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Snuff   Listen
verb
Snuff  v. i.  
1.
To inhale air through the nose with violence or with noise, as do dogs and horses.
2.
To turn up the nose and inhale air, as an expression of contempt; hence, to take offense. "Do the enemies of the church rage and snuff?"






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Snuff" Quotes from Famous Books



... was a mighty stir about the table, as you may guess; and some would smile, and some would snuff the candles for a better sight of her sweet face. And through it all, the while my heart went near to bursting at this fresh proof of her most fearless loyalty, I ground my teeth in wrath that all those men should look their fill and say by wink and nod and covert ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... dingier pretensions, where there were no object lessons, and the studies of book-keeping and French were pursued (but never effectually overtaken) under the guidance of an elderly gentleman, who wore a nondescript gown and took snuff, wrote copperplate, explained nothing, and used a cane with remarkable dexterity and gusto." But, properly considered, that inadequate elderly gentleman may be regarded as our benefactor. If he had been more apt in his methods, he might have influenced the blessed ...
— H. G. Wells • J. D. Beresford

... the twin products, the fragrant oil, with dry acetic acid ("Perkin's reaction") we get cumarin, which is the perfume part of the tonka or tonquin beans that our forefathers used to carry in their snuff boxes. One ounce of cumarin is equal to four pounds of tonka beans. It smells sufficiently like vanilla to be used as a substitute for it in cheap extracts. In perfumery it is ...
— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson

... enormous peaked saddle held in its place by girths round the beast's breast and quarters, and covered with scarlet hammer-cloth. If we move about and examine the stalls, we see lumps of candied sweetmeats here; charms, snuff-boxes made of young cocoanuts and beads there; and jars of milk or baskets of dates elsewhere. At the fountain yonder, contrived in the wall, mud approached by rugged, sloppy steps, water-carriers, wide-mouthed negro slaves, ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea

... of a court; In various talk th' instructive hours they passed, Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last; One speaks the glory of the British Queen, And one describes a charming Indian screen; A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes; At every word a reputation dies. Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat, With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that. Meanwhile, declining from the noon of day, The sun obliquely shoots his burning ray; The hungry judges soon the sentence sign, And wretches hang that jurymen may dine; The merchant from ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum

... cried the old wretch, bowing again, and scattering his snuff all over the place, while I sweep him another splendid curtsey, "likeness, ma'am, why this is no feeble copy, no humble imitation, 'tis Murdering Moll herself, and glad I am to see her again." And then he catches me under ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... first sight contradicts all that our satirists tell us of the supple Gaul, &c. A mercer in this town shews you a few silks, and those he scarcely opens; vous devez choisir[Footnote: Chuse what you like.], is all he thinks of saying, to invite your custom; then takes out his snuff-box, and yawns in your face, fatigued by your inquiries. For my own part, I find my natural disgust of such behaviour greatly repelled, by the recollection that the man I am speaking to ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi

... were the present orthodox creed of kissing, it would most woefully spoil the sport of many a gallant youth, who, with the most polite officiousness, extinguishes (by pure accident of course) while professing to snuff, the candles, only that he may snatch a hasty, unobserved kiss of the smiling maiden, whose proximity hath so irresistibly tempted him. I wish the professor who hath already obliged us with a chapter on kissing, would lay us under greater and more manifold obligations, by a course ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13 Issue 364 - 4 Apr 1829 • Various

... with legs across, and his elbow resting on his knee, gazing into the fire with unspeakable dolefulness. Marie Lagoutte, after having refreshed herself with a fresh pinch, was settling her snuff into shape in its box, while I sat thinking on the strange habit people indulge in of pressing their advice upon those who ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian

... definite idea that can carry some distance—say an inch at the least, and which can be repeated at pleasure, can be pressed into the service of language. Mrs. Bentley, wife of the famous Dr. Bentley of Trinity College, Cambridge, used to send her snuff-box to the college buttery when she wanted beer, instead of a written order. If the snuff-box came the beer was sent, but if there was no snuff-box there was no beer. Wherein did the snuff-box differ more from a written order, than a written ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler

... glazing eyes he lay, And reeking limbs immoveable, His first and last career is done! On came the troop—they saw him stoop, They saw me strangely bound along His back with many a bloody thong. They stop—they start—they snuff the air, Gallop a moment here and there, Approach, retire, wheel round and round, 700 Then plunging back with sudden bound, Headed by one black mighty steed, Who seemed the Patriarch of his breed, Without a single speck or hair ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... (The prince had really a snuff-box with the marquis' portrait enamelled in miniature on the lid, which he had placed upon the table near his plate during the ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... Salvation is first and foremost deliverance from this punishment, how is it that it does not take effect immediately? Justice would suggest that it ought to do so, for some sinners live a merry life until the eleventh hour, and then give God "the last snuff of the candle" as Father Taylor put it, whereas others repent early but never manage, all through a long life, to escape the suffering caused by their own deeds in youth. In some cases, at any rate, on ...
— The New Theology • R. J. Campbell

... later. Had you in your first definition of a cigar begun by saying that it is tobacco, rather than smoking-tobacco, you would have violated this principle; and you would have had to amplify the rest of your definition in order to exclude chewing-tobacco, snuff, and ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor

... industrial era, moving as one man to the words of the daily papers, were such creatures. Perhaps we should merely yawn and stretch ourselves, feel revived with the sun a little warmer on our backs, and snuff up a pleasant smell which we remembered; begin to whistle, and grope ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson

... neither a sword, bayonet, nor stiletto, nothing that the fertile imagination of the public prosecutor could imagine; it was a simple tool used by the accused in his profession, the presence of which in his pocket is as easily understood as that of a snuff-box in the pocket of my neighbor, the notary, who takes twenty pinches of snuff a minute. Gentlemen, this weapon was ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... business to interest himself in commonplace murder—though this hardly fitted such a description—it was part of the peculiar function which his department exercised to restore to Lady Bartholomew a certain very elaborate snuff-box which he discovered ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace

... absorbed an ample pinch of snuff as if to quicken his reminiscences; he shook his laced ruff with his finger ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne

... as the saying is. What a mouth he makes whenever he goes for to talk his gibberage!—He screws it up for all the world like a pickled oyster. I must have a care I don't get some of that snuff out of his nose. ...
— The Politician Out-Witted • Samuel Low

... fury of the people the Spanish Government sent those French who had escaped the first massacres back to France in slight boats. One of the cartels came and cast anchor by the side of our hulk. One of the unhappy emigrants offered me a pinch of snuff. On opening the snuff-box I found there "una onza de oro," (an ounce of gold,) the sole remains of his fortune. I returned the snuff-box to him, with warm thanks, after having shut up in it a paper containing these words:—"My fellow-countryman who carries ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago

... a week and meat twice or thrice a year, living chiefly upon the coarsest corn-bread, with yams and beans. Still they contrive to have their luxuries. A soldier's wife, an elderly woman, said to me pathetically, "We have six vintems (twelve cents) a day,—my husband smokes and I take snuff,—and how are we to buy shoes and stockings?" But the most extreme case of economy which I discovered was that of a poor old woman, unable to tell her own age, who boarded with a poor family for four patacos (twenty cents) a month, or five cents a week. She ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various

... the adult population use tobacco in some shape—the men by chewing or smoking, the women by smoking or dipping snuff. They never have dyspepsia, nor do they ever get flesh, after they pass out of childhood, though nearly all the children are ruddy in appearance, and well rounded ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 433, April 19, 1884 • Various

... their purposes defeated. Yet—in the vast reaches of space, in worlds of other dimensions, in the cosmic crucible of life that embodies all creation, there may be other forms of life, other menaces, hovering clouds of death, preparing to sweep down upon Earth to snuff out her ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 • Various

... of Joseph Galendo of London, snuff-maker, praying a patent for his invention to prepare and cure Virginia tobacco for snuff in Virginia, and making it into the same in ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay

... and cordials. The family was despatched a thousand ways without success, and the house was filled with distraction, till, as we were deliberating what further measures to take, he returned from a petty gaming-table, with his coat torn and his head broken; without his sword, snuff-box, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson

... he has thought this last was the case when he has been told by Mr. Hart to snuff the light on his desk, and ...
— The Book of One Syllable • Esther Bakewell

... house of country, ancient with the trees cut like some peacocks, and I demand—"What you call these trees?" "Box, Sir," he tell me. "Devil is in the box," I say at myself. "But, never mind; we shall see." So I myself refreshed with a pinch of snuff and offer him, and he take very polite, and remark upon an instant—"That is a very handsome ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various

... the Duke of Marlborough, entirely by the same woman; Comment on Hare's Sermon by the same woman, only hints sent to the printer from Presto to give her.(15) Then there's the Miscellany, an apron for Stella, a pound of chocolate, without sugar, for Stella, a fine snuff-rasp of ivory, given me by Mrs. St. John for Dingley, and a large roll of tobacco, which she must hide or cut shorter out of modesty, and four pair of spectacles for the Lord knows who. There's the cargo, I hope it will come safe. Oh, Mrs. Masham and I are very well; ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift

... hands over it, rubbed them, and then placed them behind him, whilst with his foot he pushed the wood, consisting of dry boards and rafters from the nearest houses, into the flame, to make it burn more fiercely. At the same time he very frequently took snuff, of which he seemed to have but a small quantity left in his gold box. At last he scraped together what was left with his finger, and poured it out upon his hand. When all was gone, he opened the box several times and smelt to it, without applying ...
— Frederic Shoberl Narrative of the Most Remarkable Events Which Occurred In and Near Leipzig • Frederic Shoberl (1775-1853)

... and body are all moving. The answers and movements of this game may be varied. Thus the second answer to the question "And what has it brought" might be "A bicycle," when the feet of all the players would have to move as if working pedals; the third answer could be a "snuff-box," which should set all the players sneezing; and so on. A typewriter, a piano, a barrel-organ, a ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher

... law at Knigsberg, but later became an officer in the Prussian service. He wrote, in 1759, an ode to the Prussian army, was wounded at the Battle of Knersdorf, where Frederic the Great lost his army and received a ball in his snuff-box. His poetry is very poor stuff. The weight of the enemy crushes down the hills and makes the planet tremble; agony and eternal night impend; and where the Austrian horses drink, the water fails. But his verses were full of good advice to the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... continuous and thoughtful examination of his woodcutter's axe and the fidgety way in which Good kept polishing his eyeglass, all told the same tale of nerves stretched pretty nigh to breaking-point. Only Umslopogaas, leaning as usual upon Inkosi-kaas and taking an occasional pinch of snuff, was to all appearance perfectly and completely unmoved. Nothing could touch his ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard

... otherwise Colley Cibber, in all the vapid glory of fine clothes, and a great periwig. A very prince of coxcombs, with his soft smile and conscious air of superiority—a mere bag of vanity, whose emptiness is partly hidden by gorgeous raiment, gold embroidery, rings, snuff-box, muff and what-not. With what genteel condescension does he greet Sir Charles; how gracefully nonchalant is he to my Lord Morelove. "My dear agreeable! Que je t'embrasse! Pardi! Il y a cent ans ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins

... world is unanimously trying to do. Having made a pile, he proposed to make a bigger pile. Meanwhile he slapped his soul on the back and smacked his lips in anticipation. To Jesus the fat farmer was a tragic comedy. In the first place, an unseen hand was waiting to snuff out his candle. To plan life as if it consisted in an abundance of material wealth is something of a miscalculation in a world where death is part of the scheme of things. In the second place, Jesus saw no ...
— The Social Principles of Jesus • Walter Rauschenbusch

... the flutter in the air became quite a little storm, and the precious little bells went ringing downstairs. There was soon but one person left of all the crowd, and he, with his hat under his arm and his snuff-box in his hand, slowly passed among the mirrors on ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens

... BROADBENT [stopping to snuff up the hillside air]. Ah! I like this spot. I like this view. This would be a jolly good place for a hotel and a golf links. Friday to Tuesday, railway ticket and hotel all inclusive. I tell you, Nora, I'm ...
— John Bull's Other Island • George Bernard Shaw

... my jewvenile follies (what trix we used to play the applewoman! and how we put snuff in the old clark's Prayer-book—my eye!); but one day, a genlmn entered the school-room—it was on the very day when I went to subtraxion—and asked the master for a young lad for a servant. They pitched upon ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray

... seed the water stand i' the boy's eyes. "It's a good thing," says he, tryin' to gulp it down—"it's a good thing mother don't see all this!" "Ho, ho," says I, "my lad, 'tis all but another way of bein' sea-sick! You doesn't get the land cleared out, and snuff the sea blue breeze nat'ral like, all at once! Hows'ever, my lad," says I, "take my advice—bring your hammock an' chest into the fok'sle; swap half your fine clothes for blue shirts and canvas trowsers; turn-to ready and willing, ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, August 1850 - of Literature, Science and Art. • Various

... Peter; here we are abed, while daylight is glimmering through the blinds. Just put your head out here at this window and snuff the fresh spring air. Hear the roaring of Fish Creek as it comes up over the wooded hills. By no means! Don't suppose for the sixtieth part of a minute that I intend to hurry you away without breakfast; but you must ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various

... sleepless with aches, and agues, and rheumatism of old age. "The gentleman gave me brandy-and- water," she said, her old voice shaking with rapture at the thought. I never had a great love for Queen Charlotte, but I like her better now from what this old lady told me. The Queen, who loved snuff herself, has left a legacy of snuff to certain poorhouses; and, in her watchful nights, this old woman takes a pinch of Queen Charlotte's snuff, "and it do comfort me, sir, that it do!" Pulveris exigui munus. Here is a forlorn aged creature, shaking with palsy, with no soul ...
— Some Roundabout Papers • W. M. Thackeray

... cried, "upon this mound sit and take snuff! Beetle, do thou beat a drum. And do thou crawl, O Bug, the bun-like, beneath the ash, and spread abroad this news of me, the Spider, the wrestler, the hero bold—that the Spider, the wrestler, the hero bold, no longer in the world exists; ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston

... that the above legend has some foundation in fact, I may state that one of my hero's cousins in England has a gold headed cane, and another a splendid jasper snuff-box, both said to have been left by the party who came ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd

... down upon petty pilfering without violence, and they are generous and hospitable compared with the other Somal. Personally, I had no reason to complain of them. They were importunate beggars, but a pinch of snuff or a handful of tobacco always made us friends: they begged me to settle amongst them, they offered me sundry wives and,—the Somali Bedouin, unlike the Arab, readily affiliates strangers to his tribe—they declared that after a few days' residence, I should ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton

... occasionally glanced at the squaw, who manifested more interest than was expected. Sometimes she held the pipe for a minute or two motionless, her eyes on the warriors, as if anxious to catch every word. Then she would give a snuff or grunt, lean forward and stir the fire and smoke with ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis

... he wore an old, shabby, olive greatcoat, with a greasy collar, a snuff-powdered cotton handkerchief for a cravat, and waistcoat and trousers of threadbare black cloth. His feet, buried in loose varnished shoes, rested on a petty piece of green baize upon the red, polished floor. His gray ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue

... he who takes tobacco is not more to be feared than he who wears spectacles? and if spectacles, peruke, and snuff-box combined do not triple the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... before the fire, gazing intently at the blaze. His wife sat opposite, speaking earnestly to him. She every now and then wetted a short piece of wood with saliva, and dipping it into a snuff bottle, mopped her teeth and gums with the savory powder. She was—as her husband might have said—a perfect 'paragone' of 'poor white' womanhood, with all the accomplishments of her class, smoking, chewing, snuff ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... cannot talk me out with your tradition Of wit you pick from Plays, go to, I have found ye: And for you, Sir, whose tender gentle blood Runs in your Nose, and makes you snuff at all, But three pil'd people, I do let you know, He that begot your worships Sattin-sute, Can make no men Sir: I will see this Lady, And with the reverence of your silkenship, In these ...
— The Scornful Lady • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... tree; and the adoration of the alms-bowl was everywhere. In a few minutes the Curator saw that his guest was no mere bead-telling mendicant, but a scholar of parts. And they went at it all over again, the lama taking snuff, wiping his spectacles, and talking at railway speed in a bewildering mixture of Urdu and Tibetan. He had heard of the travels of the Chinese pilgrims, Fu-Hiouen and Hwen-Tsiang, and was anxious to know if there was any translation of their record. He drew in ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling

... in his way of handling the glass, in his preliminary snuff at the aroma, in his first cautious sip of the wine, and the gustatory skill with which he gave his palate the full advantage of it, it was impossible ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... how they all acted when they heard the letter. There was not another cross word said—or a word of any kind for that matter. Not one of them even looked at the others, and it was not until poor Spot gave a big snuff that each of them found out that the rest ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various

... I started plowing when I was about eight. Before then all I can remember doin' was bushing. After gathering crops we split rails and built fences. We played on Sunday evening. Our sport was huntin', fishin', and bird thrashin' and trap settin'. To catch fish easy we baited snuff and tobacco on the hook. We used to be bad about stealin' watermelons, eggs, chickens and sweet potatoes and slippin' way down in the woods ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Arkansas Narratives Part 3 • Works Projects Administration

... "Another painter asks me to sit to him! Why, have not the people already portraits enough of poor Schill? Has not every old citizen my head on his pipe or his snuff-box? Does not every pretty girl wear my scarred face in her locket? I have no time to spare for painters; I must take ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach

... creaked behind them, and the two captains turned their heads. A portly, broad-shouldered gentleman, in a suit of snuff colour, came slowly across the court, with both hands behind him, and a cane ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... sentenced to imprisonment for two years and fined L500. After George IV. became king, Brummel fell into disfavor and had to leave London. Years later, the bankrupt beau, who had been cheated out of a snuff-box by Prince George, presented the King with another in token of submission. In the words of Thackeray, "the King took the snuff, and ordered his horses, and drove on, and had not the grace to notice his old companion—favorite, ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson

... thought of the snuffbox that he had dropped into his pocket as his brother handed it to him. He had no doubt that it contained the instructions as to the treasure. It was of Indian manufacture. He emptied the snuff from it, but it contained nothing else. He was convinced that the secret must be hidden there, and after in vain endeavoring to find a spring, he took a poker and hammered it, and as it bent a spring gave way, and showed a very shallow ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty

... thus dressed, they perform a monotonous seesaw and stamping dance, accompanied by singing and drumming. Often this sport is kept up for several days and nights in succession. During the time, they drink large quantities of caxiri, while they smoke tobacco and take snuff. Their chief masker represents their demon Jurupari, but he does not appear to be treated with ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston

... cry, See they don't entertain it inwardly; Sin, like to pitch, will to the fingers cleave, Look to it then, let none himself deceive; 'Tis catching; make resistances afresh, Abhor the garment spotted by the flesh. Some at the dimness of the candle puff, Who yet can daub their fingers with the snuff. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... numbering twelve, fifteen or even nineteen children. Girls marry young, and seem to be entirely satisfied with their condition. You seldom hear a desire expressed for anything they don't possess. Give them a box of snuff and a stick to chew it with and you never hear a murmur escape their lips. Tobacco is indispensable. Old and young, male and female, are wedded to it. I have known of an old gentleman working all day for fifty ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 38, No. 01, January, 1884 • Various

... "This is snuff," he said; "if owt will make her loose, this will. Now one o' yer take holt by her collar on each side, and hoult tight, yer know, or she'll pin ye when she leaves go o' the horse. Then when she sneezes you pull her ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty

... picturesque attitudes encircling her child and she did this work to admiration. In vain the various actors tried to win the favour of the great stage Sultan. Pizarro never got a hand from him. Bingley yelled, and Mrs. Bingley bellowed, and the Manager only took snuff out of his great gold box. It was only in the last scene, when Rolla comes in staggering with the infant (Bingley is not so strong as he was and his fourth son Master Talma Bingley is a monstrous large child for his age)—when Rolla comes staggering with ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... stove-couch, occupied by Madame Wang, and, directing a servant to light the candles, he started copying in an ostentatious and dashing manner. Now he called Ts'ai Hsia to pour a cup of tea for him. Now he asked Yu Ch'uan to take the scissors and cut the snuff of the wick. "Chin Ch'uan!" he next cried, "you're in the way of the ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... a pinch of snuff out of a fine gold box that he pulled out of his pocket, and dusted his fingers with a silk handkerchief in a very genteel fashion. "I'm only here for a few months," he said, "but if a testimony of my esteem would pacify your good lady, I should be content," and with the words he loosed ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough

... act with benevolent intentions, and that he would spend as little money as possible in carrying them out. For the most glutinously indefinite minds enclose some hard grains of habit; and a man has been seen lax about all his own interests except the retention of his snuff-box, concerning which he was watchful, suspicious, ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot

... said Mrs. Watson. "There were times when I thought it would never end. That was when a lady, who was going to travel for her health, asked Uncle Toby to keep Snuff, her Persian cat." ...
— The Curlytops and Their Pets - or Uncle Toby's Strange Collection • Howard R. Garis

... home, he saw the candle streaming its flickering ray upon the path that led to the rocks. He saw his mother snuff the flame and Satisfied take Myra's child up from the floor, but he did not see his sister. As if in answer to this thought as to her whereabouts, Myra appeared directly in front of him, carrying a pail of water from the spring. She did not notice him until he pronounced ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White

... seizing. I speak with feeling. To-day again, being the first day humanly possible for me, I went down to Apia with Fanny, and between two and three hours did I argue with that old woman—not immovable, would she had been! but with a mechanical mind like a piece of a musical snuff-box, that returned always to the same starting-point; not altogether base, for she was long-suffering with me and professed even gratitude, and was just (in a sense) to her son, and showed here and there moments of genuine and not undignified emotion; but O! on the other side, what lapses—what ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... their men at one point on the river to make a pleasant reconnoisance of the enemy, and give them a warm reception as they came flying back towards Fort Erie before the victorious Queen's Own or the University Rifles—either corps being considered quite sufficient to snuff out the little band of patriots who dared to beard the British Lion in his den. The wine and the jest passed gaily round, until so secure were they of their position and the defeat of the invaders, a landing was effected At Fort Erie where the skull and cross-bones of St. George once ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh

... dainty, slim little maiden, with yellow, flossy hair in short curls all over her head. Her eyes were very sweet and round and blue, and she wore a quaint little snuff-colored gown. It had a very short full waist, with low neck and puffed sleeves, and the skirt was straight and narrow and ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various

... if resigning the case. Pere Philibert, finger on chin, eyed the two disputants with an air of grave abstraction, waiting for one or the other to begin. Brother Marc Antoine leaned back against the apple-tree, and took snuff. His eyes twinkled. Clearly he expected good sport, and I gathered that this was not the first of Ambialet's social difficulties to be brought up to the ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... verdant lawns, by crystal floods; For sure, said he, if Earth has joys, They dwell remote from pomp and noise. He loitering pass'd the vacant hour, For Strawberries stoop'd, or pluck'd a Flower, And snuff'd the Zephyrs as they play'd, In wanton curves beneath the shade. 'Till having every sweet pursued, That leisure finds in solitude, Resolving now to seek Mankind, And new delights in converse find, He left the woods, he ...
— An Essay on War, in Blank Verse; Honington Green, a Ballad; The - Culprit, an Elegy; and Other Poems, on Various Subjects • Nathaniel Bloomfield

... Vittorio?" "For neither. I am a stupid girl; I am for the one that will feed and clothe me. But I have often laughed at the Zouaves. One of them was standing here one day, taking pinch after pinch of snuff, and he said to me: 'The Italians will never enter Rome.' I replied: 'Not if they take snuff, but they will if they storm the town.'" "Do you think that the Pope will win?" "No, I think his cause is lost. Perhaps there will even come a time when no one goes to churches here." She: "Who ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes

... good to us. Us didn' know nothin' 'bout bad times and cutting and whipping and slashing. I had to work in the house and I 'member one thing I has to do was scrub Mistus' gol' snuffbox twict a week. She kep' sweet, Scotch snuff and sometimes I ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Texas Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration

... bag, Kate? Have you got it?" she asked, when the moment came to pay a hundred dollars for two or three snuff-boxes, picked up in a place she had not visited until ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... against Morgiana?" said Mrs. Crump. "I'd like to see her, indeed! She ain't fit to snuff ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray

... duly reported and printed, removed the last let to aristocratic favor; fast young bloods of the highest nobility did not acorn to shake off their perfumes and air their profane vocabulary in the green-room, offering snuff and the incense of flattery together to the Tamerlane, the Romeo, or the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various

... the old hunter; and, taking a pinch of snuff, he began to tell the deeds of the old ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville

... coats, square hats and canes, from the blue-chinned kindly slovens that one meets in the Latin countries. (In the train near Nymwegen, however, where the priests wear beavers, I travelled with a humorous old voluptuary who took snuff at every station and was as threadbare as one likes a priest to be.) Looking into the new Roman Catholic church at Groningen I found a little company of restless boys, all eyes, from whom at regular intervals were detached a reluctant ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas

... incapacitation from holding public office, and banishment from Court. Even after this he continued, with an astonishing lack of good taste, to live extravagantly and beyond his means (again in disregard of his own precepts), so that Prince Charles observed that he 'scorned to go out in a snuff.' He died in 1626 from a cold caught in the prosecution of his scientific researches, namely in an experiment on the power of snow to ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher

... wood, and from the door in the afternoon to watch the schule skail till each group was lost in the kindly shadow, and the merry shouts died away in this quiet place. Then the Dominie took a pinch of snuff and locked the door, and went to his house beside the school. One evening I came on him listening bare-headed to the voices, and he showed so kindly that I shall take him as he stands. A man of middle height, but stooping below it, with sandy hair ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren

... not our master at Belforet," she said. "We had a little old Swiss—such an ancient, ancient man—who took snuff continually, and was always talking about his pays natal and Jean Jacques Rousseau. I think he had known Rousseau; and I am sure he was old enough to remember the night they locked ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon

... towards the central hut the animal stepped on to the only path which was not overgrown with rank vegetation. The instant its foot touched the sandy soil its head went down until its nose touched the ground. Then followed a loud snuff. The dog's great mane bristled ominously, and a low growl sounded significantly upon the still air. Now Hervey's gaze instantly became one of keen intelligence. His thoughts no longer wandered, but were of the present. He watched ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum

... he fetched from the depths of his waistcoat pocket a capacious gold box, and opened it with a tap, as though he were about to offer me a pinch of snuff. 'There's for you,' ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke

... mean that. Course they smoke and chew, too. And the women dip snuff, some of 'em. Aunt Mollie Matthews don't, though, and I ain't never goin' to, 'cause she don't. But nobody don't ask nobody else if they can. They just go ahead. That ain't the only way you're different from us, though," she continued, looking at Mr. Howitt, with that wide questioning gaze. ...
— The Shepherd of the Hills • Harold Bell Wright

... man! Barefoot boy, ay tenk yu can Getting all yu lak, by yee! Yu ban gude enuff for me. Yu ant got so many clo'es, Dar ban freckles on yure nose, And ay guess yu're purty tuff, 'Cause yu ask for chew of snuff. But, by yinks, ay lak yure face, Yu can passing ...
— The Norsk Nightingale - Being the Lyrics of a "Lumberyack" • William F. Kirk

... The ould man lived up Andreas way, and after sarvice he'd be saying, 'Boys let's put a sight on the Methodees,' and they'd be taking a slieu round to the chapel door. Then as the people came out he'd be offering his snuff-boxes all about. 'William, how do? have a pinch?' 'Ah, Robbie, fine evening; take a sneeze?' 'Is that you, Tommy? I haven't another box in my clothes, but if you'll put your finger and thumb into my waistcoat pocket here, you'll find some dust.' Aw, yes, a reglar up-and-a-down-er, Parson ...
— Capt'n Davy's Honeymoon - 1893 • Hall Caine

... yellow, pink, scarlet, and purple, with the border of open work of yellow and scarlet lace. He had, however, neither shoes nor stockings. He was accompanied by two men bearing swords, the badges of his office. One of our visitors took snuff (a usual custom), by jerking it from a richly ornamented tube of cane which his servant handed to him, on to his tongue, when ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston

... thousand times for not following them, yet my suspicions had not been aroused until after they had disappeared. The back of the man in a snuff-colored suit was, she felt confident, familiar to her. She repeated what she had already told me, yet she could not remember where she had seen a similar ...
— The Czar's Spy - The Mystery of a Silent Love • William Le Queux

... this: she was grinding coffee. How prettily it pattered down on the floor! What did it look like? O, like snuff, that people sneezed with. This was housework. Next thing they would ask her to wash dishes and set the table. She would grow larger and larger, and Gracie would grow littler and littler; and O, how nice it would be when she could do all the work, and Gracie had to sit ...
— Dotty Dimple's Flyaway • Sophie May

... again; but you get home at last—there's always light enough for that." After a short pause he said, quite abruptly, "Tom, do you want to live to be old?" I said I had never thought on the subject; and he went on, "I dread it more than I can say. To feel one's powers going, and to end in snuff and stink. Look at the last days of Scott and Wordsworth, and Southey." I suggested St. John. "Yes," he said, "that's the right thing, and will do for Bunsen, and great, tranquil men like him. The longer they live the better for all. But for an eager, ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al

... himself at the Padre's table before a blank sheet of paper, with a pen in his hand. Father Sobriente paced the apartment, with his usual heavy but noiseless tread. To his surprise, the good priest, after an exhaustive pinch of snuff, blew his nose, and began, in his most lugubrious style of ...
— A Waif of the Plains • Bret Harte

... Mlle. Mars would have a fricassee of pearls now and then—an idea she had taken from some celebrated Egyptian actress. As to the Emperor, his waistcoat pockets were lined with leather, so that he could take a handful of snuff at a time; he used to ride at full gallop up the staircase of the orangery at Versailles. Authors and artists ended in the workhouse, the natural close to their eccentric careers; they were, every one of them, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various

... hundred miles of dusty road, it is good to snuff the delicately salted air. The bight of the Exe, where we crossed it by steam launch, was only a make-believe for the sea. How wonderfully the slight rippling murmur of a calm sea flows into, and ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds

... the lurch. They started a game on me; I saw 'em whispering together, but I didn't think it meant anything till we'd got some ways in, and my candle wanted a bit o' snuffing to make it burn; so I kneels down and opens the lanthorn, and it took a bit o' time, for I wetted my thumb and finger to snuff it, and the wick spluttered after, and the light went out. Course I had my box o' matches, but it took ever so long to light the damp wick. At last, though, I got it to burn, but it went out again; and I turns to them, where they was waiting for me when I see ...
— Sappers and Miners - The Flood beneath the Sea • George Manville Fenn

... large musical box with drums and bells. This was one of the best instruments of its kind, and it played a remarkably good selection of airs, which quite charmed the audience. Among the presents I had given to Kabba Rega was a small musical snuff box. This was now wound up and exhibited, but the greedy young fellow at once asked "Why I did not ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker

... the little silver snuff-box in which he carried them. With his left hand he kept ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... stand upon the stage, talk loud, and stare about, which confounds the actors and disturbs the audience. Upon which the galleries, who hate the appearance of one of us, begin to hiss, and cry, 'Off, off!' while I, undaunted, stamp my foot, so; loll with my shoulder, thus; take snuff with my right hand, and smile scornfully, thus. This exasperates the savages, and they attack us with volleys of sucked oranges and half-eaten pippins." "And you retire?" "Without doubt, if I am sober; for orange will stain silk, and an apple may disfigure ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook

... the habit of winding up every meal by taking out his false teeth and hurling them at his wife, which you will allow is not an action likely to occur to the imagination of the average story teller. Take a pinch of snuff, doctor, and acknowledge that I have scored over ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various

... are letting a sentiment master you. There are worse things than war. There are possibilities in peace infinitely worse than any war, or there would be no war. War may kill a million bodies, but a wicked peace can snuff ...
— Makers of Madness - A Play in One Act and Three Scenes • Hermann Hagedorn

... me—for he had not accepted the lawyer's invitation to be seated, but walked to and fro in the apartment—took a pinch of snuff, and looked at me while he was taking it with an ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson



Words linked to "Snuff" :   snuffle, snuff-brown, smell, snuff it, snuff-colour, breathe in, tinge, pinch, tobacco, smelling, rappee, chukker-brown, candlewick, mummy-brown, snuff-color, inhale, touch, mite, inspire, sniff, hint, chromatic, speck, baccy, soupcon



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