"Semicircle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Madame de Maintenon faced the plain and the troops in her sedan-chair, alone, between its three windows drawn up; her porters having retired to a distance. On the left pole in front sat Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne; and on the same side, in a semicircle, standing, were Madame la Duchesse, Madame la Princesse de Conti, and all the ladies—and behind them again, many men. At the right window was the King, standing, and a little in the rear a semicircle ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... continued to burn, forming, one in the west, the other in the east, two great flames which were joined by the cordon of bivouac fires of the English, like a necklace of rubies with two carbuncles at the extremities, as they extended in an immense semicircle over ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... heaped on the locker of the window behind him, and on the back of the chair which supported his lame foot. The third and only remaining chair accommodated James, with a book placed on the table; and a semicircle swept round it, within which ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... made; pipes were lighted; the landlord sat in his chair at some little distance back from the front of the stove; Tom and the two Indians sat on their rugs on one side; Harry and Jerry Curtis completed the semicircle on the other. ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... billiards and music being over and the ladies gone, Shelton returned from changing to his smoking-suit, and dropped into one of the great arm-chairs that even in summer made a semicircle round the fendered hearth. Fresh from his good-night parting with Antonia, he sat perhaps ten minutes before he began to take in all the figures in their parti-coloured smoking jackets, cross-legged, with glasses in their hands, and cigars ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... edge of Hooker's Bend, drawn in a rough semicircle around the Big Hill, lies Niggertown. In all the half-moon there are perhaps not two upright buildings. The grimy cabins lean at crazy angles, some propped with poles, while others hold out against ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... palace in Khartum where Gordon had met his doom. The funeral service held there in memory of the dead hero was, perhaps, the most affecting scene that this generation has witnessed. Detachments of most of the regiments of the rescue force formed a semicircle round the Sirdar; and by his side stood a group of war-worn officers, who with him had toiled for years in order to see this day. The funeral service was intoned; the solemn assembly sang Gordon's favourite ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... profiting by his inability to stop her, she banged through the swinging door and commenced the descent of a long flight of steps. Below her was the stage, and between the wings she could see the girls arranged in a semicircle. Dick, with a big staff in hand, stood in front of the footlights directing the movements of a procession which was being formed; the piano tinkled ...
— A Mummer's Wife • George Moore
... than thirty in the studio; about twenty men and fifteen women. Some sat on low stools close under the platform whereon the model stood, some worked at easels drawn close together in a semicircle round the room. The model was less shocking than Mildred had imagined; he stood with his hands on his hip, a staff in his hand; and, had it not been for a slight swaying motion, she would hardly have known he was alive. She had never drawn before from the living ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... vacant space was left near the stern, in which it was possible for the party who occupied that part of the deck to move, though in sufficiently straitened limits, while the huge tiller played in its semicircle behind. At the other extremity, as is absolutely necessary in all navigation, the forecastle was reasonably clear, though even this important part of the deck was bristling with the flukes of no less than nine anchors that lay in a row across its breadth, the ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... and Bradshaw preceding the main body, about twenty paces apart. The arrangement was for the five (namely, Lacosse, Story, the Trapper, Jose, and myself) who composed the main body, to form a semicircle, of which the two scouts would compose the extreme points, and so to approach the Indians' camp, on nearing which we were to fire a volley on them from our rifles, and, wheeling round, drive our horses off and retreat. We were within two hundred paces of the camp-fires when we were startled ...
— California • J. Tyrwhitt Brooks
... In a great dense semicircle the young men disposed themselves around her. Those who were in front squatted down on the gravel; those who were behind knelt; the rest stood. Young Oxford! Here, in this mass of boyish faces, all fused and obliterated, ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... into form and color." From a compositional point of view they serve an important purpose in directing the attention of the spectator to the principal figure of the picture. All the gracefully intertwined limbs of the angelic host—outstretched arms and floating figures,—form the radii of a great semicircle centering in the ...
— Child-life in Art • Estelle M. Hurll
... a bridge is now allowed to be strength; and it has been asserted, that a semi-ellipsis has less strength than a semicircle. To this he first answers, that granting this position for a moment, the semi-ellipsis may yet have strength sufficient for the purposes of commerce. This grant, which was made but for a moment, needed not to have been made at all; for, before he concludes ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... crescent shaped; but when she begins to be a long way distant from the sun, and reaches the fourth sign, she gets a greater light, the sun's rays being turned upon her, and then she is of the shape of a semicircle. ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... dense columns with his four divisions upon General Miloradowitch, who defended the valley of the Lossmina, he soon opened a bloody passage, and rejoined the guard grouped round Napoleon. Krasnoe was thus surrounded by a semicircle of our troops, disputing the enemy's positions step by step; but Admiral Tormazoff was now on our rear, in order to hold the Orscha road. The emperor saw that he should be speedily hemmed in, and resolved to ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... these, I found one of the city gates, formed of three arches, and ornamented with pilasters, in good preservation. The finest of the remains is a street adorned throughout its length with Corinthian columns on either side, and terminating in a semicircle, which was surrounded by sixty Ionic columns, all of the choicest marble. This street was crossed by another, and at the junction of the two, large pedestals of wrought stone occupied each angle, probably in former times these bore statues. ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne
... only an honest chicken farmer, after all!" exclaimed Talbot, senior, when they were all sitting in a semicircle about the fireplace in Mary's parlor. "I hoped you were really a burglar; I always ...
— A Reversible Santa Claus • Meredith Nicholson
... walled city and in the crowded districts of Binondo, Quiapo and San Miguel north of the Pasig, and again in Paco and Ermita to the south, strong regiments were stationed in readiness to suppress the first sign of the outbreak so confidently predicted by the Bureau of Military Intelligence. In a great semicircle of over twenty miles, girdling the city north, east and south, the outposts and sentries of the two divisions kept watchful eyes upon the Insurgent forces surrounding them. Aguinaldo and his cabinet at Malolos to the north had all but declared war upon the obstinate possessors of the city ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King
... friend, or rather his enemy, Jock Crozer, had been established at a very critical part of the line of outposts; namely, where the burn issues by an abrupt gorge from the semicircle of high moors. If anything was calculated to nerve him to battle it was this. The post was important; next to the Hill-end itself, it might be called the key to the position; and it was where the cover was bad, and in which it was most natural to place a child. It should ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... them all out upon the terrace, and they sat down in a semicircle on the garden benches. Then she told them that she had a plan of taking them very soon on a steamboat excursion down the Rhine, as far as Cologne; where there was a remarkably fine zooelogical garden which they would all ...
— Gritli's Children • Johanna Spyri
... computed at 700 yards, and its altitude, taken with a plumb-line from the surface of the Table Rock, 149 feet; the American fall, narrowed by Goat Island, does not exceed 375 yards in curvilinear length (the whole irregular semicircle is nearly three quarters of a mile), its perpendicular height being 162 feet, or 13 feet higher than the top of the Great Fall, adding 57 feet for the fall. The rapids thus give only a total of 219 feet, which is less than many other falls; but their magnificence consists in the volume ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... nothing at all. Each man bore a long-bladed heavy spear. Before squatting down in front of whatever engaged his attention for the moment, the savage thrust this upright in the ground. Kingozi, behind his pipe, considered them well: and received a favourable impression. An immovable, unblinking semicircle crouched at a respectful distance taking in every detail of the white man's appearance and belongings, watching his every move. Nobody spoke; apparently nobody ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al
... reeds and tall bamboos on the top of which, swaying slightly, perched vivid green and yellow birds. The morning was hot and still. After breakfast they drew chairs together and sat in an irregular semicircle in the bow. An awning above their heads protected them from the heat of the sun, and the breeze which the boat made aired them softly. Mrs. Flushing was already dotting and striping her canvas, her head jerking this way and that with the action of a bird nervously picking ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... possible bit, so that any one looking at him would have failed to observe any motion in them. The little slit however, admitted the whole scene to the retina, and he perceived that ten of the most cut-throat-looking men conceivable were seated in a semicircle in the act of receiving portions from the big pot into tin plates. Most of them were clothed in hunters' leathern costume, wore long boots with spurs, and were more ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... municipal borough in the Devizes parliamentary division of Wiltshire, England, 86 m. W. by S. of London by the Great Western railway. Pop. (1901) 6532. Its castle was built on a tongue of land flanked by two deep ravines, and behind this the town grew up in a semicircle on a stretch of bare and exposed tableland. Its main streets, in which a few ancient timbered houses are left, radiate from the market place, where stands a Gothic cross, the gift of Lord Sidmouth in 1814. The ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 3 - "Destructors" to "Diameter" • Various
... are not salted, nor subjected to any other treatment, before being conveyed in baskets, on the heads of men and women and backs of animals, to the distilling apparatus. This consists of a tinned-copper still, erected on a semicircle of bricks, and heated by a wood fire; from the top passes a straight tin pipe, which obliquely traverses a tub kept constantly filled with cold water, by a spout, from some convenient rivulet, and constitutes the condenser. ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 275 • Various
... easily made to serve as a slope board in this manner. Hang a plumb bob about an inch below the center of a straight edge of the board while pointing at the horizon, using the back of the board. Mark a point 5.7" directly below and draw a semicircle through it with the same radius. Now mark the point below the center zero and from it divide the arc using chords one tenth of an inch long. This will give a scale reading in degrees. By sighting ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker
... the mountain fell away abruptly, pine-clad, and at its base the broad plain of the East Branch of the Yellowstone wandered through a vast valley, beyond which, in a huge semicircle, rose a thousand nameless mountains, summit over summit, snow-flecked or snow-clad, in boundless fields—a grim, lonely, desolate horror of rugged, barren peaks, of dark gray for the most part, cleft by deep shadows, and right in face of us one superb slab of very pale gray buttressed ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... this time, eschewing the careless vigor which had marked my previous efforts. The ball flew in a slow semicircle, and pitched inside the correct court. At least, I told myself, I ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse
... the sweet sigh of the violin melodies through the white winter silence of Raffaelino's eager, dreamy eyes, misty with the student's unutterable sadness and delight; of old Ambrogio, with his semicircle of children round him, lifting their fresh voices at his word; of the little robin that came every day upon the waterpipe, and listened, and thrilled in harmony, and ate joyfully the crumbs which the old maestro daily spared to it from his scanty meal—when I think of those hours, ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... Great City, flying in the battle-formation we had used many times before on our trips about the country. Mercer's platform and mine were some fifty feet apart, leading. Behind us, in a great semicircle, the girls spread out, fifty little groups of ten, each with its single leader in front. Below, a hundred feet perhaps, the fifty other girls darted back and forth, keeping pace with us. The aspect of these girls, flying thus to battle, was truly extraordinary. The pink-white ...
— The Fire People • Ray Cummings
... the savage had sufficiently recovered from his alarm, I went up to him with a tomahawk, the use of which he immediately guessed. We now observed that the natives who had fled from the river, had been employed in setting a net. They had placed it in a semicircle, with either end to the shore, and rude pieces of wood were attached to it to keep the upper part perpendicular. It was in fact a sein, only that the materials, with the exception of the net-work, were simpler and rougher than cork or lead—for which last, we afterwards discovered stones ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... have looked under the water then, you would have seen a fish somewhere upon the convex side of the semicircle. The fish would be at rest—no doubt, watching the surface for his own prey: such flies or beetles as might come along. Thus occupied, he does not heed the great dusky mass that is gliding slowly towards him, and which presents no threatening appearance—for the head of the alligator ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... Wagner was to have opened at daylight of this day; but a terrific storm sweeping over land and sea prevented. It was 12:30 P.M. when the thunder of siege guns, batteries, and gunboats announced the opening of the dance of death. A semicircle of batteries, stretching across the island for a half mile, sent their messages of destruction into Wagner, while the fleet of iron vessels battered down the works of the haughty and impregnable ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... the Pyrenees,—its coup de theatre,—is now before us. It is to Gavarnie, whose giant semicircle of precipices has been called "the end of the world." Luz and St. Sauveur constitute the most available headquarters for this trip, which is taken by every traveler to these mountains. "In the popular [French] imagination," writes a lively ...
— A Midsummer Drive Through The Pyrenees • Edwin Asa Dix
... form, size, and color. In respect to the first of these its form should be perfectly round, without any inequalities of projecting points of the petals, or being notched, or irregular. These should also be so far revolute that the side view should exhibit a perfect semicircle in its outline, and the eye or prolific disc, in the centre should be entirely concealed. There has been recently introduced into this country a new variety, all the petals of which are quilled, which ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... medicines, pow-wows, and divination. I expressed a desire to speak with her, and was conducted to a log-house, more ricketty and ruined than any of the others. About fifty half-breeds followed me in respectful curiosity, and they formed a semicircle around the cabin. The old woman sat in the threshold, barefooted, and smoking a stump of ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... semicircle of the bay, the eye commands that other eminence where the King's Palace shuts itself in austerely at the very center of the arc. Through the clustered, tea-sipping loungers on the galleries and terraces Benton made his way several days later, wearing the studiously ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... drew up in a semicircle and the drivers came out of their vehicles for lastminute preparations. A final check was made of gas, oil, and the positions of the wirecutters. Maps, showing the location of each house now covered by the grass, were studied and compasspoints checked against them. I admired ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... path ended at the amphitheater, strong barricades had been erected in a sort of semicircle; so that anyone, after having forced the first defenses, would, as he showed himself at the entrance to the amphitheater, be exposed to the fire of the whole ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... below. The chief drives of the park parallel each other, the inner one, Confederate Avenue, following, as nearly as the hills permit, the city's line of defense, while the other, Union Avenue, forms an outer semicircle and follows, in a similar manner, the trenches ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... brown slope opposite, and the darker shadow of bluffs beyond. The popping of those distant guns had ceased by the time they attained their new position, and they could distinguish the Indians—mere black dots against the brown slope—advancing in a semicircle toward the silent stage. Evidently they were puzzled, fearful of some trickery, for occasionally a gun would crack viciously, the brown smoke plainly visible, the advancing savages halting to observe the effect. Then a bright colored blanket was ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... does stealthily worm herself in, Cheri gives the pitch the moment he sets eyes on her. Cat looks up steadily at him for five minutes. Cheri, confident, strikes out in a very tempting way. Cat describes a semicircle around the window, back and forth, back and forth, keeping ever her back to the room and her front to the foe, glaring and mewing and licking her chaps. O, what a delicious tit-bit, if one could but get at it! ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... was anything but a function—with the children at table and the dogs in a semicircle, and the nurses tying bibs and admonishing the restless or belligerent, and the wide French windows open, and the sea wind lifting the curtains and stirring the cluster of wild flowers in the centre ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... parcel of limes which form the semicircle on the south front of the house by the iron gates, looking into the park, were by the dexterous hand of the head gardener removed, after some of them had been almost thirty years planted in other ...
— From London to Land's End - and Two Letters from the "Journey through England by a Gentleman" • Daniel Defoe
... articles suspended upon them,—horns, whips, branding-irons, skins, cattle-bells, lariats, and such-like appurtenances of the ranch. The little lady was seated in the centre of the group of ranchmen ranged in a wide semicircle about the hearth of flagstones; the ethereal tints of her shimmering attire showed all their highlights; her face and golden brown hair seemed particularly soft and delicate in contrast with the rough tousled heads and bearded countenances about her; here and there ...
— The Frontiersmen • Charles Egbert Craddock
... encampment—four of them grouped in a rough semicircle among the main lodge, which stood back close under the sand-bank where an eddy of wind had scooped it comparatively clear ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... both shoulders, is thrown in beautiful folds over the feet. Behind the figure, and as high as the head, is a hanging of green tapestry adorned with a golden pelican (a well-known symbol of the Redeemer); behind the head the ground is gold, and on it, in a semicircle, are three inscriptions, which again describe the Trinity, as all-mighty, all-good, and all-bountiful. The two other figures of this picture display equal majesty; both are reading holy books and are turned towards the centre ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... rivers rose to a degree such as had hardly occurred before within so limited a space of time. Yet was Napoleon busy till long past midnight, in giving directions for the morrow. He saw by their line of fires that the Allies had resumed the wide semicircle which they occupied previous to the attack, and he fixed his plans accordingly. The whole of the cavalry, with the exception of that of the Guard, which had previously acted on the level from the Pilnitz ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig
... terrace, soon after dawn. In the centre ZEUS sits alone, throned and silent. One by one the Gods come out of the house, and arrange themselves in a semicircle, to the left and right, each as he passes making obeisance to ZEUS. It is a perfectly still morning, and a dense white mist hangs over the woods, completely hiding the sea and the farther shore. When all ...
— Hypolympia - Or, The Gods in the Island, an Ironic Fantasy • Edmund Gosse
... McDowell is just south of it. Here, about this point, called Guiney's, is a Confederate division under General Anderson. McClellan has urged Washington to reenforce his right by ordering McDowell to march, thus," describing almost a semicircle which began by going south, then southeast, then southwest; "that would place McDowell on McClellan's right flank, here. Now, if McDowell reenforces McClellan, this entire army cannot cross the Chickahominy, and if McDowell does not reenforce ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... out upon a Dutch garden, full of spring flowers in bloom. In the midst was a small fountain, which murmured to itself through the night. An orangery or conservatory, of a charming eighteenth-century design, ran round the garden in a semicircle, its flat pilasters and mouldings of yellow stone taking under the moonlight the color and the delicacy of ivory. Beyond the terrace which bordered the garden, the ground fell to a river, of which the reaches, now dazzling, now sombre, now slipping secret under woods, ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... curious ship was La Reine, or The Queen, which was painted on her stern where any one might read it, among a crowd of glass dolphins and sea-horses carved there in a sort of semicircle. ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... semicircle of moorland, with the brown river as radius, and the high hills forming the northern circumference. There was not a sign or sound of a human being, only the plashing water and the interminable crying of curlews. Yet, oddly enough, for the first time ...
— The Thirty-nine Steps • John Buchan
... me tell you, M. Andre," interposed Curtis, who had as usual joined our party, "that although poets may rave, and be as enthusiastic as they like about these islands, sailors will tell a different tale. The hidden reefs that lie in a semicircle about two or three leagues from shore make the attempt to land a very dangerous piece of business. And another thing, I know. Let the natives boast as they will about their splendid climate, they are visited by the most frightful hurricanes. They get the fag-end of the storms that ...
— The Survivors of the Chancellor • Jules Verne
... they station ten or twenty of the most expert spearmen; with whom, if you want any fun, you must station yourself, taking care to remain concealed. All the juveniles of the party then start off, and make a circuit of many miles in extent, shouting and hallooing the whole time. They form a semicircle, and drive all the kangaroos before them down the valley, to the spot where the old hunters are placed. Then comes the tug of war, the crashing of bushes, the flying of spears, and the thump, thump of the kangaroos, as they ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor
... did, every word of it, and as she walked she said it to herself in a murmuring tone. When she was within the beloved inclosure she paused a moment before setting down her basket, and looked about her. The place was not so grand as her childish eyes had found it, only a great semicircle of ground brown with pine needles and surrounded by ancient trees; but it was beautiful enough. Strangely, she had not visited it for years. Her own mates no longer came, because they were doing quiet things at home, farming and household tasks, and Marietta would have had ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... matter of twenty yards; then said, "Come on; it's all right," and gave up the lantern. In and out among the sage-bushes he marched, a quarter of a mile, bearing gradually to the right; then took a new direction and made another great semicircle; then changed again and moved due west nearly half ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... their way past him. He waited no longer. It is difficult to tell where sound comes from in the dark. He plunged forward at a venture. His hand, swinging round in a semicircle, met something which felt like a shoulder. He slipped his grasp down to the arm, and clutched it with all the force at ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse
... superintended the preparations in the courtyard for Abdulla's reception. Half-way between Lakamba's house and the river a pile of dry wood was made ready for the torch that would set fire to it at the moment of Abdulla's landing. Between this and the house again there was, ranged in a semicircle, a set of low bamboo frames, and on those were piled all the carpets and cushions of Lakamba's household. It had been decided that the reception was to take place in the open air, and that it should ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... glasses; and so rapid was its descent that, before I could count a hundred, it had dipped beneath the water-line—become a flaming semicircle—then only a glowing rim—and disappeared. It left a few minutes' afterglow, with the sky every shade from crimson at the horizon ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... they embarked, on the morning of June 18, was about thirty-five miles above the Nechaco, or north fork of the Fraser, just at the upper end of the great bend where the south fork, flowing to the north-west, sweeps round in a semicircle, joins its confluent, and pours southward to the sea. This trend of the river to the south was not what Mackenzie expected. He wanted to follow a stream leading west. Without noticing it, he had passed the north fork, the Nechaco, ...
— Pioneers of the Pacific Coast - A Chronicle of Sea Rovers and Fur Hunters • Agnes C. Laut
... seemed to consist entirely of men. But what surprised me most was to see that the tables at which these guests drank and supped—as the clatter of knives and plates told me, and the shouting of toasts—were drawn up in a semicircle about a tall bed-canopy reaching almost to the ceiling in the far right-hand corner. The bed itself was hidden from me by the broad backs of two sportsmen seated in line with it and nursing a bottle apiece ...
— The Adventures of Harry Revel • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... book of mystery were broken by the Lamb in the presence of the great throne where was seated one who shone like jasper. The rainbow round about the throne was in sight like unto an emerald. Twenty-four thrones were in a semicircle around the great throne, and upon them twenty-four elders with white robes and crowns of gold. Four enormous animals, covered with eyes and each having six wings, seemed to be guarding the throne. The sounding of trumpets was greeting the breaking ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... stage was a slim, high desk, like a music-stand, with a cover of red velvet, and near it was a light ornamental chair, on which he was sure Verena would not seat herself, though he could fancy her leaning at moments on the back. Behind this was a kind of semicircle of a dozen arm-chairs, which had evidently been arranged for the friends of the speaker, her sponsors and patrons. The hall was more and more full of premonitory sounds; people making a noise as they unfolded, on hinges, ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. II (of II) • Henry James
... out as conspicuous points of activity in the western field. Ypres is one of these towns. Day by day it figures in the reports from the front. The French are there, and just to the east the English line commences.[D] The line of trenches lies beyond the town, forming a semicircle ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... quiet day. Even a very light wind is liable to pile up your seed on your neighbor's lot or on your own in places not wanted. Keep the seed in a pail while sowing, and, after taking a handful, bend close to the soil and let the seed feed through the fingers as the arm swings back and forth in a semicircle. This is very much easier to say than to do, but a little experience will make one quite proficient. To help still more, sow the seed two ways, one at right angles to the other. After sowing, rake lightly and then finish the work by putting ...
— Making a Lawn • Luke Joseph Doogue
... the clever showman had introduced a piece called "Evenings with the Critics," in one scene of which was presented a litter of nine precocious pigs, habited in bright, colored mantles, and seated on seats forming a semicircle, with Duncan in ducal robes seated on a throne, and presiding with the gravest demeanor. The nine small pigs were supposed to represent various members of the critic tribe, while Duncan, who was in spectacles, personated Doctor Easley. And so cleverly did the showman understand ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... been re-enforced to 27,000. Three divisions, under Smith, Wallace, and McClernand, stretched in a semicircle about Donelson from north to south. On the night of the 14th the Confederate generals held a consultation, and decided to try cutting their way out. Most of the troops were withdrawn from the rifle-pits during the night, and massed on the Union right. The weather had suddenly turned frosty, and ...
— History of the United States, Volume 4 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... men the Indians sat in a semicircle, with the sole intent, you might think, of staring all night at the strangers. Yet they had brought in Arctic hares and grouse, and even a haunch of venison. But they laid these things on the floor beside them, and sat with grave unbroken silence till the ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... of the Ottawa chief, is not here," said the governor, as he glanced his eye along the semicircle of Indians. "How is this? Is his voice still sick, that he cannot come; or has the great chief of the Ottawas ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... rapid pace. I climbed on to him, and sat enthroned upon his side, which was as high as my eyes when standing on the ground. In a few minutes night set in, when the natives, having illuminated the jungle with a score of fires, and formed a semicircle of bushes to windward, lay down to rest without partaking of a morsel of food. Mutchuisho would not allow a man to put an assagai into the elephant until the morrow, and placed two relays of sentries to keep watch on either side of him. My dinner ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... man filled with tears. He turned and hurriedly withdrew. Ibarra found himself standing alone in the middle of the room. His host had disappeared, and he turned to a group of gentlemen, who, as soon as they saw him coming, formed a semicircle ...
— Friars and Filipinos - An Abridged Translation of Dr. Jose Rizal's Tagalog Novel, - 'Noli Me Tangere.' • Jose Rizal
... answer, to the effect, 'Yea, surely, very much!' Upon which they all solemnly ascend to the Royal Apartments [upstairs where we have seen Wilhelmina dancing before now], where Lorraine, Wurtemberg and the other sublimities are in waiting. Lorraine and the sublimities form a semicircle; with the two Majesties, and pair of young creatures, in the centre. You young creatures, you are of one intention with your parents in this matter? Alas, there is no doubt of it. Pledge yourselves, then, by exchange of rings! said ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... Craig Dhu or Black Rock. So the Calton Crags were called, which now look green amid surrounding buildings, but which then were a dark and frowning patch in a semicircle of green hill that stretched from St Cuthberts ...
— John Knox • A. Taylor Innes
... across the stream, about twenty feet: the current carries the fly down with a semicircular sweep, until it comes in line with the bow of the canoe. Second cast,—to the left, straight across the stream, with the same motion: the semicircle is completed, and the fly hangs quivering for a few seconds at the lowest point of the arc. Three or four feet of line are drawn from the reel. Third cast to the right; fourth cast to the left. Then a little more line. And so, with widening half-circles, the water is covered, ...
— Little Rivers - A Book Of Essays In Profitable Idleness • Henry van Dyke
... in London is really more of a pageant than a musical function. The front of the house frequently claims more attention than the stage. On Caruso and Melba nights it blazes. Tiers and tiers of boxes race round in a semicircle. If you are early, you see them as black gaping mouths. But very soon they are filled. The stalls begin to leap with light, for everybody who is not anybody, but would like to be somebody, drags out everything she possesses in the way of personal adornment, and sticks it on her person, ...
— Nights in London • Thomas Burke
... which divided the library from the general reception room and there marched in, two abreast and maintaining precise step, a solemn line of children, who saluted the mayor gravely and ranged themselves in a semicircle across the room. As the mayor veered in his chair to face his visitors, a girl of some fifteen years stepped out of the line. She was still in her schoolgirl's dresses, but tall, with features of a fine, pensive cut and earnest eyes that were already peering from out the child's life ...
— The Patient Observer - And His Friends • Simeon Strunsky
... accustomed to the appearance of the inhabitants of the mountains so near to Perth to permit herself to be alarmed, as another Lowland maiden might have been on the same occasion. She saw with tolerable composure these gigantic forms arrange themselves in a semicircle around and in front of the monk and herself, all bending upon them in silence their large fixed eyes, expressing, as far as she could judge, a wild admiration of her beauty. She inclined her head to them, and uttered imperfectly the usual words of a Highland salutation. The elder and ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... largely because of the geographical location of Quigley, Howard decided on the instant to continue at least that far his quest. For, coming the way he had from his ranch, he had described a wide arc, almost a semicircle, and by the same trail, should he retrace it, was a hundred and fifty miles from Desert Valley. But, if he went on to Quigley, a mining-town in the bare mountains, he would be at the mouth of Quigley Pass, which led to a little-used trail through ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... down in ample folds over the feet. Behind, as high as the head, is a hanging of green tapestry which is ornamented with a golden pelican—a symbol of the Redeemer. Behind the head the ground is gold, and on it in a semicircle are three inscriptions describing the Trinity as almighty, all-good, and all-bountiful. The figures of S. John and of the Virgin display equal majesty; both are reading holy books, as they turn towards the centre figure. The countenance of S. John expresses ascetic seriousness, but in that ...
— Six Centuries of Painting • Randall Davies
... the 9th the position of the two armies was as follows: Lee occupied a semicircle facing north, north-west and north-east, inclosing the town. Anderson was on his left extending to the Po, Ewell came next, then Early. Warren occupied our right, covering the Brock and other roads converging at Spottsylvania; Sedgwick was to his left ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... single motion, a thousand eyes were bent upon the speaker. The semicircle opened silently in the middle; Winfried entered with his followers; ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... Give him a thing comfortable, and he was satisfied. Now, which do you think is the prettiest, to have the name in raised letters in a straight line over the top of the stone, or just to cut the words 'Alexander P. Smyth' in a kind of a semicircle in ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)
... collected edition containing the first seven Discourses, which had each year been published separately. 'I was present,' said Samuel Rogers (Table-Talk, p. 18), 'when Sir Joshua Reynolds delivered his last lecture at the Royal Academy. On entering the room, I found that a semicircle of chairs immediately in front of the pulpit was reserved for persons of distinction, being labelled ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... be described on Qq a semicircle cutting the ray CR at B, from which BV is drawn perpendicular to Qq; and let the proportion of the refraction for this section be, as before, that of the line N ...
— Treatise on Light • Christiaan Huygens
... received with a shout by the band of savages, who instantly recognized him as their friend by his voice. Poor Poopy was already in their hands, having been seized and gagged when she emerged before she had time to utter a cry. And now they stood in a semicircle, ready to receive all who might come forth into their arms, or on their spear-points, as ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... of the region—miners, farmers, and cowboys, variously attired, but all quiet and peaceful. There was not a sign of disorder, there was nothing even remotely resembling the toughs of the great Eastern cities. This seemed to be a surprise to the members of the committee, who sat in a formidable semicircle on the stage behind the candidate. But as the surprise wore away a touch of disdain appeared in their manner; they seemed to doubt whether the region and its ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... grave the Lodge forms a circle or semicircle. The Master and other officers of the Lodge take their position at the head of the grave; the Tyler behind the Master, and the mourners at the foot. The religious burial service of the church (if there be any) should be first performed, after which ...
— Masonic Monitor of the Degrees of Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft and Master Mason • George Thornburgh
... with women: "Dootless the Lord made a' things weel, but he left some michty queer kinks in women." They have their prejudices and "red rags," which have to be respected, for the main root of trouble is ignorance, not hostility. The committee sat in a semicircle before me, all with their hats off, of course, as mine was also; and really there was the appearance of ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie • Andrew Carnegie
... Colonel Washington and his troopers, flying their famous crimson flag, sweep down in a semicircle round the hill, and charge the ...
— Hero Stories from American History - For Elementary Schools • Albert F. Blaisdell
... were saluted by one gun from a proa hauled up on the beach. Our arrival had evidently caused much excitement among the natives, who came down in great numbers, and formed a semicircle round the boat. They were nearly all armed with cresses and steel-headed spears. Several of them wore a sort of breastplate made of hide, and their heads were ornamented with a profusion of richly coloured feathers and ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes
... missionary, lying in Big Tim's bed, presided. Beside him, with an expression of profound sorrow on his fine face, sat Whitewing, the prairie chief. Little Tim and his big son sat at his feet. The other Indians were ranged in a semicircle ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... from the beach, rising by regular steps into a grand semicircle of heights. The general shape is that of an amphitheatre. And here so rich is the soil, so sheltered the situation, that all the wild vegetation of the country seems growing with ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... instance, with a prominent denticulated molding. Narrower supplementary pilasters supported a molded and keyed arch, forming the frame within which the window is set. The lower sash is six-paned, while the upper one has six rectangular panes above which six ornamental shaped panes form a semicircle. ...
— The Colonial Architecture of Philadelphia • Frank Cousins
... themselves in single file and strung out across the plain. We left the road at once and headed diagonally toward them. For some strange reason, when a horse or car runs parallel with a herd of antelope, the animals will swing in a complete semicircle and cross in front of the pursuer. This is also true of some African species, whether they think they are being cut off from some more desirable means of escape I cannot say, but the fact remains that with the open plain on every side they always try ...
— Across Mongolian Plains - A Naturalist's Account of China's 'Great Northwest' • Roy Chapman Andrews
... sisters miles beyond the water, it ran off toward the Canadas, in confused and broken masses of rock, thinly sprinkled with evergreens. Immediately at the feet of the party, the southern shore of the Horican swept in a broad semicircle from mountain to mountain, marking a wide strand, that soon rose into an uneven and somewhat elevated plain. To the north stretched the limpid, and, as it appeared from that dizzy height, the narrow sheet of the ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... they turn away and slowly approach the mansion that, in simple, rural stateliness, stands upon a noble promontory, belted with woods, and half-girdled by the sparkling waters of the Potomac, which flow in a semicircle around a ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... the scene around me was sufficiently ludicrous. Such of the Guerillas as had not been thrown by force from their saddles, had slid peaceably down, and depositing their arms upon the ground, dropped upon their knees in a semicircle around us, and amidst the hoarse laughter of the troopers, and the irrepressible merriment of the Frenchmen, rose up the muttered prayers of the miserable Spaniards, who believed that now ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... butt of his gun with his first move. He pushed his hat straight: and so doing he raked the welt which the blow had left on his head. The pain finished clearing the mist from his mind; in an instant he was on his feet, maddened with shame. He saw the semicircle of white faces, and the whole episode flashed back on him. He had been knocked ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... Some forts were surrendered by treachery, and some by despair. In a few days the whole open country north of the Coleroon had submitted. The English inhabitants of Madras could already see by night, from the top of Mount St. Thomas, the eastern sky reddened by a vast semicircle of blazing villages. The white villas, to which our countrymen retire after the daily labors of government and of trade, when the cool evening breeze springs up from the bay, were now left without ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... informed of their approach, had given orders for them to be admitted, they met with no obstacle, but went into the divan in regular order, one part turning to the right and the other to the left. After they were all entered, and had formed a semicircle before the sultan's throne, the black slaves laid the golden trays on the carpet, prostrated themselves, touching the carpet with their foreheads, and at the same time the white slaves did the same. When they ...
— Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... cringing, fawning, and leaping about his knees; he noticed them not at all; the Cat-People, seated in a semicircle, looked up humbly as he passed; ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... odd to plunge suddenly into an atmosphere of merriment within a few yards of the men posted at the periscopes along the sandbagged parapet. The electric lights were burning, and a blue haze of tobacco smoke obscured the air from a semicircle of listeners, sitting on packing-cases and forms round the piano on the platform, and the chorus of "Gilbert the Filbert," sung with a will, greeted them as they descended ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... strangers who flocked to the festivals, and partly to correspond with the majesty of the dramas represented in them, which required to be seen at a respectful distance. The seats of the spectators were formed by ascending steps which rose round the semicircle of the orchestra, (called by us the pit,) so that all could see with equal convenience. The diminution of effect by distance was counteracted to the eye and ear by artificial contrivances consisting in the employment of masks, and of an apparatus for increasing the loudness of ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... blotched against the mountains which guard southern Thessaly, was the town, and in the valley, drawing in toward it, the Greeks, with the enemy on their rear and flanks enclosing them in a narrowing semicircle of fire. Before me stretched the road, a white band across the undulating green of the plain. In that road, a mile away, I saw the rear-guard as it retired swiftly but steadily, facing again and again ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd
... figures in the farmer's book. Then giving it back with a smile, he said, "Come on with me, Anton, I have something to show you. Place yourself by the brook, with your face to the north. There the brook forms a straight line from west to east, the border of the wood a semicircle. Wood and brook together define the segment ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... the heroes of Attica. In this group, Miltiades was placed in the centre, between Athena, the tutelary goddess of Athens, and Apollo, the guardian of Delphi; while on each side were five Athenian heroes, Theseus and Codrus with others, arranged in a semicircle. This important work was paid for by Athens out of her share in the spoils of Marathon. Another important commission executed by Phidias was a statue of Athena made for her temple at Plataea, and paid for with the eighty talents raised by the contributions of the other Grecian ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... Seated in a semicircle on the grass were most of the ladies boarding at Mrs. Clarkson's, and in front of them stood Toddie, in that high state of excitement to which sympathetic applause always ...
— Helen's Babies • John Habberton
... already dispersed. Singers and stage manager had hastily scattered in every direction to give vent, each in his own fashion, to the misery of the situation. None but the workmen, lamp-cleaners, and a few of the chorus gathered in a semicircle around Spontini, in order to have a look at that remarkable man, as he held forth with wonderful effect on the requirements of true theatrical art. Turning towards the dismal scene, I gently and respectfully pointed ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... been drawn out of a recess, and so placed that the light should fall at her back.—She objected to the sunshine, with true Italian perverseness. Some arm-chairs, once gilt, and still bearing a coronet, were placed in a semicircle opposite. The windows of the sala, and two glass doors of the same size and make, looked east and west; toward the terraces and the garden on one side, and over the cliffs and the chasm to the opposite mountains on the other. The walls were broken by doors of varnished ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... came to know his stage well—the purple semicircle of hills, the slim trees leaning over houses, the yellow sands, the streaming green of ravines. All that had the crude and blended colouring, the appropriateness almost excessive, the suspicious immobility of a painted ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... eight men set to work; and ten minutes later the grave was dug, greatly to the astonishment of the whole army, which had gathered in a semicircle on the rising slopes of the two hills which bordered the road, standing as if on the steps of ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - VANINKA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... gray mountain massed high about the narrow entrance of Santiago Bay, the picturesque Morro Castle, squatting like a grim giant above the strait, and outside, tossing and bobbing upon the swell of a restless sea, the mighty semicircle of drab ships waiting, yearning for the outcoming of the Dons. We of the "Yankee," I repeat, were in an agony of dread that ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... winding footpath leads up the hill to the rocky cleft from which issues in a succession of white and foamy twists and downward springs, the Falls of the Glassalt. Turning round from the spectacle, the stranger looks down on the loch in its semicircle of mountains. Gaining the crest of the hill and descending the edge on the opposite side, the foot of the grim giant Loch-na-Gar ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler
... proceeded thither at once. You have probably not visited this place, general, or you, colonel. It is a fort, and outside is a pen, or stockade as it is called, covering two or three acres. Inside are cabins for the prisoners, in the shape of a semicircle, and grounds to walk in, except in the space marked off by the 'dead line.' If any prisoner crosses that he is shot by the sentries, whose beat is on a platform running round upon the ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... of the mail-coach he handed her into the vast carriage. Then, climbing with one bound to the box, he gathered the reins and, cigar in mouth, with all the coolness of an old coachman, he started the horses in the presence of all the grooms, and made a perfect semicircle on the gravel of ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... the pen, a vast congregation of peeresses and judges watch the ceremony in devout collectiveness. How symmetrical is the place! A red, a well-trimmed bouquet of guardsmen has been set in the middle of the Turkey carpet; around the throne a semicircle of red coats has been drawn, and above it flow the veils, the tulle, the skirts of the ladies-of-honour—they seem like white clouds dreaming on a bank of scarlet poppies—and the long sad legs, clad in maroon-coloured ...
— Muslin • George Moore
... Baggs, Puffs, Combs and Brushes; beyond these, Swords with fine Knots, whose Points are hidden, and Fans almost closed, with the Handles downward, are to stand out interchangeably from the Sides till they meet at the Top, and form a Semicircle over the rest of the Figures: Beneath all, the Writing is to run in this pretty ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... sitting alone, side by side, their little pink bodies bare of all but their coarse woolen undershirts, their little faces shining with wholesome soap, their eyes bright with expectancy for the story that was to come, the two pretty children of a lonely father. Then, in a semicircle about them, the members of the Trust, with their hard, unclean faces, their rough clothes and rougher manners, and their uncultured minds driven by hearts that were—well, ...
— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum
... length she came up, and showed them a wonderful scene of desolation. Beyond the curve of hills the mountains trended out again to the south, gradually growing lower till at last they melted into the skyline. In the vast semicircle thus formed ran the river, spotted with green islands, while between it and the high ground, over a space which varied from one mile at the narrowest to twenty miles in width at the broadest of the curve, was spread a huge and dismal swamp, marked by patches ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... coffeepot, hot-water pitcher, milk and cream pitchers, spoon tray, and cups and saucers may be placed so as to form a semicircle about the hostess's place. The coffeepot should be placed at the right, and the cups and saucers at the left. If tiles or stands for the coffeepot and hot-water pitcher are used, they should also be a part of the table service. A large tray may be used to hold all ...
— School and Home Cooking • Carlotta C. Greer
... suggestion—a pattern with recurring boughs and leaves of gold for a wood, a great green curtain, with a red stencil upon it to carry the eye upward, for a palace." Mr. John Merrill of the Francis Parker School describes the quite excellent results secured with a dark curtain in a semicircle—a cyclorama—for background, and with colored lights.[1] Such a staging leaves the attention free to follow the lines, and the imagination to picture whatever the play suggests as the place of ...
— The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays • Various
... mixed with their own jargon. I had no thought of anchoring in their "good port." I hoisted the sloop's flag and fired a gun, all of which they might construe as a friendly salute or an invitation to come on. They drew up in a semicircle, but kept outside of eighty yards, which in self-defense ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... semicircle of shells in front of him. At the command of the two, without reloading, were ...
— Blazed Trail Stories - and Stories of the Wild Life • Stewart Edward White
... soft, and the operations were carried on with scarce a sound. As each party landed they fell to work under the direction of their officers. All night the labour continued, and when the dull light of the winter morning began to dispel the darkness a solid rampart of earth breast high rose in a semicircle, with its two extremities resting ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... both bows, at the distance of some two or three miles, and forming a great semicircle, embracing one half of the level horizon, a continuous chain of whale-jets were up-playing and sparkling in the noon-day air. Unlike the straight perpendicular twin-jets of the Right Whale, which, dividing at top, fall over in two branches, like the cleft drooping boughs of ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... feet thick where subjected to the pressure of the water, and the strong group of towers at the end—on the other side of the stream—guarded the dam on which the safety of the castle largely depended; the wall and towers here form a semicircle, curving back into the edge of the lake, so as to avoid the ...
— Mediaeval Wales - Chiefly in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries: Six Popular Lectures • A. G. Little
... players, having deposited his stake in the semicircle (b) at the farthest end, takes his station at a short distance, and endeavors to pitch some object, either a disk or a bit of terracotta, or more generally a baiocco, into one of the compartments. If he lodge it in the nearest bell, (a,) he pays a new stake into the pool; if into the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... Lance," and the Major's voice rang out firm, the voice of a man accustomed to obedience. "Three years ago I was in command of Devil's Drop, a little makeshift fort upon the sands outside Tangier. In front the Moors lay about us in a semicircle. Sir, the diameter was the line of the sea at our backs. We could not retire six yards without wetting our feet, not twenty without drowning. One night the Moors pushed their trenches up to our palisades; in the dusk of the morning I ordered a ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... sculptured work of gods and men and of flowers and fruits—all cut in the pure marble. At one side was a noble rostrum, of the like fine stone, whereon young boys and girls, as it were fauns and dryads and other woodland creatures, capered as they list: and above the midmost door a semicircle of pale blue enamel, whereon was the image of the Great Goddess in gleaming white. She was of smiling debonnair countenance and in the full pride of her blossom-time—being as a young woman whose girdle ...
— Earthwork Out Of Tuscany • Maurice Hewlett
... communication between. On their arrival Cook was presented with two ugly images wrapped with red cloth, and a sort of hymn was sung. Then they were marched to the scaffolding, where was a table on which lay fruits and vegetables surmounted by a very much decomposed pig, and in a semicircle round one end of this table were twelve images. Placing Cook near the scaffolding, Koah, as King and others call Touahah, took up the pig and holding it towards him made a long speech. Then, dropping the offensive porker, he made signs that the two were to climb on to the uncertain ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson
... but mocks the casino with a playful mention before proceeding to speak fully, if still playfully, of the great attraction of Tivoli: "Dame Nature... has built here three or four little mountains and laid them out in an irregular semicircle; from certain others behind, at a greater distance, she has drawn a canal into which she has put a little river of hers called the Anio,... which she has no sooner done, but, like a heedless chit, it tumbles down a declivity fifty feet perpendicular, ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells
... cushions and looked back at the line of draft beasts. They were swinging out of line now, to form a semicircle, ...
— The Weakling • Everett B. Cole
... maintained, other bees descended into the hole and proceeded solidly to attach the metal, and connect it with the walls of adjacent cells, by means of little waxen hooks which they distributed regularly over its surface. In the upper semicircle of the disc they then began to construct three or four cells, uniting these to the hooks. Each of these transition, or accommodation, cells was more or less deformed at the top, to allow of its being soldered to the adjoining cell on the comb; but its lower portion ...
— The Life of the Bee • Maurice Maeterlinck
... with dew and starlight, in which black things stood very still. I thought I could see a kind of motion ahead of me. I was strangely cocksure of everything that night. I actually left the track and ran in a wide semicircle (I verily believe chuckling to myself) so as to get in front of that stir, of that motion I had seen—if indeed I had seen anything. I was circumventing Kurtz as though it had ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... semicircle of eagerly watching girls, sympathetically thrilled by the spectacle, clapped their hands, shouting for joy; and balancing themselves on tiptoe, joined in the headlong dance. And as they glided to and fro, the wild roses ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... general, which seemed to require such treatment in the course of their peregrinations. During conversations each subjected his sapling to great varieties of usage—bending it round his back, forming an arch of it between his two hands, overweighting it on the ground till it reached nearly a semicircle; or perhaps it was hastily tucked under the arm whilst the sample-bag was pulled forth and a handful of corn poured into the palm, which, after criticism, was flung upon the floor, an issue of events perfectly well known to half-a-dozen acute town-bred fowls which had as usual ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... circle, in all the three figures, there are an infinite number of pointed arches, describable with different radii; and the three round arches, be it remembered, are themselves representatives of an infinite number, passing from the flattest conceivable curve, through the semicircle and horseshoe, up to the ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... the distress of the family, and being informed of the circumstances, he requested that the shoes and stockings last worn by the child should be brought to him. He then ordered his dog to smell them; and taking the house for a centre, described a semicircle of a quarter of a mile, urging the dog to find out the scent. They had not gone far before the sagacious animal began to bark. The track was followed up by the dog with still louder barking, till at last, ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... not, except that you have to be on the top of the cliff to get to it. We were evidently headed the right way, although we must have walked in a big semicircle since we left ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... Kirby drew an automobile map and a pencil. He notched on the pencil a mark to represent forty-six miles from the point, based on the scale of miles shown at the foot of the map. With the pencil as a radius he drew a semicircle from Denver as the center. The curved line passed through Loveland, Long's Peak, and across the Snow Range to Tabernash. It included Georgetown, Gray's Peak, Mount Evans, and Cassell's. From there it ...
— Tangled Trails - A Western Detective Story • William MacLeod Raine
... of the closing days of July, 1915, is an unbroken narrative of forward movements of German armies on all parts of the great semicircle. The movement now, however, was slow. The Russians were fighting desperately, and the Germans had to win their way inch by inch. By the 21st the Russians were withdrawing in Courland to the east of the line Popeljany-Kurtschany, ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... consequently convened a meeting—under the wide spreading branches of an elm tree, the Indian chiefs assembled. They were unarmed; the old men sat in a half-moon upon the ground, the middle aged in the same figure, at a little distance from them; the younger men formed a third semicircle in the rear. Before them stood William Penn,—a light blue sash, the only mark which distinguished him from his ...
— Peter Parley's Tales About America and Australia • Samuel Griswold Goodrich |
