"Breech" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mail steamers which daily arrive there, a profitable market for game has sprung up during the past few years, to supply which there are now a number of native gunners who, as a means of livelihood, scour the country with foreign breech-loaders in search of pheasants, wildfowl, etc., so that, being capital shots, within a considerable distance of this port the shooting is not so good as formerly, although in all other parts of the Empire it still remains practically untouched until ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready
... we opened out. No!' he said, bringing down his hand with a thump on the bedstead, 'a bay'nit ain't no good to a little man—might as well 'ave a bloomin' fishin'-rod! I 'ate a clawin', maulin' mess, but gimme a breech that's wore out a bit, an' hamminition one year in store, to let the powder kiss the bullet, an' put me somewheres where I ain't trod on by 'ulkin swine like you, an' s'elp me Gawd, I could bowl you over five times outer seven at height 'undred. ...
— Soldier Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... sprang to their posts, some to a series of levers which sprouted from the rock platform without any apparent connection, and some to wheels and gauges of varying size that clustered in bewildering intricacy about the breech of ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... dismal day, such a one as would be fitting for a dark deed of border justice. A cold, drizzly rain blew from the northwest. Jonathan wrapped a piece of oil-skin around his rifle-breech, and faced the downfall. Soon he was wet to the skin. He kept on, but his free stride had shortened. Even upon his iron muscles this soggy, sticky ground ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... launched. It was ushered in by a shattering burst of shrapnel. The word had passed to the gunners, careful and minute adjustments had been made, the muzzles had swung round a fraction, and then, suddenly and quick as the men could fling in a round, slam the breech and pull the firing lever, shell after shell had leapt roaring on their way to sweep the trench that had been British, but now was enemy. For ten or fifteen seconds the shrapnel hailed fiercely on the cowering trench; then, at another word down the telephone, the fire shut off abruptly, ...
— Between the Lines • Boyd Cable
... breech-clout the iron limbs were encased in leggings and the small feet were covered with moccasins, now faded and worn by hard usage. The Panther paused, with his left foot in advance, his right hand grasping the hilt of his knife ...
— The Phantom of the River • Edward S. Ellis
... of the village street, and a short time after the tents were up we had a visit from the Shan magistrate. He was a dapper energetic little fellow wearing foreign dress and quite au courant with foreign ways. He even owned a breech-loading shotgun, and, before we left, sent to ask for shells. He presented us with the usual chickens and I returned several tins of cigarettes. He appeared to be quite a sportsman and directed us to ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... two parties. The first, eight in number, enter in single file, preceded and followed by a man in everyday costume. These dancers, called Tsannati{COMBINING BREVE}, are nude, save for the breech-cloth, with body and face painted in white and black, and the hair hanging loose. Immediately following them are the Chanzhini{COMBINING BREVE}, six in number, accompanied by four keepers, two in front and two behind. The six are nude, the bodies painted solid white with six ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... usual to give this as one of the General Canons of the Syllogism; but we have seen (chap. vi. Sec. 6) that it is of wider application. Indeed, 'not to go beyond the evidence' belongs to the definition of formal proof. A breech of this rule in a syllogism is the fallacy of Illicit Process of the Minor, or of the Major, according to which term has been unwarrantably distributed. The following parasyllogism illicitly distributes both terms of ...
— Logic - Deductive and Inductive • Carveth Read
... I applied immediate action, pulled back the cocking-handle and pressed the trigger again. Nothing happened. After one more immediate action test, I examined the gun and found that an incoming cartridge and an empty case were jammed together in the breech. To remedy the stoppage, I had to remove spade-grip and body cover. As I did this, I heard an ominous ta-ta-ta-ta-ta from the returning German scout. My pilot cart-wheeled round and made for the Hun, his gun spitting continuously through the propeller. The ...
— Cavalry of the Clouds • Alan Bott
... curious capacity for disappearing, superstitions concerning them, usefulness of hatpins or hairpins as pipe-cleaners, usefulness of pins to schoolboys, both when bent for fishing and when filed to an extra point for use on the boy in the seat in front (honouring him in the breech, as Hamlet would have said) and their curious habits of turning up in unexpected places, undoubtedly caught by pins in their long association with the lovelier sex. But of these useful hyphens of raiment we will merely conclude by saying that those interested in ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... the matter of clothes." He grinned again. "We'll want a breech clout, at least. I propose that we get the sheerest silk gauze we can find, and cut an eighth-inch square apiece to tie about ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... weapons, and Black Eagle offered, through the interpreter, to give him a mustang and a fine wolf-skin. The pony was declined, the skin accepted, a quid pro quo being bestowed on the chief in the shape of one of Mr. Ramsay's breech-loaders, a gift that made the snake eyes glitter. But what earthly return can be made for some friendly offices? Could a thousand guns be considered as an adequate payment for the delirious thrill that Mr. Ramsay felt when he shot ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... climbs up a very tall tree, And fixes himself to his comfort and glee, Hung up from the end of a branch by his breech, Quite out of all mischievous quadrupeds' reach. A position not perfectly easy 't is true, But yet at the same ...
— Children's Books and Their Illustrators • Gleeson White
... keep starvation off for ten days. The tide and wind helped, and early one afternoon the big white boat under a ragged sail shouldered its way before the sea breeze into Patusan Reach, manned by fourteen assorted scarecrows glaring hungrily ahead, and fingering the breech-blocks of cheap rifles. Brown calculated upon the terrifying surprise of his appearance. They sailed in with the last of the flood; the Rajah's stockade gave no sign; the first houses on both sides of the ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... from his chair and turned about, forgetful of the stick and bowl. When his glance reached Frojac, my good man had his arquebus on a line with the governor's head, the match dangerously near the breech. ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... formidable warrior, for such his garb denoted him to be, continued motionless in the attitude he had at first assumed—his right cheek reposing on the ornamented stock of his rifle, and his quick and steady eye fixed in one undeviating line with the sight near the breech, and that which surmounted the extreme end of the deadly weapon. No sooner, however, had the head of the advancing column come within sight, than the trigger was pulled, and the small and ragged bullet sped hissing from the grooved and delicate ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... by the summer's heat, always a-staling. This object swives girls enow, and fancies himself a handsome fellow, and is not condemned to the mill as an ass? Whatso girl would touch thee, we think her capable of licking the breech of ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... year. Few volunteers now remain in the service, and they are being discharged as rapidly as they can be replaced by regular troops. The Army has been promptly paid, carefully provided with medical treatment, well sheltered and subsisted, and is to be furnished with breech-loading small arms. The military strength of the nation has been unimpaired by the discharge of volunteers, the disposition of unserviceable or perishable stores, and the retrenchment of expenditure. Sufficient war material to meet any emergency has been retained, ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Andrew Johnson • Andrew Johnson
... ever heard, and he was Western bred. Then he reacted on himself. "The Fox might come back!" Suddenly he remembered something. He got out a common sulphur match. He wet it on his lips and rubbed it on the muzzle sight: Then on each side of the notch on the breech sight. He lined it for a tree. Yes! surely! What had been a blur of blackness had now ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... Rotherhithe did not appear to think that Acton's being a monitor was a clinching argument barring young Bourne's sport. Perhaps he had private reasons for his opinions. Anyhow, he glibly promised to have a breech-loader and a ferret for young ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... dozen, says the citizen, was what that old ruffian sir John Beresford called it but the modern God's Englishman calls it caning on the breech. ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... the shell must have exploded directly under it. There was a sound of cheering from the intercom. Tom asked if I wanted to fire another clip. I told him I thought I had the hang of it now, and screwed a swab onto the ramrod and opened the breech to ...
— Four-Day Planet • Henry Beam Piper
... of them were desired for their beautiful feather-covered skins, which make most valuable and beautiful caps and muffs, it was decided that Souwanas and Kennedy should take the missionary's breech-loading rifle, in addition to their own guns, and try to ...
— Algonquin Indian Tales • Egerton R. Young
... advertise, and that the private businesses do; so that while there is the fullest ventilation of any defects in our military or naval organization, there is a very considerable check upon the discussion of individualist incapacity. An editor will rush into print with the flimsiest imputations upon the breech of a new field-gun or the housing of the militia at Aldershot, but he thinks twice before he proclaims that the preserved fruits that pay his proprietor a tribute of some hundreds a year are an unwholesome ...
— New Worlds For Old - A Plain Account of Modern Socialism • Herbert George Wells
... better-shaped skulls and more intelligent faces. There were less of the ape characteristics about their features, and less of the negroid, too. They carried weapons, stone-shod spears, stone knives, and hatchets—and they wore ornaments and breech-cloths—the former of feathers worn in their hair and the latter made of a single snake-skin cured with the head on, the head depending to ...
— The Land That Time Forgot • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... ready for the reception of Dr. Ferguson and his friend Kennedy. The latter, all the while swearing that he would not go, went on board with a regular arsenal of hunting weapons, among which were two double-barrelled breech-loading fowling-pieces, and a rifle that had withstood every test, of the make of Purdey, Moore & Dickson, at Edinburgh. With such a weapon a marksman would find no difficulty in lodging a bullet in the eye of a chamois at the distance of two thousand paces. Along with these implements, ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... out of the tube, opened the breech-door; and, reaching in with a long, heavy wire, lifted the starting lever and water tripper that gave motion to the torpedo's engine. The exhaust of air into the tube was driven out into the boat by the rapidly moving screws, and in a few moments ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... in the current of its passengers, partaking the characteristics of its contrasted extremities, fantastically blending the purple and fine linen of Chowringhee with the breech-cloths of the Black Town, Cossitollah is, as I have said, preminently the type street of Calcutta. Other localities have their peculiar throngs, and certain classes and castes are proper to certain thoroughfares;— ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... got safely off and returned to the fort on the next day. John Nelson, after crossing over, endeavored to escape down the river; but being there met by a stout warrior, he too was killed, after a severe struggle. His shattered gun breech, the uptorn earth, and the locks of Indian hair in his yet clenched hands, showed that the victory over him had not been ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... than in this, my first essay as a hunter. I had not gone far from the camp before I met with pigeons, and some of them alighted in the bushes very near me. I cocked my pistol, and raised it to my face, bringing the breech almost in contact with my nose. Having brought the sight to bear upon the pigeon, I pulled trigger, and was in the next instant sensible of a humming noise, like that of a stone sent swiftly through the air. I found the pistol ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... almost naked, usually with nothing but the smallest possible breech clout around their loins, which the police require them to wear; they plaster their bodies with mud, ashes and filth; they rub clay, gum and other substances into their hair to give it an uncouth appearance. Sometimes they wear their hair in long braids ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis
... vicinity of the river, and although much covered with dense bush, it was interspersed with numerous small glades, covered with parched herbage 2 or 3 feet in height. A few Tokrooris accompanied me with spare rifles (all muzzle-loaders, as the breech action had not been introduced in those days), and I was leading the way, occasionally breaking through the intervening bush, with as little ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... give you up in the middle of the night, a few hours ago," said Lingard, without even looking at d'Alcacer who raised his hands a little and let them fall. Lingard sat down on the breech of a heavy piece mounted on a naval carriage so as to command the lagoon. He folded his arms on his ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... the white splinters fly from the solid oak like bright silver sparks in the moonlight. A sharp piercing cry rose into the air—my soul identified that death—shriek with the voice that I had heard, and I saw the man who was standing with the lanyard of the lock in his hand drop heavily across the breech, and discharge the gun in his fall. Thereupon a blood—red glare shot up into the cold blue sky, as if a volcano had burst forth from beneath the mighty deep, followed by a roar, and a shattering crash, and a mingling of unearthly cries and groans, and a concussion ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... caceris chartis deseruisse decet. Torn from your book! I'll tear it from your breech. How say you, Mistress Virga, will you suffer Hic puer bonae[11] indolis to tear His lessons, leaves, and lectures from ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... gas-flare, and by the light of it he threw the breech-block of the repeating rifle to make sure the cartridge was in place. Then he, too, passed through the wicket and went to stand in the shadow of the slab-floored porch, redolent of memories. He ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... shoot much, or anything that takes me away from my Nell. But you must come out with us. There is no such fun as stumping over the moors—the Jew has got all the turn-out for that sort of thing—short frocks and knickerbockers, and a duck of a little breech-loader. She thinks she's a great shot, poor thing, and men are civil and let her imagine that she's knocked over a pheasant or a hare, now and then. As for the partridges, she lets fly, of course, but to ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... breech clout, squatted near a pot of simmering stew, now dipping in a long handled spoon and eating from it meditatively, now puffing at a yellow cigarette. Several squaws in dirty calico dresses, squatted near by awaiting their turn. Each shelter ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... weapons, their harpoons and lances, the best of wood for their sledges, the best of cutlery, knives, hatchets, and saws for their work, and the cooking utensils of civilization. Formerly they were dependent upon the most primitive hunting weapons; now they have repeating rifles, breech-loading shotguns, and an abundance of ammunition. There was not a rifle in the tribe when I first went there. As they have no vegetables, and live solely on meat, blood, and blubber, the possession of guns and ammunition has increased the food-producing capacity ...
— The North Pole - Its Discovery in 1909 under the auspices of the Peary Arctic Club • Robert E. Peary
... the indictment, which was in the usual form. It charged Laura Hawkins, in effect, with the premeditated murder of George Selby, by shooting him with a pistol, with a revolver, shotgun, rifle, repeater, breech-loader, cannon, six-shooter, with a gun, or some other, weapon; with killing him with a slung-shot, a bludgeon, carving knife, bowie knife, pen knife, rolling pin, car, hook, dagger, hair pin, with a hammer, with a screw-driver; with a nail, and with all other weapons and utensils ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... works—under which two covenants all are; some under one, and some under the other. Now this to Adam is one, therefore that on Sinai is one, and all one with this; and that this is a truth, I say, I know, because the sins against that on Sinai were punished by God for the breech thereof before it was given there; so it doth plainly appear to be a truth; for it would be unrighteous with God for to punish for that law that was not broken; therefore it was all ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... immense letter V, projecting in perfect stillness from the grass a hundred yards off. You advance, and the same proceeding is repeated. Jack is obviously deep in guns, and knows the difference in power between a muzzle- and a breech-loader, if he has not ascertained, indeed, what number shot you have in your cartridge. He varies his distance according to these contingencies. Only, he has not as yet learned to gauge the greyhound: that dog is frequently ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December, 1885 • Various
... breaches of the statutes. He would not have rained upon the unjust as the just if he had had the directing of the heavens. As Private Gellatly put it: "Sergeant Fones has the fear o' God in his heart, and the law of the land across his saddle, and the newest breech-loading at that!" He was part of the great machine of Order, the servant of Justice, the sentinel in the vestibule of Martial Law. His interpretation of duty worked upward as downward. Officers and privates ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... followed that of the young Onondaga and was intercepted by the huge figure of Tandakora, the Ojibway, who stood erect by one of the fires, bare save for a breech cloth and moccasins, his body painted in the most hideous designs, of which war paint was possible, his ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... incapable for a time of attending to their duties." "Then a person could have escaped without their seeing him?" "A whole regiment of persons might have escaped. You will understand the situation exactly if I compare this corridor to a long cannon, the room at the end being the breech-loading chamber. Two guards were inside the room, and two others stood outside the door that communicated with this corridor. These four men were killed instantly. Of the guards inside the room not a vestige ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... ship. Others had done great damage to the ship's structure aft, but none had gone anywhere near the gun or ammunition house on the poop. I saw afterwards some photos the Germans had taken of the gun as they said they found it when they went on board. These photos showed the gun with the breech open, thus proving, so the Germans said, that the Japanese had been preparing to use the gun. In reality, of course, it proved nothing of the sort; it is more than likely that the Germans opened the breech themselves before ...
— Five Months on a German Raider - Being the Adventures of an Englishman Captured by the 'Wolf' • Frederic George Trayes
... barrel, which is octagon and extremely heavy. Ramrod under barrel. Stock extends only to breech and is inlaid with German silver. Extremely rare. This type was used ...
— A Catalogue of Early Pennsylvania and Other Firearms and Edged Weapons at "Restless Oaks" • Henry W. Shoemaker
... description. It is a singular thing that during those twenty-five years of incessant fighting the material and methods of warfare made so little progress. So far as I know, there was no great change in either between 1789 and 1805. The breech-loader, heavy artillery, the ironclad, all great advances in the art of war, have been invented in time of peace. There are some improvements so obvious, and at the same time so valuable, that it ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... heavy field artillery, their long barrels sticking out from pits and pointing at them. They went closer to examine, and found the guns were made of wood painted black. The barrels were perfectly made, even to the breech blocks mounted on wheels, the tires of which were made of tin. They were a perfect imitation of a heavy ordnance piece in every detail. Curious, wondering what it could mean, the two explorers looked about them and saw an old Frenchman coming ...
— The War Romance of the Salvation Army • Evangeline Booth and Grace Livingston Hill
... close enough, I could see that he had a smile on his face, and I knew that he had recognized me. When we rode up to him he said: "Good mornin. Long time no see you," and at the same time presented the gun with the breech foremost. ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... navy lowered her flag and was headed in for the beach. After she had thus surrendered, and before the Americans could board, she was wrecked by her own crew, who opened sea-valves, smashed out dead lights, threw overboard the breech-blocks of their great guns, and in many other ways worked what destruction they could in the time allotted. As a result of this vandalism, the fine ship rolled over on her side soon after striking, and would have slipped off into deep water ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... 1896.... The gun, which is constructed of forged and tempered steel, has a 3" bore. Its total length is 8 feet and its weight is 726 pounds. The body of the gun consists of three elements:—1. A tube in which the breech piece is fixed. 2. A sleeve covering the tube for a length of 3 feet 6 inches. 3. A chase hoop. The chamber is provided with twenty-four grooves of variable pitch which have a final inclination ...
— With the Naval Brigade in Natal (1899-1900) - Journal of Active Service • Charles Richard Newdigate Burne
... a ship of Rio Sailed out into the blue, And nine and ninety monkeys Were all her jovial crew. From bo'sun to the cabin boy, From quarter to caboose, There weren't a stitch of calico To breech 'em - tight or loose; From spar to deck, from deck to keel, From barnacle to shroud, There weren't one pair of reach-me-downs To all that jabbering crowd. But wasn't it a gladsome sight, When roared the deep sea gales, To see them ...
— Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes • Walter de la Mare
... from a leopard's head, with a sort of visor made from the beak of a hornbill, the whole surmounted by a bunch of yard-long tail-feathers from some bright-plumaged bird. When the presentation was concluded all the chieftain had left was his breech-clout. He did not share in my enthusiasm. From the murderous glance which he shot at me when the Regent was not looking, I judged that if he ever met me alone in the jungle he would get his shield back, with another ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... squalor. The mass of this fierce cavalry was wretchedly clothed and disgustingly dirty. Even the showy Mexican costume of Manga Colorada was ripped, frayed, stained with grease and perspiration, and not free from sombre spots which looked like blood. Every one wore the breech-cloth, in some cases nicely fitted and sewed, in others nothing but a shapeless piece of deerskin tied on anyhow. There were a few, either minor chiefs, or leading braves, or professional dandies (for this class exists among the Indians), who sported ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... not fear the arrows which, undoubtedly, were the only form of missiles which would be hurled against them. Within were ten guns, each with a barrel twenty inches long, and a three-eighths of an inch bore. All were muzzle-loaders, as they had no facilities for making breech-loaders, so that it would be impossible to fire rapidly, after the first ten shots; but they counted on being able to hold out against a pretty strong force of savages, ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: The Tribesmen • Roger Finlay
... Chancellor of the University of Edinburgh. I attended a banquet given him there on October 26th. I then went from Raith to Brougham and Appleby, High Legh, and Teddesley, shooting at all these places, and at Crewe likewise, where I began to shoot with a new breech-loading gun. I must have shot thirty-five or forty days this year, and paid a great number of visits in country houses. We did not ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton
... intend mysteriously to sing With a pen pluck'd from Fame's own wing, Of Gargantua that learn'd breech-wiping king. ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... beginning to make. The shoals toward the beach were already white with the churn of water, while those farther out as yet showed no more sign than of discoloured water. As the schooner went into the wind and backed her jib and staysail the whaleboat was swung out. Into it leaped six breech-clouted Santa Cruz boys, each armed with a rifle. Denby, carrying the lanterns, dropped into the stern-sheets. Grief, following, ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London
... snapped Strong hotly. "The assignments of the Polaris unit, whether it be to Tara or the Moon, has nothing to do with your own breech of conduct. In any case, if they were to be assigned, they'd do a better job than you 'experienced' spacemen who are disrespectful of your superior officers and break regulations! If either of you makes one more ...
— Danger in Deep Space • Carey Rockwell
... before the bulletins to have the numerous announcements of society and club meetings explained, drinking from the old pump in the corner, and so completing the circuit and storming the gymnasium, where at last Joel's powers of reply were exhausted and Outfield promptly sprang into the breech, explaining gravely that the mattresses on the floor were used by Doctor Major, the director of the gymnasium, who invariably took a cat-nap during the afternoon, that the suspended rings were used to elevate sophomores while corporeal punishment was administered by freshmen, and that the queer little ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... Raymond's head long afterwards. He read it again and again, bewildered, tempted and yet afraid to believe it true, moved to the depths of his nature, at once happy and unhappy in the gamut of his doubts. It could not be possible. No, it could not be possible. Standing at the breech of his gun, his eyes on a Spanish gunboat they had driven under the shelter of a fort, he found himself repeating: "And very much in love with my boy. And very much in love with my boy." And then, suddenly becoming intent again on the matter in hand, he slammed the breech-mechanism ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne
... of fifty soldiers, twenty-five marines, and fifty blue-jackets, who were to embark in the steamer's boats, two of which were provided with small breech-loading pieces running on slides, and under ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... in through the ports on the sleek guns crouching ready. On the breech of one somebody had scrawled ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... morning, especially the kava-drinkers. I afterward walked out, and visited several other chiefs, and found that all of them were taking their morning draught, or had already taken it. Returning to the king, I found him asleep in a small retired hut, with two women tapping on his breech. About eleven o'clock he arose again, and then some fish and yams, which tasted as if they had been stewed in cocoa-nut milk, were brought to him. Of these he eat a large portion, and lay down once more ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... of the Regency I come empowered to make, and will conduct her Safely to Strassburg with her little son, If she shrink not to breech her as a man, And tiptoe from ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... two captains to the pivot gun, one on each side, stationed nearest to the base of the breech. Seventeen men were required to work the pivot gun, whose duties were defined in the names applied to them, the powderman being the odd one. The first and second captains were numbers one and two; the odd numbers being on the right, and the even on the ...
— A Victorious Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... shirt. I told him no, sir, I wouldn't; right away he went and got the cowhide, and gave me about twenty over my head with the butt. He tore my shirt off, after I would not pull it off; he ordered me to cross my hands. I didn't do that. After I wouldn't do that he went and got his gun. and broke the breech of that over my head. He then seized up the fire-tongs and struck me over the head ever so often. The next thing he took was the parlor shovel and he beat on me with that till he broke the handle; then he took ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... Chauxville and took the rifle from his hands. He opened the breech and looked into the barrels. They were clean; the rifle had not been ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman
... me her mare is almost foundered," remarked Madame d'Hauteserre. "Her gun has not been fired; the breech is clean; she ...
— An Historical Mystery • Honore de Balzac
... suppose that they will, but it is just as well to be prepared for everything. There is no reason why you boys should not be able to shoot as straightly as a man, and I have therefore bought two carbines. They are the invention of an American named Colt, and have a revolving breech, so that they fire six shots each. There is a spare chamber to each, which is very quickly shifted in place of the one discharged; so that each of you could fire twelve shots in a very short time. They will carry up to five hundred yards. They are a new ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... four 10-inch and six 6-inch breech-loading rifles; in the secondary battery seven 6-pounder and eight 1-pounder rapid-fire guns and four Gatlings. Her crew was made up of 370 men, and the following officers: Capt. C. D. Sigsbee, Lieut.-Commander R. Wainwright, Lieut. G. F. W. Holman, Lieut. J. Hood, Lieut. C. W. Jungen, ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis
... durability, and were often ornamented over the instep or toes with a three-pronged figure, worked in porcupine quills or beads, the three prongs representing, it is said, the three divisions or tribes of the nation. The men wore a shirt, breech-clout, leggings which reached to the thighs, and moccasins. In winter both men and women wore a robe of tanned buffalo skin, and sometimes of beaver. In summer a lighter robe was worn, made of cowskin or buckskin, from which the hair had been removed. Both sexes wore belts, which supported ...
— Blackfoot Lodge Tales • George Bird Grinnell
... reminiscences of what was instilled into him in the nursery may possibly occur to some even at this day. 'In our childhood,' he complains, 'our mothers' maids have so terrified us with an ugly devil having horns on his head, fire in his mouth, a tail in his breech, eyes like a bison, fangs like a dog, a skin like a niger, a voice roaring like a lion, whereby we start and are afraid when we hear one cry Boh!' Chaucer has expressed the belief of his age on the subject. It seems to have been a proper duty of a parish priest to bring to the notice of his ecclesiastical ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... about fifty-five years of age, handsome, portly, and genial, a keen sportsman, and sure shot with the long, single, English ducking-gun, to which he stuck, despite of the jeers and remonstrances of the owners of muzzle and breech-loading ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... reached in and drew out a rifle. He took it over to a nearby rock, smashed the gun's breech, then flung it, useless, aside. Returning to the borer, he ...
— Astounding Stories, April, 1931 • Various
... not make a bad appearance. They were a trifle awkward, perhaps, in their dark-blue hooded cloaks, with their tin-plate buttons, and armed with breech-loading rifles, and encumbered with canteens, basins, and pouches, all having an unprepared and too-new look. They all came from the best parts of the city, with accelerated steps and a loud beating of drums, and headed, if you ...
— A Romance of Youth, Complete • Francois Coppee
... rifles started, although it was dark. Mine was already in good shape, and I leaned it against the side of the trench and went below for the rest of my equipment. While I was gone, a shell fragment undid all my work by smashing the breech. ...
— A Yankee in the Trenches • R. Derby Holmes
... a 6-inch Howitzer Battery. I noticed specially how keen he was in enquiring about every little detail. Not a single thing seemed to miss his eye, from the close examination of the gun's breech, to inspecting the dug-outs of the men. He then left, and knowing he was going to inspect the Canadians I hurried off in ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... records of the Colonial Office, in which he will find enough to make him bite his nails. Still I wonder he did not come over and try his manhood otherwise. I would not have shunned him nor any Frenchman who ever kissed Bonaparte's breech. ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... was undoubtedly the Lord Proprietor's; a breechloader of curiously fine workmanship, bearing the name of a famous St. James' Street maker. Of the hammers, one was down, the other at half-cock; and, pulling open the breech, the Commandant drew forth two cartridges, the one empty, the other unused. He pocketed these and examined the barrels. Clearly, one shot—and one only—had been fired since the ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... for estimating the heights attained, others for indicating the variations of atmospheric pressure; a storm-glass for forecasting tempests; a small library; a portable printing press; a field-piece mounted on a pivot; breech loading and throwing a three-inch shell; a supply of powder, bullets, dynamite cartridges; a cooking-stove, warmed by currents from the accumulators; a stock of preserves, meats and vegetables sufficient to last ...
— Rubur the Conqueror • Jules Verne
... was empty, he struck the breech of it with his finger; and then he turned away, not deigning even once to look back again; and Lorna saw his giant figure striding across the meadow-land, as if the Ridds were nobodies, and he the proper owner. Both mother and I were ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... strength the old man swayed the breech of the heavy gun to its bearing, and then seizing the string of the lock, he stood back and watched for the next swell that would bring the shark in range. He had aimed the piece some distance ahead of his mark; but yet a little moment would settle his ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... departments were without trained assistants. At the very last moment it was discovered that thirty thousand rifles were practically useless owing to the absence of some small pin or other interchangeable mechanism about the breech-blocks, and the officer who posted off in hot haste to Paris succeeded with the greatest difficulty in securing five thousand of the missing implements. Their inactivity, again, was another matter that kept him on pins and needles; why did they idle away ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... another with a bare officer's sword. A fourteen-year-old boy stood in the middle of the street with a rifle in his hand, trifling with it. It exploded in his hand, and when he saw the ruin of the breech block he unfixed the bayonet, threw down the gun, and ran around the corner. A student came up the street examining the mechanism of a revolver. There seemed to be rifle-fire in every direction, even in ...
— World's War Events, Vol. II • Various
... but I was completely thunderstruck when I saw the two great breeches side by side. They reminded me of two big engine boilers. They must be about 6 feet in diameter and are probably not less. The officer who took us round had a breech block swung back, and we were allowed ...
— The Incomparable 29th and the "River Clyde" • George Davidson
... true, as the enemy advanced in such strong mass formation that our fellows had their hands full fighting them off until the engineers made good their work, which they did by smashing the hydraulic buffers with picks, destroying the sights, blowing the guns up, and taking the breech-blocks back ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... squirting death out of her five barrels into the flank of the rushing stream of savages. "Oh, this bloody gun!" shouted a voice. "She's jammed again." The fierce metallic grunting had ceased, and her crew were straining and hauling at the breech. ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... together with its whiskers, And twine so close, that time should never, In life or death, their fortunes sever; But with his rusty sickle mow Both down together at a blow. 280 So learned TALIACOTIUS from The brawny part of porter's bum Cut supplemental noses, which Wou'd last as long as parent breech; But when the date of NOCK was out, 285 ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... of ten years, which was shortly after Nellie's adventure with the bear. Although the farmer was frugal in all things, he believed it was the cheapest to buy the best, and the gun which was placed in the hands of Nick was a breech-loader with double barrels. It was a shot-gun, as a matter of course, for little use could be found for a rifle ...
— Through Forest and Fire - Wild-Woods Series No. 1 • Edward Ellis
... in red breech-clout and spectacles, the lamplight shining on his bald head, sat in the midst of them, familiar by a score of years with their chants. Pae filled the pipe and the bowls and joined in the chorus, while the Paumotan boys, in a shadowy ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... showed more taste in their dress, for all wore loose-fitting gowns of native cloth, gaudily colored, though the children were attired similarly to the men, with little more than a breech cloth about the loins. Even the boys of a most tender age were each armed with a javelin, none of them, however, having the points of the weapons poisoned as did their fathers and elders when ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis
... was best to teach them first. JOHNSON. 'Sir, it is no matter what you teach them first, any more than what leg you shall put into your breeches first. Sir, you may stand disputing which is best to put in first, but in the mean time your breech is bare. Sir, while you are considering which of two things you should teach your child first, another boy has ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... isles of the blest, and shut ourselves up in the healing solitudes of the crater of Haleakala and get a good rest, for the mails do not intrude there, nor yet the telephone and the telegraph; and after resting we would come down the mountain a piece and board with a godly, breech-clouted native, and eat poi and dirt, and give thanks to whom all thanks belong for these privileges, ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... I've got a streak of my daddy's wild blood. He was a great hunter in his day, and that's why I prize this gun so much. It was made in London by John Armstrong in 1874—so that silver plate on the breech says—and if it is old fashioned it kin shoot. You chaps ought to be here in the fall when the ducks and geese are ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon
... shrivelled fellow, with keen eyes, and a sharp nose. The midshipmen called him "Old Chili Vinegar," or, "Old Hot and Sour." He was what we term a martinet. He would keep a man two months on his black list, giving him a breech of a gun to polish and keep bright, never allowing him time to mend his clothes, or keep himself clean, while he was cleaning that which, for all the purposes of war, had better have been black. He seldom flogged a man; but he tormented him into sullen discontent, ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... fifty in number, are taking their seats in the luxurious chamber within. The first stop is at Sydney, Cape Breton, and the car is pointed accurately in that direction. At three minutes to 7 the engineers and conductor come on board; the former to place the powerful oxyhydrogen charge in the great breech-loading tube, the latter to close the doors against ingress or egress. Precisely at 7 the signal is given. A furious and powerful hissing is then heard, as well as a momentary scraping of the car on its runners. In another second she is high in the ...
— The Dominion in 1983 • Ralph Centennius
... hand came into contact with a polished metal surface cold as ice. It was his rifle. Naab had placed it under the blankets. Fingering the rifle Hare found the spring opening on the right side of the breech, and, pressing it down, he felt the round head of a cartridge. Naab had loaded the weapon, he had placed it where Hare's hand must find it, yet he had not spoken of it. Hare did not stop to reason with ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... narrow path that led to his house, they heard the roar and crackle of the flames; when they gained the open they saw the bright light shining on the old cannon, whose polished brass was stained and streaked with red. Tiaru lay across the breech, dead. ...
— The Brothers-In-Law: A Tale Of The Equatorial Islands; and The Brass Gun Of The Buccaneers - 1901 • Louis Becke
... dress of the whites, that with the exception of blankets—still much worn by both sexes at their homes, and dancing suits—their original costumes are now seldom seen. The blanket has been substituted for the sea-otter cloak, trousers and dresses for the breech cloth, and leather undergarments by woven ones. The men wear hats, but the women very rarely; a handkerchief or shawl being their most common head covering. Some of the elderly women, however, wear large hats of the Chinese pattern, braided by them from ...
— Official report of the exploration of the Queen Charlotte Islands - for the government of British Columbia • Newton H. Chittenden
... at once got to work. The breech-block was unscrewed and taken out, falling a prize to the Light Horse, who vied with each other in carrying it home (it weighs 137lbs.) Then gun-cotton was thrust up the breech into the body of the gun. A vast explosion told the Boers that "Tom" had gone aloft, ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... earnest between Prussia and Austria for the prize of ascendency. Both parties were confident of success,—Austria as the larger State, with proud traditions, triumphant over rebellious Italy; and Prussia, with its enlarged military organization and the new breech-loading needle-gun. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord
... of 720 lbs. weight, and were certainly masterpieces of design and execution. Unhappily, proper instructions for loading had not accompanied them from England, and on the occasion of the first round being fired from one of them, the gun not being properly loaded, cracked at the breech, and was rendered useless; the other, however, did good service, throwing shot with accuracy at great distances. I saw much that was interesting here, but more able pens than mine have already described fully the details of that long siege, where on one hand ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha
... possible! It took him about an hour and a half, and when he read it over it appeared to him the best piece of political statement he had yet achieved. Very likely it would make Fontenoy more savage still. But Fontenoy's tone and attitude in the House of Commons had been already decisive. The breech between ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... use o' worritin' 'bout these things?' said Ortheris. 'You're bound to find all out quicker nor you want to, any'ow.' He jerked the cartridge out of the breech-block into the palm of his hand. ''Ere's my chaplain,' he said, and made the venomous black-headed bullet bow like a marionette. ''E's goin' to teach a man all about which is which, an' wot's true, after all, before sundown. But wot ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... inventor of the breech-loading gun, born at Pitfour, Aberdeenshire; served in the English army in Germany and Tobago; brought out his new rifle in 1766, which was tried with success in the American War of Independence; rose to be ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... him shells containing charges of all descriptions, from fine shot to bullets. Quickly throwing open his breech-loader, he slipped a ball cartridge into one barrel and a heavy charge of buckshot ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume VIII, No 25: May 21, 1887 • Various
... have looked at the breech plug before turning on the power," said the German, "but I had no reason to suspect that anything was wrong." He went on to explain that the explosion was something like that which occurs when the breech-block of a big navy gun is not properly in place. The force of the Cardite, instead of being ...
— Lost on the Moon - or In Quest Of The Field of Diamonds • Roy Rockwood
... later a dark form cautiously came along, careful not to break a twig beneath his moccasined feet. He was naked except for a breech-clout. The tuft of feathers fastened to his "top-knot" and the paint on his face indicated that he was on ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... capturing the automatic on the table. With rapid and sure gestures he extracted and pocketed the clip, drew back the breech, ejecting into his palm the one shell in the barrel, and replaced the weapon, all before the Prussian gave over his insane ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... gun. The details of this gun are given in Fig. 94. The barrel of the gun is made of a piece of brass rod. A hole is drilled through this rod with a small drill and a piece of copper wire is inserted. A square piece of brass for the breech is then drilled out to receive the barrel. One end of the barrel is placed in this hole and held with a drop of solder. A drop of solder should also be used on the copper wire that runs through the barrel. The bearing and shield of the gun are made from thin sheet brass, ...
— Boys' Book of Model Boats • Raymond Francis Yates
... down the breech-strap he was mending. "Did you ever fire a gun?" he inquired suddenly, as he was starting across the yard to fetch ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... fought a sham battle on horseback. They only wore the breech-cloths. They fired off their rifles in all directions, and sent the bullets whistling past the spectators in such close proximity as to create most unpleasant feelings. I was heartily glad when they defiled past singly on the way back to their lodges, and the last of their unearthly ...
— The Treaties of Canada with The Indians of Manitoba - and the North-West Territories • Alexander Morris
... into the path I had been always looking for. It was narrow, but well beaten, and I saw that Case had plenty of disciples. It seems, indeed, it was a piece of fashionable boldness to venture up here with the trader, and a young man scarce reckoned himself grown till he had got his breech tattooed, for one thing, and seen Case's devils for another. This is mighty like Kanakas; but, if you look at it another way, it's mighty like ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... article of dress consists of a small breech-cloth of pandanus leaf passing between the legs, and secured before and behind to a string or other girdle round the waist—the females wear petticoats (noge) of the same leaf, divided into long grass-like shreds, reaching ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... must be destroyed," shouted Mr. Tyler. "My lads, those breech-loaders can be easily rendered unfit for use. To ...
— Young Glory and the Spanish Cruiser - A Brave Fight Against Odds • Walter Fenton Mott
... This was a long rectangular, one-story building with twenty furnaces arranged, each under an open window, around the sides. In front of each heated furnace with its tray of leaves, a Japanese man, wearing only a breech cloth, and in a state of profuse perspiration, was busy rolling the tea leaves between the ...
— Farmers of Forty Centuries - or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea and Japan • F. H. King
... Redundancy of Seed beyond what was sufficient for one Child, but not enough for Twins, wherefore Nature Form'd what she could. There might be many other particular Instances given of Monstrous Births, as some sticking together by the Bellies, others by the Breech; some Born without Arms or Legs others without Heads, yet have they liv'd for some time, till want of Sustenance made them pine away and Die, as having no place to receive it, and others with Heads like Dogs, Wolves, Bears, and other Beasts. ...
— Tractus de Hermaphrodites • Giles Jacob
... has determined the exact pressure of a charge of powder at all points in the bore of a cannon during its combustion and evolution into gas. These experiments have proved that strength is principally required near the breech, and that a cannon need not be of so great length as was formerly supposed to be necessary. We are thus able to construct guns which can be handled, throwing balls of several hundred pounds' weight. ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... 15.—Far out in the Yellow Sea busy gunners on a Japanese battleship aimed a 12-inch gun at one of the German forts in Tsing-tao. Opening the breech, they removed the smoking cartridge case, put in another loaded one, and waited to learn whether the projectile had scattered death among the enemy or exploded harmlessly in soft earth. They were five or six miles ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... bullock. I often tried to track them, but never succeeded in seeing one. One day in my eagerness to get near what I believed to be one, I rushed into rather unpleasant proximity with a jaguar, the "tigre" of the natives. I had just received a fresh supply of cartridge cases for my breech-loader, and wishing to get some specimens of the small birds that attend the armies of the foraging ants, I made up three or four small charges of Number 8 shot, putting in only a quarter of an ounce of shot into each charge, so as not to destroy their plumage. I went back into the forest ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt
... have less to doe, that's all, there's half a dozen of my friends i'th' fields sunning against a bank, with half a breech among 'em, I shall be with 'em shortly. The care and continuall vexation of being rich, eat up this rascall. What shall become of my poor familie, they are no sheep, ...
— The Scornful Lady • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... the breech block, A, hinged at its posterior extremity, and operating as described, with the hammer, D, by means of the protuberant inclined plane, C, or its equivalent, substantially as ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various
... of it. But Carvel, still watching him closely, saw that the hair along his spine had risen like a brush, and then he heard—growing slowly in Baree's throat—a snarl of ferocious hatred. It was the sort of snarl that had held back the factor from Lac Bain, and Carvel, opening the breech of his gun to see that all was right, chuckled happily. Baree may have heard the chuckle. Perhaps it meant something to him, for he turned his head suddenly and with flattened ...
— Baree, Son of Kazan • James Oliver Curwood
... proposed to abandon the pike and all muzzle-loading small arms for a breech-loading carbine and pistol, with one uniform metallic cartridge for both. The revolver pistol does not realize in service with seamen the advantages claimed ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN
... the bushes and made them spring as I gave the word to gallop for cover to the woods where the Welsh company was. There I got ——, who understands them (the guns), and an infantryman who volunteered to help, and —— and I ran up to the Maxims and took out the breech mechanism of both and one of the belts, and carried away one whole Maxim. We ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of 12) - The War Begins, Invasion of Belgium, Battle of the Marne • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... that he had an interview with Vaubois; which, I believe, is a lie: and, as to his conduct with the Maltese, it was, probably, to shew his consequence. I am sure, the good queen never had a thought of any under-hand work against us; therefore, I would recommend sending him here with a kick in the breech, and let ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison
... pardon," he continued. "Took you for old Gilly, you know." He snapped the empty shells from his gun, and blew into the breech, before adding, "Would you mind, then? That is, if you're bound up for Stink-Chau. It's a beastly long tramp, and I've been shooting ...
— Dragon's blood • Henry Milner Rideout
... of terrifying oaths Lighthouse Harry thrust a shell into the breech of the quick-firing gun. Without waiting to aim it, he tugged at the trigger. Nothing happened! He threw open the breech and gazed impotently at the base of the shell. It was untouched. The ship was ringing with cries ...
— The Boy Scout and Other Stories for Boys • Richard Harding Davis
... cluster on the gun, Clasping the clammy breech and slippery shells; If 'tis a joke they do not see the fun And damn you to the worst ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 5, 1917 • Various
... small necessaries, such as soap, sugar, tea, coffee, Liebig's extract of meat, pemmican, candles, &c., which make a total of 153 loads. The weapons of defence which the Expedition possesses consist of one double-barrel breech-loading gun, smooth bore; one American Winchester rifle, or "sixteen-shooter;" one Henry rifle, or "sixteen-shooter;" two Starr's breech-loaders, one Jocelyn breech-loader, one elephant rifle, carrying ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... all gone from the ditch to within a few feet of where I was lying. A little beyond the other end of the building stood two cannon pointing towards me with a group of rebels at the breech of each one of them trying to discharge it. They were two of our own guns that had been captured before they had been fired by our gunners and were still loaded with the double charges of canister intended for the rebels. ...
— The Battle of Franklin, Tennessee • John K. Shellenberger
... FIG. 8. Breech-loading Fog-signal Gun, with Bell Mouth, proposed by Major Maitland, R.A. Assistant Superintendent. [Footnote: The carriage of this gun has been modified in construction since this ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... disable those weapons. Even with her 12-inch guns the Texas can fire at the rate of one round per minute, and this record is as good as that made by any foreign ships. Rapid fire consists in good facilities for handling ammunition and loading the gun with a quick working breech mechanism. ...
— Porto Rico - Its History, Products and Possibilities... • Arthur D. Hall |
