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Fording

noun
1.
The act of crossing a stream or river by wading or in a car or on a horse.  Synonym: ford.



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"Fording" Quotes from Famous Books



... to forest scenery, the Wards at its novelty, and the escape from town. Too happy were they at first to care for the shaking and bumping of the road, and the first mud-hole into which they plunged was almost a joke, under Mordaunt Muller's assurances that it was easy fording, though the splashes flew far and wide. Then there was what Philetus called 'a mash with a real handsome bridge over it,' i. e. a succession of tree trunks laid side by side for about a quarter of a mile. Here the female passengers ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge

... track of the buffalo, and using skins as the only shelter against rain, winning favour with the savages by the confiding courage of their leader—they ascended the streams towards the first ridges of highlands, walking through beautiful plains and groves, among deer and buffaloes,—now fording the clear rivulets, now building a bridge by felling a giant tree across a stream, till they had passed the basin of the Colorado, and in the upland country had reached a branch of the ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat

... crossing of the main highway over ten miles to the southwest. There, too, the river might be forded even if the Austrians had destroyed that bridge also; but here or elsewhere in the hills there could be no fording—the banks of ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... was to Marty the pleasure of fording a small stream, where the horses were allowed to stop and drink. Presently they had a distant view of a cascade, called Buttermilk Falls. As the road did not approach very near, only a glimpse could be caught of the creamy foam; but Hiram said that some day, if Mr. Stokes could spare him, he would ...
— A Missionary Twig • Emma L. Burnett

... asked me if we could hold up the herd for a closer inspection. The lead cattle were then nearly a mile away, and galloping off to overtake the point, I left the party watching the saddle horses, which were then fording in our rear. But no sooner had I reached the lead and held up the herd, than I noticed Siringo on the wrangler's horse, coming up on the opposite side of the column of cattle from the vehicle. Supposing he had something of a private nature to communicate, I leisurely rode down ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams

... wood came down like a wall but a little way from the lip of the water; and scattered trees, mostly quicken-trees grew here and there on the very water side. But Mirkwood-water ran deep swift and narrow between high clean-cloven banks, so that none could dream of fording, and not so many of swimming its dark green dangerous waters. And the day wore on towards evening and the glory of the western sky was unseen because of the wall of high trees. And still the host made on, and because of the narrowness of the ...
— The House of the Wolfings - A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse • William Morris

... Crossing occupied the better part of two days and then the main body of the Indian Expedition resumed its forward march. It crossed the Neosho and moved on, down the west side of Grand River, to a fording place, Carey's Ford, at which point, it passed over to the east side of the river and camped, a short distance from the ford, at Round Grove, on Cowskin Prairie, Cherokee ground, and the scene of Doubleday's recent encounter with the enemy. ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel

... where we were—those long days of fording rivers and beating our way through jungle or of dizzy climbs up to the snow, those short nights, so cold that six blankets hardly kept us warm, while our tired horses wandered far, searching for such bits of grass as grew ...
— Tenting To-night - A Chronicle of Sport and Adventure in Glacier Park and the - Cascade Mountains • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... Spey, near the Laird of Grant's Castle. Whereupon we began our March about Noon; and the next Day, about the Break thereof, we came to that River, where we soon discover'd the Highlanders by their Fires. Sir Thomas immediately, on Sight of it, issued his Orders for our fording the River, and falling upon them as soon after as possible. Both were accordingly perform'd, and with so good Order, Secrecy and Success, that Cannon and Balfour, their Commanders, were obliged to make their ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe

... night-fall. Next day we again set out, and having succeeded in passing the British forts and blockhouses to the north of Lydenburg, we came upon the Spekboom River. This river was so swollen by the recent rains that no fording was possible, and we were only able to cross by making our horses swim. At one o'clock we reached Koodekraus, and off-saddled there. This place is about 15 miles to the west of Lydenburg. At dawn the next day, ...
— My Reminiscences of the Anglo-Boer War • Ben Viljoen

... blackamoors had taken the precaution to strap each of theirs down with a strong grass lanyard. We continued to work to windward, while every now and then the hollo came past us on the gale louder and louder, until it guided us to the fording which we had crossed on our first arrival. We stopped there;—the red torrent was rushing tumultuously past us, but we saw nothing save a few wet and shivering negroes on the opposite side, who had sheltered themselves under a cliff, and were ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott

... accommodating herself to a man's saddle. By that time Hugues and Mathilde were on his second horse. I got upon my own, and we started. Our immediate purpose was to go to Hugues's house by the woods and lanes, fording the ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens

... rode across Kentucky, where he was struck, as every one was and is, by the luxuriant beauty of the blue-grass farms. He dwells upon the difficulty and horror of fording the rivers at that season of the year. Some of his narrow escapes made such a deep impression upon his mind that he used to dream of them fifty years after. He paid a visit to old Governor Shelby of warlike renown, one of the heroes of the frontier, ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton

... thickets, covering great areas of comparative level. Long reaches of grassland opened before them, waving yellow in the autumn sun. They crossed other rivers of various degrees of depth and swiftness, swimming some and fording others. Hazel drew upon her knowledge of British Columbia geography, and decided that the big river where Bill hid his canoe must be the Fraser where it debouched from the mountains. And in that case she was far north, and in ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... swiftly over the roads towards the north, but in a few hours the wooden animal had to slacken his pace because the farm houses had become few and far between and often there were no paths at all in the direction they wished to follow. At such times they crossed the fields, avoiding groups of trees and fording the streams and rivulets whenever they came to them. But finally they reached a broad hillside closely covered with scrubby brush, through which the wagon ...
— Glinda of Oz • L. Frank Baum

... we rode forward, and, fording the stream, made our way over a mass of ruins which filled the ditch, into the interior. The scene which presented itself told a sad tale. There lay, round the tower, the bodies of friends and foes in equal numbers, with limbs torn, clothing ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston

... from two to ten miles long, and from a quarter of a mile to a mile broad. In the course of thirty geographical miles, he crossed twenty-nine, and that, too, at the end of the fourth month of the dry season. It was necessary for him to strip the lower part of his person before fording them, and then the leeches pounced on him, and in a moment had secured such a grip, that even twisting them round the fingers failed ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie

... we crossed the Platte river by fording. The stream, as I remember it, was near a mile wide, but not waist deep. Thirty and forty oxen were hitched to one wagon, to effect the crossing. But woe to the hapless team that stalled in the treacherous quicksands. They must be kept going, as it required but a short stop for the ...
— Reminiscences of a Pioneer • Colonel William Thompson

... Mr. Schreiner to spend the night with us, and this he did after fording with some difficulty the swift-running river. In the morning we showed him our quarters, our filter, the roads we had built, the spar bridge across to Kite Island, our surveying instrument and the chart we had made of the vicinity. He was greatly pleased with ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond

... the vault of heaven was thick inlaid with patterns of bright gold. But the plunge of my companion's horse in the water, and his voice calling out that all was right, soon drew me away, and in another moment I was fording in utter darkness the rapid though shallow stream of ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes

... being spoiled—well, he would just like to tell Geisner what he thought of him in emphatic bush lingo. Nellie, herself, seemed peacefully happy. Yet Mrs. Stratton had accused her of "worrying." When Ned thought of this he felt as he did when fording a strange creek, running a banker. He did not ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller

... we continued our journey; and at length, after a somewhat fatiguing march over the wide-extended plain,—having to cross several rivers and swamps, sometimes fording them, and at others passing over in hide-formed canoes, while the horses swam behind us,—we reached Don Fernando's. Our welcome was such as might have been expected: Norah was received as a daughter, and Don Carlos and I were treated as heroes; and ...
— The Young Llanero - A Story of War and Wild Life in Venezuela • W.H.G. Kingston

... part of the river had yet to be passed—a section close to the shore, where the water was deep and the rocks for fording few. ...
— Dave Porter and the Runaways - Last Days at Oak Hall • Edward Stratemeyer

... with a meaning. Searching with my eye the meeting-place of land and water, I saw what looked like a boat. Where could it have come from? There had been an old broad-bottomed craft, used for fording in spate times, on a pool a mile or so up the glen, and the flood had brought it down and thrown it ashore. Could I get it afloat, navigate it to the perishing man, ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne

... lumber road for fully ten miles, fording two streams, then halting at a sawmill on the banks of a river. The mill had not yet started operations. Tom got off and looked the property over, consulted his map, then the journey was resumed. Just beyond the mill they came upon another of the now familiar blazes, directing ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders in the Great North Woods • Jessie Graham Flower

... situations!—when spying the Alps, by a sunset in the Sicilian sea; drawing up his army for battle, in sight of the Pyramids, and saying to his troops, "From the tops of those pyramids, forty centuries look down on you;" fording the Red Sea; wading in the gulf of the Isthmus of Suez. On the shore of Ptolemais, gigantic projects agitated him. "Had Acre fallen, I should have changed the face of the world." His army, on the night of the battle of Austerlitz, which was the anniversary of his inauguration as Emperor, ...
— Representative Men • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... we crossed the line into Maryland, fording the Antietam creek, the bridge over which the rebs had burned; and Sunday we footed it back and forth over roads and across ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... a cut down the mountain, and discovered a highroad at the bottom, I saw that the river before me needed fording, like all the rest; and as my map showed me there was no bridge for many miles down, I cast about to cross directly, if possible on ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc

... household in all its branches, were always on hand at parish meetings in Salem Village. Over a distance, as their route must have been, of five miles, they came, in all seasons and all weathers, by the roughest roads, and, in the earlier period, where there were no roads at all, through the woods, fording streams, to meeting on the Lord's Day. He continued vigorous, hale, and active to the last; and died, as he truly characterizes himself in his will, "an ancient," Jan. 1, 1702, at the age ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham

... waste no strength unnecessarily in trying to stem a current; yield partly, and land obliquely lower down; if exhausted, float: the slightest motion of the hands will ordinarily keep the face above water; in any event keep your wits collected. In fording deeply, a heavy stone [in the hands, above water] will strengthen ...
— How to Camp Out • John M. Gould

... attracted the attention of a servant, who remarked that she had never seen such an impudent-looking woman. "See what long strides the jade takes!" she cried; "and how awkwardly she manages her petticoats!" And this was true enough, for in fording a little brook "Betty Burke" had to be severely reprimanded by her chaperon for her impropriety in lifting her skirts! Upon reaching the house, Macdonald's little girl caught sight of the strange woman, and ran away to tell her mother that her father had brought ...
— Secret Chambers and Hiding Places • Allan Fea

... gradually extended its scope in spite of the almost insuperable difficulties. The roads were still so miserable that wares had to be carried on pack-horses instead of in wagons. Frequently the merchant had to risk spoiling his bales of silk in fording a stream, for bridges were few and usually in urgent need of repair. Travel not only was fraught with hardship; it was expensive. Feudal lords exacted heavy tolls from travelers on road, bridge, or river. Between Mainz and Cologne, on the Rhine, toll was levied in thirteen ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes

... part of the river was still too deep for mere fording. Horses and men had to swim; so the gentlemen sat still on their saddles, with their feet put up on the necks of their horses, which were led by naked swimming Arabs in the water holding the bridles, one ...
— Byeways in Palestine • James Finn

... part of the fording-place, and when the water was low, which was the case at this time, there ...
— New National Fourth Reader • Charles J. Barnes and J. Marshall Hawkes

... train was an alarming one. It was the duty of Captain Cook and his soldiers to guard it as far as the fording of the Arkansas, at that time the boundary line between the two countries. There was good reason for believing that a strong band of Texan rangers were waiting beyond, with the intention of attacking and plundering the train. Indeed the Mexican who had it in charge had received information ...
— The Life of Kit Carson • Edward S. Ellis

... was the first that ever circled the Grand Canyon, for return was by the Ute Crossing, where fording was difficult and dangerous, for the water was deep and ice was running. The three Hopi were dismayed over their violation of tradition, but were induced to go on. Incidentally, food became so scarce that resort was had to the killing ...
— Mormon Settlement in Arizona • James H. McClintock

... Asia Minor, or intending to make his way through the defiles of the Taurus, Samosata offered a convenient fording-place; but this route would compel the general, who had Naharaim or the kingdoms of Chaldaea in view, to make a long detour, and although the Assyrians used it at a later period, at the time of their expeditions to the valleys of the Halys, the Egyptians do not seem ever to have travelled by this ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero

... cattle-herds south of Scott's Bluffs and in the valleys of Horsehead and Bear Creeks. One party had even dared to attack the ranches far up the Chugwater Valley at the crossing of the Cheyenne road; another had ridden all around Fort Laramie, fording the Platte above and below; and several of them had made away with dozens of head of cattle bearing the well-known brand of Mr. Holmes of Chicago. It was to see what could be done toward preventing the recurrence of this sort of thing that brought ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King

... soon found ourselves on firm gravelly ground, and made haste to the huge ice wall, which seemed to recede as we advanced. The only difficulty we met was a network of icy streams, at the largest of which we halted, not willing to get wet in fording. The Indian attendant promptly carried us over on his back. When my turn came I told him I would ford, but he bowed his shoulders in so ludicrously persuasive a manner I thought I would try the queer mount, the only one of the kind I had enjoyed since boyhood days in playing leapfrog. ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir

... imprisoned had to wrestle with. On the 6th, however, Wolfe struggled up, and during that day and the next superintended the march of his picked column, numbering some four thousand men, up the south bank of the river. Fording, near waist-deep, the Etchemain River, they were received beyond its mouth by the boats of the fleet, and, as each detachment arrived, conveyed on board. The Forty-eighth, however, seven hundred strong, were left, under Colonel ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various

... was at this time in flood, running turbid and swift. But the Highlanders have a peculiar way of crossing deep rivers. They stand shoulder to shoulder, with their arms linked, and so pass in a continuous chain across. As Charles was fording the stream on horseback, one man was swept away from the rest and was being rapidly carried down. The Prince caught him by the hair, shouting in Gaelic, ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various

... fondest of was that which I relished least: my—now his—horse. Into the open ulcer of my heart he poured the acid of all manner of questions concerning my lost steed's qualities and capabilities: would he swim? how was he in fording? did he jump well! how did he stand fire? I smothered my irritation, and answered as pleasantly as ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... Shipbuilders, pilots, and seamen, were brought from the Baltic, from Hamburgh, from Genoa. The whole surface of the obedient Netherlands, whence wholesome industry had long been banished, was now the scene of a prodigious baleful activity. Portable bridges for fording the rivers of England, stockades for entrenchments, rafts and oars, were provided in vast numbers, and Alexander dug canals and widened natural streams to facilitate his operations. These wretched Provinces, crippled, impoverished, languishing for peace, were forced to contribute out of ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... which you will see, by looking on a map of England, came directly in his way. He tried to get across the river, but the people destroyed the bridges and the boats, and he could not get over. He marched up to where the stream was small, in hopes of finding a fording place, but the waters were so swollen with the fall rains that he failed in this attempt as well as the others. The result was, that Richard came up while Buckingham was entangled among the intricacies of the ground produced by the inundations. Buckingham's ...
— Richard III - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... hesitation, welcomed them, supplied their wants and gave them a comfortable wigwam for the night. They were then informed that they were about twenty-five miles from the lakes. After experiencing some difficulty in fording a dangerous stream and spending another night in the woods they saw the houses on ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various

... they have stepped into the stream of their existence in some new fording-place, they have gone with great caution, not with an immature confidence born of naught save foolish audacity. Their river of life is an open water before their pleasant eyes; they prepare not for a flood in the fall, neither do they make ready ...
— The Golden Censer - The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future • John McGovern

... not tell. His tone was controlled, as if to hide pain. "It's all right. You mustn't worry any more. Wish I could have sent you news sooner. I hoped you'd guess we were getting the upper hand when the shots died away. Coming home I spotted the sneaks fording the river. I turned the car, and stirred up the boys. Then we had a shindy, and scared the dogs cold—bagged a few, but I guess nobody croaked—anyhow, none of our crowd. Half a dozen ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... As no man fording a swift stream can dip his foot twice into the same water, so no man can, with exactness, affirm of anything in the sensible world that it is.[Note 2] As he utters the words, nay, as he thinks them, the predicate ceases to be applicable; the present has become ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley

... seal the fate of those dear to them. The hearts of both are sad, their bosoms racked with anguish, as they sit in their saddles with eyes bent on the turbid stream, which cruelly forbids fording it. ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid

... by her faithful Karens, and her little boy borne in their arms,—leaving Mr. Mason to his indispensable task of acquiring the language, she would thread the wild passes of the mountains, and the obscure paths of the jungle, fording the smaller streams and carried over the larger in a chair borne on bamboo poles by her followers,—carrying joy and gladness to the hearts of the simple-minded villagers, and cheering her own by witnessing their ...
— Lives of the Three Mrs. Judsons • Arabella W. Stuart

... directed the grenadiers and royal Americans to form on the beach, where they were to wait until the whole army could be arranged to sustain them. Orders were at the same time dispatched to Townshend and Murray to be in readiness for fording ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall

... said Athos. "We will divide our regiments into two squadrons. You will put yourself at the head of the first. We and his majesty will lead the second. If no obstacle occurs we will both charge together, force the enemy's line and throw ourselves into the Tyne, which we must cross, either by fording or swimming; if, on the contrary, any repulse should take place, you and your men must fight to the last man, whilst we and the king proceed on our road. Once arrived at the brink of the river, should we even find them three ranks deep, ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... Linkinwater, the horse, whose self-will had increased with his years, soon made the discovery that he for the nonce held the reins of power; and when they reached Roaring Brook, instead of proceeding decorously across the bridge, he persisted in descending a somewhat steep bank and fording the stream. Half-way across, he found the coolness of the water so agreeable that he decided to enjoy it ad libitum. No expostulations nor chirrupings nor cluckings availed aught. He felt himself master of the occasion, and would not budge an inch. He looked up stream ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 • Various

... as they could, on planks, in a few boats, and by fording. The Russians disappeared behind the flames, whither our foremost riflemen followed them,—when they saw an inhabitant come forth, approach them, and cry out that he was a Frenchman. His joy and his accent confirmed ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur

... Kentucky prison. Here we took leave of our conductor, Henry Marshal, and a team and teamster were provided to take us on by way of Bellefontaine. The anticipated warmer weather overtook us, and with a wagon we left Carthaginia. Streams with floating ice made fording difficult, especially Mosquito Creek; but our driver and Simon measured the depth of water, and with rails pushed the floating ice from the ford, to enable me to drive through. Working as they did with all their might to keep the cakes ...
— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland

... fording the Guaynopa Creek near its junction with the Aros River, and selected a camping place on a terrace 200 feet above it. The stream, which is the one that passes the cave-dwellings, carries a good deal of limpid water, and there are abundant signs that at times it runs very high. The ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz

... posted at the head of the winding roadway can hold at bay an army toiling up from the valley; but, as at Thermopylae, the position is liable to be outflanked by an enterprising foe, who should scale the footpath leading over the western offshoots of Monte Baldo, and, fording the stream at its foot, should then advance eastwards against the village. This, in part, was Alvintzy's plan, and having nearly 28,000 men,[71] he doubted not that his enveloping tactics must capture Joubert's division of 10,000 men. So daunted was even ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... shall come back home. I know not whom I shall chance to meet. There at the fording in the little boat the unknown man ...
— Gitanjali • Rabindranath Tagore

... seemed at least a yard deep. Once they passed an oddly shaped broad track by the road-side, which the driver told them was the foot-mark of a bear. This was exciting. And a little farther on, at the fording of a shallow brook, he showed them where a deer had stopped to drink the night before, and left the impression of his slender ...
— Eyebright - A Story • Susan Coolidge

... those calm, unconscious heroines start, fixing their hairpinned braids with quick, deft touches, pinning up their skirts as for the crossing of a wimpling burn rather than for the fording of Death's black river. They measured the distance with cool, keen eyes, took up a can in each hand, exchanged a word, and started. The remaining can they left behind, saying they would come back for it. And they meant to, and ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... feet, over which the track crossed, we perceived a group of very high snowy peaks about eight miles distant. Between them and us stood a range of hills cut by a valley, along which flowed a river carrying a large volume of water. This we followed to 126 deg. (b.m.), and having found a suitable fording-place, we crossed over at a spot where the stream was twenty-five yards across, and the water reached up to our waists. We found here another mani wall with large inscriptions on stones, and as the wind was very high and cutting, we made use of it to shelter us. Within the ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... last, looking at the western side of the island, I observed that every day the tides ebbed, leaving shallow water for which the flow did not compensate; and by the end of the month the sea showed dry land in that direction. At this I rejoiced making certain of my safety; so I arose and fording what little was left of the water got me to the mainland, where I fell in with great heaps of loose sand in which even a camel's hoof would sink up to the knee.[FN281] However I emboldened my soul and wading through the sand ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... Crown of Eagle Feathers Warriors of Other Days Chief Plenty Coups The Peaceful Camp Chief Red Whip The Pause in the Journey Chief Timbo The Downward Trail Chief Apache John Climbing the Great Divide Chief Running Bird Chiefs Fording the Little Bighorn Chief Brave Bear Skirting the Sky-Line Chief Umapine Down the Western Slope The Last Arrow Chief Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa Chief Runs the Enemy Scouting Party on the Plains Scouts passing under cover of the Night Map of the Custer ...
— The Vanishing Race • Dr. Joseph Kossuth Dixon

... that the Rakaia is now tending rather to the northern side. A fresh comes down upon a crumbling bank of sand and loose shingle with incredible force, tearing it away hour by hour in ravenous bites. In fording the river one crosses now a considerable stream on the northern side, where four months ago there was hardly any; while after one has done with the water part of the story, there remains a large extent of river-bed, in the process of gradually being covered with cabbage-trees, flax, ...
— A First Year in Canterbury Settlement • Samuel Butler

... and it is impossible for me to sleep. It is as if I were up over Kiev in an aeroplane, myself. I can see millions of Germans marching along the roads from Warsaw, dragging their cannon through the mud, fording streams, with their field kitchens and ambulances, moving onward irresistibly toward the ...
— Trapped in 'Black Russia' - Letters June-November 1915 • Ruth Pierce

... of the Don have again risen, so as to prevent the army from fording the stream," observed Father Haydocke; "or it may be that some disaster hath befallen ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth

... and strike and plunge down the slope. In their evidence at the inquest, and again at the Board of Trade inquiry, these men agree that it took them from five to eight minutes only to alight, run down and across the valley (fording the stream on their way), and scramble up to the scene of the disaster: and they further agree that one of the first sad objects on which their eyes fell was the dead body of Sir John Crang with Mr. Molesworth, alive but sadly injured and bleeding, stretched ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... Pony Rider Boys In Texas" that we found the lads learning the first rudiments of the cattle business. The thrilling part that the young men took in the long cattle drive, with its stampedes, the fording of swollen rivers, the games of the cowboys and the tricks of the cattle thieves, is related in that second volume. How the boys improved their shooting and mastered the details of that fascinating sport of handling the lariat are all familiar to ...
— The Pony Rider Boys with the Texas Rangers • Frank Gee Patchin

... returned, by the Boydton road to Dinwiddie Court House, fording Gravelly Run with ease. When I got as far as the Dabney road I sent Colonel Newhall out on it toward Five Forks, with orders for Merritt to develop the enemy's position and strength, and then rode on to Dinwiddie to endeavor to get all my other troops up. Merritt was halted at the intersection ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. II., Part 4 • P. H. Sheridan

... Fish jump round us; two come in forward, pretty little silvery fellows with a potent smell of herring, one big fellow surges nearly ashore. As the boat-house and club lights appear we go hard and fast on to a bank, and a native wayfarer fording the river in the dark, whom we mistake for a Club servant expecting us, is ordered to shove us off, which he does and goes on his way without ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch

... pains; Cheap vulgar arts, whose narrowness affords No flight for thoughts, but poorly sticks at words. 20 A new and nobler way thou dost pursue To make translations and translators too. They but preserve the ashes, thou the flame, True to his sense, but truer to his fame: Fording his current, where thou find'st it low, Let'st in thine own to make it rise and flow; Wisely restoring whatsoever grace It lost by change of times, or tongues, or place. Nor fetter'd to his numbers and his times, Betray'st his music to unhappy ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham

... and seemed scarcely to have touched the edge of that wild garden where nature had been seized with a prodigal impulse. And now, rather to be doing something than to await in irritation for Seth and Claire, she turned her pony's head and rode toward the glade. In five minutes she was fording a little stream, beyond which the road rose slightly to cross the shoulder of a hill, and dipped again to run in a sharp curve along the margin of the glade. She took the rise at a gallop, sped down the other slope, and at the curve of the road reined ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham

... towards his native place, New Amsterdam, whence he had formerly been obliged to abscond precipitately, in consequence of misfortune in business—that is to say, having been detected in the act of sheep-stealing. After wandering many days in the woods, toiling through swamps, fording brooks, swimming various rivers, and encountering a world of hardships that would have killed any other being but an Indian, a backwoodsman, or the devil, he at length arrived, half famished, and lank as a starved weasel, at Communipaw, where he stole a canoe, and paddled ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving

... industriously up the right bank of the stream. When she had gone a couple of miles, and the dogs were evidently gaining again, she crossed the broad, deep brook, climbed the steep, left bank, and fled on in the direction of the Mount Marcy trail. The fording of the river threw the hounds off for a time. She knew, by their uncertain yelping up and down the opposite bank, that she had a little respite; she used it, however, to push on until the baying was faint in her ears; and then she dropped, ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten

... that morning met the horse of George Tryan swimming on the prairie; how that, farther on, he found him lying, quite cold and dead, with no marks or bruises on his person; that he had probably become exhausted in fording the creek, and that he had as probably reached the mound only to die for want of that help he had so freely given to others; that, as a last act, he had freed his horse. These incidents were corroborated by many who collected in the great chamber that evening—women and children—most ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte

... been called away by Lee only an hour before, and had made the hasty march by the rear of Sharpsburg to fall upon Sedgwick. If therefore Rodman had been sent to cross at eight o'clock, it is safe to say that his column, fording the stream in the face of Walker's deployed division, would never have reached the further bank,—a contingency that McClellan did not consider when arguing, long afterward, the favorable results that might have followed an earlier attack. As Rodman died upon the field, no full report for ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox

... After fording Venter's Spruit the battalion halted about 2 p.m. on some rising ground, whence a good view of the surrounding country was obtained. As there seemed every prospect of a long halt, the men began to take off their ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring

... throwing his mare on her haunches, pulled up alongside of me, and with a grace of manner which soon made me forget his appearance, entered into a conversation which lasted for more than three hours, in spite of the manifold checks of fording streams, single file, abrupt ascents and descents, and other incidents of mountain travel. The ride was one series of glories and surprises, of "park" and glade, of lake and stream, of mountains ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird

... street must have been the bed of a torrent, as the alleys and by-ways of Naples are still; hence, one, sometimes three, thicker blocks were placed so as to enable foot passengers to cross with dry feet. These small fording blocks must have made it difficult for vehicles to get by; hence, the ruts that are still found traceable on the pavement are the marks of wagons drawn slowly by oxen, and not of those light chariots which romance-writers ...
— The Wonders of Pompeii • Marc Monnier

... they unexpectedly came to the banks of a considerable stream, and, after a careful search, failed to discover any practicable means of crossing it, except by fording. The fact of its being fordable gave rise to an incident with a moral, and as the gallant captain relates the story we will quote his ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens

... lines of barbed-wire entanglements, one in the bed of the stream which would prevent fording or swimming, and which, being under water, could not easily be destroyed by gunfire from the southern bank. Above this was a heavy chevaux-de-frise and barbed-wire entanglement, partly sunk and concealed from view; in many places ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... campaign in the early days of Kansas scarcely can be described. Much of the travelling had to be done in wagons, fording streams, crossing the treeless prairies, losing the faintly outlined road in the darkness of night, sleeping in cabins, drinking poor water and subsisting on bacon, soda-raised bread, canned meats ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper

... of Trilobites. Later there is the Age of Fishes, then of Cryptogams and Amphibia, and then of Cycads and Reptiles, and there will afterwards be an Age of Birds and Mammals, and finally an Age of Man. But there is no ground for mystic speculation on this circumstance of a group of organisms fording the earth for a few million years, and then perishing or dwindling into insignificance. We shall see that a very plain and substantial process put an end to the Age of the Cycads, Ammonites, and Reptiles, and we have seen how ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe

... roughest of roads, brought us opposite Chumba. The bridge had been swept away, and fording such a torrent was impossible. Two long poplar trees spanned the flood; and we crossed on them, bending under us at every step. Nazee was on the bank, ready to greet us. After a few words of salutation and kind inquiry, she hastened ...
— Woman And Her Saviour In Persia • A Returned Missionary

... we rode over rocky mesas or through dense chapparal,—here fording a stream, now thundering over a barren plain, or picking our way through gloomy ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens

... sleeping placidly up-stairs—that was the best intelligence that our host could give us. He laughed at the idea of fording the Potomac, declaring that no living man or horse could stand, much less swim, in the stream. Knowing the character of the man, and his thorough acquaintance with the locality, one ought to have accepted his decision unquestioned; but I was not then so inured to disappointment ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence

... now, my lads, hinder me no longer, I must ride and run till this be delivered to my lady, and your mistress, that is to be." He was soon in the saddle, and when there, rode as if carrying the news, that a French division, having surprised the dreamy Spaniards in Badajoz, was already fording the Cayo, without meeting even Goring's handful of dragoons, to ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen

... spare and very burned, with bright red hair and blue eyes that had a kind of laughter in them, and yet were sober. His buckskin hunting shirt was old and stained and frayed by the briers, and his leggins and moccasins were wet from fording the stream. He leaned his chin on the muzzle of ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... time for rest, pushing forward by day and night, and after fording many of the smaller mountain-streams, on the evening of the third day of his travel he came upon what he believed to be a well-traveled road. But—how strange!—there were two endless iron rails lying side by side upon the ground. Such a curious sight he had never beheld. There were also ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... nearly a fortnight of clambering over mountains, pushing through tropical thickets, fording streams, and negotiating in palm huts, we approached the sea; and suddenly, on the north side of the island, at the top of the mountain back of Puerto Plata, we looked far down upon its beautiful harbor, in the midst of which, like a fly upon a mirror, lay ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White

... Polly told me, they travelled westward to the setting sun. They left the orchards and shady woods of Ohio and Indiana far behind them, and crossed the wide prairies of Illinois and Missouri also. When they came to rivers they drove through shallow fording-places, where Polly and the children used to laugh to see the little fishes swimming round the wagon wheels. Sometimes the rivers were deep, and the wagons were ferried over on a flatboat that was fastened to a wire rope, ...
— Stories of California • Ella M. Sexton

... Breckinridge's division, and drove it back on its main lines, not more than five hundred yards distant, in considerable confusion. He held this position until it was dark, with Breckinridge in force on his front, when Crittenden ordered his return. Hascall's command was fording the river, advancing when the order was suspended. Harker succeeded in recrossing the river in the face of this strong force of the enemy without any serious loss. Crittenden placed Van Cleve's division, which had reported marching from the Jefferson turnpike to the Murfreesboro road, in ...
— The Army of the Cumberland • Henry M. Cist

... at which she had been going told on her. Her legs trembled, and her heart beat like a trip-hammer. She slowed her speed, but still fled up the right bank of the stream. The dogs were gaining again, and she crossed the broad, deep brook. The fording of the river threw the hounds off for a time. She used the little respite to push on until the baying ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education

... living in a fairy-story, isn't it, Gail?" Beverly said to me one evening, as we rounded a low hill and followed a deep little creek down to a shallow fording-place. "All we want is a real princess and a real giant. Look at these big trees all you can, for Jondo says pretty soon we won't see ...
— Vanguards of the Plains • Margaret McCarter

... through this network of invisible sentinels, and after fording two streams, the affluents of a nameless river which flows into the sea near Billiers, between Arzal and Dangau, let us boldly enter ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere

... surrounding the post was a prominent object before us in going. Lieutenant Theodore F. True, with an orderly, two mules, and a horse saddled, found us fording the Laramie River to inspect the grave,—if such it can be called, as shown in the picture on this page,—where the body was dried up like a mummy, and nothing else but fragments of a buffalo-robe dangling in the wind was to be seen. Relic hunters had carried away ...
— Three Years on the Plains - Observations of Indians, 1867-1870 • Edmund B. Tuttle

... us. Pitfalls, hillocks, slippery places, the thousand little inequalities of the surface that have to be measured with infallible eye, these disturb us little. To fly or go slowly at will, to pass unshaken over rough and smooth alike, fording rivers without being wet, and mounting hills without climbing, this is indeed unmixed delight. It is the nearest approach to bird-life we seem capable of, since all the monster bubbles and flying fabrics that have been the sport of winds from the days of Montgolfier ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson

... ten or fifteen miles up the winding river, with two fording-places between. We found at the first a broad, swift stream, swollen by a recent rain. We were glad we had made preparations before starting in, for the water flowed six inches deep over the buggy floor. At the village beyond, Cross-Bear ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 54, No. 2, April, 1900 • Various

... going southwest. I would then be far from my crime and would be safe. That is what I meant to do. But once in the silent woods, I began to think of the wrong I had done. I would have given worlds to be back. But it was too late. I had to keep going. Fording rivers, creeping through underbrush, climbing ridges, crossing swampy beaver-meadows, fighting the awful swarms of mosquitoes, I got through the summer, living on fish, game and berries. You see, I had become terribly afraid of the Red Riders—the mounted ...
— Lost In The Air • Roy J. Snell

... the Conewago. Here they were concealed several days, Dr. Lewis carrying provisions to them in his saddle-bags. When the search for them had been given up in William Wright's neighborhood, he went down to Lewisburg and in company with Dr. Lewis took the whole sixteen across the Conewago, they fording the river and carrying the fugitives across on their horses. It was a gloomy night in November. Every few moments clouds floated across the moon, alternately lighting up and shading the river, which, swelled by autumn rains, ran a flood. William Wright and Dr. Lewis mounted men or women behind ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still

... enjoyed herself hugely in her four years. Twice she had been nearly drowned while fording a river on horseback; once she had been run away with on a camel; had witnessed a midnight attack of thieves on her brother's camp; had seen justice administered with long sticks, in the open under trees; could speak Urdu and even rough Punjabi with a fluency that was envied by her seniors; ...
— The Kipling Reader - Selections from the Books of Rudyard Kipling • Rudyard Kipling

... sandy soil. Small partridge very abundant. A fox observed. The ravines wherever there is water, crowded with Typha, and Saccharum; oaks are seen in abundance on the mountain to the south; left the Soorkhab river after fording it near yesterday's camp; the bridge is quite useless for cattle, as the ground is rocky and broken on this side, no pains having been taken to carry the work to the road; cypresses, planes and mulberry trees in the gardens: Cannabis, also one patch of cotton cultivation ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith

... Grenoble till August 1st, and one day rode out, and, after twice fording the river Drac (which makes a great wash) at a league's distance, went over to Pont de Clef, a large arch across that river, where we paid one sol a man; a league further we passed through a large village called Vif, and about a league thence by S. Bathomew, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885 • Various

... Monday, the Indians fired their wigwams, and continued their retreat through the wilderness toward the Connecticut River. They traveled as fast as they could all day, fording icy brooks, until late in the afternoon they came to the borders of a gloomy swamp, ...
— King Philip - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott

... biscuit. And before the simple meal is barely over, the stealthy word passes along the ranks, and a forward march begins, ghost-like in the dawn. Somewhat clumsily manoeuvred by their chiefs, the line, three or four miles in length, dips; down towards the river and crowds at a few chosen fording places. Then it spreads out again like an open fan, and marches up the further slope—the infantrymen dripping from the arm-pits downwards, and the handful of cavalry on the right of the British flank shining in the rising sun ...
— VC — A Chronicle of Castle Barfield and of the Crimea • David Christie Murray

... "Are we not yet at Rome?" We were not yet at Rome; but we did all that men could with four, and sometimes six, half-starved animals, bestrode by drowsy postilions, to reach it. Now we were labouring in deep roads,—now fording impetuous torrents,—and now jolting along on the hard pavement of the Via Aurelia. By the glimpses of the moon we could see the milestones by the roadside, with "ROME" upon them. Seldom has writing thrilled me so. To ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie

... difference, though I was not grumbling at my coarse dishes. It is well that I did not go to Bangweolo Lake, for it is now very unhealthy to the natives, and I fear that without medicine continual wettings by fording rivulets might have knocked me up altogether. As I have mentioned, the people suffer greatly from swelled thyroid gland or ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone

... almost completely environed by a superior force. No means remained of extricating itself from difficulties and dangers which were continually increasing, but fording a river, on the opposite bank of which a formidable body of troops was already posted, and then escaping to Fort George through roads impassable by artillery or wagons, while its rear was closely pressed by a victorious ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing

... river to the west of them was fully two hundred feet broad, and the stream which bounded the other side of their position was, at its mouth, over a hundred and fifty feet in width, and it appeared to be entirely too deep to attempt fording. ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: The Tribesmen • Roger Finlay

... grinding and tumbling over one another as they plunged rapidly onward. It was so dangerous at times for the horses to attempt to swim across, and so hard and disagreeable for the youths, that hours were spent in hunting for a fording place. Fortunately they were always able to gather enough fuel to make themselves comfortable at night; grass became more plentiful and no trouble was had in procuring game. This generally consisted of bison, but it was a great improvement when they were able to bring down a Rocky Mountain ...
— Deerfoot in The Mountains • Edward S. Ellis

... weeks of floundering through muddy prairies and jolting over rough forest roads, now and then fording swollen and dangerous streams, the Lincolns were met near Decatur, Illinois, by Cousin John Hanks, and given a hearty welcome. John had chosen a spot not far from his own home, and had the logs all ready to build a cabin for ...
— The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln • Wayne Whipple

... for miles which could be called a tree, but the grass grew green and rank, and there were many bushes and thickets, and the soil is said to be good. After a pleasant ride of a couple of miles, we saw the white walls of the mission, and fording a small river, we came directly before it. The mission is built of mud, or rather of the unburnt bricks of the country, and plastered. There was something decidedly striking in its appearance: a number of irregular buildings, connected with one another, and disposed in ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana

... Fords.—In fording a swift stream, carry heavy stones in your hand, for you require weight to resist the force of the current: indeed, the deeper you wade, the more weight you require; though you have so much the less at command, on account of the water buoying ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton

... see him voluntarily relinquishing the enjoyments, luxuries, and ease of the opulent refinement in which he was born and bred, and choosing the perils and hardships of the wilderness; as we follow him fording swollen streams, climbing rugged mountains, breasting the forest storms, wading through snowdrifts, sleeping in the open air, living upon the coarse food of hunters and of Indians, we trace with devout admiration the divinely appointed education he was receiving to enable him ...
— Washington's Birthday • Various

... means a thousand feet down on the other side, too. Worse than that, it means fording the Rocky River on beyond, and she's a wild one. Then you've got to ford the Maligne, as well as a lot of little creeks. After that you've got to ford the Athabasca—because we've got to get across the Athabasca in order to go up the Miette River ...
— The Young Alaskans in the Rockies • Emerson Hough

... occurrences on the journey from Missourri to Montana. Many times in crossing the mountains the conditions of the trail were so bad that we frequently had to lower the wagons over ledges by hand with ropes for they were so rough and rugged that horses were of no use. We also had many exciting times fording streams for many of the streams in our way were noted for quicksands and boggy places, where, unless we were very careful, we would have lost horses and all. Then we had many dangers to encounter in the way of streams ...
— Life and Adventures of Calamity Jane • Calamity Jane

... Once, after fording Red Pine Creek, Kiddie dropped a glove, apparently by accident, and dismounted to pick it up. Rube did not observe that, on remounting, his companion held a black feather ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton

... where the old squaw was forced to cling to her saddle, groaning with pain, the kindly Wetherell walked beside her, easing her down the banks. In crossing the streams he helped her find the shallowest fording, and in other ways was singularly considerate. Kelley couldn't have done this, but he ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland

... parched soil. The only positive clew was the fresh dung of the elephants, and this being deposited at long intervals rendered the search extremely tedious. The greater part of the day passed in useless toil, and, after fording the river backward and forward several times, we at length arrived at a large area of sand in the bend of the stream, that was evidently overflowed when the river was full. This surface of many acres was backed by a forest of large trees. Upon arrival at ...
— In the Heart of Africa • Samuel White Baker

... carcass lying half out of the water on a pile of drift where the stream was narrow, but too deep for fording. ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter

... one o'clock when Braddock crossed the Monongahela for the second time. If the French made a stand anywhere, it would be, he thought, at the fording-place; but Lieutenant-Colonel Gage, whom he sent across with a strong advance-party, found no enemy, and quietly took possession of the farther shore. Then the main body followed. To impose on the imagination of the ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman

... had overlooked the fact, as had the others, that in order to find a suitable fording place, they had followed the hanks of the East Fork for several miles. This served to throw them off their course and when they finally reached the foothills they were some six miles to the north of the place where the guide was to pick ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Montana • Frank Gee Patchin

... Botany Bay, which we had crossed in our last expedition, on the banks of which we were compelled to wait until a quarter past two in the morning, for the ebb of the tide. As these passing-places consist only of narrow slips of ground, on each side of which are dangerous holes; and as fording rivers in the night is at all times an unpleasant task, I determined before we entered the water, to disburthen the men as much as possible; that in case of stepping wrong every one might be as ready, as circumstances would admit, to recover himself. The ...
— A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson • Watkin Tench

... moments more and he stood with the wide tumult of the Athabasca at his feet. He had chosen this spot for his little cabin because the river ran wild here among the rocks, and because pack-outfits going into the southward mountains could not disturb him by fording at this point. Across the river rose the steep embankments that shut in Buffalo Prairie, and still beyond that the mountains, thick with timber rising billow on billow until trees looked like twigs, with gray rock and glistening snow shouldering the clouds above the last purple line. ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood

... Fording the Potomac again, we passed out of Maryland into Virginia at Williamsport and proceeded rapidly to Harper's Ferry. The Federal force occupying a very high hill which had been fortified by abattis and entrenchments, any attempt to storm it would have inflicted ...
— Reminiscences of a Rebel • Wayland Fuller Dunaway

... down on my fields by tens of thousands, and when somewhat thinned in ranks by my unceasing war, would be re-enforced from a neighbor's fields, once actually fording my lakelet to get to my precious potato patch. The number and variety of devouring pests connected with each vegetable are alarming. Here are a few connected closely with the homely cabbage, as given by a noted helminthologist under ...
— Adopting An Abandoned Farm • Kate Sanborn

... at the south-west pillar of the porch, and another swung at the northward veranda of the old log hospital. The road to Dead Man's Canon wound along the west bank of the stream, sometimes fording it for a short cut, and that road, the one by which Sanchez should have come, was watched wellnigh as closely as the other. Nothing up to luncheon time had been seen or heard of human being moving without the limits ...
— Tonio, Son of the Sierras - A Story of the Apache War • Charles King

... the water of a stream so that it overflows a considerable area forms a good obstacle even though of fordable depth. If shallow, the difficulty of fording may be increased by irregular holes or ditches dug before the water comes up or by driving stakes or making entanglements. Fords have frequently been obstructed by ordinary harrows laid on the bottom ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss

... low before the great * Nor over fording lesser men dost blench Who gildest dross by dirham gathering, * No ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... miles by the winding mountain road from Gate City to Warrior Gap. Over hill and dale and mountain pass the road ran to Frayne, thence, fording the North Platte, the wagon trains, heavily guarded, had to drag over miles of dreary desert, over shadeless slopes and divides to the dry wash of the Powder, and by roads deep in alkali dust and sage brush to Cantonment Reno, where far to the west the grand range ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King

... there, consisting of one Troop of the 4th Dragoon Guards and a Company of the Wexford Militia prepared to stop their progress, and in order thereto took possession of the Bridge; but perceiving the Rebels planting their Cannon on the opposite side, and fording the River in considerable numbers (the water being low,) they were obliged to retreat; all the Cavalry escaped, but about twenty of the Infantry were made Prisoners, many of whom were put to death on that and the following day. Their ...
— An Impartial Narrative of the Most Important Engagements Which Took Place Between His Majesty's Forces and the Rebels, During the Irish Rebellion, 1798. • John Jones

... water over this bank was shallow and fordable; nevertheless, a part of the detachment left the shore higher up, in order to swim past the Kazaks, and, diverting their attention from the principal passage, to cover the fording party. Those who had confidence in their horses, leaped unhesitatingly from the bank, while others tied to each fore-foot of their steeds a pair of small skins, inflated with air like bladders; the current bore them on, and each landed wherever he found a convenient spot. The impenetrable ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various

... drawing its supplies over the turnpike from Harper's Ferry. Mosby, taking a command of five companies of cavalry and two mountain howitzers,—numbering two hundred and fifty men,—passed at night across the Blue Ridge, and fording the Shenandoah, halted a few miles below Berryville. Riding out to the turnpike, he discovered in his immediate front two large trains parked for the night—one going toward the army loaded, the ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various

... Dawfuskie, Turtle, and the Hunting Islands. Behind these lie St. Helena, Pinckney, Paris, Port Royal, Ladies', Cane, Bermuda, Discane, Bells, Daltha, Coosa, Morgan, Chissolm, Williams Harbor, Kings, Cahoussue, Fording, Barnwell, Whale, Delos, Hall, Lemon, Barrataria, Lopes, Hoy, Savage, Long, Round, and Jones Islands. These are from one to ten miles in length, and usually a proportional half in width. St. Helena is over twenty miles in extent, and could well support an agricultural ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... the month the expeditionary force took up the line of march from its base at Fort Ridgley. Crossing at the ferry near by, the route pursued was on the south side of the Minnesota River, fording the Red Wood at the usual place, and touching Wood Lakes, about three miles from Yellow Medicine, which was reached on the 22nd. On the morning of the 23rd the Indians surprised a foraging party half a mile distant from the camp. The Third Regiment formed ...
— History of Company E of the Sixth Minnesota Regiment of Volunteer Infantry • Alfred J. Hill

... the stream flowed more slowly. At the ford there is as usual a small village. The Thames furnishes other examples: below Oxford there are numerous rocky or gravelly patches where fords were possible, and where villages therefore grew up. Above Oxford, however, the possibilities of fording were fewer, because the soil is clay and there is less rock; the roads and therefore the villages grew ...
— Lessons on Soil • E. J. Russell

... whose descendants are unknown. Murdoch had also a daughter, Jean, who daughter of Thomas Forbes of Raddery and of the lands of Fortrose as far as Ethie, with issue - an only son, Alexander, who was drowned along with his father, while fording the Conon, Opposite Dingwall, in 1759, when, the son being unmarried, perished the married Hector Mackenzie, by whom she had a son, Kenneth, a Jesuit Priest ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie

... creeks rose steadily, obliging him to make numerous detours and to follow the ridge roads wherever possible. He was aching in every bone and muscle from the pounding he had received, his arms were numb, his back was broken. He drowned his motor finally in fording a roily ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach

... tormented beyond endurance, I got up and dressed some time between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m. I did more. Without the coffee which Madame had promised me I sallied forth and tramped through the deserted streets of the town, fording gutters which were brooks, skirting close by walls which promised what sailors ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham

... the fording place John's face grew grave. The river had risen during the night and was rushing along with turbulent strength. There was no house within five miles. His business was imperative. He dared not leave the child until he came ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black

... fording a certain river, found his body covered all over by a swarm of small leeches, busily sucking his blood. His first impulse was to tear the tormentors from his flesh: but his servant warned him that to pull them off by mechanical violence would expose his ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot

... of a troop fording the river. It had plunged into a deep hole, and before it could struggle back into the shallow it was pulled under, and ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn

... when Germany's attack on France forced us to make them up at last; that though doubtless a chronic state of perfect lucidity and long prevision on our part would have been highly convenient, yet there is a good deal to be said for the policy of not fording a stream until you come to it; and that in any case we must entirely decline to admit that we are more likely than other people to do the wrong thing when circumstances at last oblige us to think and act. Also that the discussion is idle on the shewing of the ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various

... if possible, even more violently than before, and gusts of wind swept along the ground with the force of a hurricane; so that at first, our horses could scarcely face the tempest. Our path lay along the little stream for a considerable way; after which, fording the rivulet, we entered upon the open plain, taking care to avoid the French outpost on the extreme left, which was marked by a bivouac fire, burning under the heavy downpour of rain, and looking larger through the dim ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... Kologa. It was but a large rivulet: two trees, the same number of props, and a few planks were sufficient to ensure the passage; but such was the confusion and inattention that the emperor was detained there. Several pieces of cannon, which it was attempted to get across by fording, were lost. It seemed as if each corps was marching separately, as if there were no staff, no general order, no common tie, nothing, in short, that bound them together. In fact, the elevation of the chiefs rendered them too independent ...
— The Two Great Retreats of History • George Grote

... soon, but the skies remained a solid gray and it settled into a steady solemn pour, cold and threatening, and promising to continue all day long. They could see that every stream they crossed was far above its normal mark, and the last hope that they might find the Potomac low enough for fording disappeared. ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler

... presently in sight, and formed in close column, began to push through the fording place, though full waist deep. My heart now throbbed with anxiety; looking every moment for a stream of fire to burst upon the British, spreading destruction through ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems

... places, and some of these were so correctly formed that it was difficult to believe they had not been built by the hand of man. They often appeared opportunely to our trappers, and saved them the trouble and danger of fording rivers. Frequently the whole band would stop in silent wonder and awe as they listened to the rushing of waters under their feet, as if another world of streams, and rapids, and cataracts were flowing below the crust of earth on which they stood. Some considerable streams were ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... scents, squinting for trails, crawling noiselessly till he shall come near to his quarry and then taking careful aim. Here's to him who hunts Truth in the honest fashion of men, which is, going blindly at it, following his first scent (if such there be) or (if none) none, scrambling over boulders, fording torrents, winding his horn, plunging into thickets, skipping, firing off his gun in the air continually, and then ramming in some more ammunition anyhow, with a laugh and a curse if the charge explode in his own jolly face. The chances are he will bring home in his bag nothing but a field-mouse ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm

... After fording the stream at the further point—-under protest from Keno, who picked his way very carefully and grudgingly over the treacherous rocky bed—-Ralph dismounted and tied the horse to a tree. Then he walked carefully along the base of the cliff, crawling or jumping from one rock to another, taking ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Geological Survey • Robert Shaler

... another bar to their continuing; one still more directly obstructive, even forbidding their exit from the cave. This, the arroyo, which now in full flood fills the ravine up to the cliff's base, there leaving no path for either man or horse. That by which they approached is covered beyond fording depth, with a current so swift as to sweep the strongest animal from its feet, even were it an elephant. And to attempt reaching the opposite side by swimming, would only result in their getting carried down to be drowned to a certainty, or have ...
— Gaspar the Gaucho - A Story of the Gran Chaco • Mayne Reid

... kept up with his mates all that day, fording rivers "several times," and crossing country which would tax the strongest man, in good condition. "The last time we forded the River, it was so deep, that our tallest Men stood in the deepest place, and handed ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield

... which I was presumed to have joined, a short distance out from Junction City. They killed and scalped several teamsters and also a young German traveler; stampeded and drove off a number of mules and burned up several wagons. This was done while fording the Arkansas River, near Fort Dodge. I was delayed near Kansas City under circumstances which preclude the supposition of chance and indicate a subtle and Inexorably fatal power at work for the preservation of my life—a force which with the giant ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann

... like the road which leads from the Grindelwald along the Mettenberg to the great glacier. When the cornice was so narrow that we could find no place for our feet, we descended into the torrent, crossed it by fording, and then climbed the opposite wall. These descents are very fatiguing, and it is not safe to trust to the lianas, which hang like great cords from the tops of the trees. The creeping and parasite plants cling but feebly to the branches which they embrace; the united weight ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt

... uncertain as dreams. Yet on such unsubstantial bases every miner built a pet theory, and a large "stampede" took place in consequence. I started with a party for the new mines, early in October. A day's ride brought us to the Madison Fork, a broad, shallow stream, difficult of fording on account of its large boulders, and flowing through a narrow strip of arable land. Very different is the Gallatin, beyond. It is cut up into narrow streams of a very rapid current, and waters a valley of surprising ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 106, August, 1866 • Various



Words linked to "Fording" :   shallow fording, ford, deep fording, crossing



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