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Mail   Listen
noun
Mail  n.  
1.
A flexible fabric made of metal rings interlinked. It was used especially for defensive armor.
Chain mail, Coat of mail. See under Chain, and Coat.
2.
Hence generally, armor, or any defensive covering.
3.
(Naut.) A contrivance of interlinked rings, for rubbing off the loose hemp on lines and white cordage.
4.
(Zool.) Any hard protective covering of an animal, as the scales and plates of reptiles, shell of a lobster, etc. "We... strip the lobster of his scarlet mail."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Mail" Quotes from Famous Books



... and the order of legal functionaries soon rose from the obscurity of the tribunals and their dusty chambers, to appear at the court of the monarch, by the side of the feudal barons in their ermine and their mail. ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al

... good-will one can always find something impressive in anybody. When Mr. Mallaby-Deeley won a wide and very sudden fame in connexion with Covent Garden, an awe-stricken reporter wrote of him for The Daily Mail, 'he has the eyes of a dreamer.' I believe that Mr. Cecil Rhodes really had. So, it seemed to me, had this little boy. They were pale grey eyes, rather prominent, with an unwavering light in them. I guessed ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm

... of the roads, it was customary for travellers to attach themselves to the Grand Post, which was always guarded by an escort. At Nogales Borrow joined the mail courier; but as a rule he was too independent, too much in a hurry, and too indifferent to danger to wait for such protection against the perils of the robber- infested roads. He has given the following graphic account "of the ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins

... something like contempt. My mother wearied me with intreaties to write to her at least once a week. She should never be easy out of my sight, if she did not hear from me frequently. The omission of a mail would throw her into the utmost terrors: she should conclude I was sick, or dying, nay perhaps dead, and she conjured me to respect her maternal feelings. I did respect them, and promised all she required. She was desirous too that ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... his study now, finishing the first of them in time for the homeward mail: unconsciously enjoying a return to the familiar occupation. The writing of it had engrossed more of his mind and leisure during the last week than Quita chose to consider quite admissible in those early days. Her own absorption ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver

... a good thing to know this old trail. It is so much shorter," said Mr. Waterman. "Then if we had need for speed we could get out, or Pierre's cousin could bring in any important mail to us." ...
— Bob Hunt in Canada • George W. Orton

... contrary, he regarded the solar system as decidedly vulgar; because the planets were all of them so infernally punctual, they kept time with such horrible precision, that they forced him, whether he would or no, to think of nothing but post- office clocks, mail-coaches, and book-keepers. Regularity may be beautiful, but it excludes the sublime. What he wished for ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey

... and the ground besides was slippery from having rained a little. Then Alessandro drew his sword, which he carried in its scabbard, and thrust at me in front, and struck me on the corselet, which for my good fortune was of double mail. Before I could get ready I received three passes, which, had I worn a doublet instead of that mailed corselet, would certainly have run me through. At the fourth pass I had regained my strength and spirit, ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... on the road from St. Joe. At the fort was a postoffice and here we received letters from our friends in the East, and spent a good part of the day in writing, in response to them. Letters were brought here by the coaches of the overland express which carried the United States mail to California. ...
— A Gold Hunter's Experience • Chalkley J. Hambleton

... with integrity of heart, Disdains to play a double part: He bears a moral coat of mail, When envy snarls and slanders rail. From virtue's shield the shafts resound, And his ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay

... "We shall have to post the papers with the notice in them to-morrow to catch the Ceylon mail... How many letters have ...
— The Garden Party • Katherine Mansfield

... no mail yet from beyond Goldsborough, and the news from North Carolina seems vague and unsatisfactory. They say we beat the enemy at Kinston; yet they have destroyed a portion of the railroad between Goldsborough and Wilmington. They say the Federals are retreating ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones

... the word, Turning his ploughshare to a sword, His cassock to a coat of mail; 'Gainst bishops and the clergy rail; Convert Paul's church into the mews; Make a new colonel of old shoes, Let ...
— Cavalier Songs and Ballads of England from 1642 to 1684 • Charles Mackay

... London, for fear of attracting the eye of government. But the system was to be urged vigorously in the great manufacturing towns; the insurrection was to commence by an attack on the House of Parliament; and the king was to be put to death either on his way to the House, or in the House. The mail-coaches were then to be stopt, as a signal to their adherents in the country that the insurrection had triumphed in the metropolis. An assault was then to be made on the Tower, and the arms seized. At subsequent meetings, the question of the royal ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various

... the last meeting-places of the monarchs of these kingdoms, and death and ruin had followed their encounters. Now Henry the Eighth of England and Francis the First of France were to meet in peace and amity, spending the revenues of their kingdoms not for armor of linked mail and death-dealing weapons, but for splendid attire and richest pageantry, in token of friendship and fraternity between ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... mission was ended for the present, and agreed to suspend firing provided the shore-batteries at the river-mouth were silent. General Augusti was consulted as to this condition, and agreed to it. The mail-steamer Isla de Mindanao was aground off Las Pinas, and being armed as a cruiser the Americans fired on her and she was soon ablaze. There was still another parley with reference to Cavite. The Americans demanded the surrender of the Arsenal, the Admiral, and the ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman

... it, Joe?" asked his sister Clara, as she looked up from a letter she was reading to see her brother staring at a sheet of paper he had just withdrawn from an envelope, for the morning mail had been delivered a few minutes before. "What is it?" the girl went on, laying aside her own correspondence. "Is it anything serious—anything about father's business? Don't tell me there is ...
— Baseball Joe in the Big League - or, A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles • Lester Chadwick

... at the vicarage when he had an hour or so to spare if he liked to come; and, on the porter's telling him in return that he was only free as a rule on Sundays, as then only one train passed through the station early in the morning, between which and the mail express late at night he had nothing to do, and being a stranger in the place and without any relations the time somewhat hung on his hands, Mr Vernon asked him to come up to the house after church and have dinner with the servants, ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson

... The speed of mail coaches is, I believe chronicled in the British Almanac of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge; but their speed, if I mistake not, was surpassed by that of the "Rival," which travelled (from Monmouth, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 210, November 5, 1853 • Various

... post at Leeds. But a man in a hurry is always the victim of circumstances, and there was nothing for it but to possess my soul in patience. How eagerly I looked for further news! It was not, however, until several days later that, on returning to Tromsoe, I found a mail-steamer going north, and saw an unmistakable Englishman on the deck, whom I immediately accosted with a request for information. All he could tell me was that Mr. Gladstone had resigned on the 12th of June, and that Lord Salisbury ...
— Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 • Stuart J. Reid, ed.

... Germany in "des Enaben Wunderhorn." At Berlin, Fouque, with true old German taste, revived the romances of chivalry and, shortly before 1813, met the military spirit once more rising in Prussia with a number of romances in which figured battle-steeds and coats of mail, German faith and bravery, valiant knights and chaste dames, intermixed, it must be confessed, with a good deal of affectation. On the discovery being made that many of the ancient German ballads were still preserved among the lower classes, chiefly among the ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks

... beside me, had taken her mysterious photograph, and hidden it between the pages of a letter, covered with writing in a pretty and singularly individual hand. She explained that a whole budget of "mail" had been forwarded to Martigny, in consequence of a telegram sent to Lucerne, and then, as if forgetting the episode, she applied herself to winning the hearts of the man ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson

... is kneeling on the right, and St. John on the left. St. Paul is shown with the book of his Epistles, and St. Peter, wearing a bishop's mitre, is holding his keys. Among other details of this curious faade is the figure of a kneeling knight in a coat of mail. Upon the exterior side-walls are Roman arches en saillie, resting upon corbels and very wide pilaster-strips that are almost buttresses. In the interior, the Byzantine influence is very apparent in the three domes, which combine with the Gothic vaulting of the narrow, ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker

... its rural picture in the horrors of war which here prevailed. "Peace," he says, "is the only charm which I could not find in this beautiful region. The shepherd, instead of guarding against wolves, goes armed into the woods to defend himself against men. The labourer, in a coat of mail, uses a lance instead of a goad, to drive his cattle. The fowler covers himself with a shield as he draws his nets; the fisherman carries a sword whilst he hooks his fish; and the native draws water from the well in an old rusty casque, instead of a pail. In a word, arms ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... strong and we had to land again. However, we got off next day, reached Mudros Harbour, and changed on to the Scotian on Christmas Day. None of us will forget the kindness with which we were received on the Scotian, and the arrival of a huge mail and plum puddings completed our joy. We left on Boxing Day and got to Alexandria on the 28th, where we at once disembarked and went to camp at ...
— The Fife and Forfar Yeomanry - and 14th (F. & F. Yeo.) Battn. R.H. 1914-1919 • D. D. Ogilvie

... our shipping interests can not fail to command your attention. He emphatically recommends that as an incentive to the investment of American capital in American steamships the Government shall, by liberal payments for mail transportation or otherwise, lend its active assistance to individual enterprise, and declares his belief that unless that course be pursued our foreign carrying trade must remain, as it is to-day, almost exclusively ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 8: Chester A. Arthur • James D. Richardson

... Lucius Cary, second Viscount Falkland, who fell at Newbury, Sept. 20, 1643.] on his lips. I am afraid that you will have to bear a great deal. You will learn that the accoutrements of truth are a grievously heavy coat of mail. You will call forth reaction. Even that is the least. But reaction will come about in your own mind; after a long time, I mean. Still, you are strong; it will be a reaction of the kind that keeps aloof in order to spring ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes

... the grand scarlet robe, and the chain mail t' the knees, and the locks as bright as yer own! Well, I'm that glad t' hear it! ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates

... such a thing. We have to investigate many times just to discover how smoothly things are going on. Isn't that Jack's dog coming out with a package of papers in his mouth? Has he actually been down for the mail?" went on the gentleman. ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren

... Shelby cried; "I hated that dinky little old steamer, but now we're ashore in this live wire of a place, I'm as excited and glad as anybody. I say, the mail from England comes every ...
— The Come Back • Carolyn Wells

... I told Mother I had written Miss Susanna what train I would be on, and because she was so busy and Father away she trusted me to do things she had never trusted me to do before and didn't write herself, which is why I wasn't met. I did write the letter saying I was coming, but I forgot to mail it and found it in my bag when I got off the train and was looking for my trunk check. It was nearly eleven o'clock and nobody around but some train people who looked at me and said nothing. And then a young man who had got off the same ...
— Kitty Canary • Kate Langley Bosher

... Mr. Vining sent me a braille copy of one of the old Harvard papers in algebra. To my dismay I found that it was in the American notation. I sat down immediately and wrote to Mr. Vining, asking him to explain the signs. I received another paper and a table of signs by return mail, and I set to work to learn the notation. But on the night before the algebra examination, while I was struggling over some very complicated examples, I could not tell the combinations of bracket, brace and radical. Both Mr. Keith and I were distressed and full ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller

... Develop Power and Personality in Speaking Great Speeches and How to Make Them How to Argue and Win Humorous Hits and How to Hold an Audience Complete Guide to Public Speaking Talks on Talking Fifteen Thousand Useful Phrases The World's Great Sermons Mail Course in Public Speaking Mail Course in Practical English How to Speak Without Notes Something to Say: How to Say It Successful Methods of Public Speaking Model Speeches for Practise The Training of a Public Speaker How to Sell ...
— Successful Methods of Public Speaking • Grenville Kleiser

... garage, by mail. Rauskukle will take it. He won't rob me of more than a thousand dollars on price—not ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis

... better men than you? as you shall see this instant; for you shall lose your head here, before you look upon the face of the king." Which when he had said, he cast his javelin at him. But the coat of mail stoutly repelled it, and Cyrus was not wounded; yet the stroke falling heavy upon him, he reeled under it. Then Artagerses turning his horse, Cyrus threw his weapon, and sent the head of it through his neck near the shoulder bone. So that ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... realm among their members; and they were allied by marriage with the purest aristocracy. It is not, therefore, marvelous that a conspiracy was formed to assassinate the Chief Inquisitor, Peter Arbues. In spite of a coat-of-mail and an iron skullcap worn beneath his monk's dress, Arbues was murdered one evening while at prayer in church. But the revolt, notwithstanding this murder, flashed, like an ill-loaded pistol, in the pan. Jealousies between the old and new Christians prevented any common ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... Sent by mail, postage prepaid, to subscribers in any part of the United States or Canada. Six dollars a year, sent, prepaid, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 601, July 9, 1887 • Various

... she read. "I thought that meant you had to reply to an invitation. Oh, I see. Royal Mail Steam Packet. Here's the address. There's a boat leaving to-morrow. Would you ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge

... the other in a half-choked voice; "well, I should say not. It's the most glorious news I'm rushing over here with this fine morning. No one could have given me a more delightful surprise than I got just a little while ago. Jack! I did mail that letter, of course I did, silly that I was to ever doubt such ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton

... way of Tintalous. He confirms the news that the Sultans of Aghadez and Asoudee have completely chastised all those tribes who stopped us on the road and levied black mail ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 2 • James Richardson

... was thus described the other day. He had received a telegram to the effect that a very near relation of his was dying in Calcutta and that this dying person was desirous to see him. He started for Calcutta in all haste by the mail. The mail used to leave his station at about 3 P.M. in the afternoon and reach Calcutta early the next morning. It was hot weather and in his first class compartment there was no other passenger. He lay down on one of the sleeping berths ...
— Indian Ghost Stories - Second Edition • S. Mukerji

... employees can see to it that enemy mail is always delayed by one day or more, that it is put in ...
— Simple Sabotage Field Manual • Strategic Services

... from the front it sheltered the "United States Post-Office, Military Station No. 1," which had been transferred from Daiquiri to Siboney two or three days before. In front of this building our army wagon stopped, and we men went in to inquire for mail and to see if we could find a decently clean place for Miss Barton to sleep. She was quite ready to bivouac in the army wagon; but we hoped to get something better for her. Mr. Brewer, the postmaster, whom I had met in one of my lecture trips ...
— Campaigning in Cuba • George Kennan

... Liza is a queer girl—it all depends on how you strike her with a strong letter. You could not go to New York and make the proposal personally. It has to be done by mail. It all depends how well the letter is written, how everything is explained and how the idea of being a merchant's wife strikes her. She is a queer girl, like ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy

... rock, And Gabii of the pool. There rode the Volscian succors: There, in the dark stern ring, The Roman exiles gathered close Around the ancient king. Though white as Mount Soracte, When winter nights are long, His beard flowed down o'er mail and belt, His heart and hand were strong: Under his hoary eyebrows Still flashed forth quenchless rage: And, if the lance shook in his gripe, 'Twas more with hate than age. Close at his side was Titus On an Apulian ...
— Lays of Ancient Rome • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... was my father slain?" asked Alpin, as, being now in the armoury, they proceeded to don their coats of chain mail. ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton

... whale of a fight. But I guess I've got myself to see that you won't ever stand G. P. unless you WANT to come back to it. I needn't say I'm crazy to have you. But I won't ask you. I just want you to know how I wait for you. Every mail I look for a letter, and when I get one I'm kind of scared to open it, I'm hoping so much that you're coming back. Evenings——You know I didn't open the cottage down at the lake at all, this past summer. Simply couldn't stand all the others laughing ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis

... man that took the new marshal's gun away from him," the rancher said, nodding slowly. "My daughter knew you the minute she saw you—she was over there yesterday after the mail." ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden

... in his early days, having smiled most benignantly on him. His father was a man of considerable ability, and was to the past generation what Rowland Hill is in the present day—the great benefactor of correspondents. He first proposed and carried out the mail-coach system; and letters, instead of being at the mercy of postboys, and a private speculation in many instances, became the care of Government, and were ...
— Reminiscences of Captain Gronow • Rees Howell Gronow

... were in convoy. The sloops, cutters, gun-brigs, and local craft of all kinds were supposed to look after that, while the Line was busy elsewhere. So the merchants passed resolutions against the inadequate protection afforded to the trade, and the narrow seas were full of single-ship actions; mail-packets, West Country brigs, and fat East Indiamen fighting, for their own hulls and cargo, anything that the watchful French ports sent against them; the sloops and cutters bearing a hand if they happened ...
— Sea Warfare • Rudyard Kipling

... right." Hedwig was waved away. "I wonder if anything is the matter? Of course there isn't—only—there haven't been three Mondays since I left here that John's letter didn't come on the early mail." She straightened a rose that was falling out of a jar and stood off to watch the effect. "Nobody but John would write every week, when I don't write once in four—don't even read his letters for days after they come, sometimes. ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher

... to excuse the brevity of these few lines, as I have only this moment arrived after a journey of preaching and inspecting some of the schools, and it is necessary that the readers' journals should go off by this day's mail, which will proceed immediately. I have, I trust, some interesting things to communicate, which, please providence, I shall shortly do; and also, offer my grateful thanks to the Committee of the Tract Society, for a precious parcel of tracts, forwarded ...
— The Baptist Magazine, Vol. 27, January, 1835 • Various

... redressed those evils; and the Directors most certainly could not have redressed them without the consent of the Board of Control. Take the case of that frightful grievance which seems to have made the deepest impression on the mind of the honourable Gentleman, the slowness of the mail. Why, Sir, if my right honourable friend, the President of our Board thought fit, he might direct me to write to the Court and require them to frame a dispatch on that subject. If the Court disobeyed, he might himself frame a dispatch ordering ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... the telephone system is experiencing significant changes; there are more than 1,000 companies licensed to offer communication services; access to digital lines has improved, particularly in urban centers; Internet and e-mail services are improving; Russia has made progress toward building the telecommunications infrastructure necessary for a market economy; the estimated number of mobile subscribers jumped from fewer than 1 million in 1998 to 120 million in 2005; a large demand for main line service remains unsatisfied, ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States

... difficulties of transportation to market some seventy miles distant make it no object. He usually went to Ticonderoga on Lake Champlain once a year for his groceries, etc. His post-office was twelve miles below at the Lower Works, where the mail passed twice a week. There was not a doctor, or lawyer, or preacher within twenty-five miles. In winter, months elapse without their seeing anybody from the outside world. In summer, parties occasionally pass through here on their way to Indian Pass and Mount Marcy. Hundreds of tons of good ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs

... usually very slow, and are many days doing what a quick train does in a few hours. This one was quicker than most, because it was bearing goods to the King of Bavaria; still, it took all the short winter's day and the long winter's night and half another day to go over ground that the mail-trains cover in a forenoon. It passed great armoured Kuffstein standing across the beautiful and solemn gorge, denying the right of way to all the foes of Austria. It passed twelve hours later, after lying by in out-of-the-way stations, pretty Rosenheim, that marks the border of Bavaria. And here ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various

... short epistles from her aunt, with divers letters from Anna written slyly in the school-room and slipped into her lap, she was already well acquainted with; but of real, genuine letters, stamped by the post-office, rumpled by the mail-bags, consecrated by the steam-boat, this was certainly the first. This, indeed, was a real letter: rivers rolled, and vast tracts of country lay, between herself and its writer, and that writer was a friend selected ...
— Tales for Fifteen: or, Imagination and Heart • James Fenimore Cooper

... sallied forth early, all six aglow with enthusiasm. Mary Louise consulted her carefully prepared list and found that her first calf was to be at McGill's drug store. She found Mr. McGill looking over his morning's mail, but moments were precious, so she at once stated ...
— Mary Louise and the Liberty Girls • Edith Van Dyne (AKA L. Frank Baum)

... Wilkes's readin' o' the law: (They make all laws, you know, an' so, o' course, It's nateral they should understand their force:) He'd oughto took the vessel into port, An' hed her sot on by a reg'lar court; She was a mail-ship, an' a steamer, tu, An' thet, they say, hez changed the pint o' view, Coz the old practice, bein' meant for sails, Ef tried upon a steamer, kind o' falls; You may take out despatches, but ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various

... me by late mail that he will proceed at once to Washington to conclude the proposed treaty, if ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead

... reading his Proverbs and acting on them. They would have saved some of you many a thousand. Of course such a man knew something of the world. He was a wide-awake trader. His ships coasted the shores of Asia, and Africa, from Madagascar to Japan; and the overland mail caravans from India and China drew up in the depots he built for them in the heart of the desert. He knew the well-doing people with whom trade was profitable, and the savages who could only send apes and peacocks. He was a philosopher ...
— Fables of Infidelity and Facts of Faith - Being an Examination of the Evidences of Infidelity • Robert Patterson

... some have borne distinguished parts; Or sought through science of sweet sounds their fame: And foremost she, renowned for many a tale Of faithful love perplexed, and of that good Old man, who, as CAMILLA'S guardian, stood In obstinate virtue clad like coat of mail. Nor dost thou, SARAH, with unequal pace Her steps pursue. The pure romantic vein No gentler creature ever knew to feign Than thy fine Blanch, young with an elder grace, In all respects without rebuke or blame, Answering the ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb

... left your mail in the wagon in my other coat," he said, hooking his arm through the young man's and drawing him toward the barn. "Did you get him turned on?" he asked eagerly, when they were out of his wife's hearing. ...
— The Wizard's Daughter and Other Stories • Margaret Collier Graham

... disapproval of the Anglo-Saxon encroachments—witness Louisiana!—and zeal for the colonization of the Latin races are matters of history. Having completed his epistle, the land baron placed it in the old crone's hand to mail with: "If that man calls again, tell him I'll meet him to-night," and, leaving the room, shot through the doorway, once more rapidly walking down the shabby thoroughfare. The aged negro woman stumbled out upon the balcony and gazed after the departing figure still moaning softly to herself ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham

... Sylvia Morgan on his way from the hotel reading-room to the lobby to mail his letter, and when he met her he quickly turned down the address on the envelope, in order that she might not see it. It was done by impulse, and Churchill, for the first time, had a feeling of guilt that made ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler

... ruthless king! Confusion on thy banners wait; Though fanned by conquest's crimson wing, They mock the air with idle state. Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, Nor even thy virtues, tyrant, shall avail To save thy secret soul from nightly fears, From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears!' Such were the sounds that o'er the crested pride Of the first Edward scattered wild dismay, As down the ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum

... saved me from a terrible death. Well, if you will notice, this letter was written only two days ago. And it is the first mail I have received as having been forwarded from that address since the fire. I know other mail must have ...
— Tom Swift among the Fire Fighters - or, Battling with Flames from the Air • Victor Appleton

... watching, as of these each one Plied quickly his keen nails, through furiousness Of ne'er abated pruriency. The crust Came drawn from underneath in flakes, like scales Scrap'd from the bream or fish of broader mail. ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri

... When the moment of parting came, his hands had to be forcibly unclasped, and he subsided on his cushions a limp and sobbing little bundle, only restrained from screams of passion by receiving leave to open the wrappers of any illustrated papers if Gerrard's mail came ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier

... ever found his way to the place, and he was accompanied on the occasion by Mrs. Gilly. "The sight of a female," he says, "dressed entirely in linen, was a phenomenon so new to those simple peasants, whose garments are never anything but woollen, that Pizarro and his mail-clad companions were not greater objects of curiosity to the Peruvians than we ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles

... Day, after the mail train had been sent off, Matvey was sitting in the refreshment bar, talking and drinking tea with lemon ...
— The Bishop and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... the kingdom in gigs, on horseback, or by coach. They are the only successors that I know of, at the present day, to the knights-errant of yore. They lead the same kind of roving adventurous life, only changing the lance for a driving-whip, the buckler for a pattern-card, and the coat of mail for an upper Benjamin. Instead of vindicating the charms of peerless beauty, they rove about spreading the fame and standing of some substantial tradesman or manufacturer, and are ready at any time to bargain in his name; it being the fashion ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving

... till four years ago when I had a stroke now I ain't able ter wurk an' I sho' does want my pension. Will yo' tell dem ter sen' hit in de nex' mail." ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, North Carolina Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration

... Camden and turned his face toward his wife and children, crossing the mountains to Pittsburg in the mail coach with his dog and gun, thence down the Ohio in a steamboat to Louisville, where he met his son Victor, whom he had not seen for five years. After a few days here with his two boys, he started for Bayou Sara to see his wife. Beaching ...
— John James Audubon • John Burroughs

... Military Division of the Missouri.} "St. Louis, Mo., February 17, 1868. } "Dear Brother:— . . . I have not yet got the order for the Atlantic division, but it is coming by mail, and when received I must act. I have asked the President to let me make my headquarters at New York, instead of Washington, making my application of the ground that my simply being in Washington will be universally construed as rivalry to General Grant, a position which would ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... were adamantine. Her rule was as Procrustean as her thin-lashed eyes were inquisitive. She daily inspected both her lavishly distributed lambrequins and her "gentleman roomers'" mail, with an occasional discreet excursion into their unlocked trunks. Cooking in a bedroom was as illicit as private laundry work in the second-floor bathtub. A young Toronto poet who had learned the trick of buttering an envelope and in it neatly shirring an egg over a gas jet was first reminded ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine

... can't get about like the rest of us he's a great deal more contented, I believe, and if he can't play football he can show others how to. And," he added, as he returned to his desk, "unless I'm mistaken, he's done it to-day. Now to mail this list and then ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour

... districts, the dagger, is the inseparable companion of the Manbo. On the trails he always carries a lance and frequently a shield. For war he has an abak coat of mail and a bow and arrow. In time of alarm he sets out bamboo caltrops, makes an abatis of fallen trees, and places human spring traps ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan

... see how I lived in expectation of mail day, but suddenly his letters stopped. When father was pronounced hopelessly ill, I sent him a hurried note, saying that we should have to leave the Castle, for all the money was gone, and from that day ...
— More about Pixie • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... Wehaloosing, on the Susquehanna. Some of the scruples which Woolman felt, and the quaint naivete with which he expresses them, may make the modern reader smile, but it is a smile which is very close to a tear. Thus, when in England—where he died in 1772—he would not ride nor send a letter by mail-coach, because the poor post-boys were compelled to ride long stages in winter nights, and were sometimes frozen to death. "So great is the hurry in the spirit of this world that, in aiming to do business quickly and to gain wealth, the creation ...
— Initial Studies in American Letters • Henry A. Beers

... she said. "Give me the envelopes in which the letters came, so that I may compare the handwriting with that of the mail which comes to him. If any arrives with writing resembling the anonymous script, I'll keep it and tear ...
— Brazilian Tales • Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis

... Benton. "Nevertheless, if you were to shadow the gallant Colonel in Manhattan to-day he would probably lead you to a costuming tailor, where you would discover him in the act of being fitted with a Roman toga or a crusader's mail." ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck

... rumble of the wheels, and the mighty monster dashed through the peaceful town at fifty miles an hour. But the inhabitants were not so interested in the train, for they had seen it pass in just this fashion year after year. But from the baggage coach there came each evening a bag of mail, and this was the cause of the gathering at the post office. While the postmaster and his assistant were opening and distributing the mail behind the closed window in the post office, the restless townspeople occupied themselves ...
— The Deacon of Dobbinsville - A Story Based on Actual Happenings • John A. Morrison

... miles to San Francisco. The passengers paid high prices and were six months on the way. Those who came by the Panama route had trouble crossing the isthmus, where it was so hot and unhealthy that many died of fevers and cholera. The Pacific mail steamers connecting with a railroad across the isthmus at last shortened the time of this trip of six thousand miles to twenty-five days. For ten years all the Eastern mail came this way ...
— Stories of California • Ella M. Sexton

... comes to that, we don't in my country!... Say, boys, when you're through with your English mail you might's well provide an escort for your prisoner. ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling

... also publishes the following works by Emerson Bennett, either or all of which will be sent by mail, free of postage, to any one, on receipt of the prices annexed to them. All should send for one or more of them at once. No one will ever regret ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley

... horns, and weapons of bygone times, and among them a buff coat, an iron helmet, a cuirass, and two long straight swords, which evidently belonged to one of the gentlemen with flowing love-locks and broad collars turned down over their mail, whose portraits are hung on each side. But below these is a more modern helmet, such a helmet as was worn by Light Dragoons about a century ago, of lacquered leather with a huge comb of fur, a scarlet turban wound about it, and a short plume of red and white. ...
— The Drummer's Coat • J. W. Fortescue

... to the landward side, David saw a series of movements of the besieging forces, under the Arab leader, Ali Wad Hei. Here a loosely formed body of lancers and light cavalry cantered away towards the south, converging upon the Nile; there a troop of heavy cavalry in glistening mail moved nearer to the northern defences; and between, battalions of infantry took up new positions, while batteries of guns moved nearer to the river, curving upon the palace north and south. Suddenly David's eyes flashed fire. He turned ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... meals and beds, and be well cared for by people who kept them in the winter for travellers. Ladies sometimes made the journey on that route, which the government had lately opened, and the mails were carried that way; he could take passage with the mail-carriers. ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells

... accommodation of the roadside inns was taken into account; and it was "mine host's" interest to furnish good ale and beef, since he was tolerably certain that, with such attractions within-doors, the populous and heavy-laden mail would not pass by the sign of the Angel or the Griffin. Long and ceremonious generally were the meals of our forefathers; nor did they abate one jot from their courtesies when travelling on "urgent business." On arriving at the morning or noontide ...
— Old Roads and New Roads • William Bodham Donne

... that Mrs. Gamp's distinctive characteristics begin to assert themselves conspicuously. Her labouring under the most erroneous impressions as to the conveyance in which she is travelling, evidently confounding it with mail-coaches, insomuch that, in regard to her luggage, she clamours to the driver to "put it in the boot," her absorbing anxiety about the pattens, "with which she plays innumerable games of quoits upon Mr. Pecksniff's legs," her evolutions in that confined space with her most ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent

... to our box," he said. "Notice the number—534. Open it and bring the mail. Don't loiter ...
— The Errand Boy • Horatio Alger

... soldier in Guernsey, our hero was on intimate terms. When the grind of duty let him, he would travel "the worst road in the country—fit only for an Indian mail-carrier—in order to mix in the society of York." He periodically returned these hospitalities by a grand ball at Niagara—always the event of the season. Brock, while fond of women's society, preferred brain to beauty. Had his old Guernsey ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey

... imagined; for Nahum had, from the time of the covenanting, been gathering arms and armour from all quarters, and had thereby not only obtained a glittering breastplate for himself, but three other coats of mail for the like number of his fellows; and when they were coming over the croft, with their fife and drum, and the banner of the Covenant waving aloft in the air, every one ran to behold such splendour and pomp of war; many of the women, that were witnesses among ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt

... he would this time secure a good position in the capital. Thus the father had been obliged to give way, and Antonin was now finally wrecking his life while filling some petty employment at a merchant's in the Rue du Mail. But, on the other hand, the quarrelling increased in the home, particularly whenever Lepailleur suspected his wife of robbing him in order to send money to that big lazybones, their son. From the bridge over the Yeuse on certain days one could hear oaths and blows flying about. And here again ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola

... Gothic windows, upon huge chimney-pieces and panellings, incrusted with antique figures, carved in the black heart of oak—knights, and squires, and priests of old. Then he peoples these shadowy chambers with crowds of stern burghers, or grave ecclesiastics, or soldiers 'armed complete in mail;' and so forms striking pieces of gloomy picturesqueness. Figure-paintings of a lighter calibre also abound. There is Mr John Absolon, who is in great request for painting figures in panoramic pictures; Mr Lee, whose graceful rural maidens are not to be surpassed: Mr Warren, whose ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444 - Volume 18, New Series, July 3, 1852 • Various

... whirling nebulae; mosquitoes, wasplike flies, and whirring, shard-winged beetles, passed and repassed each other in intricate lines of flight; and, here and there, lucently flashing on long, transparent, veined wings, darted the dragon-flies in their gemlike mail. Their movements were so swift, powerful, and light that it was difficult, in spite of their size and radiant colour, to detect the business that kept the dragon-flies so incessantly and tirelessly in action. Sometimes two or three would hurtle out for a brief ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts

... strings of the twinkering rain; I have burnished the meteor's mail; I have bridled the wind When he whinnied and whined With a bunch of stars tied to his tail; But my sky-rocket hopes, hanging over the past, Must fuzzle and fazzle ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley

... vain task, should I attempt to describe to you the agony of suspense in which I watched every week for the arrival of the European mail; for, I'm sure, that Sir Samuel Cunard himself could not have evinced so deep an interest in the safety of his steamers as I did; no, not even if they had been uninsured, and the underwriters declined all offers of "risk" premiums, be they never so ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson

... reply; instead of which he adverted to the evergreens, and particularly to the skins and other ornaments with which the interior of the bower was decorated. The most remarkable part of these ornaments was a number of Highland shirts of mail, with steel bonnets, battle axes, and two handed swords to match, which hung around the upper part of the room, together with targets highly and richly embossed. Each mail shirt was hung over a well dressed stag's hide, which at once displayed the armour to ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... commons a letter, written by the earl of Melfort to his brother the earl of Perth, governor to the pretended prince of Wales. It had been mislaid by, accident, and came to London in the French mail. It contained a scheme for another invasion of England, together with some reflections on the character of the earl of Middleton, who had supplanted him at the court of St. Germain's. Melfort was a mere projector, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett

... useful shape; but I have often been badly hampered for the want of another surveyor who could work with me in surmounting some of the especially bad places. Now that you have come we shall be able to get ahead nearly twice as fast. I suppose you came out by the last mail, eh? And how are things going in ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood

... cards and other devil's tricks. Dan'l was always a steady sort: walked with a nice young woman that was under-housemaid up to the old Lord Bellarmine's at Castle Cannick, and was saving up to be married, when Hughie robbed the mail. ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... valleys, the inclination is only just sufficient to be clearly perceived. On so rugged a surface there was no means of measuring the angle; but to give a common illustration, I may say that the slope would not have checked the speed of an English mail-coach. In some places a continuous stream of these fragments followed up the course of a valley, and even extended to the very crest of the hill. On these crests huge masses, exceeding in dimensions any small building, seemed to stand arrested in their headlong course: there, ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin

... sent by mail is enclosed in an envelope addressed to Mr. and Mrs. A., and then in an outer envelope bearing full name and address. Informal notes of invitation are written on one's best note-paper and no ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter

... dark, and with him came Del, the baron, and Corliss. While Frona retired to change her clothes in one of the smaller cabins, which the masculine owners readily turned over to her, her father saw to the welfare of the mail-carrier. The despatches were of serious import, so serious that long after Jacob Welse had read and re-read them his face was dark and clouded; but he put the anxiety from him when he returned to Frona. St. Vincent, ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London

... space half filled with light Betwixt her bowing horns. So did it shine Unutterably fair. Then on her head She settled the bright helmet overstreamed With a wild mane of golden-glistering hairs. So stood she, lapped about with flaming mail, In semblance like the lightning, which the might, The never-wearied might of Zeus, to earth Hurleth, what time he showeth forth to men Fury of thunderous-roaring rain, or swoop Resistless of his shouting host of ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus

... telling how you may send money or jewelry by registered mail in Italy, and then append a footnote warning you against sending money or jewelry by registered mail in Italy. Likewise you are constantly being advised against carrying articles of value in your trunk, unless it is most carefully locked, ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb

... returned Phil Lawrence. "I don't believe he noticed our monkey-shines. He is worried over the letter he received in the mail we got at ...
— Dave Porter At Bear Camp - The Wild Man of Mirror Lake • Edward Stratemeyer

... from Indian depredations until the last winter. Up to that time the line had worked almost uninterruptedly. Even during the Indian difficulties of the previous summer and autumn, which compelled the suspension of the overland mail, the telegraph was not in any manner molested by the savages. This was supposed to be owing in a great measure to the influence of superstitious fear among them in regard to the wire, which they supposed to be under the especial care of the Great Spirit; but it was probably ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various

... Majesty," Edgar said, "but not because they are stouter men, for those we defeated so easily down in Kent are of the same mettle as our archers and men-at-arms who fought so stoutly at Cressy and Poictiers, but they have no leading and no discipline. They know, too, that against mail-clad men they are powerless; but if they were freemen, and called out on your Majesty's service, they would fight as ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty

... not know you, monsieur, and because those who walk at night frequently have their coat prudently lined with a shirt of mail." ...
— The Regent's Daughter • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)

... beat upon the bounds of Catholic Christendom, in the forefront of which stood Hungary. Hungary's king, Sigismund, was able for a moment in 1396 to unite the nations of Europe against the common danger, but the proud array of mail-clad knights were swept away like chaff before the steady ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various

... in Aden, which lasted three weeks, or until the second mail after my arrival took its departure for Suez, my wounds healed up in such a marvellously rapid manner, I was able to walk at large before I left there. They literally closed as wounds do in an India-rubber ball after prickings with a penknife. It would be difficult ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke

... still further encouraged by his being appointed postmaster of New Salem on May 7, 1833, an office he held for about three years—until New Salem grew too small to have a post-office of its own, and the mail was sent to a neighboring town. The office was so insignificant that according to popular fable it had no fixed abiding-place, Lincoln being supposed to carry it about with him in his hat! It was, however, large enough to bring him ...
— The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln • Helen Nicolay

... some letters to send off by the American mail, and I want Dick to look over them to see that I've spelt honour with a u and ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham

... me," said Rosemary, "and you'll tell Winnie, won't you, Mrs. Hildreth? She went down to the mail box at the cross-roads to mail a letter and she'll wonder where we are ...
— Rainbow Hill • Josephine Lawrence

... political conceptions in the eighteenth century began to change the face of the civilized world. The common law as to agency had to be adapted to the operations of business corporations; that as to highways to railroads; that as to contracts by mail to contracts by telegram, and later to contracts by telephone. The whole law of master and servant, which for the English people was bottomed on the relation of land-owner and serf, was to be recast. Public assemblies were to be regulated and their proceedings published ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD

... was evident that she was making unnatural efforts to subdue her anger; she fanned herself, smelled at her vinaigrette and walked up and down. Gondy, who began to feel uneasy, examined the tapestry with his eyes, touched the coat of mail which he wore under his long gown and felt from time to time to see if the handle of a good Spanish dagger, which was hidden under his cloak, was ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... flew to the medal. Miss Arden however, was the fortunate person. On securing it, and returning it to her companion, she said, "accept this symbol of peace from my hand, my dear friend. As for Miss Vincent, I just view her as the passengers in the mail coach viewed the fly, for she ...
— The Boarding School • Unknown

... opening it found therein all manner war-gear, even habergeons. So the Youth returned to the captives and unbinding their bonds, led them to the cabin of weapons and said to them, "Do each and every of you who shall find aught befitting take it and let such as avail to wear coat of mail seize one of them and don it." On this wise he heartened their hearts and cried to them, "Unless ye do the deeds of men you will be slaughtered with the slaughtering of sheep, for at this moment 'tis their design on reaching ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... employing him as pander in his intrigues, and preferring his society to that of simpler men. When he rode abroad, he took this evil friend upon his crupper; although he knew for certain that Lorenzino had stolen a tight-fitting vest of mail he used to wear, and, while his arms were round his waist, was always meditating how to stick a poignard in his body. He trusted, so it seems, to his own great strength and to the other's ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds

... o' mail that should withstand * The foeman's shafts, and you proved foeman's brand I hoped your aidance in mine every chance * Though fail my left to aid my dexter hand: Aloof you stand and hear the railer's gibe ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton



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