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Cock   Listen
noun
Cock  n.  A small boat. "Yond tall anchoring bark (appears) Diminished to her cock; her cock, a buoy Almost too small for sight."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Cock" Quotes from Famous Books



... French remained inactive around the mountain on which Cassel is built, and which the knights, mounted on iron-clad horses, were unable to scale. The Flemings had planted on a tower of Cassel a flag carrying a cock, with ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... form of a rat or mouse; and in treating of werewolves we noticed the belief that the spirits of dead ancestors, borne along in the night-wind, have taken on the semblance of howling dogs or wolves. "Consistent with these quaint ideas are ceremonies in vogue in China of bringing home in a cock (live or artificial) the spirit of a man deceased in a distant place, and of enticing into a sick man's coat the departing spirit which has already left his body and so conveying it back." [167] In Castren's great work on Finnish mythology, we find the story of the giant who could ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske

... verdigris, and damp with dew; and the little cord attached to the clapper, by which I toll it, now and then slides through my fingers, slippery with wet. Here I am, in my slouched black hat, like the "bull that could pull," announcing the decease of the lamented Cock-Robin. ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville

... the cylinder there is a metallic cup which is connected with the central reservoir by an impermeable membrane, I. These three parts form a closed chamber, into which the pressure comes through a tube, F, provided with a cock. A spring, M, which counteracts the pressure, is arranged between the crosspiece, G, and the bottom of the reservoir. The latter carries also a small rod, K, which is provided with a cord made ...
— Scientific American Suppl. No. 299 • Various

... week I went over again, taking over the same thing; nothing. I landed this time at Chicken Cock, above Smith's Creek, a leetle. I got my goods at Mr. Bean's. Mr. Bean keeps a store. I got a pair of boots for eight dollars, one pair pants for five dollars, one fine-tooth comb for fifteen cents, and also a bottle ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith

... was unfastening it, I was screwing the ramrod into the wad over the slugs, standing close alongside of the camel. At this moment the camel gave a lurch to one side, and caught his pack in the cock of my gun, which discharged the barrel I was unloading, the contents of which first took off the middle fingers of my right hand between the second and third joints, and entered my left cheek by my lower jaw, knocking out a row of teeth from ...
— The Explorers of Australia and their Life-work • Ernest Favenc

... crept forward as silently as a leopard on his prey, gliding like ghosts from bush to bush and stone to stone. When I had gone a little way I chanced to look behind me, and saw the redoubtable Alphonse staggering along with white face and trembling knees, and his rifle, which was at full cock, pointed directly at the small of my back. Having halted and carefully put the rifle at 'safety', we started again, and all went well till we were within one hundred yards or so of the kraal, when his teeth began to chatter in the ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard

... the children had been given "practical subjects"! (Practical. Save the mark. One is tempted here to go off on a by-path and discuss the topic, "What is Practical?") Thus the criticism of the unthinking—of the laymen who went off at half-cock. ...
— On the Firing Line in Education • Adoniram Judson Ladd

... Reeri (a little crimson naked man, having the head of a monkey) with his cock in one hand and his gnarled club in the other. Necessarily the Blood Demon's arrival put an end to their talking, ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell

... yours was a cock-and-bull story, too," he said. "Of course, it must have been, since Lord Chetney is not dead. But don't tell me," he protested, "that you ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis

... large fortune, and in the splendour of his carriages and horses rivalled by few country gentlemen. His table was that of hospitality, where it may be said he sacrificed too much to conviviality. Mr. Ardesoif was fond of cock-fighting, and he had a favourite cock upon which he had won many profitable matches. The last bet he made upon this cock he lost; which so enraged him, that he had the bird tied to a spit, and roasted alive before a large fire. The screams ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 20. No. 568 - 29 Sept 1832 • Various

... two days since I wrote to you, my dear old chap, and yet I find myself loaded to the muzzle and at full cock again. I have come to Bradfield. I have seen old Cullingworth once more, and I have found that all he has told me is true. Yes; incredible as it sounded, this wonderful fellow seems to have actually built up a great practice in little more than a year. He really ...
— The Stark Munro Letters • J. Stark Munro

... smiled, and Easelmann entered. Mr. Holworthy was emphatically at home, for he was on all-fours, his three children riding cock-horse, with merry shouts, varied by harmless tumbles and laborious clamberings up. Mr. Holworthy rose with a flushed and happy face, and the children rushed at once to clasp the knees of their familiar ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 17, March, 1859 • Various

... sadness and tragedy in the journal which the two young men forwarded to her after they had been a few days in their old camp at Falmouth, but Strahan's indomitable humor triumphed, and their crude record ended in a droll sketch of a plucked cock trying to crow. She wrote letters so full of sympathy and admiration of their spirit that three soldiers of the army of the ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe

... themselves into their hands, who have bin ennemy one to another all their life time, and that naturally. You must know that the Hurrons, so called by the ffrench, have a bush of a hair rised up artificially uppon the heads like to a cock's comb. Those people, I say, weare 20 or 30,000 by report of many not 20 years ago. Their dwelling is neere the uper lake, so called by name of the ffrench. That people tell us of their pedegree from the beginning, that their habitation ...
— Voyages of Peter Esprit Radisson • Peter Esprit Radisson

... that will hold our little cock-boat still about five minutes,' he said, throwing a necklace of pretty pink coral over Josie's head; 'and here's something the mermaids sent to Undine,' he added, handing Bess a string of pearly shells on ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott

... not pretend to know the hearts of others; but I think I know my own; and that I have such love to thee my Lord, that nothing can separate me from thee." Jesus answered, "Verily I say unto thee, that this night, before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice." Peter replied, "Though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee. Likewise ...
— Sermons on Various Important Subjects • Andrew Lee

... getting a bit used to the marching, especially when there is anyone singing. The favourites are 'John Peel,' 'Cock Robin,' 'Oh, who will o'er the downs so free?' 'John Brown's Body,' 'Hearts of Oak,' and 'Annie Laurie.' We all have little books of Camp Songs, and we learn them at night; it makes all the difference to the marching. ...
— One Young Man • Sir John Ernest Hodder-Williams

... were the order of the evening,—the wilder the more acceptable. Cock-fighting, mock-polo matches, or gymkhanas,—on such occasions nothing comes amiss in the way of riotous foolishness pure and simple. The senior officer forgets his seniority; the most dignified lets fall the cloak of dignity for ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver

... waiting to pick off any Union soldier discerned in the light of the fire. On this account, Webster, who had re-loaded his rifle, carried it ready for instant use, while Crawford carried his in the unwounded hand, at half-cock, and ready to make some kind of an attempt, in the event of danger, to use it as a pistol. These precautions seemed to be all superfluous, for as they came still nearer to the burning house, now almost ready to fall into ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford

... Heard a capital song at the "Pav." the other night—something about a Cock-eyed Kipper. Just suit my voice. I could easily get the words and music, and do ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 22, 1893 • Various

... call that snappy work. Twelve hours in New York, and a run-in with the police! I've noticed," he added, as the painter hurriedly quitted the room, "that, when you take the bad man out of his own cock-pit, he rarely lasts as far ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck

... fighting cock up with something," he ordered, "and go to see if there is anyone else in ...
— Mud and Khaki - Sketches from Flanders and France • Vernon Bartlett

... brother on number two; I had been a trembling spectator of scuffles and tears, and pulled ears and sore knuckles, and knew my turn for the same hardships was coming. And so it did. Number one went to college, and then number two was cock of the walk, and didn't I catch it then? The ears that had recently smarted between another's finger and thumb were now deaf to my lamentations, and the knuckles that I had seen bruised and sore now played on my poor countenance as if it had been a tambourine. It ...
— Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed

... wind was rising every minute, and by the time the beat begun it blew big guns. I stood at the right-hand corner of the spinney, which curved round somewhat, and Quatermain stood at the left, about forty paces from me. Presently an old cock pheasant came rocketing over me, looking as though the feathers were being blown out of his tail. I missed him clean with the first barrel, and was never more pleased with myself in my life than when I doubled him up with the second, for the shot was not ...
— Maiwa's Revenge - The War of the Little Hand • H. Rider Haggard

... your emptiness exposed. Because of your long length and the great sword you carry and the angle at which you cock your hat, people have gone in fear of you, have believed in you, have imagined you to be as terrible and as formidable as you insolently make yourself appear. But at the first touch of true spirit you crumple up, you tremble, you whine pitifully, and the great ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini

... stairs suit you?" said Mrs. O'Halloran. "Cock you up, indeed, the likes of you, that never was in a lady's house before. The back stairs is good enough for me, so I'm thinking it's good enough for you. ...
— Our Casualty And Other Stories - 1918 • James Owen Hannay, AKA George A. Birmingham

... returned to heaven, he carried in his right hand a rooster, which he placed on top of a palm-tree. The cock crowed three times while Tata Dios ascended to heaven. After this, whenever the sun rises in the morning, the cocks on earth respond when they hear ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz

... hundreds of years. The ancients were not wanting in ingenuity and we have pictures of many funny-looking pipes which were intended to imitate the growling of a bear (this stop was sometimes labeled Vox Humana!), the crowing of a cock, the call of the cuckoo, the song of the nightingale, and the twitter of the canary, the ends of these pipes being bent over and inserted in water, just as the player blows into a glass of water through a quill in a toy symphony. Then there ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller

... shining pebbles; to the right and left, broad masses of luxuriant foliage, chestnut, bay, and ilex, that shelter the ruins of columbariums and sepulchral chambers, where the dead sleep snug amongst rampant herbage. The region was still, save when a cock crew from the hamlets, which, as well as the tombs, are almost concealed by thickets. No parties of smart Englishmen and connoisseurs were about. I had all the land to myself, and mounted its steeps and penetrated into its recesses, with ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford

... gin cock-tail, Mr. Smooth?' the negro rejoined, with an anxious air. Evincing my surprise at such a proposition, I assured him I did not know its meaning. 'Don't know what it is!' he exclaimed, with a deep sigh. 'A very fashionable drink,' he ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton

... gentleman—or even a lady with divided skirts—might freely sit with one foot on either bank of this menacing but not yet very formidable stream. So that on the whole this nook of shelter under the coronet of rock was a favourite place for a sage cock-pheasant, or even a ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore

... perceived, not only that everything was in its place, but that the reservoir was full to overflowing. He thought he might indulge in playing his fountain, a treat which, ordinarily, following the example of Louis XIV., he only allowed himself on Sundays. He turned the cock, and the jet raised itself majestically to the height of four or five feet. The good man was so delighted that he began to sing the burden of an old pastoral song which D'Harmental had heard when he was a ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)

... of the field and the birds of the air," proceeded Hsiang-yn, "are, the cock birds, Yang, and the hen birds, Yin. The females of beasts are Yin; and the males, Yang; so how ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... formally of Hereward those three hens; and was unpleasantly disappointed when Hereward, instead of offering to fight him, sent him them in an hour, and a lusty young cock into the bargain, with this message,—That he hoped they might increase and multiply; for it was a shame of an honest Englishman if he did not help a poor Breton churl to eat roast fowls for the first time in ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley

... again, and Rosine gave Amedee a parting smile, lightly kissing the tips of her fingers, and disappeared behind the doer, which fell together, with a loud bang. The poet's first movements was one of rage. Giddy weather-cock of a woman! But he had hardly taken twenty steps upon the sidewalk before he said to himself, with a feeling of remorse, "She was right!" He thought that this poor girl had kept in one corner of her heart a shadow of reserve and ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... bequeathed to us by Greece and Rome. Plato, we have little doubt, was a much better man than Sir George Etherege. But Plato has written things at which Sir George Etherege would have shuddered. Buckhurst and Sedley, even in those wild orgies at the Cock in Bow Street for which they were pelted by the rabble and fined by the Court of King's Bench, would never have dared to hold such discourse as passed between Socrates and Phaedrus on that fine summer day under the plane- tree, ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... the perch was put into the garden, Miss Betty was sometimes startled by stumbling on John Broom in the dusk, sitting on his heels, the unfastened chain in his hand, with his black head lovingly laid against Cock's white and yellow poll, talking in a low voice, and apparently with the sympathy of his companion; and as Miss Betty justly feared, of that "other side of the world," which they both knew, and which both at ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various

... little shaw loch most beautiful. When we began our walk there was a fine soft wind that felt as if it would lift one up to the clouds, but before we got back to the little house it had quite fallen, and all was as still as in a desert, except now and then the wild cry of the grouse and black-cock. Bob'm mad with spirits, and talked nonsense all the way home. Not too dark to see the beautiful outline of the country ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell

... under the name of P'an. His style was Wen Ch'i. His natural habits were extravagant; his language haughty and supercilious. He had, of course, also been to school, but all he knew was a limited number of characters, and those not well. The whole day long, his sole delight was in cock-fighting and horse-racing, rambling over hills ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... I agreed. I came and sat down with the Captain and Ed Mason in the cock-pit. "I always think of a pirate as a man with a black ...
— The Voyage of the Hoppergrass • Edmund Lester Pearson

... audible. And when people reappeared in the moonlight, they seemed silent—like white walls, or black shadows—as everything did in the transparent mist of night. Almost every one was asleep when Judas heard the soft voice of Jesus returning. All in and around about the house was still. A cock crew; somewhere an ass, disturbed in his sleep, brayed aloud and insolently as in daytime, then reluctantly and gradually relapsed into silence. Judas did not sleep at all, but listened surreptitiously. The moon illumined one half of his face, and was reflected strangely ...
— The Crushed Flower and Other Stories • Leonid Andreyev

... on a height sat, striking a harp, the giantess's watch, the joyous Egdir; by him crowed, in the bird-wood, the bright red cock, which Fialar hight. ...
— The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson • Saemund Sigfusson and Snorre Sturleson

... thumb with the match—you always did, you know. That's the style. You've forgotten to cock your head to the side. Not so bad. ...
— Echoes of the War • J. M. Barrie

... 1474, it appears that a cock was accused of the enormous crime of having laid an egg: he was brought to trial and condemned to be burnt alive, as a warning to all cocks not to lay eggs, from which it is well known would have been hatched a cockatrice ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... cloudlets, swept her graceful way, Proud as an empress on her marriage-day; The admiring planets lit her stately march With smiles that gleamed along the silent arch, And all the starry midnight blazed with light, As if 'twere earth and heaven's nuptial-night; The cock crowed, certain that the day had broke, The aged house-dog suddenly awoke, And bayed so loud a challenge to the moon, From the old orchard fled the thievish 'coon; Within, the lightest hearts that ever beat Still found ...
— Hesperus - and Other Poems and Lyrics • Charles Sangster

... to thrust her nose into that bath of dripping sweetness. Dark as the clouds had made the night, there was still the faint light of a moon somewhere behind. The leaves of the fruit-trees joined in the long, gentle hissing, and now and again rustled and sighed sharply; a cock somewhere, as by accident, let off a single crow. There were no stars. All was dark and soft as velvet. And Nedda thought: 'The world is dressed in living creatures! Trees, flowers, grass, insects, ourselves—woven together—the world is dressed in life! I understand ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... near the end of a dream. Presently she would awaken with a start and see the pale walls of her little room at home, and hear the cherry branches brushing her window, and the old clarion-voiced cock proclaim the hour ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey

... thou, Eben Dudley, who hast been afield since the crowing of the cock, know what hath passed about the dwellings? It is plain that envy, or some other evil passion, causeth ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper

... "Good morning, Monsieur Dudu," he went on, bowing politely from the window to the raven, who had cocked his head in another direction, and seemed now to be looking up at the two children with the same supercilious stare he had bestowed upon the cock and hens. "Good morning, Monsieur Dudu; I hope you won't catch cold with this snowy weather. It's best to be very polite to him, you see," added Hugh, turning to Jeanne; "for if he took offence we should get no fun ...
— The Tapestry Room - A Child's Romance • Mrs. Molesworth

... by the way, are of a homely character. I lurk in lodgings at the village dressmaker's. I have one room at the back of the house, its dormer window looking over a grass plot and a chicken coop. Fortunately the cock is as morose and reserved an individual as I am myself, without my sense of humour—or else he's henpecked. He never opens his head till it's necessary to salute the sunrise; and the hens consider it bad form to boast loudly because a ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)

... been the proudest day of my life. Never, never have I been so lionized! I assure you, I was cock of the walk. My dear sister," said the young man, "nous n'avons qu'a nous tenir; we shall ...
— The Europeans • Henry James

... thought he was; he heard a voice within him saying, "Before the cock crow thou shalt deny me thrice," and he did what St. Peter had done, he went away and wept bitterly. That is to say, he wept in imagination, but the demon ...
— In Midsummer Days and Other Tales • August Strindberg

... the donkey's proposal, and they all continued their journey together. In a short time they came to the courtyard of an inn, where they found a cock crowing lustily. 'What in the world is the matter with you?' asked the donkey. 'The noise you are making is enough to break the drums ...
— The Grey Fairy Book • Various

... malice, an olive complexion, and a gipsy-like cast of countenance. Attired in a tight-fitting brown frieze jerkin with stone buttons, and purple hose, his head was covered with a montero cap, with a cock's feather stuck in it. He was armed neither with sword nor dagger, but carried a large cudgel or club, the well-known and formidable weapon, of the London 'prentices, in the use of which, whether ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth

... never thought of Methodism in that way, John; but I'll tell thee, it took the very heart of Yorkshire and set it to song and prayer—and cotton-spinning. It stopped a deal of gambling and racing and dog-and cock-fighting, and chapels and mills grew together all over the length and breadth of Yorkshire. They did that, and all that! I've heard my father say so many a time. Make haste now, my lad, dinner will spoil if tha keeps it waiting. ...
— The Measure of a Man • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... story opens, a young fellow full of high health, pluck and principle—a tip top soldier, said everybody from the start, until, as Gregg and other growlers began to declaim, the major completely spoiled him. Here, three years only out of military leadingstrings, he was a young cock of the walk, "too dam' independent for a second lieutenant," said the officers' club element of the command, men like Gregg, Wilkins, Crane and a few of their following. "The keenest young trooper in the regiment," said Blake and Ray, who ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King

... rate—and that was a wide stretch more of it than they might ever hope to see; and he had been in battle, and knew how to paint its shock and struggle, its perils and surprised, with an art that was all his own. He was cock of that walk, hero of that hostelry; he drew custom as honey draws flies; so he was the pet of the innkeeper, and of his wife and daughter, and they were his obliged and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... infinitesimally short duration. Fully eighty-five thousand and eighty-eight such moments make an hour, so that no mortal save Balaam had ever been able to fix that moment, although this point of time has its outward manifestations in nature, for while it lasts, the cock's comb becomes absolutely white, without even the smallest stripe of red. God's love for Israel, however, is so great that during the time that Balaam prepared to curse Israel, He did not wax angry at all, so that Balaam waited in vain for ...
— THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME III BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS - FROM THE EXODUS TO THE DEATH OF MOSES • BY LOUIS GINZBERG

... speaks of Athelwold's addition of "secret crypts," of "such organs that the like were never seen," of a sparkling tower reflecting from heaven the sun's first rays, "with at its top a rod with golden balls and a mighty golden cock which as it turns boldly sets its face to every wind that blows." More might be quoted, but it is sufficient here to refer those interested in the matter either to the chronicle itself or to Willis in the "Proceedings of the Architectural Institute" for 1845. Though Wolstan thus describes ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Winchester - A Description of Its Fabric and a Brief History of the Episcopal See • Philip Walsingham Sergeant

... eye peeled for Checkers, and if you do run across him, have your gun at half cock," he said, and, bidding good night ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor

... working out, in isolation, an interesting and independent art; but clearly she is doing no such thing. There is no live tradition, nothing but fashions as stale as last week's newspaper. All that is alive is a private schoolboy rivalry, an ambition to be cock of the walk or to ape the cock, to be primus inter pares or amico di primus. There is no live English tradition; and as English painters refuse obstinately to accept the European, and as artists do not spring up unaccountably as groundsel and dandelions appear to do, this is a ...
— Pot-Boilers • Clive Bell

... obtained it through the kindness of Dr. Roberts, the Welsh missionary at Cherrapunji) as being the deity who gives the heads of the enemy to the successful warriors. To this god, as well as to Ka Ram Shandi, they offer a cock. Before sacrifice the warriors dance round an altar, upon which are placed a plume of cock's feathers (u thuia), a sword, a shield, a bow, an arrow, a quiver, pan leaves, and flowers. After the cock has been sacrificed, ...
— The Khasis • P. R. T. Gurdon

... chlorine. It will remain so until we get a better form of motive power, liquid or compressed air, perhaps. And here"—Ross led them to a valve wheel amidships—"as though to invite such disaster, they've given us a sea cock." ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson

... upon the back of the lioness, that had been sleeping on the slab where we always stood to dry ourselves after bathing. With a snarl and a growl, before I could do anything, before I could even cock my rifle, she had bounded right across the crystal pool, and vanished over the opposite bank. It was all done in an instant, as ...
— A Tale of Three Lions • H. Rider Haggard

... charge home, with wadding between powder and shot, with more wadding on top of the shot. He withdrew the ramrod and cast it aside; he brought the hammer back to full cock and fixed a cap upon the nipple. He stood the gun upright upon the floor and leaned forward, the muzzle against his upper chest, the stock braced against the edge of a crack in the planking. With the great toe of his bare right foot ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb

... Ride a cock horse to Charing-Cross, To see a young woman Jump on a white horse, With rings on her fingers And bells on her toes, And she shall ...
— The Only True Mother Goose Melodies • Anonymous

... light, and under their steel pots the faces of the musketeers, suffused by a dull red glow, sprang for a moment out of the grey mass, to fade once more into the general greyness at the word, "Cock your matches!" ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini

... singing, or the woods being merry in spring. These are windows opened in the house of tragedy; momentary glimpses of larger and quieter scenes, of more ancient and enduring landscapes. Many of the country songs describing crime and death have refrains of a startling joviality like cock crow, just as if the whole company were coming in with a shout of protest against so sombre a view of existence. There is a long and gruesome ballad called "The Berkshire Tragedy," about a murder committed by a jealous sister, for the consummation of which a wicked miller is hanged, and the chorus ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton

... The cock-partridge stood on his drumming-log and defied the forest rider, all unseen; rabbit and squirrel sat bolt upright with palpitating flanks and moist bright eyes at gaze; overhead the slow hawks sailed, looking down at him as ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers

... freely; even as she takes her rest she turns and smiles; and there is one stirring hour unknown to those who dwell in houses, when a wakeful influence goes abroad over the sleeping hemisphere, and all the out-door world are on their feet. It is then that the cock first crows, not this time to announce the dawn, but like a cheerful watchman speeding the course of night. Cattle awake on the meadows; sheep break their fast on dewy hillsides, and change to a new lair among the ferns; and houseless men, who have lain ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker

... likeable and entertaining. He was a strong fellow and when he 'took a hate (i.e. heat) o' work' he was as good or better than the best in harvest or hayfield. His softness procured for him a certain delightful immunity from responsibility. He worked when in the humour, but race, or fair, or cock-fight, or football match drew Mick irresistibly from his labours. He was off to every bit of 'divarsion' in the country, and when there were big races at a distance Mick generally took the road a day beforehand, sleeping out in the ...
— An Isle in the Water • Katharine Tynan

... more than a half dozen of gobernadorcillo canes. His high hat and frock coat were always in evidence in the city hall, at the Government palace in Melacanan [1] and at the army headquarters, and they always appeared, too, in the cock-pit, in the market, in all processions, and in the Chinese shops. Dressed in this official costume with the tasseled cane, Captain Tiago was to be found everywhere, arranging, ordering, and putting in disorder, everything with which he had anything to do—and all with wonderful ...
— Friars and Filipinos - An Abridged Translation of Dr. Jose Rizal's Tagalog Novel, - 'Noli Me Tangere.' • Jose Rizal

... revolution of course she dreamt the impossible about that dear 'Henri Cinq,' who is as much out of the question as Henri Quatre himself; and now it ends with the 'French Legation' coming to settle in the house precisely opposite to hers, with a hideous sign-painting appended O the Gallic cock on one leg and at full crow inscribed, 'Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite.' This, and the death of her favorite dog, whom, after seventeen years' affection, she was forced to have destroyed on account of a combination of ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon

... will, after a sharp stroke that pricks him, run off the stage, and then they wring off his neck without more ado, whereas the other they preserve, though their eyes be both out, for breed only of a true cock of the game. Sometimes a cock that has had ten to one against him will by chance give an unlucky blow, will strike the other starke dead in a moment, that he never stirs more; but the common rule is, that ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... rushed along the decks letting go all the sheets and halliards by the run. We dashed next up on to the forecastle head. The perspiration of labour and sheer nervousness simply poured off our heads as we toiled to get the anchors cock-billed. I dared not look at Ransome as we worked side by side. We exchanged curt words; I could hear him panting close to me and I avoided turning my eyes his way for fear of seeing him fall down and expire in ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad

... moved Which is the kiss of Morn waking the lands, And in the east that miracle of Day Gathered and grew: at first a dusk so dim Night seems still unaware of whispered dawn, But soon—before the jungle-cock crows twice— A white verge clear, a widening, brightening white, High as the herald-star, which fades in floods Of silver, warming into pale gold, caught By topmost clouds, and flaming on their rims To fervent golden glow, ...
— The Light of Asia • Sir Edwin Arnold

... a special trade name for the feathers of almost every kind of bird known in the millinery business. Thus there is Coque for Black Cock, Cross Aigrettes for the little plumes of the Snowy Egret, and Eagle Quills from the wings not only of Eagles, but of Bustards, Pelicans, Albatrosses, Bush Turkeys, and even Turkey Buzzards. The feathers of Macaws in great numbers are used in the feather trade, ...
— The Bird Study Book • Thomas Gilbert Pearson

... (pint) of wine, price eight cents, with Rocjean, he concluded to give it another trial. He kept at giving it trials until the old Gabioni was closed, and from it arose the Four Nations or Quattre Nazione in Turkey Cock Alley (viccolo Gallmaccio), which, as any one knows, is near Two Murderers' Street. ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various

... "Dewey! Sampson! Hobson! Cock-a-doodle-doo! Pussy! Pussy! Scat! Polly wants a cracker!" cried a shrill voice from the cage. And the ...
— Sonny Boy • Sophie Swett

... Barn-Door crowing, The Cock by Hens attended, His Eyes around him throwing, Stands for a while suspended. Then One he singles from the Crew, And cheers the happy Hen; With how do you do, and how do you do, And how do ...
— The Beggar's Opera • John Gay

... wouldn't forsake it for anything the King could offer me. It's a merry time, with romance, love and adventure in it, with plenty to get and plenty to spend, with a seasoning of danger to give it piquancy—a gentleman's life from cock-crow to cock-crow, and not worthy of a passing thought is he who cannot make a good end of it. I'd sooner have the hangman for a bosom friend than a man who is likely to whimper on the day of reckoning. Did I tell you that a reverend ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner

... the baby, some blamed the clock; Some blamed the doctor, some the crowing cock. With all these close questions sure no one could know, Whether the babe was too fast or the clock was ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure

... I saw in Maine was the pileated woodpecker, or black "log cock," called by Uncle Nathan "wood cock." I had never before seen or heard this bird, and its loud cackle in the woods about Moxie was a new sound to me. It is the wildest and largest of our northern woodpeckers, and the rarest. Its voice and the sound of its hammer are heard only ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs

... who elaborated it into "If you do that, angels wont never love you." I remember a servant who used to tell me that if I were not good, by which she meant if I did not behave with a single eye to her personal convenience, the cock would come down the chimney. Less imaginative but equally dishonest people told me I should go to hell if I did not make myself agreeable to them. Bodily violence, provided it be the hasty expression of normal provoked resentment and not vicious cruelty, cannot harm a child as this ...
— A Treatise on Parents and Children • George Bernard Shaw

... gallant badinage, exquisite irony, and interesting narrative, in the story of "The Cock and Fox!" And what knowledge of human nature and skilful construction in "The Wife of Bath's Tale!" We are half inclined, with George Ellis, to call these fables the "noblest specimen of versification to be found in any modern language." We gather, too, from them a notion about ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... the point with roars of laughter, and Pixie whisked round to the other side of the stall to cock her head at a pyramid of green pottery, and move the principal pieces an inch to the right, a thought to the left, with intent to improve the coup d'oeil. To the masculine eye it did not seem possible ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey

... shells, which, by the time her young come forth, being filled with maggots, and covered with insects, form the first repast of her infant brood. The male bird is said to take upon himself the rearing of the young. If two cock-birds meet, each with a family, they fight for the supremacy over both; for which reason an ostrich has sometimes under his tutelage broods of different ...
— The Mirror, 1828.07.05, Issue No. 321 - The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction • Various

... country, he carved his name and deeds upon the pyramids. On this Augustus recalled him, and he killed himself to avoid punishment. The emperor's wish to check the tyranny of the prefects and tax-gatherers was strongly marked in the case of the champion fighting-cock. The Alexandrians bred these birds with great care, and eagerly watched their battles in the theatre. A powerful cock, that had hitherto slain all its rivals and always strutted over the table unconquered, had gained a great name in the city; and this bird, Eros, a tax-gatherer, roasted ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... table, perfunctorily doing his duty as host, wounded in his self-esteem—almost the tenderest part on him, morose and miserable. Now he snatched at the idea that he had been mistaken, as if it were a life-buoy thrown him in deep waters. He began to talk, to assert himself, to prove himself cock of his own walk. And Maule suavely encouraged him to lay down the law on things Australian, while Lady Bridget withdrew into herself, baffling and enraging McKeith still more hopelessly. He did not seem now to know his wife! A catastrophe ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed

... vomiting its black gall. But those who are caught in the clutches of celebrity at the age of twenty know nothing. I remember that the first time a reporter came to me I drew myself up straight and was as red as a cock's-comb with joy. I was just seventeen years old—I had been acting in a private house, and had taken the part of Richelieu with immense success. This gentleman came to call on me at home, and asked me first one ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt

... Summer Whores upon my life Sir, my means and manners never could attempt above a hedge or hay-cock. ...
— A King, and No King • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... dream of a Palestine flowing once more with milk and honey and holy doctrine, was a member of a "Lovers of Zion" society. He was a pasty-faced young man with gray eyes and eyebrows and a reddish beard. He wore frowsy clothes, with an old billy-cock and a dingy cotton shirt, but he combined all the lore of the old-fashioned, hard-shell Jew with a living realization of what his formulae meant, and so the close of Aaron's voyage—till the Russian landed at Alexandria—was softened and shortened by sitting worshipfully at this idealist's ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... nutriment—all the medical books say so. Just eat from four to seven good-sized turnips at a meal, and drink from a pint and a half to a quart of water, and then just sit around a couple of hours and let them ferment. You'll feel like a fighting cock next day." ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... "Don't be so cock-sure," Cummings cautioned. "I've had more experience with them than you have and you're all wrong if you think they're a bunch of dumb-bells. You'll have to be mighty careful. You've sailed right along without any trouble because you've had sound ...
— Spring Street - A Story of Los Angeles • James H. Richardson

... of Doom, once shook the world, there is pacific chaffering for poultry and greens. The sacred National Assembly Hall itself has become common ground; President's platform permeable to wain and dustcart; for the Rue de Rivoli runs there. Verily, at Cockcrow (of this Cock or the other), all Apparitions do melt and dissolve ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle

... handle of the air-brake cock at shorter intervals. Ford glanced back at the following car framed in the red glow from the opened fire-box door. It was surging and bounding alarmingly over the uneven track, not without threatenings of derailment. Ford was willing to give the president the full benefit of his ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde

... are policemen to me," said Boundary, "and Mr. Stafford King is one of the worst of the policemen from my point of view, because he's trying to trump up a cock-and-bull story about me and get ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace

... 'The ouzel-cock so black of hue, With orange-tawny bill; The throstle with his note so true: The wren with little quill; The finch, the sparrow, and the lark, The ...
— Prose Idylls • Charles Kingsley

... bairn," said my aunt, "I fear you are wasting your strength on these mysteries to your ain hurt. Did ye no see, in the last storm, when ye staid out among the caves till cock-crow, that the bigger and stronger the wave, the mair was it broken against the rocks?—it's just thus wi' the pride o' man's understanding, when he measures it against the dark things o' God. An' yet it's sae ordered, that the same wonderful truths ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton

... took to wearing caps. One summer evening, as she and the baby and Mrs. Crump and Woolsey (let us say all four babies together) were laughing and playing in Mrs. Crump's drawing-room—playing the most absurd gambols, fat Mrs. Crump, for instance, hiding behind the sofa, Woolsey chuck-chucking, cock-a-doodle-dooing, and performing those indescribable freaks which gentlemen with philoprogenitive organs will execute in the company of children—in the midst of their play the baby gave a tug at his mother's cap; ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray

... instant the huge form lay still, while the ring of Legionnaires remained petrified. Suddenly the group realized that the fighting cock had been beaten by ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson

... me the old Cock that crew over the doorway in Fleet Street, a Johnsonian tavern of mighty lineage and celebrity for chops and steaks. And I see the old waiter, with his huge pockets behind, in which he deposited the tons of copper tips from ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton

... he muttered as he went along—"ever so wrong. Somehow you can't be cock-sure about anything. I could ha' sweered as that yallow-faced poople had a finger in it, for it looked as straight as straight; but theer, it's hard work to see very far. Now, let's hear what the ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn

... back to his bed, and shivered in a delicious warmth, while outside, very gradually, came the peaceful stir of morning. A bird or two fluted drowsily in the bushes; then another further away would join his slender song; a cock crew cheerily in a distant grange, and soon it was broad day. Presently the house began to be softly astir; and the faint fragrance of an early kindled fire of wood stole into the room. Then, worn out by his long vigil, he ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson

... three days following his arrival Victor Durnovo indulged, according to his lights, in the doubtful pleasure mentioned. He purchased at the best factory the best clothes obtainable; he lived like a fighting cock in the one so-called hotel—a house chiefly affected and supported by ship-captains. He spent freely of money that was not his, and imagined himself to be leading the life of a gentleman. He rode round on a hired horse to call on his friends, ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman

... my rustic friends every night. "Eat you yer victuals, and drink yer beer, and none o' yer pryin's and peerin's among we!" That's my rebuff from Farmer Broadmead. And that old boy knows more than he will tell. I saw his cunning old eye on-cock. Be silent, Harrington. Let discretion be the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... are to do, Paul," said he, quickly. "Cock your hat on the side of your head, considerably forward, so that he can't see much of your face. Then here's a cigar to stick in your mouth. You can make believe that you are smoking. If you are the sort of boy I reckon you are, he'll never ...
— Paul Prescott's Charge • Horatio Alger

... philosopher, for all are dubbed with these new titles, endeavors to make hay while the sun shines; and every petty municipal officer, become the idol, or rather the tyrant of the day, stalks like a cock on ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell

... passing. He went out to see what made the noise and saw many crows crossing back and forth over the canon. This was the home of the crow, but there were other feathered people there, and the chaparral cock. He saw many fires made by the crows on each side of the caeon. Two crows flew down near him and the youth listened to ...
— Myths and Legends of California and the Old Southwest • Katharine Berry Judson

... had a trout fly-book, and therein lay just one large salmon fly, not a Tweed fly, but a lure that is used on the beautiful and hopeless waters of the distant Ken, in Galloway. It had brown wings, a dark body, and a piece of jungle-cock feather, and it was fastened to a sea-trout casting-line. Now, if I had possessed no salmon flies at all, I must either have sent back for some, or gone on innocently dallying with trout. But this one wretched fly lured me to my ruin. I saw that the casting-line had a link ...
— Angling Sketches • Andrew Lang



Words linked to "Cock" :   prance, tittup, pitch, hammer, putz, tilt, dirty word, phallus, cock sucking, set, bird, cant, striker, member, jungle cock, cock's eggs, sashay, ball cock, ruffle, obscenity, pose, turncock, smut, prick, firing mechanism, filth, pecker, cockerel, Gallus gallus, vulgarism, cock up, stopcock, gunlock, cock of the rock, faucet, chaparral cock, tool, fighting cock, cock-a-doodle-doo, escape cock, half-cock, rooster, chicken, walk, penis, cant over, place, strut, gamecock, lay, position, dick, peter, put, turkey cock, cock-a-hoop, slant, spigot, black cock, cock-a-leekie, swagger, go off at half-cock, shaft



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