Escape

“ Escape was next to impossible, resistance next to useless. Confined in that narrow passage, confused, terrified, their ranks broken by the rearing and plunging horses, knights and men-at-arms falling with every blow from their vigorous assailants, it seemed as if the whole army would be annihilated, and not a man escape to tell the tale. ”

“ But in this English picture all the story of the escape, as of the flight, is told, in fulness of peace, and yet of compassion. The travel is in the dead of the night, the way unseen and unknown;—but, partly stooping from the starlight, and partly floating on the desert mirage, move, with the Holy Family, the glorified souls of the Innocents. Clear in celestial light, and gathered into child-garlands of gladness, they look to the Child in whom they live, and yet, for them to die. ”

“ And all that remains to do.
To escape, yes, even from you,
My only love, and be
Alone, and free.
Could I only stand
Between gray moor and gray sky
Where the winds and the plovers cry,
And no man is at hand. ”

“ The possibility of escape galvanized them into the desire for life. Cries of distress, and prayers for help, filled the air. Men and women rushed about like frightened sheep without concert or any sensible effort to escape, wasting in futile scrambles the short time remaining to them. ”

“ I had a wonderful escape, Dick—there is no disputing that—an escape for which, while I live, I shall bless the mercy of heaven. No one can conceive or imagine what it is for flesh and blood to stand in the presence of such a thing, but one who has had the terrific experience. ”

“ The patient frenzy-stung must needs break loose,
Fly anyhow, find refuge anywhere,
Even in the arms of who should front her first,
No monster but a man—while nature shrieked
"Or thus escape, or die!" The spasm arrived,
Not the escape by way of sin,—O God,
Who shall pluck sheep Thou holdest, from Thy hand? ”

“ The weight of the material world lifted, an avenue of escape seemed to open itself to him from so much that oppressed and deadened him, and he felt like a man in an amphitheatre of overhanging mountains, who should espy in a far-off corner some scarcely perceptible track, and on nearer inspection a break in the walled precipices, a promise, or at least a hint, of a passage from imprisonment to the open plain. ”

“ I knew of no escape, no means by which we might find a way out of the toils in which we were caught—we must meet them here at the stair head, in the dark, and defend ourselves to the last extremity. Death, even, was far preferable to falling alive into their hands. ”

“ Challenge laughter, take tears, play the piano,
Form judgments, blame a crude world for disaster.
To escape is nothing. Not to escape is nothing.
The farmer's wife stands with a halo of darkness
Rounding her head. ”

“ And they're certain to stop here. And, furthermore, we may be able to do something ourselves. The river is open, and if it comes to the worst, escape would be another way out; and escape is the last thing they would dream of. ”

“ I look despairingly on all sides, and see no escape! I am bound, hand and foot, by the chains of my own noble birth, and shut within the iron walls of circumstance. I struggle vainly in my captivity; no way of freedom is open to me! ”

“ If I had not at length found the opportunity to escape, if I had not seen the landscapes for which my soul longed, I think I must have moped to death. Few men, assuredly, have enjoyed such wanderings more than I, and few men revive them in memory with a richer delight or deeper longing. ”

“ When I lay down to sleep in the forest, wrapped closely in my blanket, and surrounded by the dark-brow'd warriours, no slumber visited me; for before my diseased imagination swam continually images of the prisoner at the stake, the flame, the death-song, and all the features of savage vengeance, and exultation. Plans of escape occupied every night, and every day revealed their impracticability. During this season of excitement, I felt no fatigue. My strength was more than equal to the labour imposed: so much is the mind capable of modifying its terrestrial companion. ”

“ In the woods about my garden and familiar precincts lurk the fears of life; all threaten me, some I may escape, of others I am the destined and devoted victim. Sooner or later—and yet in any case how soon!—I shall fall, as I have seen others fall, touched by an unseen hand. ”

“ You would escape for your life; you would prefer a lodging in some vast wilderness. But what will you do when the Lord "ariseth to shake terribly the earth?" When the great day of his wrath shall come, whither shall you fly? "Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him, and they that pierced him." Where now will you find shelter from that "fire that shall devour before Him?" Where in the wide universe will you then find an all-availing friend? ”

“ Mad for escape; frenzied each breathless mote,
Lest rouse the Old Enemy from his death-still swoon,
Lest crack that whip again—they fly, they float,
Scamper, breathe—'Paradise!' abscond, are gone. . . . ”

“ I could not leave the poor French lad to perish on the mountains, and to none save my daughter, in these times of peril, could I with safety and honour to myself have imparted the secret of his escape and existence. ”

“ Then, certain of time for escape, I cried to my prisoners, "You are looking for Vidocq—well, it is he who has caged you; farewell." And away I went like a dart, leaving the party shouting for help, and making desperate efforts to escape from the unlucky closet. ”

“ Should I pass in safety, I might issue forth into a wilderness, of which I had no knowledge, where I might wander till I perished with famine, or where my footsteps might be noted and pursued and overtaken by these implacable foes. These perils were enormous and imminent; but I likewise considered that I might be at no great distance from the habitations of men, and that my escape might rescue them from the most dreadful calamities. ”

“ He simply saw a boat and threw himself into it, as he threw himself into everything else. It has all that air of running a race which makes his whole life read like an escapade or even literally an escape. ”

“ They that escape of you shall remember me - Those that escape the sword, the pestilence, and the famine, and shall be led into captivity, shall plainly see that it is God who has done this, and shall humble themselves on account of their abominations, leave their idolatry, and worship me alone. ”

“ I longed to draw in a plentiful draught of fresh air, to stretch my cramped limbs, to have room to stand erect, to feel the earth under my feet again. My relatives were constantly on the lookout for a chance of escape ”

“ I never hear the word "escape"
Without a quicker blood,
A sudden expectation,
A flying attitude.
I never hear of prisons broad
By soldiers battered down,
But I tug childish at my bars, —
Only to fail again! ”

“ I have come here by stealth, I know a secret path over the mountain by which we may escape together. Disguise yourself and come with me, and we will make our way to some distant land where your enemies cannot reach you. ”

“ My first plan of escape having failed, I now determined upon another. ”

“ We had one man at the bow to watch for "sawyers," while the others kept a vigilant look out for a place to haul up. The dense darkness of the stormy night prevented us discovering danger until we were on the point of being enveloped in it, and in several instances, our escape seemed truly miraculous. ”

“ The thoughts of a captive can no more get beyond his prison-walls than his limbs, unless they are busied in planning an escape; as, on the contrary, what prisoner, after effecting his escape, ever suffered them to return there, or took common precautions to prevent his own? ”

“ The joy of escape more than pays for the momentary unpleasantness of fear. The fear instinct is utilized also in coasting on the snow, climbing, swimming, or any adventurous sport; in all of which there is danger, but the skilful player escapes by his own efforts. ”

“ Studying means of escape, and efforts to rid them [12] selves of the tormenting vermin, were the chief occupations of prisoners of war while awake. In their fitful and uneasy slumbers they were dreaming that they were at home sitting at the most abundantly supplied tables and enjoying all the comforts which the word home implies. ”

“ The feeling he had nourished and given prominence to was one of thankfulness for his escape: he was like a traveller so grateful for rescue from a dangerous accident that at first he is hardly conscious of his bruises. Now he suddenly felt the latent ache, and realized that after all he had not come off unhurt. ”

“ If you were moved at night we knew that you would, as agreed, try to make your escape and join us here. If you were moved in the day, and had no chance of escaping, we made up our minds to follow and to get you away if possible, for we considered your life would be in danger, and that, however great the risk, you would be willing to try to escape. ”

“ Your escape would, however, have to be made by night; but as you would run some risk in crossing the grounds, and, when you passed the gate, would find yourself in the midst of a strange world, without a friend, you must only think of flight as your last resource in the most desperate extremity. We must resort to cunning, until your friends come for you, on Monday night. ”

“ Pretending to be well satisfied with my new mode of life, I at last gained upon the confidence of the savages, and one day when their vigilance was relaxed, I made my escape and returned in safety to my friends, who had mourned for me as dead. ”

“ And he did have a fancy for escapes, as I myself have always had. My own tales, told and untold, are full of escapes—by water in the dark and in a leaky boat, escapes from situations, escapes from dullness, from pretense, from the heavy-handed seriousness of the half artists. What writer of tales does not dote upon escapes? They are the very breath in our nostrils. ”

“ A walk of a very few rods concealed us from his view, by a turn in the road and some bushes, and thus we escaped from prison, for we thought we were hardly dealt by, to be confined by those whom we took to be our friends, after having laboured so hard to escape being made prisoners by the common enemy. ”

“ We thought of the difficulties surmounted in the escape and of the good fight which we had made against our pursuers, and with such recent memories our spirits could not be cast down. We had a little food, a little drink, good weapons, and enough of ammunition. We knew that [Pg 295] every man could trust his comrades, and so, while our horses lasted, and for at least a day afterwards, we could laugh at Fate. ”

“ The earnest desire of every heart was to escape from the constant dogged and depressing pursuit of their savage and artful foes, and the account of the unsuspected path to the river filled them with the hopes which they had nearly abandoned. ”

“ But now she was sick to nausea of the part, and envious of the others who could escape by flight—by perpetual evasion.
Not that she really wanted to be one of them; she was not sure that she wanted to go away at all—at least in the body. Spiritual escape was what she craved ”

“ At any rate, we would leave no 85 plan untried, let it be as thoughtless, or even desperate as it may, to escape from our miserable lot, and as we had an eternal imprisonment hovering over us, we determined either to reach our homes, or find a grave among the mountains or beneath the waves. ”

“ It is good to escape for a time from the House of Rimmon—be it office or cutchery—and to go abroad under no more exacting master than personal inclination, and with no more definite plan of travel than has the horse, escaped from pasture, free upon the countryside. ”

“ All their hopes of escape depended on the success of the artifice. If they might elude the cunning of their pursuers, by this simple and therefore less suspected expedient, they could renew their flight as the evening approached, and, by changing their course, the chance of final success would be greatly increased. ”

“ I will provide you with a boat and a man. You may succeed in reaching the shore, by making a détour. It is not yet daylight; the waves are high and the sea dark. You will probably escape. There are occasions when to flee means to conquer. ”

“ When you treat them as rats baited into a trap, from which escape is impossible, you dissolve the main idea and interpose the thought of escape. ¶ And this is what makes so many married men and women stray in their sleep and tread the border-land of folly. ”

“ Yes; we can choose the right moment. With not men enough on deck to prevent our lowering a boat, and a dark night, the escape will not prove difficult. No one aboard except myself will know where we are. ”

“ Kedzie tiptoed away. She felt as Eve must have felt sneaking out of Eden and hearing the nightingales wrangling and the leopards at play.
CHAPTER XXVI
We must fly fast and keep on flying if we would escape from our pasts. Ambition, adventure, or sheer luck may carry us forward out of them as in a cavalry-foray over strange frontiers, but sooner or later we must wait for our wagons or fall back to them. ”

“ I say so, “obtain your hats and baggages with immediate quickness and I will snuggle you away from here before they can catch you.”
“What you mean by what you say?” they require.
“I observe how you suffer. Therefore I help escape.” This I say. ”