"Battle royal" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... saw. The players, as well as the officials, were covered with mud. In fact my sweater was saturated, the players having used it as a sort of towel to dry their hands. A kicked ball had been fumbled on the goal line and there was a battle royal on the part of the players to get the coveted ball. I dived into the scramble of wriggling, mud-covered players to detect the man who might have the ball. The stockings and jerseys of the players were so covered with mud that you could not tell them apart. As I was forcing my way ...
— Football Days - Memories of the Game and of the Men behind the Ball • William H. Edwards
... collect all the fathers and plan a regular campaign? Without their allowances they'd soon be helpless. It would be a battle royal and might make history! Might also get hold of the fathers of these young chaps. Few have ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... the village soon made it apparent that the history of the battle royal, as given by the vanquished party, like many other histories, deviated in various particulars from the strict truth. Thus the Squire asserted that he and his myrmidons quitted the field victoriously, drums beating and colours ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... difficult to get the boat near enough to them; but when you did succeed there was invariably a rush for your bait and a game fight to follow. They are splendid chaps. Then I would return to the tarpon and have another battle royal; and so it went on. But sometimes you would hook a jack fish (game, and up to 25 lbs.), and sometimes get into a shark of very big proportions. Indeed, the sharks are a nuisance, and will sometimes cut your tarpon in two close to your boat, and they eagerly await the time when you land your ...
— Ranching, Sport and Travel • Thomas Carson
... believe, he was true to history. That was a battle royal of dames, and I, for my part, have always regretted that Diane had to give up her palace. Have you seen Chaumont, which she so unwillingly received in exchange? No! Then you will see something fine in its way, but far less ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... proclaimed. Some times two contestants were adjudged heroes, and it was necessary to run a contest between the two combatants before a final hero could be proclaimed. Then the two antagonist would stage a battle royal and would continue in the conflict till ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves - Kentucky Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... in no hits on either side. It looked very much as though the game might turn out to be a pitchers' duel. Some people like that sort of battle royal, but in the main the spectators would much rather see a regular old-fashioned batting fest, especially if it is their side that is doing most ...
— Jack Winters' Baseball Team - Or, The Rivals of the Diamond • Mark Overton
... Battle royal raged, and the ministers grew red-faced and excited, especially at the moments when Ernest called them romantic philosophers, shadow-projectors, and similar things. And always he checked them back to facts. "The fact, man, the irrefragable fact!" he would proclaim triumphantly, when ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London
... except upon public days, or when they crossed each other in the hall, or when from his pit-box at the opera he surveyed them in their box on the grand tier) his lordship, we say, appeared among the ladies and the children who were assembled over the tea and toast, and a battle royal ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... a battle royal in Casa Rosa—a battle over the breaking of a huge blue pitcher valued at eight francs, a pitcher belonging to ...
— Penelope's Postscripts • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... inspiring; the season was rounding out in a blaze of glory for Sunrise. The two teams were evenly matched, And the stern joy that warriors feel In foemen worthy of their steel, spurred each to its best efforts. It was a battle royal, with all the turns of strategy, and quickness, and straight physical weight, and sudden shifting of signals, fake plays, forward passes, line bucks, and splendid interference, flying tackles, speedy end runs, and magnificent defense of goals with lines ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... of those thoroughly well-chosen dinners of few courses and faultless service suitable for card-players, who neither care to stuff themselves as a preliminary to a battle royal, nor to dawdle through courses, eliminating for themselves what is not good for them. The men drank a light, sound, aromatic Irish of the major's; the women—except Marion, who took what the men took—used claret ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... crowd was getting excited. To them it was a battle royal; nothing of the kind had ever been seen at Mason's Corner before. A great many in the crowd were friends of Strout's, and admired his pluck in standing out so well. They had seen at a glance that Abner Stiles had ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin
... animosity of religious fanaticism will pursue us. If the news of our exploit has, in any unaccountable way such as the Arabs know how to employ, reached Jannati Shahr, we are in for a battle royal. If not, we still have a chance to use diplomacy. A few hours ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... halt, but no persuasion could reduce her to the necessary docility. She fretted on until, exasperated, the man jabbed her sharply with the spurs. Then the mischief started. Her head went down and her back humped, and she settled to a battle royal. ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum
... which in consequence, he prized as the apple of his eye. During his temporary absence from the ranch one day a confrere, "Stiff" Warwick, had, in a spirit of bravado, roped the "devil" and instituted a contest of wills. The pony was stubborn, the man likewise, and a battle royal followed. As a buzzard scents carrion, other cowboys anticipated sport, and a group soon gathered. Ere minutes had passed the blood of the belligerents was up, and they were battling as for life, with a dogged ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... tremendous Gibney, nevertheless what they lacked in horsepower they made up in pugnacity—and the salt sea seldom breeds a craven. Captain Scraggs thrust a frightened face up through the engine-room hatch, but at sight of the battle royal taking place on the deck aft, his blood turned to water and he thought only of escape. To climb up to the bulkhead without being seen was impossible, however, so, not knowing what else to do, he stood on the iron ladder and gazed, pop-eyed with ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... him 'Scotty,' Ben; he doesn't mind in the least. He's 'Scotty' to every Alaskan from Juneau to Barrow, Eskimos included—age no restraint. Yes, Jack is fond of 'Scotty,' but it took a battle royal to bring about ...
— Baldy of Nome • Esther Birdsall Darling
... scramble, melee, scrimmage, stramash[obs3], bushfighting[obs3]. free fight, stand up fight, hand to hand, running fight. conflict, skirmish; rencounter[obs3], encounter; rencontre[obs3], collision, affair, brush, fight; battle, battle royal; combat, action, engagement, joust, tournament; tilt, tilting [medieval times]; tournay[obs3], list; pitched battle. death struggle, struggle for life or death, life or death struggle, Armageddon[obs3]. hard knocks, sharp contest, tug of war. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... Greeley upon about as many. In his effort to secure the remaining seventeen, Weed discovered that Ira Harris had a considerable following, who were indisposed to affiliate with Evarts, while several assemblymen indicated a preference for other candidates. This precipitated a battle royal. Greeley did not personally appear in Albany, but he scorned none of the ordinary crafts of party management. Charles A. Dana, then of the Tribune, represented him, and local leaders from various parts of the State rallied to his standard and industriously prosecuted ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... battle royal raged between Daniel O'Connell and the press; but, as might have been expected, Dan was no match for the hydra-headed antagonist he had been rash enough to provoke. The quarrel originated in a complaint made by the Liberator of a misrepresentation of a speech ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... Mommsen will soon have an opportunity to speak more at length of French Caesarism, for the first two volumes of Napoleon III.'s "Life of Julius Caesar" are announced as nearly ready for publication, and their appearance cannot fail to be the signal for a battle royal, as few scholars, we presume, will be content to take historical law from an Emperor. The modern master of forty legions will not be as fortunate as Hadrian in finding philosophers disinclined to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... earls, marquises—of all the pompous establishments of British royalty and nobility—with that contemptuously humorous tolerance of a necessary and somewhat amusing evil which we find in American comic papers. We had a battle royal for about one hour, and I must confess he was a foeman worthy of any man's steel, so long as I was reasonable in my arguments; but when I finally observed that it wouldn't be ten years before Barnum and ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... strange battle. The therns and blacks had not combined against us. Wherever thern ship met ship of the First Born was a battle royal, and in this I thought I saw our salvation. Wherever messages could be passed between us that could not be intercepted by our enemies I passed the word that all our vessels were to withdraw from the fight as rapidly as possible, ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... her beauty and fine attitude, could not avoid perceiving her violence, and testified their displeasure at it." Possibly the scene excited mirth in an equal degree. Foote forthwith prepared a burlesque, "The Green-room Squabble; or, A Battle Royal between the Queen of Babylon and the Daughter of Darius." The same tragedy, it may be noted, had at an earlier date been productive of discord in the theatre. Mrs. Barry, as Roxana, had indeed stabbed her Statira, Mrs. Boutell, with such violence that the dagger, although the point ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... A battle royal was fought over the body of Arthur Tims, Malcolm Sage's chauffeur. Sir John Dene had insisted that a car and a chauffeur were indispensable to a man who was to rival Pinkerton's. Malcolm Sage, on the other hand, had protested that it was an ...
— Malcolm Sage, Detective • Herbert George Jenkins
... interpreters may be: 110 Thus, though your several Churches disagree, Yet every saint has to himself alone The secret of this philosophic stone. These principles your jarring sects unite, When differing doctors and disciples fight. Though Luther, Zuinglius, Calvin, holy chiefs, Have made a battle royal of beliefs; Or, like wild horses, several ways have whirl'd The tortured text about the Christian world; Each Jehu lashing on with furious force, 120 That Turk or Jew could not have used it worse; No matter what dissension leaders make, Where every private man may save a stake: ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... experience last night and this morning! Last night two hours' talk with Gladstone, this morning, again an hour and a half's strenuous argument, during which the great man got quite white sometimes and tremulous with interest and excitement.... The talk this morning was a battle royal over the book and Christian evidences. He was very charming personally, though at times he looked stern and angry and white to a degree, so that I wondered sometimes how I had the courage to go on—the drawn brows were ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... long, remained motionless, glimpsing unexpectedly something of Barbee's soul; watching a little human drama, become spectator to the battle royal of the two contending factions which made up a ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... Such opposition would nerve me up to a battle royal. I wouldn't give it up until I'd returned from Barnegat, if I were you," I added, anxious to have him renew his efforts; for an idea had just flashed across my mind, which, although it involved a breach of faith on my part, I nevertheless believed to be good and justifiable, ...
— A Rebellious Heroine • John Kendrick Bangs
... detectives? Oh, the agony of that walk from the bedroom to the reception-room! She would never forgive her father for this—never, never, never! He had now killed her love for him—that was what she felt. It was to be a battle royal between them from now on. As they rode—in complete silence for a while—her hands clasped and unclasped defiantly, her nails cutting her palms, ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... the middle of May the Yankees passed St. Louis and ran seventh in the race until July. 4. But accident and injury, and the loss of Cree, shot the Yankees to pieces. For nearly six weeks, however, it was a battle royal between New York and St. Louis to escape the last hole, but in the middle of August the Yankees again established their superiority, retaining seventh place until after the middle of September. In the homestretch the new blood given Stovall enabled him to pull his men out of the last notch just ...
— Spalding's Official Baseball Guide - 1913 • John B. Foster
... being printed in extenso. You appear to have piled, as on so many other occasions, honours high and thick on my old head. But I well know how great a part you have played in establishing and spreading the belief in the descent- theory, ever since that grand review in the "Times" and the battle royal at Oxford up to the ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin |
