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Knock   /nɑk/   Listen
Knock

verb
(past & past part. knocked; pres. part. knocking)
1.
Deliver a sharp blow or push :.  Synonym: strike hard.
2.
Rap with the knuckles.
3.
Knock against with force or violence.  Synonym: bump.
4.
Make light, repeated taps on a surface.  Synonyms: pink, rap, tap.
5.
Sound like a car engine that is firing too early.  Synonyms: ping, pink.  "The car pinked when the ignition was too far retarded"
6.
Find fault with; express criticism of; point out real or perceived flaws.  Synonyms: criticise, criticize, pick apart.  "Don't knock the food--it's free"



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"Knock" Quotes from Famous Books



... I suggested that she should steal in first by the way she had come out, and that I should wait a little and knock at the door when she had had time ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman

... from the other end of the table. Mrs. Starling had raised her voice, but Josiah's wits always wanted a knock at the door before they ...
— Diana • Susan Warner

... Dr. Bevan to look at him, as I do not care for such undivided responsibility. And perhaps it will be well to have a nurse for a week or two. Mrs. Crampton is not as young as she was, and it is a pity to knock her up." ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... and arrows, or of their lances; and we thought their numbers increased upon our hands, particularly we thought so by the noise. So I called to our men to halt, and bid them pour in one whole volley and then shout, as we did in our first fight, and so run in upon them and knock them down with ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe

... closed with a decision that sent a sharp echo through the silent, heated air, and Mr. Dyceworthy was left to contemplate it at his leisure. Full of wrath, he was about to knock peremptorily and insist that it should be re-opened; but on second thoughts he decided that it was beneath his dignity to argue with a servant, much less with a declared lunatic like Sigurd,—so he made the best of his way back to his boat, thinking gloomily of the hard labor awaiting ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... The Legends of King Arthur were uppermost in Johnnie's mind, that the flat had a mysterious caller, this a bald-headed, stocky man wearing a hard black hat, a gray woolly storm coat, and overshoes. "You Johnnie Smith?" he asked when the door was opened to his knock. ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates

... There was a knock at the door. Sir Edward's secretary ushered in a tall, plainly dressed gentleman, who had the slightly aggrieved air of a man who has been kept out of his bed beyond the ...
— The Illustrious Prince • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... Huntingdon was at work in her own private sitting-room, there came a knock at the door, followed by the head ...
— Amos Huntingdon • T.P. Wilson

... of sight when, with bitter sobs, the quadroon retraced her steps to the door of the cottage. Clotelle had in the mean time awoke, and now inquired of her mother how long her father had been gone. At that instant, a knock was heard at the door, and supposing that it was Henry returning for something he had forgotten, as he frequently did, Isabella flew to let him in. To her amazement, however, a strange woman stood ...
— Clotelle - The Colored Heroine • William Wells Brown

... the bait. There was only one ship in the galaxy that could knock back a blip that big at such a distance. It was closing last, using the raw energy of the battleship engines for a headlong approach. My ship bucked a bit as the tug-beams locked on at maximum distance. The radio ...
— The Misplaced Battleship • Harry Harrison (AKA Henry Maxwell Dempsey)

... much changed. In outward appearance more even than the time accounted for. No man can knock about the world, in different lands and climates, for seventeen years, without bearing the marks of it. Though still under fifty, he had all the air of an "elderly" man, and had grown a little "peculiar" in his ways, ...
— The Laurel Bush • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

... observes, the Otter smels a fish forty furlong off him in the water; and that it may be true, is affirmed by Sir Francis Bacon (in the eighth Century of his Natural History) who there proves, that waters may be the Medium of sounds, by demonstrating it thus, That if you knock two stones together very deep under the water, those that stand on a bank neer to that place may hear the noise without any diminution of it by the water. He also offers the like experiment concerning the letting an Anchor fall by a very long Cable or rope on a Rock, ...
— The Compleat Angler - Facsimile of the First Edition • Izaak Walton

... said Barby half sorrowfully and half indignantly;—"you look as if a straw would knock you down this minute. There's sense into everything. You catch me a going to bed and leaving you up! It won't do me no hurt to sit here the hull night; and I'm the only one in the house that's fit for it, with the exception of Philetus, and the little wit he has by day seems ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner

... noble lords to go to bed, we shall now return to Amsterdam at twelve o'clock at night precisely; as the bell tolled, a loud knock was heard at the syndic's house. Koop, who had been ordered by his master to remain up, immediately opened the door, and a posse comitatus of ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat

... escape, she armed herself with a chopper in one hand and the boiling soup in the other, and entering the room where he was, first threw the soup in his face, and then struck him a blow with the hatchet on his neck, which brought him to the ground senseless. At this moment a fresh knock at the door occasioned her to look out of an upper window, when she saw a strange hunter, who demanded admittance, and on her refusal, threatened to break open the door. She immediately got her father's gun, and as he was proceeding to put his threat in execution, she shot ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various

... himself leisurably on a hillock of thyme, began to knock out his pipe against the edge of his boot-sole, and suddenly exploded in laughter so violent that he was forced to hold his sides. The exhibition took Nicky-Nan right aback. He could but ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)

... slight comfort to Mrs. Spriggs that Mr. Augustus Price did, after all, choose a convenient time for his reappearance. A faint knock sounded on the door two days afterwards as she sat at tea with her husband, and an anxious face with somewhat furtive eyes was thrust ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs

... day, and there was no difficulty about "satisfying the keen demands of appetite." But sometimes it rained unexpectedly, and on these occasions fortune was kind to us. A few minutes before it was time to start for home there would be a knock at the door, and a neat little maid would appear bearing a basket, with a message from mother to the schoolmistress, begging that we might be allowed to take dinner in the schoolroom. Who can describe the delights of the feast? ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII. No. 358, November 6, 1886. • Various

... rumbled to a deep, rueful laugh. "In these parts, lad, I'm not called by my proper name. I'm Hodd Savage—The Barbarian. And that was a fair knock you gave me." ...
— The Barbarians • John Sentry

... emotion of which it was the utterance, if we realize clearly this modern spirit of the background. All great modern, and perhaps even ancient, poets are touched by it. Drama itself, as Nietzsche showed, "hankers after dissolution into mystery. Shakespeare would occasionally knock the back out of the stage with a window opening on the 'cloud-capp'd towers.'" But Maeterlinck is the best example, because his genius is less. He is the embodiment, almost the ...
— Ancient Art and Ritual • Jane Ellen Harrison

... indefatigable brain which has had to stand all the wear and pressure of his long life.' In the spring of 1851 he finds him 'very like a spent cannon-ball, with a great and sometimes almost frightful energy remaining in him: though weak in comparison with what he was, he hits a very hard knock to those who come across him.' When December came, the veteran was taken seriously ill, and the hope disappeared of seeing him even reach his eighty-seventh birthday (Dec. 11). On the 7th he died. As Mr. Gladstone wrote to Phillimore, 'though with little left either of sight or hearing, and only ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... now I must knock off for dinner, the variety of which never changes. You've heard of 'Stew, stew, glorious stew'; perhaps, however, beer was the subject then. Well, I'll resume at the first possible moment; for, in the Army, what you don't go and fetch you never see, and then again, first ...
— One Young Man • Sir John Ernest Hodder-Williams

... some word for you late this evening. Yes, one of the local attorneys for your friends came in and we figured everything up. He thought that if this office would throw off a certain per cent. of its expense, and Reed would knock off the interest, his clients would consent to a settlement. I told him to go right back and tell his people that as long as they thought that way, it would only cost them one hundred and forty dollars every twenty-four hours." The lawyer was back within twenty minutes, bringing a draft, covering ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams

... tocsin in his heart; they, and others of authority, will enter in. Petition and request to wearied uncertain National Guard; louder and louder petition; backed by the rattle of our two cannons! The reluctant Grate opens: endless Sansculottic multitudes flood the stairs; knock at the wooden guardian of your privacy. Knocks, in such case, grow strokes, grow smashings: the wooden guardian flies in shivers. And now ensues a Scene over which the world has long wailed; and not unjustly; for a sorrier spectacle, of Incongruity fronting Incongruity, and as it were recognising ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle

... tobacco, with a party of porters, coopers, inspectors, and clerks examining them. It was curious to see how rapidly they would go through the process. The coopers would set a hogshead up upon its end, knock out the head, loosen all the staves at one end, whisk it over upon the platform of the scales, and then lift the hogshead itself entirely off, and set it down on one side, leaving the tobacco alone, in a great round pile, on the platform. Then when it was weighed they would tumble it over upon ...
— Rollo in Holland • Jacob Abbott

... a very cheery tea, and assisted Cynthia to wash up afterwards. We had just put away the last tea-spoon when a knock came at the door. The countenances of Cynthia and Nibs were suddenly petrified into a stern ...
— The Mysterious Affair at Styles • Agatha Christie

... into the boat. Next time he came up I grabbed him an' took him aboard. The fog was pretty thick an' none o' the rest of 'em saw what was goin' on. In a minute or two I could see he was beginnin' to come round an' I didn't quite know what to do. I didn't want to knock him on the head, he hadn't done anythin' to hurt me, an' so I dropped the row-locks overboard, tossed the oars ashore—there they are, lyin' among the seals—an' got ashore myself. As soon as I was on solid ground I untied the painter what ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... and worry now and again," Thomas would say when things did not go as they should. "If we never had un, and livin' were always fine and clear, we'd forget to be thankful for our blessin's. We has t' have a share o' trouble in our lives, and here and there a hard knock whatever, t' know how fine the good things are and rightly enjoy un when they come. And in the end troubles never turn out as bad as we're expectin', by half. First and last there's a wonderful sight more good times than bad uns for ...
— Troop One of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace

... equipment-park." He turned to Inez Malavez. "You call Jarman; tell him what O'Leary reported, and tell him to get cracking on it. Tell him not to let those geeks get any of that equipment onto contragravity; knock it down as fast as they try to lift out with it. And tell him to see what he can do in the way of troop-carriers or lorries, to get Falkenberg's Rifles to the equipment-park.... How's business at the lorry-hangars ...
— Uller Uprising • Henry Beam Piper, John D. Clark and John F. Carr

... stood now, a hand affectionately upon the album, a trace of the fatuously admiring smile still lingering on his expressive face, a knock sounded upon the ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson

... do sailors usually get drugged?" inquired Mr. Mayhew. "What kind of people usually feed sea-faring men with what are generally known as knock-out drops?" ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies • Victor G. Durham

... that I came to knock at my door: all was still and silent: my heart dilated with unutterable happiness, when, to my amazement, I saw the house bursting out in a blaze of fire, and every apperture red with conflagration! I gave a loud convulsive outcry, and fell upon the pavement insensible. This alarmed ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith

... my generosity. It is looked for from the Capataz of the Cargadores, who are the rich men, and, as it were, the Caballeros amongst the common people. I don't care for cards but as a pastime; and as to those girls that boast of having opened their doors to my knock, you know I wouldn't look at any one of them twice except for what the people would say. They are queer, the good people of Sulaco, and I have got much useful information simply by listening patiently ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad

... steward bullied. "Suppose 'm you no fetch 'm beer close up, I knock 'm eight bells 'n 'a dog-watch onta you. Suppose 'm you no fetch 'm close up, me make 'm you go ashore 'n' walk about ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London

... thought what a fight you could put up if you were invisible? Why, you could walk right up in front of a fellow and smash his nose or knock him down before he could put up his guard or smash back—and even then he couldn't see you to hit you. Of course that would be a cowardly thing to do, but I'm just saying "Suppose." And this is to introduce right here your arch enemy, the devil, who ...
— "Say Fellows—" - Fifty Practical Talks with Boys on Life's Big Issues • Wade C. Smith

... course he set them all wild. Their eternal salvation depended on their performing the Nine Fridays successively. And so one Thursday night, when the wind was howling dismally, and the rain pattering on the windows, and the fire in my little grate looking all the brighter from the contrast, a timid knock came to my door. I put down the Pensees of Pascal,—a book for which I have a strange predilection, though I do not like the man who ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan

... of the grave She cannot see the life she gave. For all her love, she cannot tell Whether I use it ill or well, Nor knock at dusty doors to find Her beauty dusty in ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various

... than we minister to our gross selves? Good, good, my lord, bethink you, none have died for my brother's offence, though many have committed it. So you would be the first that gives this sentence, and he the first that suffers it. Go to your own bosom, my lord; knock there, and ask your heart what it does know that is like my brother's fault; if it confess a natural guiltiness such as his is, let it not sound a thought against my brother's life!' Her last words more moved Angelo than all she had before ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb

... shouted the first-lieutenant; "knock off that nonsense, men; stop your fiddling, I say, ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston

... off your shoes and the first man that makes a sound will get his neck cracked. Knock 'em out, if necessary, but no killing ...
— Frontier Boys on the Coast - or in the Pirate's Power • Capt. Wyn Roosevelt

... lower part of the South, the beating or flogging of laborers was such a common occurrence that these places came to be considered veritable peon camps. Besides, in many of the saw-mill establishments overseers and bosses were accustomed to knock Negroes around with pieces of timber or anything else that happened to be within their reach at the needy time. This brought on much dissatisfaction and caused the Negroes to become determined to leave ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various

... piece of wreckage from hotel to hotel. "How different this life is from the life in Ireland. Here we live in the actual moment." And he began to wonder. He had not been thinking five minutes when a knock came to the door, and he was handed a telegram containing two words: "A boy." He had always felt it was going to be a boy. "Though it does cost a shilling a word they might have let me know how she is," he thought. ...
— The Untilled Field • George Moore

... a few minutes' time the well-known knock was heard, and Ermine, with a look half arch half gay, surprised her sister by rising with the aid of the arm of her chair, and adjusting a crutch that had been ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge

... the act of stooping over, when Redvignez sprang behind him with the stealth and agility of a cat, and struck his arm a violent blow. His purpose was to knock the revolver out of the captain's hand, so that he and his friends could secure the use of it. But he overdid the matter, for the revolver went spinning out of the captain's hand and dropped into the water, where it sank out of sight. ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis

... evening a knock at the door brought me back to my objective senses. I had been oblivious to the ...
— The Trail of a Sourdough - Life in Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan

... in response to the cry of "Come in" which followed their knock on the framework of the portal, the visitors at once found themselves face to face with the four ladies, who had risen to their feet to meet them; the sable attendants crouching at the rear end of the apartment with a grin of sympathetic ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood

... was heard on the stairs, he assumed an expression of profound absorption. "Come in," he said, in reply to her knock, timidly repeated. She entered fresh and gay, her beautiful arms bared to the elbows, and with so rustic an air that the rice-powder on her face seemed to be the flour from some theatrical mill in ...
— Jack - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... filthy women and hideous, drunken men ran to the burning houses and seized flaming brands, which they carried in every direction, and which our soldiers were obliged repeatedly to knock out of their hands with the hilts of their swords before they would relinquish them. The Emperor ordered that these incendiaries when taken in the act should be hung to posts in the public squares; and the populace prostrated themselves around these ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant

... friend who was one day to be her master and mine. What a happy home-picture, while in that hotel room— Ah! was I never to find the key of the terrible enigma? Where was I to go? What was I to do? At what door was I to knock? ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne

... daylight to haul the trammel. The trumpeter hadn't been to bed at all. Towards the last he mostly spent his nights (and his days, too) dozing in the elbow-chair where you sit at this minute. He was dozing then (my father said), with his chin dropped forward on his chest, when a knock sounded upon the door, and the door opened, and in walked an upright ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... the mighty trees knock their naked arms together, and creak and cry wildly in the wind. In Forty-nine's cabin, by a flickering log-fire, Carrie sits alone. The wind howls horribly, the door creaks, and the fire snaps wickedly; the wind ...
— Shadows of Shasta • Joaquin Miller

... hand she now holds on the troubled blood Of her incensed lord. Methought the spirit (When he had utter'd his perplex'd presage) Threw his changed countenance headlong into clouds, His forehead bent, as it would hide his face, He knock'd his chin against his darken'd breast, And struck a churlish silence through his powers. Terror of darkness! O, thou king of flames! That with thy music-footed horse dost strike The clear light out of crystal on dark earth, And hurl'st instructive fire about the world, Wake, ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury

... him out of gear and knock his work to pieces for a while. She may even turn up here some day and make a scene on the staircase: one never knows. But until Dick speaks of his own accord you had better not touch him. He is no ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling

... at the door. On account of the smallness of the house the knock certainly must have been heard, but there was ...
— Frank and Fearless - or The Fortunes of Jasper Kent • Horatio Alger Jr.

... you'll find that two can play at that. Dubbs is quite right, and you're a set of asses if you think you'll do any good by burning the punishment book. I've got the poker, and you shan't have it to knock the desk open. I suppose Paton can afford sixpence to buy another book; and enter a tolerable fresh score against you ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar

... have believed them," Henry retorted. "Damn it, Galway, do you think a man like Plunkett would let a lot of fiddling schoolmasters knock him off ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine

... you suppose I've been longing for all day? A good saddle horse? I feel that a brisk canter would set me straight in a short time. But the only horse in Hiroshima is a mule. A knock-kneed, cross-eyed old mule that bitterly resents the insult of being hitched to something that is a cross between a wheelbarrow and a baby buggy. The driver stands up for the excellent reason that he has no place to sit down! We tried this coupe once for the fun ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little

... still insensible," he said, "but she will soon be all right. I can't discover any injury, and I think it likely that it was the sudden shock, and perhaps a knock against the side of the boat, that stunned her; for I have no doubt she could swim, small as she is. This is a much more serious affair; he has an ugly gash in his temple, his collarbone is broken, and," he went on, as he passed his hands down the patient's side, ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty

... have the full sway of authority, do wrest the Scriptures, which, as Camotensis saith, is an usual custom with the Popes? How if he have renounced the faith of Christ, and become an apostate, as Lyranus saith many Popes have been? And, yet for all this, shall the Holy Ghost, with turning of a hand, knock at his breast, and even whether he will or no, yea, and wholly against his will, kindle him a light so as he may not err? Shall he straightway be the head-spring of all right; and shall all treasure of wisdom and understanding be found in him, as it were laid ...
— The Apology of the Church of England • John Jewel

... the afternoon, at Helen's leisure hour, when she and Bo were in the sitting-room, horses tramped into the court and footsteps mounted the porch. Opening to a loud knock, Helen was surprised to see Beasley. And out in the court were several mounted horsemen. Helen's heart sank. This visit, indeed, ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey

... mind, good Dame Nature presented a more acceptable prospect, when I happened to look out of the window of my room. There I saw the trees and flowerbeds of a garden, tempting me irresistibly under the cloudless sunshine of a fine day. I was on my way out, to recover heart and hope, when a knock at the door ...
— The Legacy of Cain • Wilkie Collins

... faint voice, just as the auctioneer was about to knock down the picture. The stupefied painter gave a start of joy. He raised his head and looked to see from whose lips those blessed words had come. It was the picture dealer, to whom he ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey

... was clearing away, when there came a knock at the door. His charwoman, whose duty it was to clean his brushes every week, ...
— The Holiday Round • A. A. Milne

... For the Lard's love, if you'm gwaine up Drift, take care o' all that blessed money. Doan't say no word 'bout it till you'm in the farm, for theer's them—the tinners out o' work an' sich—as 'ud knock 'e on the head for half of it. To think as Michael burned a hunderd pound! Just a flicker o' purpley fire an' a hunderd pound gone! 'Tis 'nough ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts

... he said, "you must bear it all manfully if you have firmly resolved to join our Brotherhood." (Pierre nodded affirmatively.) "When you hear a knock at the door, you will uncover your eyes," added Willarski. "I wish you courage and success," and, pressing Pierre's hand, ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... his footsteps and learn where he goes; And now at the door of a house see him stand; But why wait so long ere admittance he seeks, In attempting to knock, ...
— The Kings and Queens of England with Other Poems • Mary Ann H. T. Bigelow

... got even a knife; but I've heard that there's nothing equal to a chair, if you want to disconcert a burglar; and so I'll take this, and knock down the first brigand that shows his nose;" and as he said this, he lifted a chair from the floor, and swung it ...
— Among the Brigands • James de Mille

... debt yourself, or by your allowing your wife to run into debt, you give another person power over your liberty. You cannot venture to look your creditor in the face. A double knock at the door frightens you: the postman may be delivering a lawyer's letter demanding the amount you owe. You are unable to pay it, and make a sneaking excuse. You invent some pretence for not paying. At length you are driven to downright lying. For "lying ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles

... period of from eight to ten years to perfect his coiffure." With other nations the head is shaved, and in parts of South America and Africa even the eyebrows and eyelashes are eradicated. The natives of the Upper Nile knock out the four front teeth, saying that they do not wish to resemble brutes. Further south, the Batokas knock out only the two upper incisors, which, as Livingstone (47. 'Travels,' p. 533.) remarks, gives the face a hideous ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin

... not far from Liverpool," answered the man. "You were very nearly drowned in the 'Connaught,' and you've had a nasty knock on the head as well. . . . Feel ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile

... at a trot for Rica Town, where probably that night it appeared upon the grid. Brother John saw, and his big white beard bristled with indignation like the hair on the back of an angry cat, while Stephen spluttered something beginning with "You brute," and lifted his fist as though to knock the Kalubi down. This, had I not caught hold of him, I have no doubt ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard

... their lot for his sake. He parted with all his followers except O'Neil. Donald Macleod shed tears on bidding him farewell. Macleod was taken prisoner a few days afterwards in Benbecula, by Lieutenant Allan Macdonald, of Knock, in Slate, in the island of Skye. He was put on board the Furnace,[279] and brought down to the cabin before General Campbell, who examined him minutely. The General asked him "if he had been along ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson

... followed him as he toiled back to his room. He rested on the landing and faced round toward me. There was something in his eye which said, Stop there! So we finished our conversation on the landing. The next day, I mustered assurance enough to knock at his door, having a pretext ready.—No answer.—Knock again. A door, as if of a cabinet, was shut softly and locked, and presently I heard the peculiar dead beat of his thick-soled, misshapen boots. The ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various

... gals are ALWAYS frightened," Fanny's brother replied; but Giles Bacon, more violent, said, "I'll tell you what, Tom: if this goes on, we must pitch into him." And so I have no doubt they would, when another thundering knock coming, Gregory rushed into the room and began lighting all the candles, so as to produce an amazing brilliancy, Miss Fanny sprang up and ran to her mamma, and the young gentlemen slid down the banisters to receive the company ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray

... upon the good woman, and ate her up in a moment; for it was above three days that he had not touched a bit. He then shut the door, and went into the grand-mother's bed, expecting Little Red Riding-Hood, who came some time afterwards, and knock'd at the door, ...
— The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault • Charles Perrault

... said Sir Thomas, that evening, when the ladies had left the two men to their decanter, "I thought my Frenchwoman would wake you up, but, by George, I hardly expected she would knock you all of a heap so quick. Hey! you're winged, Adrian, winged, or this ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... at each other in affright. None of them moved to open the door. But the knock was not repeated, for the door itself was thrown bodily from its hinges, and the stalwart form of Lord Fairholme, accompanied by two policemen, appeared in ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy

... luxury and serenity of these New England dwellings. For the outward gilding, at least, the age is golden enough. As you approach the sunny doorway, awakening the echoes by your steps, still no sound from these barracks of repose, and you fear that the gentlest knock may seem rude to the Oriental dreamers. The door is opened, perchance, by some Yankee-Hindoo woman, whose small-voiced but sincere hospitality, out of the bottomless depths of a quiet nature, has travelled quite round to the opposite side, and fears only to obtrude ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau

... combustible stuff, that they could hardly bear the street between them. Their business was to follow the fire, for the surer execution: as fast as the fire either forced the people out of those houses which were burning, or frightened them out of others, our people were ready at their doors to knock them on the head, still calling and hallooing one to another ...
— The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe

... asked the feller if sich hurryin' a hog through a course of spraouts helped the pork any, and he said it didn't make any difference, he s'pected. He said they were not hurryin' then, but if I would come in, some day, when 'steam was up,' he'd show me quick work in the pork business—knock daown, drag aout, scrape, cut up, and have the hog in the barrel before he got ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley

... through him; for there is none other name given under heaven or among men whereby you must be saved. He promises to hear your prayer and give you his Holy Spirit to work in you the work of faith with power, if you will only and earnestly ask. "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: What man is there of you whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then being evil know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father ...
— Fables of Infidelity and Facts of Faith - Being an Examination of the Evidences of Infidelity • Robert Patterson

... Prefecture, all sorts of statements were made respecting Florent's alleged intrigue with the beautiful Norman. Perhaps, thought the commissary, he had now taken refuge with her; and so, accompanied by two of his men, he proceeded to knock at the door in the name of the law. The Mehudins had only just got up. The old woman opened the door in a fury; but suddenly calmed down and began to smile when she learned the business on hand. She seated herself and fastened her clothes, ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola

... bed, you fellows. Jerry and I will manage the first and second watches between us. If we want help, we'll knock ...
— The Outdoor Chums on the Gulf • Captain Quincy Allen

... the first few drays, 'cause I wanted the drug so bad (they give you some there, but it never was enough) that I used to disturb everybody, and besides, was very troublesome. I'll never forget the day when I tried to knock my brains out on the dark cement floor, but couldn't; so I cried, 'O God! if there is a God, and some of these missionary folk that come here say there is a God, and a Christ what can save, save me, save me, please save me! I don't ...
— Fifteen Years With The Outcast • Mrs. Florence (Mother) Roberts

... 't is the usual price, A sort of income-tax laid on by fate: Juan had reach'd the room-door in a. trice, And might have done so by the garden-gate, But met Alfonso in his dressing-gown, Who threaten'd death—so Juan knock'd him down. ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... shall the Abbot of Abingdon And all his issue for ever, Have a knock of a king, And ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... find among several that had been blown down by the wind. At 3 feet from the ground its circumference is 57 feet 9 inches; at 134 feet, 17 feet 5 inches; the extreme length 245 feet.... As it was impossible either to climb the tree or hew it down, I endeavored to knock off the cones by firing at them with ball, when the report of my gun brought eight Indians, all of them painted with red earth, armed with bows, arrows, bone-tipped spears, and flint-knives. They ...
— The Mountains of California • John Muir

... exercise, inasmuch as the burning of gunpowder was an attendant of the recreation. He had never killed but one bird in his life, and that, was an owl, of which he took the advantage of daylight and his stocking feet to knock off a tree in the deanery grounds, very early after his arrival. In his trials with John, he sometimes pulled trigger at the same moment with his companion; and as the bird generally fell, he thought he had an equal claim to the honor. He was fond of ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper

... papers side by side and that will be a good advertisement of liberty of opinion; an' Jake, if you haven't got sense to stick to this at your time of life, I'm sorry for you; and if you haven't Andrew at yours, I'll have to knock it into you with a strap,—now mind! An' if you don't get your work done you'll go ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin

... this point in his letter, painting with terrible force, to console his mother for her absence, the dullness of life this year at Mousseaux, when he heard a gentle knock at his door. He thought it was the young critic, or the Vicomte de Bretigny, or perhaps Laniboire, who had been very unquiet of late. All these had often prolonged the evening in his room, which was the largest and most convenient, and had a ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... sat down on a stone bench in the marketplace and tried to sleep, a lady coming out of the cathedral noticed him, and, learning his homeless state, bade him knock at the bishop's house, for the good bishop's charity and compassion were ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... nearer, and very near, and stopped; only Dolly heard a mixed jangle of the bells, as if the horse had thrown his head up and given a confused shake to them all. The next thing was the gate falling to, and a step crunching the crisp snow. Then the house door opened with no preliminary knock; and somebody was throwing ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner

... you go into that wood, and remain there till nightfall; then come to our house and knock at the gate, and you can shelter there as long as you like. As you know, there are few indeed who come there, and if I get you a servitor's suit, assuredly none of our visitors would recognize you, and as for the village folk, you ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty

... of conjuring it. He said to it, 'If thou art the soul of the late Madame de St. Memin, strike four knocks,' and the four knocks were struck. 'If thou art damned, strike six knocks,' and the six knocks were struck. 'If thou art still tormented in hell, because thy body is buried in holy ground, knock six more times,' and the six knocks were heard still more distinctly. 'If we disinter thy body, wilt thou be less damned, certify to us by five knocks,' and the soul so certified. This statement was signed by twenty-two cordeliers. ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 227, March 4, 1854 • Various

... grace, O amazing grace! To see a prince entreat a beggar to receive an alms, would be a strange sight; to see a king entreat the traitor to accept of mercy, would be a stranger sight than that; but to see God entreat a sinner, to hear Christ say, "I stand at the door and knock, with a heart full and a heaven full of grace to bestow upon him that opens;" this is such a sight as dazzles the eyes of angels. What sayest thou now, sinner? Is not this God rich in mercy? hath not this God great ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin

... number in the battery being not above two hundred.] The engineer, Verrier, opposed the blowing up of the works, and they were therefore left untouched. Thierry and his garrison came off in boats, after spiking the cannon in a hasty way, without stopping to knock off the trunnions or burn the carriages. They threw their loose gunpowder into the well, but left behind a good number of cannon cartridges, two hundred and eighty large bombshells, and other ordnance stores, invaluable both to the enemy and to themselves. Brigadier Waldo ...
— A Half-Century of Conflict, Volume II • Francis Parkman

... childhood, this place is far worse, and a wave of pity fills Jane's heart as she thinks of that delicate, patient child growing up in surroundings like these. Marie herself opens the door in response to Jane's knock, her eyes anxiously asking the question ...
— The Alchemist's Secret • Isabel Cecilia Williams

... "sit in a public house with a quart of beer and a long pipe," to play cards for silver money, to "keep a white bull dog with one gray ear, and carry her puppies in his pocket just like a man," to have apprentices and to bully them, to knock them about and make them carry soot sacks while he "rode before them on his donkey, with a pipe in his mouth and a flower in his button hole, like a king at the head of his army!" "Yes, when his master let him have a pull at the leavings of his beer, Tom was the jolliest boy in ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester

... to knock off. They had been working at high tension for a long while now and were beginning to feel the strain. They were all frankly sleepy, too, after the excitement of the night before. As a final precaution against a repetition ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Air on Lost Island • Gordon Stuart

... Jack. "You'd better hoist the black flag. But, see here, Edmund, with all this inter-atomic energy that you talk about, why in the world didn't you invent something new—something that would just knock the Venustians silly, and blow their old planet up if necessary? Automatic arms are pretty good at home, on that unprogressive earth that you have spurned with your heels, but they'll likely be rather small ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss

... the Carnival, under any provocation whatever, lose his temper. And here John Bull often tripped up. On the last night of the last Carnival—that great night—there was the Senza Moccolo or extinguishment of lights, in which everybody bore a burning taper, and tried to blow or knock out the light of his neighbour. Now, being tall, I held my taper high with one hand, well out of danger, while with a broad felt hat in the other I extinguished the children of light like a priest. I threw myself into all the roaring fun like a wild boy, as I was, and was never so ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland

... all the impudent little fiends I ever met! Hector says there is a certain point at which the only answer you can give to a man who breaks all the rules is to knock him down. What would you say if I were to ...
— Heartbreak House • George Bernard Shaw

... stand it—she was capable of believing he had edged away, excusing himself and trumping up a factitious theory, because he hadn't the wit, hadn't the hand, to knock off the few pleasant pages she asked him for and that any proper Frenchman, master of the metier, would so easily and gallantly have promised. Should she so begin to commit herself he'd, by the immortal ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James

... he fell into silent meditation, and while he mused there came a knock at the door. The little man started up on his seat, alert as a squirrel, and turned his eyes over his shoulder, listening intently. The knock was repeated—three quick sharp raps. Evidently ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss

... resume our story. As the persons against Chin Jung were so many and their pressure so great, and as, what was more, Chia Jui urged him to make amends, he had to knock his head on the ground before Ch'in Chung. Pao-yue then gave up his clamorous remonstrances and the whole ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... attestations of many persons, it was, on the suggestion of Pompey, produced by Memmius, but with the names obliterated. It has made no difference to Appius—he had no character to lose! To the other consul it was a real knock-down blow, and he is, I assure you, a ruined man. Memmius, however, having thus dissolved the coalition, has lost all chance of election, and is by this time in a worse position than ever, because we are now informed that ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... passed in a silent conflict. A knock announced the return of the maid; and the girl reentered, placing upon the ...
— The Yellow Claw • Sax Rohmer

... her so by courtesy. Her cottage was over across the lane, and just a bit around the corner; and Polly flew along and up to the door, fully knowing that now she would be helped out of her difficulty. She didn't stop to knock, as the old lady was so deaf she knew she wouldn't hear her, but opened the door and walked in. Grandma was sweeping up the floor, already as neat as a pin; when she saw Polly coming, she stopped, and leaned ...
— Five Little Peppers And How They Grew • Margaret Sidney

... had put her up. The pit being nearly full of water, she had little to do on starting, and, to use George's words, "came bounce into the house." Dodds exclaimed, "Why, she was better as she was; now, she will knock the house down." After a short time, however, the engine got fairly to work, and by ten o'clock that night the water was lower in the pit than it had ever been before. It was kept pumping all Thursday, and by the Friday afternoon the pit was cleared of water, and the workmen were "sent ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles

... saw a pale flash shoot out from the vehicle and knock over a hunter still hanging on the flanks of the fleeing people. He hugged the sand. Something went whining and whistling over him, there was a thunk and a screech. It was repeated, and then the ...
— The Stars, My Brothers • Edmond Hamilton

... found another; she said nothing to Sarah or to Simon. But there was a strange complacent smile upon her lip as she busied herself in her work, that puzzled the old woman. Late at noon came the postman's unwonted knock at the door. A letter!—a letter for Miss Fanny. A letter!—the first she had ever received in her life! And it was from him!—and it began with "Dear Fanny." Vaudemont had called her "dear Fanny" a hundred times, and the expression had become a matter of course. But "Dear ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... the soldiers entered it he and Chung got on to the roof, where none of the Japanese thought of looking for victims. His broken arm was causing him considerable suffering, and having acquired during my knock-about life some rude knowledge of surgery, I put the fracture together, and made a sling with ...
— Under the Dragon Flag - My Experiences in the Chino-Japanese War • James Allan

... received it, I locked my door and sat down to read it, when a student knocked at the door. I gave him no answer, dreading to be found reading such a book, but he continued to knock and beat the door until I had to open it. He came in, and seeing the book lying on the bed, seized it, and examined its title. Then he said, "Why, Hill, do you read ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various

... the physical qualities which had sustained them. Even the faults of the public mind had given way under its new complexion of character; ambition and civil dissension were extinct. It was questionable whether a good hearty assault and battery, or a respectable knock-down blow, had been dealt by any man in London for one or two generations. The doctor carried his reveries so far, that he even satisfied himself and one or two friends (probably by looking into the parks at hours propitious to his hypothesis) that horses were seldom or ever used for ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey

... come and knock at his door? Poverty with a beloved wife! It would appear a hideous and terrifying spectre, chilling in its livid approach and ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France

... voice in answer to her knock. "Come in. I was just about to begin without you. Sit down here, dear, in this low chair by the table. We will have a 'plate tea' and a drawing-room tea combined;" and Kitty dropped gladly into a pretty low chair beside the tea-table, which was drawn up to the fire, ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... only they will open again before you,—steeped in the illusive vagueness of the first long-past day,—peopled only by friends outreaching to you. Soundlessly you will tread those shadowy pavements many times,—to knock in thought, perhaps, at doors which the dead will open to you.... But with the passing of years all becomes dim—so dim that even asleep you know 'tis only a ghost-city, with streets going to nowhere. And finally ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Mystic-Humorous Stories • Various



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