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More "Foolhardy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for which she would have unreflectingly made any sacrifice. The embrace was over in an instant. Besides being guiltless of obesity, George Cannon was free from the unpardonable fault of clumsiness. He was audacious, but he was not foolhardy, and he would never be abashed. True, she had seen dismay on his face at the moment of his declaration, but that moment was unique, and his dismay had ineffably flattered her. Now, on the half-landing, she was drenched in bliss. ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... should like to have you a proficient in all manly accomplishments, only don't be foolhardy and run useless risks. I want my son to be brave, but not rash; ready to meet danger with coolness and courage when duty calls, and to have the proper training to enable him to do so intelligently, but not to rush recklessly into it ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... the scene from the balcony. At the time it did not strike me as a farce. I merely thought that she had been stupid and foolhardy. But since then I have reflected. She provoked the mob of the street, wilfully, just at the very moment when she reached M. Droulde's door. She meant to appeal to his chivalry, and called for help, well knowing that ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... plunged that ill-starred land into chaotic confusion. The plan was discovered by the Portuguese military attache, who warned the President himself and the War Minister. But Sidonio Paes, quixotic and foolhardy, refused to take or brook precautions. A few weeks later the assassin, firing three shots, had no difficulty in taking aim, but none of them took effect. The reason was interesting: so determined were the conspirators to leave nothing ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... sheriff, met me on Baltimore Street, and informed me he held the warrant for my arrest. I assured him it would be foolhardy to try to execute it, for one of us would certainly be injured. I recommended him to report to Judge Bond, and I assured him I would be responsible ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith
... time. That's the funny thing. He must have been a foolhardy fellow, and I rather think it was him that wrote that." He took out a slip of paper from his pocket. "That's what he wrote, sir. 'I've got out, Eustace Borlsover, but I'll be back before long.' Some jail bird just escaped, I suppose. It will ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... It would take all the fingers of one hand, and the thumb of the other, to count us, O reader. Six! Yes, six. A Frenchman might well hold up his hands in astonished horror at the insane prolificness—the foolhardy fertility—of British householders. We come very improbably close together, except Tou Tou, who was an after-thought. There are no two of us, I am proud to say, exactly simultaneous, but we have come tumbling on each other's heels into the world in so hot a hurry that we evidently expect to find ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... various items composing this policy would be fully discussed during the campaign. In proposing such a policy the governor would be held to a high sense of responsibility. He could not escape from the penalties of an unwise, an ill-drawn, or a foolhardy legislative proposal. At the same time he would be obliged constantly to meet severe criticism both as to the principle and details of his measures on the part of the legislative council. Such criticism would fasten upon any weakness and would sufficiently ...
— The Promise Of American Life • Herbert David Croly
... other places in Scotland, has its Piper's Cave. There is a remarkable similarity in all such tales—diversified, however, by quaint local additions. MacLaine's piper, a foolhardy man, determined once to test the allegation that a certain cave on Lochbuie was connected with another cave at Pennygown on the Sound of Mull. Attired in his official costume and having his dog at his heels, he entered the cave, blowing ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... not tell you that the boy ranchers in their secret hearts rather hoped there would be shooting. They had been under fire before, and while they were not foolhardy nor inclined to take risks, they felt that if there was to be a fight on the part of the sheep men to get unlawful possession of Diamond X land, the sooner such a fight took place the better. Suspense was worse than ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker
... covering up. Their own rays were useless now. Though Arcot could not hope to destroy their ray shield, they could no longer attack his, for their rays were useless, and already they had lost so much of the protective relux, that they would not be so foolhardy as to risk a second attack ...
— Invaders from the Infinite • John Wood Campbell
... somewhat restored, and headed for the shower. When it was running nicely and he was under it, he started to sing. But his voice didn't sound as much like the voice of Lauritz Melchior as it usually did, not even when he made a brave, if foolhardy stab at the Melchior accent. Slowly, he began to realize ...
— Supermind • Gordon Randall Garrett
... was foolhardy. One night a mixer in the room below us got his numbers mixed, killing a banquet program on a trunk channel and sending our outrageous burlesque out instead. When the poor fellow discovered his mistake he made for the bottom of the canal. As for me, ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl
... which knocked out one of his eyes, just as the Calender was deprived of his eye in the "Arabian Nights." Still worse was the fate that overtook a woman, who, at midnight on New Year's Eve, when all water is turned into wine, was foolhardy enough to go to a well. As she bent over it to draw, one came and plucked ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... brave general," said Hudelist, gently; "a courageous captain, and a most defiant and foolhardy enemy of France. How unwavering were the courage and intrepidity with which he met the Viceroy of Italy everywhere, and attacked him, even though he knew beforehand that he would be unable to worst the superior enemy! ...
— Andreas Hofer • Lousia Muhlbach
... channel, my men by this time having gained sufficient confidence in my judgment, since so far we had had no serious mishap. But I foresaw that we should soon have an accident, as they were getting foolhardy, and in their ignorance attributed the wonderful luck we had had entirely to their ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... most foolhardy capers they preserved an unalterable gravity of demeanour, to such a degree that it was quite impossible to make ...
— Honey-Bee - 1911 • Anatole France
... cost, and a very foolhardy one, or I should never have attempted to find Sandypoint in this confounded storm. Edith—you'll excuse my calling you so, my name is Charley—wouldn't it have been better if you had left me here and gone for some one. I'm dreadfully ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... not raising his voice. His eyes rested on Jock with the steady, penetrating gaze that was peculiar to him. More foolhardy men than Jock McChesney had faltered and paused, abashed, under those eyes. "McChesney, your enthusiasm for your work is causing you to forget one thing that must never be forgotten in ...
— Personality Plus - Some Experiences of Emma McChesney and Her Son, Jock • Edna Ferber
... He ought to have joined us by now. He is just a trifle foolhardy, is Stanninghame, in knocking about so far afield alone," and a shade of anxiety steals ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... a thorough good scolding," he went on presently. "What possessed you to attempt bathing in a rough sea like that? Seriously"—speaking more earnestly. "It was a most foolhardy thing ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... said that she was of defective intellect—well—Jeb would face much to be allowed to handle that $134.92. (This was the "proppity" in question. It was a "back" pension and there was to be $2.11 per month henceforth.) But Jeb was not foolhardy, and he had trudged back from town without having done what the young "'squire" had advised, and Sabriny's "proppity" was ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various
... kindness of his companions by incessant grumblings and complaints. He hated having to give up his own way; he hated being tied to a sofa and a bath-chair; he resented offers of help as if they had been actual insults, and hindered his recovery by foolhardy attempts at independence. ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... cerebration, the use of the brain with which he was endowed, man found on occasion he could do things to his environment that heretofore had been the province of the gods—and in the doing had not become a god! To the courageous, the brave, the daring, the foolhardy questions then ...
— Eight Keys to Eden • Mark Irvin Clifton
... after Lester had gone, thinking deeply. What a twisted career! What an end to great possibilities? What a foolhardy persistence in evil and error! He shook his head. Robert was wiser. He was the one to control a business. He was cool and conservative. If Lester were only like that. He thought and thought. It was a long time before he stirred. And still, in the bottom of his heart, his erring ...
— Jennie Gerhardt - A Novel • Theodore Dreiser
... mistake about a man, it is because at the beginning of our acquaintance with him we confound his defects with the kinds of perfection to which they are allied. The cautious man seems to us a coward; the economical man, a miser; the spendthrift seems liberal; the rude fellow, downright and sincere; the foolhardy person looks as if he were going to work with a noble self-confidence; and so on in ...
— The Essays Of Arthur Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer
... who had the gift of making a show of all his qualities. Sheldon knew himself for a brave man, wherefore he made no advertisement of the fact. He knew that just as readily as the other would he dive among ground-sharks to save a life, but in that fact he could find no sanction for the foolhardy act of diving among sharks for the half of a fish. The difference between them was that he kept the curtain of his shop window down. Life pulsed steadily and deep in him, and it was not his nature needlessly to agitate ...
— Adventure • Jack London
... world, men, women and children being mercilessly butchered, burnt alive, or carried into a still more horrible captivity. But Divine Providence remedied this terrible state of affairs, by means not naturally looked for, and which in the commencement seemed not only foolhardy, but little suited to the end. Yet a very special providence was visibly at work, in a chain of events that were altogether miraculous, as the sequel proved. A new colony was founded at Montreal, which was intended as a barrier against the ...
— The Life of Venerable Sister Margaret Bourgeois • Anon.
... his shoulder, so as to be ready to fire if the man remained. He held it thus full a minute, at the end of which he discerned the foolhardy being who had not changed his position in the least. Hesitating no longer, he pointed his piece directly at his heart, ...
— The Riflemen of the Miami • Edward S. Ellis
... a more than foolhardy enterprise, and it was told in Israel that Micaiah, a prophet, the son of Imlah, had predicted its disastrous ending. "I saw," exclaimed the prophet, "the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing on His right hand and ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... he would acknowledge an authority which had been made real to him by chains and imprisonment, and reluctantly suspend an intended blow and retreat to a corner when insistently commanded, yet the fires of rebellion never were extinguished and it would have been foolhardy to get within effective reach of his paw. To strangers he was irreconcilable ...
— Bears I Have Met—and Others • Allen Kelly
... not the first one of your age who has been on the verge of an irreparable blunder. Thank God it is not too late for you to retreat! Do not let this word jar upon you, for it often requires much higher courage and manhood to retreat than to advance. To do the latter in this case would be as foolhardy as it would be wrong and disastrous to all concerned. It would be as fatal to me as to you, for I could not long survive if I learned that I had been leaning on such a broken reed. It would be fatal to you, for I would not leave my money so you could enrich these people. ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... "I do not want your blood upon my hands. It will be foolhardy enough if you go forth ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... letter. The senior vicaire informs me that my book has been a source of grief to Monseigneur, and has already overshadowed the spiritual joy with which he looked forward to the festival of our Lady of Mount Carmel. The work, he adds, is full of foolhardy doctrines and opinions which have already been condemned by the authorities. His Grace could not approve of such unwholesome lucubrations. This, then, is what they write to me. But I will relate your story to Monseigneur. It will prove ...
— Balthasar - And Other Works - 1909 • Anatole France
... upon him, built a temple to the shade of this brother. A cloud over the palace of another Emperor was interpreted as a portentous monster, half monkey and half snake, and one of the Minamoto warriors won fame for his daring in shooting an arrow at the cloud, which then vanished. Equally foolhardy and marvellous was the deed of Fujiwara Michinaga, who alone of a band of courtiers in the palace dared one dark night to go unattended and without lights from one end of the ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... about the distance of a quarter of a mile, and stood still. By this Mr. Monkhouse and two or three of the waterers were encouraged to march up to them; but seeing the Indians keep their ground, they were seized with a sudden fear which is not uncommon to the rash and foolhardy, and made a hasty retreat. This step increased the danger which it was intended to avoid. Four of the Indians immediately ran forwards, and discharged their lances at the fugitives, with such force that they went beyond them. Our people ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... foolhardy risk," Julien muttered. "If those fellows could have got at him, they'd have killed him. Have they gone back to their room, I wonder? Let us hear what the people say about ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... hour's start which Marguerite and Sir Andrew had of their enemy—in which to warn Percy of the imminence of his danger, and to persuade him to give up the foolhardy expedition, which could only end ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... you foolhardy sunbeam caught With a single splash from my ewer! You that would mock the best pursuer, Was ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne
... time to go home. What shall I say I have done? It must be a very plausive invention that carries it. I find my tongue is too foolhardy.—SHAKESPEARE. ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... We must wait for their attack, sir knight. It were foolhardy to attempt to seek them in their own hills, and yet they must stop us. They will attack before we reach ...
— ...After a Few Words... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... of the year extensive preparations were made for the chastisement of the Iroquois. De Courcelles had determined upon a stroke of almost foolhardy boldness: to march over the snow into the country of the Mohawks, a distance of three hundred leagues. Thick ice had formed on the St. Lawrence, and on the 9th of January the audacious Governor set off at the head of his ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... eluded and the city despoiled while it was buried in sleep; so that it paid for its heedlessness with destruction, and was more pitiable for its own sloth than by reason of the valour of the foe. For in warfare nought is found to be more ruinous than that a man, made foolhardy by ease, should neglect and slacken his affairs and doze ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... a man, or at least a boy, that was in charge of a jewelry shop, and that the boy might die. Cousin Willie, Mr. Peters says, has been stealing jewelry nearly ever since we came here and the police have been watching him but he did not know this and so he had grown quite foolhardy, and this morning in broad daylight he went into some sort of jewelry or pawn shop where there was only a boy watching the shop, and the boy was a cripple. Cousin Willie had planned to hide the things under his coat and to sneak out but the ...
— The Hohenzollerns in America - With the Bolsheviks in Berlin and other impossibilities • Stephen Leacock
... clear of the entrance I saw the enemy distant about a thousand metres. I at once recognized her as being one of the oldest type of Russian torpedo boats afloat. When I established this fact, a devil entered into my mind, and did a most foolhardy act. ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... know, the folly of his act so weighed upon his mind that he left the army, and when I last heard of him his friends were afraid that his reason was giving way. There now! I've made your faces solemn enough to satisfy nurse. And you will never dare your sisters to do foolhardy exploits again, will you, my boy? And you will never listen to him if he does, girls? Now my lecture is ended, and you can tell nurse to forgive you all. Where is Mrs. Giles? I wonder if she could put up my friend ...
— Odd • Amy Le Feuvre
... had absolute confidence in her star. As first-rate toreadors consider themselves quite safe under the very horns of the bull, as long as they keep their presence of mind, so she set danger at defiance, and even went out of her way to court it with a coolness that was foolhardy. ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... kind do not occur in the great tourist centres—though worse, far worse happens to the foolhardy or featherheaded in the by-paths and hidden corners of this mysterious land—but if you have the vision, the terrible silence of the Past, the supreme indifference of the great ruins to the passage of Time, the wonderful repose ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... Verrina. "I should have followed her when she left the garden, and complimented her on her proficiency in handling a poniard, but I was not so foolhardy as to stand the chance of meeting the sbirri. Moreover, I shall speedily adopt measures to discover who and what she is; and when I present myself to her, and we compare qualifications, I do not think there can arise any ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... "I don't remember no other house so near the road. It can't be we ain't passed Crocker's yit! If we ain't got no further than that, I'm in favor of stoppin'. I'm not afraid of a snow-storm, but I ain't a fool nuther, and if we haven't got further than Crocker's it will be foolhardy to try to push on through the dark and these big drifts, which will be ...
— The Magic Egg and Other Stories • Frank Stockton
... would, at the very least, be foolhardy, and that he had much better throw his pack of cards into the fire, wash the Kings of Israel and Judah off his shirt, destroy his strings and hooked wires, and keep his Examination-coat for a shooting one. But all their arguments ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... in bravery. For telling of his loyalty to the Union he was insulted and hissed at on the streets of Nashville, and when he received a hoop skirt from his lady friends he reluctantly concluded to take up arms against the country he loved so well. He paid the penalty of foolhardy recklessness in the first ...
— Reminiscences of Pioneer Days in St. Paul • Frank Moore
... America who was foolhardy enough deliberately to choose sculpture as a profession was Horatio Greenough, born in 1805, of well-to-do parents, and carefully educated. It is difficult to say just what it was that turned the ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... he determined to set about it at once, and use up the hours before him as long as he could, without any further delay. If by any possibility he could stop that leak, he determined to start off at the next high tide, that very night, and run the risk. It was a daring, even a foolhardy thought; but Tom was desperate, and the only idea which he had was, to escape as ...
— Lost in the Fog • James De Mille
... where I stood. Some intrepid larches waved green pennons in the very midst of the turbulent water, here and there a veteran lay with his many-summered head abased in the rocky course of the stream, and here was a young foolhardy beech that had climbed within a dozen yards of the rampart. All was wild and solitary, and one might have declared it a scene untrodden by the foot of man, but for the telegraph posts and small piles of broken "macadam" ...
— The Quest of the Golden Girl • Richard le Gallienne
... thought. The escalators weren't running, and we weren't going to alert any hypothetical ambush by starting them. We tiptoed up, and I even drew my pistol to show that I wasn't being foolhardy. The big social room was empty. A couple of us went over and looked behind the bar, which was the only hiding place in it. Then we went back to the rear and ...
— Four-Day Planet • Henry Beam Piper
... you to know that I'm going to wait for it till—Midsummer Day. Then"—he bent still closer—"you will give it to me yourself. I'm saying this foolhardy sort of thing to give you something to remember all these months—I've got to. You'll have so many other people saying things to you when I can't that I've got to startle you in order to make an impression that will stick. That one will, ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond
... whole shop," said the Officer one day. "Moreover, who faces one, faces all, for we all march in the same direction. We not only have our good swords, but we know how to use them. They are sheathed now, but let no one count upon that to offend us. Let but a foolhardy toy dare insult us, and—" here he gave the word of command, and instantly a dozen and one swords sprang from ...
— Adventures in Toyland - What the Marionette Told Molly • Edith King Hall
... laid it by as an item, that the badness and sameness of men lies in their wits—if you want a companionable, safe man, you've got to turn to sich as are bereft of their senses—and most women is that foolhardy they prefer wits and diviltry, ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... the courageous, but foolhardy Satorians leaped through the opening and stared in bewilderment as they saw no one moving. Arcot, Morey, and Torlos were hanging invisible in the ...
— Islands of Space • John W Campbell
... to acquire; but, released from his close, personal responsibility, the single man follows the crowd, and soothes his own mortification and wounded pride by joining in the cry that is to immolate a victim. Yet Abercrombie was not the foolhardy and besotted bully that Braddock had proved himself to be. His misfortune was to be ignorant of the warfare of the region in which he was required to serve, and possibly to over-estimate the imaginary invincible character of the ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... challenge, the hotter the pace grew. Perhaps they both felt, without knowing they felt it, that there was something in Barry which leaped instinctively out to applaud reckless courage, some element in himself which responded to it even while he called it foolhardy. You could tell that Barry was of that type, by the quick glow of his eyes and smile. But the rivalry in daring was not really for Barry; Barry's choice was made. It was at bottom the last test of mettle, the ultimate challenge from the ...
— Dangerous Ages • Rose Macaulay
... who followed Roland thought him more than brave, they considered him foolhardy. But Roland, caring little whether they followed or not, retraced his own steps in default of those of the bandits. The ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... it which is so offensive. It may be of interest to state, that the facts therein named are the recollections of old Dr. McClay, a Baptist minister of known power and veracity. The fact of Paine's miserable, and cowardly, and man-forsaken end is too true. Let no one be foolhardy enough to follow them, rejecting to do it, a fourfold cord of strong testimony; nay, we may add, a stronger cord of fivefold testimony, as Paine's nurse testifies ...
— Fables of Infidelity and Facts of Faith - Being an Examination of the Evidences of Infidelity • Robert Patterson
... we lay in wait for them, they invariably avoided that particular place and seized their victim for the night from some other camp. Hunting them by day, moreover, in such a dense wilderness as surrounded us, was an exceedingly tiring and really foolhardy undertaking. In a thick jungle of the kind round Tsavo the hunted animal has every chance against the hunter, as however careful the latter may be, a dead twig or something of the sort is sure to crackle just at the critical moment ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson
... were both sent back to their own lands. Lieutenant Hume does not say what is the matter with him. His letter isn't about himself. He is really tremendously anxious to hear news of us. He has just learned of Eugenia's marriage to Henri Castaigne, and he thinks we are pretty foolhardy to have offered our services ...
— The Red Cross Girls with the Russian Army • Margaret Vandercook
... said, with a change of tone. "I'm not saying this for Alf Henley's sake, for I hate him; he is the only man in this county that ever tricked me out of my rights, and I'll get even with 'im, sooner or later, but I'm thinking now about you. You may be foolhardy enough to try some slip-up game on him. I'm not afraid you'll meet him like a man, for, if it had been in you, you'd have done it before this, but you may think you can do your job in the dark, so listen to me, Hank. You may think you can shoot him from behind, but I tell you if you do you'll ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... him. They found his footprints the next morning in their snow-shoe tracks, and wondered how far behind them he had been. I don't know whether it was a vein of real courage that nerved him up to doing such a foolhardy thing as to follow a man with the intention of attacking him, or whether it was simply a case of recklessness. The probability is, however, that he was hungrier than usual, and that the smell of the warm blood made him forget everything else. ...
— Forest Neighbors - Life Stories of Wild Animals • William Davenport Hulbert
... refusing to take the proper precautions to guard against surprise. This is only one of many instances of a similar folly which I observed throughout the American war. I speak of military officers especially. There is something in the character of Englishmen which makes them over-confident and foolhardy, and they will require to be taught by some very severe lessons before they learn the importance of caution. This want of caution in an officer, when entrusted with the lives of brave men, is a very great fault, and shows ...
— Hurricane Hurry • W.H.G. Kingston
... not been fortunate enough to see any crews. Indeed, I doubt if there are any here. A good many maniacs disport themselves every day in rickety things which look something like gigantic needles, and other people have been riding along the bank, and, very naturally, abusing them loudly for their foolhardy recklessness. But no amount of abuse causes them to desist. I have puzzled my brains to know what it all means, but I confess I can't make it out. I fancy I know a boat when I see one, and of course these ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, July 11, 1891 • Various
... 30,000 or 40,000 men without arms, and met the Marechal de La Meilleraye, who I thought would have stifled me with embraces, and who said these very words: "I am foolhardy and brutal; I had like to have ruined the State, and you have saved it; come, let us go to the Queen and talk to her like true, honest Frenchmen; and let us set down the day of the month, that when the King ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... these foolhardy, quixotic actions of yours. I've heard of your visiting these wretched people—going into fever dens. Is that conduct becoming your name? Think a little of your station in ...
— Peg O' My Heart • J. Hartley Manners
... his father agreed, "the dog's got sense enough for a dozen. Watch out for yourself, though, and don't get foolhardy," he added warningly, as the lad disappeared in the darkness; "you've got to be right careful when ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... at times appear to me a foolhardy one, but the confidence of the woman of Bulika, real or simulated, always overcame my hesitancy. The princess's magic, she insisted, would prove powerless against the children; and as to any force she might muster, ...
— Lilith • George MacDonald
... simultaneously. Well, my good Flemming, there is not much wisdom needed to tell me that if the king knows of our contract, he will be all the more on his guard, and will make preparations to defend himself; for he would not be so foolhardy as to attempt to attack our three united armies. No, no. Our regiments can remain quietly in Poland, the seventeen thousand men here ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... such a place, he felt, would be foolhardy. He made his weapons ready, and took his position in a corner of the room behind the door. If ill was intended, he would ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... horrible thing at that period to be imprisoned by the enmity of the king. Louvieres sprang forward to snatch his sword, which stood against a chair in a corner of the room; but a glance from the worthy Broussel, who in the midst of it all did not lose his presence of mind, checked this foolhardy action of despair. Madame Broussel, separated by the width of the table from her husband, burst into tears, and the young girls ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... leaped clear of the roadbed, and he struck almost to the knees in a drift of sand. Otherwise, he might well have broken his legs with that foolhardy chance. As it was, the fall whirled him over and over, and by the time he had picked himself up the lighted caboose of the train was rocking past him. Donnegan watched it grow small in the distance, and then, when it was only a red, uncertain star far down ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... "Popularity is nothing to me. I have neither sought it nor desired it. Given a great work to do, with the Divine help I have done it, irrespective of public clamor. For many years I have lived in the midst of alarms, Mr. Hobart. I am not foolhardy. What precautions I can reasonably take I do. For the rest, my confidence is in an all-wise Providence. It is written that not even a sparrow falls without His decree. In that promise I put my trust. If I am to be cut off it can only ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... dear Madame Weiss, abandon this foolhardy undertaking. How can you expect to find Weiss in all that confusion? Most likely he is no longer there by this time; he is probably making his way home through the fields. I assure you that Bazeilles ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... drift of your question," answered Mr Dunnage; "but I do not think that, foolhardy as Delano may be, he would have ventured to offer for sale articles which had been shipped from this, and would be so easily recognised. No; all that we can hope to prove without a doubt is, that the William ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... their aid as fast as steam could carry him. But now, if he did not come—well, what Nick had said was true, and they would know that the end of the old close friendship had come. But, for the young wife's sake, if he should come, he and Nick must not let him do anything foolhardy and they must try to keep him out ...
— Emerson's Wife and Other Western Stories • Florence Finch Kelly
... Gelderland to the Rhine. At Kaiserworth he reviewed his forces, and announced his intention of immediately crossing the river. There was a murmur of disapprobation among officers and men at what they considered the foolhardy scheme of mad old Mondragon. But the general had not campaigned a generation before, at the age of sixty-nine, in the bottom of the sea, and waded chin-deep for six hours long of an October night, in the face of a rising tide from the German Ocean and ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... quite justify the scheme. All the efforts of his imagination, as he rode home, to bring his judgment to the same side with itself, had failed, and he had been driven to confess the project a foolhardy one. But, on the other hand, had he not had a leading thitherward? Whence else the sudden conviction that Scudamore had taken her, and the burning desire to seek her in Raglan stables? And had he not heard mighty arguments from the lips of the most favoured ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... to confide her secret to him, but something held her back; something said to her that he was not meant to know it, that if he knew he might be tempted to do still more foolhardy deeds, he would feel compelled to put her mystical message to the test. She remained silent; her mind was working too quickly for speech. She had forgotten that Michael wanted her answer. Her heart had given it so willingly that words were scarcely ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... weaving for his life, and possessing such unavowed but powerful enemies among the great lords as Tremouille and Bouillon, to say nothing of Mademoiselle d'Entragues's half-brother, the Count of Auvergne—I could hardly believe that with this knowledge his Majesty had been so foolhardy as to travel without guards or attendance to Fontainebleau. And yet I now felt an absolute certainty that this was the case. The presence of La Varenne also, the confidant of his intrigues, informed me of the cause of this wild ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various
... felt very anxious, and he could not help asking himself whether or not he was engaged in a foolhardy enterprise in attacking the fort. His orders related only to the steamer that was loading in the bay, and he had been warned in his instructions to take the fort into consideration in his operations. He felt that he had given proper attention ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... at the outset a few dissenting opinions, the gist of the opposing sentiment being that the Indians would make the operation of the route impossible. One newspaper went so far as to say that it was "Simply inviting slaughter upon all the foolhardy young men who had been engaged as riders". But the California spirit would not down. A vast majority of the people favored the enterprise and clamored for it; and before the express had been long in operation, all ...
— The Story of the Pony Express • Glenn D. Bradley
... attack was made; in fact, even if such a thing was meditated, the captain's friends watched his tent night and day, and made such a feat a foolhardy enterprise, full of danger from without ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... something rose in his throat. The canoe was familiar. He had seen it a few hours before on the upper bay, and now his keen sight made out the figure of Belding. Instantly he grasped the cause of this foolhardy deed. A glance at Elsie told him she was unaware who it was that ...
— The Rapids • Alan Sullivan
... immediately to the left of the lounge door, yawned the well of the basement stairway. And one chance was no more foolhardy than another. Like a shot down that dark hole he dropped—and brought up with a bang against a closed door at the bottom. Happily, it wasn't locked. Turning the handle, he stumbled through, reclosed the door, and intelligently ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... of the ravaging of Acadian fishing towns set Massachusetts in flame. To Boston, above all New England towns, was Louisburg a constant danger. The thing seemed absolute stark madness,—the thoughtless daring of foolhardy enthusiasts,—but it is ever enthusiasm which accomplishes the impossible; and April 30, 1745, after only seven weeks of preparation, an English fleet of sixty-eight ships—some accounts say ninety, including the whalers and transports gathered along the ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... returned the old man phlegmatically. "It is high time you were off. You are foolhardy to match your chances with justice. Prison stares ...
— The Princess Elopes • Harold MacGrath
... exclaimed Mrs. V. "I hope you idiotic Kafirs are not going to be so foolhardy as to leave me, leave the Baas, and leave the farm upon which your fathers and mothers lie buried. Do not you know that during this very week numbers of Natives have been calling on the Baas, asking him for places of abode, complaining ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... children and fools. Johnny Jewel, I think, could justly claim protection on both grounds. He was certainly attempting a foolhardy feat, and he was doing it with a childlike confidence in himself. As for Mary V—oh, well, Mary V was very young and a woman, and therefore not to be held accountable for her rash faith that the man would take care of her. Mary V had centuries ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower
... had me eye on ye f'r fifteen minyits an' ye're a dead man as I can prove be witnesses," I says. An' he fell off th' roof. I was sorry to take his life but war knows no mercy. He was a brave man but foolhardy. He ought niver to've gone again' me. He might've licked Cervera but he cudden't lick me. We captured all th' men-iv-war, desthroyed most iv th' cruisers an' ar-re now usin' th' flag-ship f'r a run-about. Th' counthry is safe, thanks to a vigylant ...
— Observations by Mr. Dooley • Finley Peter Dunne
... himself three times in the throat to the sound of slow music. He bore Washington a special grudge, being quite aware that it was he who was in the habit of removing the famous Canterville blood- stain, by means of Pinkerton's Paragon Detergent. Having reduced the reckless and foolhardy youth to a condition of abject terror, he was then to proceed to the room occupied by the United States Minister and his wife, and there to place a clammy hand on Mrs. Otis's forehead, while he hissed into her trembling husband's ear the awful secrets ...
— Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories • Oscar Wilde
... do, that such are daily, nay hourly, subject, as I have observed, to a thousand kind of ailments and deaths. This is, in fact, so obvious, as to require no proof. Nay, I remember perfectly well, how I used to behave at that time of life. I know how inconsiderately that age is apt to act, and how foolhardy young men, hurried on by the heat of their blood, are wont to be; how apt they are to presume too much on their own strength in all their actions; and how sanguine they are in their expectations; as well ...
— Discourses on a Sober and Temperate Life • Lewis Cornaro
... denunciations of the Johannesburg conspirators, who had bungled their side of the business and who had certainly shown no rashness. At any rate, whatever the merits of their case, no one in England accused the Johannesburgers of foolhardy courage or impassioned daring. They were so busy in trying to induce Jameson to go back that they had no time to go forward themselves. It was not that they lost their heads, their hearts ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... report of horsemen crossing the heath at a gallop sets it dishonourably creaking and complaining in rapid motion, and the squire curses his miserly purse that would not hire a guard, and his dame says, I told you so!—Foolhardy man, to suppose, because we have constables in the streets of big cities, we have dismissed the highwayman to limbo. And here he is, and he will cost you fifty times the sum you would have laid out to keep him at a mile's ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... in touch; but how could a mere handful of a score of Indians cope successfully with the men of the mission, aided, as they would be, by the trained soldiers of the presidio? Pomponio had sense enough to see that such procedure would be foolhardy, and he abandoned the plan for the time, hoping his little body of followers would increase, when the disparity in strength and numbers between the two sides ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... natural that five or six feet of human flesh shouldn't be afraid of what can torture and destroy it. The natural thing is to be always a little scared, like me, but by an effort of the will and attention to work to contrive to forget it. But Wake apparently never gave it a thought. He wasn't foolhardy, only indifferent. He used to go about with a smile on his face, a smile of contentment. Even the horrors—and we had plenty of them—didn't affect him. His eyes, which used to be hot, had now a curious open innocence like Peter's. I would have ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... monster, this oppressor and enemy of the citizens. The succeeding ranks of "Greens" followed the example, and from the midst of a troop of young married men, members in the gymnasium of the society of the Dioscuri, one foolhardy spirit had the reckless temerity to blow a shrill, far-sounding ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... He held no foolhardy view of his own powers. The one-sided nature of the conflict thus far was due solely to his possession of Lee-Metfords as opposed to muzzle-loaders. Let him be surrounded on the level at close quarters by a dozen determined men ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... impulses, and a capacity for self-contradiction. He is the most extraordinary contrast to Teddy, whose confidence in the universe amounts almost to effrontery. Teddy carries our national laxness to a foolhardy extent. He is capable of leaving his watch in the middle of Claverings Park and expecting to find it a month later—being carefully taken care of by a squirrel, I suppose—when he happens to want it. He's rather like a squirrel himself—without the habit of hoarding. He ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... touch; but how could a mere handful of a score of Indians cope successfully with the men of the mission, aided, as they would be, by the trained soldiers of the presidio? Pomponio had sense enough to see that such procedure would be foolhardy, and he abandoned the plan for the time, hoping his little body of followers would increase, when the disparity in strength and numbers between the ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... attempt to add my contribution to man's store of knowledge in so weighty a matter without as much as knowing whether I possessed the requisite patience—a genuine gift for imparting tuition, and a sufficient measure of devotion? Above all, how could I have been so foolhardy as to have undertaken to make my investigations in connexion with a descendant of Rolf's! Indeed, my only excuse could be my intense love of knowledge, my reverence and high regard for science. Science—whose temple we may enter only when filled ...
— Lola - The Thought and Speech of Animals • Henny Kindermann
... in his cabinet, thought this action foolhardy and useless; but Quincy Adams, neither expecting nor receiving any thanks for it, just as in the Seminole War difficulty, nobly stood up for the President. A telling speech by him in the House led to its unanimous resolution, March 2, 1835, that the execution of the treaty ...
— History of the United States, Volume 3 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... in battle array, and by daylight; but it's foolhardy and irreverent to tempt Satan, and on such a night as this. Listen how the wind whistles through the trees; and hark! there is the howling of ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... his Highness answered, "You are foolhardy, young man, to esteem so lightly the power of her evil spirit; for know that it is a mighty and terrible spirit, who could strangle you as easily as he has murdered others, for all your defiant speeches! Therefore ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... Fenian question, which at that time was occupying the minds of Canadians to some extent. Yates was telling them what he knew of the brotherhood in New York, and the strength of it, which his auditors seemed inclined to underestimate. Nobody believed that the Fenians would be so foolhardy as to attempt an invasion of Canada; but Yates held that if they did they would give the Canadians ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... out of the rock, winding upward along the face of the precipice. The view, as one rises, is of the break-neck description. The way is really safe enough, even on mule-back, ascending; but one would be foolhardy to ride down. We met a lady on the summit who was about to be carried down on a chair; and she seemed quite to like the mode of conveyance: she had harnessed her husband in temporarily for one of the bearers, which made ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... choose between the two aviators for courage in attempting what would have been considered a foolhardy feat a year or two before. Bleriot's state, with an abscess in the burnt foot which had to control the elevator of his machine, renders his success all the more remarkable. His machine was exhibited in London for a time, and was ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian
... burst out. "I was elated, monsieur. I tasted a sort of felicity. But I kept very quiet. I took my turns at pulling all through the night. We made for the open sea, putting our trust in a passing ship. It was a foolhardy action. I persuaded them to it. When the sun rose the immensity of water was calm, and the Iles de Salut appeared only like dark specks from the top of each swell. I was steering then. Mafile, who was pulling bow, let out an oath and ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... with England began, President Madison and his advisers thought it foolhardy to attempt to oppose Great Britain on the ocean, for she had the strongest fleet of any nation in the world, and so decided to confine the war entirely to land. It was Bainbridge who brought about a change of this unwise policy by impassioned pleading, to the everlasting glory of the American ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... This rather foolhardy speech of mine made the doctor wince, and I am not sure but he began to fear that my mind was weakening in a new direction. But I had my own excuse for my action, which I felt that I could explain to him at some future time. The fact is, I was so disturbed in my mind about ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... supernatural potency of these gimcracks? No, and yes. Not to be foolhardy, he quietly slipped down every day to the levee, had a slave-boy row him across the river in a skiff, landed, re-embarked, and in the middle of the stream surreptitiously cast a picayune over his shoulder into the river. Monsieur ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... thorough good scolding," he went on presently. "What possessed you to attempt bathing in a rough sea like that? Seriously"—speaking more earnestly. "It was a most foolhardy thing ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... until the outlets from the Trentino were thoroughly and effectively stopped up. For Italy to have advanced in the Carso, with her rear open to attack by the Austrians coming through the Tyrolean passes, would have been foolhardy. Italy's first step, therefore, was to start a simultaneous forward movement through every pass from Stelvio on the west to the pass near Pontebba on the north. These movements naturally were of an offensive nature, although they were really for a defensive purpose. No attempt ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... conditions of the various states of Italy at that date. On April 8th in that year, Lorenzo de' Medici, who had succeeded in maintaining a political equilibrium in the peninsula, expired, and was succeeded by his son Piero, a vain and foolhardy young man, from whom no guidance could be expected. On July 25th, Innocent VIII. died, and was succeeded by the very worst pope who has ever occupied St. Peter's chair, Roderigo Borgia, Alexander VI. It was felt at once that the old order of things had somehow ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... had gone into the mountains south of Sunset Pass toward Chevlon's Fork, and his trail was doubtless watched to head off couriers or cut down stragglers. Blakely's appeal to be allowed to follow and join his troop had been declared foolish, and the attempt foolhardy, by Captain Cutler. This and not the real reason was given, coupled of course, with the doctor's dictum. But even Graham had begun to think Blakely would be the better for anything that would take him away ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... replied the old sailor, drily; "but you'll find it too stiff for you to-night, anyhow. Howsomdever, if you should reach t'other side, take an old feller's advice, and don't be foolhardy ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... steadiness of Jack's, in what he thought a very bad cause, and he was quite as much surprised that Rose did not join him, in his endeavours to persuade the steward not to be so foolhardy, as to endeavour to go back to the brig. Rose did not, however; sitting silently eating her dinner the whole time, though she occasionally cast glances of interest at both the speakers the while. In this state of things the mate abandoned the attempt, for the moment, ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... that delay, the difference of a week, might mean a year's postponement. The period nearest approaching safety was when the river was at the middle stage of the spring rise—about eight feet above low water. After it had passed this point only the utterly foolhardy would have ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart
... a deputy sheriff, met me on Baltimore Street, and informed me he held the warrant for my arrest. I assured him it would be foolhardy to try to execute it, for one of us would certainly be injured. I recommended him to report to Judge Bond, and I assured him I would be responsible ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith
... terror in all the courts of Europe. How, at last, his ambition getting the better of his discretion, he thought to be a modern Alexander, to make Europe Protestant, subdue Rome, and carry his conquering eagles into Egypt and Turkey and Persia. How, by unwise measures and foolhardy endeavors, he lost all the fruits of his hundred victories and his nine years of conquest in the terrible defeat by the Russians at Pultowa, which sent him an exile into Turkey, kept him there a prisoner of state for over five years; and how, finally, when once again ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... part of the next day to run to their destination, and the whole of the following one to find and buoy the channel, which changed more or less with every storm that swept the coast. Marcy thought it a foolhardy piece of business to depend upon that treacherous inlet for a way of escape in case the schooner was discovered and pursued by a ship of war, and told Captain Beardsley so; but the latter simply smiled, referred Marcy to the work he had done that day, and reminded him that ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... ailments and deaths. This is, in fact, so obvious, as to require no proof. Nay, I remember perfectly well, how I used to behave at that time of life. I know how inconsiderately that age is apt to act, and how foolhardy young men, hurried on by the heat of their blood, are wont to be; how apt they are to presume too much on their own strength in all their actions; and how sanguine they are in their expectations; as well on account of the little experience they have had for the the time past, as ...
— Discourses on a Sober and Temperate Life • Lewis Cornaro
... flay the League had lifted Mr. Mix into a position of much prominence, and conveyed the very reasonable supposition that he was individually powerful. When a man is supposed to possess power, he can travel a long distance on the effect of a flashing eye, and an expanded chest; also, it is a foolhardy man who, regardless of his reputation, engages to meet all-comers in their ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall
... He had no right to go off like that without consulting us—without saying a word to a soul! A foolhardy trick!" ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... all my warnings the Dales were foolhardy enough to ride into danger. Ericus Dale would not only stake his own life but even his daughter's on his faith in red men. I recalled Cornstalk's pretended friendship for the whites at Carr's Creek and on Jackson's River and the price the settlers ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... decided to leave. McNally, Buck Barry, and Missouri Jones, however, could not be persuaded out of their intention of remaining to dig fresh gold; nor, I am afraid, were we very cordial in our insistence. We considered them foolhardy; but in our then mood we did ...
— Gold • Stewart White
... the eldest son retreated, crying that a wise and prudent man never strives with dragons, the second advanced recklessly, without thinking of protecting himself. The third, however, set to work in a business-like way, not only to rescue his foolhardy brother, but to slay the dragon. On perceiving this, the father resumed his wonted form, and announced he would divide his realm into three parts, of which the best share, Iran or Persia, was bestowed upon Trij, the son who had ...
— The Book of the Epic • Helene A. Guerber
... the project which had been for some time forming in his mind. He had managed to concentrate a force of four thousand men above the fortress without awakening the suspicions of the French, who were confident that Bougainville was fully able to prevent any force from attempting so impossible and foolhardy an exploit as the ascent of the high cliffs. The visitor to the historic places around Quebec will be deeply interested in a cove, just above Sillery, now known as Wolfe's Cove, but in old times as the Anse-au-Foulon. A zig-zag and difficult path led from this cove to the top of the height, ...
— Canada • J. G. Bourinot
... Scott's book on Witchcraft, which was written in the sixteenth century. It would be in vain to ask what was the original of the tradition. The choice between the horn and sword may, perhaps, include as a moral that it is foolhardy to awaken danger before we have arms in ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... just as the Calender was deprived of his eye in the "Arabian Nights." Still worse was the fate that overtook a woman, who, at midnight on New Year's Eve, when all water is turned into wine, was foolhardy enough to go to a well. As she bent over it to draw, one came and plucked out ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... Foolhardy chaps as lives in towns, What dangers they are all in; And now a'tremblin' in their beds, For fear the roof should fall in! Poor creatures, how they envies us, And wishes, I've a notion, For our good luck in such a night, To be ...
— The Esperantist, Vol. 1, No. 1 • Various
... John O'Groat's" is nothing for an automobile, though it is the longest straightaway bit of road in all Britain, 888 miles, to be exact. If you are out for a record on an automobile you do it as a "non-stop" run. It's dull, foolhardy business that, and it proves nothing except your ability to keep awake for anything between thirty-six and forty-eight hours, which you can do just as well sitting up ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield
... though a very religious man himself, laughed at all I had suggested about its being an intimation from Heaven, and told me several stories of such foolhardy people, as he called them, as I was; that I ought indeed to submit to it as a work of Heaven if I had been any way disabled by distempers or diseases, and that then not being able to go, I ought to acquiesce in the direction of Him, who, having ...
— A Journal of the Plague Year • Daniel Defoe
... their military system. When this does get into their heads, if it ever do, I think they may so swell with rage at this "insult" that they may break loose in one last desperate effort, ignoring the United States, defying the universe, running amuck. Of course it would be foolhardy to predict this, but the fear of it keeps coming into my mind. The fear is the more persistent because, if the worst comes to them, the military caste and perhaps the dynasty itself will prefer to die in one last terrific onslaught rather than to make a peace on terms which will require ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II • Burton J. Hendrick
... us about the miners. Let's make a study of coal mining, hold up everybody we can for information and watch our chance to help the poor families and their sick children whenever we can without doing anything foolhardy." ...
— Campfire Girls in the Allegheny Mountains - or, A Christmas Success against Odds • Stella M. Francis
... succession, of heads set close together like a mosaic, and covering the whole surface of the great street, and by the roar which went up, cheering everything which made its appearance; whether it were the struggling activity of the crowd moving in the center of the street, the sudden fall of foolhardy boys who had climbed into trees or up lampposts, or the short and sharp fights which went on between spectators for the best places, nothing ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... talk, Rathburn, I thought maybe bravado had brought you here to make a grand-stand play," he said coolly. "But I see you're not as foolhardy as some might think. I always gave ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... for a time all the stories of witch-trials and of the exploits of the witches, dormant for forty years, and Sir Richard's orders that the coffin should be burnt were thought by a good many to be rather foolhardy, though they were ...
— Ghost Stories of an Antiquary • Montague Rhodes James
... a bold thought of these men, or a foolhardy, to strike across the Wilderness," he said meditatively, in the tone of one picking up a talk which chance ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... nearly was the destruction of you all. Yet you would not have been disgraced in my eyes had you retreated. To me it seems a rash and foolhardy thing for knights to stand their ground when ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... of that composite language in which dogs communicate with men, and he would assure me, on his honour, that there was some peril on the mountain; appeal to me, by all that I held holy, to turn back; and at length, finding all was in vain, and that I still persisted, ignorantly foolhardy, he would suddenly whip round and make a bee-line down the slope for Silverado, the gravel showering after him. What was he afraid of? There were admittedly brown bears and Californian lions on the mountain; and a grizzly visited Rufe's poultry ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... not to do anything so utterly foolhardy," spoke Lila's frigid voice. A certain inflection in the tone made Ellen shrink away instinctively. For an instant she looked full into the serene, indifferent eyes, and her own seemed to flutter as if struggling against the contempt she saw there. ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... was by this time riddled by the flying stones and everything in and about it was plastered with mud. It would have been foolhardy indeed to attempt to get at ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... Osberne answers from where he sat: "There is but little, for I am little." Then they turn and see him hugging himself up in the sack, and something at his back, they cannot see what; and the goodman says: "What hast thou been about all day, kinsman? Thou art forever foolhardy and a truant; of right, stripes should pay the for thy straying." Said Osberne: "I have been shepherding sheep; may it not buy me off the stripes that I have found two of the lost ones, and brought back all safe?" "Maybe," says the master; "but did aught ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris
... that the solution was Government property, and he had to do something to make everybody think it worthless, so that he could get title to it? That faked demonstration that failed was certainly a bold stroke—so bold that it was foolhardy. But it worked. It fooled even me, and I am not usually asleep. The only reason he got away with it, is, that he has always been such an open-faced talker, ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... writings of Jansenius(505) was censured by Pope Innocent the Tenth as "foolhardy, impious, ...
— Grace, Actual and Habitual • Joseph Pohle
... was a coward, but two glasses of beer were enough to turn his nature in precisely the opposite direction. A glass less would have left him timorous, a glass more would have made him foolhardy and silly. He saw that somebody was about to stab his old friend. In five long, noiseless steps, or leaps, he was behind that somebody, and had seized the ...
— The Adventures of Captain Horn • Frank Richard Stockton
... "I should like to have you a proficient in all manly accomplishments, only don't be foolhardy and run useless risks. I want my son to be brave, but not rash; ready to meet danger with coolness and courage when duty calls, and to have the proper training to enable him to do so intelligently, but not to rush recklessly into it to ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... stand now, it is better to say as little as possible of such a deplorable fiasco, wherein the only points which stood out clearly appeared to be that Englishmen were as brave, and perhaps also as foolhardy, as ever; that President Kruger, while pretending to shut his eyes, had known exactly all that was going forward; that the Boers had lost nothing of their old skill in shooting and ambushing, while the rapid rising and massing of their despised forces was as remarkable ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... can only be escaped by extraordinary personal dexterity, has had considerable influence on the local character, as the waves have made it impossible for clumsy, foolhardy, or timid men to ...
— The Aran Islands • John M. Synge
... of your age who has been on the verge of an irreparable blunder. Thank God it is not too late for you to retreat! Do not let this word jar upon you, for it often requires much higher courage and manhood to retreat than to advance. To do the latter in this case would be as foolhardy as it would be wrong and disastrous to all concerned. It would be as fatal to me as to you, for I could not long survive if I learned that I had been leaning on such a broken reed. It would be fatal to you, for I would not leave my money so you could enrich these people. You would have nothing ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... stared, while something rose in his throat. The canoe was familiar. He had seen it a few hours before on the upper bay, and now his keen sight made out the figure of Belding. Instantly he grasped the cause of this foolhardy deed. A glance at Elsie told him she was unaware who it was that thus played ...
— The Rapids • Alan Sullivan
... the dragon had him," muttered King Aetes to himself, "and the four-footed pedant, his schoolmaster, into the bargain. Why, what a foolhardy, self-conceited coxcomb he is! We'll see what my fire-breathing bulls will do for him. Well, Prince Jason," he continued, aloud, and as complaisantly as he could, "make yourself comfortable for to-day, and to-morrow morning, since ...
— Tanglewood Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... organ of thought in the United States, believed that the Negroes should be thankful to Senator Morgan for his attitude on emigration, because he might succeed in deporting to Africa those Negroes who affect to believe that this is not their home and the more quickly we get rid of such foolhardy people the better it will be for the ...
— A Century of Negro Migration • Carter G. Woodson
... a very brave general," said Hudelist, gently; "a courageous captain, and a most defiant and foolhardy enemy of France. How unwavering were the courage and intrepidity with which he met the Viceroy of Italy everywhere, and attacked him, even though he knew beforehand that he would be unable to worst the superior enemy! ...
— Andreas Hofer • Lousia Muhlbach
... toreadors consider themselves quite safe under the very horns of the bull, as long as they keep their presence of mind, so she set danger at defiance, and even went out of her way to court it with a coolness that was foolhardy. ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... consented I was not half so eager to undertake it; but I had said I would and now I must stick to my word, or acknowledge that I was a big bluffer. I went up to the office and Fred Bennett gave me the orders. But as he did so he said: "Bates, that's a foolhardy thing for you to do, and I reckon the old man must be crazy to allow you to try it, but rather than give in to that mob out there I'll see you through with it. Now don't you forget for one minute, that you have ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... is the last date in the poet's biography. After having achieved that admirable and despicable performance, he disappears into the night from whence he came. How or when he died, whether decently in bed or trussed up to a gallows, remains a riddle for foolhardy commentators. It appears his health had suffered in the pit at Meun; he was thirty years of age and quite bald; with the notch in his under lip where Sermaise had struck him with the sword, and what wrinkles the reader may imagine. In default of portraits, this ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had heard this pistol shot, she had obeyed a foolish impulse to find her father's pistol. How reckless! How foolhardy! How stupid! Because, to come right down to a fine point, here she was shut up in a perfectly huge room, as black as the ...
— The Motor Maids in Fair Japan • Katherine Stokes
... present is not to be marred. But helpful and merciful as they are, they invest the unknown to-morrow with a solemn power which it is good, though sobering, for us to feel, and they silence on every lip but that of riot and foolhardy debauchery the presumptuous words, 'To-morrow shall be as this day, and ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... as Juon Tare perceived that his antagonist was foolhardy enough to try a fall with him, he complacently allowed his body to be encircled and calmly murmured: 'Ho, ho! then you would wrestle with me, eh, Fatia Negra! Very well, ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... appeal to Duane. His curiosity was aroused; it did not, however, tempt him to any foolhardy act. He turned southwest and rode a hundred miles until he again reached the sparsely settled country. Here he heard no more of rangers. It was a barren region he had never but once ridden through, and that ride had cost him dear. He had been compelled to ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... dream, Gretchen." And in truth he was, for he was about to set forth for the lion's den, and only amazing cleverness could extricate him. Man never enters upon the foolhardy unless it be to dazzle a woman. And the vintner's love for Gretchen was no passing thing. "Let us hurry; it is growing late. They will be shutting off ...
— The Goose Girl • Harold MacGrath
... Francisco, a man that was contemplating shooting grizzlies with the bow and arrow. The doctor replied that he did, whereat the sage laughed and said that the feat was impossible, most dangerous and foolhardy; it could not be done. We fully appreciated the danger involved—therein lay some of the zest. But we also knew that even should we succeed in killing them in Yellowstone Park, the glory would be sullied by the popular belief that all park bears are hotel pets, live upon garbage, ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... replied Stephano Verrina. "I should have followed her when she left the garden, and complimented her on her proficiency in handling a poniard, but I was not so foolhardy as to stand the chance of meeting the sbirri. Moreover, I shall speedily adopt measures to discover who and what she is; and when I present myself to her, and we compare qualifications, I do not think there ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... believe," said the sheriff who had been listening with keen interest to the hunter's account of his bold but fruitless attempt to compel the submission of the desperado, "I cannot believe, after all, that the fellow will be so foolhardy as to persist in his refusal to surrender, when he knows there is now no longer any chance for him to escape. I will try him faithfully ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... other chance!" cried Blood, in broken-hearted frenzy. "If ye say it was desperate and foolhardy, why, so it was; but the occasion and the means demanded nothing less. I fail ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... pieces.' Some of the mob cried that he was saying this to give her time to escape. Others said, if it were so, he should assuredly suffer the penalty. Churchill answered nothing, only smiled; and then the majority said he could not be so foolhardy, and they would grant the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348 • Various
... this was a mere bravado, in the full confidence that no one would be found sufficiently foolhardy to engage to follow the example. It is needless to say, that the promise of laughing aloud could not have been performed; so that any one might have safely accepted the challenge, conditioning for the full ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... mind that he left the army, and when I last heard of him his friends were afraid that his reason was giving way. There now! I've made your faces solemn enough to satisfy nurse. And you will never dare your sisters to do foolhardy exploits again, will you, my boy? And you will never listen to him if he does, girls? Now my lecture is ended, and you can tell nurse to forgive you all. Where is Mrs. Giles? I wonder if she could put up my friend for a night ...
— Odd • Amy Le Feuvre
... another chance to talk to you privately for some time. A few things are to be impressed on your minds. The first is this. Take no foolish chances. Don't be foolhardy. We cannot afford to waste our tools. And in this struggle tools are what you are, not boys, not human beings that will feel cold, and heat, and pain and privations; just ...
— The Boy Scouts on a Submarine • Captain John Blaine
... halls. Under his canopy, opposite the high altar, sat the vicegerent of God upon his golden throne, surrounded by the consecrated cardinals and bishops, protected by the Swiss guard! Who could have ventured to attack the holy father—who would have been so foolhardy as to attempt to penetrate that thick wall of Swiss guards and princes of the Church—who could have been successful in such an attempt? No human being! But where the people could not penetrate, where there was no room for the swinging ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... the narrow escape from death of a military man who, for a wager, rode a horse down the cliff to the extreme verge of the Land's End; where the poor animal, seeing its danger, turned in affright, reared, and fell back into the sea raging over the rocks beneath. The foolhardy rider had just sense enough left to throw himself off in time—he tumbled on the ground, within a few inches of the precipice, and so barely saved the life which he had ...
— Rambles Beyond Railways; - or, Notes in Cornwall taken A-foot • Wilkie Collins
... of Odysseus, but was attached to his legend, as floating jests of unknown authorship are attributed to eminent wits. It has been remarked with truth that in this episode Odysseus acts out of character, that he is foolhardy as well as cunning. Yet the author of the Odyssey, so far from merely dove-tailing this story at random into his narrative, has made his whole plot turn on the injury to the Cyclops. Had he not foolishly exposed himself and his companions, ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.
... again, never cussed nor stormed, and I've laid it by as an item, that the badness and sameness of men lies in their wits—if you want a companionable, safe man, you've got to turn to sich as are bereft of their senses—and most women is that foolhardy they prefer wits and diviltry, ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... foolhardiness of the deed his safety. And yet the strain was high. Were they watching the island? Among the eager crew, to each of whom the capture might mean a splendid prize and chance of promotion, was there one would have the genius of suddenly suspecting that this foolhardy wayfarer might be the man they wanted and not merely Sir Adrian returning on foot towards his home?... And then came the answer of hopeful youth and ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... dreadful woman, Margot, over to the authorities, Mr. Cleek," she said, with an expression of great seriousness. "She is not likely to forget or to forgive what you have done; and some day, perhaps ... Oh, do be on your guard. It was really foolhardy to have attempted the thing alone. Surely you might have appealed for assistance to the Paris police and not only have minimised your personal risk but made sure of ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... said Queeker, after a few minutes' consideration, "to attempt to leap everything. I think that would be foolhardy. I must tell you, Mr Stoutheart, before we get to the place of meeting, that I can only ride a very little, and have never attempted to leap a fence of any kind. Indeed I never bestrode a real hunter before. I shall therefore content ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... beast sustained his reputation by nipping angrily at Mr. Farnshaw as he dodged under the straps with which the horses were tied to the reach ahead. To have passed in front of this team unencumbered and alone when the power was in motion would have been foolhardy; but with Jack in his arms it was an act of mock-heroics typical of the whole bull-headed character of Josiah Farnshaw. He stumbled slightly in springing out of the horse's way, and with Jack, who was a load, in his arms, was barely able ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger
... "You are foolhardy. What can be done quietly, ought to be done quietly. If we cannot succeed so, why dare both Sir ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... were good-byes to be said. The polar winter was near at hand, when the sea for miles beyond the barrier would freeze solid and it would have been foolhardy for the Brutus, which had discharged all her coal but that necessary to steam north with, to have remained longer. She sailed early in the morning, bearing with her letters to their friends in the north, ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... curiously-shaped tail, lay so ominously still and silent, with its enormous circular black eyes so wide open and fixed, that, having heard of its threatening demonstration against the cavalry who attacked it on the previous day, they felt certain it meant mischief, and was only waiting for some foolhardy wight to venture within its reach, to seize and devour him. They had been despatched by a despotic king to capture or kill the creature; but, whilst every man there would have emulated his neighbour in rushing to certain death against the ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... a person in the water but launched toward them. When adrift in an unmanageable boat cast anchor and wait for assistance. Never rock a boat for fun. A Scout who so far forgets herself as to do such a foolhardy act should be forbidden to go into a boat again for some time as a punishment. Most drowning accidents are from some such ...
— How Girls Can Help Their Country • Juliette Low
... the immediate English territory should be massacred. The West Saxons rose on the appointed night, and slew every one of them, including Gunhild, the sister of King Swegen, and a Christian convert. It was a foolhardy attempt. Swegen fell at once upon Wessex, and marched up and down the whole country, for two years. He burnt Wilton and Sarum, and then sailed round to Norwich, where Ulfkytel, of East Anglia, gave him "the hardest hand-play" that he had ever known in England. ...
— Early Britain - Anglo-Saxon Britain • Grant Allen
... selection of a homesite as foolhardy, but Paoa was unaware of the sudden and rapid rise the river made when heavy rains and cloud-bursts loosed their torrents high upon the slopes of Mauna Kea. Hina, goddess of the river, warned the visitor of his danger and told him how the angry waters would sweep everything ...
— Legends of Wailuku • Charlotte Hapai
... he would have entered the blackness of the undergrowth they tried to dissuade him; and the wagerer was most insistent of all that he abandon his foolhardy venture. ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Winchester, and he carried a light, short-handled axe in his belt besides the regulation knife; so he had no serious misgivings as he trod the crackling, moonlit snow beneath the moose-hide webbing of his snowshoes. But not being utterly foolhardy, he kept to the open stretches of meadow, or river-bed, or snow-buried lake, rather than in the close shadows ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... is one thing, reckless daring another. Two or three instances will illustrate this. A few years ago Blondin, for the sake of money, jeopardized his life at the Crystal Palace, by walking blindfolded on a tight-rope, and holding in his hand a balancing pole. In so doing he was foolhardy, but not heroic. But a certain Frenchman, at Alencon, walked on one occasion on a rope over some burning beams into a burning house, otherwise inaccessible, and succeeded in saving six persons. This was the act of a true hero. When Mr. Worthington, the 'professional diver,' plunged into the water ...
— The Hero of the Humber - or the History of the Late Mr. John Ellerthorpe • Henry Woodcock
... ladies, that Saffredent and the rest of the company may know that all ladies are not like the Queen he has spoken of, and that all foolhardy and venturesome men do not compass their ends, I will tell you a story in which I will acquaint you with the opinion of a lady who deemed the vexation of failure in love to be harder of endurance than death itself. ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. I. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... fear naught for his life in battle, but that he is foolhardy, and of too proud a courage. Save for that, he were ...
— The Fall of the Niebelungs • Unknown
... fear from Red Mask at present, but if you continue your headlong course you will have; and, as far as I can make out, his hand is heavy and swift in falling. Go back to your women-folk, I say. You can get no horses from me for such a foolhardy purpose as you meditate." ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum
... I thank God, the Creator and Conserver of all things, for having guided me into this hospitable house. It is He alone who governs us and we are compelled to recognise His providence in all matters human, notwithstanding that it is foolhardy and sometimes incongruous to follow Him too closely. Because being universal He is to be found in all sorts of encounters, sublime by the conduct which He keeps, but obscene or ridiculous for the part man takes in it and ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... for the stone projectile weighed only a third as much as an iron ball of the same size, and the bore walls could therefore be comparatively thin. They were made in calibers up to 50-pounders. There was a chamber for the powder charge and little danger of the gun's bursting, unless a foolhardy fellow loaded it with an iron ball. The wall thicknesses of this gun are shown in Figure 24, where the inner circle represents the diameter of the chamber, the next arc the bore caliber, and the outer lines the respective diameters at chase, ...
— Artillery Through the Ages - A Short Illustrated History of Cannon, Emphasizing Types Used in America • Albert Manucy
... uncalculating^; heedless; careless &c (neglectful) 460; without ballast, heels over head, head over heels; giddy &c (inattentive) 458; wanton, reckless, wild, madcap; desperate, devil-may-care. hot-blooded, hotheaded, hotbrained^; headlong, headstrong; breakneck; foolhardy; harebrained; precipitate, impulsive. overconfident, overweening; venturesome, venturous; adventurous, Quixotic, fire eating, cavalier; janty^, jaunty, free and easy. off one's guard &c (inexpectant) 508 [Obs.]. Adv. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... of the fraternity least able to defend himself, simply because in a moment of haste and excitement he had been guilty of what they were pleased to call (p. 187) a technical libel. It did not seem to occur to them, that any one could be so foolhardy as to make them the object of attack. They did not have to wait long to discover that the influence wielded by a journal was no protection. Besides the newspapers already mentioned, Cooper prosecuted the "Oneida Whig," published at Utica. ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... would have caused them to fall on the neck of even a foreign soldier in adoration. The thirst for joviality often led wayward sailors to crave for drink, and under its baneful influence they were easily wafted into a delirium of foolhardy devices that would never have entered the mind of the ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... would seem foolhardy in a prince so little popular as Philip the Fair; but Philip in reality risked nothing, and knew it; the feudality did not possess sufficient union, the people did not have enough force to profit on this occasion against ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... station in northern Labrador. This journey would be too hazardous to undertake in the month of October in a canoe—the rough, open sea of Ungava Bay demanded a larger craft—and although Ford told me it was foolhardy to attempt it so late in the season with any craft at all, I requested him to do his utmost the following day to engage for us Eskimos and a small boat and we would make the attempt to get there. It has been my experience that frontier traders ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... and with our confidence thus strengthened we glided gently forward over the glassy waters of the creek, every eye being directed anxiously ahead, for we knew not at what moment we might encounter our enemy, nor in what force he might be. To me it appeared that we were acting in rather a foolhardy manner in thus rushing blindfold as it were upon the unknown, and earlier in the day—in fact, just after we had entered the river—I had suggested to Ryan the advisability of taking the schooner somewhat higher ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... to walk, however good a crutch might be found, would have been foolhardy, for it was only with the greatest ...
— Messenger No. 48 • James Otis
... I was a foolhardy boy. Two years ago I was not afraid of anything. Nobody dared go into the wood, or even so much as over the rocks, to look at it, after what happened there."—"I've heard a foolish story," said Paul.—"So once, sir, the thought took me that I ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... the line. He could not pass another bucket after seeing the chum he loved so well plunge into the doomed building. From right and left he heard many things spoken, and presently understood what it was induced Jack to attempt what seemed so like a foolhardy thing. ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... his papers; he stepped silently on board, and we exchanged salutes. As I saw that the two boat-loads of twenty-five men were lying off within hearing, on either side of us, I took this opportunity to admonish the captain about his foolhardy attempt to escape, and how he thereby had endangered the lives of his crew. The latter, realizing the justice of my remarks, thanked us for having saved them by respectfully lifting their caps. The captain awkwardly excused himself by saying he had ...
— The Journal of Submarine Commander von Forstner • Georg-Guenther von Forstner
... itself. His guards of honor were having a time of it to keep their feet in the face of the current, but they were still willing to go on, believing that the farther the statue went into the stream, the sooner the waters would go down. At last, however, the most foolhardy withdrew. The Saint came back. Though the procession at once went on to the next road and to the ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... making a show of all his qualities. Sheldon knew himself for a brave man, wherefore he made no advertisement of the fact. He knew that just as readily as the other would he dive among ground-sharks to save a life, but in that fact he could find no sanction for the foolhardy act of diving among sharks for the half of a fish. The difference between them was that he kept the curtain of his shop window down. Life pulsed steadily and deep in him, and it was not his nature needlessly to agitate the surface so that the world could see ...
— Adventure • Jack London
... a home!" exclaimed Mrs. V. "I hope you idiotic Kafirs are not going to be so foolhardy as to leave me, leave the Baas, and leave the farm upon which your fathers and mothers lie buried. Do not you know that during this very week numbers of Natives have been calling on the Baas, asking him for places of abode, complaining that they have ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... as was his bravery, his size, his strength, what could they avail in such foolhardy strife? One jerk of the black snout, one flash of the white tusks, and, with a last yelping scream, the body of poor Shark goes whirling up into the air, and falls a bleeding, bisected, lifeless lump. Poor Shark! with all his faults, I ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... an enterprise, there should be an identity of interests among the leaders, a sympathy which is lacking here. Besides, Hatteras is mad; his whole past proves it! But we shall see! Circumstances may arise in which the command of the ship will have to be given to a less foolhardy captain—" ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... crevice which had swallowed up his companion, with almost a sense of relief at being for the moment beyond the power of the Priest. He was tempted to cut the rope behind him, but a brief examination convinced him that this would be foolhardy. He still had sufficient left for an emergency—in case the rope was drawn up from above. Two men should stand a better chance of getting out of here than would a ...
— The Web of the Golden Spider • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... continued after dinner, we went through easily and safely, as of course we could have done in the first place if the Major had been willing to take an unknown risk. But in the shadow the fall might have been almost anything and it would have been foolhardy to run it without examination, even though we found it so hard to stop. Below the rapid that had halted us so abruptly there was nothing for about a mile but easy running, when we stopped in a cove to examine another rapid. Prof. here started ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... moved one man or woman from their constant faith. Only one hungry boy whom Charles had fed, attempted to betray him, but was not believed. As for the prince, he is briefly described by a companion as "the most prudent man not to be a coward, the most daring not to be foolhardy, whom he had ever known." He showed a constant gayety, singing and telling tales to hearten his followers. His resource was endless; he was by far the best cook and the least fastidious eater of his company. He could cook a dish of cow's brains, or swallow raw oatmeal and salt-water. Surrounded ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... wants to document it and pin it down. He suspects it only too justly of disorderly impulses, and a capacity for self-contradiction. He is the most extraordinary contrast to Teddy, whose confidence in the universe amounts almost to effrontery. Teddy carries our national laxness to a foolhardy extent. He is capable of leaving his watch in the middle of Claverings Park and expecting to find it a month later—being carefully taken care of by a squirrel, I suppose—when he happens to want it. He's rather like a squirrel himself—without ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... refined home at the West End, within three minutes of Tube and omnibus"—"noble dining and recreation rooms, bath h. and c." thrown in—to unmarried members of the stronger sex, must of necessity be a lady whose close acquaintance it would be foolhardy to make without a trifle ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... some time or other the door must open, and the reprobate come forth in the abhorred garments of the grave. It was thought a high piece of prowess to knock at the Lord Advocate's mausoleum and challenge him to appear. "Bluidy Mackenzie, come oot if ye daur!" sang the foolhardy urchins. But Sir George had other affairs on hand; and the author of an essay on toleration continues to sleep peacefully among the many whom he so intolerantly ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... mountebank," said Wildschloss, "or else there is only one man I know of either so foolhardy or so ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... went into a terrible temper tantrum, rolling on the ground, pawing it in frenzy, squealing in maddened rage. Then Shortie was on his feet, desperate determination showing in every line of his body. With heedless, desperate, foolhardy ...
— The Planet with No Nightmare • Jim Harmon
... "Well, of all the foolhardy, cowardly tricks, I believe that takes the premium!" said Frank, as he arose and grasped the wheel again. "That man is drunk ...
— Frank Merriwell's Cruise • Burt L. Standish
... wait to be asked a second time? Oh, no! Even had I not been the "foolhardy Ebers," I should have accepted her invitation. The very next evening I was in the pleasant sitting-room, and whenever I could slip away after supper I went to the girl, whom I loved more and more ardently. Sometimes ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... sphere for her. She almost trembled at the audacity which might have carried her on to a terrible rebuff. She could find heart only to look at the pictures which were showy and then walk out. It seemed to her as if she had made a splendid escape and that it would be foolhardy to think of ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... fairly gallied this week when the King went out yachting, meaning to be back for the theatre; and the eight or nine o'clock came, and never a sign of him. I don't know when 'a did land; but 'twas said by all that it was a foolhardy ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... proceeded to batter in the door with a log, and as it fell in, Jim McCandlas, who must have been a brave man to undertake so foolhardy a thing against a man already known as a killer, sprang in at the opening. He, of course, was killed at once. This exhausted the rifle, and Bill picked up the six-shooters from the table and in three ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... so, I do not doubt the truth of what you declare. It looks like a foolhardy risk, but boys will be boys. I will not detain you now; for others wish to welcome you back, and I know they are all glad to see you, unexpected ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic
... he got into the taxi, he would have called footless and foolhardy an hour before, and at any other hour his judgment might have restrained him. But just now he seemed controlled by a force greater than smooth-running judgment—a composite of many forces: by sudden jealousy, by a sudden desire to shield ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... wanting to enlist in the British Aero Corps, to get life's supreme sensation—scouting ten thousand feet in air, while dozens of batteries fired at him; a nose-to-earth volplane. The thinking Carl, the playmate Carl that Ruth knew, was masked as the foolhardy adventurer—and as one who was not merely talking, but might really do the thing he pictured. And Martin Dockerill seemed so dreadfully to take it for granted that ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... such a fit of coughing he burst a blood-vessel, and the man who let the bromine out got away and never came back. I suppose he thought there was going to be a death. But the broker lived, and left the next day; and I have never seen him since, either." Edison tells also of another foolhardy laboratory trick of the same kind: "Some of my assistants in those days were very green in the business, as I did not care whether they had had any experience or not. I generally tried to turn them loose. One day I got a new man, and told him to conduct ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... War—the hideous din, the horror of man let loose and become beast once more, the pitiless yell of the victors, the despairing cry of the vanquished, the irremediable overthrow! It would, however, be foolhardy in those who can only guess at what the picture may have been to arrogate to themselves the right of sitting in judgment on Vasari and those contemporaries who, actually seeing, enthusiastically admired it. What excited their delight must surely have been Titian's magic power of brush as displayed ...
— The Later works of Titian • Claude Phillips
... health of body and mind should be thus considered—pleasant, less as personal gratification, than that it casually reflected a proof of her good judgment in a course which everybody among her kindred had condemned by calling a foolhardy undertaking. ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... baseness and excessive self-denial; gentleness is a mean between irascibility and insensibility to insult; modesty is a mean between impudence and shamefacedness. People are often mistaken and regard one of the extremes as a virtue. Thus the reckless and the foolhardy is often praised as the brave; the man of no backbone is called gentle; the indolent is mistaken for the contented; the insensible for the temperate, the extravagant for the generous. This is an error. The mean ...
— A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy • Isaac Husik
... of days before I yielded. Common sense told me it was futile, even foolhardy, to gaze again on the vision of perfect desirability. I fought against the hunger, but I fought hopelessly, and was not at all surprised to find myself one evening rapping on van Manderpootz's door in the University ...
— The Ideal • Stanley Grauman Weinbaum
... and fanaticism render them almost foolhardy in a battle, if a Moro sees that he is beaten and that escape is possible, he will avail himself of opportunities to fight another day. If brought to bay, however, he is desperate, and in his more religious moments he will throw himself on a ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... desperate, unhelped enterprises, when there is support at hand which may be had for the asking, may be one road to glory, but it is certainly not the path to success in War. The Charge of the Light Brigade at Balaklava was made immortal by Tennyson's poem, but it was as foolhardy as asking a troop of Boy Scouts to capture Gibraltar. In battle, a main obligation of those who lead is to make constant resurvey of the full horizon of their resources and means of possible support. This entails in time of peace the acquisition of a great body of knowledge seemingly unrelated ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... last word. He only came up against it when caught in the act of selling spirits. This was scarcely likely to happen. He was far too astute. His only danger was a trap customer, and the difficulties and dangers of attempting such a course, even the most foolhardy would scarcely dare to risk in a place ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... the Crown in Bishopgate Street, and as you did not care to return to your lodgings near Saint Botolph's Church without Aldgate, you privily despatched Dick Taverner to bring your horses from the Falcon in Gracechurch Street, where you had left them, with the foolhardy intention of setting forth this morning to Theobalds, to try and obtain an ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... away from an infuriated populace; there were then thousands of sturdy New Englanders in the towns about, ready to crowd into Boston at the proper signal; and what were two single regiments to do if they had come? It was foolhardy in Hutchinson to resist the demand of the determined gathering at the Old South. He had been wise the evening before, but on that day his sagacity deserted him. When Lord North, the unwise minister of King George, heard of the circumstances, he was ...
— Under the Liberty Tree - A Story of The 'Boston Massacre' • James Otis
... disheartened the Christian world, men, women and children being mercilessly butchered, burnt alive, or carried into a still more horrible captivity. But Divine Providence remedied this terrible state of affairs, by means not naturally looked for, and which in the commencement seemed not only foolhardy, but little suited to the end. Yet a very special providence was visibly at work, in a chain of events that were altogether miraculous, as the sequel proved. A new colony was founded at Montreal, which was intended ...
— The Life of Venerable Sister Margaret Bourgeois • Anon.
... came to an abrupt halt as soon as she saw Grosvenor, straight toward whom she was charging. In an instant the white man's rifle leapt to his shoulder, and the next instant he fired. But even as he pressed the trigger, a dog, more valiant or more foolhardy than the rest, dashed in upon her, and with the rapidity of lightning she turned to meet his rush, dropping her cub, and nearly tearing the miserable cur's head from his shoulders with a single stroke of her powerful fore paw. At the same instant Grosvenor's bullet, aimed ...
— The Adventures of Dick Maitland - A Tale of Unknown Africa • Harry Collingwood
... these overland travelers were over-zealous, even foolhardy. One of the earliest pioneers, Mr. Daniel B. Miller, who reached Oregon by the plains route in 1852, wrote later to relatives in Illinois, "I would not bring a family across for all that is contained in Oregon and California." Himself single, he had come with ...
— Crossing the Plains, Days of '57 - A Narrative of Early Emigrant Tavel to California by the Ox-team Method • William Audley Maxwell
... seemed to be too far apart to be of much help to each other, for the cupola Crows had lost little time in lifting the trap-door of the belfry and finding that the ladder was gone, and none of them was hardy—or foolhardy—enough to risk the drop into the uncertain dark. So there ...
— The Dozen from Lakerim • Rupert Hughes
... than this will be found in which to say a few words about the remarkable man who planned and led this movement about Hooker's flank,—a manoeuvre which must have been condemned as foolhardy if unsuccessful, but whose triumph wove a final wreath to crown ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... very anxious, and he could not help asking himself whether or not he was engaged in a foolhardy enterprise in attacking the fort. His orders related only to the steamer that was loading in the bay, and he had been warned in his instructions to take the fort into consideration in his operations. He felt that he had given proper attention to the fort, inasmuch as he had disabled ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... success this incident brought her turned Laura's head, making her so foolhardy in her inventions that Maria, who for all her boldness of speech was at heart a prude like ...
— The Getting of Wisdom • Henry Handel Richardson
... It would seem a foolhardy thing to do—to invite battle with such an overwhelming force, when they might quietly reach their boat and make away without detection. But their blood was up, and there was a friend and ally in peril of a Spanish dungeon ...
— A Prisoner of Morro - In the Hands of the Enemy • Upton Sinclair
... overhanging rock is at this point. It is a piece of granite, say four or five feet wide, flat on top, but with rounding edges. It sticks out from the cliff several feet. Foolhardy people walk out to the edge of it and make their bow to imaginary audiences over three thousand feet below. One of the guides with our party, wearing heavy "chaps" (bear-skin overalls) walked out upon this rock, took off his hat, waved it over his head, posed for his photograph, even took a jig ...
— Out of Doors—California and Oregon • J. A. Graves
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