"Fordable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... which the English would advance was the old Roman causeway running nearly north and south. The Bannock Burn was fordable from a spot near the Park Mill down to the village of Bannockburn. Above, the banks were too high and steep to be passed; while below, where ran the Bannock through the carse, the swamps prevented passage. The army was therefore drawn ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... thanked the men, and bidden them come to Lescombe the next day to be paid for their assistance. Then they all stood to watch Mark ride through the river, at the shallowest place, indicated both by her and the labourers. It was perfectly fordable, so Annaple's were mock ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... and report to him. He was very slow in moving, some of his troops not starting until after 5 o'clock next morning. When he did move it was done very deliberately, and on arriving at Gravelly Run he found the stream swollen from the recent rains so that he regarded it as not fordable. Sheridan of course knew of his coming, and being impatient to get the troops up as soon as possible, sent orders to him to hasten. He was also hastened or at least ordered to move up rapidly by General Meade. He now felt that ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant
... thought a rainbow had burst into a million fragments—that shamed the very planets, and made us think mighty well of ourselves and our achievement. There was still a long dark mile between us and the bungalow; on this mile were strung a fordable stream, a ragged village of Italian gardeners, some monstrous looking hay-stacks, and troops of dogs that mouthed horribly as we ploughed through ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... City just ten minutes to realize that it was in a cage. We expected trouble; but there wasn't any. The citizens saw that we had 'em. The nearest railroad was thirty miles away; and it would be two weeks at least before the river would be fordable. So they began to cuss, amiable, and throw down dollars on the bar till it sounded like a selection ...
— The Gentle Grafter • O. Henry
... having over it a drawbridge connected with a barred gate, had been cut across the isthmus, so as to make the Hook, in reality, an island. This ditch could be passed only at low water. Thirty paces within it was a row of abattis running into the river; and some distance in front of it, is a creek fordable only in two places. ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 3 (of 5) • John Marshall
... myself tore down the mesa. After passing The Rebel's camp, I held my course as long as the footing was solid, but on encountering the first sand, crossed the river nearly opposite the appointed rendezvous. The North Platte was fordable at any point, flowing but a midsummer stage of water, with numerous wagon crossings, its shallow channel being about one hundred yards wide. I reined in my horse for the first time near the middle of the stream, as the water reached ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams
... pinched up a hole in my waist-belt, scrugged my bonnet, and set out at a deer-stalker's run across the moor. I splashed in hags and stumbled among roots; I made wild leaps across poisonous-looking holes stewing to the brim with coloured water; I made long detours to find the most fordable part of a stream that twisted back and forth, a very devil's cantrip, upon my way. Then a smirr of rain came at my back and chilled me to the marrow, though the sweat of travail a moment before had been on every ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... explained. A slight splash told of water encountered. He had been in search of the river, and had found it. This was the Tchernaya—a slow sluggish stream, hidden amidst long marshy grass, and everywhere fordable, as McKay had heard, at ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... a part of it which was fordable, and a little farther on met with a most wonderful species of vine, the bottoms of them that touched the earth were green and thick, and all the upper part most beautiful women, with the limbs perfect from ...
— Trips to the Moon • Lucian
... is divided by the King's River, which at times is so rapid and impetuous as not to be fordable by the strongest horse. A plank bridge, eighteen inches wide, and one hundred and ten feet long, with a rail on one side, is thrown across for the convenience of those who may be desirous ...
— Minnie's Pet Lamb • Madeline Leslie
... banks, mark if there were any tracks by which horses or cattle had at some time come down to the water, and observe if similar tracks were to be seen on the opposite bank, as this would show that, though possibly only in dry weather, the river was fordable there. Where the ground was too broken and rock-covered to permit of horses passing rapidly across it, they were to dismount and crawl down the river ...
— With Buller in Natal - A Born Leader • G. A. Henty
... the range had turned for twenty-four hours every mountain stream into a foaming torrent for a hundred miles. Not a bridge remained along the Platte. Not a ford was fordable within two days' march of either Emory or Frayne. Not a courier crossed the Box Elder, going either way, until the flood went down, and then it transpired that a tide in the affairs of men had also turned, and that there was trouble ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King
... on a commanding ground about half a mile from Stirling, near to the Abbey of Cambus-Kenneth. The Forth lay before him, crossed by a wooden bridge, over which the enemy must pass to reach him, the river not being fordable in ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... water glittering in the rays of the western sun. It was a river running from the north-west to the south-east, and as we approached we saw that it was of considerable width. Should it not prove fordable, ...
— Afar in the Forest • W.H.G. Kingston
... the night in great uneasiness. All day the weather had threatened to turn to rain, and we have already said how rapidly the Taro could swell; the river, fordable to-day, might from tomorrow onwards prove an insurmountable obstacle; and possibly the delay had only been asked for with a view to putting the French army in a worse position. As a fact the night had scarcely come when a terrible storm arose, and so long as darkness lasted, great rumblings ...
— The Borgias - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... in the wind here. I have just been ordered to try where the stream is fordable. I've mentioned your name to the general, and I think you'll be sent for ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... the bushes, though there was not much fear of being attacked in this place by wild beasts in the day-time, as it was a frequented route and had been often visited by the hunter. By and by we came, to a stream, which was fordable in the dry season. Senegambia abounds with rivers and creeks; indeed it seems to be one of the best-watered regions of the earth, and has excellent means of communication for trade. These waters are full of fish, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal Vol. XVII. No. 418. New Series. - January 3, 1852. • William and Robert Chambers
... started forth, followed in Indian file by his young adventurers, none more eager than Tecumseh. The narrow path, worn smooth by the feet of runners, followed high ground to avoid the dense brush, and led to points where the streams were shallowest and most easily fordable. Every day soon after sunrise the party was journeying through new regions which unfolded beauties ever fresh. At sunset they pitched their tents, lighted their fires, and gathered about them to discuss the day's adventures. Thus they ...
— Tecumseh - A Chronicle of the Last Great Leader of His People; Vol. - 17 of Chronicles of Canada • Ethel T. Raymond
... to the little river Oka, but it was fordable, and they had no difficulty in crossing. The sky was cloudy and the temperature moderate. There was some fear that the rain might come on, which would much have increased their misery. A few showers fell, but they did ...
— Michael Strogoff - or, The Courier of the Czar • Jules Verne
... with muskets, (pillaged, be H observed, from royal magazines hastily deserted,) commenced a tumultuous assault. Less than 300 militia and yeomanry formed the garrison of the place, which had no sort of defences except the natural one of the River Slaney. This, however, was fordable, and that the assailants knew. The slaughter amongst the rebels, meantime, from the little caution they exhibited, and their total defect of military skill, was murderous. Spite of their immense numerical advantages, it is probable they would have been defeated. But in Enniscorthy, (as where ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... better than an artificial ditch; its front facing the river and the heights was composed of strong thick and high palisades planted perpendicularly with gunholes pierced for several pieces of large cannon in it, the river is deep and only fordable at low water at a musket shot before the fort: this made it more difficult to be forced on that side than on its other side of earthworks facing Beauport which had a more formidable appearance and the hornwork certainly on ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... coiling it as before, succeeded in throwing the noose over the third rock, where it settled and held fast. The other end was tied as before, and all passed safely to the new station. Here, however, their labour ended. They found that from this point to the shore the river was shallow, and fordable; and, leaving the rope where it was, all four took the water, and waded safely ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... called Ruoichin, Ruith-in, or "river island," separated from the rest of Kent and the mainland of Britain by the estuary of the Wantsum, which, though now a small brook, was formerly navigable for large vessels, and in Bede's time was three stadia broad, and fordable ...
— History Of The Britons (Historia Brittonum) • Nennius
... miles south of Shergotti the bridge spanning a tributary of the Sone is broken down, and no ferry is in operation. The stream, however, is fordable, and four stalwart Bengalis carry me across on a charpoy, hoisted on their shoulders; they stem the torrent bravely, and keep up their strength and courage by singing a refrain. From this point the road becomes undulating, and of indifferent surface; the macadam is badly washed by the soaking ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... walked the walls thereof till he thought his adversary was gone, but seeing the moon so fair and clear he determined to take his horse and forthwith proceed on his journey, for the river was low and fordable, and trintled its waters with a silvery sheen in the stillness ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... scarce see each other's faces, and when it cleared off, in about an hour and a half, and went down the wind to the south-east, the stream was waxen great, and ran brown and furious down the dale, so that it was fordable only here and there; and as for tracking the slot of those twain, there was no need to talk thereof, for the fury of the driving rain had washed ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... through Futtygurh and Bareilly. We returned by a longer route via Meerut and Delhi. Our difficulties on our way back were somewhat different, but they were quite as great as on our upward journey. Some of the streams we had to cross were not fordable, and we had great difficulty in getting ourselves ferried over. A few nights were spent in exceeding discomfort, our carts not having come up with our tents, and we were shelterless and supperless—rather, if I may coin such a word, dinnerless. One night cover was got for my ...
— Life and Work in Benares and Kumaon, 1839-1877 • James Kennedy
... a fordable river one move. To change from fours to two ranks half a move. To change from two ranks to extension half a move. To embark into boats two moves for every twenty men embarked at any point. To disembark one move ...
— Little Wars; a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys' games and books • H. G. Wells
... which it is distant a little over a mile; and its north side is formed by a long narrow point, called Navy Point, on which was the naval establishment. Where Black River Bay meets the lake, its south shore is prolonged to the west by a projection called Horse Island, connected with the land by a fordable neck. Brown expected the landing to be made upon this, and he decided to meet the attack at the water's edge of the mainland, as the enemy crossed the neck. There he disposed his five hundred militia, placing the regulars under Backus in a second line; a steadying point ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... grew apace. Gourgues plainly saw the fort, whose defences seemed slight and unfinished. He even saw the Spaniards at work within. A feverish interval elapsed. At length the tide was out,—so far, at least, that the stream was fordable. A little higher up, a clump of woods lay between it and the fort. Behind this friendly screen the passage was begun. Each man tied his powder-flask to his steel cap, held his arquebuse above his head with one hand and grasped his sword with the other. The channel was ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... boundary dividing Hazara and Peshawar, two districts of the North West Frontier Province. Lower down it parts Peshawar from the Panjab district of Attock. In this section after a time the hills recede on both sides, and the stream is wide and so shallow that it is fordable in places in the cold weather. There are islands, ferry boats and rafts can ply, and the only danger is from sudden freshets. Ohind, where Alexander crossed, is in this section. A more famous passage is at Attock just below the junction ...
— The Panjab, North-West Frontier Province, and Kashmir • Sir James McCrone Douie
... Pshaw, I only meant, it wasn't fordable to the enemy: no, poor devils! they couldn't ford it certainly; but as to our hussars: whew! such fellows as they would get thro' any thing, were it ever so deep to the bottom. (takes the flask from Gaspard ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter
... plunge down into the steep valley of the stream. Here, among heavy tracts of fallen timber and countless tumbled rocks, they came at last to the white water of their river, now grown very small and easily fordable ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Missouri • Emerson Hough
... sea. On the opposite side the glacis runs into a sort of large lake formed by two arms of the reef, level with the surface of the sea. The admiral wanted to know whether the bed of this lake was level, whether it was fordable, and whether, in case of necessity, the glacis and the walls of the fort could be reached from it, after they had been gutted ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... now, and go southeast two miles and you come to the crossing of the Ridge road to Corinth, where you will find General Prentiss's division, before mentioned. Keeping on, you come to Lick Creek. It has high, steep banks. It is fordable at this point, and Colonel Stuart's brigade of Sherman's division is there, guarding the crossing. The brook which gurgles past the church empties into the creek. You see that Prentiss's entire division, and the left wing of McClernand's, is between Stuart's brigade and the ...
— My Days and Nights on the Battle-Field • Charles Carleton Coffin
... beyond. Everywhere it was guarded, as well as in his immediate front, and having run the gauntlet of the batteries up and down the river, he returned to his post at Montmorenci. On the right of the French position, across the Montmorenci River, which was fordable at low tide, was a redoubt of the enemy. He would have that. Perhaps, to defend it the French chief would be forced out from his lines, and a battle be brought on. Wolfe determined to play these odds. He would fetch over the body of ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... took the south side; and in two days more they disappeared again: for they, believing we were still before them, pushed on till they came to the Udda, a very great river when it passes farther north, but when we came to it we found it narrow and fordable. ...
— The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... in which, though distrustful of the intended Military Congress, Mavrocordato had consented to accompany Lord Byron, was, as the foregoing letters have mentioned, delayed by the floods,—the river Fidari having become so swollen as not to be fordable. In the mean time, dangers, both from within and without, threatened Missolonghi. The Turkish fleet had again come forth from the Gulf, while, in concert, it was apprehended, with this resumption of the blockade, insurrectionary ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... streets resembled so many torrents, and in most places were not fordable, notwithstanding scores of persons, with the alacrity of mushrooms after rain, had placed themselves at the narrowest parts of the streams, with raised planks, or temporary bridges for crossing. Our load was landed under the arcade ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 330, September 6, 1828 • Various
... of fortification taken by De Salaberry. In his rear there was a small rapid where the river was fordable in two spots close to one another. He commanded this with a strong breastwork and a guard. There were four ravines which issued from the very thick woods, crossing the road, and distant from each other two hundred yards or ...
— An Account Of The Battle Of Chateauguay - Being A Lecture Delivered At Ormstown, March 8th, 1889 • William D. Lighthall
... took advantage. Peters' corps of Tories were entrenched on the other side of the stream, in lower ground, and nearly in front of the German Battery. The little river, that meanders through the scene of the action, is fordable in all places. Stark was encamped upon the same side of it as the Germans, but, owing to its serpentine course, it crossed his line of march twice on his way to their position. Their post was carefully reconnoitered at a mile's distance, and the plan of attack was arranged in the following ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... before we came to the inn; an immense ridge of rocks stretching out on one side. The inn was sheltered under them; and about a hundred yards from it was a bridge that crossed the river, the murmurs of which I have celebrated; it was not fordable. The Swedish general received orders to stop at the bridge and dispute the passage—a most advantageous post for an army so much inferior in force; but the influence of beauty is not confined to courts. The mistress ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... the British, when every means was taken to spare life, to prevent plunder, and to restore order. We must not omit to speak of the gallantry of several naval officers mentioned by Sir Hugh Gough. Having heard that the canal was fordable, he had sent Major Gough to ascertain the fact, accompanied by Captain Loch, RN, who acted as an amateur throughout the campaign, as the general's extra aide-de-camp, and Lieutenant Hodgson, of the Cornwallis, as also by Lieutenant ...
— Our Sailors - Gallant Deeds of the British Navy during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... Bann was not fordable, and the bridge broken down, the Irish forced thither at different times, a great number of unarmed, defenceless protestants, and with pikes and swords violently thrust above one thousand into the ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... morning the rain-clouds rolled themselves up and disappeared, and the bright blue sky looked as if it had been well washed. I had to wait till noon before the rivers became fordable, and my day's journey is only seven miles, as it is not possible to go farther till more of the water runs off. We had very limp, melancholy horses, and my mago was half-tipsy, and sang, talked, and jumped the whole way. Sake ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... enemy's cavalry were guarding this ford, but after a sharp little skirmish my battalion of cavalry crossed and took up a strong position on the other bank. The stream was very high and the current very swift, the water, tumbling along over its rocky bed in an immense volume, but still it was fordable for infantry if means could be devised by which the men could keep their feet. A cable was stretched across just below the ford as a lifeline for the weaker ones, and then the men of the entire division having secured their ammunition ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 2 • P. H. Sheridan
... were now to penetrate. Rugged paths, narrow passes, gloomy thickets and dark ravines, encountered them in their hourly progress, calling for constant vigilance and the maintenance of all their courage. Rivers, fordable in unfrequent places and overlooked by precipitous banks on either side, crowned most commonly by dense and intricate masses of forest, through which and without a guide, our little army was compelled to pass,—presented opportunities ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... horses. They were named "Beef," "Steaks," and "Suet." "Beef" was a magnificent animal, but having been bitten by the flies, he so lost his condition that I changed his name to "Bones." We were ready to start, and the natives reported that early in January the Asua would be fordable. I had arranged with Ibrahim that he should supply me with porters for payment in copper bracelets, and that he should accompany me with one hundred men to Kamrasi's country (Unyoro), on condition that he would restrain ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... and the western side there was another lofty headland, which terminated the Cove of Torwich; as the sea, except at low-water in high spring tides, washed the foot of this promontory, it was only fordable at ebb-tide. In the middle of the intermediate space, three rocks which might truly be called "forked promontories" from their sharp pyramidical shape, jutted abruptly out of the beach, and were connected by a sort of natural ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 375, June 13, 1829 • Various
... some day be worked with telling effect upon England's trade. I must not deceive you into a belief that the Ohio is always navigable. So far from that being the case, I understand that, for weeks and months even, it is constantly fordable. As late as the 23rd of November, the large passage-boats were unable to make regular passages, owing to their so frequently getting aground; and the consequence was, that we were doomed to prosecute our journey ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... skirmish-line. The country gradually became more rugged as the route brought them near Centreville. There were no hills—a bare but not bleak champaign, mostly without houses or farms, as the North knows them. Sluggish brooks became more frequent, but none that were not easily fordable. There were no landmarks to hold the mind to the scene, nor, in case of battle, give the strategists points of vantage for the iron game. About noon, the detached groups stalking a little negligently now over the tedious plains, ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... length and weight of their arrows that Greeks collected them, and used them as javelins. Seven days of this brought the retreating force to the river Centrites, which parts the Carduchian mountains from the province of Armenia. With a barely fordable river, troops in evidence on the other side, and the Carduchi hanging on their rear, the passage offered great difficulties, solved by the discovery of a much shallower ford. A feint at one point by the rearguard ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... running out into the sea, and possesses one of the finest harbours in the world, protected by an island as by a natural breakwater. But it had a weak side, and this had been betrayed by fishermen to Scipio. During ebb-tide the water of the shallow pool W. of the town fell so much that it was fordable and the bottom was firm. Of this Scipio took advantage. He first made a feint attack on the N. wall and then led 500 men across the ford, who scaled the W. wall and opened the ...
— Helps to Latin Translation at Sight • Edmund Luce
... point of the Rovuma, above a cataract where a reach of comparatively still water, from 150 to 200 yards wide, allows a school of hippopotami to live: when the river becomes fordable in many places, as it is said to do in August and September, they must find it ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... the crow flies, but eight miles from Pittsburg, and scarce twelve by the course of the river. For three-quarters of a mile below the entrance of the creek the Monongahela was unusually shallow, forming a gentle rapid or "ripple," and easily fordable at almost any point. Its common level is from three to four hundred feet below that of the surrounding country; and along its upper banks, at the second crossing, stretches a fertile bottom of a rich pebbled mould, about a fourth ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... column managed to advance. The river Fum was rising, but was still fordable, and they crossed it, with difficulty. It was now necessary to give up scouting, and depend entirely on the volleys of the men in front to discover ambuscades. One or two deserted or thinly populated villages were passed. Then, after two hours of this trying tramp, the advance ...
— Through Three Campaigns - A Story of Chitral, Tirah and Ashanti • G. A. Henty
... had risen in flood without warning. Last night it was a fordable shallow; to-night five miles of raving muddy water parted bank and caving bank, and the river was still rising under the moon. A litter borne by six bearded men, all unused to the work, stopped in the white sand that bordered ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... river they could see the dismounted troopers, playing cards, sleeping or currying their horses. They seemed to be in no hurry at all. Colonel Winchester sent divisions of scouts up and down the stream, and, both returning after a while, reported that the river was not fordable anywhere. ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler
... gallop. Think of this, Inspector-General of Artillery: the Boer gunners fired ten or eleven shells, every one of which fell among or within a hundred yards of our ranks. Between us and the wood ran a deep donga with a river only fordable in places flowing through it. Some confusion occurred in crossing this, but at last the whole regiment was across, and found shelter from the terrible gun—perhaps there were two—on the further bank. Thanks to our dispersed formation only two horses had been ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill
... we left Nongoma early in the hope of reaching Ulundi that evening if the Ivuna and Black Umfolozi Rivers proved fordable. As it chanced, although they were high, we were able to cross them, I seated on the horse which two of the Zulus led. Next we tramped for miles through the terrible Bekameezi Valley, a hot and desolate place which the Zulus swear is ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... about, he frequently comes to very deep hollows, excavated by the various branches of the river, which flow with a very gentle current in large sandy channels. Except after heavy rains, these are almost always fordable, and are commonly sunk fifty or sixty feet perpendicular below the general level of ...
— An Account of The Kingdom of Nepal • Fancis Buchanan Hamilton |
