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Timber   Listen
noun
Timber  n.  
1.
That sort of wood which is proper for buildings or for tools, utensils, furniture, carriages, fences, ships, and the like; usually said of felled trees, but sometimes of those standing. Cf. Lumber, 3. "And ta'en my fiddle to the gate,... And fiddled in the timber!"
2.
The body, stem, or trunk of a tree.
3.
Fig.: Material for any structure. "Such dispositions are the very errors of human nature; and yet they are the fittest timber to make politics of."
4.
A single piece or squared stick of wood intended for building, or already framed; collectively, the larger pieces or sticks of wood, forming the framework of a house, ship, or other structure, in distinction from the covering or boarding. "So they prepared timber... to build the house." "Many of the timbers were decayed."
5.
Woods or forest; wooden land. (Western U. S.)
6.
(Shipbuilding) A rib, or a curving piece of wood, branching outward from the keel and bending upward in a vertical direction. One timber is composed of several pieces united.
Timber and room. (Shipbuilding) Same as Room and space. See under Room.
Timber beetle (Zool.), any one of numerous species of beetles the larvae of which bore in timber; as, the silky timber beetle (Lymexylon sericeum).
Timber doodle (Zool.), the American woodcock. (Local, U. S.)
Timber grouse (Zool.), any species of grouse that inhabits woods, as the ruffed grouse and spruce partridge; distinguished from prairie grouse.
Timber hitch (Naut.), a kind of hitch used for temporarily marking fast a rope to a spar.
Timber mare, a kind of instrument upon which soldiers were formerly compelled to ride for punishment.
Timber scribe, a metal tool or pointed instrument for marking timber.
Timber sow. (Zool.) Same as Timber worm, below.
Timber tree, a tree suitable for timber.
Timber worm (Zool.), any larval insect which burrows in timber.
Timber yard, a yard or place where timber is deposited.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Timber" Quotes from Famous Books



... Mar-Elme so much as Cooper for this fact, because it is no less given him by his name to spoil elmes, than it is allowed him by the secret judgment of God to mar the Church. A man of Cooper's age and occupation, so wel seene in that trade, might easily knowe that tubs made of green timber must needs leak out; and yet I do not so greatly marvel; for he that makes no conscience to be a deceiver in the building of the churche, will not stick for his game to be a deceitfull workeman in making ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli

... domicile looked the very picture of desolation and misery. Nothing more forlorn could be conceived. The roof was partially untiled; the chimneys were tottering; the side-walls bulged, and were supported by a piece of timber propped against the opposite house; the glass in most of the windows was broken, and its place supplied with paper; while, in some cases, the very frames of the windows had been destroyed, and the apertures were left free to the airs of heaven. ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth

... Department during the years 1817, 1818, 1819, 1820, and 1821, and as much as can be shewn for the year 1822, with the items for which the money was expended, the place where and the persons to whom paid, what quantity of timber has been procured for gun carriages and caissons, its cost annually, and where deposited; the quantity of ordnance of every kind that has been procured during those years or paid for, and the whole amount of arms of every description now belonging to the United States; the sum expended in ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 3) of Volume 2: James Monroe • James D. Richardson

... and rolling meadows sweet with clustering haycocks, they came at last to the crest of the hill that guarded the eastern end of the dale. The whole round sweep of the horizon lay about them in an unbroken chain of ripening vineyards and rich timber-land, of grain-fields and laden orchards; not one spot that did not make glorious pledges to the harvest time. Drinking its fairness with his eyes, the lord of the manor sighed in full content. "When ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz

... valuable timber on Bates's land. The romance of the lumber trade had already passed from this part of the country, but the farmers still spent their winters in getting out spruce logs, which were sold at the nearest saw-mills. Bates and Cameron had possessed ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall

... the labor income. To make the matter concrete, we will assume a farm of 200 acres worth $60 an acre located in central Pennsylvania on a limestone clay loam soil over 1,000 feet above sea level. This farm is to contain 20 acres of timber, a 30-acre apple orchard two years old, 40 acres of pasture, 96 acres of cultivated land divided into six 16-acre fields. The rest of the 200 acres consists of small yards, roadways and waste land. One-half of each of the six 16-acre fields is to consist of a rotation ...
— The Young Farmer: Some Things He Should Know • Thomas Forsyth Hunt

... blow was then rained upon the heel of the mast, all working with fresh courage and determination as the ponderous piece of timber gave way before their efforts, a wide gaping hole having been now made ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson

... merchants, and in the report of the Committee of the House of Commons, he had, on his own view, ascertained to be correct. He applauded the wise measure of Earl Spencer, to improve naval architecture at Milford; and was of opinion that, to apply, with oeconomy, the supply of timber on the sides of the Severn, for the purpose of building ships on the draughts of Mr. Barralleer at Milford, would do honour to the earl's views, and benefit to the service. He had critically examined the ships on the slips; and declared, that they ought to be models, of their class, for the British ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison

... sometimes palely presided over a twilight teapot. The Reverend Homer was a burr-like man with a life-work. He was writing a concordance to the Scriptures, and had arrived as far as Kings. Being, presumably, a suitor for his daughter's hand, I was timber for his literary outpourings. I had the family tree of Israel drilled into my head until I used to cry aloud in my sleep: "And Aminadab begat Jay Eye See," and so forth, until he had tackled another book. I once ...
— Options • O. Henry

... was lost, being carried at a rapid rate into the open lake, where it capsized, and sunk immediately. After dragging for the body for upwards of an hour, it was fished up from under some logs of timber moored some distance below where the catastrophe occurred. The body being landed and placed on the bank, a loud altercation ensued as to the means to be used to attempt resuscitation—a vain hope—but still persisted in by those assembled. Some wanted to roll it on a barrel, others ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell

... their name. They live in that little house where you took them. Their father's got a piece of land on Zion's Head that he's clearin' off for the timber. Their mother's dead, and Cynthy keeps house. She's always makin' up names and faces," added the boy. "She thinks herself awful smart. That Franky's ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... under Francis the First, sheltered persons of good condition; on the other, divided from these by the width of the road and a reeking kennel, a row of peat-houses, the hovels of cobblers and sausage-makers, leaned against shapeless timber houses which tottered upwards in a medley of sagging roofs and bulging gutters. Tignonville was strange to the place, and nine nights out of ten he would have been at a disadvantage. But, thanks to the tapers that to-night ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman

... strains did this crowd of winged songsters rejoice and be glad in their beautiful gift of life. The interior of the building was plain and simple as plain and simple could be. When it was fitted up, oak-timber was much cheaper than it is now, so the wood-work was all of that description; but roughly hewed, for the early builders had not much wealth to spare. The walls were whitewashed, and were recipients of the shadows of the beauty without; on their ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... hall occupying the centre of the house, with beams of timber showing and a huge chimney covered with gleaming brasses, the room was bright and cheerful and open at both fronts: to the east, on the terrace, by a long bay; to the west, by two windows, on the garden, which it overlooked from the ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc

... have a sea-anchor. Well, we made a line fast to the sea-anchor and to the bow of the Snark, and then dropped the sea-anchor overboard. It promptly dived. We had a tripping line on it, so we tripped the sea-anchor and hauled it in. We attached a big timber as a float, and dropped the sea-anchor over again. This time it floated. The line to the bow grew taut. The trysail on the mizzen tended to swing the bow into the wind, but, in spite of this tendency, the Snark calmly took that sea-anchor in her teeth, and went ...
— The Cruise of the Snark • Jack London

... has almost become unmeaning to him. He comes across it most (as I say) when he is playing some game within four walls; when in charades, a hearthrug will just do for a fur coat, or a tea-cozy just do for a cocked hat; when a toy theater needs timber and cardboard, and the house has just enough firewood and just enough bandboxes. This is the man's occasional glimpse and pleasing parody of thrift. But many a good housekeeper plays the same game every day with ends of cheese and scraps of silk, not because ...
— What's Wrong With The World • G.K. Chesterton

... fine orrange yellow. the wide spaces void of feathers on the side of the neck are also of the same colour. I had some parts of this bird preserved. our present station is the last point at which there is a single stick of timber on the river for a great distance and is the commencement of the open plains which extend nearly to the base of the rocky Mts. Labuish returned this evening having killed two deer I sent and had them brought ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... and my servants shall be with thy servants: and unto thee will I give hire for thy servants according to all that thou shalt appoint: for thou knowest that there is not among us any that can skill to hew timber like unto the Sidonians. 7. And. it came to pass, when Hiram heard the words of Solomon, that he rejoiced greatly, and said, Blessed be the Lord this day, which hath given unto David a wise son over this great people. 8. And Hiram sent to Solomon, saying, I have considered ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... night in the trenches, with the sky criss-crossed with searchlight shafts and illuminating bombs; an automobile party might be caught on some East Prussian road with the woods on either side crackling with rifle fire as the skirmishers beat through the timber after the scattered enemy as after so many squirrels. Our moment came one afternoon in the German trenches at Givenchy, when, with the English trenches only a stone's throw away, both sides began to amuse themselves by ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various

... sight; it seemed so cruel to kill the great trees just as they were pushing their buds for another summer of life. But he consoled himself by recalling that they had been too crowded and that the timber was really needed on the estate. As he reached the house again carrying a bunch of white violets which he had plucked in a sheltered place for Barbara, he perceived a motor travelling at much more than the legal ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard

... never came to my hands 'till yesterday. Altho' your disrespectful conduct towards me, in coming into this country and spending weeks therein without ever coming near me, entitled you to very little notice or favor from me; yet I consent that you may get timber from off my Land in Fauquier County to build a house on your Lott in Rectertown. Having granted this, now let me ask you what your views were in purchasing a Lott in a place which, I presume, originated ...
— The True George Washington [10th Ed.] • Paul Leicester Ford

... of half a penny for each acre,—he then becomes absolute owner, and the little ground rent can never be increased. Sometimes the hunter builds a wooden hut, and the nearest neighbors in the wilderness help cut the timber, build the log hut, fill the crevices with mud, put on the roof and put in windows and doors, and in return the owner pays them with a gallon of brandy, and by a like good service in turn. Then he lays out his garden and pasture and fields, cuts out the underbrush, tops the big trees and strips ...
— Achenwall's Observations on North America • Gottfried Achenwall

... case of being pursued. This is a hole in the trunk or one of the larger limbs— some natural excavation caused by the decaying of a branch—in short, what is termed a "knot hole," which is common in many kinds of timber. In this hole the squirrel usually lays up its store of winter food, consisting of nuts, beech-mast, etcetera; and here it takes refuge when hunted, finding the tree-cave a safe asylum. Unless decoyed out again, or, which often happens, ...
— Quadrupeds, What They Are and Where Found - A Book of Zoology for Boys • Mayne Reid

... the Shenandoah and Luray Valleys. The Seventh, Eighth, and Second Regiments were encamped several miles distant, but all in the hearing of one another's drums. Our main duties outside of our regular drills consisted in picketing the highways and blockading all roads by felling the timber across for more than a hundred yards on either side of the roads. Large details armed with axes were sent out to blockade the thoroughfares leading to Washington and points across the Potomac. For miles out, in ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert

... the explorer. One finds a bare and sterile space, from which the hardy chickweed can scarcely gain the sustenance for timorous sproutings; a few outcropping rocks; a series of transverse gullies here and there, washed down to deep indentations; above the whole a stretch of burnt, broken timber that goes by the name of "fire-scald," and is a relic of the fury of the fire which was "set out" in the woods with the mission to burn only the leaves and undergrowth, and which, in its undisciplined strength, transcended its instructions, ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock

... with their spurs and branches adjusted themselves early in the war to the new direction of business currents. They then began to carry the new inhabitants into the cities, the new manufactures to their markets, and to press upon iron, coal, and timber for their own supplies. Men of business laid the foundations of huge fortunes in supplying the new and growing demands. The stock company, with negotiable shares and bonds, made it possible for the small investor to share in the ...
— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson

... wisdoms of our time in the crudest and most liberal commixture with its unwisdoms. And thus, though his house is laboriously put together, yet it is built upon the sand; and though his bark has much good timber, and is well modelled for speed, yet its keel is wholly rotten, so that whosoever puts to sea therein will sail far more swiftly to bottom than ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... run up even upon your shoulder to show his appreciation of the Swan Song. Antelope dart scornfully away across the open plains, and the little coyote halts in his course to turn the inquisitive gaze of his pretty bright eyes upon this new animal crossing his path. The timber wolf, not satisfied with staring, follows, perhaps, as if enjoying company, at the same time occasionally licking his chaps. When the sun goes down his long-drawn bark rolls out into the clear winter sky like a song to the evening star, rendering the blaze of ...
— The Romance of the Colorado River • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh

... through all the winter months, and by the spring his health and strength were restored. Then he turned woodman, cut down every stick of timber in a little wood near his house, and sold it; and then set to work to grub up the roots for fires, and cleared it for tillage. The sum he received for the wood was much more than he expected, and this ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade

... Dutch. The usual building of ships in the islands has so harrassed and exhausted the unfortunate natives that it is necessary to have ships built for the Philippines in India and other countries where timber and labor are more abundant. The trade of the colony with China is the object of much discussion, and proposals are again made to restrict it, as well as that with Nueva Espana, in order to protect the commercial interests ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVIII, 1617-1620 • Various

... indeed, fell into the sea near the town where I resided; but the valley of the river was shallow and bald, for as far up as ever I had the heart to follow it. There were roads, certainly, but roads that had no beauty or interest; for, as there was no timber, and but little irregularity of surface, you saw your whole walk exposed to you from the beginning: there was nothing left to fancy, nothing to expect, nothing to see by the wayside, save here and there an unhomely-looking homestead, and here and there a solitary, spectacled stone-breaker; ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... enumerated could have been added a fertile soil, and an extensive back country, suitably furnished with timber and fuel, the spot to which this gallant bark was led would have proved as eligible a site for a flourishing colony as could possibly have been desired. But these advantages were wanting; and though our fathers considered it an "extraordinary blessing of God" in ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various

... adjoining land is somewhat higher than the three specified sites, as far as I can judge by maps and from information given me by Dr. Johnson. If; however, a great pile of broken stones, mortar, plaster, timber and ashes fell over the remains of any building, their disintegration in the course of time, and the sifting action of worms, would ultimately conceal the whole beneath ...
— The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the action of worms with • Charles Darwin

... around the curve, and the cliff was broken by a wedge of timber, when a curiously shaped object projected itself over the edge of the bank, and rolling down, lay almost at his feet. The lamps brought it into sharp relief—a man, gagged and tied, and rolled, cigar ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... at Raleigh, the capitol of North Carolina, and were camped in a piece of timber, and shortly after dark orders were issued to us all to lie flat on the ground and not rise up till daylight. About the middle of the night a man belonging to a New Jersey regiment, who had apparently ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... in addition to his ornithological occupations, kept a small shop for the sale of coals and potatoes; he was also, in a very small way, a timber merchant; for several bundles of firewood were piled in ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various

... that range between the Phrygian tribes and the Phoenician tribes. It was a city half-Greek and half-Asiatic, and had from the earliest days been famed for ship-building and commerce. Mount Taurus supplied it with timber, and around the mouth of its river, as it widens into a quiet lake, were the ancient dockyards which had made the ships of Tarshish proverbial with the Hebrew writers. Its merchants, enriched by industry and enlightened by foreign trade, had ornamented ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 10 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... having the margin or flanch cast upon the rail itself; and this plan was shortly after adopted in other places. In 1800, Mr. Benjamin Outram, of Little Eaton, in Derbyshire (father of the distinguished General Outram), used stone props instead of timber for supporting the ends or joinings of the rails. Thus the use of railroads, in various forms, gradually extended, until they were found in general use all ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles

... claim hereabout. Mighty poor judgment he showed, too, for he wouldn't have known what to do with oil if he'd found it in those days and by all accounts the land couldn't have been much good for anything else; swampy and low-lying, without even timber. He had a beautiful daughter, Dolores, of course. Funny how that gal Dolores manages to get herself mixed up in every yarn below the border, ain't it? There was a kid brother, Jose, too, ...
— The Fifth Ace • Douglas Grant

... a partly dry muskeg bottom. Beyond this was a thicker growth of timber, mostly spruce and cedar, from behind which came the rushing sound of water. A few moments more and he stood with the wide tumult of the Athabasca at his feet. He had chosen this spot for his little cabin because the river ran wild here among the rocks, and because pack-outfits going ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood

... snowed in reminded me of a little experience I had up north here in Coconino County. You know Arizona ain't all sand and cactus—not by no means. Them San Francisco Mountains up above Flag are sure snow-crested and covered with tall timber and it gits so cold up there in the winter-time that it breaks rocks. No, that's straight! Them prospectors up there when they run short of powder jest drill a line of holes in a rock and when one of them awful cold snaps comes on they run out and fill the holes up with hot water ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge

... which the young clerk had now to follow lay through a magnificent forest of the very heaviest timber, where the giant bowls of oak and of beech formed long aisles in every direction, shooting up their huge branches to build the majestic arches of Nature's own cathedral. Beneath lay a broad carpet of the softest and greenest moss, flecked over with fallen leaves, but yielding pleasantly ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle

... of the great had hitherto differed from those of the poor chiefly in dimensions and but very slightly in structure. The home of the wealthy patrician had simply been on a larger scale of primitive discomfort; and if his large parlour built of timber could accommodate a vast host of clients, the bed and the cooking pots were still visible to every visitor. The chief of the early innovations had been merely a low portico, borrowed from the Greeks by the Etruscans and transmitted by them to Rome, which ran round the courtyard, ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge

... plan, according to which Bonaparte is enabled, and intends, to build twenty ships of the line and ten frigates, besides cutters, in the year, for ten years to come. I read the calculation of the expenses, the names of the forests where the timber is to be cut, of the foreign countries where a part of the necessary materials are already engaged, and of our own departments which are to furnish the remainder. The whole has been drawn up in a precise and clear manner by Bonaparte's Maritime Prefect at Antwerp, M. ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... riders. His travels about the country as a guide to those who could see, as a musician, soldier, chapman, fish-dealer, horse-dealer, and waggoner, had given him a perfectly familiar acquaintance with the northern roads. He could measure timber or hay in the stack, and rapidly reduce their contents to feet and inches after a mental process of his own. Withal he was endowed with an extraordinary activity and spirit of enterprise, which, had his sight been spared him, would probably have rendered him one of the most extraordinary men of ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles

... but it was a country of large area, comprising about 3500 square miles, with a soil of unbounded fertility in a high state of cultivation, a population sufficiently numerous for all requirements of the island, and forests of timber that was in great request for the architect and ship-builder. In addition to these natural sources of wealth, the mineral productions were celebrated from the earliest history, and the copper of Cyprus was used by the Phoenicians in the manufacture ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker

... refinery,[231] showing that the method employed was analogous to that in vogue amongst the Japanese to-day, and that bone-ash was used in the construction of the hearths.[232] The houses were mainly built of red clay (on a foundation wall of flint and mortar) filled into a timber frame-work and supported by lath or wattle. The exterior was stamped with ornamental patterns, as in modern "parjetting" (which may thus very possibly be an actual survival from Roman days). This clay has in most cases soaked away into a mere layer of red mud ...
— Early Britain—Roman Britain • Edward Conybeare

... explained to me at breakfast next morning. 'The place is afflicted like one of those unfortunate South Sea potentates, who flourish up to the age of fourteen and then cypher out, and not a soul to know why. First of all, there's the lumbering. Well, here's the timber all right; only Bellefont, farther down the valley, has cut us out. Then we had the cinnabar mines—you may see them along the slope to northward, right over the west end of the town. They went well for about sixteen months; and then came ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... hands with him—all except Girnel, who held back, looking on, with his right hand in his trouser pocket. He was one who always took the opposite side— a tolerably honest and trustworthy soul, with a good many knots and pieces of cross grain in the timber of him. His old Adam was the most essential and thorough of dissenters, always arguing and disputing, especially on ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald

... building that had apparently grown out of an older and smaller one of logs, part of which remained. It was much the same with the barns and stables, for while they were stoutly built of framed timber or logs one end of most of them was lower than the rest, and in some cases consisted of poles and sods. Even to her untrained eyes all she saw suggested order, neatness, and efficiency. The whole was flanked ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss

... Herod's gate. And all the time he toiled, it was said, sinister sorcerers sat upon the battlements, working unknown marvels for the undoing of the labour of man. If the great knight had a touch of such symbolism on his own side, he might have seen in his own strife with the solid timber something of the craft that had surrounded the birth of his creed, and the sacred trade of the carpenter. And indeed the very pattern of all carpentry is cruciform, and there is something more than an accident in the allegory. The transverse position of the timber does indeed involve ...
— The New Jerusalem • G. K. Chesterton

... habitable portions were two wild caves opening to the sea, into which at high tide the breakers tumbled, and where during rough weather it was impossible to continue with safety. On the face of the rock Peter built a homestead of timber, and set up farm and tavern. In the rock itself he excavated fifteen rooms, to each of which he gave an appropriate name; the most interesting are the "Gaol Room," the "Devil's Chamber," the "Circular Room," the "Dining ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 218, December 31, 1853 • Various

... machinery at any modern agricultural fair reveals what man has accomplished since the beginning of the agricultural art. In forest countries the beginning of agriculture was in the open places, or else the natives cut and burned the brush and timber, and frequently, after one or two crops, moved on to other places. The early settlers of new territories pursue the same method with their first fields, while the turning of the prairie sod of the Western plains was frequently ...
— History of Human Society • Frank W. Blackmar

... Sunderland making a speech to the winds (as is done by many Johns), and the Betsy of Yarmouth with a firm formality of bosom and her knobby eyes starting two inches out of her head; in and out, hammers going in ship-builders' yards, saws going at timber, clashing engines going at things unknown, pumps going in leaky ships, capstans going, ships going out to sea, and unintelligible sea-creatures roaring curses over the bulwarks at respondent lightermen, in and out,—out at last upon the clearer river, where the ships' boys might ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... advantage. Out of the caverns of the earth we dig iron, a thing entirely necessary for the cultivation of the ground. We discover the hidden veins of copper, silver, and gold, advantageous for our use and beautiful as ornaments. We cut down trees, and use every kind of wild and cultivated timber, not only to make fire to warm us and dress our meat, but also for building, that we may have houses to defend us from the heat and cold. With timber likewise we build ships, which bring us from all parts every commodity of life. We are the only animals who, from our knowledge ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... grass sloped gently downward from the windows till it met the broad level on which stood, in clumps, or solitarily scattered, some of the noblest timber in England. Hoar in the moonbeams stood those graceful trees casting their moveless shadows upon the grass, and in the background crowning the undulations of the distance, in masses, were piled those woods among ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu

... cultivators, they yet produce little to sell, and the consequence of this is seen in the fact that the mass of the flour, rice, corn, peas, butter, lard, herrings, &c. needed for consumption requires to be imported, as well as all the lumber, although millions of acres of timber are to be found among the unappropriated lands of ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey

... larger than the others. It approached deliberately, and seemed to lie down and take aim. It then rose suddenly, and gave the brig, which was chubby as a cherub, such a mighty slap on the port cheek that she quivered in every timber. And high over the railing, far in upon the deck, dashed the cold salt spray; the captain had scarcely time to duck his head ...
— Norse Tales and Sketches • Alexander Lange Kielland

... elbow, and stretching out her feet from the side of the bed, and groping after her shoes." At that moment Thorstein, the master of the house, entered, and Grimhild laid herself down, wherewithal every timber in the room creaked. Thorstein now fashioned a coffin for Grimhild's body, and bore it away, and cared for it. He was a big man, and strong, but it called for all [his strength], to enable him to remove the corpse from the house. The illness grew upon Thorstein ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various

... grass, and they saw a number of fine dells or valleys, through which flowed various small rills of fresh water; the trees were very tall and straight, of regular growth and of different kinds, some of which would, as they presumed, furnish excellent timber for ships' masts, yards, etc. The soil was very rich, and on the whole the country looked very promising. They remained there, making various landings, and taking in firewood and water, till the 26th of April, when they put to sea again...shaping ...
— The Part Borne by the Dutch in the Discovery of Australia 1606-1765 • J. E. Heeres

... they shrink from the light; in all their expeditions for providing food they construct a covered pathway of moistened clay, and their galleries above ground extend to an incredible distance from the central nest. No timber, except ebony and ironwood, which are too hard, and those which are strongly impregnated with camphor or aromatic oils, which they dislike, presents any obstacle to their ingress. I have had a case of wine filled, in the course of two days, with ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent

... which she lives, is 20 by 28 feet; built of square timber, with a shingled roof, and a framed stoop. In the centre of the house is a chimney of stones and sticks, in which there are two fire places. She has a good framed barn, 26 by 36, well filled, and owns a fine stock of cattle and horses. ...
— A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary Jemison • James E. Seaver

... United States Coast Survey Report of 1858 declares, that, "For depth of water, boldness of approaches, freedom from hidden dangers, and the immeasurable sea of gigantic timber coming down to the very shores, ...
— Life at Puget Sound: With Sketches of Travel in Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon and California • Caroline C. Leighton

... Bumble,' he said at length, 'there's no denying that, since the new system of feeding has come in, the coffins are something narrower and more shallow than they used to be; but we must have some profit, Mr. Bumble. Well-seasoned timber is an expensive article, sir; and all the iron handles come, by canal, ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens

... all right," said Christophe. "He is destroying it so thoroughly that I don't see what is going to be left for you to build up again. Do you think there'll be timber enough left for your new house? And are you even sure that the worms have not ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland

... beams and rafters and the whole of the straw were fast moving off to my camp; and when seized, the sipahees seemed much surprised, and asked me what they were to do, as they had not received any pay for six months, and the Government expected that they would help themselves to straw and timber wherever they could most conveniently find it. All were fined; but the hope to put a stop to this intolerable evil, under the present system, is a vain one. The evil has the acquiescence and encouragement of the Government and ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman

... of the morning watch; not that he distrusted my discretion in the least, but because he distrusted the wind and the land. I never saw him in so much concern before, for it was his habit to consider himself a timber of the ship, that was to sink or ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper

... prosy book imparts to its pages a fragrance born of summer and heaven; but such lives are the exception. The true destiny of the sons and daughters of earth is to grow within the garden of life as a sapling rather than as a sickly weed, developing timber rather than pith, and yielding finally to death, the sharp-axed old woodman, as the tree falls, to pass onward to new opportunities of power and service. The tree does not decay where it stands, nor does it often fall because its core is honeycombed by disease. It is cut down in the ...
— A String of Amber Beads • Martha Everts Holden

... chimney-pieces, less elaborately carved than those in the rooms beneath. Every door and window is on the south side of the house, save a single door to the north, contrived behind the staircase to give access to the vineyard. Against the western wall stands a supplementary timber-framed structure, all the woodwork exposed to the weather being fledged with slates, so that the walls are checkered with bluish lines. This shed (for it is little more) is the kitchen of the establishment. You can pass from it into the house without going outside; but, nevertheless, ...
— La Grenadiere • Honore de Balzac

... all the cattle in the land? I've swallowed a dozen haystacks for my breakfast, and killed the finest mill-dam over the world this morning. I said I would as soon as winter came, when they dammed me up last spring, so many miles away! Oh, such a mass of stone and timber which they put up to fret me in my path; and what a joke to think this solid mass is scattered through the land since yesternight, and I am ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various

... seeming ease, under which an ordinary Irish laborer would stagger. Comparatively few wheeled vehicles are in use, and these are of the rudest character, the wheel being composed of three pieces of timber, so secured together as to form a circle, but having no spokes or tire, very like the ancient African and Egyptian models. To such a vehicle a couple of oxen are attached by a wooden bar reaching across their frontlets and lashed to the roots of the ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou

... house of the de Veres, the famous Earls of Oxford, whose principal seat, Hedingham Castle, was within a short distance of Chelmsford. It was converted into a hostelry in the middle of the seventeenth century, and was first known as the Crown or New Inn. It was an ancient timber structure house, and some of the carved woodwork, with the well-known device of the boar's head taken from one of the rooms of the old inn, is still preserved in ...
— The Inns and Taverns of "Pickwick" - With Some Observations on their Other Associations • B.W. Matz

... was a child one of these signs still remained—at the left, just beyond Pelham Bridge. And people used to laugh and point at the great trees and say that because of the sign the British had never dared to trespass and cut down the timber. Now the man had never owned a Boole Dogge, nor had any of his descendants. I doubt if there was ever one on the premises, unless latterly, perhaps, there has been a French bulldog or so let out of a passing automobile ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris

... now, Jurgen!" says Chloris, weeping softly. "It is little I care what foolish words these priests of Philistia may utter against me. But the big-armed axemen are felling my tree yonder, to get them timber to make a bedstead for the Queen of Philistia: for that is what this Queen Dolores ordered them to do the first ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell

... expected to improve and sizable foreign investments materialize. Among these investments are metal production (aluminum, steel), natural gas, power generation, agriculture (cotton, sugar), fishing, timber, and transportation services. Additional exports in these areas should bring in ...
— The 1999 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... Greenwood school several more were killed and many were injured. Mrs. E. J. Edwards, wife of a druggist, was knocked down by a heavy timber that broke her leg and pinned her to the ground. When she was found the woman was screaming for her child, and later the little fellow, eight years old, was picked up dead and carried to the Greenwood ...
— The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado • Logan Marshall

... I told you. She turned down my tenth-dozen proposal so emphatically that I lost all interest in Boston and took to the tall timber again. But I've come back. A friend of my father's wrote me to come on and consider a good opening there was in his law office. I came on a month ago, and considered. Then I went back to pack up. Now ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter

... Tom Smart's taste with such peculiar nicety, that he ordered a second with the least possible delay. Hot punch is a pleasant thing, gentlemen—an extremely pleasant thing under any circumstances—but in that snug old parlour, before the roaring fire, with the wind blowing outside till every timber in the old house creaked again, Tom Smart found it perfectly delightful. He ordered another tumbler, and then another—I am not quite certain whether he didn't order another after that—but the more he drank of the hot punch, the more he ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens

... and AGRICULTURAL GAZETTE contains, in addition to the above, the Covent Garden, Mark Lane, Smithfield, and Liverpool prices, with returns from the Potato, Hop, Hay, Coal, Timber, Bark, Wool, and Seed Markets, and a complete Newspaper, with a condensed account of all the ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 191, June 25, 1853 • Various

... and four hundred counties, covers an area twice the size of New England. Its population is equal to that of New England, excepting Massachusetts. Its resources, in mineral deposits and in valuable timber, are varied and rich. It is being rapidly opened up to trade, and thus indirectly to civilization. Its inhabitants are ready to welcome outside influences, and they are in large degree susceptible of those ...
— The American Missionary, Volume 42, No. 12, December, 1888 • Various

... frequently mentioned by Suetonius, was so called because it was the largest of all the circuses in and about Rome. Rudely constructed of timber by Tarquinius Drusus, and enlarged and improved with the growing fortunes of the republic, under the emperors it became a most superb building. Julius Caesar (c. xxxix) extended it, and surrounded it with a canal, ten feet deep and as many broad, to protect ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... several instances besides Mrs. Jablett's establishment in Fleur-de-Lys Court, one of which was a dark and mysterious cavern a foot below the level of the street, that burrowed under an ancient house on the west side of Fetter Lane—a crinkly, timber house of the three-decker type that leaned back drunkenly from the road as if about to sit down in ...
— The Vanishing Man • R. Austin Freeman

... life may illustrate the point. In building a number of houses, I had occasion often to use the word studding, but on every occasion, I forgot the word and always had to end lamely by saying "those pieces of timber that go up and down." Each time the builder supplied the word, but the next time it was no more accessible. Finally, the reason came to me. One day when I was a little child I looked out of the window and cried, ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury

... felt our Commerce, while Mr. Spence only saw it—had awakened. In this very month (August, 1866), the Pres. Brit. Assoc. has applied a similar salve to the coal panic; it is fit that science, which rubbed the sore, should find a plaster. We ought to have an iron panic and a timber panic; and {232} a solemn embassy to the Americans, to beg them not to whittle, would be desirable. There was a gold panic beginning, before the new fields were discovered. For myself, I am the unknown and unpitied victim of a chronic gutta-percha panic: I never could get on without ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan

... formed the little settlement were engaged in cattle raising, and seemed prosperous and contented. Their houses and sheds were built of timber and mud, and looked substantial and well suited to stand the cold and winds of North Mongolia. We were given a hearty welcome and taken at once into a large whitewashed room, kitchen, living-room, and bedroom in one. Everything was spotlessly ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall

... prosperous. Coming on deck one sunny morning we saw land, which was Cape Ray, and before the sun set we were in the Gulf of St Lawrence. We were not alone now, for every few hours we sighted ships. They were part of the Spring fleet to Quebec, now on their voyage home with cargoes of timber. One passed us so close that the captains spoke, and when the homeward captain shouted he was for the Clyde there were passengers who wished they were on board her, and the tear came to their eyes when they thought of Scotland and of those who were there. The Bird Rocks were quite a sight ...
— The Narrative of Gordon Sellar Who Emigrated to Canada in 1825 • Gordon Sellar

... had to sit down and make his tools first, and then quarry his stone and fell his timber for the building of his house, instead of finding everything ready to his hand for dressing his stone already hewn, for sawing and carving the timber already in logs and planks beside him, no doubt his house would have been built; but can we with any reason suppose ...
— A Dish Of Orts • George MacDonald

... Um Terif for the flotilla with the fifteen days' supplies on board. Meanwhile the axes of an army of soldier wood-choppers were clanging upon the hard timber, which was being felled for firewood. The ruin of agriculture had meant the growth of bush, and there was an abundance of useful mimosa and sunt growing on the alluvial lands by ...
— Khartoum Campaign, 1898 - or the Re-Conquest of the Soudan • Bennet Burleigh

... eighteen inches from the ground. One round was enough to put it in the water, each explosion removing several cubic feet of wood. By repeating this process on other trees they soon had enough large timber for buoyancy, so that they had but to superimpose lighter cross-logs and bind the whole together with pliable branches and creepers to form a substantial raft. The doctor climbed on, after which Bearwarden and Ayrault cast off, having prepared long poles for navigating. ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor

... knew and used gold, silver, and copper; they made weapons and other implements of bronze; they had ploughs to till the ground, and axes, and probably saws, for the purpose of cutting and shaping timber. Of pottery and weaving they knew something: the western tribes certainly used hemp and flax as materials for weaving, and when the stuff was woven the women made it into garments by the use of the needle. Thus ...
— Fairy Tales; Their Origin and Meaning • John Thackray Bunce

... mining fever at once. He was interested first in the riches that he could see. Among these was the timber-land around Lake Bigler (now Tahoe)—splendid acres, to be had for the asking. The ...
— The Boys' Life of Mark Twain • Albert Bigelow Paine

... gray, timber-wolves. We hadn't been bothered by them for years. Two of 'em, working together, would pull down a full-grown cow, let alone a little bit of a calf and a little bit of ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe

... wet, and raw, and gray, and we could see the beach strewn with trees and timber, the thatched roof of a bamboo house, and all the aftermath of a terrible storm that had swept over the islands five days before, and of which we, in the safe shelter of Cebu's harbour, were ignorant. It was here we were told by cable that the line from Iligan ...
— A Woman's Journey through the Philippines - On a Cable Ship that Linked Together the Strange Lands Seen En Route • Florence Kimball Russel

... long that they needed medical attention, and so we drove for home—and cracked our foremast-head doing it. That delayed us almost a week, for the skipper had to have that spar just so. A lot might depend on it, same as the rest of the gear. And it was a spar—as fine a bit of timber, Oregon pine of course, as was ever set up in a fisherman. And maybe that too was just as well, with ...
— The Seiners • James B. (James Brendan) Connolly

... fires, and London looked the picture of desolation. At the corner of a by-street, near Temple-bar, was stationed a 'street-breakfast.' The coffee was boiling over a charcoal fire, and large slices of bread and butter were piled one upon the other, like deals in a timber-yard. The company were seated on a form, which, with a view both to security and comfort, was placed against a neighbouring wall. Two young men, whose uproarious mirth and disordered dress bespoke the conviviality of the preceding evening, ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... them speedily. He now built them a fort with the timber of the wreck, and fortified it with the guns of the Santa Maria, and did every thing in his power to provide for their comfort during his absence, particularly enjoining them to be kind ...
— Peter Parley's Tales About America and Australia • Samuel Griswold Goodrich

... the Canal St. Martin, confined by two locks, showed in a straight line its water black as ink. In the middle of it was a boat, filled with timber, and on the bank ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert

... in commenting upon this revolutionary but perfectly sane decision, says: "Time is truly running short; the annual cut of saw-timber, with natural losses, is 50% greater than annual growth.... If the individual forestland owner is too lazy, short-sighted, or indifferent to act, the Federal Government will have to enter ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 41st Annual Meeting • Various

... dint of any idea gathered from Sir Howard Douglas or Robinson Crusoe. But we were all faint and languid from want of food, and besides, there were no materials. Higher up the river there were bushes and river plants, but nothing like timber; and the cord with which my baggage was tied to the pack-saddles amounted altogether to a very small quantity, not nearly enough to haul any sort of craft ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake

... slowly and dully, and this, too, was a result of his illness, for in past days his voice had rung stentorian above the blows of axes in the timber. "Yes, I've heard of you. You're the millionaire hobo. When a man's got plenty of money and chooses to live alone in a country that 'most everybody else is leavin', he's tolerable apt to ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck

... a narrow gulch which might have been sought in vain for ten years by a stranger, they passed into the rim of a bowl-shaped valley. Timber covered it from edge to edge, but over to the left a keen eye could see a thinning of the foliage. Toward this they went, following the sidehill and gradually dipping down through heavy underbrush. Before him the officer of rangers saw daylight, and presently a corral, ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine

... hunchbacked king. It descended very sharply for a distance of several hundred yards, after which for another hundred yards or more its walls and roof were so riven and shaky that, for fear of accidents, we found it necessary to timber them as we went. ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard

... a Sanskrit word for "plough" seems to record a revolution in agriculture. The primitive cultivation of the Malays was carried on by clearing and burning the hill-sides (a system still largely adopted in native states where land is plentiful and timber valueless), and the cultivation of the wet ricefields of the plains, which necessitates the use of the plough, would thus seem to have been resorted to only after the arrival ...
— A Manual of the Malay language - With an Introductory Sketch of the Sanskrit Element in Malay • William Edward Maxwell

... habiliments as they could throw over them in the confusion of the night, presented a fatal mark to their enemies. Still they continued to maintain a stout resistance, checking the progress of the Spaniards by barricades of timber hastily thrown across the streets; and, as their intrenchments were forced one after another, they disputed every inch of ground with the desperation of men who fought for life, fortune, liberty, all that was most dear to them. The contest hardly slackened ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott

... jovial way when he felt especially good-tempered; "an' we'll have an extra glass of old Bourbon come dinner-time on the strength of it, old boss! How the beauty does walk, to be sure! I wouldn't swap a timber of her for the best Philadelphia-built clipper out of ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson

... interest on thy first birthday, and I hev added a L100 now and then, as I could see my way clear to do so. Thou hes now L22,000 o' thy own—a varry tidy fortune. If ta takes Hallam thou must pay down a' of this to Antony. I'll hev to find t' other L28,000 by a mortgage. Then I shall sell all t' young timber that's wise to sell, and some o' Hallam marsh, to pay off t' mortgage. That will take time to do wisely, and it will be work enough for me for t' balance or my life. But I'll leave thee Hallam clear if God spare me five years longer, and ...
— The Hallam Succession • Amelia Edith Barr

... separated from us by a valley, into which our camping-ground subsides with a mild declivity; to the north is a range of low hills, their round sides unbroken by shrub or tree; while to the south stretches an extensive tract of low land, densely covered with timber, and resplendent with the colors ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various

... "No," Said Jack, "I cannot be easy till I find out this monster's habitation." So taking the Knight's directions, he mounted his horse and soon after came in sight of another Giant, who was sitting on a block of timber waiting for ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten

... prudence which consists in husbanding little strokes of the tool, little portions of time, particles of stock and small gains. The eye of prudence may never shut. Iron, if kept at the ironmonger's, will rust; beer, if not brewed in the right state of the atmosphere, will sour; timber of ships will rot at sea, or if laid up high and dry, will strain, warp and dry-rot; money, if kept by us, yields no rent and is liable to loss; if invested, is liable to depreciation of the particular kind of stock. Strike, says the smith, the iron is white; keep the rake, ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... he said dubiously; "this is hardly a woman's affair. If there's a scrap of any kind, you hike for the timber." Which was Halsey's solicitous care for me, put ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... Arab is all right," smiled Kiddie. "You'll find her in the old stable back of the timber stack." ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton

... village school in the week, and for a service on Sunday. This succeeded so well, that in a few months I determined to enlarge the building in which we assembled, as speedily as possible. Having made all necessary plans, and procured stones, timber, and slate, we commenced operations at five o'clock one Monday morning, and by Saturday night had a chancel (which I thought most necessary) ready for ...
— From Death into Life - or, twenty years of my ministry • William Haslam

... being no more then timber covered with palm leaves (cajanns) so very dangerous taking fire," and the chief of the factory was ordered to build "a small compact house of brick with a Hall, and conveniencys for half a dozen Company's servants. And being advised that for want of a necessary house in the Fort, they keep the Fort ...
— The Pirates of Malabar, and An Englishwoman in India Two Hundred Years Ago • John Biddulph



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