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Trim   Listen
verb
Trim  v. t.  (past & past part. trimmed; pres. part. trimming)  
1.
To make trim; to put in due order for any purpose; to make right, neat, or pleasing; to adjust. "The hermit trimmed his little fire."
2.
To dress; to decorate; to adorn; to invest; to embellish; as, to trim a hat. "A rotten building newly trimmed over." "I was trimmed in Julia's gown."
3.
To make ready or right by cutting or shortening; to clip or lop; to curtail; as, to trim the hair; to trim a tree. " And trimmed the cheerful lamp."
4.
(Carp.) To dress, as timber; to make smooth.
5.
(Naut.)
(a)
To adjust, as a ship, by arranging the cargo, or disposing the weight of persons or goods, so equally on each side of the center and at each end, that she shall sit well on the water and sail well; as, to trim a ship, or a boat.
(b)
To arrange in due order for sailing; as, to trim the sails.
6.
To rebuke; to reprove; also, to beat. (Colloq.)
To trim in (Carp.), to fit, as a piece of timber, into other work.
To trim up, to dress; to put in order. "I found her trimming up the diadem On her dead mistress."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Trim" Quotes from Famous Books



... forget it - I had taken a trail that was new to me. After a while the woods began to open, the sea to sound nearer hand. I came upon a road, and, to my surprise, a stile. A step or two farther, and, without leaving the woods, I found myself among trim houses. I walked through street after street, parallel and at right angles, paved with sward and dotted with trees, but still undeniable streets, and each with its name posted at the corner, as in a real town. Facing down the main ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson

... neighbours, 'I would sweep away all the black and dirty stuff from that wall.' The wall was backed by a bank of earth, and was exquisitely decorated with ivy, flowers, moss, and ferns, such as grow of themselves in like places; but the mere notion of fitness associated with a trim garden-wall prevented, in this instance, all sense of the spontaneous bounty and delicate care of Nature. In the midst of a small pleasure-ground, immediately below my house, rises a detached rock, equally remarkable for the ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth

... survey of one who in his art is still of to-day, I have been poignantly conscious throughout of the fact that posterity has an inconvenient habit of reversing the judgments delivered upon creative artists by their contemporaries; yet to trim deftly one's convictions in the hope that they may elastically conform to any one of a number of possible verdicts to be expected from a capricious futurity, is probably as dangerous a proceeding as to ...
— Edward MacDowell • Lawrence Gilman

... Vaux-le-Vicomte is still the home of people who love its beautiful lawns and parterres and keep them green and blooming. Armies of gardeners trim the hedges, plant the borders, and remove every stray leaf from the gravel paths. Here we saw the ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton

... the pan, he took out one of the little boats from the hole near, and began to trim its keel here and there with his knife. The occupation ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... Except to trim the boats; look out for the mizen sheets or somethg o' that kind. Couldn't expect 'em, even in a calm, to be brisk in manning the ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 6, May 7, 1870 • Various

... was a more grotesque race entry in all the West; and the difference between the burnished form of Red Rover in his perfect trim, and this demon-painted Pinto gave rise to an ever-growing chorus of shouting, laughter, rough jibes, and ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton

... Alcasto marched, and with him The boaster brought six thousand Switzers bold, Audacious were their looks, their faces grim, Strong castles on the Alpine clifts they hold, Their shares and coulters broke, to armors trim They change that metal, cast in warlike mould, And with this band late herds and flocks that guide, Now kings and realms he ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... afforded. Times are getting a little easier with me now, though I ain't rich, far from it. Besides there's another point to be considered. Now if you get an article of dress, you have some taste in making and wearing it," and he looked admiringly at the trim figure before him; "but Susan here, completely spoils everything ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock

... citizen can go two pins above it. If you wants a showin', just name the mark. I've seed ye times enough,—how ye would not stand ramrod when a nigger looked lightning at ye. Twice I seed a nigger make ye show flum; and ye darn't make the cussed critter toe the line trim up, nohow," he mumbles out, dropping his tumbler on the table, spilling his liquor. They are Graspum's "men;" they move as he directs-carry out his plans of trade in human flesh. Through these promulgators of his plans, his plots, his desperate games, he has become a mighty man of trade. They are ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... enemy still keeps a squadron cruising off here; but this shall not prevent my attempts to depart whenever the wind will permit. I hope we have recovered the trim of this ship, which was entirely lost during the last cruise; and I do not much fear the enemy in the long and dark nights of this season. The ship is well manned, and ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various

... thin, dark, rather smallish man of fifty, this ship's surgeon, trim in his blue and white uniform. I knew him well: we had made several flights together. An American—I fancy of Jewish ancestry. A likable man, and a skillful doctor and surgeon. He and I had always ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various

... and merchantmen which, trim and in good order, had lain in the bay the afternoon before, some half-dozen only had weathered the hurricane. The "City of London" alone had succeeded in steaming out to sea when the gale began. The "Jason" and a few others had ridden ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty

... of carriages; and never were there more noiseless streets than those that give access to these pretty residences. On either side there is thick shrubbery, with glimpses through it of the ornamented portals, or into the trim gardens with smooth-shaven lawns, of no large extent, but still affording reasonable breathing-space. They are really an improvement on anything, save what the very rich can enjoy, in America. The former occupants of our ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... road stood a travel-stained middle-class automobile, with a miscellany of dusty luggage, rugs and luncheon things therein—a family automobile with father no doubt at the wheel. Sir Richmond left his own trim coupe ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells

... Miranda won't like to see you always reading in the long winter evenings. Now if you think you can baste two rows of white tape round the bottom of your pink skirt and keep it straight by the checks, I'll stitch them on for you and trim the waist and sleeves with pointed tape-trimming, so the dress'll be real pretty for ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... nothing could be better than this." And Mr. Ponsonby allowed his adventurous eyes to rest for a moment upon Margaret's trim figure, until he saw a flush in her face. "This prospect," he added, turning to the sea, where a few sails took the slant rays ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... the air was frosty, and I was wondering what the prospects of food and shelter were in this enchanted region, when we came suddenly upon a small lake, close to which was a very trim-looking log cabin, with a flat mud roof, with four smaller ones; picturesquely dotted about near it, two corrals,[13] a long shed, in front of which a steer was being killed, a log dairy with a water wheel, some hay piles, and various evidences of comfort; and two men, on serviceable ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird

... "Trim it, Hector. You can break all the banks in town uplifting the drama and never put it over. About once a winter you have a good piece; the rest of the time the folks who want to see real actors go to Indianapolis ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson

... They left it on the beach at twilight, well out of water reach. But in the night came up a great storm that swept it away. It came from the west, the wind having blown for days from that quarter. I ask you will empty billows fell a tree and trim it and carve it? It is said that a Portuguese pilot picked up one like it off Cape Bojador when the wind was southwest. I have heard a man of the Azores tell of giant reeds pitched upon his shore from the west. There is a story of the finding on the beach of Flores ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston

... chestnut and divers coloured marbles, I was shown this morning by the obliging proprietor. The Prince's Palace itself is rehabilitated, and shines afar with white window-curtains from the midst of a garden, all trim borders and greenhouses and carefully kept walks. On the other side, the villas are more thronged together, and they have arranged themselves, shelf after shelf, behind each other. I see the glimmer of new buildings, too, as far eastward as Grimaldi; and a viaduct carries (I suppose) the railway ...
— The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 1 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... It was freezing hard, the keen air stung our faces, the tiniest twig was finger-thick with hoar-frost, and the grass crunched under our feet at every step. I went ahead as guide, and in five minutes we arrived at the dock, where Joe, the boat out, cushioned and trim for the voyage, was vigorously slapping his hands crosswise round his waist to keep them warm. He held the boat up to the bank, I stepped in, handed in Mistress Waynflete, bestowed her with all possible comfort, settled by her side, and took the ropes. Then Joe, clambering in, pushed off ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough

... the Gentile lies but little more than a cable's length from the shore, so that you can almost look down upon her decks. You perceive that she is a handsome craft of some six or seven hundred tons burthen, standing high out of water, in ballast trim, with a black hull, bright waist, and wales painted white. Her bows flare very much, and are sharp and symmetrical; the cut-water stretches, with a graceful curve, far out beyond them toward the long sweeping martingal, and is surmounted ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various

... he said. "Upon my word, and a very good thing you must make of it; for I see you dressed like a gentleman from top to toe. Are you not ashamed to go about the world in such a trim, with honest folk, I daresay, glad to buy your cast-off finery second-hand? Speak up, you dog," the man went on; "you can understand English, I suppose; and I mean to have a bit of talk with you before I march you to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... morning watch to-morrow. We shall be all snug; no sails to trim, no sails to set, and no holystoning the deck—nothing to do but to keep myself ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat

... halted again, his chums crowding on his heels. They looked out into a clearing beyond. There, amid trees, stood a small three-room house, looking still quite new in its trim paint, though the building had stood there idle for some five years. At one time the city had planned a new reservoir site on a hill just above, and this little cottage had been intended for the reservoir tender. Then a better site for the reservoir had been ...
— The Grammar School Boys in Summer Athletics • H. Irving Hancock

... We sha'n't do much trade at present. Still, a few coasters have come in, and I hope that every day things will get better. Besides, all the vessels that have been lying in the Pool since June will want painting up and getting into trim again before they sail out of the river, so things may not be so slack after all. You will find everything in order in the store. I have had little to do but to polish up brass work and keep the metal from rusting. When do the apprentices come ...
— When London Burned • G. A. Henty

... git stiff," he winningly began; "then, first thing he knows, some fine day—crack! Like that! All his own fault, too, 'cause he ain't kep' in trim." He jauntily twirled one of the heavy revolvers on a forefinger. "Not me, though, pard! Keep m'self up and comin', you bet! Ketch me not ready to fan the old forty-four! I guess not! Some has thought they could. Oh, yes; plenty has thought they could. Crack! Like that!" He wheeled, this ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... day's work ends. Our divisional column, with its trim, sturdy, infantry battalions, its jingling cavalry and artillery, its real live staff, and its imposing transport train, sets us thinking, by sheer force of contrast, of that dim and distant time seven ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay

... the head of the stairs, there stood the still trim and active figure of an old woman, with something of the mouse likeness seen in her grand-daughter, in the close cap, high hat, and cloth dress, that sumptuary opinion, if not law, prescribed for the burgher ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge

... sky darkened and the moon whitened—and my fight went on. I had taken the precaution to work for two months at rowing to harden my hands for just such a fight as this. Yet my hands suffered greatly. A man who is not in the best of physical trim, with his hands hard, cannot hope to land a ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey

... product home with him. To tell the truth, Sol's hair had been worrying me almost as much as his system. When I hired him I'd supposed he'd finally molt it along with his musical tail-feathers. I had a little talk with him then, in which I hinted at the value of looking clear-cut and trim and of giving sixteen ounces to the pound, but the only result of it was that he went off and bought a pot of scented vaseline and grew another inch of hair for good measure. It seemed a pity now, so long as I was after his scalp, not to get it ...
— Old Gorgon Graham - More Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer

... their miserable shifts for dressing well on next to nothing at all, and they expected me—mother and daughters—to do the most wonderful and impossible things. I had to turn old rags into smart new costumes, to trim worn-out hats into all manner of gaudy shapes, even to patch up boots in a way you couldn't imagine. And they used to send me with money to buy things they were ashamed to go and buy themselves; then, if I hadn't laid out their few pence with marvellous ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing

... clear arms glittering in the sun; lost now in some hollow, then emerging, winding out with long-drawn glitter again; till at length their blue uniforms and actual faces come home to you. Near upon 30,000 of all arms; trim exact, of stout and silently good-humored aspect; well rested, by this time;—likely fellows for their work, who will do it with a will. The King seemed to be affected by so glorious a spectacle; and, what I admired, his Majesty, though fatigued, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... your salad herbs as fresh as possible; if you suspect they are not "morning gathered," they will be much refreshed by lying an hour or two in spring-water; then carefully wash and pick them, and trim off all the worm-eaten, slimy, cankered, dry leaves; and, after washing, let them remain a while in the colander to drain: lastly, swing them gently in a clean napkin: when properly picked and cut, arrange them in the salad dish, mix the sauce ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner

... the winter wild While the heaven-born child All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies; Nature, in awe to him, Had doffed her gaudy trim, With her great master so to sympathize: It was no season then for her To wanton with ...
— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald

... trim little Nieuports. I looked mine over with a new feeling of importance and gave orders to my mechanicians for the mere satisfaction of being able to. To find oneself the sole proprietor of a fighting ...
— Flying for France • James R. McConnell

... conceive anything more grotesque than the Sunday trim of the poor people; their ideality, as Mr. Combe would say, being, I should think, twice as big as any rational bump in their head. Their Sabbath toilet really presents the most ludicrous combination of ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble

... lesson. And when I'd walled off the cause of each failure, one by one, seemed like there opened before me a broad clear way that led right into the goal I'd been seeking from the first day. Then I closed out all my deals, and looked and saw that everything was trim and ready for winter—and got my horse and ...
— Lahoma • John Breckenridge Ellis

... merely fanciful which discovers an analogy between the French garden, with its trim regularity and artificial smoothness, and the couplets which Pope wrote: just such an analogy as exists between the whole classical school of poetry and the Italian architecture copied from Palladio and introduced in England by Inigo Jones and Christopher ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers

... I once with him Was walking near the docks; We heard a cry, both Trim and I,— The cry ...
— The Nursery, October 1873, Vol. XIV. No. 4 • Various

... twenty years have rolled over since I did that bit of a good turn, and here I is the very same old Jack Hardweather, skipper of the Maggy Bell. But for all that—and I'd have folks know it!—the Maggy's as trim a little craft as ever lay to on a sou'-easter; and she can show as clean a pair of heels as any other—barring her old top timbers complain now and then—to the best cutter as ever shook Uncle Sam's rags." His hard features softened, as in the earnest of his heart he spoke. He extended ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... no one but old Mandy McGovern! For the sake of amusement I should have left her to make her own argument with the guard, had I not in the same glance caught sight of her companion, a trim figure in close fitting corduroy of golden brown, a wide hat of russet straw shading her face, wide gauntlet gloves ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough

... some of which were more than a century old and four or five inches in diameter. In the hardest ploughing on the most difficult ground, the grubs were said to be as thick as the hair on a dog's back. If in good trim, the plough cut through and turned over these grubs as if the century-old wood were soft like the flesh of carrots and turnips; but if not in good trim the grubs promptly tossed the plough out of the ground. A stout Highland Scot, our neighbor, whose plough ...
— The Story of My Boyhood and Youth • John Muir

... afternoon, having a gentle breeze at S.E. by E., I sent out the master with two boats, as well to sound a-head of the ship as to look out for a harbour where we might repair our defects, and put the ship in a proper trim. At three o'clock we saw an opening that had the appearance of an harbour, and stood off and on while the boats examined it, but they soon found that there was not depth of water in it sufficient for the ship. When it was near sun-set, there being many ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr

... was going to be sucked under water—so I was for a short time; but I held a tight grasp of the oars, and once more quickly rose to the surface. When I looked round there was not a sign of a brig. I shouted, no one answered. I could see no one floating alive on the spot where the trim craft had lately glided in all her pride and beauty. I was alone on the dark troubled sea. The foam dashed in my face, and the waves tumbled me about terribly, and I thought more than once that I should have to let go and sink with the ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston

... company with Mary, Sheila, Monica, and Winnie, who were also on the good conduct list. Of course there was considerable prinking in front of the looking-glasses, careful adjusting of hair ribbons and other trifles of toilet, before the girls considered themselves in party trim and ready to do credit to the Villa Camellia. Escorted by Miss Brewster, who acted chaperon, or "policewoman" as Sheila insisted on calling her, they walked in orderly file down the eucalyptus avenue ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil

... it all over for the hundredth time, weighing for and against in his gentle and deliberative mind, he strolled far out of town. There was a house here and there on the road—a house with a trim, stiff little garden, full of pink and white and blue flowers in orderly, clam-shell-bordered beds. But it was certainly, he had to admit, as he looked about him, very countrified indeed. It seemed that ...
— The Story of a New York House • Henry Cuyler Bunner

... fire with another Christmas log. You, Willie, open the windows at top and bottom, to let out the smoke the young historian will be sure to raise. Laura, my dear, trim the lamp; and you, Ella,—will you have the kindness to put a little sugar in your uncle's cider?—there's a darling! Ned, my boy, just tumble sleepy-headed Charlie there out of his comfortable nap, and touse him into his waking senses again. All right? Now I would have every ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady

... day; but spring was late, and every thing looked bleak to Jack after his Southern sojourn. Certainly it was quite different from the trim little town of Jack's boyhood. The blight of poverty and thriftlessness had fallen upon it. There were piles of refuse in the streets, still half frozen; there were muddy stoops and shabby hall-doors, ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas

... Chazy Junction on the morning of his arrival. The young fellow had improved in appearance, having discarded his frayed gray suit for one of plain brown khaki, such as many of the workmen wore, a supply being carried by the company's store. He was clean-shaven and trim, and a gentlemanly bearing had replaced the careless, half defiant attitude of the former hobo. It was evident he remembered meeting Mr. Merrick, for he smiled and returned the ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces on Vacation • Edith Van Dyne

... and all at once—New York, the little apartment, Lucille, being free from Francis—even the black kitten seemed to her something that she could not live one moment longer without. She turned and looked at Francis, trim and alert as ever, just steering the car around the side of the house, and found herself hating him for the moment. He was so at home here. And she hadn't even carfare to run away ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer

... "forest of masts" has fallen before the march of progress and the axe of steam almost as thoroughly as the primeval woods. The low and open piers have been enclosed, some of them with considerable architectural effect, giving a trim and bandbox look to ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various

... thus he told me on a day, Trim are thy sonnets, gentle Gay, And certes, mirth it were to see Thy joyous madrigals twice three, With preface meet and notes profound. Imprinted fair, and well y-bound. All suddenly then home I sped, And did ev'n as my ...
— Life And Letters Of John Gay (1685-1732) • Lewis Melville

... to that stage where one could feel confidence that summer would follow—a confidence one cannot always feel in March—a short letter came from Mr. White. He enclosed two photographs. One of them showed a trim-looking man with eyeglasses and moustache, sitting shirt-sleeved in a frail-looking craft. The letter explained that this was a collapsible canvas boat. My deduction was that the picture had been taken before ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton

... and keep still a couple minutes at a time, it would be a reposeful spectacle. In that case I think I could enjoy looking at her; indeed I am sure I could, for I am coming to realize that she is a quite remarkably comely creature —lithe, slender, trim, rounded, shapely, nimble, graceful; and once when she was standing marble-white and sun-drenched on a boulder, with her young head tilted back and her hand shading her eyes, watching the flight of a bird in the sky, I ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... well fitted for the task in hand, in spite of his youth. But he had been well trained by his father, and life on Diamond X had put him in trim for hard fighting. It was not the first time he had had to do with cattle raids, though it was his own first experience on a large scale, and he was vitally interested. He followed the plans he had seen his father put into ...
— The Boy Ranchers on the Trail • Willard F. Baker

... eyes that lingered on old trees and grass and flowers trim. She smelt the ripe pears when they drooped and fell and broke upon the path. Old were her thoughts of things of old; her present thoughts were few and dim; Her eyes saw not the things she saw; she listened, ...
— Poems New and Old • John Freeman

... it is the easiest thing in life: the only awkward point is the sort of usage which our unhappy limbs may receive when we arrive at the bottom, and what sort of travelling trim we shall be in afterwards. But follow me now, and I will show you the only chance we have.' With this he conducted me to the verge of the cataract, and pointed along the side of the ravine to a number of curious looking roots, some three or four inches in thickness, and ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville

... the boy who is to be a duke?" exclaimed he, one day, when his friend had introduced the point with a view to a final arrangement. "Bell has good blood in her veins—is a tight built little vessel—clean heel'd and trim, and would make as good a duchess as the best of them; so Denbigh, I will begin by taking a survey of ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper

... and the windmill. Only a little farther on, the sea appeared and two or three ships upon it, pretty as a drawing. One of these was extremely close in to be so great a vessel; and I was aware of a shock of new suspicion, when I recognised the trim of the Seahorse. What should an English ship be doing so near in to France? Why was Alan brought into her neighbourhood, and that in a place so far from any hope of rescue? and was it by accident, or by design, that the daughter ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... of it, four or five times before it became a definite thing to him. Before he could stop, let us say, before the Browns' house and take pleasure in the trim of their front door, before he could see the heliotrope growing in the snow-white jardiniere in the living-room window, before he knew that Mrs. Brown made cookies every Friday, and that if you went round to the kitchen door and were very hungry and polite she gave ...
— If You Touch Them They Vanish • Gouverneur Morris

... Mock Oysters.—Trim the soft gill portion of the Pleurotus ostreatus into the shape of an oyster; dust with salt and pepper; dip in beaten egg, then in bread crumbs, and fry in smoking hot fat as you would an oyster, and serve at once. This is, ...
— Studies of American Fungi. Mushrooms, Edible, Poisonous, etc. • George Francis Atkinson

... Red Hall is a beautiful little chamber called Old Maids' Grotto, probably on account of its trim appearance and ideal location. It is so entirely concealed from the view of those passing on the public highway, that its existence is not even suspected, until special attention is called to its cosiness, and then it is necessary to mount an accumulation ...
— Cave Regions of the Ozarks and Black Hills • Luella Agnes Owen

... up Rupert Street; the one in dirty, evil-looking rags, and the other attired in the regulation uniform of a man about town, trim, glossy, and eminently well-to-do. Villiers had emerged from his restaurant after an excellent dinner of many courses, assisted by an ingratiating little flask of Chianti, and, in that frame of mind which was with him almost chronic, had delayed a moment by the door, peering round ...
— The Great God Pan • Arthur Machen

... turned the handle, and we entered the room together, closing the door after us. The blind was still down, and in the dim, uncertain light nothing out of the common was, at first, to be seen. The shabby little room looked trim and orderly enough, save for a heap of cast-off feminine clothing piled upon a chair. The bed appeared undisturbed except by the half-seen shape of its occupant, and the quiet face, dimly visible in its shadowy corner, might have been that ...
— John Thorndyke's Cases • R. Austin Freeman

... withdrew. Damage to the various vessels was repaired as well as could be done at sea and the ships in need of a more thorough overhauling steamed for England, where they would go into dry-dock. The bulk of the British fleet, however, still in perfect fighting trim, again took up the task of patrolling the North Sea, that no German vessels might make their escape from the fortress of Heligoland, for which point the enemy headed immediately ...
— The Boy Allies at Jutland • Robert L. Drake

... taken from the protecting care of the mother? Who has a better right to them than she? How much do fathers generally do toward bringing them up? When he comes home from business, and the child is in good humor and handsome trim, he takes the little darling on his knee and plays with it. But when the wife, with the care of the whole household on her shoulders, with little or no help, is not able to put them in the best order, how much does ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... on to say something more, but at that moment a trim parlourmaid came in and began to arrange the tea-table beside her mistress's chair, and for some time afterwards Cara skilfully contrived to keep the conversation on impersonal lines. It was not until ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler

... was slowing down. There was a handsome brick station and a long platform. This was crowded with boys, all in military garb like Tom's own. They looked so very trim and handsome that Helen and Ruth were quite excited. There were boys ranging from little fellows of ten, in knickerbockers, to big chaps whose mustaches were ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson

... white and black ventilators, white hull with blue line, flying the burgee Belle Helene, or some such name. None could advise me for a time, and I looked in vain, as I had in every dock in six hundred miles, for the trim hull of my yacht. At last one old mariner, in rubber boots, himself skipper of a house-boat south-bound for a winter's trapping, admitted that he had seen such ...
— The Lady and the Pirate - Being the Plain Tale of a Diligent Pirate and a Fair Captive • Emerson Hough

... last, bent double over his wheel as though he had cramps. From the front bar extended two bent cowhorns which he held at their very ends, so that he seemed to fly across the road with arms outstretched. But now and then his animated glance would take in Spiele's trim figure and sometimes he remained behind in order to take a good start and to rush on like an express train. He especially admired Spiele's small feet which so strongly and cleverly worked the pedals and showed a commendable perseverance ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various

... eyes what you've seen without your telling me," said Boyd. "The Sioux are there. In some way they've picked up our trail and are coming. It's a mighty good thing that we've saved our horses. They're in splendid trim now for a long run, and we'll need every ounce ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler

... had just returned to the poop, after seeing the watch trim the forward sails and curl down the slack of the ropes, while Captain Dinks was wondering why the steward had not yet summoned them down to breakfast, considering that it was past eight bells. He was just indeed asking Mr Meldrum whether he felt hungry ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson

... of the circular hill that surrounds the lake, stands the famous Grotto del Cane, closed with a door to enable the keeper to get a little money from the foreigners who come to visit it. You may be sure I was careful not to trim any of the ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant

... said the big man, as he puffed out rings and fondled the trim bronze body of his Lady of Death. They let the car slide down the street to the left end of the barricade, where it ...
— Golden Lads • Arthur Gleason and Helen Hayes Gleason

... only the coat of a page to borrow, And tie my hair in a horse-boy's trim, And I save ...
— Dramatic Romances • Robert Browning

... couldn't find him in time for the funeral, and he's away still; but he's sent orders that this place—the beggar's got three or four others in England and elsewhere, I believe—should be put in fighting trim—water supply, new stables, electric light—the whole bag of tricks. And I—I who speak to you—am going to be a kind of clerk of the works. No need to go on your knees to me, Falconer; just simply bow respectfully. You will find no alteration in me. I shall be as pleasant and affable as ever. ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice

... marked with her mother's love and contained handsome plaid material for a dress, with the silk to trim it, and a ...
— Jewel's Story Book • Clara Louise Burnham

... Avenue to the front. They did not converse—they were both too shy, too impressed by the peculiarity of the predicament. They simply peered. They peered everywhere for the truant form of Musa balanced on one side by a bag and on the other by a fiddle case. From the trim houses, each without exception new, twinkled discreet lights, with glimpses of surpassingly correct domesticity, and the wind rustled loudly through the foliage of the prim gardens, ruffling them as it might have ruffled the unwilling hair of the daughters ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett

... ship was now so light, that in a gale of wind she drove bodily to leeward; so that I was very solicitous to get into Port Desire,[12] that I might put her hold in order, and take in sufficient ballast, to avoid the danger of being caught upon a lee-shore in her present trim. We steered in for the land with the wind at N.E. and in the evening brought to; but the wind coming to the westward, we were driven off in the night. At seven the next morning, we stood in again, steering S.W. by S. by the compass, and soon perceived the sea to break right a-head ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr

... say, that he was a very insignificant young man indeed. We all moved into the dining-room; the others took the seats they were accustomed to. Mr. Whitney and I, being the only new-comers, were advised which seats belonged to us by a trim young maid-servant, and I, for one, was very glad to get into mine. Mr. Whitney was my neighbor on one hand, the youngest of the Hollenbeck boys on the other. These were ...
— Richard Vandermarck • Miriam Coles Harris

... Lord Gifford's castle sought, Deep labouring with uncertain thought; Even then he mustered all his host, 350 To meet upon the western coast; For Norse and Danish galleys plied Their oars within the Frith of Clyde. There floated Haco's banner trim, Above Norweyan warriors grim, 355 Savage of heart, and large of limb; Threatening both continent and isle, Bute, Arran, Cunninghame, and Kyle. Lord Gifford, deep beneath the ground, Heard Alexander's bugle sound, 360 And tarried not his garb to change, But, in his wizard habit strange, ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott

... Wahena, no longer in bonds, kept close to her. He intimated in his dumb language that he wanted to take the helm, and gently took the tiller from her. He was soon proficient in steering, for there was now nothing to do but keep the boat in the middle of the river, and occasionally to trim ...
— Hope and Have - or, Fanny Grant Among the Indians, A Story for Young People • Oliver Optic

... warm weather it is a good plan to trim the tops of plants when setting them. This can be done readily with some plants, such as cabbage and lettuce, by taking a bundle of them in one hand and with the other twisting off about half of ...
— The First Book of Farming • Charles L. Goodrich

... were many of them richly carved, and the twisted chimneys and quaint windows showed traces of considerable ingenuity in the builder's art. Plainly, too, there had been a time when the ground around the house had been cared for and kept trim and garden-like. ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green

... will seek to enter in, and shall not be able." They will put on all the confidence they can; they will trick and trim up their profession, and adorn it with what bravery they can. Thus the foolish virgins sought to enter in; they did trim up their lamps, and made themselves as fine as they could. They made shift to make their lamps to shine a while; but the ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin

... an hour in a tiny room which had mirrors all around it and a maid (as trim and French-accented as any maid any duchess could have) and a couple of fitters and a head fitter. It ended up with: "Do you mean to tell me that after all the reducing and dieting I've been doing I can't wear under a twenty-seven? It's ridiculous. I ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine

... sympathizing with the worthy man, felt how pleasant a thing it would be were the congregation permitted to do for him in the church what the Rev. Mr. Macfarlane, erst of Stockbridge, does for him in the presbytery. Corporal Trim began one of his stories on one occasion, by declaring 'that there was once an unfortunate king of Bohemia;' and when Uncle Toby, interrupting him with a sigh, exclaimed, 'Ah, Corporal Trim, and was he unfortunate?' 'Yes, your honour,' readily replied Trim; ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller

... Ring and had Tristan "already planned in his head"; a conductor whose ideal was nothing lower than perfection—this gentleman came from Zurich to conduct a society whose membership was compact of trim and prim mediocrity, and whose directors were mostly duffers. Can we wonder that both sides were disappointed? These amiable directors never quite recovered from the honour of having Mendelssohn to conduct for them; and they undoubtedly looked upon Wagner as ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman

... the same plains stretched far and wide; the same rivers rolled on their course. There is no alteration in the physical formation of the country; but its aspect was very different. Instead of the fields all trim with cultivation, and all covered with various produce, one would see inaccessible morasses and vast forests, as yet uncleared, given up to the chances of primitive vegetation, peopled with wolves and bears, and even the ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... sitting at the Cafe' de la Paix with his head painted. I could not wear my hat through the interview. I could not exhibit the thick five days' stubble, to appear in contrast with the heavy fringe that had been spared;—I could not trim the fringe to the shortness of the stubble; I should have looked like Pierrot. I had only, then, to remain bald, and, if I obtained the post, to shave in secret—a harmless and ...
— The Beautiful Lady • Booth Tarkington

... lightest marching-trim. Iglesias bore an umbrella, our armor against what heaven could do with assault of sun or shower. I was weaponed with a staff, should brute or biped uncourteous dispute our way. We had no impediments of "great trunk, little trunk, bandbox, and bundle." A thoughtful man hardly feels ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... squirming, restless small children. Mrs. Burgoyne sat down, and studied the hall with delighted eyes. It was ordinarily only a shabby, enormous, high-ceiled room, filled with rows of chairs, and with an elevated stage at the far end. But, like all Santa Paloma, it was in holiday trim to-night. All the windows—wide open to the summer darkness—were framed in bunting and drooping flowers, and on the stage were potted palms and crossed flags. Great masses of bamboo and California ferns were ...
— The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne • Kathleen Norris

... growing wild in the jungles, opened out a new industry, and soon the low-lying hills, knolls and undulating plains of the little valley became gradually clear of jungle, and covered instead with row after row of carefully-kept and trim tea bushes. To-day acres upon acres of tea are grown in Cachar; and the inland steamers, which ply all through the rainy season up and down the wide-rolling stream of the river Barak, bring down for export millions of pounds of tea for the ...
— Bengal Dacoits and Tigers • Maharanee Sunity Devee

... the skipper shouted, coming aft. 'Can't you find any work to do? I'll have no loafers aboard my boat. Here, you Chinee, you get for'ard, and trim the lamps.' ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various

... A star shot, and Margery knew that a soul was on its way to Paradise, where she would fain go if only she could find the way.... There are purple flowers growing by the creek between the cedar wood and the marsh. Let us go gather them, and trim ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston

... steel crochet hook. She was not an expert workwoman, and it had taken her many weeks to make the half-yard of narrow lace which she kept wound about the buckram back of a disintegrated copy of "The Lamplighter." But there was no other way of getting any lace to trim her summer blouse, and since Ally Hawes, the poorest girl in the village, had shown herself in church with enviable transparencies about the shoulders, Charity's hook had travelled faster. She unrolled the lace, dug the hook into a loop, and bent to ...
— Summer • Edith Wharton

... first period of a campaign when troops are still in full trim, almost like that of peacetime maneuvers, but with a shade of martial swagger in their clothes, and a touch of the gaiety and spirit of enterprise which always accompany the opening of ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... idea that the latter was the language in which the prisoners were speaking. After an hour of pretended despair, both rose from the deck on which they had been sitting and, on an order being given to trim the sails, went to the ropes and aided the privateersmen to haul at them and, before the end of the day, were doing duty as regular ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty

... road separated St Austin's from the lodge gates of Badgwick Hall, the country seat of Sir Alfred Venner, M.P., also of 49A Lancaster Gate, London. Barrett walked rapidly for over half-an-hour before he came in sight of the great iron gates, flanked on the one side by a trim little lodge and green meadows, and on the other by woods of a darker green. Having got so far, he went on up the hill till at last he arrived at his destination. A small hedge, a sloping strip of green, and then the famous Dingle. I am loath to inflict any scenic rhapsodies ...
— The Pothunters • P. G. Wodehouse

... and the only male voice left in the land is the voice of the milk-boy on his rounds, the necessary postman, and the innocuous grocer's tout. There is something of the 'hushed seraglio' in these miles of trim houses, from whose doors and windows only female faces look out. An air of sensible bereavement lies upon the land. Woman, deprived of her lord and natural complement, cuts but a poor figure anywhere, but nowhere so poor as in ...
— The Quest of the Simple Life • William J. Dawson

... blackberry bushes, scrubby oaks and young madrono trees. In the rear, a gate through a low paling fence led to a snug, squat bungalow, built in the California Spanish style and seeming to have been compounded directly from the landscape of which it was so justly a part. Neat and trim and modestly sweet was the bungalow, redolent of comfort and repose, telling with quiet certitude of some one that knew, and that ...
— Brown Wolf and Other Jack London Stories - Chosen and Edited By Franklin K. Mathiews • Jack London

... out between the Black Colonel and his Red Murdo, some little time after the duel at Lonach. To get his injured but recovered sword-arm in trim again the Colonel had taken to practising on his man, also a sufficient swordsman, though always liable to make a foul stroke. This time he had to defend himself from a sudden, half-angry, half-playful, wholly energetic assault ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne

... sufficient renown to make the plans for the house, wandered from room to room on a quiet tour of inspection. Mrs. Sequin's fears of his judgment were not without cause, for Mr. Horton was one of those critics whose advice one always ignores but whose approval one ardently desires. He was a trim, immaculate person with short, pointed beard, and narrow, critical eyes that always seemed to be taking measurements. Passing from the Dutch dining-room, with its blue tile, and old pewter, he paused in the doorway of the drawing-room where the dancing had already begun. His glance, taking ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice

... he carried the scar of that first meeting for six months, and may, for aught I know, take it with him to his little swinging grave. Even Smith remembers to this day how she looked, standing there on her two trim ankles, that disappeared into her hand-turned sandals or faded in the flute and fringe of her fawn skin skirt. Her full bosom rose and fell, and you could count the beat of her wild heart in the throb of ...
— The Last Spike - And Other Railroad Stories • Cy Warman

... train of thought, and in a luxury of repose, lay staring at some green stripes on the bed furniture, and associating them strangely, with patches of fresh turf, while the yellow ground between made gravel walks, and so helped out a long perspective of trim gardens. ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser

... was half a mile from "Wayside" cresting a windy hill. The house itself was large and comfortable, old enough to be dignified, and girdled with maple groves and orchards. There were big, trim barns behind it, and everything bespoke prosperity. Whatever the patient endurance in Mr. Douglas' face had meant it hadn't, so Anne ...
— Anne Of The Island • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... missed from the ball-room altogether. Some one reported having seen them strolling up and down the beach in the moonlight. There was no mistaking the tall, broad-shouldered, handsome Englishman, and the trim, dainty little figure in fleecy white, with the ermine wrap thrown over the pretty plump shoulders and round neck, on which rare diamonds, that would have paid a king's ransom, gleamed fitfully whenever the sportive breeze tossed back ...
— Jolly Sally Pendleton - The Wife Who Was Not a Wife • Laura Jean Libbey

... hungry ruffians. They sighted mail-boats moving on their appointed routes; passed well-found home ships with rusty iron sides anchored in the shallow sea waiting for a change of weather or the turn of the tide; an English gunboat, white and trim, with two slim masts, crossed their bows one day in the distance; and on another occasion a Dutch corvette, black and heavily sparred, loomed up on their quarter, steaming dead slow in the mist. They slipped through ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad

... Killiney. A house agent would have described it as a most desirable residence, standing in its own grounds, overlooking the sea. Its windows opened upon one of the best of the many beautiful views of Dublin Bay. Its half-acre of pleasure ground—attended to by a jobbing gardener once a week—was trim and flowery. Its brown gate shone with frequently renewed paint, and the drive up to the door was neatly raked. Inside Miss Goold's wants were ministered to by an eminently respectable man-servant, his wife who cooked, ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham

... what thing of sea or land? Female of sex it seems, That so bedeck'd, ornate, and gay, Comes this way sailing Like a stately ship Of Tarsus, bound for the isles Of Javan or Gadire, With all her bravery on, and tackle trim, Sails fill'd, and streamers waving, Courted by all the winds that hold them play; An amber-scent of odorous perfume Her harbinger, ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge

... exactest, the most fly-in-amber little town in the world, with its uncrowded streets, its absurd fortifications, and its contented silent houses—all like a family at ease and at rest under its high sun. It is as sharp and trim as its own map, and that map is as clear as a geometrical problem. Everything in ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc

... walking by a falling off in the size of his foot. He cherishes and cultivates this part of his anatomy, and apparently thinks his taste and good breeding are to be inferred from its diminutive size. A small, trim foot, well booted or gaitered, is the national vanity. How we stare at the big feet of foreigners, and wonder what may be the price of leather in those countries, and where all the aristocratic blood is, that these plebeian extremities so predominate! If ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs

... Hurons so suddenly changed their mode of attack their canoe was not in the best possible racing trim. There were but two paddles, and the third man so much extra and useless cargo. Then the difference in weight between the sisters and the other two men, more especially in vessels so extremely light, almost neutralized any difference ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper

... with our stick; delight we to launch your mimic barks from the sandy shores of Serpentine; with you, glad are we to make haste, expecting the fastest sailer on the further shore; with you, we exult, once more a boy, in the speed of our trim-built favourite. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various

... supposed,—so great a shrinking grew up in him winter after winter from the perils and hardships of the mail-steamer's route. But he persevered and bided his time, and in ten years had the luck to become owner and master of a trim little coasting-steamer which had been known for years as the "Sally Wright," making two trips a week from Charlottetown to Orwell Head,—known as the "Sally Wright" no longer, however; for the first thing Donald did was to repaint her, from stem to stern, ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson



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