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Brass   /bræs/   Listen
Brass

noun
(pl. brasses)
1.
An alloy of copper and zinc.
2.
A wind instrument that consists of a brass tube (usually of variable length) that is blown by means of a cup-shaped or funnel-shaped mouthpiece.  Synonym: brass instrument.
3.
The persons (or committees or departments etc.) who make up a body for the purpose of administering something.  Synonyms: administration, establishment, governance, governing body, organisation, organization.  "The governance of an association is responsible to its members" , "He quickly became recognized as a member of the establishment"
4.
Impudent aggressiveness.  Synonyms: boldness, cheek, face, nerve.  "He had the effrontery to question my honesty"
5.
An ornament or utensil made of brass.
6.
The section of a band or orchestra that plays brass instruments.  Synonym: brass section.
7.
A memorial made of brass.  Synonyms: memorial tablet, plaque.



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"Brass" Quotes from Famous Books



... that had finished rearing their young by the sixteenth of June were fortunate, for on the morning of that day a great and continuous shouting, with gun-firing, banging on old brass and iron utensils, with various other loud, unusual noises, were heard at one extremity of the village, and continued with occasional quiet intervals until evening. This tempest of rude sounds spread from day to day, until the entire area of the ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson

... you'd ha' thought that Bob Pretty's 'ouse was a peep-show. Everybody stared at the winders as they went by, and the children played in front of the 'ouse and stared in all day long. Then the old gentleman was seen one day as bold as brass sitting at the winder, and we heard that it was a pore old tramp Bob Pretty 'ad met on the road and given a home to, and he didn't like 'is good-'artedness to be known for fear he should be ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs

... coiled themselves to sleep in the noon-day sun, still contained gold enough to reward patient industry—industry of which the foreign-devils were not capable when the result would be but five pennyweights a day, washed out in the hot waters of the creek under a sky of brass, "with flour at two-pounds-ten per 50 lb. ...
— Chinkie's Flat and Other Stories - 1904 • Louis Becke

... more inspiring congregational singing, and the use of the piano, organ, orchestra and brass band are important factors in the curriculum. In the chapel I spoke to an audience so attentive, so alert, so receptive, so filled with animation, that the whole place looked like a vast advertisement ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard

... him for a moment thoughtfully. Phipps was a man of brass, without sensitiveness or sensibility. Nevertheless, he flushed a little. Just then dinner was announced and Lady Amesbury bustled once more into the midst ...
— The Profiteers • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... made melodious chime Was heard, of Harp and Organ; and who moovd Thir stops and chords was seen: his volant touch Instinct through all proportions low and high Fled and pursu'd transverse the resonant fugue. In other part stood one who at the Forge 560 Labouring, two massie clods of Iron and Brass Had melted (whether found where casual fire Had wasted woods on Mountain or in Vale, Down to the veins of Earth, thence gliding hot To som Caves mouth, or whether washt by stream From underground) the liquid ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton

... whose twang it is plain That his home port is somewhere round Boston or Maine, With a jaw that's the cut of a square block of wood, And beat it, my son, while the going is good! There'll be scraping and scouring from morning till night To keep that brass shiny and keep them decks white, And belaying-pin soup both for dinner and tea, For them smart ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. CLVIII, January 7, 1920 • Various

... most prominent article of furniture bears the name of the Lafayette room, and is in every particular furnished after the manner of a sleeping apartment of one hundred years ago. The curtains of the high bedstead, the quaint toilet-table, the bedside table with its brass candlestick, and the pictures and the ornaments are all in harmony. Nowhere has a discordant modern note been struck. The same thing is true of all the other apartments in the house. The Starks have one and all displayed great taste and decided skill in preserving ...
— The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees • Mary Caroline Crawford

... Bec Sali, "that mine has had the brass to hang up a bell? Does he think we are slaves to run when he rings it? Never ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... level of the ground, and fastened to the rock by one side only, like an altar: two persons could stand, one at the head and one at the foot; and there was a place also for a third in front, even if the door of the cavity was closed. This door was made of some metal, perhaps of brass, and had two folding doors. These doors could be closed by a stone being rolled against them; and the stone used for this purpose was kept outside the cavern. Immediately after our Lord was placed in the sepulchre it was rolled in front of the door. It was very ...
— The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ • Anna Catherine Emmerich

... the inner[1] countries; I mean China, and other emporiums, it receives silk[2], aloes, cloves, clove-wood, chandana[3], and whatever else they produce. These it again transmits to the outer ports[4],—I mean to Male[5], whence the pepper comes; to Calliana[6], where there is brass and sesamine-wood, and materials for dress (for it is also a place of great trade), and to Sindon[7], where they get musk, castor, and androstachum[8], to Persia, the Homeritic coasts[9], and Adule. Receiving in return the ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... volunteers, attended to give in their names: and hence the army was stronger not only by the number, but also by the kind of soldiers, veterans being mixed with them. Before they marched out of the city, they engraved on brass, and fixed up in public view, the decemviral laws, which have received the name of "the twelve tables." There are some who state that the aediles discharged that office by order of ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... Chillingwood returned bearing two small brass-bound chests. The Indian followed him bringing a number of packages of tinned food. Smith glanced from the chests—which were as much as Chillingwood could carry—to the angular proportions of the Indian's burden, then back again to the chests. He watched furtively as the officer ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum

... wharves and warehouses—built on that wondrous Euphrates—were packed with "merchandise of gold, silver, precious stones, of pearls, fine linen, purple, silk, scarlet, and all rare woods, and all manner of vessels of ivory, brass, iron, marble, cinnamon, odours, ointments, frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour, wheat, beasts, sheep, horses, chariots, slaves—and souls ...
— The Mark of the Beast • Sidney Watson

... pillars. The coat of arms of her family rests in the centre of the arch. She died July 3, 1603. The monument has been very much admired. In the southern aisle is the organ, with handsomely carved oak case. On a jutting wall close by is a curious old brass plate found buried in 1770. The inscription is in Latin to Margaret Svanders, who died 1529. The floor of the church is thickly covered with flat tombstones. One of these is in memory of Thomas Carlos, son of Colonel Careless, who hid in the ...
— Hammersmith, Fulham and Putney - The Fascination of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton

... found in possession of these people consited of a few indifferent knives, a few brass kettles some arm bands of iron and brass, a few buttons, woarn as ornaments in their hair, a spear or two of a foot in length and some iron and brass arrow points which they informed me they obtained in exchange for horses from the Crow or ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... dolly! my own little daughter! Oh, but it's the awfullest crack! It just makes me sick to think of the sound When her poor head went whack Against this horrible brass thing That holds up the little shelf. Now, Nursey, what makes you remind me? I know ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole

... Place, Bloomsbury. In the brown monotony of the street it stood out splendid, conspicuous. Its door and half its front were painted a beautiful, a remarkable pea-green, while its door knob and door-knocker were of polished brass. Mrs. Downey's boarding-house knew nothing of concealment or disguise. Every evening, at the hour of seven, through its ground-floor window it offered to the world a scene of stupefying brilliance. The blinds were up, the curtains half-drawn, ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair

... infantry, exhibited some cavalry, and fired a few rounds from a field piece, unlimbered on a height commanding the road. The British still pushed on and the enemy again gave way. They retreated notwithstanding their reinforcement so hurriedly that the six pounder brass gun on the height, an iron eighteen, and an iron six pounder were left behind. At last they reached the woods and Riall considered that for one day he had done enough, on land. But not yet fully satisfied, he detached Captain Robinson with two companies of the King's regiment ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger

... true, the King and the laws permit us to refuse this coin of Mr. Wood, but at the same time it is equally true, that the King and the laws permit us to receive it. Now it is most certain the ministers in England do not suppose the consequences of uttering that brass among us to be so ruinous as we apprehend; because doubtless if they understood it in that light, they are persons of too much honour and justice not to use their credit with His Majesty for saving a most loyal kingdom from destruction. ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. VI; The Drapier's Letters • Jonathan Swift

... short bent sword called a tulwar, with shield on shoulder. The traders walked about with tulwars by their sides, while the idlers carried both the pistol and the shield. The latter is of buffalo-hide, generally covered with brass knobs, and is worn on the left shoulder. The fierce-looking moustaches of the Rajpoots and Patans, and the black beards of the Mussulmans, with their tulwars and shields, as they swaggered about, gave them a particularly warlike air. Even grave-looking men, carried ...
— The Young Rajah • W.H.G. Kingston

... a number of jackbooted, brass-buttoned, gentlemen of various ages were presented in turn to Henrietta who forgot all their names the moment after they were introduced and was quite delighted when she was conducted to her room and ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai

... as I can, but it causes quarrels and almost separation. All my babies have had marasmus in the first year of their lives and I almost lost my baby last summer. I always worry about my children so much. My husband works in a brass foundry it is not a very good job and living is so high that we have to live as cheap as possible. I've only got 2 rooms and kitchen and I do all my work and sewing which is very ...
— Woman and the New Race • Margaret Sanger

... quite pale. "In that case," he said, "we had better begin now, and have a fair start." So without more ado they squatted down on the floor, with the brass pot full of Khichri between them, and began to eat as fast as ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten

... letter upon it to make a space between each word. When he has filled his box he lifts all the letters carefully out without jumbling any of them up together, stands them in a tray, and keeps them from falling down by placing a flat rule of brass against the side of them. When he has set up so many of these metal letters that they are enough, when properly arranged in columns, to make a whole page of printing, they are all brought close together and then tightly fastened in a kind of frame, ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... examine the ancient wealth, the golden store, may closely survey the brilliant cunningly-wrought gems, that so I may the more tranquilly, after seeing the treasured wealth, quit my life, and my country, which I have governed long." Bowls and dishes, a sword "shot with brass," a standard "all gilded, ... locked by strong spells," from which issued "a ray of light," are brought to him. He enjoys the sight; and here, out of love for his hero, the Christian compiler of the story, ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand

... of the Bucktails have rallied on their right, and thrown up a similar defense of logs, rails, any thing that can stop a bullet. Here the line seems to terminate; but just beyond and a little back, is a brass battery, concealed by bushes, every gun charged with grape and canister. A house stands close behind the line, in a recess ...
— In The Ranks - From the Wilderness to Appomattox Court House • R. E. McBride

... girl exclaimed as she entered, "more unlike a solicitor's office, I never saw! Flowers outside and flowers on your desk, Mr. Pengarth! Don't you have to apologize to your clients for your surroundings? There's absolutely nothing, except the brass plate outside, to show that this isn't an old-fashioned farmhouse, stuck down in the middle of a village. Fuchsias ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... took an enthusiastic interest in Rosetta's brick-building, superintended and sharply criticised Mee Lay's games of dominoes, and even suggested herself as a substitute. Burmese dominoes are black, with brass points, and held in the hand like cards. Mrs. Slater, a keen and clever opponent, indignantly refused to relinquish her post to her relative, and was radiant and triumphant when she carried off a stake of eight annas. Shafto would have enjoyed these matches, and this contest of wits ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker

... of the dreadful excess to which she had abandoned herself, the imagination of Mrs. —— became disordered, and conjured up horrible visions. In her fits of the delirium tremens, she fancied herself bound with a belt of brass, to which was attached a chain held by the great enemy of souls, who had indeed enchained her with the most dire and effectual of all his spells. She would cross the room with the rapidity of lightning, screaming that he was winding up the chain, and she must ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society

... fashionable just in time to save it from being metamorphosed by its mistress into a show of gay meanness and costly ugliness. A good fire of mingled peat and coal burned bright in the barrel-fronted steel grate, and shone in the brass fender. The face of the boy continued to look very red in the glow, but still its colour came more from within than from without: he cherished the memory of his father, and did not love his mother more ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald

... other the tip of his fingers, as soon as the ceremonious part of the reception was over; and casting a glance, half admiring, half critical, at the appearance of things on deck—"What has Nelson sent us down here about this fine morning, and—ha!—how long have you had those brass ornaments ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper

... King's Head," has a dark avenue of yews leading from the road to the porch. A brass to the memory of Archbishop Harsnett may be seen on the floor of the chancel. The epitaph in Latin was ordered to be so written in the will of the archbishop. Translated, the first portion may be read: "Here lieth Samuel Harsnett, formerly ...
— What to See in England • Gordon Home

... sauce which pampers man's appetite, and the drug that restores him to health—on the ermine which decorates the judge, and the rope which hangs the criminal—on the poor man's salt, and the rich man's spice—on the brass nails of the coffin, and the ribands of the bride. At bed or board, couchant or levant, we must pay—the schoolboy whips his taxed top—the beardless youth manages his taxed horse, with a taxed bridle, on a taxed road;—and ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell

... Bergundy; and in the midst of these historical personages Dietrich of Berne, a fabulous hero: the closed visor concealed the countenances of the knights, but when this visor was lifted up a brazen countenance appeared under a helmet of brass, and the features of the knight were of bronze, like his armour. The visor of Dietrich of Berne is the only one which cannot be lifted up, the artist meaning in that manner to signify the mysterious veil which covers the history of ...
— Ten Years' Exile • Anne Louise Germaine Necker, Baronne (Baroness) de Stael-Holstein

... far, and we soon found ourselves outside a square whitewashed building, which had a huge "Dr. Cullingworth" on a great brass plate at the side of the door. Underneath was printed "May be consulted gratis from ten to four." The door was open, and I caught a glimpse of a crowd of people waiting ...
— The Stark Munro Letters • J. Stark Munro

... the countess's door a stair carpet, held at each step by a brass rod, made a soft ascent to the feet of visitors; this, too, had been removed. A screen-door covered with green velvet and studded with brass nails had hitherto protected the entrance to the apartment; of that no sign, except the injury to the wall done by the workmen in taking it away. For a moment ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... he could help it! None but himself or his "Marse Frank" was under any circumstances permitted to get on her back. If watchfulness could possibly preserve the mare unharmed and in fine shape until the day of the great race, Neb plainly meant to see that this was done. Even the amateur brass-band and glee-club into which he had organized the stable-boys and other negro lads about the place, and of which he acted as drum-major—the proudest moment of his life were when he donned the moth-eaten old shako which was his towering badge of ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey

... full, ejecting the disjointed syllables during the intervals of mastication! In truth, an American seems to look on a judge exactly as he does on a carpenter or coppersmith; and it never occurs to him, that an administrator of justice is entitled to greater respect than a constructor of brass knockers, or the sheather of a ship's bottom. The judge and the brazier are paid equally for their work; and Jonathan firmly believes that, while he has money in his pocket, there is no risk of suffering from the want either of law or ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... mistress, or any sick members of the family—a straw mattress and a wooden pillow. His bows and arrows, with a pair of dags or pistols, hung on a rack against the wall at the foot of his bed, and a little brass cross engraved with a figure of the Crucified hung over it. It was such a chamber as any son of a house might have, who was ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson

... another wire crossing the first at right angles. This action breaks an electric current which has traversed a second electro-magnet F (Fig. 2), and releases the iron armature N of the lever NP, pivoted at P, thus enabling a strong spiral spring G to lift a stout brass wire L out of mercury, and to break at the surface of the mercury a strong current that has circulated round the primary circuit of a Ruhmkorff's induction coil; this produces at the surface of the mercury ...
— The Splash of a Drop • A. M. Worthington

... difficulties of engineering and finance. Among other things, there are 213 kilometres of subterranean tunnellings to be built; eleven thousand workmen are employed; the cost is estimated at 125 million francs. The Italian government is erecting to its glory a monument more durable than brass. This is their heritage from the Romans—this talent for dealing with rocks and waters; for bridling a destructive environment and making it subservient to purposes of human intercourse. It is a part of that practical Roman genius for "pacification." Wild nature, to the ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas

... in marriage. If she marry him, she will marry a beggar: not an acre of mine shall he inherit, not a dollar of mine will he receive. Give her a dowry? Give her a dukedom. No, sir; I will not buy brass from you at the price of gold; I will not subsidize you to avoid your ward." And, with the words, he bowed himself out of the room, and the advocate, casting himself backwards in his easy chair, laughing, exclaimed: "Was ever such ...
— The Advocate • Charles Heavysege

... speaking of this audacious attack of Vandamme that the Emperor used this expression, which has been so justly admired, "For a retreating enemy it is necessary to make a bridge of gold, or oppose a wall of brass." The Emperor heard with his usual imperturbability the particulars of the loss he had just experienced, but nevertheless repeatedly expressed his astonishment at the deplorable recklessness of Vandamme, and said he could not comprehend how this experienced general could have allowed himself ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... which the old portcullis used to slide. He passed through the gateway, under the tower, into the graveled courtyard of the Castle. On three sides the courtyard was loop-holed and sullen, but on the fourth modern windows and a brass-knobbed door had been let into the solid masonry. Above the door, shining down on the whitened steps, a lamp burnt in a wrought-iron socket. Several of the windows were ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson

... is exposed to the air is likely to tarnish very quickly. To obviate this, after I have cleaned and polished my brass vases etc., in the usual way I take a rag, and with this smear just a tiny scrap of vaseline over the brass. This keeps it bright ...
— Armour's Monthly Cook Book, Volume 2, No. 12, October 1913 - A Monthly Magazine of Household Interest • Various

... tune of the brass band, he stepped from the upper rung upon the roomy deck, and stood in the garish sheen of an arc-light, he found himself between two rows of men, the officers and some of the ship's crew. It was the group of uniformed men he had noticed from below. He was astonished and delighted ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann

... I was convinced from others seeing him that I was not mad, I should believe in design. If I could be convinced thoroughly that life and mind was in an unknown way a function of other imponderable force, I should be convinced. If man was made of brass or iron and no way connected with any other organism which had ever lived, I should perhaps be convinced. ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin

... Broadway, turned sharply to the right and entered a fashionable all-night cafe. Halting for a moment in the richly-carpeted and mirrored vestibule to divest themselves of their outer garments, they pocketed the brass checks handed out by a dapper page and passing on into the restaurant, quietly took seats in ...
— The Easiest Way - A Story of Metropolitan Life • Eugene Walter and Arthur Hornblow

... were but as one day! The cane coal-scuttle, instinct with spirit, beeted the fire of its own accord, without word or beck of ours, as if placed there by the hands of one of our wakeful Lares; in globe of purest crystal the Glenlivet shone; unasked the bright brass kettle began to whisper its sweet 'under song;' and a centenary of the fairest oysters native to our isle turned towards us their languishing eyes, unseen the Nereid that had on the instant wafted them from ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various

... her drawing-room, which looked like a stall at a bazaar, but, to her credit be it said, that she had never made any change in it, except to remove a brass idol from the writing-table, at which she was ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley

... fearing Bothwell and yielding their countenance to his plans—pacing that chamber, appearing at that window, her loveliness, her adornments, and all the wiles of triumphant beauty forgotten, throwing forth to the earth that was as brass and the skies that were as iron, like a wild animal in its torment, her hoarse inarticulate cry. And, whatever we may think of her merits, that terrible spectacle is more than flesh and blood can bear. Pity takes the place of wrath and indignation that she alone should suffer: why ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant

... sham! the tiger was sham!" laughed William W. Kolderup. "Both of them were stuffed with straw, and landed before you saw them with Jup Brass ...
— Godfrey Morgan - A Californian Mystery • Jules Verne

... Diana of Poitiers, with a crescent on her brow, and is furnished with firedogs of elaborately worked iron. The centre panel bears the arms of Admiral Bonnivet. Stained-glass windows admit a softly-tinted light. From the magnificently painted ceiling, a chandelier of brass repousse work hangs from the claws of a ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... other boys told the same. They could just pick and choose their good times. Tessie's mind groped about, sensing a certain injustice. How about the girls? She didn't put it thus squarely. Hers was not a logical mind. Easy enough to paw over the men-folks and get silly over brass buttons and a uniform. She put it that way. She thought of the refrain of a popular song: "What Are You Going to Do to Help the Boys?" Tessie, smiling a crooked little smile up there in the darkness, parodied the words deftly: "What're ...
— One Basket • Edna Ferber

... one no more intelligent than a week-end at Brighton. Well, it doesn't matter. What ingrates we should be now to turn on Kipling because we disagree with the politics he prefers, those loud opinions of his which, when we get too much of them, remain in the ears for a while like the echoes of a brass tray which a hearty child banged for a drum. Though we hold the British Constitution as sacred as the family vault we do not think the less of Dickens because the awful spectacle of our assembled legislators made ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson

... the daily appearance of the Sun, it has been satisfactorily settled that it is completely enveloped in gas. By the application of the literary spectrum, it is also shown that this gaseous vaporization is the result of brass in a high state of incandescence, while the indications of alkalies, and, in fact, all kinds of lies, are no ...
— Punchinello Vol. II., No. 30, October 22, 1870 • Various

... leading a correct life! Would he not be a much better man if allowed to have Hester!—whereas in all probability she would fall to the lot of some quill-driver like her father—a man that made a livelihood by drumming his notions into the ears of people that did not care a brass farthing about them!—Thus would Vavasor's love-fits work themselves off—declining from cold noon to a drizzly ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald

... jackass-voiced macaw; and next a couple of hundred screeching songbirds, and presently some fetid guinea pigs and rabbits, and a howling colony of cats. It is all a groping and ignorant effort to construct out of base metal and brass filings, so to speak, something to take the place of that golden treasure denied them by Nature, a child. But this is a digression. The unwritten law of this region requires you to kill Judge Driscoll on sight, and he and the community will expect that ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... thing, but her play, her taste, her magnificence, even her general familiarity, made her the fashion. She soon declared the women's head-dresses ridiculous, as indeed they were. They were edifices of brass wire, ribbons, hair, and all sorts of tawdry rubbish more than two feet high, making women's faces seem in the middle of their bodies. The old ladies wore the same, but made of black gauze. If they moved ever so lightly the edifice trembled and the inconvenience ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... machinery of war, as when riding past a great manufactory you see a single pulley, or a row of spindles through a window. You do not see the thousands of wheels, belts, shafts,—the hundred thousand spindles, the arms of iron, fingers of brass, and springs of steel, and the mighty wheel which gives motion to all,—and so you have not seen the great, complicated, far-reaching, and powerful machinery ...
— My Days and Nights on the Battle-Field • Charles Carleton Coffin

... the river and viewed our camp with much attention for some time and retired.- at 5 P.M. Frazier who had been permitted to go to the village this morning returned with a pasel of Roots and bread which he had purchased. brass buttons is an article of which these people are tolerably fond, the men have taken advantage of their prepossession in favour of buttons and have devested themselves of all they had in possesson which they have given in exchange for roots ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... probably succeeded, for the arrows and ordinary missiles of the defenders rebounded and rolled down innocuous from the tough brass-bound bull-hides; and the rebels were already well nigh in despair, when Caius Crispus, who had been playing his part gallantly at the barricade, and had stabbed two or three of the legionaries with his pilum, in hand to hand encounter, through the apertures of the grating, rushed up to the battlements, ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 2 of 2) • Henry William Herbert

... nearly every inch of the otherwise smooth stem. These plants give forth tubers of irregular shape, in substance like a parsnip, about six inches long and four thick. The tubers, after being scraped and rinsed, are ground, or rather grated against a wheel with a brass grater as a tire. One slave turns the wheel, and another presses the root against it. The pulp is then put into bags and pressed. The matter, which resembles cheese-cake in consistence, is then rubbed through a wire sieve and thrown into shallow copper pans moderately heated. After ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston

... Bell-metal, copper and brass kettles require very nice cleaning immediately before they are used, or it will endanger your health. Vinegar with salt or ashes should be used; save the vinegar that is left in the pickle ...
— Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers • Elizabeth E. Lea

... tokens, and English and Irish half-pence, mostly of base metal, had been congregated into the box. There was a very substantial pencil-case, and the semblance of a shilling; but he latter proved to be made of tin, and the former of German-silver. A gilded brass button was doing duty as a gold coin, and a folded shopbill had assumed the character of a bank-note. But Deacon Tilton's feelings were much revived by the aspect of another bank-note, new and crisp, adorned with beautiful engravings, ...
— Other Tales and Sketches - (From: "The Doliver Romance and Other Pieces: Tales and Sketches") • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... of the tent placed a large kettle on the fire, wiped it carefully with a horse's tail, filled it with water, threw in some coarse tea and a little salt. When this was nearly boiled she stirred the mixture with a brass ladle until the liquor became very brown, when she poured it into another vessel. Cleaning the kettle as before, the woman set it again on the fire to fry a paste of meal and fresh butter. Upon this she poured the tea and some thick cream, stirred it, and after a time the whole. Was taken ...
— The Little Tea Book • Arthur Gray

... Every week or two, new patterns are brought out, better, lighter, or prettier than the last; whereupon the old ones are thrown aside, though not half worn. Why, Miss, do you know that your sex are carrying about them some thousands of tons of brass and steel in the shape of these skirts? As to the waste, it is already so large as to have become a public nuisance. An old hat or shoe may be given away to somebody,—an old scrubbing-brush may be disposed of by putting it into the stove; but as to an old skirt, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various

... had begun to threaten Chen Li at once. He told his tale. He was, said this fellow, next door neighbour to Mr. Daniel Multenius, in Praed Street, Chen Li's landlord: his name, if Chen Li wanted to know it, was Parslett, fruitier and green-grocer, and it was there, bold as brass, over his shop-door, for him or anybody to look at. He had a side-door to his house: that side-door was exactly opposite a side-door in Mr. Multenius's house, opening into his back-parlour. Now, ...
— The Orange-Yellow Diamond • J. S. Fletcher

... resumed, while she bestowed the sovereign in an incredibly old bag-purse with a brass rim; "tell him there's always one foolish in a family, and what it is with Masther Larry, he's too give-ish! That's what ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross

... burning of the woods, which caused the ores to run. Copper and brass came first and were rated above gold and silver. And then the metals took the place of hands, nails, teeth, and clubs, which had been men's earliest arms and tools. Weaving followed the discovery of the use of iron. Sowing, planting, and grafting were learned from nature herself, ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... what had really been said. But Cartier felt assured that the treachery, if any were contemplated, came only from one of them, Taignoagny. As a great mark of trust he gave to Donnacona two swords, a basin of plain brass and a ewer—gifts which called forth renewed shouts of joy. Before the assemblage broke up, the chief asked Cartier to cause the ships' cannons to be fired, as he had learned from the two guides that they made such a marvellous noise ...
— The Mariner of St. Malo: A Chronicle of the Voyages of Jacques Cartier • Stephen Leacock

... virtuous character cannot be defaced, nor can the vices of a vicious man ever become lucid. A jewel preserves its lustre, though trodden in the mud, but a brass pot, though placed upon the head, ...
— Book of Wise Sayings - Selected Largely from Eastern Sources • W. A. Clouston

... paying the price of admission, I had to run the gauntlet through a score of black-headed Teutons, who salaamed and grinned as they ushered me into the blank space beyond, containing nothing more interesting than a few tables and chairs, a dumb brass band, and a swarm of hungry waiters. I saw no dance-houses, such as there were in Hamburg; and by nine o'clock the festivities of the day were at an end. The Easter fair lasted some five or six weeks, and at its termination its merriment disappeared. ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie

... satisfactory: (1) The gut is soaked in juniper oil for at least a month; the juniper oil is then removed by ether and alcohol, and the gut preserved in 1 in 1000 solution of corrosive sublimate in alcohol (Kocher). (2) The gut is placed in a brass receiver and boiled for three-quarters of an hour in a solution consisting of 85 per cent. absolute alcohol, 10 per cent. water, and 5 per cent. carbolic acid, and is then stored in 90 per cent. alcohol. (3) Cladius ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles

... Hibernia, famed, 'bove every other grace, For matchless intrepidity of face. 340 From her his features caught the generous flame, And bid defiance to all sense of shame. Tutor'd by her all rivals to surpass, 'Mongst Drury's sons he comes, and shines in Brass. Lo, Yates[27]! Without the least finesse of art He gets applause—I wish he'd get his part. When hot Impatience is in full career, How vilely 'Hark ye! hark ye!' grates the ear; When active fancy from the brain is sent, And stands on tip-toe for some wish'd event, 350 I hate those careless blunders, ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... canst instruct that those who have the itch Of craving more, are never rich. These things thou knows't to th' height, and dost prevent That plague, because thou art content With that Heaven gave thee with a wary hand, (More blessed in thy brass than land) To keep cheap Nature even and upright; To cool, not cocker appetite. Thus thou canst tersely live to satisfy The belly chiefly, not the eye; Keeping the barking stomach wisely quiet, Less with a neat than needful diet. But that which most ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick

... little. I remember being frightened by sitting so high up on my father's shoulder, and then feeling so safe when I got into my mother's lap; and I remember Robin's curls, and his taking my woolly ball from me. I remember our black frocks coming in the hair-trunk with brass nails to the sea-side, where Margery and I were with our nurse, and her telling the landlady that our father and mother and brother were all laid in one grave. And I remember going home, and seeing the stone flags up in the yard, and a deep dark hole ...
— Last Words - A Final Collection of Stories • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... afar it was a stately and beautiful vessel, deep red in colour, double-banked with scarlet oars, its broad, flapping sail stained with Tyrian purple, its bulwarks gleaming with brass work. A brazen, three-pronged ram projected in front, and a high golden figure of Baal, the God of the Phoenicians, children of Canaan, shone upon the after deck. From the single high mast above the huge sail streamed the tiger-striped flag of Carthage. So, like some stately ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle

... if I like this orderin' business," said one grizzled seaman; "they said he was h—l on orders, but what I shipped for was prize money and a chance to get a lick at them bloody Britishers; not for to clean brass work, an' scrape spars, an' flemish down, an' holy-stone decks, which he won't let us spit terbacker on. I don't call this no fighting fur liberty, not ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... are graceful and almost pretty, slight in figure, and very fond of ornament. Indeed both sexes pierce their ears, noses, and lips, through which to thrust silver, brass, and gold rings, also covering their ankles and arms with metallic rings, the number only limited by their means. In the immediate neighborhood of the town are some English plantations and neat cottages, with inclosures of flowers and orchards of fruit trees; while still ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou

... opposite to each other. A little further along the corridor came the two best bedrooms, which, at first sight, gave to a Parisian girl a sensation of bareness and emptiness, corrected later by habit. Everything necessary was to be found there,—large brass bedsteads with snowy coverings, all the modern contrivances for the toilet, chests of drawers, each surmounted by a bright looking-glass; even a number of tiny and curious gimcracks ornamented the narrow mantelpiece; but to ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al

... a rather imposing outfit. First of all, he purchased and packed about 600 pounds worth of beads of many colours, cloth of different kinds, thick brass wire, and a variety of cheap trinkets, such as black men and women are fond of, for Yoosoof was an "honest" trader, and paid his way when he found it suitable to do so. He likewise hired a hundred men, whom he armed with guns, ...
— Black Ivory • R.M. Ballantyne

... adorned the old Twentieth Street drawing-room; and thrifty Mrs. Hitchcock had not sufficiently readjusted herself to the new state to banish it to the floor above, where it belonged with some ugly, solid brass andirons. In the same way, faithful Mr. Hitchcock had seen no good reason why he should degrade the huge steel engraving of the Aurora, which hung prominently at the foot of the stairs, in spite of its light ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... that, we can cram in a handful of nails, or brass buttons, or hammer up a few halfpence—anything of that sort will do to settle ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest

... and calls out, dramatically, "Behold me!" takes the order, shrieks it to the cook, and returning with the dinner, cries out again, more dramatically than ever, "Behold it ready!" and arrays it with a great flourish on the table. I have dined in an hotel at Niagara, to the music of a brass band; but I did not find that so utterly bewildering, so destructive of the individual savor of the dishes, and so conducive to absent-minded gluttony, as I at first found the constant rush and clamor of the waiters in the Venetian ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells

... the Philosophy there is a frontispiece, a lamp furnace, consisting of a brass rod, fastened to a piece of metal, furnished with rings of different diameters, and thumb screws to raise or lower the lamp and rings when in use. By this furnace evaporation, digestion, solution, sublimation, distillation and other processes, which require a low temperature, ...
— James Cutbush - An American Chemist, 1788-1823 • Edgar F. Smith

... Chicago in circumstances of far less dignity than the Democratic Convention at Charleston. Processions and brass bands, rough fellows collected by Lincoln's managers, rowdies imported from New York by Seward's, filled the streets with noise; and the saloon keepers did good business. Yet the actual Convention consisted of grave men in an earnest mood. Besides ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood

... cushion, a well for parcels under the seat, two high slim wheels, and a pair of shafts connected by a bar at the ends. The body is usually lacquered and decorated according to its owner's taste. Some show little except polished brass, others are altogether inlaid with shells known as Venus's ear, and others are gaudily painted with contorted dragons, or groups of peonies, hydrangeas, chrysanthemums, and mythical personages. They cost from 2 pounds upwards. The shafts rest on the ground at a steep incline ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird

... described (in a biographical sketch published in the "Gardener's Chronicle", 1864) as having been one of the first physicians in London who gave up the customary black coat, knee-breeches and silk stockings, and adopted the ordinary dress of the period, a blue coat with brass buttons, and a buff waiscoat, a costume which he continued to wear to the last. After giving up practice, which he did early in life, he spent much of his time in acts of unpretending philanthropy.) Your helping ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin

... young lady says in a serious tone, "GILMORE'S band should have played that piece without any assistance. These New York people do not understand the potentialities of brass." ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870 • Various

... always did smoke when the wind was in the north. A Smut came down and settled on a brass knob of the fender, which the councillor's housekeeper had polished that very morning. The shining surface reflected the Smut, and he seemed to himself ...
— Miscellanea • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... which had the desired effect. At this moment one of the natives took up the stand, and upon our pointing at him, they appeared to comprehend our object; a consultation was held over the stand which was minutely examined; but, as it was mounted with brass and, perhaps on that account, appeared to them more valuable than a tomahawk, they declined giving it up, and gradually dispersed; or rather pretended so to do, for a party of armed natives was observed to conceal themselves under some mangrove ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King

... from abroad or is grown at home; on the sauce which pampers man's appetite and on the drug that restores him to health; on the ermine which decorates the judge and the rope which hangs the criminal; on the poor man's salt and the rich man's spice; on the brass nails of the coffin and ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... aged news-vender at the corner; he then crossed Piccadilly Circus into Coventry Street, skirted Leicester Square, and at the end of Green Street entered Pavoni's Italian restaurant. There he took his seat always at the same table, hung his hat always on the same brass peg, ordered the same Hungarian wine, and read the same evening paper. He spoke to no one; no one spoke ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis

... then, met, and were reconciled. But it was a reconciliation without cordiality, without affection—a shaking of hands across a barrier of brass; and even this hand-shaking was a strictly metaphorical one, for they do not seem ever to have got beyond the interchange of a frigid bow. The opportunities, however, for observation were few. Soon after ...
— Prince Zaleski • M.P. Shiel

... with that intention; for he did not mean that his pupil should commence that day, or the next; and he was in no doubt which to choose among many old lectionaries that had been laid aside. There was an immense one, with great brass knobs and corners, out of which he had himself learned to chant long before he could lift it, and indeed, now that he was come to man's estate, it was as much as he could carry. This book he meant to use; but for ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 449 - Volume 18, New Series, August 7, 1852 • Various

... into which every thing connected with industry has fallen under the Turkish government, prevents us from obtaining any information in regard to the mineral stores of that country, "whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayst dig brass." Volney indeed relates, that ores of the former metal abound, in the mountains of Kesraoun and of the Druses, in other words, in the extensive range of which Libanus is the principal member. Every summer the inhabitants work those mines which are simply ochreous. There is a vague report in the district, ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell

... last, dimly visible through the driving rain. It was a miserable-looking hovel, roofed with sodden thatch, surrounded by a sea of mud. A bare-footed woman stood in the doorway. She wore a tattered skirt and a bodice fastened across her breast with a brass safety-pin. Behind her stood a tall man in a soiled flannel jacket and a pair of trousers which hung in a ragged fringe ...
— Lady Bountiful - 1922 • George A. Birmingham

... Mayor, Mr. George Shenton, and the other members of the City Council, companies of volunteers lined the streets on either side, and the various bodies of Freemasons, Oddfellows, and Good Templars, accompanied by the brass band of the latter, took a part in the procession. A great crowd of citizens assembled, and the balconies of the houses on both sides were thronged with the fair sex, and garlands of flowers were showered down upon us. The streets of the city were decorated ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles

... of the Tamar River, which divides Cornwall from Devon, and a little above Saltash, stands the country church of Landulph, so close by the water that the high tides wash by its graveyard wall. Within the church you will find a mural tablet of brass thus inscribed— ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... between two inanimate horses? The horses I mean of Wool-Church and Charing, Who told many truths worth any man's hearing, Since Viner and Osborn did buy and provide 'em For the two mighty monarchs who now do bestride 'em. The stately brass stallion, and the white marble steed, The night came together, by all 'tis agreed; When both kings were weary of sitting all day, They stole off, incognito, each his own way; And then the two jades, after mutual salutes, Not only ...
— Andrew Marvell • Augustine Birrell

... groups were playing at dice; for gambling is the passion of slaves. And many of these men, to whom wealth could bring no comfort, had secretly amassed large hoards at the plunder of Plataea, from which they had sold to the traders of Aegina gold at the price of brass. The appearance of the rioters was startling and melancholy. They were mostly stunted and undersized, as are generally the progeny of the sons of woe; lean and gaunt with early hardship, the spine of the back curved and bowed by habitual degradation; ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton

... in the navel of his belly. He moveth his tail like a cedar. His bones are as strong pieces of brass. His bones are like bars of iron. He lieth under the shady trees in the covert of the reeds and fens. The shady trees cover him with their shadow. The willows of ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... at the young man cautiously, almost suspiciously. "He don't keep no jewels nor no money in his chamber. He got some old things,—old jugs, old brass figgers, old money, such as they used to have in old times: she don't pass now." Paolo's genders were apt to be ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... on Lead, tin, and brass Tallow Melted Lead and brass Muriatic acid (reduced) With swab Copper, galvanized iron and brass Muriatic acid (raw) With ...
— Elements of Plumbing • Samuel Dibble

... The New Babylon Brass Band fell lustily upon a popular two-step at this moment, and an usher thrust a bundle of campaign leaflets into Graves's hands. One of these pamphlets contained a half-tone portrait of Shelby, with an account of his career and a few phrases from the more noteworthy of ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther

... used for storing jars of oil, liqueur, and deck-chairs; the hotel flourishing, some religious body had taken the place in hand, and it was now fitted out with a number of glazed yellow benches, claret-coloured footstools; it had a small pulpit, and a brass eagle carrying the Bible on its back, while the piety of different women had supplied ugly squares of carpet, and long strips of embroidery heavily wrought with ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf

... (ironically) Ah! M. Dupre, I don't care a brass button about my son's union with Mlle. de Verby—the niece of a disreputable man! It was that fool of a Madame du Brocard who tried to bring about this grand match. But to come down to a daughter of ...
— Pamela Giraud • Honore de Balzac

... was five foot six and weighed, possibly, a hundred and thirty-five pounds, and was no boxer. Sickles was six foot three and weighed two-fifty. He had enormous muscles and knuckles of brass. His hide was thick and hard as double-ought canvas. Drislane could have stood off and pounded on his ribs for a week and hardly black-and-blued them. He could have swung on him for a month ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly

... right hand energetically, laid its inner edge against the brass buttons of his kepi, and then waved ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable

... answered Eldrick coolly. "You're not? Good! If you want a wife, there's Miss Mallathorpe. Nice, clever girl, my boy—and no end of what Barford folk call brass. ...
— The Talleyrand Maxim • J. S. Fletcher

... best conductors of heat, as well as electricity, being used for kettles, boilers, stills and wherever this quality is desirable. Copper is also used in alloys with other metals, forming an important part of brass, bronze, german silver, bell metal and gun metal. It is about one-eighth heavier than steel and has a tensile strength of about 25,000 to 50,000 ...
— Oxy-Acetylene Welding and Cutting • Harold P. Manly

... to be satisfied, and so I now present to them this sixth volume, which relates the stirring adventures of the three Rover boys in the Adirondacks, whither they had gone to solve the mystery of a certain brass-lined money casket found by them on an island in ...
— The Rover Boys In The Mountains • Arthur M. Winfield

... more than a quarter of a century, both in their skill and the economy of their labour, they have been unmatched throughout the country. As manufacturers of ironmongery, they carry the palm from the whole district; as founders of brass and workers of steel, they fear none; while as nailers and locksmiths, their fame has spread even to the European markets, whither their most skilful workmen have frequently ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli

... earthen jar, bound round with brass, Lies tangled in the cordage of his net. About the bright waves gleam like shattered glass, And where the sea's rim was The sun dips, flat ...
— Young Adventure - A Book of Poems • Stephen Vincent Benet

... you may be sure, and out to join the party that moved with infinite precaution on the water troughs as soon as it was light enough to see clearly. We found them riddled with bullets and the water all run out. Gleaming brass cartridges scattered, catching the first rays of the sun, attested the vigour of the defence. Four bodies lay huddled on the ground under the partial shelter of the troughs. I saw Ramon, his face frowning and sinister even in death, his right hand still grasping ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White

... the shadow, and, my hand pressed to my side, I tried to collect my scattered senses and to plan out what I should do. As I stood there, breathless, the great brass bells roared twice above my head. It was two o'clock. Four was the hour when the storming-party would be in its place. I had still two ...
— The Adventures of Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle

... hats, the crook-necked squashes, the skeins of thread and yarn hanging in bunches on the wainscot; the sheen of the pewter plates and basins, standing in rows on the shelves of the dresser; the trusty firelock, with powder-horn, bandolier, and bullet-pouch, hanging on the summer-tree, and the bright brass warming-pan behind the bedroom door—all stand more clearly revealed for an instant, showing the provident care for the comfort and safety of the household. Dimly seen in the corners of the room are baskets in which are packed hands of flax from the barn, where, under the flax-brake, the swingling-knife ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 3, March, 1886 - Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 3, March, 1886 • Various

... the puzzle in a rather curious practical form, as it was made in polished mahogany with brass hinges for use by certain audiences. It will be seen that the four pieces form a sort of chain, and that when they are closed up in one direction they form the triangle, and when closed in the other ...
— The Canterbury Puzzles - And Other Curious Problems • Henry Ernest Dudeney



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