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Nigh   /naɪ/   Listen
Nigh

adjective
(compar. nigher; superl. nighest, or next)
1.
Not far distant in time or space or degree or circumstances.  Synonyms: close, near.  "In the near future" , "They are near equals" , "His nearest approach to success" , "A very near thing" , "A near hit by the bomb" , "She was near tears" , "She was close to tears" , "Had a close call"
2.
Being on the left side.  Synonym: near.  "The animal's left side is its near or nigh side"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Nigh" Quotes from Famous Books



... this subject without assuring you of my support of any measures the wisdom of Congress may devise for the promotion of peace on this continent and throughout the world, and I trust that the time is nigh when, with the universal assent of civilized peoples, all international differences shall be determined without resort to arms by the benignant processes ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... of ground gained. The British had a difficult task to perform in assaulting positions protected by natural defenses, and held in strength with quantities of machine guns. After forcing the enemy out of the positions, and when their strength was well-nigh spent, the British troops were forced to beat off repeated counterattacks preceded by barrage fire and to destroy the enemy again and again. They encountered no more formidable conditions in the course of the war than in this region, for the Germans had machine redoubts on the slopes ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... Health's latest relic fled, Where Hope might flatter, with reluctant tread,— Still, darting forward from the weight of woe, Thy soul with all its energy would glow; Still with the purest passion wouldst thou prove The glow of friendship and the warmth of love. And ah! to sacred Memory ever nigh, Thy wit and humour claim the passing sigh: When, thro' the hour, with unresisted skill, I've seen thee mould each feature to thy will,— When friends drew round thee with attentive ear, Pleas'd with the raill'ry which they could not fear. ...
— Poems • Sir John Carr

... drew nigh, the inmates of this little cabin placed themselves at a clear fire; the father at one side, the mother at the other, and the daughter directly between them, knitting, for this is usually the occupation ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton

... astonishment. "What is the world coming to? Well, I've said many and many a time that Brother Lion was not right up here." Mr. Rabbit tapped his forehead significantly. "In a cage! Now, that pesters me. Why, he used to go roaring and romping about the country, scaring them that didn't know him mighty nigh to death. And so Brother Lion is in a cage? But I might have known it. I wonder how the rest of the family are getting on? Not that they are any kin to me, for they are not. I called him Brother Lion just to be neighborly. Oh, no! He and his ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris

... good lad," the old man said, mollified, "and I don't know what I should have done without you. I am nigh past work now, but in the ten years you have been with me things have always gone well with me, and I have money enough to make a shift with for the rest of my life, even if I work no longer. But I don't like this freak that you have taken into your head. It will ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty

... prejudice as is founded on just homage to civilization, culture, righteousness, and progress, he humbly bows and meekly does obeisance. But before that nameless prejudice that leaps beyond all this he stands helpless, dismayed, and well-nigh speechless; before that personal disrespect and mockery, the ridicule and systematic humiliation, the distortion of fact and wanton license of fancy, the cynical ignoring of the better and the boisterous welcoming of the worse, the all-pervading desire to inculcate disdain for everything ...
— The Souls of Black Folk • W. E. B. Du Bois

... had heard Tabitha's many talents lauded by their cousins until their curiosity had well-nigh reached the bursting point. "Speak right away. It's no fun watching the old moon come up! Besides, it's high enough now to make things as plain ...
— Tabitha's Vacation • Ruth Alberta Brown

... happened, which made it a sad and anxious home to the inmates for many long months, running to nigh on two years. They were fond of riding, and one afternoon when there was no visitor or any person to accompany them, the youngest girl said she would have her ride and ordered her horse to be brought from the paddock and saddled. Her elder sister, who was ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson

... the maiden was still there, though on the summit of the brow. She turned round, and, with an ineffable smile and curtsy, saluted him, and again moved slowly on. She vanished gradually beyond the summit, and while the green feathers were still nodding in view, and so nigh that the Laird could have touched them with a fishing-rod, he reached the top of the brow himself. There was no living soul there, nor onward, as far as his view reached. He now trembled in every limb, and, without knowing what ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various

... said Poole. "Matter!" growled the copper-faced old fellow. "Look at my deck—I mean, as much of it as you can see. I am pretty nigh sick of this! A set of jabbering monkeys; that's ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn

... the other night," one of the boatmen remarked to Frank, as a few days after the adventure he strolled down with Ruthven and Handcock to talk to the boatman whose boat had been lost, "a very narrow shave. I had one out there myself when I was just about your age, nigh forty years ago. I went out for a sail with my father in his fishing boat, and I didn't come back for three years. That was the only long voyage I ever went. I've been ...
— By Sheer Pluck - A Tale of the Ashanti War • G. A. Henty

... you nothing about Cromwell is, alas, that there is nothing to be told. I am day and night, these long months and years, very miserable about it,—nigh broken-hearted often. Such a scandalous accumulation of Human Stupidity in every form never lay before on such a subject. No history of it can be written to this wretched, fleering, sneering, canting, twaddling, God- forgetting generation. How can you explain ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson

... Before the Communion it was a custom taken from Gaul, which lasted in England up to the Reformation, that the Bishop, if present, should bless the people. A hymn was sung during the communion of the people; the ancient "Draw nigh and take the Body of the Lord" remains still to us from a Celtic source for use at this time. The service ended with a "Let us pray" and collect after Communion, closely followed by the second of the alternative post-communion prayers now in our English office. Immediately after this prayer ...
— The Church and the Barbarians - Being an Outline of the History of the Church from A.D. 461 to A.D. 1003 • William Holden Hutton

... providence which guards the rear. "Goodness and mercy shall follow me!" God's grace comes between me and my yesterdays. It cuts off the heredity from the old Adam, and no far-off plague comes nigh my dwelling. ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett

... was inconceivably horrible. The winter weather of late December and early January had been most inclement and the Indians had trudged through it, over snow-covered, rocky, trailless places and desolate prairie, nigh three hundred miles. When they started out, they were not any too well provided with clothing; for they had departed in a hurry, and, before they got to Fall River, not a few of them were absolutely naked. They had practically ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel

... the willowy stream is nigh, Down wend we to the ford; No shafts across its fishes fly, Nor ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris

... God, according to a writing of God, definite as to time'? And if a man die, is it not also written: 'Repute not those slain in God's cause to be dead; nay, alive with God, they are provided for'? They are people of the 'right hand,' of whom it is written: 'They shall be brought nigh God in the gardens of delight, upon inwrought couches reclining face to face. Youths ever young shall go unto them round about with goblets and ewers, and a cup of flowing wine; and fruits of the sort which they shall choose, and the flesh of birds of the ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace

... right," muttered John, whose quick eye saw everything. "Ole Sam payin' him off good. He think he'll be in the seventh heaven when he got a boy, and he mighty nigh torment that little gal's life out with his mexens and things; but now he got a boy, he feel a ...
— Cousin Maude • Mary J. Holmes

... of the day, To thee I rais'd an evening cry; Thou heardst when I began to pray, And thine almighty help was nigh. ...
— The Psalms of David - Imitated in the Language of The New Testament - And Applied to The Christian State and Worship • Isaac Watts

... know that Christmas was a great day with both masters and slaves in the South, but the Christmas of 1864 was the greatest which had ever come to the slaves, for, although the proclamation did not reach us until 1865, we felt that the chains which had bound us so long were well nigh broken. ...
— My Life In The South • Jacob Stroyer

... word—Shakespeare," said Mrs. Weaver. "It come purty nigh keeping me from marrying Doc. You see, Doc ain't like common folks. Don's got sich broad ideas of things. Lib'ral, he calls it, but I name it jist common foolish. He's got to give every new-fangled scheme a show. I guess, off and on, Doc's believed most every queer ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler

... hoard; an' if ye could ye'd keep the thumbmarks on the door. Ye've got t' weep t' make it home, ye've got t' sit an' sigh An' watch beside a loved one's bed, an' know that Death is nigh; An' in the stillness o' the night t' see Death's angel come, An' close the eyes o' her that smiled, an' leave her sweet voice dumb. Fer these are scenes that grip the heart, an' when yer tears are dried, Ye find the home is dearer than it was, an' ...
— Making the House a Home • Edgar A. Guest

... and so she grieved till, quite outworn with sorrow, sleep stole upon her and she dreamed. Gudruda dreamed that she was dead and that she sat nigh to the golden door that is in Odin's house at Valhalla, by which the warriors pass and repass for ever. There she sat from age to age, listening to the thunder of ten thousand thousand tramping feet, and watching the fierce faces of the chosen as they marched out in ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard

... sir, around this corner. Most of them, the lads, sir, live in the village, however. You see, there ain't rooms enough in the 'Cademy grounds. I heard the other day that there's nigh on to two hundred and twenty boys in the school this year; I can remember when they was'nt but sixty, and it was the biggest boardin' school for boys in New York State. And that wa'n't many years ago, neither. The boys? Oh, they're a fine ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour

... timid light Through the enchanted hall of dawn is gleaming; Remember, when the pensive night Beneath her silver-sprinkled veil walks dreaming; When pleasure calls thee and thy heart beats high, When tender joys through evening shades draw nigh, Hark, from the woodland deeps A gentle whisper ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke

... Novgorod, Moscow, and Jaroslaf. The increase in population together with the growing demand for lumber, have caused extensive clearings; but the area covered by the forests is so large, that the supply is well-nigh inexhaustible. ...
— The Story of Russia • R. Van Bergen

... become like unto him, and we become devils, angels to a devil, to be shut out from the presence of our God, and to remain with the father of lies, in misery, like unto himself; yea, to that being who beguiled our first parents; who transformeth himself nigh unto an angel of light, and stirreth up the children of men unto secret combinations of murder, and all manner of secret works of darkness. O how great the goodness of our God, who prepareth a way for our escape from the grasp of this awful monster; yea, that monster, ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... taken a great liking to Bauer from the moment of his arrival, was as enthusiastic as Helen and praised the inventor until he was well nigh overwhelmed. ...
— The High Calling • Charles M. Sheldon

... scholars and professors made one grand assault all along the line, fairly overwhelming Joan with objections and arguments culled from the writings of every ancient and illustrious authority of the Roman Church. She was well-nigh smothered; but at last she shook herself free ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... save twain things alone, Crushed grain (heaven's gift), and steaming water-draught? Food nigh at hand, and Nature's aliment— Of which no glut contents us. Pampered taste hunts out ...
— Science in the Kitchen. • Mrs. E. E. Kellogg

... no guile in this allusion, and he forbore the obvious remark, merely suggesting that it was fully time to get back to the house for a late cup of tea, and to release Cooper for his evening engagement. They left the maze accordingly, experiencing well-nigh the same ease in retracing their path as they had ...
— Ghost Stories of an Antiquary - Part 2: More Ghost Stories • Montague Rhodes James

... yes, we've got lots handy; and the animals are certain peeved with thirst. Boys, I'm going to snap that offer up, because you see, my canvasmen are pretty nigh done up, having so little sleep. Here you are; just take ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren

... a symptom of fear. As he spoke, a poor toad, who had sate quite aloof In a hovel of earth, with a stone for a roof, Now slowly, on tiptoe, crept out of his hole, And into the midst of the company stole; The quadrupeds gazed as the reptile drew nigh, Half afraid of his looks, though they could not tell why. Mouse's hair stood on end, and, still stranger to say, Miss Chameleon changed colour, and fainted away. Poor bufo confess'd, as he sate in the dark, He had listen'd to porcupine's brilliant ...
— The Quadrupeds' Pic-Nic • F. B. C.

... and sanitary accommodation on this fourth floor, with the cold draughts from the stairways and windows of the wall-gallery, must have been well-nigh intolerable; nor could wooden screens, hangings, or charcoal brasiers have rendered it endurable. It is not surprising, therefore, that under Henry III. the palace was considerably enlarged, or that these chambers were abandoned by him for warmer quarters ...
— Memorials of Old London - Volume I • Various

... reconnoitre. The minutes passed by. Everybody was wishing everybody else good luck, and many were the hopes of 'Blighty' entertained—not all to be realized. It is a wonderful sensation—counting the minutes on one's wrist watch as the moment to go over draws nigh. The fingers on my watch pointed to 8.30, but the first wave of D Company had not gone over. I do not know what caused the delay. Anyhow, they were climbing over. Eventually, at 8.40, I got a signal from ...
— At Ypres with Best-Dunkley • Thomas Hope Floyd

... captives grown accustomed to their prison, they seemed to be too familiar with wretchedness to heed it, and to take everything as it came. Yet a certain frank light-heartedness was not lacking in their faces; and on a closer view, their monotonous life, the lot of so many a poor creature, well-nigh seemed an enviable one. Trouble had set its unmistakable mark on them, but petty cares had ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac

... mun knaw 'at aw havn't been spar'd, For trials an' troubles have come, an' mi heart has felt well nigh to braik; An' mi wife, 'at tha knaws wor mi pride, an' mi fortuns has shared, Shoo bent under her griefs, an' shoo's flown far, far away aat ...
— Yorkshire Ditties, Second Series - To which is added The Cream of Wit and Humour - from his Popular Writings • John Hartley

... out through the portal of the massive wall, and thence to a place beyond but yet nigh unto Jerusalem, the cortege advanced. The destination was a spot called Golgotha, or Calvary, meaning "the ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... doubt that Marlanx had completely overthrown the dynasty and was in full possession of the government. He did not know that the Prince and his court had succeeded in reaching the Castle, whose walls and gates were well-nigh impregnable to assault, even by a great army. If he had known this he might ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... help in his ruin, and turn us and him out as beggars upon the world, because he has not chosen to obey the unjust bidding of one of them." Here the boy hung down his head, and turned away his face. "But it is not that. All that has had no effect in nigh breaking his heart. Money is but money. No one can bear its loss better than our papa. Though he might have to starve, he would starve like a gallant man; and we could starve with him. You and I, Frank and Ada, would bear all that he could bear. But—" The boy looked ...
— The Landleaguers • Anthony Trollope

... there appeared a short, somewhat stout figure in a green uniform, white trousers, and riding boots; a man wearing on his head a cocked hat well-nigh as magically potent as its wearer; the broad red ribbon of the Legion of Honor rose and fell on his breast, and a short sword hung at his side. At one and the same moment the man was seen by all eyes in ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac

... encounter with a terrible giant, Hidimba, the prototype of the Cyclops of Homer, and of the whole race of giants of northern origin, who, after amusing our ancestors, children of larger growth, descended to our nurseries, from whence they are now well-nigh exploded. After this adventure the brothers take up their residence in the city of Ekachara, where they are hospitably received in the house of a Brahmin. The neighbourhood of this city is haunted by another ...
— Nala and Damayanti and Other Poems • Henry Hart Milman

... thoughts and feelings shall not die, Nor leave thee when gray hairs are nigh A melancholy slave; But an old age serene and bright, And lovely as a Lapland night, Shall lead thee ...
— The Golden Censer - The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future • John McGovern

... Protestant or Romanist, of the Lord's declaration to the Twelve when He had set a little child in the midst of them, "Whosoever shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven." Yet we, nigh a century after he went forth with the Gospel to Hindostan, may venture to place him where the Church History of the future is likely to keep him—amid the uncrowned kings of men who have made Christian England what it is, under God, to its own people and to half the human race. These ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith

... the pallid shield Of the wan sky the almond blossoms gleam, The corncrake nested in the unmown field Answers its mate, across the misty stream On fitful wing the startled curlews fly, And in his sedgy bed the lark, for joy that Day is nigh, ...
— Poems • Oscar Wilde

... hundred and eighty miles from the Gap, and all that the Army used had to be hauled that distance by mule teams over roads that, in their best state were wretched, and which the copious rains and heavy traffic had rendered well-nigh impassable. All the country to our possession had been drained of its stock of whatever would contribute to the support of man or beast. That portion of Powell's Valley extending from the Gap into Virginia was still in the hands of the ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... two talking," she exclaimed, "that you pay no attention to the bell? Come to lunch, mamma, please; for we have been playing lawn tennis all the morning, and are well-nigh distraught with hunger." ...
— Belles and Ringers • Hawley Smart

... eagerly, "Look here, pard! Then we're on velvet! I've got NINE hundred; put your FIVE with that, and I know a little ranch that we can get for twelve hundred. That's what I've been savin' up for—that's my little game! No more minin' for ME. It's got a shanty twice as big as our old cabin, nigh on a hundred acres, and two mustangs. We can run it with two Chinamen and jest make it howl! Wot yer say—eh?" ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte

... theories have been founded upon 'Hamlet' —the drama richest in philosophical contents. Over and over again men have hoped to be able to ascertain, from this tragedy, the great master's ideas about religion. It is well-nigh impossible to say how often such attempts have been made, but the reward of the exertions has always remained unsatisfactory. On the feelings which this masterwork of dramatic art still excites to-day—nearly three hundred years after its conception—thousands have ...
— Shakspere And Montaigne • Jacob Feis

... was at his wonted trade, Still tempting heedless men into his snare, In witching wise, as I before have said; But when he saw, in goodly gear array'd, The grave majestic knight approaching nigh, His countenance ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... that she was alive, well, with means of livelihood, and beautiful as ever. Though she was now thirty-one, she looked, on the stage, not a day older than upon that sad night when he had thrown her from him, six years and more before—nay, than upon that day well-nigh eleven years before, when he had bade her farewell to go upon his first campaign. She was still as slender, still had the same girlish ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens

... once called his three sons before him, and he gave to the first a cock, to the second a scythe, and to the third a cat. "I am already aged," said he, "my death is nigh, and I have wished to take thought for you before my end; money I have not, and what I now give you seems of little worth, but all depends on your making a sensible use of it. Only seek out a country where such things are still unknown, and your fortune ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers

... only around the corner in a large green field, and the foundation, broad, and not too nigh, was a tempting place to run; so they clambered up, and raced back and forth, and all around several times, 'till out of breath, then Kat paused, and looked about with a contemplative and ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving

... was bitterly cold; the cold, indeed, was fearful. The air had that damp rawness so noticeable in Dutch climate, a thick mist overhung the city, and a drizzling rain came down with a steady persistence such as quickly soaked through the stoutest and thickest garments. The streets were well-nigh empty. The great thoroughfare, the Oude Gracht, was almost deserted, and as Koosje hurried along the Meinerbroederstraat—for she had a second commission there—she drew her great shawl more tightly round her, muttering ...
— Stories By English Authors: Germany • Various

... courtiers; everybody calling for Fagon and Felix. Monseigneur had been taken very ill. He had passed the day at Meudon, where he had eaten only a collation; at the King's supper he had made amends by gorging himself nigh to bursting with fish. He was a great eater, like the King, and like the Queens his mother and grandmother. He had not appeared after supper, but had jest gone down to his own room from the King's cabinet, and was about to undress himself, when all at once he lost consciousness. His valets, frightened ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon

... again Morris spoke eagerly, entreatingly, but the aerophone was dumb. So he ceased at length, and even then well nigh laughed when he thought that in this useless piece of mechanism he saw a symbol of his own soul, which also had lost its mate and could hold true converse ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard

... town, who persuaded him to remain and read law in his office until a year should elapse and he could be admitted to the Ohio bar. However, in less than a week he fell ill of a fever which did not leave him until the expense of it had well-nigh emptied his slender purse. His physicians, fearing he was too slight and delicate for Western hardships, urged him to go back to Canandaigua, but when he left Cleveland he again turned westward, resolved in his own mind never to go back without the ...
— Stephen Arnold Douglas • William Garrott Brown

... were first created, there was neither Lake of Biwa nor Mountain of Fuji. Suruga and Omi were both plains. Even for long after men inhabited Japan and the Mikados had ruled for centuries there was neither earth so nigh to heaven nor water so close to the Under-world as the peaks of Fuji and the bottom of Biwa. Men drove the plow and planted the rice over the very spot where crater and ...
— Japanese Fairy World - Stories from the Wonder-Lore of Japan • William Elliot Griffis

... her, of course," my driver went on, "an' she was old a-plenty to marry. Marjie was a mighty purty girl. The boys was nigh crazy about ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter

... How the blind said, as thou named their gifts, and placed them in their hands, that it seemed they could straightway behold them? How even the dumb gave forth pleasant sounds like music from their helpless tongues? and how even the lame well-nigh leaped from their lameness, for the light of thy young face? But when thou comest to thy crown and throne thou needest not got forth alone upon thy birth-night, but send out thy ...
— The Potato Child and Others • Mrs. Charles J. Woodbury

... other curious wood-work in the castle cellars, copies of which, being unobtainable by photographs, he had intended to make if all went well between Paula and himself. The zest for this was now well-nigh over. But on awaking in the morning and looking up the valley towards the castle, and at the dark green height of the Konigsstuhl alongside, he felt that to become vanquished by a passion, driven to suffer, fast, and pray in the dull ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy

... just as everything is nice, and worse, you come across him when he is nigh bein' shot to death. Then, worse yet, by what the papers said, you went to the hospital with him and gave the whole thing away. When I saw the name, Alves ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... any who would live truly. Work is hard; burdens are heavy; responsibility is great; trials are sore; duty is large. Life's competitions are fierce; its rivalries are keen; its frictions sometimes grind men's very souls well nigh to death. It is hard to live sweetly amid the irritations that touch continually at most tender points. It is hard to live lovingly and charitably when they see so much inequity and wrong, and sometimes must ...
— Making the Most of Life • J. R. Miller

... tension of my feelings. But it was not so. The moment the door had closed behind me the agony of the thought that I had seen her perhaps for the last time, and the poignancy of my regret that I had not been able to put to her one question which rang in my brain, became well-nigh unendurable. ...
— The House by the Lock • C. N. Williamson

... track of his blood in the grass. But so much he went in thoughts of Nicolette, his lady sweet, that he felt no pain nor torment, and all the day hurled through the forest in this fashion nor heard no word of her. And when he saw vespers draw nigh, he began to weep for that he found her not. All down an old road, and grass-grown, he fared, when anon, looking along the way before him, he saw such an one as I shall tell you. Tall was he, and great of growth, ugly and hideous: his head huge, and blacker than charcoal, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various

... answered Jeffrey, as he took his horse. "Christopher Harflete may yet be a good friend to a maid in need, and I think that need is nigh." ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard

... had thrown himself on a bench, and intimated to the host the nature of his wants. As the latter furnished the required draught, he made a sort of apology, which was intended for the ears of all his customers nigh the stranger, for the manner in which an individual, in the further end of the long narrow room, not only monopolized the discourse, but appeared to extort the attention of all within hearing to some portentous legend he ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper

... plain till he came to the side of a dry pit, when looking round to see that no one was nigh, he laid his table on the grass, and, sitting down with his legs over the side of the pit, he motioned me to do the same. "So you are in want of employ," said he, after I had sat ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow

... made it vital that people should drop in somewhere, and speculate about certain interesting matters well known to be going on in the community, but going on in such an underhand and secretive fashion that it well-nigh destroyed one's faith ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin

... trying and bloody war. To acknowledge our defects and miscomings now, is but to give a handle to the enemies of our cause: but, this danger removed, the axe will at once be laid at the root of those evils which have come nigh to working our destruction; all the unsightly excrescences which have for years been accumulating upon the trunk of our goodly tree will be carefully pruned away, and the result will be a healthier and ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... decreases, and it follows that, having a shorter column of air to support, those portions are less dense than those lower down. So rare does the atmosphere become, when great altitudes are reached, that at a height of seven miles breathing is well-nigh impossible, and at far lower altitudes than this airmen have to be supported ...
— The Mastery of the Air • William J. Claxton

... do pretty well in the exams, though, for Dad's sake," answered Millicent, throwing aside her wraps. "But I don't mean to kill myself studying, just the same. Time enough for that when exams draw nigh. They're comfortably far off yet. But I'm in a bit of a predicament, Worth, and I don't know what to do. Here are two invitations for Saturday afternoon and I simply must accept them both. Now, how can I do ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... said the clerk, with that exaggerated idea of distances, and that vivid perception of difficulties in getting from place to place, which is peculiar to all country people. "Nigh on five mile, I can ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins

... of Yeld. The villagers, as in duty bound, flocked to pay their last respects to the old Squire, whose face for the last twenty years they had scarcely seen, and of whose existence, save on rent-day, many of them had been well-nigh ignorant. ...
— Roger Ingleton, Minor • Talbot Baines Reed

... Sumter, S.C., and they brought them here to Wilmin'ton and put them out under Fourth Street bridge, and the white ladies of Wilmin'ton, N.C. cooked food and carried it by baskets full to them. We all had plenty of food. A warehouse full of everything down there by the river nigh Red Cross Street, an' none of us ever went hungry 'till the war ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, North Carolina Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration

... nobody else that ever I hearn of. Mr. Briscoe war a plum favorite, far an' nigh," said old Jubal Clenk, the eldest of the party. "But shucks!" he continued, with a change of tone and the evident intention of preserving harmony among the conspirators. "'Twar jes' an accident, an' that's what it will pass fur among folks ginerally. Mr. Briscoe's mare skeered an' shied an' ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock

... cannot go beyond his Orders; but that which gives me a better Opinion of Balaam than all this is, his plain Prophesy of Christ, Chap. xxiv. 17. where he calls him the Star of Jacob, and declares, I shall see him, but not now, I shall behold him, but not nigh; there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Scepter shall rise out of Israel, and shall smite the Corners of Moab, and destroy all the Children of Seth, all which express not a Knowledge only, but a Faith in Christ; but I have done preaching, this is all by the by, I return ...
— The History of the Devil - As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts • Daniel Defoe

... attention. Beneath one of the largest of the trees, upon the grass, was a kind of low tent or booth, from the top of which a thin smoke was curling; beside it stood a couple of light carts, whilst two or three lean horses or ponies were cropping the herbage which was growing nigh. Wondering to whom this odd tent could belong, I advanced till I was close before it, when I found that it consisted of two tilts, like those of waggons, placed upon the ground and fronting each other, connected behind by a sail or large piece of canvas, which was but partially drawn across ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow

... know how Paw knowed 'bout it. Paw knows nigh everything 'bout what's doin' up here. Reckon you-all'll have er right smart time gittin' to the loot'nant's property ever, 'cause that's where Bat an' his bunch make ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders Among the Kentucky Mountaineers • Jessie Graham Flower

... in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them: while the Sun, or the Moon, or the Stars be not darkened, nor the clouds return after the rain; in the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, and ...
— The Mysteries of Free Masonry - Containing All the Degrees of the Order Conferred in a Master's Lodge • William Morgan

... then to meet him, and thrust at him thrice so hard that Brodir fell before him at each thrust, and was well-nigh not getting on his feet again; but as soon as ever he found his feet, he fled away into the wood ...
— Njal's Saga • Unknown Icelanders

... so nigh the mountain that the cinders, which grew thicker and hotter the nearer he approached, fell into the vessel, together with pumice-stones and black pieces of burning rock; and now the sudden ebb of ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum

... the coursers; Bright is Gomersalez' eye; Saints protect thee, Woolfordinez, For his triumph sure is nigh! Now his courser's flanks he lashes, O'er his shoulder flings the rein, And his feet aloft he tosses, Holding stoutly ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun

... was the triumph of Juniper at the success of his efforts on this occasion, this very success was well nigh bringing about a total defeat. For it came to Frank's ears, by a side wind, as such things so often do, that his man had been playing him a trick, and had been filling up his glass continually with strong ale when he was ...
— Frank Oldfield - Lost and Found • T.P. Wilson

... indeed, gasping for breath, and well nigh dropping from fatigue and excitement. The kind captain supporting him, they made their way toward the ship; but Archy, though he tried to speak, had lost all power of utterance. One of the other men came quickly to their assistance, and Archy was lifted on board, and placed ...
— Archibald Hughson - An Arctic Story • W.H.G. Kingston

... flame swayed slower, and even slower; until, at last, it swung to the North and South in great, ponderous beats, that lasted through seconds. A long space went by, and now each sway of the great belt lasted nigh a minute; so that, after a great while, I ceased to distinguish it as a visible movement; and the streaming fire ran in a steady river of dull flame, across ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson

... sometimes the unburied bodies, of the emigrants themselves, the survivors having been compelled to push onwards with the remnant of their cattle to a more fertile region, where provender and water could be procured to restore their well-nigh exhausted strength. Oftentimes they have been attacked by bands of mounted Indians, whose war-whoop has startled them from their slumbers at night; and they have been compelled to fight their way onwards, day after day assailed by their savage ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston

... of the shooting of Henry C. Frick by Alexander Berkman is briefly referred to in the first chapter, but the events which led up to that shooting have well-nigh been forgotten. Certainly, nothing could have created more bitterness among the working classes than the act of the Carnegie Steel Company when it ordered a detective agency to send to Homestead three hundred men armed with Winchester rifles. There was the prospect of a strike, and ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter

... workhouse, tha run about th' streets i' rags, tha pretty nigh clemmed to death, tha blacked boots, tha sold newspapers, tha feyther was a common workin'-mon— and now tha's coom into Temple Barholm an' sixty ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... into which we made our way was well-nigh impregnable; it seemed to me that for age upon age its undergrowth had run riot, untrimmed, unchecked, until at last it had become a matted growth of interwoven, strangely twisted boughs and tendrils. It was ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher

... old gentleman, to whom the younger had seldom a word to say. George was a demure studious boy, and his senses seemed to brighten up in the library, where his brother was so gloomy. He knew the books before he could well-nigh carry them, and read in them long before he could understand them. Harry, on the other hand, was all alive in the stables or in the wood, eager for all parties of hunting and fishing, and promised to be a good sportsman ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... when he drew nigh the place whither he had directed his steps—a little country town, not far from a famous seat of learning: there he would make inquiry before going further. The minister of his parish knew the minister of Auchars, and ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald

... leave, when my eyes fell upon something so unexpected and so extraordinary, seen as it was under the influence of the old tragedies with which my mind was necessarily full, that I paused, balked in my advance, and well-nigh uncertain whether I looked upon a real thing or on some strange and terrible ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green

... Wes, a-squintin' out into the game 'bout forty foot from shore, and a-whistlin' purt' nigh in a whisper. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various

... my comrades! see the signal Waving in the sky; Reinforcements now appearing, Victory is nigh! 'Hold the fort, for I am coming,' Jesus signals still; Wave the answer back to Heaven, 'By Thy ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy

... the valley melted away like a mist, and the prince saw an army besieging a city; he heard a general haranguing his soldiers to urge them on, and the soldiers shouting and battering the walls; but shortly, when the city was well-nigh taken, he saw some men secretly giving gold among the soldiers, so much of it that they threw down their arms to pick it up, and said that the walls were so strong that they could not throw them down. "O powerful ...
— Wonder-Box Tales • Jean Ingelow

... astonishment, this young beauty declined to understand such language. Couched in other terms, he renewed his suit, yet apparently was no whit less obscure than on the first occasion. Such a scandal as this well-nigh put him to the blush, and he was obliged to admit that this modest maiden either affected to be, or ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan

... for a sexual allurement. This end is far more effectively attained, with greater advantage and less disadvantage, by concentrating the chief ensigns of sexual attractiveness on the upper and more conspicuous parts of the body. This method is well-nigh universal among animals ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... ears were dinned by virulent speeches,—which, could he have comprehended them, would have told him how much he was despised for being an infidel, and not a follower of the true prophet,—while his eyes were well-nigh put out by dust thrown in his face,—accompanied by spiteful expectorations,—his body was belabored by sticks, his skin scratched and pricked with sharp thorns, his whiskers lugged almost to the dislocation of his jaws, and the hair of his ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid

... journey to England in company with the poet Waller, who had been glad to go abroad after being much worried by the Puritan party. They travelled by way of Vicenza, Verona, Brescia, Milan, the Lago Maggiore, the Simplon Pass, Sion, and St. Maurice to Geneva. Here again Evelyn became sick nigh unto death, from small-pox contracted at Beveretta, the night before reaching Geneva. 'Being extremely weary and complaining of my head, and finding little accommodation in the house, I caus'd one of our hostesses daughters to be removed out of her bed ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn

... exclaimed, after returning from a drive to Eastboro village, "I give you my word, Seth, they dummed nigh et me alive. They covered the horse all up, so that he looked for all the world like a sheep, woolly. I don't mind moskeeters in moderation, but when they roost on my eyelids and make 'em so heavy I can't open 'em, then I'm ready to swear. But I couldn't get ...
— The Woman-Haters • Joseph C. Lincoln

... men should have held their own so well in such company, and especially that Tom, the miller's son, should have beaten the best of them. He is captain of the band, you know, but almost all the others shoot nigh as well; there is not one of them who cannot send an arrow straight into the face of a foe at a hundred and twenty yards. There were some others as good who would fain have been of the party, but our lady said she would take no married ...
— At Agincourt • G. A. Henty

... wind had skifted 'em, an' t' mooin were shinin' ower Pendle Hill way an' leetin' up t' trees and makkin' t' watter glisten like silver. Lile Doed were that fain he started clappin' his hands an' well-nigh forgat all about Melsh Dick an' t' squirrel. Then all on a sudden he gat agate o' laughin', for when he saw t' mooin' i' t' watter he bethowt him o' a tale his mother had telled him o' soom daft fowks that had seen t' mooin i' t' watter an' thowt it were a cheese an' started to rake ...
— More Tales of the Ridings • Frederic Moorman

... day certain men journeyed toward Egypt, and this was that land of Egypt that should thereafter be mighty exceedingly; for these were the days before the First Dynasty—yea, many thousands of years before. And, it being nigh unto the time of the setting of the sun, they happened, by adventure, ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 25, January 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... soft, tremulous petals. Dainty, chic, well-poised, serene, flawlessly pretty in her miniature fashion: Anisty recognized her in a twinkling. His perceptions, trained to observations as instantaneous as those of a snap-shot camera, and well-nigh as accurate, had photographed her individuality indelibly upon the film of his memory, even in the abbreviated encounter of the ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance

... operas. I will dismiss, therefore, much of the prose with very brief notice, and some of it without any notice at all. It may be remarked that of all the commentaries I have waded through (and been well-nigh choked with), on the prose, there is, to my mind, only one worth reading, Mr. Ernest Newman's valuable Study ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman

... me and were answered, so that my time was well occupied until twelve, when dinner was brought in from "over the way." Being well-nigh ravenous, I dispatched it with great celerity, washing it down with a little mild ale. Prisoners awaiting trial are allowed (if they can pay for it) a pint of that beverage, or half ...
— Prisoner for Blasphemy • G. W. [George William] Foote

... circumstances, but for which no individual Minister or General was solely responsible. The matter was brought about by successive steps that turned out to be necessary, though they were deplorable in every respect. Failing the capture of the Boer commandoes, which was well-nigh impossible, the British troops were driven to strip the country, and stripping the country meant depriving not only the fighting men but also the women and children of the means of subsistence. Concentration, therefore, ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill

... one. Shut out from the Sandwich Islands as a coal base, an enemy is thrown back for supplies of fuel to distances of thirty-five hundred or four thousand miles,—or between seven thousand and eight thousand, going and coming,—an impediment to sustained maritime operations well-nigh prohibitive. The coal-mines of British Columbia constitute, of course, a qualification to this statement; but upon them, if need arose, we might hope at least to impose some trammels by action from ...
— The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future • A. T. Mahan

... Yeniseisk province, where the Strelitski family resided. A year or so afterwards the Yeniseisk authorities accorded the family permission to reside in Yeniseisk, and Joseph, having given proof of brilliant abilities, was placed in the Yeniseisk gymnasium. For nigh three years the boy studied here, astonishing the gymnasium with his extraordinary ability, when suddenly the Government authorities ordered the boy to return at once "to the place where he was born." ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... our country is so slight that even to a Woman my tale necessarily appeared extraordinary and well-nigh incredible; but my Wife, whose good sense far exceeds that of the average of her Sex, and who perceived that I was unusually excited, did not argue with me on the subject, but insisted that I was ill and required ...
— Flatland • Edwin A. Abbott

... animal was packed with some camp-kettles, coffee-pots, and other cooking traps. As soon as he was let loose and heard the tinware rattle he broke and ran, bringing up in a quagmire up to his sides. The saddle had turned, and his hind feet stepping into the pack well nigh ruined ...
— In the Early Days along the Overland Trail in Nebraska Territory, in 1852 • Gilbert L. Cole

... of the clouds, and the hot July sun began to pour down with a glare on the water that was well-nigh blinding. As the waves went down he changed his position on the log, and this gave him temporary relief. Soon the sun made his head ache, and he began to see strange visions. Presently he put out his hand, thinking that Tom ...
— The Rover Boys on the Great Lakes • Arthur M. Winfield

... in undisturbed tranquillity, but little larger than when the Far West had brought the first recruits of the North West Mounted Police to its levees. To those who loved the place, who believed in it, the result caused by the changing conditions of Western life was well-nigh heartbreaking. ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman

... make no differ whar he bides," said Joe. "Soon or late our paths'll cross an' bring us face to face. When he struck down my father it war sealed and signed above that he war to fall by my hand; an' there's a feelin' in my heart that that hour air drawin' nigh." He nodded and ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey

... quarry; and ere long he knew we were behind him, and hasted, sore hindered with his great bulky body, to the shore. There we overtook him, and at once he faced us, and made with his sword a great lunge at Hugo that well-nigh took his life. But even so, Hugo was quick with his parry, and kept him ...
— The Fall Of The Grand Sarrasin • William J. Ferrar

... thing was clear, viz., that he had, since his marriage, spent a very large sum of money; spent it lavishly, not to say foolishly. Indeed, the more closely Mr. Craven looked into affairs, the more satisfied he felt that Mr. Elmsdale had committed suicide simply because he was well-nigh ruined. ...
— The Uninhabited House • Mrs. J. H. Riddell

... mark the rising flood of the wheat to its hour of overflow. Yet there went through the village a sense of expectation, and men said to each other, 'We shall be there soon.' No one knew the day—the last day of doom of the golden race; every one knew it was nigh. One evening there was a small square piece cut at one side, a little notch, and two shocks stood there in the twilight. Next day the village sent forth its army with their crooked weapons to cut and slay. It used to be an era, let me tell you, ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies

... offering peace to all; which law is general and common as well to the Canaanites as to foreign nations: "When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it. And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, then it shall be that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee." Which commandment was afterward observed by Israel; of whom ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie

... no dispute, I am sure, as to the value of some of the results he achieved in that other path. He did indeed create anew for us the type of good-citizenship, well-nigh effaced in a sordid and selfish time, and of an honest politician and a pure-minded journalist. He never really forsook literature, and the world of actual interests and experiences afforded him outlooks and perspectives, without which ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... most carefull seen to that no four-footed thing come nigh hand, for it would be a despert ill thing if such by any mishap did run just across or loup over ...
— The Evolution Of An English Town • Gordon Home

... journey Mr. World and Miss Church-Member drew nigh to this great college, but the shrewd and wicked Mr. World remained silent, waiting for the first words of his companion. Miss Church-Member, however, as she looked upon the stupendous edifices, was so filled with wonder and ...
— Mr. World and Miss Church-Member • W. S. Harris

... of Asia, Spaniards, Italians, Algerians, Moroccans, Egyptians. Many had kept their original costume and to this varied picturesque garb was united a diversity of tongues, some of them mysterious and well-nigh extinct. As though infected by the oral confusion, the French themselves began to forget their native language, speaking the dialect of Marseilles, which preserves indelible ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... suffer much, I reckon," said another. "My owd mother was nigh froze to death in t' forest, and her said 'twas just like dropping to sleep. An' luck ye, the poor lad's face be as quiet as ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)

... faith I had once again nigh forgotten your Faerie Queene; howbeit, by good chance, I have now sent her home at the last neither in better or worse case than I found her. And must you of necessity have my judgement of her indeed? To be plain, I am void of all judgement, ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church

... felt, not long afterward, when a letter from father was handed me in which he said I must anticipate my vacation a week or two and come home and join the Church on the next Communion Sabbath. The serious feelings I had were well-nigh gone, and I was beginning to feel quite jolly again, and I did not know what to do. I went home, however, and let them take me into the Church. A kind of pride and shamefacedness kept me from saying I did not think I was a Christian, and so I ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various

... "The Quaker well nigh fainted when he heerd this, but he was pretty deep too; so, says he, 'Lawyer, that's a great deal of money, but I have more cases there; if I give you the one thousand dollars will you plead the other cases I shall have to give you?' 'Yes,' says Daniel, 'I will to the best of ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... the roughness of the Bucher family life mortified her. It was often well-nigh outlandish. How could she have so ardently studied the beautiful in music and colors ...
— Villa Elsa - A Story of German Family Life • Stuart Henry

... were for high, heroic deeds. Joseph Strelitski, student and cigar commission agent, jumped to his feet and cried passionately in German: "Everywhere Israel groans and travails—must we indeed wait and wait till our hearts are sick and strike never a decisive blow? It is nigh two thousand years since across the ashes of our Holy Temple we were driven into the Exile, clanking the chains of Pagan conquerors. For nigh two thousand years have we dwelt on alien soils, a mockery and a byword for the nations, hounded out from every worthy ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... His holy name. Repeating a saying of this same prophet, our Lord said to the members of the Jewish Church in His day: "Ye hypocrites, well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto Me with their mouth, and honoreth Me with their lips; but their heart is far from Me. But in vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men" (Matt. 15, 7-9). The Pharisees in the days ...
— Luther Examined and Reexamined - A Review of Catholic Criticism and a Plea for Revaluation • W. H. T. Dau

... opinion of Christmas as a time of jollity. Solemn—blessed, if you will—but no, not jovial. At no time do the dead so clamor to be remembered. Even those that went a long time ago, the regret for whose departure has settled down to a tender, almost pleasant pain; whom at other times we go nigh to forget; even they cry out loud, ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton

... resign, "because the king would not hear reason." It seems at any rate tolerably certain that, although they brought forward the "Bill of Pains and Penalties" under pressure of the Crown, they did not do so until they had well-nigh exhausted every effort short of actual resignation (this dignified position they did not take) to avoid it. Mr. Wade tells us that "their first indiscretion consisted in commencing hostilities against the queen by the omission of her name in ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt

... sand—is the one obstacle an automobile cannot overcome. It is possible to traverse roads so rough that the machine is well-nigh wrenched apart; to ride over timbers, stones, and boulders; plough through mud; but sand—deep, yielding sand—brings one to a stand-still. A reserve force of twenty or thirty horse-power will get through most places, but in dry ...
— Two Thousand Miles On An Automobile • Arthur Jerome Eddy

... chance for you. It'll take him pretty nigh twenty minutes to eat me (I'm rather stringy and tough) and you can escape in less ...
— Androcles and the Lion • George Bernard Shaw

... as you said I must," Hugh, continued, and Sam went on: "'Tell him I loves him; and ef he lives I'll be his wife.' Dem's her very words, nigh as I can 'member—but what is massah goin' to do?" he continued in some surprise, ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes

... git a chance, to walk Off by myself to hev a privit talk With a queer critter thet can't seem to 'gree Along o' me like most folks,—Mister Me. Ther' 's times when I'm unsoshle ez a stone, An' sort o' suffocate to be alone,— I'm crowded jes' to think thet folks are nigh, An' can't bear nothin' closer than the sky; Now the wind's full ez shifty in the mind Ez wut it is ou'-doors, ef I ain't blind, An' sometimes, in the fairest sou'west weather, My innard vane pints east for weeks together, My natur' gits all goose-flesh, an' my sins ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various

... was nigh twenty years ago. It were Mr. Baldwin as keeps a inn at Salthill as started to run 'em daily. The coach stops at the Belle Savage, Ludgate. Be that near where you want ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce

... Jethro, I—I'm hard up, I'm desp'rate, pretty nigh. I'll let you have my five hundred shares of Wellmouth Development Company for just half what I paid for it—ten dollars a share. If you wasn't my friend, I wouldn't—What are ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln

... were no better off; their wheel is forrard, and so you may suppose the fellow that steered had his share of the seas; the others stood by to relieve him; and for the matter of water, she was just like a rock, the waves striking her bows and flying pretty nigh as high as the top of her funnel, and blowing the whole length of her aft with a fall like the tumble of half-a-dozen cartloads of bricks. I like to speak of what they went through, for the way they were knocked about was ...
— Heroes of the Goodwin Sands • Thomas Stanley Treanor

... sat up. "Done got into nest ob snakes," he declared, "reckon I killed fifty of 'em, but more and more kept coming so I had to run. Golly, I 'spect thar was mighty nigh a hundred chased me most to camp. Dat's why I yells ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely

... he be the victor in the battle," Sir Thomas replied, "Silesia is not conquered. And if the battle be lost, your majesty is well nigh ruined." ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott

... callin' this marnin'. 'Tis a sort o' whisper as comes to a body's ear, an' it means that the high hills knaws the rain is nigh. An' they tell it wan to t'other, and moans it mournful over the valleys 'pon the wind. 'The storm be comin', the storm ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts

... impressive and stately spectacle. It is a beautiful day, say; but far be it from me to intimate as much to my neighbor, who plainly would rather die than thus commit himself with me, and who, in fact, would well-nigh strike me speechless with surprise if he did so. If there is any necessity for communication, as with the conductor, we essay first to express ourselves by gesture, and then utter our desires with ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells

... throbbing situation that confronted Cadet Carter as he picked up an Army bat and stood by the plate, facing the "wicked" and well-nigh invincible Darrin ...
— Dick Prescotts's Fourth Year at West Point - Ready to Drop the Gray for Shoulder Straps • H. Irving Hancock

... this, and be henceforth among the Gods Thyself a Goddess, not to earth confined, But sometimes in the air, as we, sometimes Ascend to Heaven, by merit thine, and see What life the Gods live there, and such live thou!" So saying, he drew nigh, and to me held, Even to my mouth of that same fruit held part Which he had plucked; the pleasant savoury smell So quickened appetite, that I, methought, Could not but taste. Forthwith up to the clouds With him I flew, and underneath beheld The earth outstretched immense, a prospect ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton

... did not know just what he wanted at this period of his life, there were a great many people in the town of Rockland who thought they did know. He had been a widower long enough, "—nigh twenty year, wa'n't it? He'd been aout to Spraowles's party,—there wa'n't anything to hender him why he shouldn't stir raound l'k other folks. What was the reason he did n't go abaout to taown-meetin's 'n' Sahbath-meetin's, 'n' lyceums, 'n' ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... second time that I stood here was nigh three years ago, when I spoke to you in relation to John Brown, then in a Virginia jail. How great the result of that idea which he pressed upon the country! Do you know with what poetic justice Providence treats that very town where he lay ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... China in the beginning of the thirteenth century. Indeed, the amiable and profound historian is of opinion, after the most mature deliberation, that 'God himself must have arranged all this in favour of so great and good a prince; and knowing that his end was nigh, inspired him with the idea of undertaking this enterprise, that he might have the merit of having completed it; otherwise, how should he have thought of leading out his army in the dead of winter to cross countries covered with ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... there was no call to count his eldest son's running off with a dairymaid, it being well beknown," they would observe with severity, "that his mother never would let e'er a one of the young madams as were suitable to marry him come nigh the house." ...
— Fated to Be Free • Jean Ingelow



Words linked to "Nigh" :   hot, nearby, near, far, adjacent, distance, about, left, warm



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