"Headlight" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... gives her strength to travel over the rough roadbed with incredible speed. Her eyes are upon the station, which momentarily becomes more and more indistinct; she knows that if the train starts up the grade she can see the headlight. Her lips move in an articulate prayer that she may not see the light. So absorbed is she in the thought of how to stop the train in the event of its passing the station that she fails to see a culvert bridge. At the bridge the roadbed terminates and a trestle carries the tracks for a distance ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams
... not so hard. The glare of the headlight was upon us for an instant and then, passing, left us in blinding darkness. The brakes creaked, the wheels grated and at last the train came to a standstill. For one horrible moment I thought it was going on through in spite of its promissory signal. Britton went one way and I ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... Kootenay Landing is, in itself, something of a wonder. In the dark, as we waited for the train to be made up, it seemed as solid as good hard land can make it. But as the big Canadian engine came up with the first car we felt our "earth" sway slightly, and in the beam of the big headlight we saw the reason. Kootenay Landing is a station in the air. It is built ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... lighter and brighter: soon it had a strong glare like a locomotive headlight; it kept on getting brighter and brighter till it was like the sun peeping above the horizon-line at sea—the big red rays shot ...
— Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven • Mark Twain
... men—encountering the break, the car and men fell into the ravine and one of their men was captured and scalped. In his agony, he grabbed his scalp and got away in the darkness as had his two more fortunate companions. The engineer discovered the break by the light of his headlight, but not in time to stop his train, and the engine and two car loads of brick, immediately following it, toppled into the ravine with the balance of the train, box cars loaded with miscellaneous freight, piled up and round about. ...
— The Story of the First Trans-Continental Railroad - Its Projectors, Construction and History • W. F. Bailey
... it," said Schwartz; "and if I conclude to, I will. It's got to clear up, if we can see even the headlight on the other ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... their sleeping bags were spread in the rear dome. While Alec was shaking out the bags and stowing gear, Troy set up the tiny camp stove in the front dome, broke out the rations and began supper. The detachable, mercury-battery headlight from one of the Sno cars hung from the apogee of the front dome and the other car light was in ...
— The Thirst Quenchers • Rick Raphael
... stood on a siding, near a detached engine, where one man was lighting the lamp before the reflector of the headlight, and another, who whistled merrily, burnished the brass and copper platings. In the door of the ticket office the agent lounged, puffed his cigar, and fanned himself ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... I first pictured the Becketts (if I stopped to picture them at all) I imagined they would be an ordinary American millionaire and millionairess, bow-fronted, self-important creatures; the old man with a diamond stud like a headlight, the old lady afraid to take cold if she left off an extra row of pearls. In our desperate state, anything seemed fair in love or war with such hard, worth-their-weight-in-gold people. But I ought to have known that a man like Jim Beckett couldn't have such parents! ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... hat-brim as are his city brothers. He peruses the slangily worded ads of the "classy clothes" tailors, and when scarlet cravats are worn the small-town boy is not more than two weeks late in acquiring one that glows like a headlight. ...
— Buttered Side Down • Edna Ferber
... be on guard against catching fire these days. Sometimes I feel the need of a companion with a fire bucket. My headlight is hope and I have little patience with these whispering, croaking Tories and with the barons of the south and the upper Hudson. I used to hold the plow on my father's farm and I am still plowing as ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... in question, there it stood, nearly ready. Just behind the great hissing locomotive, with its parabolic headlight and its coal-laden tender, came the baggage, mail, and express cars; then the passenger coaches, in which the social condition of the occupants seemed to be in inverse ratio to their distance from the engine. ...
— The Denver Express - From "Belgravia" for January, 1884 • A. A. Hayes
... exclaimed Bert, as they went around another turn in the path and came to a road. Down it could be seen the headlight of an approaching trolley, and also the twin lamps ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at School • Laura Lee Hope
... He was pale and white as a ghost, but I could see that he was breathing, though with difficulty. In the glare of the headlight of a car which Garrick had turned on him, he looked ghastly. I looked again to discover traces of blood. ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... a deep sound that had been audible for some moments identified itself by a plaintive mooing like that of a gigantic cow and by the pearly spot of a headlight apparent half a mile away. It was a steam-driven train this time, rumbling and groaning, and as it tumbled by with a monstrous complaint it sent a shower of sparks and ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... she could not in ordinary circumstances refuse to wear the gage d'amour of her rich fiance, even though three wild young boys, who stay here spending money for love of her, choose to laugh at the size of the diamond and compare it to the headlight of a locomotive. I heard them pretend to suffer pain in the eyes from its intense brilliance, and they even went so far as to manufacture for themselves green shades to tie over the forehead, which ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... saw the headlight of the locomotive at the head of the accommodation split the gloom. Instinctively Spike rose, paid his check, and stood uncomfortably at the door, buttoning the ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... bulging with stogies and one glowing like a headlight in advance of him he wandered in a sort of coma up Tenth Avenue, crossed to the Riverside Drive, mounted Morningside Heights, descended again through the rustling alleys of Central Park, and found himself at Fifth Avenue and Fifty-ninth Street just as the dawn ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train
... pulling in from the west, with a switching-engine chasing it to begin the cutting out of the Copah locals. Over in the Red Butte yard a road-locomotive, turning on the table, swept a wide arc with the beam of its electric headlight in the graying dusk. Through the half-opened door in the despatcher's room came the diminished chattering of the telegraph instruments; this, with the outer clamor of trains and engines, made the silence in the ...
— The Taming of Red Butte Western • Francis Lynde
... Colombine, and Humpty-Dumpty; shapes which came out of nowhere and instantly vanished into nothing, for all the world like the absurd pantomimes of his boyhood days. He kept close to the curb, scrutinizing the numbers as he went along. Never had he seen such a fog. Two paces away from the curb a headlight became an effulgence. Indeed, there were a thousand lights jammed in the street, and the fog above absorbed the radiance, giving the scene a touch of Brocken. All that was needed was a witch on a broomstick. He counted ...
— The Voice in the Fog • Harold MacGrath
... thrown in at his open window, had joyfully dressed himself. At the last moment Charlotte had thought of the automobile headlight, and this, hurriedly filled and lighted, streamed out over the snow as the three jumped into the sleigh. All were warmly dressed, and Charlotte had brought many extra wraps, as well as a supply of medicines for a possible emergency ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... the gap below and ran across the road, Oppner as actively as either of his companions. Already, the white beam of the headlight was cutting-the gloom, below, where the road was heavily ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... a rarely beautiful sight—if she had only known it—with the dark water rippling gently against her bosom, her big black head thrust forward, and the feathers of her throat and breast glistening in the glare of the headlight, white as the snow that was ...
— Forest Neighbors - Life Stories of Wild Animals • William Davenport Hulbert
... A bright, bull's-eye headlight, strapped on a stiff hat, so that the light can be thrown where it is wanted, is an excellent device for night fishing. And during the heated term, when fish are slow and sluggish, I have found the following plan works well: Bake a hard, well ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears
... the signal-light, rosy and red; Then sounds the loud roar of the swift-coming train, The hissing of steam, and there, brightly ahead, The gleam of a headlight illumines the rain. "Down brakes!" shrieks the whistle, defiant and shrill; She heeds the red signal—she ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... track a bright star came shooting toward Fossingford. He knew it to be the headlight of the flyer. With a breath of relief he saw that he was the only human being on the platform. Havens had failed again. This time he approached the recumbent one determinedly. She was awake the instant ...
— The Purple Parasol • George Barr McCutcheon
... glanced at them, but they did not turn. She stepped forward and let the rain beat on her face—he stood behind, looking at her. A light showed far down the track, and they heard a faint whistle. "A train," he said; and she nodded. The headlight grew, and the car lights appeared behind it, and then the black outline of the engine. There was a rush and a roar, and ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... unscheduled stop, Latisan stepped down and was immediately hidden in the darkness. He saw Craig and his crew on the station platform; the headlight of a narrow-gauge locomotive threw a radiance which revealed them. Therefore, it was plain, Craig had wired for a ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day
... expressman. It was nearly three o'clock when they heard the far-off shriek of the whistle sounding up from the south; then, after an interval, the puffing of the engine on the up-grade; then the faint ringing of the rails, the increasing clatter of the train, and the blazing headlight of the locomotive swept slowly through the darkness, past the platform. The engineer was leaning on one arm, with his head out of the cab-window, and as he passed he nodded and waved his hand to Hemenway. The conductor also nodded and hurried ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... air, it found, was breathable, and there were no harmful radiations or other dangers. According to the plans, there should be a big room at the other end, slightly curved, a hundred feet wide by a hundred on either side of the tunnel entrance. The robot entered this, and in its headlight they could see reconnaissance-cars, and contragravity tanks with 90-mm guns. It swerved slightly to the left, and then the screen stopped receiving, the telemetered instruments went dead and ...
— The Cosmic Computer • Henry Beam Piper
... bright white light appeared, deep in the darkness, growing bigger with a thundering noise. The rolling stock usually kept on the sidings in Rincon was being run back to the yards for safe keeping. Like a mysterious stirring of the darkness behind the headlight of the engine, the train passed in a gust of hollow uproar, by the end of the house, which seemed to vibrate all over in response. And nothing was clearly visible but, on the end of the last flat car, a negro, in white trousers and naked to the waist, swinging a blazing torch basket incessantly ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... approaching. To that end the train must be stopped. His plan was simple. The train was moving very, very slowly, and though he had no lantern to wave, in order to bring it to a halt he need only stand on the track exposed to the glare of the headlight and wave his arms. David sprang between the rails and gesticulated wildly. But in amazement his arms fell to his sides. For the train, now only a hundred yards distant and creeping toward him at a snail's pace, carried no head-light, and though in the ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... boys reached the head of the train they found an excited crowd beginning to collect. The locomotive of the express had cut into the last freight car a distance of several feet, smashing a number of boxes and barrels and likewise the headlight of the engine. Nobody had been hurt, for which everybody was thankful. But the engineer of the express ...
— The Rover Boys at College • Edward Stratemeyer
... sound and sight They take God's gracious gift of night. The stars are watchful over them. On Clifton as on Bethlehem The angels, leaning down the sky, Shed peace and gentle dreams. And I — I ride, I blasphemously ride Through all the silent countryside. The engine's shriek, the headlight's glare, Pollute the still nocturnal air. The cottages of Lake View sigh And sleeping, frown as we pass by. Why, even strident Paterson Rests quietly as any nun. Her foolish warring children keep The grateful armistice of sleep. For what tremendous errand's sake ...
— Trees and Other Poems • Joyce Kilmer
... engineer in the service of the Great Northern, and there was full reason why he should center attention and interest on this the proudest moment of his life. No. 999 was the crack locomotive of the system, brand new and resplendent. Its headlight was a great glow of crystal, its metal bands and trimmings shone like burnished gold, and its cab was as spick and span and neat as the private office of the division ...
— Ralph on the Overland Express - The Trials and Triumphs of a Young Engineer • Allen Chapman
... crowded to the outer edge of the thicket, peering through intently. The bright headlight of an approaching locomotive soon penetrated this part of the forest. Then the ...
— The Young Engineers in Colorado • H. Irving Hancock
... hands, and no gloves for such cold little hands! Here, lemme warm 'em. Wouldn't I just love to wrap a little Peachy like you up in a great big fur coat and put them little cold hands in a great big muff and hang some great big headlight earrings in them little bittsie ears. Wouldn't I, though. M-m-m-m! Poor cold ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... succumbed to the seething floods, whose roar can be heard a long distance. The water is still rising and it is thought that the West Pennsylvania Railroad will be without a single bridge. It is reported that a man went down with the Blairsville bridge while he was adjusting a headlight. ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker |
