Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Bit   /bɪt/   Listen
Bit

noun
1.
A small piece or quantity of something.  Synonym: spot.  "A bit of paper" , "A bit of lint" , "I gave him a bit of my mind"
2.
A small fragment of something broken off from the whole.  Synonyms: chip, flake, fleck, scrap.
3.
An indefinitely short time.  Synonyms: minute, mo, moment, second.  "In a mo" , "It only takes a minute" , "In just a bit"
4.
An instance of some kind.  Synonym: piece.  "He had a bit of good luck"
5.
Piece of metal held in horse's mouth by reins and used to control the horse while riding.
6.
A unit of measurement of information (from binary + digit); the amount of information in a system having two equiprobable states.
7.
A small amount of solid food; a mouthful.  Synonyms: bite, morsel.
8.
A small fragment.  Synonym: snatch.
9.
A short theatrical performance that is part of a longer program.  Synonyms: act, number, routine, turn.  "She had a catchy little routine" , "It was one of the best numbers he ever did"
10.
The part of a key that enters a lock and lifts the tumblers.
11.
The cutting part of a drill; usually pointed and threaded and is replaceable in a brace or bitstock or drill press.



Related searches:



WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Bit" Quotes from Famous Books



... renew the fight against the powers of darkness, and he therefore went and reported the new happenings to Anshar, representative of the "host of heaven," and took counsel with him. When Anshar heard the matter he was greatly disturbed in mind and bit his lips, for he saw that the real difficulty was to find a worthy antagonist for Kingu and Tiamat. A gap in the text here prevents us from knowing exactly what Anshar said and did, but the context suggests that he summoned Anu, the Sky-god, to his assistance. Then, having given ...
— The Babylonian Legends of the Creation • British Museum

... of a good dinner, many are indigenous, such as butcher's meat, fowl and fruits. Others for instance, the beef- stake, Welch rare-bit, punch, etc., were invented in England. Germany, Spain, Italy, Holland, all contribute, as does India, Persia, Arabia, and each pay their quota, in sour-krout, raisins, parmera, bolognas, curacao, rice, sago, soy, potatoes, ...
— The Physiology of Taste • Brillat Savarin

... ponderous mace With lion's rage swung round; Destruction stalked before his face, While groans and howlings filled the place And hundreds bit the ground. ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... Miss Richards, you go back to your hotel, and of course conduct yourself as if you had nothing unusual on your mind; but hold yourself in readiness to produce that important bit of cloth, if I should call upon you to do so within the next few hours. By the way," he added, with sudden thought, "if you have it with you, I might as well take a ...
— True Love's Reward • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... vegetables boil in one-third less time than stale ones. Green vegetables should be put into plenty of boiling water and salt, and boiled rapidly, without covering, only until tender enough to pierce with the finger nail; a bit of common washing soda, or of carbonate of ammonia, as large as a dried pea, put into the boiling water with any of the vegetables except beans, counteracts any excess of mineral elements in them, and helps to preserve their color. A lump ...
— The Cooking Manual of Practical Directions for Economical Every-Day Cookery • Juliet Corson

... me about the new parson, wanting me to try whether I couldn't get more out of you than the old parson. That's the way we talk about you, you see, sir. You'll understand. And I've never told him that I'd been to church since you came—I suppose from a bit of pride, because I had so long lefused to go; but I don't doubt some of the neighbours have told him, for he never speaks about it now. And I know he's been looking out for you; and I fancy he's begun to wonder that the parson was going ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald

... intend to make trouble. Boots has to be greased, you know, else they crack all out, an' don't last no time; mine do. This 'ere Cologne is nice, to be sure. I jest poured out a bit on ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various

... dedicated to bright folks, who study human needs, and to such as possess and inspire a bit of high-soul, creative imagination, as well as to humanitarians, who become capable of knowing, advising and showing the better sides of life by lofty mental concentration, which ever lifts the thinker into the special soul atmosphere of each separate mentality, ...
— Cupology - How to Be Entertaining • Clara

... martyrs is the seed of the church." Then he filled up his glass, and drank the wine off with such a mournful, resigned air, and wiped his lips so gently with his cambric handkerchief (I saw that it was a hem-stitch), that I had no voice to ask him to take a bit of the cold chicken, which he did, however, without my asking him. But when he said in the same low voice, "A little more breast, dear Mrs. Potiphar," I was obliged to run into the drawing room for a ...
— The Potiphar Papers • George William Curtis

... water gas has a smell every bit as strong as coal gas, and a leak would be detected with equal facility by the nose; and I think you will agree with me that the cry raised against the use of carbureted water gas, for this reason, is one of the same character that hampered the introduction of coal gas itself ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 794, March 21, 1891 • Various

... close to the wall's foot. He may also pledge himself to catch it first with the right hand and then with the left for a hundred times; or to bat it up a hundred times with a tennis racket or a flat bit of board. An interesting game for one is to mark out a golf course round the garden, making a little hole at intervals of half a dozen yards or so, and see how many strokes are needed in going round and getting into each ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher

... dance, and dey marries mawnstus young; but dey not like some niggehs: dey stays married. An' modess? Dey dess so modess dey shy! Yes, seh, dey de shyes', easy-goin'es', modesses', most p'esumin' peop' in de whole worl'! I don't see fo' why folks talk 'gin dem Cajun'; on'y dey a lil bit slow." ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable

... lips of hern. I can swear to that, for I've seen 'em. No use tryin' to trot her out. She's a leetle set up, ye see, with bein' made much of. Look at her, gentlemen! Who can blame her for bein' a bit proud? She's a fust-rate fancy-article. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various

... little bit afraid of him, but I don't know why I should be. Marmee said I might come, and I don't think you're any the worse for it," said Jo, composing herself, though she kept her eyes ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott

... Snarleyyow," said Mr Vanslyperken. "Come here, sir, and lie down." But Snarleyyow had not forgotten the red-herring; so in revenge he first bit Smallbones in the thigh, and then ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat

... mistaken,' said Mr. Spenlow, as Miss Murdstone brought a parcel of letters out of her reticule, tied round with the dearest bit of blue ribbon, 'those are also from ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... stone, but the stone had been liberally oiled to keep out the wet, and the blackness thus produced had not a very cheerful look. Then, on this particular evening the scant bushes surrounding the house hung limp and dark in the rain, and amid the prevailing hues of purple, blue-green and blue the bit of scarlet coping running round the black house was wholly ineffective in relieving the general impression ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various

... lock-bar, associated as it was with his painful experience in box 1, revived the strongly affective experience of stepping on the nail. Psychologically described, the sound induced an imaginal complex equivalent to the earlier painful experience. The behavior seems to the writer a most important bit of evidence of imagery in the monkey. Finally, on August 9, after ten hundred and seventy trials, Skirrl succeeded in choosing correctly in the ten trials of a series, and he was therefore considered to have solved the problem of the second door from the ...
— The Mental Life of Monkeys and Apes - A Study of Ideational Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes

... and told Rhoda what had happened, his wife was not in the least bit moved. "I'll never let that girl in my house," she said through thin lips. "A classless nothing! I'm going to keep my pride ...
— Cerebrum • Albert Teichner

... for not yet had he got the victory over evil; at all events he thought he would still wait a bit, but he would certainly carry out his intention of leaving the country for a while at least; and two days after the time we write of, his mother sat in her own room with a full heart after having ...
— Little Frida - A Tale of the Black Forest • Anonymous

... owes me two hundred and fifty," thought he, as he glanced at Tanaroff in passing. Then, more irritably, "It's astonishing, upon my word! Of course we're good friends, and all that, but I wonder that he's not the least bit ashamed of himself. He might at any rate make some excuse for owing me all that money. No, I won't lend him ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef

... make into round balls, or roll out and cut with a cooky cutter with a hole in the centre. Heat two cups of lard with one cup of beef suet which you have melted and strained, and heat till it browns a bit of bread instantly. Then drop in three doughnuts,—not more, or you will chill the fat, —and when you take them out dry on brown paper. It is much better to use part suet than all lard, yet that will do if you have ...
— A Little Cook Book for a Little Girl • Caroline French Benton

... this pain; and then I seemed to be lifted off my feet, tumbling down this ladder here, and after that through a hole in the deck, amongst a lot of coal-dust and oil-cans, that messed my clothes a bit." ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson

... shade, are invariably clear, distinct, and speaking. The stones and gravel of the bank catch green reflections from the boughs above; the bushes receive grays and yellows from the ground; every hairbreadth of polished surface gives a little bit of the blue of the sky or the gold of the sun, like a star upon the local color; this local color, changeful and uncertain in itself, is again disguised and modified by the hue of the light, or quenched ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin

... he was to be seen devoting himself to the cultivation of this bit of ground, and making of his house a sort of hostelry whither the poor and the sick came in swarms. He not only welcomed them, but he sought them out, even to the malaria-infected Maremma, often returning with ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier

... the best of me to-night. But I couldn't help it, fer that boy did more'n stir me up. Guess he's cooled down now, though I'm mighty surprised that he knuckled under so soon. It's not a bit like Eb's way, let me ...
— Jess of the Rebel Trail • H. A. Cody

... ended here, I should probably have been in my chair at the college today; and the whole affair, so far as it related only to myself, would have been regarded by me as merely a bit of an episode in my life—of course a most exciting one. But the worst was to come, at least so far as it concerned the lady personally; and the very worst it would be better to say ...
— The American Prejudice Against Color - An Authentic Narrative, Showing How Easily The Nation Got - Into An Uproar. • William G. Allen

... them from the postoffice, hence the accumulation in the postoffice grew until there was room for little else. These books were surveys and agricultural reports. Unreadable to say the least, but heavy in the extreme. The postoffice at Santa Fe was a little bit of a concern, and the postmaster said there was no room for the books there. Earlier in the year I had carried one of these sacks to the postoffice and had attempted to get the postmaster to accept them as mail. I told him ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus

... I will take the front way," I answered. "It may be a bit longer, but it will give me the more time ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle

... country. If I shall beat you, you shall cry out thrice, 'Let France flourish!' if I shall be beat (which I hope I shall not), I will in the same words celebrate your Germany." They bowl away: a stone represents the Jack: a mischievous bit of brickbat rather interferes with the German's accuracy, of aim, but in the end he wins, and the French cock has to crow thrice, "Let Germany flourish." In another game between two students who are contending in the play of striking a ball through an iron ring, it is arranged ...
— Old English Sports • Peter Hampson Ditchfield

... trouble and running from the police, eh? Not a bit of it! Here, run up to this preacher's. I'll convince ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... that every man should have a master, but, for my part, I prefer a mistress. Give me a nice young woman with plenty of money in her pocket, and a bit of taste for seeing life, and I'll leave you all the prying "amatoors" that ever sniffed about a gear-box without knowing ...
— The Man Who Drove the Car • Max Pemberton

... him to see what it was all about. He had been kindness itself. He always was the kindest and gentlest creature. If she wanted a house, hotel or what not, she should have it. In fact, he got her one, installed her, and undertook to keep her there. She bit her lip now to remember that she had agreed—and the ensuing difficulties. He had no money, and would have none of his own, and he refused to live under a roof on any terms whatsoever. Of ten thousand marks a year, which he was to receive from his Grand Duke, half was to be hers; he would ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett

... Fanny observed, bit her lip, and tacked internally, " 'bout ship," as the sailors say. Her game now, conceived in a moment, and at once put in execution, was to encourage Uxmoor's attentions to Zoe. She began by openly courting Mr. Severne, ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade

... also are drowned in the Red Sea," is answered by a brief chorus, "The Depths have covered them," which is followed by four choruses of triumph,—"Thy Right Hand, O Lord," an elaborate and brilliant number; "And in the Greatness of Thine Excellency," a brief but powerful bit; "Thou sendest forth Thy Wrath;" and the single chorus, "And with the Blast of Thy Nostrils," in the last two of which Handel again returns to the imitative style with wonderful effect, especially in the declaration of the basses, "The Floods stood upright as an Heap, and the ...
— The Standard Oratorios - Their Stories, Their Music, And Their Composers • George P. Upton

... be safer heyah, seh,' he decided. 'It's a little bit o' old door, and Ah reckon they's a ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various

... (1881—the very date on which the French Expeditionary Force constrained the Bey of Tunis to accept French suzerainty) 'steps were taken on behalf of Lord Hartington, Lord Granville, and myself to see whether, now that France had knocked another bit out of the bottom of the Ottoman Empire by her attack on Tunis, we ought to try to get any compensation in Egypt for ourselves. Hartington was to consult the India Office upon the question, and I wrote to Sir Edward Hertslet, asking him to ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn

... bit," said I, for already, with eyes which gleamed with curiosity and with avarice, he was stooping over the lid. "I don't see that there is any hurry over this matter. You've read that card which warns us not to open it. It ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle

... minute they could snatch was spent in studying text-books. Their country had come into the war so late that they resented any moment lost from making themselves proficient. When expostulated with they explained themselves by saying, "When we've done our bit it will be time to amuse ourselves." They were dull company, but, in a time of war, inspiring. All their talk was of when they reached England. Their enthusiasm for the Britisher was such that they expected to be swept into a rarer atmosphere by ...
— Out To Win - The Story of America in France • Coningsby Dawson

... man. "Why, of course, sir. It's a Bri'sh sailor's nature to like a bit of prize money at the end of a v'y'ge; but, begging your pardon, sir, don't you make no mistake. There arn't a messmate o' mine as wouldn't give up his prize money for the sake of overhauling a slaver ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn

... that'll do us a bit of good," he said. "We need it. The Germans are miles ahead of us with regard ...
— The Kingdom of the Blind • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... think that I—I love a man that is a man; that doesn't sit down and whine because a fight is hard, or give up and say it's no use. I do despise a moral weakling, Ford. I don't mind what you have been; it's what you are, that counts with me. And you're a man, every inch of you. I'm not a bit afraid you'll weaken. Only," she added half apologetically, "I did want you to give me the—the jug, because I couldn't bear to see you look so worried." She gave his fingers an adorable little squeeze, and flung his hand away from her, and laughed in a way ...
— The Uphill Climb • B. M. Bower

... o' seems 's though the sunshine was a leetle bit brighter to-day than usual, all on 'count of my goin' to Ebenezer. Only I wish ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park

... Combray's confidential man consented to guide the detectives. He took a bunch of keys and followed by Licquet and Legendre, went up to a little room under the roof of a narrow building next to Marillac's wing. This room had only one window, on the north, with a bit of green stuff for a curtain; its only furniture was a miserable wooden bed drawn into the middle of the room. Licquet and the commissary examined the partitions and had them sounded. Soyer allowed ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre

... bit of it, and that's partly why I'm here. Vanished like a witch, begad, while I was turning to ring the bell! And where she went or where she came from are ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... us, mounted on a powerful horse, with a target on one arm, and a broadsword flashing in his right hand. Several arrows were shot at him, but he caught them on his target, and dashed on unharmed. The first Indian he attacked bit the dust; another made at him, the head of whose spear he lopped off with a single blow, and he then clove his opponent from the crown of the head to the neck. On seeing this, the Indians, crying out to each other, turned their horses' heads and attempted ...
— Adventures in the Far West • W.H.G. Kingston

... at this peculiar compliment; and Madge bit her lips, half in vexation, half in merriment. I hardly knew what to think of Margaret. She was certainly the most eccentric being I ever saw. She, who seemed to care for the opinion of no one,—reckless, defying, and apparently ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... For seeing his countrymen to be grown wanton and insolent, and the people made, by their prosperity, obstinate and disobedient to the senate, and drawing the whole city, whither they would, after them, he would have had the fear of Carthage to serve as a bit to hold in the contumacy of the multitude; and he looked upon the Carthaginians as too weak to overcome the Romans, and too great to be despised by them. On the other side, it seemed a perilous thing to Cato, that a city which had been always ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... Fortune, that mother is just a little wee bit better?" asked Iris again. There was an imploring note ...
— A Little Mother to the Others • L. T. Meade

... mouthpiece, or worn spats of Mackenzie tartan, the great heart of the voting- man, and the gush of the paragraph-makers might have been unreservedly his. The art of public life consists to a great extent of knowing exactly where to stop and going a bit further. ...
— The Unbearable Bassington • Saki

... dripping. Place in Dutch oven or in one of the small vessels in fireless cooker. Half cover with boiling water, surround with six slices carrot, one stalk celery, broken in pieces, one onion sliced, two sprays parsley, a bit of bay leaf, three cloves and one-half teaspoonful peppercorns. Cover closely and bake slowly two or more hours basting often if cooked in Dutch oven. If necessary, add more water. Remove hearts ...
— Stevenson Memorial Cook Book • Various

... boys," said Grainger. "Now you go ahead and raise the stone, and as soon as I am a bit stronger I'll start off for the Bay and buy what I want in the way of screens, grinding pans, quicksilver, and other gear. I'm almost convinced that with new, fine screens we shall get good results out of the stone, and if we are disappointed, then ...
— Chinkie's Flat and Other Stories - 1904 • Louis Becke

... unreal here; I mean St. James and all that was so tremendously important; incredibly stupid—the Princess Amelia's stockings. But you can't imagine the jealousy. Every bit of it shall go out of my thoughts. You'll help me, a harmless magic. I'll be as simple as that girl across the road, with the red cheeks, in a single slip. You must call me Ludowika; Ludowika and Howat. I'm not so terribly old, ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer

... influx of foreign workers, both legal and illegal. Because of its conservative financial approach and its entrepreneurial strengths, Taiwan suffered little compared with many of its neighbors from the Asian financial crisis in 1998-99. Growth in 2000 should pick up a bit from 1999, backed by expansion in domestic consumption, exports, and ...
— The 2000 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... to in life, as I am told; but that don't signify much, only the house will cost me a pretty penny to get it into order and furnish. The rental is five thousand a-year and some hundreds, and the rents can be got up a bit—so Larkin tells me. Do you know anything of him? He says he did business for your uncle once. He seems a clever fellow—a bit too clever, perhaps—and was too much master here, I suspect, in poor Dickie's reign. Tell me all you can make out about him. It is a long time ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... are so many genera and little sub-families of Marsupiata that the group cannot be called aberrant or anomalous. Sagitta (and the earwig) is one of the most anomalous animals in the world, and not a bit the less because there are a dozen species. Now, my point (which, I think is a slightly new point of view) is, if it is extinction which has made the genus anomalous, as a general rule the same causes ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin

... with us all Is the lack of a high conceit. If each man thought he was sent to this spot To make it a bit more sweet, How soon we could gladden the world. How easily right all wrong. If nobody shirked, and each one worked ...
— Custer, and Other Poems. • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... know much about boating," returned the man; "but my gentleman said he thought I had better practise a bit, because he will want me to row him about of an evening. Well, another time I will keep out of the way of ...
— Littlebourne Lock • F. Bayford Harrison

... why I called her "Mims" then, but I did, and afterwards I never called her anything else; that was my secret name for her. She kissed me again and stroked my cheek with her hand, and we went on again together up the last steep bit of road to the house. Always, after that, I never thought of Mrs Cottier without feeling her lips upon my cheek and hearing the stamp of old Greylegs as he pawed on the snow, eager for the stable ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield

... What I mean is that it's so splendid to have understood the issues.... That's how I feel. I just told dad I'd have to come and do my bit, as ...
— One Man's Initiation—1917 • John Dos Passos

... not the step of a young person. She wore on her head only a close white cap; and her gray gown was straight and scant: on her arm she carried a basket of scarlet plaited straw, which made a fine bit of color against the gray and white of her costume. It was just growing dusk, and the doctor could not distinguish her features. At that moment, a lad came running from the inn, and darted across the road, calling aloud, "Tantibba! ...
— Hetty's Strange History • Helen Jackson

... a line while he swam the stream, and, drenched to the waist, scaled the cliff. When he reached the spot, he found the prints of a woman's shoe in the dust of the path, going down. There were none returning, and he had not long to wait. A scarlet bit of color soon flashed through the gray bushes below him. The girl was without her bag of corn. She was climbing slowly, and was looking at the ground as though in deep thought. Reckless as she was, she had come to realize ...
— A Cumberland Vendetta • John Fox, Jr.

... where he could lead the best life for the good of the State. His aim was not to make his citizens happy but to promote goodness; but he had enough faith in human nature—and who can be an educational thinker without having faith in human nature?—to be convinced that to enable men to 'do their bit', as we say to-day, was to assure them of the truest happiness. We of this generation know how abundantly that faith has been confirmed. And indeed we can appeal in this matter not only to the common sense of Education Authorities ...
— Progress and History • Various

... "Not a bit!" Sir Charles' voice rose in lively protest. "I remember out in Australia reading about the fellow in the sporting papers from home, and wondering what had become of him. So that was it? Go on, Mr. Gillett! With ...
— Half A Chance • Frederic S. Isham

... lodger, out of whom she could make no indirect profit; and she had a waspish tongue. John Douglas regarded her taunts—almost amounting to open insult—with a patient and mild curiosity. It was a little bit of psychological study, and more interesting than book-keeping by double entry. Meantime, things were becoming very serious; with all his penuriousness, he had ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black

... it is the other phase of this great physicist's mental trend which particularly interests the student of human behavior— that wisdom which gives him (as it gave William James, and for a like reason), the bravery to look a bit beyond the more or less materialistic confines of mere science into the broader realm. And strange, is it not, that a man NEED be brave in this twentieth century Domini to discuss spiritism and survival and telepathy? Only those do it who cannot "lose their jobs." ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10

... have read every bit of Owen Meredith's [his now well-known pseudonym] volume, and it has left me in a state of delighted admiration. He is a truly musical, reflecting, impassioned and imaginative poet, with a tendency to but one of the faults of his contemporaries and ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay

... that utterly upset the calculations and disconcerted the plans of its authors. Instead of a people ready, after a week or two of privation, to sue for mercy—to revolt against their sovereign and succumb to his rival—the French found in every bit of Old Greece—from Mount Pindus to Cape Malea—a nation nerved to the highest pitch of endurance: prepared to suffer hunger and disease without a murmur, and when the hour should come, to die as those die who possess things they value more than life. This was ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott

... his chair. "It's better than all King Solomon's mines, El Dorado, Golconda, and Sindbad the Sailor's treasure lands—rolled in one! It's an obviously good thing! All we need is a bit of luck ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy

... vanity, but mistrust; it certainly was unintentional.' And again, 'As to my meals, I can say that I was always careful to see that no one else would take a thing before I served myself; and I believe as to the kind of my food, a bit of cold endings of a dab at breakfast, and a scrap of mackerel at dinner, are the only things that diverged from the strict rule of simplicity.' 'I am obliged to confess,' he notes, 'that in my intercourse ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey

... entirely disappeared. But such a well-preserved structure as the mission of Santa Barbara recalls a Benedictine monastery, [30] with its shady cloisters, secluded courtyard, and timbered roof covered with red tiles. It is a bit of the Old World transplanted ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER

... course carried up by the Knights of the Bath. And many fine ceremonies there was of the Heralds leading up people before him, and bowing; and my Lord of Albemarle's going to the kitchin and eating a bit of the first dish that was to go to the King's table. But, above all, was these three Lords, Northumberland, and Suffolke, [James Howard, third Earl of Suffolk.] and the Duke of Ormond, coming before the courses on horseback, and staying so all dinner-time, and at last bringing ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... bit of his skill, he sought the narrowest part of the valley and flipped over in a racking loop. The stern tubes hit rock. The nose slammed down on the opposite wall, wedging the ...
— A World is Born • Leigh Douglass Brackett

... heels of Hans Marais, and so did Considine, but Jerry soon began to pant with excitement; then he stumbled and fell. Before recovering himself from a "wait-a-bit" thorn he had been left out of sight behind. He pushed valiantly on however and came to a small open plain, where he looked anxiously round, but his comrades were nowhere to be seen. Just then a shot was fired, it was followed quickly by another, ...
— The Settler and the Savage • R.M. Ballantyne

... kittens were all enjoying themselves at tea; when Paulina, the eldest, was warbling some of her most delightful songs, and Violet, the second, was entertaining the rest, in an under tone, with a little bit of scandal about a neighbouring Tabby, whom she had seen coming home in a sad condition about five o'clock in the morning, when she, Miss Violet, was taking her early walk;—just at this moment there sounded a tap at the door, and ...
— The Comical Creatures from Wurtemberg - Second Edition • Unknown

... taken in part, and lost the same day. On the 17th the same thing happened. On the 23d they once more got into the work; in the evening they repulsed five separate counter-attacks; then a sixth succeeded in turning them out. On the 27th they took all except a bit of trench in the northern face, and two days later they made that good, as well as a trench about fifty yards to the north ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... full significance of the intruder's presence flashed over his little pink face in a trouble of uneasiness. The probable consequences of such a bit of charity as his visitor proposed almost turned him ...
— Conjuror's House - A Romance of the Free Forest • Stewart Edward White

... know—though it's fine saying "you know", when I didn't know a bit about it myself till the captain's ship was ordered there, though I was the head girl at Miss Dobbin's in the geography class—Acre is a seaport town, not far from Jaffa, which is the modern name for Joppa, ...
— Sylvia's Lovers — Complete • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... his intentions he took passage there. The ship should be in within a week or ten days. And, by the way"—Philip stood up and thrust his hands deep in his pockets as he spoke, half smiling at Gregson—"it gives me pleasure to hand you a bit of cheerful information along with that," he added. "Miss Brokaw is coming with him. ...
— Flower of the North • James Oliver Curwood

... traveler told me that on one occasion, in the presence of a beautiful bit of mountain scenery, he overheard two ladies in anxious consultation comparing, article by article, the corresponding menus of two rival hotels. The fact that three varieties of fish were offered at one, while only two were offered at the other, opened so animated a discussion ...
— Why Worry? • George Lincoln Walton, M.D.

... care to sleep next door to such as me," he said. "You wouldn't turn your back on a bit of my blanket, though, if we were out in the lonesome places together. Never mind! You won't cotton to me all at once, I dare say. I cotton to you in spite of that. Damn the bed! Take or leave it, ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins

... not without the sweet tribute of feminine sensibility, which is the most precious of all testimonials to a poet's power over the heart. True, her love belonged to another,—but then she was so used to Gifted! She did so love to hear him read his poems,—and Clement had never written that "little bit of a poem to Susie," which she had asked him for so long ago! She received him therefore with open arms,—not literally, of course, which would have been a breach of duty and propriety, but in a figurative sense, which it is hoped ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various

... a bit excited and aroused," said the Chancellor. "Who would not have been at seeing the hopes and the work of the whole period of my Chancellorship going for nought? I recalled to the Ambassador my efforts for years to bring about an understanding between England and Germany; an ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times

... "A bit of pine-land probably," said M. Fille—with anxiety, however, for the red glow lay in the direction of St. Saviour's where were the Manor Cartier and Jean Jacques' mills. Maitre Fille was possessed of a superstition that all the things which ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... unslaked, with black lips baked, We could nor laugh nor wail; Through utter drought all dumb we stood! I bit my arm, I sucked the blood, 160 And cried, A sail! ...
— Coleridge's Ancient Mariner and Select Poems • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... man has lost his wife," she said, "there's some difference of opinion in Parliament, as I hear, whether he does right or wrong, if he marries his wife's sister. Wait a bit! I'm coming to the point. My master is one who has a long head on his shoulders; he sees consequences which escape the notice of people like me. In his way of thinking, if one man may marry his wife's sister, and no harm done, ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins

... the inevitable; of trembling, slipping, straining, of smooth ice appearing when it was least expected, and of weak entreaties to be left behind while the others went on. "Jim" always said that there was no danger, that there was only a short bad bit ahead, and that I should go up even if ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird

... "We didn't have a bit of expense on us. Our doctor bills was paid and had clothes give to us and had plenty of ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration

... of history so superficial, combined with such an amazing suppression of contemporary political thought, that it is difficult to believe that the requirements of the country were taken in the least bit seriously; secondly, in the comparisons made between China and the Latin republics, a deliberate scouting of the all-important racial factor; and, lastly, a total ignorance of the intellectual qualities which are by far the most ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale

... annuity deed only because it was worthless. As for what he had said to the Mayor about drawing his first payment of the pension, he had done it because he was a bit conscience-stricken over fabricating the deed. He ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure

... four o'clock when the last strand of wire was strung tight. Then, for want of a shady tree to lean his back against, he sat down by a fence post and smoked, while his horse, with girths loosened, and bit removed from its mouth, grazed joyfully ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum

... tired," said Nancy. "I tell you what, Ellen, you had better take to liking pork; you can't work on potatoes. I ain't tired a bit. There's somebody coming to the door again! Do run and open it, will you? my hands are wet. I wonder why folks can't come in without ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell

... from the first moment I spotted you." He had praised her housekeeping. He had said he fed better, lived more comfortably, held up his end with the fellows, and saved money. And she remembered that day when he had crushed her in his arms and declared she was the greatest little bit of a woman that had ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London

... 'This day I bid good-bye To bit and bridle rein, To ditches deep and fences high, For I have dreamed a dream, and ...
— Rio Grande's Last Race and Other Verses • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson

... he was my husband, the bo'sun for many a year o' your ship the Black Eagle. He went out to try and earn a bit for me and the child, sir, but he's dead o' fever, poor dear, and lying in Bonny river, wi' a cannon ball at his feet, as the carpenter himself told me who sewed him up, and I wish I was dead and with ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... chequered and speckled; he put together a piece of joinery so crossly indented and whimsically dovetailed; a cabinet so variously inlaid; such a piece of diversified mosaic; such a tesselated pavement without cement; here a bit of black stone, and there a bit of white; patriots and courtiers; king's friends and republicans; Whigs and Tories; treacherous friends and open enemies; that it was indeed a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch, and unsure ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... which it was adorned. Then the girl who was the first to finish reaping sets fire to the pile, and all pray that Ceres may give a fruitful year. Here, as Mannhardt observes, the old custom has remained intact, though the name Ceres is a bit of schoolmaster's learning. In Upper Brittany the last sheaf is always made into human shape; but if the farmer is a married man, it is made double and consists of a little corn-puppet placed inside of a large one. This is called the Mother-sheaf. It is delivered ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer

... up the Seams thereof, and examining our very Hair, in quest of Gold and Jewels. The Boatswain, however, that was appointed to search me, after taking from me all my Stock of Money, which was Considerable, returned to me the famous Bit of Parchment between the Glasses, which was to bear me Harmless against the Claws of Holy Mother Church if she happened to turn Tiger-Cat; for these Mahometans have a profound respect for Charms and Amulets, and very like he took this for one, which could be no good to him, ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala

... there's one bit of comfort," said old Baxter, in a whisper. "Master slipped out as soon as I told of you, and I saw him cross the field towards the church. Go you that way, and ...
— The Maidens' Lodge - None of Self and All of Thee, (In the Reign of Queen Anne) • Emily Sarah Holt

... over all his frame, so that he lost his senses at once. Seeing this Duryodhana bound him with chords of shrubs, and threw him into the water. The insensible son of Pandu sank down till he reached the Naga kingdom. Nagas, furnished with fangs containing virulent venom, bit him by thousands. The vegetable poison, mingled in the blood of the son of the Wind god, was neutralised by the snake-poison. The serpents had bitten all over his frame, except his chest, the skin of which was so tough that their fangs ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)

... camp, calling softly, "Birree, gougou," which meant "Sool 'em, sool 'em," and was the signal for the dogs to come out. Quickly they came and surrounded the black fellows, took them by surprise, flew at them, bit and worried them to death. Then they and Bougoodoogahdah dragged the bodies to their camp. There they were cooked and were food for the old woman and the dogs for some time. As soon as the supply was finished the same plan to obtain more ...
— Australian Legendary Tales - Folklore of the Noongahburrahs as told to the Piccaninnies • K. Langloh Parker

... all over the basin, we commenced a small heap on one of the sloping sides of the basin; with a horse and cart we drew to this heap, just as winter set in, every bit of manure that could be found on the premises, and everything that would make manure. When got all together, it made a heap seven or eight feet wide, twenty feet long, and three or four feet high. We then laid planks on the heap, and every day, as the pig-pens, cow and horse stables ...
— Talks on Manures • Joseph Harris

... Shaken a little bit in their argument, and a great deal in their faith, Eliakim, Shebnah and Joah held a short consultation. Then Eliakim said to the spokesman, ...
— Stories of the Prophets - (Before the Exile) • Isaac Landman

... said, shaking his head, "is the spice of delight. But I like it diffused. A bit more and I'll be knowing ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple

... You see, our first battalion has had a lot of casualties and three of us subs are being taken from the third. We've got to join the day after to-morrow. Bit of a rush. And I've got things to get. I'm afraid I must ask you to give me a leg up, uncle. I'm ...
— War-time Silhouettes • Stephen Hudson

... tranquilly, seeing the youngster's future assured, because this man so lavish in violence was equally so in generosity. In time there would be a bit of land and a good flock of ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... was sitting leaning on his elbow, his face beaming with jollity, as he waited, with a full cup, for Deschenaux's toast. But no sooner did he hear the name of his sister from those lips than he sprang up as though a serpent had bit him. He hurled his goblet at the head of Deschenaux with a fierce imprecation, and drew his sword as he rushed ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... the acoustics before the contractor turns over the building. I am not satisfied about the sounding board he has put in, and the only way is to try it with at least part of the seats occupied. We'll sing a bit and plan the dedication; not have a formal service. So then, Billy, you can have your fox-trotting and a good time to all of you, bless you, my children." As he spoke he smiled at the entire group with the most delightful interest and pleasure. He was dressed in a straight ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess

... my Tenants are no Subjects, they obey nothing, and they are people too never Christened, they know no Law nor Conscience, they'll devour thee; and thou mortal, the stopple, they'll confound thee within three days; no bit nor memory of what thou wert, no not the Wart upon thy Nose there, shall be e're heard of more; go take possession, and bring thy Children down, to rost like Rabbets, they love young Toasts and Butter, ...
— Wit Without Money - The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher • Francis Beaumont

... intervention; and on the same day there went a letter to Lockhart urging him to his utmost diligence in the matter, and suggesting that the French King should incorporate the Piedmontese valleys with his own dominion, giving the Duke of Savoy some bit of territory with a Catholic population in exchange. Reaching Louis XIV. and Lockhart at the moment of the great success before Dunkirk, these letters accomplished their object. The will of France was signified at Turin, and the Protestants of ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson

... was speaking rapidly and confidently, and that somewhere in his ill-assembled parts lurked a familiar bit of him that objected to her even more than usual; but she had used half of her time, at least, before he was able to gather any coherent meaning from what she was saying. Even then he caught only a fragment, here and there, and for the rest—so far ...
— Ramsey Milholland • Booth Tarkington

... night and morning, she held it between her folded hands on her neck. . . . Young Bevis Marks went away finally no better off than the others; the rascal sold to the King of France a handsome ruby, the very size of the bit of glass in Rebecca's ring; but he always said he would rather have had her than ten thousand pounds: and very likely he would, for it was known she would at once have a plum ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray

... her before a little unostentatious piece of furniture, that looked certainly as if it was made out of a good bit of English oak. What it was, did not appear; it was very plain and rather massively made. Now Mr. Rhys produced keys, and opened first doors; then a drawer, which displayed all the characteristic contents and arrangements of a ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume II • Susan Warner

... constructing any, was furnished. The ground was rather thickly wooded, and covered with undergrowth, when the Stockade was built, and certainly no bit of soil was ever so thoroughly cleared as this was. The trees and brush were cut down and worked up into hut building materials by the same slow and laborious process that I have described as employed in building our huts ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... of the men. "You've hit it exactly. I had forgotten all about it, but there's a stone marker in a wee bit of a park, put up to commemorate the passage of Paul Revere on his famous ride. He came down this very road, and that marker is almost at the exact spot where the road touches the ...
— The Secret Wireless - or, The Spy Hunt of the Camp Brady Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss

... she was not going to be disappointed in her, as she had been in so many others. But time went on, and Lilias passed unscathed through what, in Nancy's estimation, was the severest of all ordeals. She was sent to a school "to learn accomplishments," and came home again, after two years, "not a bit set up." So Mrs Stirling came to feel at last that she might have faith in the ...
— The Orphans of Glen Elder • Margaret Murray Robertson

... stifled by the stuff you worked in. Your senses, he maintained, were no good if you couldn't see a thing at the first glance and feel it with the first touch. Vision and contact prolonged removed you so many degrees from the reality; and what you saw that way was not a bit of use to you. He denied perversely that genius was two-sexed, or that it was even essentially a virile thing. The fruitful genius was feminine, rather, humble and passive in its attitude to life. It yearned perpetually for the embrace, the momentary embrace of the real. But no more. All that ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair

... that the friends of the Virginian had, unnoticed by him, cut the leather to a bare thread, while the friends of the other party, with equal persistency, charged the Captain with cutting it himself. That when he saw the race lost, he reached over and cut the rein about six inches from the bit, thus throwing the horse out of the track and saving its credit, if not the money. No one ever knew how it happened, but that there had been a trick played and foul means employed were evident. A great many had lost their money, and their curses ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert



Words linked to "Bit" :   portion, parity, instance, frog's-bit, countersink, mouthful, example, New York minute, jiffy, bridle, case, shank, part, drill, performance, bit field, cutting implement, parity bit, wad, cud, bore bit, split second, flash, chaw, unit of measurement, splinter, small indefinite quantity, matchwood, turn, countersink bit, curb, twist drill, small indefinite amount, stable gear, instant, Pelham, crumb, unit, byte, blink of an eye, saddlery, sop, bridoon, snaffle, key, sliver, fragment, chew, burr, wink, quid, counterbore, curb bit, check bit, twist bit, bur, tack, exfoliation, stopper, drill bit, plug, flake, scale, cross bit, trice, show-stopper, blade bit, frog's-bit family, showstopper, heartbeat, pilot bit, scrap, roller bit, scurf, public presentation, sops, taste, twinkling, time



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com