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Clinch   Listen
noun
Clinch  n.  
1.
The act or process of holding fast; that which serves to hold fast; a grip; a grasp; a clamp; a holdfast; as, to get a good clinch of an antagonist, or of a weapon; to secure anything by a clinch.
2.
A pun.
3.
(Naut.) A hitch or bend by which a rope is made fast to the ring of an anchor, or the breeching of a ship's gun to the ringbolts.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Clinch" Quotes from Famous Books



... master was there, and guests, for the matter of that; she insisted on it. He knew his place as well as any man, but his eye fell on the rabbit and he looked very queer and nearly dropped a cup. She saw it and began to tremble and go white, and it came over me then that now or never was the time to clinch matters or she'd nearly die from shame and I couldn't soothe ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon

... fearing accidental defeat, forgot caution and tried to rush in for a clinch. But this was the kind of attack that Prescott was ...
— The High School Boys' Training Hike • H. Irving Hancock

... an excitin' game; and when we work in a few minutes of hand-holdin', or I get away with a hasty clinch, why, that scores for our side. So, for a personally conducted affair, it ain't so poor. I'm missin' no dates, I notice. And tuck this away; if it was a case of Vee and a whole squad of aunts, or an uninterrupted ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford

... insupportable. Such were these earnest wishings that but one man had been saved. I believe I repeated the words, "O that it had been but one!" a thousand times; and my desires were so moved by it, that when I spoke the words my hands would clinch together, and my fingers would press the palms of my hands, so that if I had had any soft thing in my hand, it would have crushed it involuntarily; and the teeth in my head would strike together, and ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe

... in, if you're goin', Kernel. I reckon I'm talkin' to Kernel Clinch," said the passenger beside Hale with sudden alacrity. "I'm Rawlins, of Frisco. Heerd of ye afore, Kernel, and kinder spotted you jist now ...
— Snow-Bound at Eagle's • Bret Harte

... formulae of politeness in French, our conversation was carried on in Italian, and I had a better opportunity of studying my host's air and manner. His hands he held clasped before him, but frequently released them, to make those vivid gestures with which Neapolitans frequently clinch their phrase. His most remarkable feature was his eyes, of a greenish grey: extraordinary eyes, not for beauty, but for their fathomless depth, and for the sympathy which one felt welling up in them from the soul beneath. ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce

... hill in silence, Ardita's hand still resting in Carlyle's as it had when they finished dancing. She felt it clinch nervously from time to time as though he were unaware of the contact, but though he hurt her she made no attempt to remove it. It seemed an hour's climb before they reached the top and crept cautiously across the silhouetted plateau to the edge of the cliff. After ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald

... Boon's eldest son, were slain, and the cattle scattered; and though the backwoodsmen rallied and repulsed their assailants, yet they had suffered such loss and damage that they retreated and took up their abode temporarily on the Clinch River. ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt

... holdin' his side. "Can you tie that?" He looks over and sees Van Ness in a clinch with Miss Vincent—and son, you could see the muscles rollin' under his coat sleeves. "Look at the big, ignorant ...
— Kid Scanlan • H. C. Witwer

... Mr. Gibney welcomed Captain Hicks with a terrific right swing, which missed; before he could guard, Dan Hicks had planted left and right where they would do the most good and Mr. Gibney went into a clinch to ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne

... obtain enlistments. The large church was crowded. After addresses had been made by the writer and Colonel Beard, one hundred men volunteered at once, and the number soon reached about one hundred and twenty-five. Such, however, were the demands of Fort Clinch and the Quartermaster's Department for laborers, that Colonel Rich, commanding the fort, consented to only twenty-five men leaving. This was a sad disappointment, and one which some determined not to bear. The twenty-five men were carefully selected from among those not employed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... know it's not. It's like sitting at a Barmecide feast, very hungry, only the Barmecide's sitting opposite you eating all the time and talking about his food. I tell you it's maddening, perfectly maddening—" There was a fierce vehemence in her face, her voice, the clinch of her slender hands on the muslin frill. That strong vitality which before had seemed to carry her lightly as on wings, over all the rough places of life, had now not failed, but turned itself inwards, burning in an intense flame ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods

... assuming in these sketches no office of a teacher. I am seeking only to make a truthful analysis of the boyish thought and feeling. But having ventured thus far into what may seem sacred ground, I shall venture still farther, and clinch my matter ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell

... order to calm alarms, which might at any moment have disturbed the public peace. That Bill of Indemnity and Oblivion had to be shaped in accordance with the Declaration issued by the King from Breda. Personally, Hyde had endeavoured to restrain the impulse which tempted the King to clinch a promising bargain by over-lavish concessions. He always held that the dignity of the King could not be satisfied without vengeance on the murderers of his father, and that the security of the Crown rendered a severe example necessary. But if his caution led ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... is done—done and over—until you have nailed it fast. So you go back again, though perhaps you are so tired that you are fainting; but you fight yourself like a madman, you struggle until you feel a thing at your heart like a wild beast; and you keep on, you hold it fast and learn it, clinch it tight, and make it yours forever. I have done that same thing five times to-day without a rest; and toiled for five hours in that frenzy; and then lain down upon the ground, with ...
— The Journal of Arthur Stirling - "The Valley of the Shadow" • Upton Sinclair

... very uncertain to a looker-on. It might be the approaches of love, and quite as probably the wary beginnings of war, and the next feature of the programme was not explanatory; they rose together in the air ten feet or more, face to face, fluttering and snatching at each other, apparently trying to clinch; succeeding in doing so, they fell to the ground, separated just before they touched it, and flew away. O wings! most maddening ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller

... floriated richly and graduated with a precise symmetry, rises to an extreme altitude of 220 feet 6 inches. The extreme length is about 170 ft. The massive oaken front doors are carved handsomely, and contain the arms of the Stewart family, the Clinch family (Mrs. Stewart's maiden name), the Hilton family, and those of Bishop Littlejohn, the Episcopal head of the Long Island Diocese. The porch or tower entrance, which is the main entrance to the building, is paved ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 488, May 9, 1885 • Various

... time Commander of the Southern Military District, directed Lieut.-Colonel Clinch to perform the barbarous task. I was at one time personally acquainted with that officer, and know the impulses of his generous nature, and can readily account for the failure of his expedition. He marched to the vicinity of the Fort, made the necessary recognisance, and returned, making ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various

... seem to win a share of its eternal sufferance. Your peasant will bow his back as soon as he can stand upright, and every year draws him nearer to the earth. The rheumatics at last grip him unawares, and clinch him in a gesture which is a figure of his lot. The scarred hills, the burnt plains, the trees which the wind cows and lays down, the flowers and corn, meek or glad at the bidding of the hour—the earth-born is kin to these, more plant than man. I have done ill if I have ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett

... to clinch our understanding of the above conditions we must now consider in more ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson

... Chin and Shoop knew what was coming, and Shoop decided to surprise the assemblage. The main issue was not the shooting contest, and if High-Chin Bob had not already seen enough of Shoop's work to satisfy him, the genial Bud intended to clinch the matter right there. ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert

... Mohammed Beyd had recovered himself and was dashing upon him. Again Werper struck the other in the face, and the Arab returned the blow. Striking at each other and ceaselessly attempting to clinch, the two battled about the small interior of the tent, while the girl, wide-eyed in terror and astonishment, watched the duel ...
— Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... Isaac Cutter and his wife, who had money to spend, and were not averse to showing it; there was Miss Eliza Clinch, who had spent her fifty years of life in looking for a bargain, which she had not yet found; and some others. But though the Skipper was courteous to all, he kept close to the side of Mr. Endymion Scraper; and the boy ...
— Nautilus • Laura E. Richards

... was she actually born in wedlock? Lord Levellier's assurances regarding her origin were, by the calculation, a miser's shuffles to clinch his bargain. Assuming the representative of holy motherhood to be a woman of illegitimate birth, the history of the House to which the spotted woman gave an heir would suffer a jolt when touching on her. And altogether the history fumed rank vapours. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... help him into fame. If he were great as principal, he was unrivalled as confidant. He could enter into a passion; he could counsel wary moves, being, in his own phrase, so old a hawk; nay, he could turn a letter for some unlucky swain, or even string a few lines of verse that should clinch the business and fetch the hesitating fair one to the ground. Nor, perhaps, was it only his "curiosity, zeal, and intrepid dexterity" that recommended him for a second in such affairs; it must have been a distinction to have the assistance and advice of "Rab the Ranter"; and one who was ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... bloody nose ye'll have, too," as he drove his left with deadly precision on Quinlan's olfactory organ, staggering that amazed youth, who, nothing daunted, ran into a series of jabs and swings that completely dazed him and forced him to clinch to save further damage. But the fighting blood of O'Connell was up. He beat Quinlan out of the clinch with a well-timed upper-cut that put the youth upon his back ...
— Peg O' My Heart • J. Hartley Manners

... I'm sorry not to be able to clinch the story, but the man recovered and is now a successful stockbroker in Drapers Gardens. The woman, too, is the mother of a considerable family. But ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle

... trifle to the police), this treacherous friend agreed to insert into the pamphlet three or four phrases which exposed it to seizure and caused its author to be summoned before the court of assizes. Now the way to make the explanation clinch the doubt in Thuillier's mind is to let him know that the next day la Peyrade, who, as Thuillier knew, hadn't a sou, paid Dutocq precisely that very sum ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... weak, seeming to be overtrained. The Cyclone waded in, using both hands effectively. The Battler fell into a clinch, but the Cyclone broke away and, measuring his distance, picked up a haymaker from the floor and put it ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... by the meaning of the very term 'needfire'. This word does not derive, as was formerly believed, from the word 'need', meaning a 'fire kindled in a state of need', but, as recent etymological research has shown, from a root which appears in the German word nieten - to clinch or rivet. 'Needfire' therefore means nothing less than a fire which was kindled for 'clinching' anew the bond between earthly life and the primal spiritual order at times when for one reason or another there ...
— Man or Matter • Ernst Lehrs

... Hazlitt. Now gather up Miss Hardy, Walsh. Register devotion, gratitude, adoration—now you got it. Turn on your lamps full power, dearie! Wow! Bully! A couple of tears, please. That's the stuff. You'll be the queen of the world. Weep a little more. Real tears. That's it! Now clinch ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes

... fastening to wood thin material, such as veneers, textiles, leather, matting, tin, etc. Tinner's tacks, which are used for clinching, are commonly called clinch-nails. Wire tacks, altho made, are not so successful as cut tacks because they lack a sharp ...
— Handwork in Wood • William Noyes

... General Clinch, who commanded at Fort Brooke, having been reinforced with thirty-nine men from Key West, no time was lost in preparing two companies for the above service. On the 24th of December 1835, a force of one hundred men, and eight ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... it appeared that Coligny was paramount at court. Both English and French volunteers were fighting in the Netherlands. Small wonder that Burghley and Walsingham believed that a French marriage would clinch matters, make France a virtually Huguenot Power, and secure a combination which would bring the Pope and the King of Spain to their knees. The approaching marriage of the French King's sister, Margaret, to young Henry of Navarre—now ...
— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes

... with the consciousness that on the one side he was really tired, and on the other that he could not sleep and, to clinch it, the knowledge that a twenty-mile walk lay before him. He began to tell himself that sleep was merely a question of will—of will deliberately relaxing attention. He rearranged his position a little; ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson

... As if to clinch the argument a dozen of the ruffians swung their cannikins of rum in the air and began to shout a song at the top of their lungs. All the words that reached Jeremy were oaths except one phrase at the end of the refrain, repeated so often that he began to make ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader

... embarcadero. I've told what a charming evening we had with you and your daughters in the old house, and how I returned your hospitality by giving you a tip about the railroad; and how you slipped out while we were playing cards, to clinch the bargain for the land with that drunken ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte

... will not tolerate banter and suggestive conversation among Christians, what would he say of the shameful backbiting which is heard whenever people meet, though but two individuals? Yes, what would be his judgment of those who in public preaching clinch and claw, attack and ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther

... MEN. Oh! those confounded women! how they do cajole us! How true the saying: "'Tis impossible to live with the baggages, impossible to live without 'em"! Come, let us agree for the future not to regard each other any more as enemies; and to clinch the bargain, let us ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al

... left for a stroll around the grounds they'd both got back to lookin' more or less nice and natural. They had gone to a close clinch and was sobbin' affectionate on ...
— On With Torchy • Sewell Ford

... The fight was on: fast and furious. The followers of each leader, appalled at the fierceness of the combat, stood as though frozen in their places. The flag, clutched by both fighters, was in danger of being torn from end to end. Then came the clinch. Gripping, writhing, twisting, tangled in the colors, the lithe young bodies wavered to their fall. And when they fell the flag fell with them, into the grime and slush of the road. In an instant Pen was on his feet again, but Aleck did not rise. He pulled himself slowly to his elbow and ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene

... sir; I have been on board a guardo. Top your boom, I say, and be off, or I'll have you hauled up and riveted in a clinch—both fore-tacks over the main-yard, and no bloody knife to cut the seizing. Sheer! or I'll pitch into you like a shin of beef into a ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville

... thing to do was to push Rosecrans's army to Chattanooga and beyond. With the valley of the Tennessee in our possession, and Chattanooga held as a new base of supply for a column in East Tennessee as well as another in Georgia, the occupation of Knoxville and the Clinch and Holston valleys to the Virginia line was easy. Without it, all East Tennessee campaigns were visionary. It was easy enough to get there; the trouble was to stay. Buell's original lesson in logistics, in which he gave the War Department a computation of the wagons and ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox

... of it. Realising that the time had come for decisive action, the white man summoned the company, told them that his stick had revealed the plot to him and warned them of the danger they ran. To clinch his argument he offered to allow the ringleaders to return home, taking the stick with them; but told them that they would be dead within twenty-four hours, and the stick would come back to him. To his dismay they accepted the challenge, ...
— Sketches of the East Africa Campaign • Robert Valentine Dolbey

... vacant; an uncle of his was a very important person on the Council; that and other wires might be pulled. Constance, eagerly, began to count up her own opportunities of the same kind; and between them, they had soon—in imagination—captured the post. Then, said Falloden, it would be for Constance to clinch the matter. No man could do such a thing decently. Pryce would have to be told—"'The world's your oyster—but before you open it, you will kindly go and propose to my cousin!—which of course you ought to ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... realized at the outset that he was up against a hard fight. In his hurry to close with the red-bearded man, his foot had slipped on the slimy grass and he had been forced to clinch to save himself from falling. This placed him at a marked disadvantage. His opponent had the best of him in weight by at least twenty pounds and was heavily muscled. Moreover he possessed a certain agility on the grass-covered rocks which rendered any attempt on Gregory's part to force the ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton

... same spirit, that the opinions of old men about life have been accepted as final. All sorts of allowances are made for the illusions of youth; and none, or almost none, for the disenchantments of age. It is held to be a good taunt, and somehow or other to clinch the question logically, when an old gentleman waggles his head and says: 'Ah, so I thought when I was your age.' It is not thought an answer at all, if the young man retorts: My venerable sir, so I shall most probably think when I am yours.' And ...
— The Pocket R.L.S. - Being Favourite Passages from the Works of Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson

... exhibition of in front of Sally without doing something to hold his end up. He proposed to go down with his flag flying, and in pursuance of this object he dug Mr. Butler heavily in the lower ribs with his right, causing that expert to clinch and the two wise guys to utter sharp barking ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse

... same divine Spirit, and has flung fiery questions at the Judaisers, which silenced them. Then, after the impressive hush following his eager words, Barnabas and Paul tell their story once more, and clinch the nail driven by Peter by asserting that God had already by 'signs and wonders' given His sanction to the admission of Gentiles without circumcision. Characteristically, in Jerusalem Barnabas is restored to his place above Paul, and is named ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren

... pretty suburb, inhabited by people of the middling class. U—— met me joyfully, but seemed to have had a good time with Mrs. Oakford and her daughter; and, being pressed to stay to tea, I could not well help it. Before tea I sat talking with Mrs. Oakford and a friend of hers, Miss Clinch, about the Americans and the English, especially dwelling on the defects of the latter,—among which we reckoned a wretched meanness in money transactions, a lack of any embroidery of honor and liberality in their ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... not bribe. They need not resort to illegal or unethical methods. The ordinary channels of advertising, of business acquaintance and patronage, of philanthropy and of social intercourse clinch their power over the ...
— The American Empire • Scott Nearing

... was strained to Manassas plains; every heart throbbed stronger at the mention of that name. All knew that there the giants were soon to clinch in deadly wrestle for the mastery; that the struggle was now at hand, when the flag of the South would be carried high in triumph ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon

... he did not quarrel with the compass; he merely became doubtful as to which was the north end of the needle—the white or the black. After a few moments' puzzling he was quite at sea, and could no more remember how he had been taught as to this than you can clinch the spelling of a doubtful word after you have tried on paper a dozen variations. But being a youth of sense he did ...
— The Forest • Stewart Edward White

... kiss her when we parted), until I was quite gone altogether, and did nothing but think of her all day and dream of her all night. Well, the last time that I was in the transport to Portsmouth, I had made up my mind to clinch the business, and as soon as the sails were furled, I dressed myself in my best toggery and made all sail for the old house. When I came in I found Peggy in the bar, and a very fancy sort of young chap alongside ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat

... well enough," cried Lapham; "but if I don't clinch this offer within twenty-four hours, they'll withdraw it, and go into the market; and then ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... misery and wretchedness. Why was such an unkind thing permitted in the world? And then again returned that something which stirred inside him, something hot and hard, which made his cheeks and eyes burn and his fingers clinch once more. And then again the ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various

... you are a novelty in these particulars; keeping as true to education as if you had never left the settlements. With me the case is different, and I never want to clinch an idee, that I do not feel a wish to swear about it. If you know'd all that I know consarning Judith, you'd find a justification for a little cussing. Now, the officers sometimes stray over to the lake, from the forts on the Mohawk, to fish and hunt, and then the creatur' seems beside herself! ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper

... now on, it must take a lot of my thought and every moment of my spare time." He looked at the waiting canvas. "Clinch it to-day. Hurry ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller

... then," said Varney, ever ready to clinch the business that promised gold, and relieve his apprehensions of the detection of his fraud. "And now to your noiseless hands, as soon as may be, I consign the girl; she has ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... idea as mere silly talk. He admits, indeed, that the women were conveyed to the place of execution in carts; but he denies that there is any deep significance in the cart, and he is prepared to maintain this view by a chemical analysis of the timber of which the cart was built. To clinch his argument he appeals to plain matter of fact and his own personal experience. Not a single instance, he assures us with apparent satisfaction, can be produced of a witch who escaped the axe or the fire in this fashion. "I have myself," says he, "in ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer

... was refused, as contrary to precedent, but a hearing was granted before the Senate Judiciary Committee,[63] Friday morning, January 12. Not only the committee room but the corridors were crowded. Mrs. Stanton and Mrs. Hooker spoke grandly,[64] and as usual Miss Anthony was chosen to clinch the argument, which she did ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper

... girls out of the way, he would invite his father to smoke a pipe outside, during the companionship of which he intended taking old Zebedee decidedly to task, and, putting his intended marriage with Eve well to the front, clinch his arguments by the startling announcement that unless some reformation was soon made he would leave his native place and seek a home in a foreign land. Such words and such threats as these could not be uttered to a father by a son save when they two stood quite ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various

... ever a place where a kind of growth does not go on? There is a moonrise in me that tells me that that fighting is to be scorned. But what shall I do, seeing that he is my foe?... Ah, I do not know—save haunt him, save bring and bring again my inner man, to clinch and wrestle with and throw, if may be, his inner man. And to see that he knows that I do this—that it tells back upon him—through and through tells back!... It has been a strange year. Now and then I am aware of curious ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston

... construct a machine which should pass between its fingers a broad belt of leather and a fine thread of wire, prick rows of holes across the breadth of the leather, bend, cut off, and insert the shank ends of the teeth clear through these holes, and clinch them on the back side, and pour out a continuous, uninterrupted stream of perfectly-teethed belt, all ready for carding,—this, I fancied, was the ne plus ultra of mechanical inventions. But it is quite surpassed by the lace-weaving looms of Nottingham, that work out, ...
— A Walk from London to John O'Groat's • Elihu Burritt

... war against infidels, and for some time the issue remained in doubt. At length, about sundown, three squadrons of the Household Cavalry, and the 7th Dragoon Guards, together with four light guns, were hastily sent forward from the main body in the rear to clinch the affair. General Drury Lowe wheeled this little force round the left flank of the enemy, and, coming up unperceived in the gathering darkness, charged with such fury as to scatter the hostile array in instant rout[370]. The ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose

... was about to come out through the coroner's office, but I settled as soon as I read the first newspaper item—here it is." He handed to me a clipping which Smith had used to clinch the payment of what he (Smith) called ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent

... stood at arm's length and sparred. In this style of fighting, however, the young Englishman had all the better of it and after he had landed several blows upon the pirate's face and body, the latter rushed into a clinch. ...
— The Boy Allies with Uncle Sams Cruisers • Ensign Robert L. Drake

... of shame which this last thought aroused, following in the train of her bitter reasoning, that caused her to quicken her pace and clinch her hands. That same pride, which had been her ally hitherto, had come to her rescue once more. She said to herself that she had done what she knew was right, and that no force of cruel circumstances should induce her to regret that she had not acted differently. She ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant

... just in time, Stafford," he remarked. "You ran it close. We will clinch it instantly. Let us ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... grinned and sat down. "I was afraid she would back out," he said, "and I wanted to clinch the thing. Jest let me tell her that I am afraid she can't do a thing and then it would take a good deal more high water than we've had for a year or two to keep her ...
— Old Ebenezer • Opie Read

... murderess said nothing at all, but, unbalanced with her game hindleg, having no force to push or spring with, and being very weak, she knew she was done for directly they closed to the clinch. ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars

... that the demagogues are babbling—and they don't know just what they mean themselves. He is an honest man. Have I known him all my life without finding that out? But he isn't going to start out and clinch any reputation for honesty by turning his back on his own party and its interests—not for the sake of having the cheap demagogues of the other side pat him on the back and pick his pockets at the same time. He knows politics too well. But we won't sit up here to-night and discuss that. ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day

... his place. Bang! went an easel. "Nom de Dieu!" in French,—"Where in h—l are you goin'!" in English. Crash! a paintbox fell with brushes and all on board. "Dieu de Dieu de—" spat! A blow, a short rush, a clinch and scuffle, and the voice of the massier, stern ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers

... would, for I realized also what he would become after such a repulse—a cold, sneering Nemesis, revengeful, ready to crush even a woman remorselessly. And he possessed the power, the means to make that revenge complete. I felt my teeth lock, my hands clinch in sudden anger. Perhaps I could accomplish little in her defense, but I intended to be free to do that little. Whatever fate might be in store for us, that sneering, olive-hued devil should receive his deserts if ever he attempted ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish

... by the prosecution that the weakness of the bomb was a blunder on the part of the socialists, just as its premature explosion, caused by Ernest's losing his nerve and dropping it, was a blunder. And to clinch the argument, there were the several Congressmen who testified to having seen Ernest fumble and drop ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London

... and thumb Clinch his small nose, A gurgle, a gasp, And down it goes; Scowls Henry now; But mark that cheek, Sleek with the ...
— Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes • Walter de la Mare

... not to be denied. They had caught the 'Varsity "off its stride," and they fought like tigers to clinch their advantage. Every ounce of strength and determination that they possessed was called to the front by the prospect of impending victory. A daring run around the left end netted them twenty yards, and they gained fifteen more on downs. An easy forward pass was fumbled by the regulars, who ...
— Bert Wilson on the Gridiron • J. W. Duffield

... must allure the conversation By many windings to their clever clinch; And secondly, must let slip no occasion, Nor bate (abate) their hearers of an inch, But take an ell—and make a great sensation, If possible; and thirdly, never flinch When some smart talker puts them to the test, But seize the last word, ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... cleaned up, and he's in right up to his shoulderblades. No more convincing proof of America's determination to see the thing through could be had than a sight of Uncle Sam's big storage depot and all-around tool shop. And, to clinch the argument even further, as fast as the shops on the big reservation have been put up, the machinery has been shoved into them and the work in them started as soon as the machinery was in place ...
— The Stars & Stripes, Vol 1, No 1, February 8, 1918, - The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919 • American Expeditionary Forces

... said, or done at a certain rare coincidence is good. I would not be one of those who will foolishly drive a nail into mere lath and plastering; such a deed would keep me awake nights. Give me a hammer, and let me feel for the furring. Do not depend on the putty. Drive a nail home and clinch it so faithfully that you can wake up in the night and think of your work with satisfaction—a work at which you would not be ashamed to invoke the Muse. So will help you God, and so only. Every nail driven should be as another ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau

... of the nails with a rather dull clinch cutter ("buffer") and drawing the nails one at a time, the old shoe is critically examined and laid aside. Remaining stubs of nails are then drawn or punched out and the hoof freed of dirt and partially detached horn. The farrier ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture

... Murray's solid jaw, scraping the skin off his knuckles, but Murray swayed to the blow, sapping its force, and came in to clinch. They rolled on the floor. Murray twisted Sime's head painfully, bit his ear. But in the next split second he ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl

... prayers in the churches for victory to the armies in the field are of no avail—and how absurd to expect them to be—but who shall say that the prayer of the soldier on the eve of battle may not steady his hand and clinch his courage? But the prayer for rain or for heat or cold, or for the stay of an epidemic, or for any material good, is as vain as to reach one's ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs

... condition of mind when a man does not know what to think of any particular event. The bee-hunter, quick-witted, and managing for his life, was not slow to perceive the advantage he had gained, and he proceeded at once to clinch the nail he had so skilfully driven. Turning from Cloud to the head-chief of the party, a warrior whom he had no difficulty in recognizing, after having so long watched his movements in the earlier part of the night, he pushed the ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper

... newly-gained estates to Sir Wymonde Carew, but there seems reason to suppose that Lord Dudley remained in possession of the manor-house until his attainder in the reign of Queen Mary, because the manor then reverted to the Crown, and was regranted. Clinch gets out of this difficulty by supposing Lord Dudley to have parted with his estates and retained the manor, but in the deed of license for exchange all his "mansion place and capital house, late the house ...
— Holborn and Bloomsbury - The Fascination of London • Sir Walter Besant

... Odysseus, to clinch the reunion and fulfil customary law, advises Agamemnon to bring out the gifts of atonement (the gifts prepared in Book IX.), after which the right thing is for him to give a feast of reconciliation, "that Achilles may have nothing lacking of his right." [Footnote: ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang

... Chiswick, and found Bute Lodge to be, if not precisely a jewel amongst lodges, at any rate clean and comfortable, she came back to the agent with an offer to take it from month to month, and with a roll of notes ready to clinch the bargain. Money is the best reference, as she found when she paid a month's rent on the spot, and promised that all her payments should be in advance. But, as the agent had asked her for a reference of another kind, Lettice, who had expected this demand, and was prepared for it, gave the name ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... rarely did business without the other. If a digger came to purchase a pair of trousers or boots the bargain was never completed to the satisfaction of both parties without a glass of spirits at the adjacent grog shop to clinch it; and at night, when the diggers would drop round the latter for a glass, many pairs of breeches, boots, or other articles were disposed of under the happy influence ...
— Five Years in New Zealand - 1859 to 1864 • Robert B. Booth

... existence. There is probably more human electricity, more population to make it, more business, more light-heartedness, than ever before. The armies that swiftly circumambiated from Fredericksburgh—march'd, struggled, fought, had out their mighty clinch and hurl at Gettysburg—wheel'd, circumambiated again, return'd to their ways, touching us not, either at their going or coming. And Washington feels that she has pass'd the worst; perhaps feels that she is henceforth mistress. So here she sits with her surrounding hills spotted with guns, ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman

... of the highwaymen who ended their careers at the gallows appear to have been dandies. Swift gives us a picture of one in "Clever Tom Clinch." He says:— ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews

... and his left cheek displaying a bright patch of red, which looked as if it might have been the result of what is popularly termed a smart box on the ear. He was also heard by the shopman at Rutherford Street to use a very shocking expression in reference to Mrs. Yatman, and was seen to clinch his fist vindictively as he ran round the corner of the street. Nothing more has been heard of him; and it is conjectured that he has left London with the intention of offering his valuable services ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins

... still leave us beast-like; With unchangeable purpose we're men. We must drive the nail home—and then clinch it Or storms shake it loose again. In things of great import, in trifles, We our recreant souls must subdue Till the evil we would not we do not And the good that ...
— It Can Be Done - Poems of Inspiration • Joseph Morris

... the seconds. An over-sanguine pack-rat tried to scramble up the tar-paper covering on the outside and squeaked as he fell back with a thud, but the face of neither man relaxed. Smaltz took the full limit of the time. He saw Bruce's fingers work, then clinch. Suddenly he grinned—a sheepish, ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart

... quibble. To clinch, or to clinch the nail; to confirm an improbable story by another: as, A man swore he drove a tenpenny nail through the moon; a bystander said it was true, for he was on the other ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.

... honour long life, which I wish you with all my heart!" concluded the worthy man, as if he doubted what reception the pious verses he had just recited might receive in heaven, and was determined to clinch the matter in prose ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai

... the purposes spines serve me. Which of you defies the fox or terrier in the open? I leave the fliers out—running away is not defence. To me a fight is child's play. The more inquisitive my foe, the tighter do I clinch myself together. They get more harm ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English

... who are hard up are "wasters." No one has any business to be hard up; "respectable" men live on what they've got. If any one were to ask him how people are to live within their means when they've not got any, he would reply with the word "bunkum" and clinch the argument with a grunt. It will be understood that conversation with Mr. Adolf Reiss is ...
— War-time Silhouettes • Stephen Hudson

... d—d careful how you say it," was the reply, with a sneer that would have stung an abject slave into a longing for revenge, and that grated on Mr. Billings's nerves in a way that made him clinch his fists and involuntarily grit his teeth. Could it be that O'Grady detected it? One quick, wistful, half-appealing glance flashed from the Irishman's eyes towards the subaltern, and then, with evident effort at composure, but with a voice that trembled with ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... creatures might be traced, were it profitable. Down what a vale of little intricate follies should we be going, lighted by one ghastly conclusion! At times, struggling from the midst of her sophisms, Cornelia prayed her lover would claim her openly, and so nerve her to a pitch of energy that would clinch the ruinous debate. Forgetting that she was an 'ideal'—the accredited mistress of pure wisdom and of the power of deciding rightly—she prayed to be dealt with as a thoughtless person, and one of the herd of women. She felt that Sir Purcell threw too much on her. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... glad of your epigram. It is odd that we should both let our wits run away with our sentiments; for I am sure that we are both Queen's men at bottom. But there is no resisting a clinch—it is so clever! Apropos of that—we have a 'diphthong' also in this part of the world—not a Greek, but a Spanish one—do you understand me?—which is about to blow up the whole alphabet. It was first pronounced at Naples, and is spreading; but we are nearer the ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron

... wishbone. First he'd swing her round with her head bent back until her barrette almost scraped the floor; then he'd yank her up, toss her in the air, and let her trickle graceful down his shirt front, like he was a human stair rail. Next, as the music hit the high spots, they'd go to a close clinch, and whirl and dip and pivot until she breaks loose, takes a flyin' leap, and lands shoulder high in his hands, while he walks around with her like she was something he was bringin' ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford

... was. A girl like that would not take seriously a "steamer friendship." She was only doing what all young people do on such trips, making pleasant acquaintances with whom to pass away the monotonous days. "Sure, sure," said he, as if to clinch the argument, but nevertheless, deep within his soul there was an undercurrent of protest against ...
— Story of Chester Lawrence • Nephi Anderson

... years," replied Hyde, promptly. "I bought it when I was touring in the United States, at a town called Guthrie, in Oklahoma. And," he added suddenly and with a triumphant smile as of a man who is unexpectedly able to clinch an argument, "there is a gentleman there who was with me when I bought it—Mr. ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher

... of the axe had caused Cuthfert to drop the pistol, and as his lungs panted for release, he fumbled aimlessly for it among the blankets. Then he remembered. He slid a hand up the clerk's belt to the sheath-knife; and they drew very close to each other in that last clinch. ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London

... to the mayor with the plain intent of getting down to a working understanding, Mr. Daunt broke up what threatened to be an embarrassing clinch. As if carried away by enthusiasm in meeting one of his own kind in business affairs, Daunt grabbed Morrison's hand and pulled the mayor away with him toward the door, assuring him that he was glad to pitch in, heart and ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day

... his own hands. On the same day, Major Dade, leading a relief expedition from Tampa Bay, was ambushed and overwhelmed near Wahoo Swamp. Only four of his men escaped death. Within forty-eight hours, on the last day of the year, General Clinch, commanding the troops in Florida, won a bloody fight on the banks of ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson

... her own, and allowed to nurse freely. Thus a friendship sprang up between the kitten and the woodchuck, which lasted as long as the latter lived. They would play together precisely like two kittens,—clinch and tumble about and roll upon the grass in a very amusing way. Finally the woodchuck took up his abode under the floor of the kitchen, and gradually relapsed into a half-wild state. He would permit ...
— Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers • John Burroughs

... a strawberry garden on your roof or even on a balcony. This need not be costly. Clinch all the nails on the inside of a stout barrel. Bore half a dozen two-inch holes in the bottom, or put in a layer of stones, for drainage. Bore a row of eight holes about eight inches from the bottom ...
— Three Acres and Liberty • Bolton Hall

... held its position by reason of its recent success against the extreme demands of State sovereignty. The right of women to vote under national protection was but the logical result of the political guarantees of the war, and Republican leaders should have been anxious to clinch their war record ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... were yelling presently, here was so evidently grit against mere muscle, spirit against flesh. Randall grew angry and hit hard, but he was wild; he grew afraid and tried to clinch, but his rush was feeble. David jabbed him repeatedly in the ribs, drew off, and for the first time in the three rounds (the referee was just calling time) ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French

... there. A hundred times I took the locket out of its hiding-place and wondered what to do, and at last it came to me that the first question the Judge would ask was why I had not told him at once. That was enough to clinch the matter; until to-night the secret has been my own and you can blame me or not, as ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child

... turn, was astonished at the complete change that had come over the "yokel." Before they recovered from their mistaken opinion about the man, they saw him clinch his fists in determination and heard his voice ring out clearly and distinctly, above the ...
— Stories of the Prophets - (Before the Exile) • Isaac Landman

... laid aside; an old Indian night-gown was wrapped about his rugged limbs; a red nightcap overshadowed his frowning brow; an iron-grey beard of three days' growth gave additional grimness to his visage. Thrice did he seize a worn-out stump of a pen, and essay to sign the loathsome paper; thrice did he clinch his teeth, and make a horrible countenance, as though a dose of rhubarb-senna, and ipecacuanha, had been offered to his lips. At length, dashing it from him, he seized his brass-hilted sword, and jerking it from the scabbard, ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving

... attention. Luckily, I did not understand the import of what he said till he had taken himself off, with an unusually deep bow of thanks to myself. The only comfort we derived was the reflection that these lies were too audacious to be aught but inventions made up to clinch the wavering and ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson

... the penitentiary for life? Had it been Worthington, striving to reproduce the murder of Tom Langdon as he evidently had reconstructed it, experimenting with his experts in the safety of a different city, for points of evidence that would clinch the case against the accused man beyond all shadow of a doubt? Instinctively Houston felt that he just had heard an unwritten, unmentioned phase of his own murder case. Yet—if that had been Worthington, if those experts had found evidence against him, if the theories ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper

... you, and that was all I cared about. If all this had not happened everything would have been all right. But, you see, nine-tenths of what that girl said to you was so perfectly true that it is humanly impossible for you not to believe the other tenth, which wasn't. And then, to clinch it, you hear Nutty consoling me. That ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse

... Major Talbot as one pea does another. The long, thin white hair, curly at the ends, the aristocratic beak of a nose, the crumpled, wide, raveling shirt front, the string tie, with the bow nearly under one ear, were almost exactly duplicated. And then, to clinch the imitation, he wore the twin to the Major's supposed to be unparalleled coat. High-collared, baggy, empire-waisted, ample-skirted, hanging a foot lower in front than behind, the garment could have been designed from no ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various

... to his mother's room, not from a sense of duty, but a desire to clinch the matter finally. Lady Rylton would be the last person to permit backsliding where her own interests were concerned, and perhaps—— He does not exactly say it to himself in so many words, but he feels a certain dread of the moment when he shall be ...
— The Hoyden • Mrs. Hungerford

... in singing this hymn, which swelled high above the howling of the storm. A brief pause ensued; the preacher slowly turned over the leaves of the Bible, and at last, folding his hand down upon the proper page, said: "Beloved shipmates, clinch the last verse of the first chapter of Jonah—'And God had prepared a great ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville

... never make the third!" 'Flower o' the pine, You keep your mistr. . .manners, and I'll stick to mine!' I'm not the third, then: bless us, they must know! {240} Don't you think they're the likeliest to know, They with their Latin? So, I swallow my rage, Clinch my teeth, suck my lips in tight, and paint To please them—sometimes do, and sometimes don't; For, doing most, there's pretty sure to come A turn, some warm eve finds me at my saints— A laugh, a cry, the business ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson

... together, the very thing that must be religiously stifled and hid, emanated from her like fragrance from a flower; sharply reawakening his own temptation to respond—were it only to ease her pain. And there was more in it than that—or very soon would be, if he hesitated much longer to clinch matters by telling her the truth; though every nerve shrank from the ordeal—for himself and her. Running away from oneself was plainly a futile experiment. To have so failed with her, disheartened him badly and dwarfed his proud ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver

... proposed that if a hundred families would pay him regularly 50 cents a week, he would undertake to supply them with garden truck, provisions and meats at wholesale prices. To clinch the demonstration he showed that an average family would save this 50-cent weekly fee ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer

... your happiness lay in your study and in society, and that any path which led you elsewhere was a departure from happiness." Through nine pages of gentle and friendly eloquence Deyverdun pursues his argument to induce his friend to clinch the bargain. "I advise you not only not to solicit a place, but to refuse one if it were offered to you. Would a thousand a year make up to you for the loss of five days a week?... By making this retreat to Switzerland, besides the beauty of the ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison

... the rail, riveted by the paralysis of fright, saw her champion stagger back and half crumple to the deck. Then she saw him make a brave and desperate rally, as, though torn with agony, he lurched forward in an endeavor to clinch with the brute before him. Again the mucker struck his victim—quick choppy hooks that rocked Mallory's head from side to side, and again the brutal blow below the belt; but with the tenacity of a bulldog the man fought for a hold upon his foe, and at last, notwithstanding Byrne's ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... looking to see me: you seem overcome By the unexpected pleasure. Your pardon, mistress, If I intrude. By crikes! But I'm no ghost To set you adither: you don't see anything wrong— No, no! What should you see? I startled you. Happen I look a wee bit muggerishlike— A ragtag hipplety-clinch: but I've been travelling Mischancy roads; and I'm fair muggert-up. Yet, why should that stagnate you? Where's the sense Of expecting a mislucket man like me To be as snod and spruce as a young shaver? ...
— Krindlesyke • Wilfrid Wilson Gibson

... fists up, worked in as close as he could, trying to get in under the big bully's guard for a clinch, so that Hal Hastings could finish the work of successful attack. Dan, fighting with the fury and strategy of desperation, kept them both ...
— The Submarine Boys on Duty - Life of a Diving Torpedo Boat • Victor G. Durham

... willingly assumed the additional task of assorting and recording them, verifying when possible the information presented, and extending the correspondence personally when this proved to be necessary either to trace a clew or clinch a fact. The information obtained in this way showed, first, that a very large number of colored inventors had consulted patent lawyers on the subject of getting patents on their inventions, but were obliged finally to abandon the project ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various

... not tell you," said Moretti, as he untied some papers he had been carrying, and sat down at a table to glance over them, "Did I not tell you that when all other arguments fail, the unanswerable one of woman can be brought in to clinch every business?" ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... if he elbowed in and tried to break up the Clinch, it would mean a Rope Ladder, a piece in the Papers, and a final Reconciliation, with Parent playing the usual role ...
— Ade's Fables • George Ade

... crossed the mountains from North Carolina, and, building a cabin on the banks of Watauga Creek, began the settlement of Tennessee. James Robertson and a host of others followed in 1770, and soon the valleys of the Clinch and the Holston were dotted with cabins. In 1769 Daniel Boone, one of the grandest figures in frontier history, began his exploits in what is now Kentucky, and before 1777 Boonesboro, Harrodsburg, and ...
— A School History of the United States • John Bach McMaster

... night the Planter arrived. We left St. Simon's on the following morning, reached Fort Clinch by four o'clock, and there transferring two hundred men to the very scanty quarters of the John Adams, allowed the larger transport to go into Fernandina, while the two other vessels were to ascend the St. Mary's River, unless (as proved ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various

... just a poor dumb brute, my Roderick Dhu, And our scientific brethren scoff at you. They "reason" and they "think," Then they set it down in ink, And clinch it with their learned "point ...
— The Dog's Book of Verse • Various

... proper angletwitch, that Wendron fella. Stank 'pon en both ends, and he'll rise up in the middle and look at 'ee. There was no one a patch on en but the Dane; and I'll back the Dane next time they clinch. 'Tis a nuisance, though, to have'n like this—with a big job coming on, too, over ...
— The Ship of Stars • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... recognizing the fourfold—physical, mental, social and spiritual—life of the scholars, in planning for the work of the class. The tremendous opportunity of teachers for reaching adolescent boys for Jesus Christ, through their physical and social instincts, was emphasized. Luke 2:52 was quoted to clinch the argument. In the discussion that followed everybody seemed satisfied that a broader policy of work should be pursued. At this juncture a man in the audience arose, and, in a most uncompromising manner, attempted ...
— The Boy and the Sunday School - A Manual of Principle and Method for the Work of the Sunday - School with Teen Age Boys • John L. Alexander

... hit. Don't butt nor trip. Don't clinch. Don't use knee, elbow, nor shoulder. When I call 'Break away,' break without hitting. If you do any of these things you will be jolly well disqualified. Fight fair and God have mercy on your souls." To Dam it seemed ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren

... the ground work for combining and working out the problems of the future. He was epigrammatic, terse, and gifted with a quaint humour, with which he was apt, even when in the driest philosophy, to drive in and clinch ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint

... staring at the schoolmaster and his cousin. "Gone to a clinch, have they? Huh! I guess it's time ...
— The Mission of Janice Day • Helen Beecher Long

... to clinch the bargain, advanced to meet him, and the boy, keeping his back toward the new-comer, managed to walk out of the opposite ...
— Messenger No. 48 • James Otis

... Creek. This last name owes its origin to its valley having been resorted to by the herdsmen of the country, for the attainment of a good range, or choice pasture-ground, for their cattle. The creek rises in Powell's mountain, and is tributary to Clinch river, which it enters at the distance of between two and three miles below the tunnel. The aspect of the surrounding country, and especially of that to the northward of the tunnel, and constituting the southerly slope of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 583 - Volume 20, Number 583, Saturday, December 29, 1832 • Various

... soundingboard devised for the sole purpose of throwing back the mellifluous voices of native orators. At the cross-roads store, philosophers, perched upon barrel and soap-box (note the soap-box), clinch in endless argument. Every county has its Theocritus who sings the nearest creek, the bloom of the may-apple, the squirrel on the stake-and-rider fence, the rabbit in the corn, the paw-paw thicket where fruit for the gods lures farm boys on frosty mornings in golden autumn. In olden times the ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson

... was not lost upon Jube, who offered a culminating inducement to clinch the trade. He suddenly stood erect, teetered fantastically on one foot, as if about to begin to dance, and held out ...
— The Young Mountaineers - Short Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock

... won with his fists, Cantor's superior weight and muscle counted in this deadly clinch. And now Darrin found himself lying with both shoulders touching, while Cantor, kneeling over him, fought to free his knife hand for the ...
— Dave Darrin at Vera Cruz • H. Irving Hancock

... strong p'int o' law, I've heerd tell, not that I know much o' law, Goodness knows, nor ever want to, but never mind, it's a strong p'int when there's two witnesses to a thing,—one to clinch what the t'other drives in; and you must have a show o' law to work on Alf. Barton, ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor

... eight apprentices were unable to swim. The senior apprentice, a boy named Robert Clinch, seventeen years old, swam out, and brought back two of his young companions in safety to the keel of the upturned boat. Clinch was just starting to bring in the third lad, the youngest of them all, when there ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton

... a pair of legs if needed. Next make a T-rail, Fig. 4, of two boards, one 5 by 3/4 by 32 in., the other 3-1/2 by 3/4 by 32 in. Threequarter inch of the wider board projects over each of the smaller boards. Nail firmly and clinch nails, or screw together. Screw this rail on the machine board so that its center coincides exactly with the machine centers. Bore a number of 3/8-in. holes with centers 2-3/4 in. apart along the center line of this rail, beginning 6 in. from the end nearest the ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics

... the earl with a stately smile, "seldom express much satisfaction with the terms of their rejection; but I cannot say that Lord Ballindine testified any strong emotion." He rose from the sofa as he said this, and then, intending to clinch the nail, added as he went to the door—"to tell the truth, Fanny, I think Lord Ballindine is much more eager for an alliance with your fair self now, than he was a few days back, when he could never find a moment's time to leave his horses, and his friend Mr Blake, either to see his ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope

... trembling seized me. I was almost as much agitated as Mrs. Rayne. I felt that I must clinch the matter somehow, but I took refuge in a platitude to gain time: "There is such a difference in ships, almost as much as in houses, and the comfort of the voyage ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various

... than prevent the opposing troops from being sent to reinforce the defence against the main offensive. For this purpose they were perhaps needlessly aggressive, for each resulted in the capture of ground which could not be held, and the forces engaged in these local enterprises were badly needed to clinch the nearly successful major operation. Later on in the war it was found that enemy troops could be contained along the line without such numerous and expensive precautionary attacks, and possibly these were really intended not so much to contain the enemy ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard

... of the first rush, ending in complete victory for the Freshmen, Haviland had been so unfortunate as to clinch with Cap Smith, and he was largely responsible for the ignominious tying up of that husky Sophomore. He would much rather have been carted off himself, if it hadn't been for the class. He saw his Beta Rho chances vanishing. Pellams evidently did not know ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field

... up till then that an actor lived like a god on praise and greasepaint and his photograph in the papers. "Another cup, won't you?" says Miss Gladys Cooper; "No, thank you," says Mr. Dennis Eadie—dash it, it's exactly what we do at home ourselves. And when, to clinch matters, the dramatist makes Mr. Gerald du Maurier light a real cigarette in the Third Act, then he can flatter himself that he has indeed achieved the ambition of every stage writer, and "brought the actual scent of the ...
— The Sunny Side • A. A. Milne

... laughed curiously. That brought his entreating back to them, and he assured them, looking in their faces, that he truly did need to be told why they wanted him. So they held up the gold and asked him whose that had been, and he made a wretched hesitation in answering. If anything was needed to clinch their certainty, that did. They could not know that the young successful lover had recognized Drylyn's strange face, and did not want to tell the truth before him, and hence was telling an unskilful lie instead. A rattle ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister

... fragmentary sentences, must have been a very curious and an interesting book. He mentions, among other similar cases, that our little fish phycis has a close outward semblance to the sea-perch; and this is enough to clinch the proof that Aristotle's nest-building fish was not a goby but a wrasse. The whole purport of Speusippus's book seems to have been to discuss how, or why, with all Nature's apparently infinite variety, certain animals have a ...
— The Legacy of Greece • Various

... background of shelves laden with bright-coloured calicoes, and a line of tin pails hanging overhead, and stated his view of the case with vigour. He even pulled off his coat and rolled up his shirt-sleeve to show the knotty arguments with which he proposed to clinch his opinion. ...
— The Ruling Passion • Henry van Dyke



Words linked to "Clinch" :   noose, hold, C-clamp, evasive action, holdfast, clench, slip noose, boxing, square off, secure, embrace, embracing, hug, settle, fix, fixing, clutch, double clinch, bench clamp, pipe vise, embracement, take hold, Clinch River, inside clinch, clamp, running noose, vessel, maneuver, bosom, rivet, seize, press, fasten



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