rushed forward. The steep ascent checked them, but they rushed up until within ten yards of the line of soldiers on its brow. Then Mr. Hallam gave the word to ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... you can only get the skins of the texts that way. If you want their juice, you must press them in cluster. Now, the clustered texts about the human heart, insist, as a body, not on any inherent corruption in all hearts, but on the terrific distinction between the bad and the good ones. "A good man, out of the good treasure of his heart, bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man, out of the evil treasure, bringeth forth that which is evil." "They on the rock are they which, in ...
— The Ethics of the Dust • John Ruskin
... have been so mistreated! It was not at all unlikely that she was seriously injured, marred for life—possibly even killed. The horror of that! The ensuing storm of public rage! A trial! His whole career gone up in one terrific explosion of woe, ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... a cart of one man and harness of another, and put his and his son's riding horses to it, to take Mrs. D- and me home. As it was still early, he took us a 'little drive'; and oh, ye gods! what a terrific and dislocating pleasure was that! At a hard gallop, Mr. M- (with the mildest and steadiest air and with perfect safety) took us right across country. It is true there were no fences; but over bushes, ditches, lumps of rock, watercourses, we jumped, flew, and bounded, and up every hill we went ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon
... This terrific malady was something of a very different kind from the tranquil sensuousness of the days in Savoy, when the blood was young, and life was not complicated with memories, and the sweet freshness of nature made existence enough. Then his supreme expansion had been attended ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... posted on what is taking place over in Belgium, but it's said the bombardment of Antwerp began yesterday and it's impossible for the place to hold out for long. Perhaps even now the city has fallen under the terrific bombardment." ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in the Red Cross • Edith Van Dyne
... those unevenly-laid rails. The escape of the pursuers, was, indeed, almost miraculous, for Andrews found time to stop just beyond a curve and lay a loose rail on the track, and Fuller's engine ran upon this at full speed. There came a terrific jolt; the engine seemed to leap into the air; but by a marvellous chance it lighted again on the rails and ran on unharmed. Had it missed the track not a man on it would have ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... memories of old days and old friendships are preserved by ghosts of an almost genial and entirely harmless disposition, we will now turn to those more elaborate pictures in which the dead are represented under an altogether terrific aspect. It is not as an incorporeal being that the visitor from the other world is represented in the Skazkas. He comes not as a mere phantom, intangible, impalpable, incapable of physical exertion, ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... Jimmy and I unpacked the horses. Here Jimmy Andrews set fire to the spinifex close to all our packs and saddles, and a strong hot wind blowing, soon placed all our belongings in the most terrible jeopardy. The grass was dry and thick, and the fire raged around us in a terrific manner; guns and rifles, riding- and pack-saddles were surrounded by flames in a moment. We ran and halloed and turned back, and frantically threw anything we could catch hold of on to the ground already burnt. Upsetting a couple ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... where, so I was told, I might expect to meet savages; but seeing no signs of life, I came to anchor in eight fathoms of water, where I lay all night under a high mountain. Here I had my first experience with the terrific squalls, called williwaws, which extended from this point on through the strait to the Pacific. They were compressed gales of wind that Boreas handed down over the hills in chunks. A full-blown williwaw will throw a ship, even without sail on, ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... terrific play during all the rest of the combat. Cuff went down every time. At the sixth round there were almost as many fellows shouting out, "Go it, Figs," as there were youths exclaiming, "Go it, Cuff." At the twelfth round ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... a cramped position in an automobile, covered with dust or wet with sudden showers; tired, hungry, putting up with all sorts of discomforts by the way, and half the time frightened out of my wits by appalling precipices or terrific wild beasts? But happy I am, happier than I've ever been, though I keep asking myself, or Maida, or Beechy, "Why ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... this, and listened to the swish of the rain and the mighty howling of the wind. It had grown very dark, and the air was chilly. The lightning was incessant, and traced zigzag pathways of fire across the sombre heavens. The thunder was terrific, and often shook the solid earth. I asked Salome if she was not afraid, but she laughed from her snug retreat, and said she loved it all. What manner of girl was this, who feared nothing, and who loved Nature even when she was at war ...
— The Love Story of Abner Stone • Edwin Carlile Litsey
... advanced into the current, the loud commands, and shouts, and outcries increased more and more, and the rapidity of the current and of the eddies by which the boats and rafts were hurried down the stream, or whirled against each other, soon produced a terrific scene of tumult and confusion. As soon as the first boats approached the land, the Gauls assembled to oppose them rushed down upon them with showers of missiles, and with those unearthly yells which barbarous warriors always raise in going into battle, as a means both of exciting ...
— Hannibal - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... to violent action: but dynamite is a bigger athlete, who sleeps so soundly that a spark or flame can only rouse him to moderate rage; it requires a special shake to make him wide-awake, but when thus roused his fury is terrific, as you have just seen. And now," I added, as we drew near the house, "we will change the subject, because I have this morning received two letters, which demand the united consideration of our whole party. I will therefore call up Bella and Nicholas, who have fallen behind, as usual. Mr ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... background of the night, he stood and surveyed them for a moment, his aspect terrific. Then he leapt forward, baring his sword as he came. An incoherent roar burst from his lips as he bore straight ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... turning from literature, we spoke with the gentle abbate of our day's adventures, and eagerly related that of the Ecelino prisons. To have seen them was the most terrific pleasure ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells
... Hilda's terrific egoism might have got fresh books somehow from somewhere, had she really believed in the virtue of books. Thus far, however, books had not furnished her with what she wanted, and her faith in their promise ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... to an unaccustomed height, had taken on an added and tremendous swiftness. The red turbid stream was eddying and bulging and hurrying with terrific swiftness between its shallow banks, striking with an immensity of power against the projection of land on which stood Marie Louise's cabin, and rebounding in great circling waves that spread and lost themselves in the seething turmoil. The cable used in crossing the unwieldly flat had long ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin
... extraordinary state of agitation: so the sound is low and distant just at this period. But when storms are at their height, when the ocean hurls mountain after mountain of water on the cliffs, then the noise is terrific; the roaring heard down here in the mine is so inexpressibly fierce and awful that the boldest men at work are afraid to continue their labor; all ascend to the surface to breathe the upper air ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... where we saw the ship must strike. A huge roller seemed to lift her, and with a terrific crash down she came on the sand, the foaming sea instantly dashing over her, making every timber in her tremble, and tearing off large fragments ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston
... absolute necessity that there should be no waste. Accordingly, the field-officers pointed the pieces in person, and the words "look to the commodore—look to the two-deckers!" passed along the line. The conflict soon grew terrific. The balls whistled above the heads of the defenders, and bombs fell thick and fast within the fort; yet, in the excitement of the moment, the men seemed totally unconscious of danger. Occasionally a shot from one of their ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... to be seen, but the hissing, crackling sound coming up from below, at intervals fell upon the ear, and told that the fierce element was still raging there, and would soon exhibit itself in all its red and terrific splendour. ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... the spot, face to face with the other colonel, at the very moment when the captain fell, calling out 'Help!' No, our Italian colonel was no longer human! Foam like the froth of champagne rose to his lips; he roared inarticulately like a lion. Incapable of uttering a word, or even a cry, he made a terrific signal to his antagonist, pointing to the wood and drawing his sword. The two colonels went aside. In two seconds we saw our Colonel's opponent stretched on the ground, his skull split in two. The soldiers of his regiment backed—yes, by heaven, ...
— Another Study of Woman • Honore de Balzac
... three days the weather had been terrific; but on the third day it so far cleared up that one of the men who belonged to the fishing station thought that they might manage to drag the nets a bit that day. The others, however, were not inclined to venture ...
— Weird Tales from Northern Seas • Jonas Lie
... dashed through the creek to the foot of the last hill, which was so steep that the cannon could not be depressed sufficiently to damage them. After halting for a minute to take breath, the brigade charged, with a terrific yell, up the hill. The instant they passed the curve of the hill, as fearful a fire met them as men are ever called to face. The whole line seemed falling, officers and men going down by scores. But not a man stopped; all who were not hit went on. Hayes shouted to his men to push ...
— The Life, Public Services and Select Speeches of Rutherford B. Hayes • James Quay Howard
... for a moment. It seemed as if the boy had gone mad. With the same wild cry, and this time with a knife open in his hand, he sprang at his hated enemy, stabbing quick, fierce stabs. But this time Rosenblatt was ready. Taking the boy's stabs on his arm, he struck the boy a terrific blow on the neck. As Kalman fell, he clutched and hung to his foe, who, seizing him by the throat, dragged ...
— The Foreigner • Ralph Connor
... rescue, he would have been seriously torn about the face, but just in time the woman's arms were seized in a giant grip, and she was flung bodily out of the room, falling with a crash upon the landing. Then from her and the child arose a most terrific uproar of commination; both together yelled such foulness and blasphemy as can only be conceived by those who have made a special study of this vocabulary, and the vituperation of the child was, if anything, richer in quality than the mother's. The former, moreover, did not confine herself ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... chance was droll That sent so mild a hack To smite the invulnerable soul Whom WILLIAM could not whack; But spiteful folk remarked, of course, He must have used terrific force Before he got that wretched horse To ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 29, 1917 • Various
... through sternlights of "Lotus"; grand collision of yawl at full speed and a rakish cutter at anchor. Profane language in the cabin; sleepy crew, half awake, rush up the hatchway, and denounce Irrepressibles. Irrepressibles sing "Smuggler's Life," etc.; terrific noise of hens; half-the-crew invite the Irrepressibles to "be as decent as they can." No moon yet; everybody ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... where it had fallen. As a matter of fact, by one of those very lucky accidents, that often attend a star in the ascendent, the sapling dove head on into a cavern in the jam above the clump of piles. The detonation of the twelve full sticks of giant powder was terrific. Half the river leaped into the air in a beautiful column of water and spray that seemed to hang motionless for appreciable moments. Dark fragments of timbers were hurled in all directions. When the row had died the clump of piles was ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... brands aloft were flung, Margaret on Roderick's mantle hung, And Malcolm heard his Ellen's scream, As faltered through terrific dream. Then Roderick plunged in sheath his sword, And veiled his wrath in scornful word:' Rest safe till morning; pity 't were Such cheek should feel the midnight air! Then mayst thou to James Stuart tell, Roderick will keep the lake and fell, Nor lackey with his freeborn clan ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... blizzards and terrific gales passed. Mid-April came, and Toby and Charley, with dogs and komatik, met Skipper Zeb at Black River tilt, when he appeared again out of the silent wilderness with the harvest of his labours, and his winter's ...
— Left on the Labrador - A Tale of Adventure Down North • Dillon Wallace
... was a terrific explosion that shook the house. I could see a shower of stones and brick and timbers and dust, rising like a smoke, seamed with fire, high in the air, within the lines of the barricades. Then came another, even louder; then another, and another, ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... That night the cold suddenly fled, the chilly clouds left the heavens and the great Northern General issued a command. A year before another command of his produced that terrific campaign through the Wilderness, where a hundred thousand men fell, and he meant this second one to be ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... apologized further, but the funicular gave a mighty jerk at that moment, and the carriage started. Up—up went the little train, working on wire ropes like a bucket coming out of a well. Higher and higher and higher it rose up the terrific incline, over masses of cinders, towards the thick cloud of smoke that loomed above. It stopped at last at a big iron gate, which opened to admit the passengers on to the summit. Here the guides were waiting, and ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... twelve years. Once clear of the streets, I mount and soon outdistance the crowd, though still followed by a number of horsemen. Part way out we wait for the Vali's state carriage, in which he daily rides between the city and his residence. "While waiting, a terrific squall of wind and dust comes howling from the direction we are going, and while it is still blowing great guns, the Vali and his mounted escort arrive. His Excellency alights and examines the Columbia with much interest, ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... Coolidge was downed last night in a hurricane on the Atlantic. A terrific wind arose, which broke one of the huge wings. The ship dropped abruptly, and though the captain fired distress signals, nothing could possibly have saved the passengers but the timely arrival of the Admiral Sims, a destroyer, captained by Helen Tuttle, and the ship, The Roosevelt, captained ...
— The 1926 Tatler • Various
... the corner just now you were walking at such a terrific pace, and looked so much as though you were greatly upset about something, that I feared there had been an accident at 'Sea View,' ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... blown, And now upon that reeking hill Slaughter rides screaming on the vengeful ball; While with terrific signal shrill, The vultures from their bloody eyries flown, Hang o'er them like a pall. Now deeper roll the maddening drums, And the mingling host like ocean heaves; While from the midst a horrid wailing comes, And high above the ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... country be changed! What would become of the lofty houses, thickly-packed cities, great manufacturies (sic), the beautiful public and private edifices? If the new period of disturbance were to commence by some great earthquake in the dead of night, how terrific would be the carnage! England would be at once bankrupt; all papers, records, and accounts would from that moment be lost. Government being unable to collect the taxes, and failing to maintain its authority, the hand of violence and rapine ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... massed yet translucent, mild yet thick, moving and turning within themselves to a hushed noise of multitudinous soft rustling. In their sound was something very sweet and sinning that fell into her with a spell of horrible enchantment. They were so mild, each one alone, yet so terrific in their combination. Cold seized her. The sheets against her body had ...
— The Man Whom the Trees Loved • Algernon Blackwood
... words of the law, the blessings and the cursings." We must let the Lord brace us with His severities. We must gaze steadily upon the appalling fearfulness of sin, and upon its terrific issues. At all costs we must get rid of the spurious gentleness that holds compromise with uncleanness, that effeminate affection which is destitute of holy fire. We must seek the love which burns everlastingly against all sin; we must seek ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett
... the hills as splendidly as the French had gone. They struck in all directions toward Paris. In Lorraine was their left flank, the Bavarians, meant to play the same part to the east that von Kluck played to the west. We heard only of von Kluck; nothing of this terrific struggle ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... the murderers of Julius Caesar, being in his tent during a night which was not very dark, towards the third hour of the night, beheld a monstrous and terrific figure enter. "Who art thou? a man or a God? and why comest thou here?" The spectre answered, "I am thine evil genius. Thou shalt see me at Philippi!" Brutus replied undauntedly, "I will meet thee there." And on going out, he went and related the circumstance to Cassius, ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... his little horn to Seppi, and now he shouted to him, "Blow your horn." Seppi could not play Fritz's merry little tune, but he blew a terrific blast, and Bello knew that he must follow the sound of the horn, even though it meant parting ...
— The Swiss Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... for prey, but he never cloaked his motives beneath a calculating exterior of piety or benevolence. Thousands upon thousands he had deceived, for business was business, but himself he never deceived. His bitter scoffs at what he termed theologic absurdities and superstitions and his terrific rebuffs to ministers who appealed to him for money, undoubtedly called forth a considerable share of the odium which was hurled upon him. He defied the anathemas of organized churchdom; he took hold of the commercial world and shook ...
— History of the Great American Fortunes, Vol. I - Conditions in Settlement and Colonial Times • Myers Gustavus
... of jealous and hostile States, and you destroy the prosperity and onward march of the whole and every part and involve all in one common ruin. But such considerations, important as they are in themselves, sink into insignificance when we reflect on the terrific evils which would result from disunion to every portion of the Confederacy—to the North not more than to the South, to the East not more than to the West. These I shall not attempt to portray, because I feel an humble confidence that the kind Providence which inspired our fathers ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 5: James Buchanan • James D. Richardson
... There was firing to my left, and as I afterward learned was from the Fourth Iowa of Thayer's brigade (and I believe of Steele's division). I was struck and fell, and my regiment went back in great disorder. The fire was terrific. I saw beyond the Thirteenth Illinois, to my right, a disordered line, and learned afterward it was the Sixteenth Ohio. When I was taken from the field by the enemy and taken into Vicksburg, I found among the wounded and prisoners men and officers ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... this imposing-looking diplomat is the principal partner of the autocrat of Germany in such juvenile games as "Hot Cockles," which is a very favorite game on board the Hohenzollern, and in which the kneeling and blindfolded victim receives a terrific spank or smack, and then has to guess, under the penalty of ridiculous forfeits, who it ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... great deal better than myself, insists that the name is not d'Arc, i.e. of Arc, but Darc. Now it happens sometimes, that if a person, whose position guarantees his access to the best information, will content himself with gloomy dogmatism, striking the table with his fist, and saying in a terrific voice—"It is so; and there's an end of it,"—one bows deferentially; and submits. But if, unhappily for himself, won by this docility, he relents too amiably into reasons and arguments, probably one raises an insurrection against him that ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... glance. He had not turned his head, not a muscle of his face had moved, and his features had remained as motionless as the golden mask of a mummy, yet his eyes had turned between his painted eyelids towards Tahoser, and a flash of desire had lighted up their sombre discs, an effect as terrific as if the granite eyes of a divine simulacrum, suddenly lighted up, were to express a human thought. He had half raised one of his hands from the arm of his throne, a gesture imperceptible to every one, but which one of the ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... the walls, the leaders would immediately discard their now useless bucklers and begin to ply their axes, protected from overhead assaults by the overlapping shields of their comrades. The formation advanced steadily; there was a suggestion of terrific irresistibility in the very slowness of its progress; to the eager fancy it might have been the veritable recreation of some prehistoric monster, the illusion being heightened by the torchlight that flickered uncertainly over the rounded bellies of the shields of greenish leather and was reflected ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... was in the heyday of youth. A brazen helmet decorated with a panther skin and the crest set off with a crimson cock's-comb shaded his fresh young face and displayed a long and terrific mane that swept his back. His red jacket was cut short and square, barely reaching to the waist, the better to show off his elegant figure. In his girdle he carried an enormous sabre, the hilt of which was a glittering eagle's beak. A pair of flapped ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... chimed in a cloud-high shrapnel from Bulwan. It was half-past seven in the morning of November 7; the real bombardment, the terrific symphony, had begun. ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens
... perhaps twenty acres when we first found ourselves enclosed in it. But every minute it was diminishing; and the heat there was something terrific. The men were rather surprised, after trying in vain on every side to discover a break in the circle of fire, to come ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... and he may live in continual enjoyment, and slay wild ducks and snipes in abundance; a number of buffaloes are to be seen grazing on the marshes. They are not to be met with to the North of Rome. They resemble entirely the buffaloes of Egypt and India, being black, and they are very terrific looking animals to the northern traveller, who beholds them here for the ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... was then known as the Lower Ferry Dock, about a mile below the village of Fort Erie. Just as the boats struck the shore, the color-bearers of Col. Owen Starr's 17th Kentucky Regiment sprang on to Canadian soil and unfurled their Irish flags amid terrific cheering by the Fenian troops. This was the first intimation that the people of the quiet vicinity received that an invasion had actually occurred, and it was a terrible awakening from peaceful slumber to most of them. There were no Canadian troops whatever within 25 miles ...
— Troublous Times in Canada - A History of the Fenian Raids of 1866 and 1870 • John A. Macdonald
... then ranked by himself among those trivial, fond records which he has deeply sworn to erase from his heart and brain. He has no thought to link his terrible destiny with hers: he cannot marry her: he cannot reveal to her, young, gentle, innocent as she is, the terrific influences which have changed the whole current of his life and purposes. In his distraction he overacts the painful part to which he had tasked himself; he is like that judge of the Areopagus, who being occupied with graver matters, flung from him the ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... "once the seas begin to pound against the boat, with every wave the strain on that rope is bound to be just terrific. It might hold for a time; but mark my words, the constant chafing against the rock, where you fastened the end, will wear the strands until they snap; and then good-bye ...
— The, Boy Scouts on Sturgeon Island - or Marooned Among the Game-fish Poachers • Herbert Carter
... high above, there was a sudden roar, a terrific crash, then a rushing sound, followed by a dead silence of a few seconds, and then the earth seemed to receive a quivering blow, resulting in a boom like that of some monstrous gun, and the noise now ran up the valley, vibrating from side to side, ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... were now approaching, and the din became terrific, the more so as one company after another ...
— The Rover Boys in the Land of Luck - Stirring Adventures in the Oil Fields • Edward Stratemeyer
... at last being in readiness, the pilot came on board, and all hands were called to up anchor. While I worked at my bar, I could not help observing how haggard the men looked, and how much they suffered from this violent exercise, after the terrific dissipation in which they had been indulging ashore. But I soon learnt that sailors breathe nothing about such things, but strive their best to appear all alive and hearty, though it comes very hard for many ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... as they approached the bank of the river, but Ned was in no mood for trifling now. He brought down the stick on the animal's hip with a terrific whack. ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Montana • Frank Gee Patchin
... days since, I was speaking on the subject to a dear old friend, who, after the lapse of fifty years, quoted a passage on Hell that he had heard almost as a child: 'If we allowed our imagination, my dear brethren, to dwell persistently on this terrific truth, Reason itself would totter on its throne.' But the people of to-day cannot quote, because they cannot get the opportunity. The race of ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... later Mr. Billy Warner went down on his back with a crash as Barry caught him a terrific blow on the chin, and then spinning round on his heel he dealt the hare-lipped nigger a kick in the side that cracked two of his ribs like pipe-stems and doubled him up ...
— Edward Barry - South Sea Pearler • Louis Becke
... was magnificent, and from where I stood there was every opportunity of seeing it. The castle is on the very edge of a terrific precipice. A stone falling from the window would fall a thousand feet without touching anything! As far as the eye can reach is a sea of green tree tops, with occasionally a deep rift where there is a chasm. Here and there are silver threads where the rivers wind in ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... D'ye mane to say you've pink toes undher your bullswools, ye blandanderin','—Mulvaney gathered himself together for a terrific denunciation—'school-misthress! Pink toes! How much Bass wid the label did that ...
— Soldier Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... active, a traveler on the Islands ought by all means to see it; for Dr. Coan assures me that it is then one of the most terrific and grand sights imaginable. I did not visit it, as it was not active while I was on the Islands, though its fires were alive. The crater is a pit about three miles in circumference, with precipitous banks about two thousand feet deep. At the bottom is the burning lake, which has a curious ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff
... lads! Push 'em back! Into the water with 'em!" shouted the stalwart hunter, and emptying rifle and pistol he clubbed the former, striking terrific blows. Tayoga, tomahawk in hand, went up and down like a deadly flame. Soldiers and borderers came to the danger point, and the savages were borne back. Not one of them coming from the water was able to ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the strain ease in his tired limbs, felt the arteries resume their easy functioning and settled himself for more of a rest. At last he stretched himself slowly, luxuriously upon the ground, as an athlete, rejoicing in the strength of his body, might stretch himself before entering a terrific contest. Slowly he rolled over upon his back and opened his eyes. Above his head long streamers of delicate Spanish moss waved indolently from the branches of a cypress tree. It was an old tree and dead, and the moss seemed nothing more cheerful than a ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... I fired. The explosion was followed by a terrific roar. The bullet had not touched a vital part; I had only succeeded in dangerously wounding him. I had now an angry ...
— Harper's Young People, March 2, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... the fur fly off av' wan av' thim hairy baboons av' Boers since he starrtud, an' supposin' the air a taste thicker, 'tis punched wid bullet-holes we'd be seem' ut all round 'um, the same as a young lady in the sky-in-terrific dhressmakin' line would be afther jabbin' out the pattern av' a shoot ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves |
