river-dam

Updated: May 5, 2025

A single man or a single family or even a small tribe could not construct a river-dam without the help of others. However much a farmer might dislike his neighbors he disliked getting drowned even more and he was obliged to call upon the entire country-side when the water of the river began to rise and threatened him and his wife and his children and his cattle with destruction.

Hendrik Willem Van Loon - Ancient Man : The Beginning of Civilizations

Then ceased the song, and the whole band of the Woodlanders came pouring tumultuously into the space allotted them, like the waters pouring over a river-dam, their white swords waving aloft in the morning sunlight; and wild and strange cries rose up from amidst them, with sobbing and weeping of joy.

William Morris - The Roots of the Mountains; Wherein Is Told Somewhat of the Lives of the Men of Burgdale