"Tail" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... snake although now they were safe from any attack by the reptile. Its skin was glossy and the dark folds had a certain beauty of their own. Both boys, however, were unaware of the colors of the great snake. At last Zeke succeeded in severing the body. In a moment he grasped the tail and flung the part to which it was attached several ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and Simon's Mine • Ross Kay
... stupid. I was forgetting it is Fantomas who is supposed to be caught, then are they going to give out that Fantomas is dead?... That seems out of the question.... Besides this man didn't die a natural death, he was killed! I can't make head or tail of it." ...
— A Royal Prisoner • Pierre Souvestre
... to Sedd ul Bahr—they might try to make another Gibraltar of it. Their aeroplanes came up every day. There was a French-man with a long tail—he only came to the edge of the camp, and as soon as the batteries opened up turned back, but the Englishman didn't stop for anything. He dropped a bomb or two every time he passed—one man must have been square under one, for they found pieces of him, but never did find his head. It wasn't so ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... hiding itself behind a rock close to me. And scarcely had the halcyon and adder embraced than the cat sprang on the innocent pair. This was my time to act. I seized him in spite of his struggles and with the knife I used for opening oysters I cut off the monster's head, paws and tail. And as soon as I had thrown the creature's body into the sea, before me stood two beautiful ladies, one with a crown of white feathers and the other with a scarf made of snake's skins. They were, as I have ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Outside World • Margaret Vandercook
... pinnacles. He crowned himself and Jim with wreaths made of water cress that he found on a tiny sandy beach. When they were obliged to take to the water he pretended that he was an alligator and made uncouth sounds and lashed the water with the grub bag in lieu of a tail. ...
— Still Jim • Honore Willsie Morrow
... When I did he was a dull one, and when I asked him if there was a train to Paddington his answer was sleepy and vague. As far as I understood him, he said there would be a train in half an hour. I sat down and lit a cigar and waited, watching the last tail of the tattered sunset and listening to the everlasting rain. It may have been in half an hour or less, but a train came rather slowly into the station. It was an unnaturally dark train; I could not see a light anywhere in the long ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton
... horse, I'se marvel what beast a will get into next." "Probably into a mule," said the knight; "in that case, you will be in some danger—but I can, at any time, dispossess you with a horse-whip."—"Ay, ay," answered Timothy, "your honour has a mortal good hand at giving a flap with a fox's tail, as the saying is—'t is a wonderment you did not try your hand on that there wiseacre that stole your honour's harness, and wants to be an arrant with a murrain to 'un. Lord help his fool's head, it becomes him as a sow doth a cart saddle." ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... heart the pretty stiff head-dress, the leaning figure, ever ready to try some new gracious salutation, the scarf fastened behind in an enormous bow, the large falling sleeves, the dress slightly clinging about the ankles with a little crooked train like a lizard's tail. ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... stoned him, and I could hardly refrain from giving public utterance to the anathemas that burned on my tongue, when the wretched animal, who seemed to have an insane attraction to me, floundered about my legs as I moved, or flapped his stump tail under my chair when I sat still. Dora alone, with strange perversity, persisted in ignoring his bad habits, his vulgar manners, his uselessness, his ugliness, and his impudence, and set me at defiance when I objected ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... your highness's curiosity without offending decency—as, after they had finished the operation I was describing, they made the figure of their most respected deity upon my arm." The renegade then pulled up his sleeve, and showed the figure of a mermaid, with a curling tail, a looking-glass in one hand and a comb in the other. "Here your highness will perceive a specimen of their art. This is a representation of their goddess, Bo-gee. In one hand she holds an iron rake, with which ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Frederick Marryat
... forehead at her, puckered an eye, toned a long No that wagged vibration behind it like an undocked tail. ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens
... were to be gained by riding a goat, any petty crossroads, with its lodge-room over the grocery, would contain a Herbert Spencer; and the agrarian mossbacks would have wisdom by the scruff and detain knowledge with a tail-hold. ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard
... used to say something about 'man being his own star,' I don't recollect it all, but I know it meant he could be one of the first magnet if he'd a mind to. I set out to be a comet, I reckon, all hot air tail, and there isn't much of ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... mantle, sitting enthroned with Beatrice (a tiara and feathers on her head) at his side, and kneeling before them a nondescript article, consisting chiefly of a fur cloak, a fur cap, adorned with a pair of grey squirrel cuffs, sewn ingeniously into the form of ears, a boa by way of tail, and an immense pair of boots. As Uncle Geoffrey said, the cat was certainly out of the bag, and it proceeded in due form to take two real partridges from the bag, and present them to the king and princess in the name ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... for sign that he understood thoroughly, and at once fell to new capers by way of changing the subject. Tilda became severe. "Look here, Godolphus," she explained, "this is biz-strict biz. You may wag your silly Irish tail, but that don't take me in. Understand? . . . Well, the first thing you 'ave to do is take me ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... now unfortunately exiled from her Kingdom of Roses. I next present Polychrome, a sky fairy, who lost her Bow by an accident and can't find her way home. The small girl here is Betsy Bobbin, from some unknown earthly paradise called Oklahoma, and with her you see Mr. Hank, a mule with a long tail and ...
— Tik-Tok of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... every living being hath eaten of it and, if thou take of it in they turn, thou art worthier thereof than any other." This pleased the mouse and she squeaked for joy and danced and frisked her ears and tail, and greed for the grain deluded her; so she rose at once and issuing forth of her home, saw the sesame husked and dry, shining with whiteness, and the woman sitting at watch and ward. The mouse, taking no thought to the issue of the affair (for the woman had armed ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... and each time forgot how many minutes it was to five. He fancied that every passer-by looked at him in a peculiar way, with a sort of sarcastic astonishment and curiosity. A wretched little dog ran up, sniffed at his legs, and began wagging its tail. He threatened it angrily. He was particularly annoyed by a factory lad in a greasy smock, who seated himself on a seat on the other side of the boulevard, and by turns whistling, scratching himself, ...
— Dream Tales and Prose Poems • Ivan Turgenev
... species,—sometimes by the form of corolla, sometimes by that of calyx, sometimes by that of the filaments, sometimes by that of the stigma, and sometimes by that of the seed. As, for instance, thyme is to be identified by the calyx having hairs in its throat, dead nettle by having bristles in its mouth, lion's tail by having bones in its anthers (antherae punctis osseis adspersae), and teucrium by having its ...
— Proserpina, Volume 2 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... door of my bed-room, where I was seated, and which adjoined the apartment in which this scene was enacted, and saw him holding this dog by the collar, suspended in the air, while a boy, who was in his service, a Kalmuck by birth, held the animal by the tail. It was a poor little King Charles spaniel, and the duke was beating him with all his might with the heavy handle of a whip. I interceded for the poor beast; but this only made him redouble his blows. Unable ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... comfortable, and even luxurious, accommodations in the comet for as many persons as will honor us with their patronage, and make an extended excursion among the heavenly bodies. We shall prepare 1,000,000 state-rooms in the tail of the comet (with hot and cold water, gas, looking-glass, parachute, umbrella, etc., in each), and shall construct more if we meet with a sufficiently generous encouragement. We shall have billiard-rooms, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... so cruel. 'I seen my duty and I done it noble,' as the essay runs. I made that vacancy to get ahead of a rattlesnake that got me there, a venomous big one with nine police calls on its tail, and that's no snake story, either. I cut the flesh out to get rid of the poison. I was n't in a college laboratory and I had to work fast and use what tools I had with me. I killed the gentleman that did the mischief, though," Vic added ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... and a long-legged, long-eared calf." 228 "Pulled the butt under her chest." 248 "He 'belled' harshly several times across the dark wastes." 254 "In a flash was up again on his haunches." 268 "He curled down his abbreviated tail, and ran." 280 "In his fright the kid dropped his toadstool and stared back ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... making a mess of rescuing you, but I can't get head nor tail of the situation. It's all a mess. Every time we try to break out, something happens and we're turned back. We're only a couple of blocks now from where I got you out of that entrance. Friend and foe are all mixed up. It's chaos. ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London
... Virgil bound the Muses, to the footstool of thrones, to flatter the frail humanity thereon with the incense of divine honors. Homer's Muses, like true Americans, pay no higher honors to the diadem on the king's head than to the gaudy plumage of the peacock's tail. Young America would derive great advantages from an intimate acquaintance with Homer. He wrote in a language which gives to all the arts and sciences their technical terms. Hence, the previous study of the Greek makes ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... and turn yer nose up, and joke and hev yer fun, And laugh and holler "Tail-holts is better holts'n none! Ef the city suits you better w'y, hit's where you'd ort'o be— But the little Town o' ...
— Afterwhiles • James Whitcomb Riley
... from the controls as if they had abruptly become white hot. "Rocket," one of them screamed. "Enemy rocket on our tail!" ...
— No Hiding Place • Richard R. Smith
... lion sleeping, and Master Fox persuaded his companion to steal the crown, sceptre and royal robes. The ape, arrayed in these, assumed to be king, and Fox was his prime minister; but so ill did they govern, that Jupiter interfered, the lion was restored, and the ape was docked of his tail and ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... He was there, perhaps, an hour, alone, and saw nobody pass along the road. Then came the sound of horse's hoofs, and at the same time he heard a motor-car approaching from the opposite direction. The rider made appearance first, riding a grey horse with an Arab's high set head and tail. She was holding him with difficulty, for the whirr of the approaching car grew every moment louder. Shelton rose; the car flashed by. He saw the horse stagger in the gate-way, crushing its rider ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... word and hurried back across the water meadow. Along the river bank between the patrols the anglers still sat in their patient row. And on the road to the north-west the tail of the second brigade was winding slowly ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... and beauty in these statues, as also in the lions which support them, recalling the early French and German manner. In addition, one finds the usual Lombard grotesques—two sea-monsters, biting each other; harpy-birds; a dragon with a twisted tail; little men grinning and squatting in adaptation to coigns and angles of the windows. The toothed and chevron patterns of the north are quaintly blent with rude acanthus scrolls and classical egg-mouldings. Over the western porch is a ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... was there, as he stood staring in at the chromium bicycle lamps, red glass tail lights, and wire baskets, that ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... would shyly frolic through the yard; a covey of white-topknotted blue quail would run past, in single file, twenty yards away; a paisano bird, out hunting for tarantulas, would hop upon the fence and salute him with sweeping flourishes of its long tail. In the eighty-acre horse pasture the pony with the Dantesque face grew fat and almost smiling. The troubadour was at the ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... to a "gownsman." Cf. Gradus ad Cantabrigiam (1824), quoted in Century Dictionary: "Snobs.—A term applied indiscriminately to all who have not the honour of being members of the university; but in a more particular manner to the 'profanum vulgus,' the tag-rag and bob-tail, who vegetate on the sedgy banks of Camus." This use is in De Quincey's mind. Later, in the strikes of that time, the workmen who accepted lower wages were called snobs; those who ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... now and walked on briskly. Both of them needed movement and action, something to "take them out of themselves." A gray squirrel ran down from its tree with a waving tail and crossed just in front of them slowly. Charmian followed it with her eyes. It had an air of cheerful detachment, of self-possession, almost of importance, as if it were fully conscious of its own value in the scheme of the universe, whatever ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... he ate with his mouth—so! Till at last there was only one small fish left in all the sea, and he was a small 'Stute Fish, and he swam a little behind the Whale's right ear, so as to be out of harm's way. Then the Whale stood up on his tail and said, 'I'm hungry.' And the small 'Stute Fish said in a small 'stute voice, 'Noble and generous Cetacean, have you ...
— Just So Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... now sprawling and tipsy in their cups; now scaling heaven, from which the angelic Pitt hurled them down; now cursing the light (their atrocious ringleader Fox was represented with hairy cloven feet, and a tail and horns); now kissing Boney's boot, but inevitably discomfited by Pitt and the other good angels: we hated these vicious wretches, as good children should; we were on the side of Virtue and Pitt and Grandpapa. But if our sisters wanted to ...
— John Leech's Pictures of Life and Character • William Makepeace Thackeray
... had an iron-clad back and a long tail that could wrap itself around a mountain. It had four front legs, with big knees that were bent up like a grasshopper's, but were covered with scales like armor. These were as hard as steel, and bulged out at the ...
— Welsh Fairy Tales • William Elliot Griffis
... before you scatter! Line up here, and let's give three cheers and a tail-twister for next-Governor Bucks! ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... one fault on The part of the sparrows at Walton; And that's why I fail To put salt on their tail— The birds have no tails to put ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, July 25, 1891 • Various
... help him!" cried Ned, for he saw that his chum had rushed to the rear of the auto, and was endeavoring to drag one of the powder boxes across the lowered tail-board. Tom was straining and tugging at it, but did not seem able to move the case. It was heavy, as Ned learned later, and was also held down by the weight of other express packages ...
— Tom Swift and his Giant Cannon - or, The Longest Shots on Record • Victor Appleton
... your Honor! We notaries are privileged to wear furred cloaks in the Palais de Justice, and black robes in the country when we can get them! Look here at my robe of dignity!" He held up the tattered tail of his gown with a ludicrous air. "The profession of notary is meat, drink, and lodging: every man's house is free to me—his bed and board I share, and there is neither wedding, christening, nor ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... firing rapidly but with doubtful effect with her single 90-mm and tossing out counter-missiles. There was another fireball between her and the mountain. Then, when the Dragon had followed the Lester Dawes to safety, she turned tail and bolted, the Goblin following. As they approached the mountains, something the shape of a recon-car and about half the size passed them going in the opposite direction. As they dropped into the chasm on the other side, another nuclear went ...
— The Cosmic Computer • Henry Beam Piper
... beauty which they have in the wilderness, as they do their pristine dimensions. Those who have hunted our wild species are likely to remember scenes where in some forest glade they have beheld a gobbler displaying his graces to an admiring harem. As he struts about with his tail feathers erect and his neck arched back, now and then pausing to utter an exultant gobble, the spectacle is one of the most amusing displays of animal pride which the naturalist has a ...
— Domesticated Animals - Their Relation to Man and to his Advancement in Civilization • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler
... hours' voyage to Lausanne-Ouchy in carefully preparing for his interview with Madame Berthe Louison. He abandoned the idea of trying the "whip hand," remembering how suddenly he had descended from the "high horse." "Bah! She is about as sentimental as a rat-tail file. However, she is good for my passage to India, at any rate, and, the nearer I am to old Johnstone and this pretty heiress to be, the better my all-round chances are." So, he contented himself with watching the pictured shores of Lake Leman glide by, and wondering if he might not turn ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... blood, the spell of it gripped hold of them and would not let them go. Man after man of them, after the most terrible privation and suffering, shook the muck of the country from his moccasins and departed for good. But the following spring always found him drifting down the Yukon on the tail ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... that label, Chum; I think that was the worst offence of all. And why should I label one who was speaking so eloquently for himself; who said from the tip of his little black nose to the end of his stumpy black tail, "I'm a silly old ass, but there's nothing wrong in me, and they're sending me away!" But according to the regulations—one must ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 21, 1914 • Various
... saw. From this slit the gas was burned as a sheet of flame called the "bats-wing." In 1820 Nielson made a burner which allowed two small jets to collide and thus form a flat flame. The efficiency of this "fish-tail" burner was somewhat higher than that of the earlier ones. Its flame was steadier because it was less influenced by drafts of air. In 1853 Frankland showed an Argand burner consisting of a metal ring containing a series of holes from ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh
... was presented to him. He wagged his queer tail, smiled with his intelligent brown eyes, took it between his teeth, and trotted across the street in the most business-like way, the others following, but detaining the boy from keeping too close. They found the creature sitting upright, tapping the ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... examination, which proved her statement to be "false and proceedinge of some lewde and imposterouse pretence," she and her maid were ordered to be whipt,—"ther backes only beeinge layd bare,"—at the cart's tail through the city on a market day, "with a note in writinge uppon the hinder part of there heades shewinge the ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe
... the tail of her gown, put her feather-crowned head through the gap in the fence and drew her august person after, and Jeffrey followed her. He had a gay sense of irresponsibility, of seeking the event. He was grateful to Madame Beattie. They went on, and ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... vindicating his own independence by the proper amount of showing off, started away down the road with as high an action as he could command, playing to the gallery, looking back and out of the tail of his eye to see if Lewis observed what a terrible fellow he was ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris
... with her own hands. If that won't satisfy you it's hard to say what can; but indeed I think you ought to know by this time o' day how far a handsome face goes with them. Give the divil himself but that, and they'll take his horns, hooves, and tail into the bargain—ay, ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... described as 'the yellow pony' and 'the little mare.' Hyacinth began with the yellow pony, the oldest and staidest of the two. The little mare, who had a temper of her own, gave him more trouble. She disliked his way of putting the crupper under her tail, and one day, to her owner's great delight, 'rose the divil on them' when her new groom got the shaft of the car ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... to display the tail of a short topcoat that was one of his treasures. The garment was fashionably made and of the best material, for Ripley's father was a wealthy lawyer in Gridley, and the young Ripley hopeful had all the most costly things ...
— The High School Freshmen - Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports • H. Irving Hancock
... contrived to provision themselves (in the leading shops, under the arcades of the Rue de Rivoli) with as much tact as good taste, and the Cook ladies have the innocent illusion of making bargains every day. One may even buy there, hung up by the tail, stuffed with straw and looking extremely real, the last crocodiles of Egypt, which, particularly at the end of the season, may be had at ...
— Egypt (La Mort De Philae) • Pierre Loti
... always two men in the outer hall, all day long, and sometimes four, ready to announce visitors or to answer questions, as the case might be. It was deserted now, a great, dismal, paved hall, already dingy with dust. One of the box-benches was open, and the tail of a footman's livery greatcoat which had been thrown in carelessly, hung over the edge and dragged ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... come up; one riding on a broom-stick, another on a wine-jar, a third on an oven-peel and a fourth on a black bitch,[FN192] and I knew that they were witches making for thy city. One of them came up to me and kicked me with her foot and beat me with a fox's tail she had in her hand, hurting me grievously, whereat I was wroth and smote her with a knife I had with me, wounding her in the back parts, as she turned to flee from me. When she felt the wound, she fled before me and in her flight let ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... Murgatroyd sat on the floor, his long tail coiled reflectively about a chair leg. He watched the door of the ...
— This World Is Taboo • Murray Leinster
... the office. There, wedged in between two old shanties, he had to wait two hours for Pat to get on the office beat. Oh, what a long night! Just ahead were the office and the starving men. Between them and their rescuer a Chinaman stalked, gun in hand, pig-tail bobbing in the night air, and eyes ever on the alert to see an intruder. In the bar-room Job could hear the talking. Dan Dean and O'Donnell were there. They were boasting that not a soul outside knew of the strike; that a late telephone to ...
— The Transformation of Job - A Tale of the High Sierras • Frederick Vining Fisher
... can use his standard is the obsequious method of forecasting the course society would take but for him, and then putting an extinguisher on all personal idiosyncrasies of desire and interest, and with bated breath and tiptoe tread following as straight as may be at the tail, and bringing up the rear of everything. Some pious creatures may find a pleasure in this; but not only does it violate our general wish to lead and not to follow (a wish which is surely not immoral if we but lead aright), but if it ...
— The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James
... expecting it, the answering blaze of fire from the bushes on both flanks of the charging horsemen took even Max somewhat by surprise. Three horses fell in a bunch, and two turned tail and dashed back riderless the way they had come. Again, in a second or two, a scattering discharge came from the bushes; more men fell, and the remainder, their nerves obviously shaken by the unexpected attack, turned their horses' ...
— Two Daring Young Patriots - or, Outwitting the Huns • W. P. Shervill
... I'll unfold a tail See yonder rooster, all bedecked in gold?" sed I, pointin to the wether vein on top of the Tribune bildin. "Well, put your hand to it, and you'll behold the man wot my in-flooence is going to carry to the Wite House. If you've got eny spare change, ...
— The Bad Boy At Home - And His Experiences In Trying To Become An Editor - 1885 • Walter T. Gray
... nor tail of the thing; but one point was clear. Since this white man had neither Kaffirs nor gear he couldn't hurt my river, and that was what chiefly mattered to me just then. I might have forgotten him altogether, but that I came on his tracks again, and ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... the column halted, nine miles from Heilbron, having done only twenty miles during the whole day's march. I say the head of the column, because the body of it was still straggling somewhere along the road, to say nothing of the tail. We went to bed hungry, the men with the waggon being too lazy to make a fire. I consoled myself with the prospect of a good breakfast in Heilbron the next morning, and slept as well as the cold ...
— With Steyn and De Wet • Philip Pienaar
... certainly, never be called an imposition, as another Latin Grammar frequently is. We remember having had the whole of it to learn at school, besides being— no matter what— for pinning a cracker to the master's coat-tail. The above hint is worthy the attention of boys; nor will the following, probably, be thrown away upon school-masters, particularly such as reside in the north of England. "Laugh and grow fat," is an ancient and a true maxim. Now, will not the "Comic Latin ...
— The Comic Latin Grammar - A new and facetious introduction to the Latin tongue • Percival Leigh
... was rolled up that way, all the little spears hidden in the hair of his coat stood right out until he looked like a great chestnut-burr. Bowser stopped short. Then he reached out his nose and sniffed at this queer thing. Slap! The tail of the stranger struck Bowser the Hound right across the side of his face, and a dozen of those little spears were left sticking there just like pins ...
— The Adventures of Prickly Porky • Thornton W. Burgess
... pick my mother out by a small piece of grass which I will put in her hair, and you can pick me out from my cousins, for when we commence to dance, I will shake my head, flop my ears and switch my tail. You must choose quickly, as they will be very angry at your success, and if you lose any time they will make the excuse that you did not know, that they may have an excuse to trample you ...
— Myths and Legends of the Sioux • Marie L. McLaughlin
... once upon my course. I got into the wagon, calculating that the water would probably not come to my head while standing up, should the boat go down. If it should, then I determined to take my horse by the tail and let him tow me ashore. But the owner of the team succeeded in cutting the harness, thus freeing the horse and allowing the boat to right itself so that it ...
— Autobiography of Frank G. Allen, Minister of the Gospel - and Selections from his Writings • Frank G. Allen
... rains were coming. And up and down the cow-trail below the ditch, morning and evening, went his dairy-herd to pasture; and after them loitered Nancy, on a strawberry pony with milk white mane and tail. ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... knew elephants from head to tail, and he was very well acquainted with the three grades that compose the breed. The least valuable of all are the Mierga—a light, small-headed, thin-skinned, weak-trunked and unintelligent variety that ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... thinking that I must have fallen into a dream there in the sunshine. When I lifted it again all was the same as before. There stood the sentry, indifferent to that which had no interest for him; the cock that had moulted its tail still scratched in the dirt; the crested hoopoe still sat spreading its wings on the head of one of the two great statues of Rameses which watched the gate; a water-seller in the distance still cried his wares, ...
— Moon of Israel • H. Rider Haggard
... also noticed how useful are the Rat's front paws and tail. I have seen a Rat on the top of a swill tub at a pigsty, when the swill has been about ten inches from the top of the tub. The Rat was too cunning to jump down on the wet swill and drown, but I saw it reach as far down the inside of ...
— Full Revelations of a Professional Rat-catcher - After 25 Years' Experience • Ike Matthews
... no wit, and Babbitt fell into a great silence and devoted himself to the game of beating trolley cars to the corner: a spurt, a tail-chase, nervous speeding between the huge yellow side of the trolley and the jagged row of parked motors, shooting past just as the trolley ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... encrasicholus), a fish of the herring family, easily distinguished by its deeply-cleft mouth, the angle of the gape being behind the eyes. The pointed snout extends beyond the lower jaw. The fish resembles a sprat in having a forked tail and a single dorsal fin, but the body is round and slender. The maximum length is 8 1/8 in. Anchovies are abundant in the Mediterranean, and are regularly caught on the coasts of Sicily, Italy, France and Spain. The range of the species also extends along the Atlantic coast of Europe ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... progress. I regard general disappropriation as impossible: attacked from that point, the problem of universal association seems to me insolvable. Property is like the dragon which Hercules killed: to destroy it, it must be taken, not by the head, but by the tail,—that is, ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... journalists). There is a small white patch on his chin. There is a white waistcoat on his chest, or bosom if you consider that a more affectionate word. White also are the last twelve bristles (we have counted them) on his tail (which is much too long). His front ankles bend inward rather lopsidedly, as though he had fallen downstairs when very young. When we stoke the furnace, he extends his forward legs on the floor (standing erect the while ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... on his legs than Kaviak, determined not to lose his grasp of the situation, climbed upon the three-legged stool just vacated, and resumed his former relations with the friendly coat-tail. ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... he has made a likeness of little Sally." From the Indians be got some of the pigments with which they smeared their faces, and his mother's indigo bag supplied him with blue; while from the house cat's tail he took the hair for his brushes. West was well known as a portrait-painter at fifteen. His Quaker friends at first demurred at the vanity of his calling: but in a solemn meeting the spirit happily moved them to bless him and consecrate him to art. He found rich patrons, ...
— The Nation in a Nutshell • George Makepeace Towle
... drove them to the palace. The King wondered how Hans had been able to take a hundred hares to graze without losing any of them; he would, however, not give him his daughter yet, and said he must now bring him a feather from the Griffin's tail. Hans set out at once, and walked straight forwards. In the evening he came to a castle, and there he asked for a night's lodging, for at that time there were no inns. The lord of the castle promised him that with much pleasure, and asked where he was going? Hans ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers
... slowly to wander; yet without keeping at bay for long the sense of having rounded his corner. He had so rounded it that he felt himself lose even the option of taking advantage of Milly's absence to retrace his steps. If he might have turned tail, vulgarly speaking, five minutes before, he couldn't turn tail now; he must simply wait there with his consciousness charged to the brim. Quickly enough moreover that issue was closed from without; in the course of three minutes more Miss Theale's servant had returned. He preceded ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... is not the signal merely for the evidence of human existence. At the moment that the Islanders, crowned with flowers, and waving goblets and garlands, burst from their retreats, upon each mountain peak a lion starts forward, stretches his proud tail, and, bellowing to the sun, scours back exulting to his forest; immense bodies, which before would have been mistaken for the trunks of trees, now move into life, and serpents, untwining their green and glittering folds, ...
— The Voyage of Captain Popanilla • Benjamin Disraeli
... a Navajo under the cook wagon an' I sized it up. It appeared to be seven feet long, but I kicked it in the ribs. Things began to happen at once. A huge creature of a man slid out on the opposite side of the cook wagon, an' when he came around the tail of it he was holdin' a bear gun so it would explode without much ceremony. He was usin' some language an' his speed was a thing to covet; but I just stood with my back to the fire, waitin' until I could get ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... skates. Then the two started, hand in hand, up the lake. They skated well, as did most of the children of the community. The wind in their faces was bitter cold, making conversation difficult. Whether or not Kent was grateful for this, one could not say. He watched Lydia out of the tail of his eye and as the wind whipped the old red into her cheeks, he began to whistle. They had been going perhaps fifteen minutes when the little girl ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... at this reference to his convict days did not disturb in the least the man on the bed. His good-natured drawl grew slightly more pronounced. "Wall yore eyes and wave yore tail all you've a mind to, Dan. I was certainly some indiscreet reminding you of those days when you was a guest ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... I would say, where we had the mutton chops and where we heard the bullfrogs on the bridge. Or that town may be circumstanced in cherry pie, a comical face at the next table, a friendly dog with hair-trigger tail, or some immortal glass of beer on a bench outside a road-inn. These things make that town as a flame in the darkness, a flame on a hillside to overtop my course. Many years can go grinding by without obliterating the pleasant sight of its flare. Or maybe the town is so intermingled with dismal ...
— Journeys to Bagdad • Charles S. Brooks
... Alander has much of the Swede in his composition is shown by the neatness of his dwellings and cleanly mode of life. He is an amphibious creature, half mariner, half yeoman, a sober, thrifty individual, who spends half of his time at the plough-tail and the other half at the helm. Fishing for a kind of small herring called "stroemming" is perhaps the most important industry, and a lucrative one, for this fish (salted) is sent all over the country and even to Russia proper. Farming is a comparatively recent innovation, for the Alanders ...
— Russia - As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Various
... during his residence at Bordentown, and offered him the throne of Mexico. In making answer to this proposition, our ex-king did not hesitate a moment. He told the delegation, that, having already worn two crowns, he desired never again to wear another. The old fable of the fox which had lost its tail did not probably come into his mind; but if it had, he might well have spoken of it to his ...
— Stories of New Jersey • Frank Richard Stockton
... boy am I." And yet in spite of him Rubens, for the sake of a better line in the foreground of one of his greatest compositions dares to reconstruct a horse with his head issuing from his hind quarters, allowing the tail to serve as the mane, and Turner kept ...
— Pictorial Composition and the Critical Judgment of Pictures • Henry Rankin Poore
... young animals. If either could have flown away or bounded off finally at that moment, they would have done so with no more concern for preliminary detail than a bird or squirrel. The wagon rolled steadily on. The boy could see that one of the teamsters had climbed up on the tail-board of the preceding vehicle. The other seemed to be walking ...
— A Waif of the Plains • Bret Harte
... on her way to Peerout Castle, Bearhunter following her up the road to where the slope of birch trees began; then he turned around and jogged home with the blandest and prettiest of Sunday curls in his tail. ...
— Lisbeth Longfrock • Hans Aanrud
... unrivalled ability to handle metre, he had sought to rejuvenate the fixed poetic forms. He turned the tail of the sonnet into the air, like those Japanese fish of polychrome clay which rest on stands, their heads straight down, their tails on top. Sometimes he corrupted it by using only masculine rhymes to which he seemed partial. He had often employed a bizarre form—a stanza of three lines ...
— Against The Grain • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... and turned him around, and hit him a whack in the rear with the flat of his hand; and in an instant that good little boy shot out through the roof and soared away toward the sun with the fragments of those fifteen dogs stringing after him like the tail of a kite. And there wasn't a sign of that alderman or that old iron-foundry left on the face of the earth; and, as for young Jacob Blivens, he never got a chance to make his last dying speech after all his trouble fixing it up, unless ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... surgeon, and reported healthy. He paid the insurance premium, and obtained the policy. So now he felt secure, under the aegis of the Press, and the wing of the "Gosshawk." By-and-by, that great fish I have mentioned gave a turn of its tail, and made his placid waters ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... to crawl again. Sore! Stiff!! I labored all of ten minutes trying to get my boots on. And I had to ride up Hermit Trail that day. I was glad to ride. I never mentioned walking to warm my feet. The trail wound up and up. Today I slid down on Dixie's tail, whereas yesterday I had braced my heels against her ears. A young snowslide came down the mountainside, and we almost went on with it. It missed us by such a very slight margin that fugitive snowballs rolled around Dixie's ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... got four, General, and he wants you to come down. The shallow's all alive, and they are taking well. There's a trout, sir, at the tail of that weed. ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior
... all the animals of which they have the care must turn vegetarians. We were present when an old tiger, wounded by an English bullet, was fed. Having sniffed at a kind of rice soup which was offered to him, he lashed his tail, snarled, showing his yellow teeth, and with a weak roar turned away from the food. What a look he cast askance upon his keeper, who was meekly trying to persuade him to taste his nice dinner! Only the strong bars of the cage saved the Jaina from a vigorous protest on ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... climbing in search of sustenance, breathed peacefully near the tumble-down fence; the ubiquitous, long-legged, yellow dog, rendered trustful by long seclusion, aroused himself from his nap to greet the arrival with a series of heavy raps upon the rickety porch-floor with a solid but languid tail. Lennox stepped over him in reaching for the gourd hanging upon the post, and he did not consider it incumbent upon himself ...
— Lodusky • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... thence to the tail of Kempsey Lake; and still better near the Rhydd (the seat of Sir E. A. H. Lechmere, Bart.). Worcester is surrounded by very many spots of interest to lovers of natural scenery, to archaeologists, botanists, and geologists. Among those within easy reach, and ...
— Handbook to the Severn Valley Railway - Illustrative and Descriptive of Places along the Line from - Worcester to Shrewsbury • J. Randall
... glance descried a dark object; he watched intently as it moved and rose from behind the summit of the ridge to make a bold black figure silhouetted against the cold clearness of sky. He saw it distinctly, realized it was close, and breathed hard as the wind-swept mane and tail, the lean, wild shape and single plume resolved themselves into the unmistakable outline of an Indian ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... word to Wangtshuk, and said, "If you will send me ten thousand swallows and one thousand cats then I will cease attacking the town"; upon which the required number was procured. Temudjin fastened some lighted wool to the tail of each and let them go; then the swallows flew to their nests in the houses, and the cats climbed and jumped on the roofs; the city was fired, by which means Temudjin conquered Wangtshuk Khakan, and took his daughter Salichai for his wife. He then marched farther eastward to the river Unegen, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... are such a great help to it. She was a fine, alert, upstanding dog, hardy, fierce, and literally untiring, of a tawny light brown like a lioness, about the same size and somewhat of the type of the smooth-coated collie, broad of chest and with a full brush of tail. ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... and George Washington Marlborough were to lay hold of her horns to 'port and starboard,' as the captain insisted, while the Michigan man—who was over six feet tall, and leggy—was to fasten with a good grip on to her tail, that he might serve not only as a 'drag,' as our commander phrased it, but as a pilot as well, 'if she should get to yawing or be suddenly taken aback, and be unable to come up into the wind promptly,' while I was ...
— The Busted Ex-Texan and Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... restless on the last day, the "Fire Eater" wounded the white war-party. Splendidly painted and with feather hanging from his tail, he galloped out toward the fort. His brothers, seeing this rashness, closed in with him, but no sign of ...
— The Way of an Indian • Frederic Remington
... tailed pig, or a short tailed pig, Or a pig without a tail, A sow pig, or a boar pig, Or a pig ...
— Traditional Nursery Songs of England - With Pictures by Eminent Modern Artists • Various
... Jesuits, &c. I say, her labouring to hide the wickedness that she hath committed against kings, countries, nations, kingdoms and people. She hath hid these things by the means or persons made mention of before; as by the tail; for they indeed are the tail of the beast, that cover his most filthy parts: The prophet that speaketh lies, he is the tail ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... this that brought you here. Maybe you're statin' facts as to this job which, you say, is coming up. But you lied when you said you'd shoot square, Eagen. I wouldn't trust you as far as you could throw a bull by the tail, an' there's half a dozen other reasons why you ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... Doctor would return. And every day I went to the little house with the big garden on the edge of the town and tried the gate to see if it were locked. Sometimes the dog, Jip, would come down to the gate to meet me. But though he always wagged his tail and seemed glad to see me, he never let ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... uncommonly small for his age—hence his name, which, in the Cree language, means half. He came at the tail-end of a very large family. Being remarkably small from the first, he was regarded as the extreme tip of that tail. His father styled him half a child—Poosk. But his lack of size was counterbalanced ...
— Personal Reminiscences in Book Making - and Some Short Stories • R.M. Ballantyne
... Hunt is conceded to have done, then our judiciary and not our criminals is our dangerous class. With such judges as Hunt, who has attempted to crush out the trial by jury, and make of the jury merely an ornamental tail to his judicial kite; with such teachers as the Albany Law Journal, which, while acknowledging Hunt's outrageous illegality of action, yet calls it "a mistake," and speaks of him as "a good and pure" man, the administrators and the expounders of law ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... roots; the neck thin; body enlarging from fore to hind quarters; the back straight and narrow, but broad across the loin; joints rather loose and open; ribs rather flat; hind quarters rather thin; bone fine; tail long, fine, and bushy at the end; hair generally thin and soft; udder light color and capacious, extending well forward under the belly; teats of the cow of medium size, generally set regularly and wide apart; milk-veins ...
— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings
... yield, though heaven and earth should fall. The mass he denounced as the greatest and most horrible abomination, inasmuch as it was 'downright destructive of the first article,' and as the chiefest of Papal idolatries; moreover, this dragon's tail had begotten many other kinds of vermin and abominations of idolatry. With regard to the Papacy itself, the Augsburg Confession had been content to condemn it by silence, not having taken any notice of it in its articles on the essence ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... fav'rite charackters, he calls f'r some tea an' toast, jabs his pen into th' inkwell, an' writes: 'Vichtry was not long in th' grasp iv th' whale. Befure he cud return to his burrow Tusky Bicuspid had seized him be th' tail an' dashed his brains out agin a rock. With a leap in th' air th' bold wolf put to rout a covey iv muskrats, those evil sojers iv fortune that ar-re seen hoverin' over ivry animile battlefield. Wan blow iv his paw broke th' back iv th' buffalo. With another he crushed a monsthrous sage ...
— Mr. Dooley Says • Finley Dunne
... says in regard to the special work which Mrs. Mansfield has done: "It is so seldom that an artist is able to take in hand what may be termed the entire decoration of a book—including in that phrase cover, illustration, colophon, head- and tail-pieces, initial letters, and borders—that it is a pleasure to find in the subject of our paper a lady who may be said to be capable of taking all these points into consideration in ...
— Women in the fine arts, from the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentieth Century A.D. • Clara Erskine Clement
... [Arabic], of a black colour, are likewise met with here; the Arabs kill and eat them. It is principally in the Dhahy that ostriches breed, and great quantities of them are killed there. This desert is moreover inhabited by a large lizard called Dhab [Arabic], of one foot and a half in length with a tail of half a foot, exactly resembling in shape the common lizard, but larger. The Arabs eat them in defiance of the laws of their prophet; the scaly skin serves them instead of a goat skin to preserve their butter in. These ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... a magical effect. Besides the full-page pictures, etchings, and photo-gravures, the minor details of title-lines, head- and tail-pieces, and the like, are executed in a way so pretty and clever as to leave nothing to be desired. The rich quarto is sumptuously bound, and, altogether, as a holiday gift-book the work has every element of beauty ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December, 1885 • Various
... irresistibly provocative of insult in the back of a shabby-looking dog! The poor terrier, used to affronts, raised its heavy eyelids, and shot the gleam of just indignation from its dark eyes. But it neither stirred nor growled, and Beau, extremely pleased with his achievement, wagged his tail in triumph and returned to his master,—perhaps, in parliamentary phrase, to "report proceedings and ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... consider now the case of the goldfish in the house. His diet is the same, but how different his surroundings! If his bowl is placed on a table in the middle of the floor, he has but to flash his tail once and he has been all round the drawing-room. The drawing-room may not seem much to you, but to him this impressionist picture through the curved glass must be amazing. Let not the outdoor goldfish boast of his freedom. What does he, in his little world of water-lily roots, know of the vista ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne
... day, both husbands were absent, and the Devil and his son knocked at the door in their semblance, and sat down to supper. But the eldest child said secretly, "Mother, mother, father's got long claws!" The second said, "Mother, mother, he's got a tail too!" And the youngest added, "Mother, mother, he's got iron teeth in his mouth." The woman comforted the children, and while the childless woman went with one of the devils, the mother put the children to bed on the stove, laid juniper twigs in front, and made the ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... months in your house, he will cut you dead in London. I remember once meeting with such a return, but took it, of course, very coolly. Next day, when I was arm in arm with —— ——, I happened again to meet my quondam friend, who immediately rushed up to me—I, however, turned on my tail, and did not know him.—Fashion is an odd thing after all. It is not rank which will do. I have seen many a spendthrift young commoner cut his uncle the duke; and being a duchess by no means will ensure admittance at Almack's.—I thank ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 345, December 6, 1828 • Various
... he is sure the resemblance can't fail, The tip of his nose is red hot, There's his grin and his fangs, his skin cover'd with scales And that—the identical curl of the tail, Not a ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects and Curiosities of Art (Vol. 3 of 3) • S. Spooner
... nudge, when we gaed ben the hoose to get oor things aff; but I said naething, for, the fac' o' the maitter is, I thocht Mistress Kenawee a fell sicht hersel'. There was a great target o' black braid hingin' frae the tail o' her goon, an' the back seam o' her body was riven in twa-three places. An' if the truth be tell'd, I wasna very braw mysel'. Thinks I to mysel', as I've heard the Gairner's wife say, them that hae riven breeks had better keep ...
— My Man Sandy • J. B. Salmond
... of the frightened pony lay coiled a gigantic rattlesnake, its ugly head and tail raised and its rattles singing ominously. Two more steps and the pony would have been ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... not alight. There was no sound. The rain was as noiseless as the passage of time. Two other wayfarers were in the street with me. One had no right there, nor anywhere, and knew it, slinking along with his head and tail held low, trailing a length of string through the puddles. The other, too, seemed lost. He was idling as if one street was the same as another, and on that day there was rain in all. He came towards me, with his hands in his pockets and his coat collar up. He turned on me briskly, ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson
... over the armful of wood, surveyed her with shrewd eyes. He reached down a long arm and, seizing her by the tail, swung her clear of his path, landing her on the big lounge. With a purr of satisfaction, she settled herself, kneading her claws in its ...
— Uncle William - The Man Who Was Shif'less • Jennette Lee
... the dirty-white revolving mass (the smell of which is like no other in the world), and headed the leaders north. But the leaders and tail-enders were inextricably mixed, and for a long time there was ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... reached me from the waterside and the men there scattered and ran, I saw the shock of the double charge—the flame overhead lighting up every detail of it. The riderless horses, though they opened and swerved, neither turned tail nor checked their pace, but heading suddenly towards the left wing of the troop went through it as water through a gate, the dragoons either vainly hacking at them with their sabres, or leaning ...
— The Adventures of Harry Revel • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... that the limbs were transformed to the terrestrial type before the animal itself became terrestrial, the habit of swimming having been partly abandoned for that of crawling or walking at the bottom of the water, and the tail being used merely for swimming to the surface to obtain air. But the condition of the Dipnoi, which possess lungs but do not walk on land, does not support this supposition, for they possess fins which are either filamentous ...
— Hormones and Heredity • J. T. Cunningham
... belaboured me with might and main, till she was clean exhausted. She then threw the street-door half open and, as I made for it to save my life, attempted violently to close it, so as to squeeze my soul out of my body; but I saw her design and baffled it, leaving behind me, however, the tip of my tail; and piteously yelping hereat I escaped further basting and thought myself lucky to get away from her without broken bones. When I stood in the street still whining and ailing, the dogs of the quarter seeing a stranger, at once came rushing ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... bitterness of their spirit, and when feeling that they could do nothing; but if these enemies begin you will see what we can do." One of the oxen we offered to the Chiboque had been rejected because he had lost part of his tail, as they thought that it had been cut off and witchcraft medicine inserted; and some mirth was excited by my proposing to raise a similar objection to all the oxen we still had in our possession. The remaining four soon presented a singular shortness of their ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... says I, catching him by the tail of his khaki coat. 'You've made me kind of mad, in spite of the aloofness in which I have heretofore held you. You are out for making a success in this hero business, and I believe I know what for. You are doing it either because you are ...
— Options • O. Henry
... swore from temper and disposition; the jay from malice and derision. The bird seemed to have the better of the argument, for the squirrel suddenly fell silent and departed, his emotions revealing themselves only in the angry flicks of his tail. When he was gone, the jay began to investigate a knot in a limb of the oak. The bird climbed around this knot with slow motions curiously like those of ...
— All the Brothers Were Valiant • Ben Ames Williams
... other habitations of men. He seemed cut off from the world, and ached to hear the cheerful little barks which Nita had been in the habit of giving him by way of good night. Her amiable eye with its friendly light was missing, the gay wag of her tail was gone; all her ridiculous ways, at which he was never tired of laughing, were things of ...
— The Shape of Fear • Elia W. Peattie
... going through a village, and a whole army of gossoons were hunting a poor dog with a kettle tied to his tail. He ran up to Jack for protection, and the ass let such a roar out of him, that the little thieves took to their heels as if the ...
— Celtic Fairy Tales • Joseph Jacobs (coll. & ed.)
... this," he said, selecting a little flexible enamel fish, and trying to lure back this small wild bird. "See this little gold and green fish, it moves its head and tail." ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... wild birds make their strongest appeal to the human mind; in fact, the words "birds" and "spring" seem almost synonymous, so accustomed are we to associate one with the other. All the wild riotous singing, all the brave flashing of wings and tail, all the mad dashing in and out among the thickets or soaring upward above the tree-tops, are impelled by the perfectly natural instinct of mating and rearing young. And where, pray, dwells the soul so poor that it ...
— The Bird Study Book • Thomas Gilbert Pearson
... and when he demurred, and began to tease, as she called it, she felt as if she should scream, till he turned the old horse and took the back track. She was wild to get home, and kept hurrying him, and wanting him to whip the horse; but the old horse merely wagged his tail, and declined to go faster than a walk, and this was the only thing that enabled her ...
— Questionable Shapes • William Dean Howells
... vessels, coming on shore later in the day, brought tales of a strange invasion, and wanted to know who were the two offensive lunatics in a steam-launch, apparently after a man and a girl, and telling a story of which one could make neither head nor tail. Their reception by the roadstead was generally unsympathetic, even to the point of the mate of an American ship bundling them out over the rail with ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... others without mouths, who fed on the fragrance of fruits and flowers. Among the lower animals, he enumerates horned horses furnished with wings; the mantichora, with the face of a man, three rows of teeth, a lion's body, and a scorpion's tail; the basilisk, whose very glance is fatal; and an insect which cannot live except in the midst of the flames. But notwithstanding his credulity and his want of judgment, this elaborate work contains many valuable truths and much entertaining information. The prevailing ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... clothes-prop, with which he dealt the disturber of our peace a few rapid, but vigorous, blows, breaking its spine in several places. Then the step-ladder was brought out, and Ted, seizing the reptile by the tail, uncoiled it with some difficulty from the wire, and threw it ...
— Amona; The Child; And The Beast; And Others - From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other - Stories" - 1902 • Louis Becke
... mueddin, chanting the call to prayer and the Shehad,[20] roused me again, refreshed. The night was passing; even as the sonorous voice of the unseen chanted his inspiring "Allah Akbar," it was yielding place to the moments when "the Wolf-tail[21] sweeps the paling east." ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... meadows, the will-of-the-wisp has undoubtedly been seen, as well as in a wet field in the central part of the parish; but it is a disappointing phenomenon—nothing but a misty, pale bluish light, rather like the reality of a comet's tail, and if "he" was by "Friar's Lantern led," "he" must have ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge
... grandmother now. Funny to think it all over, ain't it? At this present time she's a tall, thin ol' lady thet fans with a turkey-tail, an' sets up with the sick. But the way she hangs in her little frame in my mind, she's a chunky little thing with fat ankles an' wrisses, an' her two cheeks they hang out of her pink caliker sunbonnet thess like ...
— Sonny, A Christmas Guest • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... days in the winter festival season, and also at other times, and may as well be considered at this point. In some cases they are definitely imitations of animals, and may have replaced real sacrificial beasts taken about in procession, in others they are simply men wearing the head, horn, hide, or tail of a beast, like the worshippers at many |200| a heathen sacrifice to-day. (Of the rationale of masking something has already ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles
... auspices, a grand fete was performed to the memory of this republican martyr, who had been executed as an assassin. As part of this impious ceremony, an ass, covered with a Bishop's vestments, having on his head a mitre, and the volumes of Holy Writ tied to his tail, paraded the streets. The remains of Challiers were then burnt, and the ashes distributed among his adorers; while the books were also consumed, and the ashes scattered in the wind. Fouche proposed, after giving the ass some water to drink in a sacred chalice, ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... The dog's tail stirred in answer, and at the same moment the other listener burst into loud, emotional sobs, and the old man remembered. "That's it, that's it. It's the boy who made me remember—'Te rappelles tu, te rappelles—tu, ma Toinon?' Why do ...
— The Halo • Bettina von Hutten
... vegetation that is usually of the narrow leaved type (p. 72), and not very dense. On the road sides you see broom, heather, heath, harebells, along with gorse and bracken with milkwort nestling underneath: crested dog's tail and sheep's fescue are common grasses, while spurrey, knotwood, corn marigold, are a few of the numerous weeds in the arable fields. Gardens are easily dug, but it is best to put into them only those plants that, like the native vegetation, can ...
— Lessons on Soil • E. J. Russell
... a futile attempt to waggle his dripping tail; it only splattered sadly against the top of the pail, and he gave up that effort in favor of one to ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... It's an old trick, but one seldom tried. This hair came from the tail of a white horse. It was threaded into a long, keen needle. The fellow who got at your horse yesterday was an expert. With one jab of that needle he passed the hair through the flesh just back of this cord. ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish
... us, and still their horns blew as they spread out toward the left of our line; the cattle in the pasture-field, heretofore feeding quietly, seemed frightened silly by the sudden noise, and ran about tail in air and lowing loudly; the old bull with his head a little lowered, and his stubborn legs planted firmly, growling threateningly; while the geese about the brook waddled away gobbling and squeaking; all which seemed ...
— A Dream of John Ball, A King's Lesson • William Morris
... the best of cats. She washed us kittens all over every morning, and at odd times during the day she would wash little bits of us, say an ear, or a paw, or a tail-tip, and she was very anxious about our education. I am afraid I gave her a great deal of trouble, for I was rather stout and heavy, and did not take a very active or graceful part in the exercises which she thought ...
— Pussy and Doggy Tales • Edith Nesbit
... Dispirited, their best laid low, The vanquished could but yield to fate, And turn their backs upon the foe In silence nursing grief and hate. A poodle neatly cropped and clipped, With tasselled tail made leonine, On hearing of the stern rescript, Straightway set up ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards |
