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More "Knot" Quotes from Famous Books



... English tongue. It was upon the part of a town constable, perhaps as nearly of the Dogberry type as could be imagined. I was standing in the town hall, at a moment preliminary to a public meeting. A knot of youngsters had been joking one another, when this authoritative official approached. All but one speedily retired before the awful presence. "Master Constable" addressed the lingerer: "Disperge,"—a difficult operation ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous

... A knot of passengers gathered round to hear what followed; and Martin heard his friend say, as he whispered to another friend, and rubbed his hands, 'Pogram will smash him into sky-blue ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens

... The first of them was a stout boy, with a white top-knot and spectacles. The housemaid brought him in and said, 'Compliments, and at what time was he to be fetched!' Mrs. Alicumpaine said, 'Not a moment later than ten. How do you do, sir? Go and sit down.' Then a number of other children came; boys by themselves, and girls by themselves, and boys and ...
— Holiday Romance • Charles Dickens

... not accidental that the wreath should be composed of white and red roses, and tied with a knot of white and red ribbons. White and red, you remember, are the colors of ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... to be put on the gold chain which, as the head of the order, he had a right to wear with it, and took from the jewel case several especially handsome rings and a very costly star of diamonds and rubies, which he had fastened in the knot of the bow of his ruff. The state sword and sheath, which Adrian handed ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... feel their heavy rims press on our tender brain-roofs. However, when the saucy eyes of Mon Amie look out sparkling from under her begrimed helmet, the effect is not bad; on the contrary, the masquerade is piquant. No need to mention the ribbons that we knot under our wide, square collars for becomingness, our coquetry "under difficulties," nor the gauntleted gloves wherewith we protect our hands, nor the daintiness of the little boots that peep from the loose trousers, ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various

... (ua haki ka pule). This boded him ill; therefore he called to his son to stand in prayer; but the result was the same. Then he said, "This augurs of the day of death; see! the rising up of a man in the pass of Hapuu, putting on his kapa with its knot fastening on the left side of the neck, which means that he is bringing a ...
— Hawaiian Folk Tales - A Collection of Native Legends • Various

... few times, and it was made with a pocket, the first he had ever had. As he saw the box slammed down, he remembered with a pang that in the pocket was his little bestest white handkerchief with lace on it and in the corner of the handkerchief, tied in an easy knot, was a penny that Denys ...
— The Girls of St. Olave's • Mabel Mackintosh

... and on. Presently they passed the pretty, unpretentious club-house, built close to the water. A few light sails were dipping and shaking on the bay, children were gathered in a little knot beside an upturned canoe, on the shore. Several cars were parked on the drive outside the club, and Nancy felt decidedly self-conscious as she and Bert and the children walked onto the awninged porch that was ...
— Undertow • Kathleen Norris

... the knot over without reply. Up stream the jam creaked, groaned, settled deliberately forward, cutting a ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White

... of answer the man proceeded to open the bag. He took out a parcel wrapped loosely in brown paper, and about the size of a large book. It was tied with string, and the man seemed unnecessarily long untying the knot. When at last the string was off and the paper unfolded, there appeared a series of smaller packages inside. The man took them out very carefully, almost as if they had been alive, Blake thought, and set them ...
— The Empty House And Other Ghost Stories • Algernon Blackwood

... what you were doing; it was what you were undoing that bothered me. You were undoing the knot with which I fastened my rope before I descended your air shaft to get ...
— The Crime of the French Cafe and Other Stories • Nicholas Carter

... among the knot of loungers at the church-gate such sentences as the following passed ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... over which Sir Lucien Pyne presided, and which must be kept hidden from Monte Irvin; and it was not until she thus contemplated cutting herself adrift from it all that she perceived the Gordian knot which bound her to the drug coterie. How far, yet how smoothly, by all but imperceptible stages she had glided down the stream since that night when the gold box had lain upon her dressing-table! Kazmah's drug store in Bond Street had few secrets for her; or so she believed. ...
— Dope • Sax Rohmer

... that he should advise or consult. As there is no difficulty nor impediment in the way of his power,—he doth all that he pleases, ad nutum, at his very word or nod, so easy are impossibilities to him,—so there is nothing hard to his wisdom, no knot but it can loose, nothing so curious or exquisite but he can as curiously contrive it, as the most common and gross pieces of the creation, and therefore, "he is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working." But ye have here expressed, as it were, ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... knots Amaryllis weaves three different colours; Amaryllis knots and says: I knot the ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V1 • William Mienhold

... in to rescue his Sawhorse, and had his left foot smashed by the hammer before he could pull the creature out of danger. They then found that the Sawhorse had been badly dazed by the blow; for while the hard wooden knot of which his head was formed could not be crushed by the hammer, both his ears were broken off and he would be unable to hear a sound until some new ones were made for him. Also his left knee was cracked, and had to be ...
— Ozma of Oz • L. Frank Baum

... lawyers, Mrs. Harte was pursuing the settled purpose of her soul, constructing with infinite care, as directed by her complete English Housekeeper, a desert island for a wedding, in a deep china dish, with a mount in the middle, two figures upon the mount, with crowns on their heads, a knot of rock-candy at their feet, and gravel-walks of shot comfits, judiciously intersecting in every ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth

... Thrushes now are silent, Our Swallows flown away,— But Robin's here, in coat of brown, With ruddy breast-knot gay. Robin, Robin Redbreast, O Robin dear! Robin singing sweetly In the falling ...
— The Posy Ring - A Book of Verse for Children • Various

... desire is such, that it is ready, so far forth as it can, to dissolve that sweet knot of union that is betwixt body and soul, a knot more dear to a reasonable creature than that can be which is betwixt wife and husband, parent and child, or a man and his estate. For even 'all that a ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... the eyes of fifty well-dressed beaux upon me, to trip it in the Mall, or walk on the Battery give me the luxurious, jaunty, flowing bell-hoop. It would have delighted you to have seen me the last evening, my charming girl! I was dangling o'er the battery with Billy Dimple; a knot of young fellows were upon the platform; as I passed them I faltered with one of the most bewitching false steps you ever saw, and then recovered myself with such a pretty confusion, flirting my hoop ...
— The Contrast • Royall Tyler

... the educated. Letters were usually written with the stylus, an iron instrument like a pencil in size and shape, on thin slips of wood or ivory covered with wax, and folded together with the writing on the inside. The slips were tied together by a string, and the knot was sealed with wax and stamped with a signet ring. Letters were also written on parchment with ink. Special messengers were employed to carry letters, as there was no regular mail service. Roman letters differed from ours ...
— History of Rome from the Earliest times down to 476 AD • Robert F. Pennell

... and yet—he knows she is still in the flesh. How strangely her eyes gleam. A dull gleam and so passionless. Her brown hair—not altogether fallen down her back, but loosened from its hairpins, and hanging in a soft heavy knot behind her head—gives an additional pallor to her already too white face. The open eyes are looking straight before them, unseeing. Her step is slow, mechanical, unearthly. It is only indeed when she lays the candle she holds upon the edge of the ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford

... the big river you speak of. Walking is very pleasant exercise, especially when one hasn't half a hundredweight of traps and provisions to carry; but it's very slow work you'll allow. I like to spank along with a ten-knot breeze across the open ocean, with studden-sails alow and aloft; or to glide down a river with a strong current and fair breeze. Ah, mate, if you ever come to sea with me in a smart craft, you'll know ...
— Manco, the Peruvian Chief - An Englishman's Adventures in the Country of the Incas • W.H.G. Kingston

... win some stubborn maid, Still does the wanton god assume The martial air, the gay cockade, The sword, the shoulder-knot, and plume. ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book IV • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... conspired to make this Irish question a Gordian-knot which no man can untie, and but few would dare to cut. The past extravagance of the landlords, absenteeism, rack-renting, injustice of all kinds; the past jealousy of England and her over-shadowing all native industries and productions; difference of religion, ...
— About Ireland • E. Lynn Linton

... on more briskly through the silent streets, and such as were awake at the moment heard her footfall and said, "The New Year is come!" Wherever there was a knot of midnight roisterers, they quaffed her health. She sighed, however, to perceive that the air was tainted—as the atmosphere of this world must continually be—with the dying breaths of mortals who had lingered just long enough for her to bury them. But there were millions left alive ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... it you I see go by the window, Jim Larkin—you not looking at me nor any one, And your shadow swaying from East to West? Strange that you should be walking free—you shut down without light, And your legs tied up with a knot of iron. ...
— Sun-Up and Other Poems • Lola Ridge

... had resumed the conduct of affairs since the morning of the 27th—the Emperor William, itching to cut the knot, driven on by his Staff and his generals—to him and no other must we trace the responsibility for this insolent move which made war inevitable. "The heads of the army insisted," was all that Herr ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various

... The final disenchantment was anything but glorious. Roughly seizing him, the two men forced him stiffly upright in the chair, drew his arms about the back of it, and there secured them, wrist to wrist, drawing the knot until Alex almost cried out in pain. Then, as tightly, they bound his ankles to the lower rungs, one ...
— The Young Railroaders - Tales of Adventure and Ingenuity • Francis Lovell Coombs

... nothing to either except a one-inch board and a thickness of lath and plastering. I passed the two lines of fuse through the two holes, and into the other building, which was a drug store. In the other building I tied a loose knot in the ends of the fuse and left it lying on the floor behind the counter and covered with ...
— Track's End • Hayden Carruth

... spears. He could deduce from age to age The web of island parentage; Best lay the rhyme, best lead the dance, For any festal circumstance: And fitly fashion oar and boat, A palace or an armour coat. None more availed than he to raise The strong, suffumigating blaze, Or knot the wizard leaf: none more, Upon the untrodden windward shore Of the isle, beside the beating main, To cure the sickly and constrain, With muttered words and waving rods, The gibbering and the whistling gods. But he, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... kindled, purpose is generated, and the wheels in us begin to go round. They had gone round, even in John's father; but not only were time, place, and circumstance against the older man, but his love had nested in so narrow a knot-hole that the purposes and activities of his gentle soul died in ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable

... didn't buy a single thing for herself," grumbled Laura, untying the cord. "Isn't it just too sweet!" She held up a dish of pale pink glass with a knot of ...
— Peggy-Alone • Mary Agnes Byrne

... no easy matter to fasten it so as to make it look at all like a man naturally mounting stairs. The more difficult it was, however, the more they all became interested in the business. Mildred brought straw, and Ailwin tied a knot here, and another knot there, while Oliver cocked the hat in various directions upon the head, till they all forgot what they were dressing up the figure for. The reason popped into Ailwin's head again, when she had succeeded ...
— The Settlers at Home • Harriet Martineau

... Those bejeweled fingers, tremulously eager to caress, surely were not those of a red-handed murderer! Yet if my wiles succeeded, those hands would wear manacles, those fingers convulsively clutch at vacancy, and that musical voice choke with tense strain of the hangman's knot. ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee

... morning, yellow leaves had fluttered down again. Its time of flowers, and even of fruits, was over; but a scantling of apples enriched the trees. Only a blossom here and there expanded pale and delicate amidst a knot of faded leaves. ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte

... obliged to remain, and laid himself down near him, in order that he might be roused as soon as he should stir. A few hours afterwards, Francis wished to get up, but finding himself fastened by the cord, he untied the knot, and went to pray under some neighboring trees. The novice, not finding him when he awoke, went to seek him under the trees. A celestial light caused him to draw near a spot, where he stopped, and from whence he saw Jesus Christ, surrounded by angels, His Blessed Mother, and John ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe

... and the cap was his uniform; he was collecting the pennies for the chairs. So I gave him two soldi and another for himself and saw him scamper happily away and join a knot of brother Cupids who were playing together round a lamp-post. He showed them the soldo I had given him for himself and the meeting became as ebullient and full of excitement as ...
— Castellinaria - and Other Sicilian Diversions • Henry Festing Jones

... find no end, Let each man use his chance to day And carve his fortune as he may; Each warrior from his own good lance Shall reap the fruit of toil or chance; Jove deals to all an equal lot, And Fate shall loose or cut the knot." CONINGTON, ...
— Story of Aeneas • Michael Clarke

... of the four flabby men, an oily sort of shabby gentleman, who was blind of an eye, and had very disordered red hair, and a bruise on the end of a very red nose, which looked like a birch knot growing upon a redder face, now came jauntily forward, and having doffed a much damaged hat, that sat on the side of his head with a challenging air, and approaching the major, who had arranged his uniform to the best advantage, spoke as follows: "Long life t'yer 'onor, for me name's Dinnis ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"

... happened was this. In his conflict with his own ill-humour, Cochrane had strolled over this nearest crest, and had found a group of camels in the hollow beyond, with a little knot of angry, loud-voiced men beside them. Brown was the centre of the group, pale, heavy-eyed, with his upturned, spiky moustache and listless manner. They had searched his pockets before, but now they were determined to tear ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle

... its grace, or betrayed the least consciousness; she looked dignified because she was dignified. That form of falsehood which consists in assuming the look of what one fain would be, was, as much as any other, impossible to Isobel Macruadh. She wore no cap; her hair was gathered in a large knot near the top of her head. Her gown was of a dark print; she had no ornament except a ring with a single ruby. She was working a ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald

... for an occasional scrape as they struggled. Rick's arms began to hurt, and his neck felt as though it would never straighten again. Gradually he worked the rope end into reach and began to move it, hoping to loosen the knot. Then there was a soft exclamation of triumph ...
— The Scarlet Lake Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin

... wished that Jill would not sit and stare at him like that. He wished that she would say something—anything. But Jill, apparently struck dumb with embarrassment, was nervously twisting the corner of her apron into a little knot. David tried to recollect what he had talked about a few days before, and he wondered why he had so enjoyed himself then. He wished that something would happen—anything!—and then from an inner room came the sound ...
— Just David • Eleanor H. Porter

... everybody's appearance [at Streatham].' And again she writes:—'his blindness is as much the effect of absence [of mind] as of infirmity, for he sees wonderfully at times. He can see the colour of a lady's top-knot, for he very often finds fault with it.' Mme. D'Arblays Diary, i. 85, ii. 174. 'He could, when well, distinguish the hour on Lichfield ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill

... oiled, and all were completely armed; their muskets were loaded, their cartouch boxes were fastened round their waists, and their patoo-patoos were fixed to their wrists. Their hair was tied up in a tight knot at the top of their heads, beautifully ornamented with feathers of the albatross. As the opposite party landed, ours all crouched on the ground, their eyes fixed on their visitors, and perfectly silent. When the debarkation was completed I observed ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle

... had ever beheld and I doubt if any childless woman could have seen such a child cuddle to another woman's breast and shoulder and not have had something of the same thrill of pain. His whiteness and pinkness and sturdy chubbiness were like many another infant's charms but his jet black top-knot that ascended on one side and cascaded over his ear on the other in a hauntingly familiar way, his violet eyes under their long lashes and his clear-cut, firm, commanding mouth, that curled into the bud of a rose as he ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess

... of noble birth and of great wealth arise and press the food in the bag, with both his feet saying, 'Enough has been put therein;' and I will cause him to go and tread down the food in the bag, and when he does so, turn thou the bag, so that he shall be up over his head in it, and then slip a knot upon the thongs of the bag. Let there be also a good bugle horn about thy neck, and as soon as thou hast bound him in the bag, wind thy horn, and let it be a signal between thee and thy knights. And when they hear the sound of the horn, let ...
— The Mabinogion Vol. 3 (of 3) • Owen M. Edwards

... "I'm only a knot on a log. The marshal we had wasn't worth the powder that killed him. Oh-h, he did kill off a few of 'em, but what we need here is a man that can see both sides of the street and behind him at ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden

... the baron roused himself, and signed to Pierre that he wished to retire to his own chamber; whereupon the servant lighted a pine knot at the fire, and preceded his master up the stairs, Miraut and Beelzebub accompanying them. The smoky, flaring light of the torch made the faded figures on the wall seem to waver and move as they passed through the hall and up the broad staircase, ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier

... deviating from it in various directions and different degrees. Thus a genus may consist of several species which approach very near the type, and of which the claim to a place with it is obvious; while there may be other species which straggle farther from this central knot, and which yet are clearly more connected with it than with any other. And even if there should be some species of which the place is dubious, and which appear to be equally bound to two generic types, it is easily ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill

... I said soberly. "Nor can I solve entirely his purpose. He is my brother, and I am the next in line. We are not even on speaking terms; yet he is childless, and may feel some measure of dislike to have the family end in a hangman's knot. I can think of no other reason for his interference. I knew ...
— Wolves of the Sea • Randall Parrish

... time of the Spanish conquest of Peru, the Empire of the Incas was supposed to have been in existence about four hundred years. But the Incas had no hieroglyphic or pictorial system of recording events. The most they had was a system of knot records or quippos, which will be explained in due time. These records were simply aids to the memory. Mr. Squier places them "about on a par with Robinson Crusoe's Notched Calendar, or the chalked tally of an illiterate tapster." They ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen

... boats, laden deep, had shoved off, there was a struggle, and the crowd of idlers that had gathered scattered suddenly. Two Indians had broken away, and were running across the wharf, with a little knot of soldiers close on their heels. One of the soldiers, leaping forward, brought the stock of his musket down on the head of the nearer Indian. The fugitive went down, dragging with him his companion, who tugged desperately at the chain. A soldier drew his knife, and cut off the dead Indian's ...
— The Road to Frontenac • Samuel Merwin

... Aniela, I noticed that her eyes were brilliant as if from recent slumber; that on her face and the light print dress fell the golden rays of the morning sun filtering through the young leaves; her hair was tied in a loose knot, and the flowing morning dress showed the outline of her shoulders and supple waist, and in its very carelessness had a certain freshness, which enhanced a thousandfold her charm. It did not escape my notice how much smaller than usual she looked among the tall elm trees of the avenue,—almost ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... Spanish bayonet, a few thin leaves, and, on reaching the point where an animal which he wishes to capture has rested, or whence it has newly taken flight, he deposits, together with sacrifices hereinafter to be mentioned, a spider knot (ho-tsa-na mu kwi-ton-ne), made of four strands of these yucca leaves. This knot must be tied like the ordinary cat-knot, but invariably from right to left, so that the ends of the four strands shall spread out from the center as the legs of a spider from its body. The knot is further characterized ...
— Zuni Fetiches • Frank Hamilton Cushing

... looking at the hearth. A warmer flush than that of firelight alone lay on her cheek. She bent forward and threw on a pine knot. It blazed richly. Then she drew the cricket more securely under her feet, and settled ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown

... treacherous, or insulted by a favoured, servant in the decline of life, when protection is grown hopeless and resistance vain; and as they enjoy at least a moral certainty of never living worse than they do to-day: while the little knot of unmarried females turned fifty round Red Lion Square may always be ruined by a runaway agent, a bankrupted banker, or a roguish steward; and even the petty pleasures of six-penny quadrille may become by that misfortune too costly for their income.—Aureste, as the French say, the difference ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi

... far the feud merely smouldered, finding occasional expression in sarcastic speech, and the severance of former friendly relations, but it boded more serious trouble for the near future. To a loyal henchman, Moffat merely condescended to remark, glancing disdainfully at a knot of hard riders disconsolately sitting their ponies in front of the saloon door, "We 've got them fellers roped and tied, gents, and they simply won't be ace-high with the ladies of this camp after our fandango is ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish

... Caulde, where the betrothal was solemnised. The next day they rode to Cambremer, and the happy pair were married, "le sieur de Boissey," says the manuscript, "espousa sa fiancee sans bans," and no doubt Brother Nicolle de Garsalle helped to tie the knot. No less than sixteen persons being implicated in the capital charge of abduction which followed, you may imagine how lively the Procession of the Fierte was that year, and the cheers of the populace as Jean de Boissey (begarlanded with roses, ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook

... at Copan, as given by STEPHENS, one naturally looks for points of striking resemblance or striking difference. Where all is unknown, even the smallest sign is examined, in the hope that it may prove a clue. The Plate I, Fig. 49, has a twisted knot (the "square knot" of sailors) of cords over its head, and above this is a chiffre composed of ellipses, and above this again a sign like a sea-shell. A natural suggestion was that these might be the signs for the name of the ...
— Studies in Central American Picture-Writing • Edward S. Holden

... thistle, which is so well armed that the plant-collector knows not where to grasp it; next, the spear-thistle, with its ample foliage, ending each of its veins with a spear-head; lastly, the black knap-weed, which gathers itself into a spiky knot. In among these, in long lines armed with hooks, the shoots of the blue dewberry creep along the ground. To visit the prickly thicket when the Wasp goes foraging, you must wear boots that come to mid-leg or else resign yourself to a smarting in the ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre

... the bear-meat hung. This he shook with violence, looking downward, to see if the suspended object would fall. Disappointed, he left this after a time, and came down to the other branch, where the lasso was tied in a knot. Here he again seized the rope in his claws, and shook it with violence, but with a like result. Although he had the advantage of the wolves in being able to climb the tree, he had not their cunning, else he would soon have let the meat down, by cutting the rope with his teeth. This idea, however, ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid

... structure between Regent street and Piccadilly, which with impartial alacrity, provided the hire is paid, opens its doors to every sort of gathering—its platform occupied one night by Joachim and Halle, the next by Jolly Nash or the Christy Minstrels; on Wednesday, maybe, by a knot of Total Abstinence enthusiasts, denouncing publicans as sinners; and on Thursday by the band to which Licensed Victualers and their friends are dancing at their annual public ball. You really want to go in? Very well. Gentlemen's tickets, one guinea; ladies', twenty-five ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various

... North and South should be ruptured and so the integrity of the nation be the more imperiled. Withal there was a spreading and deepening and most reasonable disgust at the reckless ranting of a little knot of antislavery men having their headquarters at Boston, who, exulting in their irresponsibility, scattered loosely appeals to men's vindictive passions and filled the unwilling air with clamors against church and ministry ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon

... and stood back awhile to look at it. My first effort at electioneering. There was no immediate sensation, for everybody else was too busy over his own affairs to notice my little poster, and so I went about from one little knot of talkers to another, hanging shyly on the outskirts in the hope that, when it broke up, I might lead the way casually towards my masterpiece—"VOTE FOR ...
— If I May • A. A. Milne

... crocheting in order that she might construct a Tam o' Shanter cap. It had been a difficult task, and the result was far from satisfying. Dropped stitches and uneven rows were in evidence all over the creation of dark red, with its bushy little knot on top. But Janet had an eye for the impressionistic touch, and as she glanced in the mirror of Susan Jane's bureau, the general effect was gratifying. Under the dull red the splendid, dusky gold of the girl's hair shone exquisitely. Janet had trained the rebellious locks at ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock

... beside one little knot of business men. Observing that the hand was pointed to them, Scrooge advanced to listen ...
— A Christmas Carol • Charles Dickens

... my child! Come, wipe away thy tears, and shew thy father A cheerful countenance. See, the tie-knot here Is off—this hair must not hang so dishevelled. 60 Come, dearest! dry thy tears up. They deform Thy gentle eye—well now—what was I saying? Yes, in good truth, this Piccolomini Is a most noble and ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... her floursack dish-towels, which Lennon, with mock seriousness, permitted her to knot over his shoulder in a sling. The loop of cloth extended along his arm from elbow to finger tips without hiding ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet

... parcels were exactly alike, both of them well tied up with good whip cord. Ben took his parcel to a table, and, after breaking off the sealing wax, began carefully to examine the knot, and then to untie it. Hal stood still, exactly in the spot where the parcel was put into his hands, and tried first at one corner, and then at another, to pull the string off by force. "I wish these ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth

... between him and his wife, Parvati, alias Kali, she cursed the person that should thenceforward dare to drink of the water that flowed over his images on earth. The river Ganges is supposed to flow from the top- knot of Siva's head, and no one would drink of it after this curse, were it not that the sacred stream is supposed to come first from the heel of Vishnu, the Preserver. All the little images of Siva, that are made out of stones taken from the bed of the Nerbudda river, are supposed to be absolved ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... Faith's dressing; the rest was a plain white cambric frock, which had its only setting off in her face and figure. The one touch of colour which it wanted, Faith found when she went down stairs; for upon the basket where 'Le Philosophe' commonly reposed, lay a dainty breast-knot of autumn tints,—fringed gentian with its delicate blue, and oak leaves of the deepest red, and a late rose ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner

... he said. "The bush down that way is black as pitch. Guess I'll have to look for a pine-knot and get a light." ...
— The Gold Trail • Harold Bindloss

... Baratinski, who commanded the Guard. Orloff, who had already thrown down the Tsar, pressed upon his chest with his own knees, holding him fast at the same time by the throat. Baratinski and Teplof then passed a table-napkin with a sliding knot round his neck, and the murderers accomplished the work of death ...
— Love affairs of the Courts of Europe • Thornton Hall

... to prevent its being rubbed over the ears. Tie a piece of cord, a yard long, to the off side, D, of the head-stall; pass the cord through the near side, D. Accustom the colt to see and to be held by this. It is very powerful, as it forms a slip knot round his nose, and prevents his pulling with the top of his head; and it keeps the two cheek-straps back, which otherwise might injure the colt's eyes. When he is used to the short cord, tie a long ...
— Hints on Horsemanship, to a Nephew and Niece - or, Common Sense and Common Errors in Common Riding • George Greenwood

... I saw on Bulkley's desk a note for a few hundred dollars, drawn to his own order and signed by him with the firm's name, and in response to my inquiry as to the meaning of it, he told me it was a little matter he was putting through by a friend for his own accommodation, I cut the knot and insisted on a dissolution of ...
— The Romance and Tragedy • William Ingraham Russell

... are too great, and that too faint a blow To give them now; it would have serv'd at first, When with the weakest touch their knot had burst. But, now, your care must be, not to detect The smallest cord, or line of your suspect; For such, who know the weight of prince's fear, Will, when they find themselves discover'd, rear Their forces, like seen snakes, that else would lie Roll'd in their circles, ...
— Sejanus: His Fall • Ben Jonson

... gordian knot, indeed," said Hazel. "What, die to shirk a few difficulties? No. I propose an amendment to that. After the words 'kneel down,' insert the words, 'and get up again, trusting in that merciful Providence which has saved us so far, but expects us ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade

... which it was with difficulty he managed to fasten the rope. He had to pull away smaller stones from beneath it, and pass the rope through under it. Having lifted it a little way with the powerful help of his tackle, to try if all was right before he got out to haul in earnest, he saw that his knot was slipping, and lowered the stone again so as to set it on one end, leaning against the side of the well—when he discovered that his rope collar had got so frayed, that one of the strands was cut through; ...
— Gutta-Percha Willie • George MacDonald

... twinkling lights of Las Estrellas, seeming at first fallen stars caught in the mesquite branches, swam into view. Plainly Tony's accident had stimulated much local interest; among the few straggling houses men came and went, while a knot of women, children, and countless mongrel dogs had congregated just outside of the hut where the injured man lay. A brush fire in the street crackled right merrily, its ...
— The Bells of San Juan • Jackson Gregory

... 280, No. 18 current volume, for a reply, which you considered "sufficient." With your kind permission I would like to speak a few words about the "snakes" in question. When I resided in Pennsylvania, I, in company with many other lads, used to tie a bundle of horse hairs into a hard knot and then immerse them in the brook, when the water began to get warm, and in due time we would have just as many animals, with the power of locomotion and appearance of snakes, as there were hairs in the bundle. I have raised them one-eighth ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various

... voice not loud but distinct, the utterance never hurried beyond the point of immediate comprehension, but carrying the attention of the audience with it, eager to the end. Two letters of warning and remonstrance against the habits of lecturing in a colloquial tone, suitable to a knot of students gathered round his table, but not to a large audience—of running his words, especially technical terms, together—of pouring out new and unfamiliar matter at breakneck speed, were addressed to him—one by a "working man" of his Monday evening audience ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley

... stimulated to deeds of high emprise the knights, who styled themselves their "servants," and besought "favours" from them in the shape of a scarf, a veil, a sleeve, a bracelet, a ringlet, or a knot of ribands. At such times Henry himself would enter the lists; and, in his earlier days, and before he became too unwieldy for active exertion, no ruder antagonist with the lance or sword could be found than he. Men indeed, existed in his days, very different in hardihood of frame and ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 2 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth

... energetically pulling up his belt as one tightens the loosened girth on a horse that has had an interval of rest. The young noble's glance leaped them completely in its haste to reach those who followed,—the knot of women, fluttering and rustling and preening like a flock of birds. But the bird he sought was not of their number. He stared blindly at the pilgrim as the wanderer shuffled past, muttering and beating his breast. Only one figure followed ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz

... "Read by almost every American, and recommended as a work replete with truth, against which none but the partial and prejudiced can form any objection,... it satisfied multitudes that it is their true interest immediately to cut the Gordian knot by which the... colonists have been bound to Great Britain, and to open their commerce, as an independent people, to all the nations of the world." In April and May, after the Congress had opened the ports, the tide set strongly and irresistibly in the direction of the formal ...
— The Eve of the Revolution - A Chronicle of the Breach with England, Volume 11 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Carl Becker

... now for doubts. The horses were half-broken broncos. They traveled the first hundred yards tied in a knot, the buckboard sometimes on four wheels, but ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine

... every one had read it already, and from every one, from the fine lady on her throne to the red-coat on his cock-horse and the school-boy on his forrum (as our Irish brethren call it), I have heard but one word, and that is, that it is the jolliest book they ever read. Among a knot of red-coats at the cover-side, some very fast fellow said, 'If I had had such a book in my boyhood, I should have been a better man now!' and more than one capped his sentiment frankly. Now isn't it a comfort to your old bones ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury

... look she gave him, some half-articulated expression, would turn his cheek pale and almost make him shiver, and he would say kindly, "Now go, Elsie, dear," and smile upon her as she went, and close and lock the door softly after her. Then his forehead would knot and furrow itself, and the drops of anguish stand thick upon it. He would go to the western window of his study and look at the solitary mound with the marble slab for its head-stone. After his grief had had its way, he would kneel down and pray for his child as one who has no hope save ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... killed men, in order to realise her own danger. Now, for instance, he merely forced her back to the campfire, pulled the saddle strings from his pocket and tied her feet together, using a complicated knot which he told her she might work on all she darn pleased, for all he cared. Then he went calmly ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower

... many evasions, that all the art of man can never bind them so fast, but that an easy distinction shall give them a starting-hole to escape the scandal of being baffled. They will cut asunder the toughest argument with as much ease as Alexander did the gordian knot; they will thunder out so many rattling terms as shall fright an adversary into conviction. They are exquisitely dexterous in unfolding the most intricate mysteries; they will tell you to a tittle all the successive proceedings of Omnipotence ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus

... the Frenchman's muscles, as the ace sat there so strangely silent and motionless, betrayed the effort he was making to rise, to lift even a hand. Beads of sweat began to ooze on his forehead; veins to knot there Still he remained seated, without power to ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England

... bruised spot on that plain, dogged face, where a chunk of wood had flown up and all but blinded him. He noticed that big mouth. The whimsical thought occurred to him that this young fellow's face was, itself, something like a knot of wood; strong and stubborn, and very plain and homely. And yet he was so easily imposed upon—not exactly that, perhaps, but he was simple withal, and trusting ...
— Tom Slade at Black Lake • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... loose garment Pahwahbekezegun, n. a stove or an iron box that is capable of being warmed through Pahzhejeahje-ee, prep. over Peendahgun, n. a pocket or pouch Peendig, n. inside Paquahkoostegowng, block-headed Pequahquod, n. a ball or knot Poodahwain, make fire Poodahjegun, n. a musical or blowing instrument Pookedaemin, n. a mandrake Pahmetahgun, n. a servant Pahbegwah, adj. rough Pahquahskezhegun, n. a scythe Papahmebahegood, n. a rider, a name for a dragoon Pamahdezid, the living Pahsquagin, n. leather ...
— Sketch of Grammar of the Chippeway Languages - To Which is Added a Vocabulary of some of the Most Common Words • John Summerfield

... a fight; and coolies and natives, and Europeans in white, clustered at the door. I joined the knot of people and pressed forward to see what was holding their attention, and saw the body of a big, foreign-looking man, half inside the door and half on the ...
— The Devil's Admiral • Frederick Ferdinand Moore

... quotient by the off-wheel-rein, and add the near leader's blinkers to the result. Then pass your left thumb under your right middle finger, taking care at the same time to tie the off-leading-rein round your neck in a sailor's knot. Add six yards of whipcord to the near leader's shoulders, subtract yourself from the box, and send us your doctor's bill, for purposes ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 22, 1893 • Various

... given a thought to the bystanders. But now as they fell back to give him room, she swept a glance across their faces. They all wore smiles of sorts. There was something amusing about this—something out of the regular routine. A little knot of chorus-girls halted in the act of going out the wide doors and stood watching. Was it just a hoax? The suppressed unnatural silence sounded like it. But at what John Galbraith did, one of ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster

... Cousins Dick and Maud made quick work of their courting, and the marriage is to follow very speedily. In most cases such speedy work would be risky enough, but they know all about each other—at least so far as a couple may before the knot is tied which makes them one flesh. I think very highly of both, and hope it is going to be a ...
— Elsie at Home • Martha Finley

... of Scouting are similar to those of the schools, the church and the home, its methods are less direct and success depends upon the attraction which the program has for the girls. Belonging to an organization, the uniform, such novel activities as knot-tying, hiking, signalling and drilling, the chance for leadership, the laws to which they voluntarily subscribe and the recognition of ability by the system of giving badges are the distinctive elements of Scouting. They succeed in bringing about improved health, approved standards of behavior towards ...
— The Girl Scouts Their History and Practice • Anonymous

... gone before him, or ignorant of its nature. In describing himself to Buonagiunta da Lucca in Purgatory, he says, "I am one who, when Love breathes, mark, and according as he dictates within, I report"; to which the poet of Lucca replies, "O brother, now I see the knot which kept the Notary and Guittone and me back from that sweet new style which now I hear. I see well how your pens have followed close on the dictator, which truly was not the case with ours."[9] As Love was the common theme of the verses from which Buonagiunta ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various

... sat round a lantern, in the dark bowels of the ship, like a knot of charcoal burners in ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville

... his seat suddenly, and struck the alarum. The next instant each person on board knew that an accident had happened. The engines were stopped and reversed within two minutes. Blue-lights were burned on the paddle-boxes, and showed a knot in the cable as it lay ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 5, March, 1878 • Various

... man was sentenced to be hanged, he was taken to the prison, and after a short interval was placed in a cart, to which a horse was attached, and taken straightway to the gallows. Here a rope was suspended, with a noose, or running knot, at the end, which was placed round the culprit's neck, and after other preliminaries the hangman saw to it that the man's hands were securely handcuffed and the noose carefully adjusted. At a given signal from him the cart was drawn from under the man's feet, leaving ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor

... pretty arms about that neck which previous circumstances had rendered infamous? That she would put up with the refuse of the rope, the leavings of the cord? Or that any analogy could subsist between the knot which binds true lovers, and the knot ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb

... moments later the courtly Winslow, armed cap-a-pie and carrying a haversack of gifts at his back, strode down the hill, and across the brook to a point where a knot of dusky warriors awaited him, and with them passed out of sight, leaving his comrades to an hour of extreme ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin

... first notes of spring song have sounded in the distance, Bluebirds are to be seen by twos and threes about the edge of old orchards along open roads, where the skirting trees have crumbled or decaying knot-holes have left tempting nooks for the tree-trunk birds, with whom the Bluebird may be classed. For, though he takes kindly to a bird-box, or a convenient hole in a fencepost, telegraph pole or outbuilding, a tree hole must have been his first home and ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various

... of these vehicles were standing up, struggling to catch a sight of the match that was being played behind the screen erected to shut out non-paying sightseers. Among the horses' feet, squirming between the spokes of wheels, utterly regardless of all injury, small boys glued their eyes to knot-holes in the fence, while others climbed surreptitiously, and for the most part unobserved, on to the backs of tradesmen's carts. All these individuals were in a state of tremendous excitement, and even the policeman ...
— The Wonder • J. D. Beresford

... none undo The knot that makes one flesh of two, Sick with hatred, sick with pain, Strangling-When shall we ...
— A Shropshire Lad • A. E. Housman

... the discontented, the Spartan chief had wisely laid aside the wondrous Median robes. He stood on her stern in the armour he had worn at Plataea, resting one hand upon his shield, which itself rested on the deck. His head alone was uncovered, his long sable locks gathered up into a knot, in the Spartan fashion, a crest as it were in itself to that lofty head. And so imposing were his whole air and carriage, that Cimon, gazing at him, muttered, "What profane hand will dare to ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton

... I think, no rational connection between the BUNG of a barrel and an eye which has been closed by a blow. One might as well get the simile from a knot in a tree or a cork in a flask. But when we reflect on the constant mingling of Gipsies with prizefighters, it is almost evident that the word BONGO may have been the origin of it. A bongo yakko or yak, means a distorted, crooked, or, ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland

... in black as before, and pale, but there was a knot of pink anemones fastened at her throat, which, in the play they made with her face and hair, gave him a start ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... Fuller's, accompanied by a joyous knot of diplomatists, it was discovered to be over three hours past midnight; a novelty in etiquette which it was decided nem. con. would have "plenty of ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power

... gnawed secretly and unseen at the hard crust of want. Thus from father to son the debts were constantly increasing, and the revenues becoming smaller and smaller. If I do not make an end of this, and sever the Gordian knot like Alexander, instead of attempting the wearisome task of untying it, I shall soon present to the court and nobility the sad spectacle of a Count Rhedern who is compelled to give up his hotel, his equipage, his furniture, and ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... it," he thought, as he smiled on its beautiful waters. "All others failing to please, you are here, sure, definite, soft as a bed, tender as Martha, lovely as a dream. There will be no vulgar outcry when you untie the knot of woe. And because I am sure of you, and have such confidence in you, I can sit here and defy your ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith

... first dusting the bench, vigorously set to planing away at my bed, the while grinning like an ape. The shavings flew right and left; till at last the plane-iron came bump against an indestructible knot. The landlord was near spraining his wrist, and I told him for heaven's sake to quit — the bed was soft enough to suit me, and I did not know how all the planing in the world could make eider ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... what might be called a serpentine curve or series of loops in the river. This was at the centre of what is known as the Double Bow Knot, three rounded loops, very symmetrical in form, with an almost circular formation of flat-topped rock, a mile or more in diameter in the centre of each loop. A narrow neck of rock connects these formations to the main mesa, all being on the same level, about 700 feet above ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb

... mainland, when we had the wind from the eastward, getting round again towards noon to south and by west. This may be some guide to the limit of the land wind, and as such I record the fact. During the three days previous to our making the land, we experienced a northerly current of one knot per hour. We tried during the same period for soundings, with nearly 200 ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes

... are the last words your fingers wrote, Scrawled in broad characters across a page In this brown book I gave you. Here your hand, Guiding your rapid pen, moved up and down. Here with a looping knot you crossed a "t", And here another like it, just beyond These two eccentric "e's". You were so small, And wrote so brave a hand! How strange it seems That of all words these are the words you chose! And yet a simple choice; you did not know ...
— Renascence and Other Poems • Edna St. Vincent Millay

... tapering legs, but these sometimes have the flutings spiral instead of perpendicular, and the backs are either oval or rectangular, and ornamented with a carved riband which is represented as tied at the top in a lover's knot. Gobelins, Beauvais, and Aubusson tapestry are used for covering, the subjects being in harmony with the taste of the time. A sofa in this style, with settees at the ends, the frame elaborately carved with trophies of arrows ...
— Illustrated History of Furniture - From the Earliest to the Present Time • Frederick Litchfield

... and daffodils ever since Christmas. I have lots of pets. We have nine cats. One is fourteen years old. And we have a shepherd dog that has a great deal of sense. I have three white hens—one top-knot, one plain, and one with pantalets. I have a chicken grave-yard, and we have funerals. The red and blue birds, wrens, jays, and woodpeckers, staid with us all winter. I found a nest of hatched partridge eggs, and the large ends were all picked round even, and opened ...
— Harper's Young People, March 30, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... obliged," said she, her eye flashing quickly about the room before settling down upon the knot he ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green

... considered her image carefully when, lo and behold! the crystal was bright and clean as virgin silver and when he eyed her semblance in the glass he saw it pure as a white dove's. THen sent he forthright for the Kazi and witnesses and they knotted the knot and wrote the writ and the bride was duly throned. Presently the Prince took the Wazir his father-in-law into his own mansion, and to the young lady he sent a present of costly jewels and it was ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... A dangerous meaning in your riddle lurks. One knot is yet unsolved; that told, this strange And most mysterious drama ends. The name ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb

... tunics, with various embroideries and different coloured edgings, and armed with the usual pierced and gold-inlaid swords. To judge from the dignity of their appearance, they seemed one and all to be individuals of very great importance. Behind each of these great men stood a small knot of followers and attendants. ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard

... caution's voice, Ere de marriage knot you tie; It is [the devil],(25) mit shrews to splice, Dat nobody can deny, deny, Dat nobody ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke

... he was a piper's son, He learned to play when he was young, And all the tune that he could play Was, "Over the hills and far away," Over the hills, and a great way off, The wind will blow my top-knot off. ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various

... indignant denial, the crestfallen man exclaimed, "Well, Lor', lady, I made sure you did, you're so yaller complected" (I had shortly before recovered from an attack of jaundice). Now, it chanced that Peter, knowing my fondness for a pine-knot fire, had collected a quantity of knots, which he just then brought in, and, hearing the uncomplimentary remark of my soldier-friend, turned upon him with the utmost fury, and such a tirade of abuse as followed baffles alike my power to recall the words or to describe the rage which prompted ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers

... around an angle of the stone wall, and told him that the horse was gone. He was disconcerted, but not abased; maintaining that it was a new kind of knot that couldn't slip and that the horse must have chewed the halter through! He was less enthusiastic than I had ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... not greatly accustomed to having his rather fiery top-knot thus openly referred to in tones of evident admiration. It was a subject he naturally felt somewhat sensitive about, and in spite of the open honesty of the young girl's face, he could not help doubting for a moment ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish

... boys in the water looking on, and his courage rose; for Mealy was in the primary department of life, and had not yet learned that one must fight alone. He answered, "I did," with an emphasis on the "I," as he tugged at the last knot. The new boy had been looking Mealy over, and he replied quickly, ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White

... school, those whose rhetoric bloomed perennial in First Readers from which her grandfather's prose had long since faded. Amid that clamor of far-off enthusiasms she detected no controversial note. The little knot of Olympians held their views in common with an early-Christian promiscuity. They were continually proclaiming their admiration for each other, the public joining as chorus in this guileless antiphon of praise; and she discovered no traitor in ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton

... who cut the Gordian knot, and made one of his welcome disappearances, which lasted until David was ready to start in college. His savings, that he had accumulated by field work in the summers and a very successful poultry business for six years, netted ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates

... a window, or walking in a garden, or passing through the streets, or sauntering in any quiet place about the town, you will hear this game in progress in a score of wine- shops at once; and looking over any vineyard walk, or turning almost any corner, will come upon a knot of players in full cry. It is observable that most men have a propensity to throw out some particular number oftener than another; and the vigilance with which two sharp-eyed players will mutually endeavour to detect this weakness, and adapt their game to it, is very ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens

... that this Cryptosporella is related to the black knot of the plum is an interesting feature; and that it attacks the growing canes during the growing season and fruit during the fall and winter. He suggests the treatment of removing all the infected branches during the fall and winter. I would add to that, complete eradication ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association, Report of the Proceedings at the Fourth Annual Meeting - Washington D.C. November 18 and 19, 1913 • Various

... entreaty in her manner, and before their owner had time to refuse or comply, the scorched hands were taken possession of, the red blisters covered with a cool bandage, and the frown of pain smoothed out of Warwick's forehead by the prospect of relief. As she tied the last knot, Sylvia glanced up with a look that mutely asked pardon for past waywardness, and expressed gratitude for past help; then, as if her heart were set at rest, she was gone before her ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott

... on their elbows, began to make splashing movements, by way of casting off the clammy infernal covering that weighed them down. The paralysis of cold was passing away from the knot of sufferers, though the light no longer made any progress over the great irregular marsh of the lower plain. The desolation proceeded, ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse

... the Christmas carol, and their ample boards groaned under the weight of hospitality. Even the poorest cottage welcomed the festive season with green decorations of bay and holly—the cheerful fire glanced its rays through the lattice, inviting the passenger to raise the latch, and join the gossip knot huddled round the hearth, beguiling the long evening with legendary jokes and ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving

... was too good a soldier to force a sentry, and rode off therefore to the Guides' camp to lay the matter before the commanding officer. The rest was naturally all cordiality and good feeling, and an invitation to lunch; while the Guides' subaltern galloped off and cut the Gordian knot. ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband

... was arranged to take place within a week of Captain Paget's expressly declared wish. It was to be solemnised at a church near Knightsbridge, and again at a Catholic chapel in the neighbourhood of Sloane-street; by which double ceremonial a knot would be tied that no legal quibble could hereafter loosen. Charlotte was just sufficiently recovered to obtain permission to be present at the ceremonial, after some little exercise of her persuasive powers with the medical practitioner to whose care Dr. ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon

... two sheaves of water flying upward in silver dust, then a great stone bridge, and at the further end a square building with statues in front of it, and an iron gateway where carriages were standing, people passing through and a knot of police officers. That was the place. She made her way bravely through the crowd as far as a high ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet

... few moments later the courtly Winslow, armed cap-a-pie and carrying a haversack of gifts at his back, strode down the hill, and across the brook to a point where a knot of dusky warriors awaited him, and with them passed out of sight, leaving his comrades to an hour of ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin

... spear. And as he went there met him in the middle of the wood his mother, but habited as a Spartan virgin, for she had hung a bow from her shoulders after the fashion of a huntress, and her hair was loose, and her tunic short to the knees, and her garments gathered in a knot upon her breast. Then first the false huntress spake: "If perchance ye have seen one of my sisters wandering hereabouts, make known to me the place. She is girded with a quiver, and is clothed with the skin of a spotted lynx, or, maybe, she hunts a wild boar with horn ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various

... His love and compassion for all that err and all that offend, how many difficulties, both within and without us, would they relieve! How many depressed minds should we console! How many troubles in society should we compose! How many enmities soften! How many a knot of mystery and misunderstanding would be untied by a single word, spoken in simple and confiding truth! How many a rough path would be made smooth, and how many a crooked path be made straight! Very many places, now solitary, would be made glad; very ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike

... a measure is desirable in any event, it is especially desirable at this time, in view of the fact that our present governmental contract for ocean mail with the American Line will expire in 1905. Our ocean mail act was passed in 1891. In 1895 our 20-knot transatlantic mail line was equal to any foreign line. Since then the Germans have put on 23-knot, steamers, and the British have contracted for 24-knot steamers. Our service should equal the best. If it does not, the commercial public ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt

... North, but are not of greater width than Coventry Street, or St. Martin's Lane; and, being unlighted by gas, it is difficult at night, should it prove rainy and dark, to keep out of the gutters. At the point where four streets meet, you may generally observe a well, and around this well a knot of idlers, men and women, congregate and gossip, leaning against its palings; but the respectable portion of the inhabitants are never to be found in the streets, although they may be seen, on summer evenings, walking on the ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross

... before the ball that beat him, All ends up, went down to meet him, Tie him up in a knot, defeat him Once and for ever, He told his mates that he wished, when hoary Time put an end to his famous story, To trudge with his old brown ...
— More Cricket Songs • Norman Gale

... been long or short, it was perhaps minutes, perhaps only seconds, ere he awoke to find himself observed, and saw the captain sitting up and watching him over the break of the poop, a strange blindness as of fever in his eyes, a haggard knot of corrugations on his brow. Cain saw himself in a mirror. For a flash they looked upon each other, and then glanced guiltily aside; and Carthew fled from the eye of his accomplice, and ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... this herself, and evidently enjoyed her triumph with a frank and girlish pleasure. She had conquered her audience before opening her lips. She is of rather tall stature, a figure slight but perfectly modeled, her well-shaped head dressed Greek fashion with the simple knot behind, her arms, which the Greek costume displayed to the shoulder, long, white, and of a roundness seldom attained so early in life, her walk and all her attitudes consummately graceful and expressive. A more general form of disparagement is that which pretends to account for all Miss ...
— Mary Anderson • J. M. Farrar

... that ill-kept, ill-smelling garden. Handbills and ribbon streamers of every hue flaunted gaily among the leaves; natural flowers competed unsuccessfully for an existence with odds and ends of millinery. You discovered a knot of ribbon adorning a green tuft; the dahlia admired afar proved on a nearer view to ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac

... Eagle Feather. "Done last night when all dark. Indians at corn dance and maybe sleepy. No hear some one come up soft to Eagle Feather's barn and take out horse. Have to cut rope 'cause Indian tie knot white man find too much hard to ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue in the Big Woods • Laura Lee Hope

... dear; so glad. If only you'll always feel like that about me..." She stopped, hardly knowing what she said, and aghast at the idea that her own hands should have retied the knot she imagined to be broken. But she saw he had something more to say; something hard to get out, but absolutely necessary to express. He caught her hands, pulled her close, and, with his forehead drawn into its whimsical smiling wrinkles, "Look ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton

... and her deep eyes are filled with a curious, deprecating light. A broad black ribbon is fastened about her waist, and a knot at her throat. She looks so small, so lovely, that he gathers her in ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... knot of servants were gossiping in frightened whispers with a couple of large, rather bovine country constables who, bareheaded, without their helmets, which they held under ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine

... car to a stop, and had thrown open the door, alighting on the crossing, while a little knot of curious people ...
— Tom Swift and his Wireless Message • Victor Appleton

... moat where the victims of the night had been tossed unburied, had been dispersed by threat of arms; the sentinels nodded at their posts—scarce knowing whose power they were upholding, nor by what name men called their masters. Here and there throughout the city, a little knot of the graver burghers might be found lingering to discuss the situation in attitudes of helpless dejection, and scattering with their problems all unsolved. They were too insignificant to dread, and for the moment the ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... form or color is beyond art, true and beautiful, being fresh from God; there are countless purpled vines creeping out from the earth under that grass; the air trembles with the pure spring healing and light; the gray-barked old elms wrestle, and knot their roots underground, clutching down at the very thews and sinews of the earth, and overhead unfold their shivering delicate leaves fresh in the sunlight to catch the patter of the summer rain when it comes. It is sure to come. Winter and summer, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various

... his words and repeated these things for his own purposes, the Queen following behind. When they were come to the corridor-end, there he found, as he had thought, a knot of lords and gentlemen, babbling with their ears ...
— The Fifth Queen Crowned • Ford Madox Ford

... mean," the young man said, with a thoughtful knot between his brows. "I'm not wanted myself, at present, in the short stories; but in the last dozen or so where I had an engagement I certainly didn't meet you; and it is pleasant to be paired off in a story with a heroine who has the ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells

... things glittering in the light of torches. He sprang behind the great table against the window and seized the heavy-leaden sandarach. The French scullions knew, tho' he had no French, that he would cleave one of their skulls, and they stood, a knot of seven—four men and three maids—in blue hoods, in the centre of ...
— Privy Seal - His Last Venture • Ford Madox Ford

... umpire, and a little knot of boys on the bank waved red banners and cheered delightedly. Then ball and bat came together and the runner was speeding toward first. But the hit had been weak and long before he reached the bag the ball was snuggling in ...
— The New Boy at Hilltop • Ralph Henry Barbour

... River and Moonlight were married—not after the simple Indian fashion, but with the assistance of a real pale-faced missionary, who was brought from a distance of nearly three hundred miles, from a pale-face pioneer settlement, for the express purpose of tying that knot along with several other knots of the same kind, and doing what in him lay to establish and strengthen the good work which ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne

... Shaddai was holy, and that his Son Emmanuel was holy; yea, he knew it by woeful experience; for, for his iniquity and sin was Diabolus cast from the highest orbs. Wherefore what more rational than for him to conclude, that thus for sin it might fare with Mansoul. But fearing also lest this knot should break, he bethinks himself of ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... on, for each man is doing his best with soap, water, razor, brush, and garments, to make himself spruce. Salamander is there, before a circular looking-glass three inches in diameter in the lid of a soap-box, making a complicated mess of a neck-tie in futile attempts to produce the sailor's knot. Blondin is there, before a similar glass, carefully scraping the bristles round a frostbite on his chin with a blunt razor. Henri Coppet, having already dressed, is smoking his pipe and quizzing Marcelle Dumont—who is also shaving—one of his chief jokes being an ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne

... asked the Earl of Argyle to give him his daughter in marriage, in order that he might strengthen his alliance with the Ulster Scots. It is true that she had been already married to his rival, O'Donel; but that was a small difficulty in his way. The knot was tied, but he had no hesitation in cutting it with his sword. 'The countess' was well educated for her time. She was also a Protestant, and the government had hopes that her influence would ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin

... and surprised his intent gaze: she flushed slightly, the gloves were twisted into a knot, but her eyes were unwavering—they held an appeal to his understanding, his sympathy, not to be mistaken. It was evident that that gaze cost her an effort. She was, Gordon remembered, a diffident girl. His resentment evaporated.... He speculated upon her ...
— Mountain Blood - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer

... gravestone shapes that meet My forward-straining view? Or forms that cross a window-blind In circle, knot, and queue: Gay forms, that cross and whirl and wind To ...
— Poems of the Past and the Present • Thomas Hardy

... and lashed fast with rope-yarns. Pawing, clawing, blaspheming, he was conquered and bound, inch by inch, and drawn to where the inexorable shears lay like a pair of gigantic dividers on the snow. Red Bill adjusted the noose, placing the hangman's knot properly under the left ear. Mr. Taylor and Lawson tailed onto the running-guy, ready at the word to elevate the gallows. Bill lingered, contemplating his work with ...
— The God of His Fathers • Jack London

... and bent his bow, "Just watch this famous shot; See that old willow by the brook— I'll hit the middle knot." Swift flew the arrow through the air, Madge watched it eager-eyed; But, oh! for Harry's gallant vaunt, The wayward dart ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... what is done in this Terrestriall starre The same is done in every Orb beside. Each flaming Circle that we see from farre Is but a knot in Psyches garment tide. From that lax shadow cast throughout the wide And endlesse world, that low'st projection Of universall life each thing's deriv'd What e're appeareth in corporeall fashion; For body's but this spirit, fixt, grosse ...
— Democritus Platonissans • Henry More

... strong in Shoal-water Bay, the rate seldom exceeding one knot; but they stir up the soft mud at the bottom., and make the water thick, as in Keppel Bay. I am not able to speak very accurately of the rise in the tide; but it may be reckoned at twelve or fourteen feet at the neaps, and from ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders

... you can see a dozen or twenty men being oiled and rubbed down by barbers or by friends, and a great deal of oil is used in the hair. After a man is grown he allows his hair to grow long and wears it in a knot at the back of his head. Some Hindus have an abundance of hair, of which they are very proud, and upon which they spend ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis

... it was time, for a knot of bats just then detached itself from the main body and flew full-face towards me. My shot caught the middle one on the snout, and as I swung the squirt to left and right, it disabled four or ...
— The Five Jars • Montague Rhodes James

... lives, but not all escaped unhurt. The "spraggly" forms of two or three of those nearest to him showed dark against the moon-lit sky before they limped off, and, joining their fellows, gathered in a little knot at a distance from their fractious pupil, and discussed his merits with great freedom. They voted him an ill-natured brute, a stupid dolt—in short, a perfect donkey. Scarcely had they arrived at this unanimous conclusion, when—pop! pop! bang! bang!—four loud reports, and four little ...
— Harper's Young People, May 11, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... further prospect, than of present popularity and present profit. When his plays had been acted, his hope was at an end; he solicited no addition of honour from the reader. He therefore made no scruple to repeat the same jests in many dialogues, or to entangle different plots by the same knot of perplexity, which may be at least forgiven him, by those who recollect, that of Congreve's four comedies, two are concluded by a marriage in a mask, by a deception, which perhaps never happened, and which, whether likely or not, ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot

... cute little thing, you! See, my mouth's the same way, too. Feels like a knot. Gee! you cute little thing, you—all ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst

... arguing. I was too lazy to go and explain the matter, and writing was not my forte. Besides, I didn't want to thwart my mother in her plans, or hurt her feelings; and so the long and the short of it is, I solved the difficulty and cut the knot by crossing quietly over to Norway. I wrote a short note to my mother, making no allusion to her project, and since then I've been gradually working my way down to the bottom of the map of Europe, and here ...
— The American Baron • James De Mille

... the dreamer explained to him his sad and mournful fate, and why he had come there forsooth, under the impulse of a dream, he had set out thither, and was expecting God as if by a wonder, to unravel this more than Gordian knot. The mendicant answered "Good Heaven! are you so mad and foolish as to rely on a dream, which is emptier than nothing, and journey hither? I should betake myself to Dort, to dig up a treasure buried under such a tree in such a man's garden (now this garden had belonged to the ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... is suicidal. There will be high speed boats for use as transports and a wise government will assist steamship companies in paying for them, as the English Government is now doing in the cases of the Lusitania and Mauretania, twenty-five knot boats; but no steamship company will put them out ...
— Sinking of the Titanic - and Great Sea Disasters • Various

... to make this Irish question a Gordian-knot which no man can untie, and but few would dare to cut. The past extravagance of the landlords, absenteeism, rack-renting, injustice of all kinds; the past jealousy of England and her over-shadowing ...
— About Ireland • E. Lynn Linton

... command.' 'Cousin,' said the king, 'drink we to our good friends the Huguenots.' 'It is well said, sir,' answered the duke. 'And to our good barricaders,' said the king; 'let us not forget them.' Whereupon the duke began to laugh a little," adds L'Estoile, "but a sort of laugh that did not go beyond the knot of the throat, being dissatisfied at the novel union the king was pleased to make of the Huguenots with the barricaders." What must have to some extent reassured the Duke of Guise was, that a Te Deum was celebrated at Notre-Dame for the King of Navarre's exclusion from all right to the crown, ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... it is forbidden by reliable testimony. The characteristic of Marcion's teaching is just this, that as soon as we seek to raise his ideas from the sphere of practical considerations to that of a consistent theory, we come upon a tangled knot of contradictions. The theoretic contradictions are explained by the different interests which here cross each other in Marcion. In the first place, he was consciously dependent on the Pauline theology, and was resolved ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 1 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack

... position. On either side of the path we continually passed pieces of rubber vine cut into lengths of some two feet or so, and on the top one or two leaves plaited together, or a piece of bush rope tied into a knot, which indicated whose property ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley

... fact of so many treacherous ledges and reefs to be navigated safely in a four-knot tide that was agitating the half-dozen "guests" at Mis' Shannon's boarding-house. It need hardly be said that Mis' Shannon was a widow, but her distinction lay in being called mis' instead ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams

... care was to knot his end of the rope swiftly around Grace's body, above the waist, adjusting the coils so that considerable of the strain would come under the shoulders, where it ...
— The High School Left End - Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron • H. Irving Hancock

... the mud is too deep for teams, farmers go by on horseback, with their horses' tails tied into a knot to keep them out of the mud. They have come to town to learn the price of wheat, corn or hogs, to bargain for some article of farm use, or perhaps to pay the interest on their mortgages. Many of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various

... this mad uproar. A party of worshippers, in the first place, rebelled against it; these had been standing with veiled heads, near the statue of Serapis, muttering exorcisms after a Magian and howling lamentably at intervals; then a preacher, who had succeeded in collecting a little knot of listeners, bid the trumpeters cease; and finally, a party of actors and singers, who had assembled in the outer hall to perform a satira play, tried to stop them, though they themselves were making such ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... had other things to think about, and had already dismissed the little incident from my mind, when at the bottom of the Rue Blanche I came upon a knot of gaffers, men and women, who were talking and gesticulating very excitedly outside the door of a cook-shop. At first I did not take much notice of what was said: my eyes were glued to the front of the shop, ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy

... for a nose and two cairn-gorms[14] for eyes. To the human observer, he is decidedly well-looking; but to the ladies of his race he seems abhorrent. A thorough elaborate gentleman, of the plume and sword-knot order, he was born with the nice sense of gallantry to women. He took at their hands the most outrageous treatment; I have heard him bleating like a sheep, I have seen him streaming blood, and his ear tattered like a regimental banner; and yet he would scorn ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson

... this, I gently let my left hand glide down the rock and bring up the sash on that side. This I placed in my mouth, gently changed hands and hauled up the right end of the sash, then, after many attempts, with my mouth and right hand I managed to tie a knot in it so as to form the sash into a short endless band. This I dropped down, and putting my foot in the loop, had a somewhat ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling

... the usual amount of bad talk on both sides, and we were pleased to see our man slowly get the better of the New York plug-ugly. After several sharp rounds they closed, and still Payne was ahead, but in an evil moment he spied a pine knot at his feet, which he thought he could reach, and end the fight by cracking Donnelly's head with it. Donnelly took instant advantage of the movement to get it, threw Payne heavily, and fell upon him. His crowd rushed in to finish our man by clubbing him over the head. We sailed in ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... not say the right thing to them we are all done for,' said the Russian at my elbow. The knot of men with the stretcher had stopped too, half-way to the steamer, as if petrified. I saw the man on the stretcher sit up, lank and with an uplifted arm, above the shoulders of the bearers. 'Let us hope that the man who can talk so well of love in general will find some particular reason ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad

... slowly, and at each little shock I felt that the four hands holding me above had come to a knot. I tried to remember the number of knots, for it seemed to me that ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt

... supper. Then Skrymer fell asleep and snored tremendously. When Thor took the provision-sack and was to open it, then happened what seems incredible, but still it must be told,—that he could not get one knot loosened, nor could he stir a single end of the strings so that it was looser than before. When he saw that all his efforts were in vain he became wroth, seized his hammer Mjolner with both his hands, stepped ...
— The Younger Edda - Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda • Snorre

... you would don your black jacket and brown trousers, knot your gayest kerchief around your neck, and with your guitar in hand you would hasten forth to enjoy the fun that prevails in every street of every town in Spain on Christmas Eve, or, as it is known ...
— Yule-Tide in Many Lands • Mary P. Pringle and Clara A. Urann

... been so much captivated with the manner of Florence as he had been struck with her beauty, and now, seeing her apparently engaged with another, he rose and quietly moved away. He was soon one of a knot of men who were conversing on the absorbing topics of the day; and as by degrees the exciting subject brought out his natural eloquence and masculine sense, the talkers became listeners, the knot widened into a circle, and he himself was unconsciously ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... first to notice it, and tearing out a handkerchief which was up her sleeve, she rolled it into a bandage roughly, whirled over to Diavolo, and tied it round his head, covering his right eye, and leaving a great knot and two long ends sticking up like rabbit's ears amongst his fair hair, and a pointed flap hanging down ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand

... into a naughty little knot. There were awkward corners to be negotiated in these questions. She avoided them by boldly striking for ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet

... more words she might say before the time she allowed herself had expired, and she found courage to go on, striving to explain to the shifting knot of people that the battle which now threatened civilisation was the terrible and final fight between Order and Disorder and that, under inexorable laws which could never change, order meant life and survival; disorder chaos and ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers

... arrangement, but it presents the curious anomaly of a poor peasant living in a one-story house with a three-story wife. According to the prevailing style of architecture in well-wooded countries, these women ought to wear their hair shingled; but they generally tie it up in a knot behind, or cover it with a fancy-colored handkerchief, on the presumption, I suppose, that they look less barbarous in that way than they would with shingled heads. You may suspect me of story-telling, but upon my word I think three-story women are extravagant enough without adding ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne

... am coming with a train," said the darning-needle, drawing a long thread after her; but there was no knot ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen

... Bower, With it's peacock hedges of yew, One could never find the flower Unless one was given the clue; So take the key of the wicket, Who would follow my fancy free, By formal knot and clipt thicket, And smooth greensward so fair ...
— A Floral Fantasy in an Old English Garden • Walter Crane

... were too lazy to search for knots, split the wood into small sticks, each about the size of a goose quill, and, standing three or four in a vessel filled with sand, gained as much in the way of light as might be had from one pine knot. ...
— Richard of Jamestown - A Story of the Virginia Colony • James Otis

... comrade with an air of satisfaction. He later produced an extensive handkerchief from his pocket. He folded it into a manner of bandage and soused water from the other canteen upon the middle of it. This crude arrangement he bound over the youth's head, tying the ends in a queer knot at the back ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane

... She has turned quickly in speaking, her hand clutching a little knot of bell buttons hanging by a chain at the front of her dress. She has turned just in time to catch a warning glance in Uncle Jack's twinkling eyes, and to see a grim smile lurking under the gray moustache of the gentleman with the Loyal Legion button who is leading away the tall young ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... confession very prettily and simply, and, with quaint, childish earnestness, drew the sketch-book away close to her own side of the table. Miss Halcombe cut the knot of the little embarrassment forthwith, ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins

... that he had. He treated me now confessedly as a cipher. The prince, the princess, my grandfather, and me—he had gathered us together, he said. I heard from him that the prince, assisted by him in the part of an adviser, saw no way of cutting the knot but by a marriage. All were at hand for a settlement of the terms:—Providence and ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... the sunny room, her pretty dimpled arms bared to above the elbow, her lovely cheeks (because of much stooping over the fire) brighter even than the roses after which she had been named, her golden hair done up in a trig, tight knot (as Aunt Hedwig had taught her was the proper way for hair to be arranged while cooking was going on), and over her tidy print gown a great white apron, fashioned in an ancient German shape, as ...
— An Idyl Of The East Side - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier

... was not all; a whitish haze cleared up; to the northward there was a spanking felucca, with her long lanteen sails brailed up, and sweeping about in the very centre of a knot of dull sailing merchant vessels, four of which, by their altered courses, had evidently been taken possession of. Reversing the good old adage, first come first served, we turned our attention to the last appearance. ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard

... The last line alludes to a charming custom of which mention is made in the most ancient Japanese literature. Lovers, ere parting, were wont to tie each other's inner girdle (himo) and pledge themselves to leave the knot untouched until the time of their next meeting. This poem is said to have been composed in the seventh year of Y[o]r[o],—A.D. 723,—eleven hundred ...
— The Romance of the Milky Way - And Other Studies & Stories • Lafcadio Hearn

... usury? A. 1. It dissolveth the knot and fellowship of mankind. 2. It hardeneth man's heart. 3. It maketh men unnaturall, and bereaveth them of charity, and love to their dearest friends. 4. It breedeth misery and provoketh the wrath of God from heaven. 5. It consumeth rich men, it eateth up the poore, ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin

... and graceful. She wore that morning a short gray-velvet coat over white linen. Her thick brown hair was gathered into a low knot and her fine white skin had a touch of artificial color. Her eyes were a clear blue. She was really very lovely, but I felt that the gray coat deadened her—that if she had not worn it she would not have needed that touch of ...
— The Gay Cockade • Temple Bailey

... defence of Iyeyasu's head. The victory won, he called for his helmet, which he put on, carefully tying the strings. As all looked on with surprise at this strange action, he, with a smile, repeated to them an old Japanese proverb, "After victory, knot the ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... to him as to me, and this antique garden as attractive; and he strolls on, now lifting the gooseberry-tree branches to look at the fruit, large as plums, with which they are laden; now taking a ripe cherry from the wall; now stooping towards a knot of flowers, either to inhale their fragrance or to admire the dew-beads on their petals. A great moth goes humming by me; it alights on a plant at Mr. Rochester's foot: he sees it, and bends to ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte

... skirts of her dress looped up with convolvulus flowers—the one with her hair fastened in a sort of Venus knot behind; she has just been dancing with that perfumed piece of a man they call Mr. Ladywell—it is he with the high eyebrows arched like a girl's.' He added, with a wrinkled smile, 'I cannot for my life see anybody answering ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy

... to an end as he arrived, and, after they had seated their partners, red-faced perspiring young punchers swelled the knot around the door. ...
— A Texas Ranger • William MacLeod Raine

... themselves. Untruth became Truth. A large part of what was once my old world was again mine. To me, at last my mind seemed to have found itself, for the gigantic web of false beliefs in which it had been all but hopelessly enmeshed I now immediately recognized as a snare of delusions. That the Gordian knot of mental torture should be cut and swept away by the mere glance of a willing eye is like a miracle. Not a few patients, however, suffering from certain forms of mental disorder, regain a high degree ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers

... me for at least five minutes. Impatience began to master me, when he appeared, laughing, and flourishing a knot of red ribbon, which I had observed ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke

... charmed and patient Bess! She was so slight, yet round and supple—strong, too, with the strength of perfect health! The thick fluffed black hair was rolled away from her face and gathered into a low knot in the nape of her neck. Her dress cut low at the throat enhanced the white purity of her face and the slim round grace of her neck which showed to advantage against the ebony flank of the mother of many milky ways. Her ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller

... be speedy; a Priest shall be ready To tye the holy knot; this kiss I send him, Deliver ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (1 of 10) - The Custom of the Country • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... fairy story. You don't tell fairy stories at Christmas; they're for summer, when the windows are open and they can hide in the flowers and ride on the wind—the fairies, I mean—but this is Christmas." She twisted herself into a knot of quivering joy and hugged her arms with rapturous intensity. "It's all in my bones, and I'm nothing but shivers. Isn't it grand to have Christmas in your bones? Have you got it in yours?" She held Laine's face between ...
— The Man in Lonely Land • Kate Langley Bosher

... and Tom jumped out of the boat, holding me by the ears. The hounds were all on the beach, most of them lying down, for they were very tired, but the men were standing in a knot at a distance talking earnestly, Tom ran to the ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard

... he knew, as he proposed to have Ray bailed out instanter no matter what that young gentleman's wishes might be, and Blake, giving her his arm, escorted Mrs. Rallston through the bustling streets until they reached the jail. Even then there was a little knot of hangers-on watching with wolfish curiosity every comer. The officials touched their hats to Blake and his veiled companion, and looked admiringly at her tall, graceful form. Already something was beginning to whisper ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... Even the poorest cottage welcomed the festive season with green decorations of bay and holly—the cheerful fire glanced its rays through the lattice, inviting the passenger to raise the latch, and join the gossip knot huddled round the hearth, beguiling the long evening with legendary ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving

... Maguelonne is but one knot in the long thread of cordon littoral that reaches from Cette to Aigues Mortes, and it can be reached on foot by land from Palavas, but the simplest and shortest route is by boat in half an hour ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould

... out. When we had completed the circle of the cromlechs, we came suddenly upon him. More to our dismay than surprise he had become the centre of a little knot of excursionists, who were listening to him eagerly. As ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates

... light. Soon the heat became unbearable and I too tore off jersey and shirt. Liosha joined me and we worked together without speaking. Her long thick hair had come down and she had hastily tied it in a knot, just as you might tie a knot in a towel, and she had thrown off things like everybody else and only a flimsy cotton, sleeveless bodice, or whatever it's called, drenched through and sticking to her, made a pretence of ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke

... they could not get lights. Added to this it was raining hard. The hotel apparently could not supply natives with food at such an hour, and it was necessary for them to go and look for it. This sad story greeted X. when his own dinner was done. But the kind President of the Landraad cut the knot of this dilemma and soon provided a caterer, protector, and guide ...
— From Jungle to Java - The Trivial Impressions of a Short Excursion to Netherlands India • Arthur Keyser

... set, but not so acutely as in the Chinese and some other Mongols. Jaws frequently are prognathous, mouth large, with sometimes rather thick lips. Hair black, straight, and worn long, the hair of people who adopt the old style being caught up in a knot at the back. Some males cut the hair short with the exception of a single lock at the back, which is called u niuhtrong or u niuh-' iawbei (i.e. the grandmother's lock.) The forepart of the head is often shaven. It is quite the exception to see a beard, although the ...
— The Khasis • P. R. T. Gurdon

... of cases, quite sufficient to insure good behavior; for the slaves were well aware of the difference between life in the well-managed establishments in Virginia and that in some of the other Southern States. Handing his horse to Dan, Vincent joined a knot of four or five of his acquaintances who had strolled ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty

... figures, each to its simple apex,—one little point containing the essence and secret of the whole. Once or twice in the course of a lifetime are a few men permitted to catch a glimpse of these awful Beginnings,—to touch for a minute the knot where all the tangled threads ravel themselves out smoothly. I had found such a place,—had had such an ineffable vision,—and, overwhelmed with tremendous awe, I sank on my knees, lost ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various

... he, haggard and hapless, on the leads of the tower, which were nought small; and there gathered together in a knot, and all gazing eagerly out over the lake, he found a dozen of men-at-arms and the castellan amongst them. They took no heed of him as he came up, though he stumbled as he crossed the threshold and came clattering over the lead floor, and he ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris

... through his eyes, Arrows which were her nailed-scratched bosom, her reddened sleep-denied eyes, her crimson lips from a bath of kisses, her hair disarranged with the flowers awry, and her girdle all loose and slipping. With hair knot loosened and stray locks waving, her cheeks perspiring, her glitter of lips impaired, And the necklace of pearls not appearing fair because of her jar-shaped breast being denuded, And her belt, her glittering girdle, dimmed in beauty, The happy ...
— The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry • W. G. Archer

... Centre through the Seventh Gate I rose, and on the throne of Saturn sate, And many a Knot unravel'd by the Road; But not ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy

... — Select three things you most wish to know; write them down with a new pen and red ink on a sheet of fine-wove paper, from which you must previously cut off all the corners and burn them. Fold the paper into a true-lover's knot, and wrap round it three hairs from your head. Place the paper under your pillow for three successive nights, and your curiosity to know the ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... again—yes, there was a group beneath his window. "Faster! faster!" she cried frantically; "faster if you can." The door was at last reached; she sprang from the carriage and pressed through the little knot of people who were gathered on the pavement. Alas! her presentiments were correct. There, lying on the pavement, was the mangled form of her father, who had desperately sprung from the balcony above, to escape arrest from the man with the keen grey eyes, who, with ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb

... those which are growing all about upon the tree. If we do not watch the female when she settles to her young or eggs we may search in vain for this tiniest of homes, so closely does it resemble an ordinary knot on a branch. ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe

... age The web of island parentage; Best lay the rhyme, best lead the dance, For any festal circumstance: And fitly fashion oar and boat, A palace or an armour coat. None more availed than he to raise The strong, suffumigating blaze, Or knot the wizard leaf: none more, Upon the untrodden windward shore Of the isle, beside the beating main, To cure the sickly and constrain, With muttered words and waving rods, The gibbering and the whistling gods. But he, though thus with hand and head He ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... step, close to the black water, he passed the rope through the ring, and tied it deftly in a loose knot that any backward movement of the boat would tighten. She watched with profound attention his hands moving quickly in the faint light cast by ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens

... dark inn-yard, And he tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred; He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there But the landlord's black-eyed daughter, Bess, the landlord's daughter, Plaiting a dark red love-knot ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes

... in bridging the gap? As yet there were no signs of light in the castle windows, except the lurid reflections of the northern sky. But in any event there was no time to spare. Renwick tied a large knot and a loop in the end of the rope and then carefully lowered it over the northern wall, measuring its length by his arms, as it went over. Fifty yards, sixty, seventy, eighty—when it stretched taut. Eighty yards! Sick with anxiety, he crawled upon his stomach to the edge of the precipice ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs

... work; also that marriage unites two into one human form, so that they are no longer two but one flesh. 3. That nuptials are the commencement of an entire separation of the love of the sex from conjugial love, which is effected while, by a full liberty of connection, the knot is tied by which the love of the one is devoted to the love of the other. 4. It appears as if nuptials were merely an interval between those two states, and thus that they are mere formalities which ...
— The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love • Emanuel Swedenborg

... soil are of the same hue, and the few clumps of cypresses add to the pallor of the scene with their dark funereal shafts. The only bit of color is where a cluster of low red-washed houses have found room for their scanty foundations on a knot of rock where several chasms converge. Where the sides of the chasms slope gently enough to admit of being terraced, vineyards are planted, which yield famous wines, the red Aleatico and the white Vino Santo, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December, 1885 • Various

... other furniture of the room was a chair with a broken back. On the floor lay the gipsy's wallet, and his abarcas, which he had taken off to avoid noise during his clandestine entrance into the house. The gipsy himself was busy tying slip-knot at the end of a stout rope about seven or eight yards long. Another piece of cord, of similar length and thickness, lay beside him, having much the appearance of a halter, owing to the noose already made at one of its extremities. The tiles and rafters covering the room were green with damp, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various

... gown, but with none of her old niceness of detail. She merely put it on. Her wet hair she twisted into a knot without glancing at the mirror. As she entered the parlor she staggered slightly. Talbot averted his eyes. He may have had similar cases, and, as a doctor, become hardened to all manifestations of human weakness, but this patient ...
— Sleeping Fires • Gertrude Atherton

... untying the last knot. "Spit out what you're drivin' at," he cried bluntly; "this ain't no time for sideshow barkin'. The big show is about ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day

... excited when they showed her, with the Baby, gossiping among a knot of sage old matrons, and affecting to be wondrous old and matronly herself, and leaning in a staid, demure old way upon her husband's arm, attempting—she! such a bud of a little woman—to convey ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens

... one pump going every hour, he stuck to it for another seven hours, when the crew called out "she sucks!" i.e., the well is dry. This was gladsome news. It is gladsome even under favourable circumstances, but here were men who had stood almost continuously up to the waist in water; and sometimes a knot of a sea would smash right over them. Their sleeves were doubled up and they had neither boots nor stockings on. Their hands were cut and their arms and legs were red raw with friction and salt water boils. Let ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman

... Henrietta, "I forgot the secret spring; the fourth plank of the flooring—press on the spot where you will observe a knot in the wood. Those are the instructions; press, ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... proceeded the picture, was managed by a hidden operator, evidently from his voice, occasionally overheard, a mere boy; and an old man, like a broken-down clergyman, whose dirty white neckcloth seemed adjusted on a secret understanding of moral obliquity, its knot suggesting a gradual approach to the last position a knot on the neck can assume, kept walking up and down the parti-colored gloom, flaunting a pretense of lecture on the scenes presented. Whether he was a little drunk or greatly in ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald

... Pee-wee was all tangled up with the two big placards and the rope that had held them together, and the whole business, Pee-wee, placards, rope and all, looked like a double sailor's knot having an epileptic fit. ...
— Roy Blakeley's Camp on Wheels • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... I suppose?" retorted Hozier, for the now visible schooner had not attempted to change her course by half a point. She was now bowling along with every stitch set before a five-knot breeze from the east; the tilt of her sails was such that she practically presented only the outline of her spars when first sighted from the steamer; and her side lights probably had tallow ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy

... against it with ghostly face. She quickly stuffed the corner of her apron into her mouth to keep back the scream of agony that involuntarily rose to her lips. Her thin hands were tightly clinched and her body half drawn into a knot. ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray

... curl. Altogether, I was rather proud of him. But the result of my crude attempt at surgery became manifest when I finally removed the splints. The limb had grown together, it is true, but it was dreadfully crooked, and a large knot appeared where the fracture had been. When he tried to walk, I discovered that this leg was a trifle shorter than its mate, and poor Fido limped a little, but I believe this only added ...
— The Love Story of Abner Stone • Edwin Carlile Litsey

... were you down to the pond this late for?" asked Bea, flitting about in her white dress, with the softest color in her cheeks, a knot of blush roses in her hair, and another ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving

... now up to you to cinch again, with your foot in the pack, as I did here just a little. That tightens all the slack clear to your corners. Now when your rope comes back to me for the last tightening I haul it hard as I can and tie off at my cinch-ring. I use a knot which I can jerk loose easily if I want to tighten or loosen the pack on the trail. So, there you are, all set." And Uncle Dick slapped old Billy on the hip as he stood groaning in great pretense of suffering, at which old Billy walked forward a few steps and stood ...
— The Young Alaskans in the Rockies • Emerson Hough

... neutral-tinted spectacles, and the white canvas Spanish sand shoes of the modern Scotch missionary: but instead of a cheap tourist's suit from Glasgow, a grey flannel shirt with white collar, a green sailor knot tie with a cheap pin in it, he wears a suit of clean white linen, acceptable in color, if not in cut, ...
— Captain Brassbound's Conversion • George Bernard Shaw

... to hoping that once across the threshold of Courcelles he should find an expedient for unfastening this Gordian knot of his own tying. There are believers in the omnipotence of necessity who never turn back; the close presence of danger is an inspiration that calls out all their powers for victory. Gaston de Nueil was one ...
— The Deserted Woman • Honore de Balzac

... is begun at the inner side of the slit. Always place the knot on the outside of the garment a short distance to the right of the buttonhole, leaving a long stitch underneath which can be cut off when the buttonhole is finished. A buttonhole should be completed with one thread if possible as it is difficult to mend ...
— Textiles and Clothing • Kate Heintz Watson

... hoar beaches and the kindled cliffs Of falling waters. These he waded through, Beholding, past the forests of the West, A break of light and homes of many men, And shining corn, and flowers, and fruits of flowers. Yea, seeing these, the facile-footed chief Grasped by the knot the huge Aeaean lance And fell upon the farmers; wherefore they Left hoe and plough, and crouched in heights remote, Companioned with the grey-winged fogs; but he Made waste their fields and throve upon their ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall

... of it," I replied, confidently. "They hurried the Islander down the river; and when both vessels are doing their best the Sylvania gains about a knot an hour on the Islander. I have tried this with her when she had a sailing-master on board who knew all about her, and had sailed her hundreds of miles. I don't believe Captain Blastblow can do any better with her than Captain Braceback; and I used ...
— Up the River - or, Yachting on the Mississippi • Oliver Optic

... victory follow you, lad!" said the king's daughter. "I am safe for one night, but the beast will come again and again, until the other two heads come off it." He caught the beast's head, and he drew a knot through it, and he told her to bring it with her there to-morrow. She gave him a gold ring, and went home with the head on her shoulder, and the herd betook himself to the cows. But she had not ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various

... might be seen in old Mrs. Gadabout's sky-blue livery, with a tarnished, gold-laced hat, nodding over his nose; and on a third he would shine forth in Mrs. Major-General Flareup's cockaded one, with a worsted shoulder-knot, and a much over-daubed light drab livery coat, with crimson inexpressibles, so tight as to astonish a beholder how he ever got into them. Humiliation, however, has its limits as well as other things; ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... "soreheads" found themselves extremely uncomfortable. None of their fellow-students, among the boys, would notice them. Whenever some of the "soreheads" passed a knot of other boys, low-toned laughs followed. Even many of the girls, it proved, had taken ...
— The High School Left End - Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron • H. Irving Hancock

... was raised in squatter country behind a barb-wire fence, who has to gentle his horses before he can sit up on one, who has hitched a gun on his belt because he thinks it's the thing to do, and has stowed it in a place where he'd have to tie himself in a knot—or undress—to reach it. And then you talk of pulling the Three Bar out of a hole! Why, there are twenty men within fifty miles of here that would kill you ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts

... essentials had been won, the old dividing lines began to melt away. All but a small knot of Tory irreconcilables now agreed that the majority must rule, and that this would neither smash the Empire nor make an end of order and justice in the province itself. But who were to unite to form that majority, and what was to be their platform? In ...
— The Day of Sir Wilfrid Laurier - A Chronicle of Our Own Time • Oscar D. Skelton

... Tringa canutus, Brisson. French, "Becasseau canut," "Becasseau maubeche."—Common as the Knot is on the south and west coast of England during autumn and winter, it is by no means so common in the Channel Islands. I have never shot it there myself in any of my autumnal expeditions. Miss C.B. Carey records one, however, in the 'Zoologist' ...
— Birds of Guernsey (1879) • Cecil Smith

... honestly, in his shaggy rough male fashion, reverence and cling to the flower of souls he named as his wife. His piteous groans of self-accusation during the crisis haunted her, and made the conduct and nature of men a bewilderment to her still young understanding. Save for the knot of her sensations (hardly a mental memory, but a sullen knot) which she did not disentangle to charge him with his complicity in the blind rashness of her marriage, she might have felt sisterly, as warmly as ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... lose much pleasure from your ignorance of the rudiments of learning. Take my advice and study. It's not too late to begin. Nonsense! difficult! everything worth doing is difficult! There's pleasure in overcoming difficulties. Come, you have begun to teach me seamanship— to knot and splice—to reef and steer. I'll teach you to read, and then the way is open to you to teach yourself whatever you like. Navigation! certainly. Why, you would have been master of a vessel by this time if you had known that." In the interval of Newman's ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston

... overcoat was lined with astrakan, and this important fact was casually betrayed at the lapels and at the sleeves. He wore a black silk necktie, with a small pearl pin in the mathematical centre of the perfect rhomboid of the upper part of a sailor's knot. His gloves were of slate colour. The chief characteristic of his faintly striped trousers was the crease, which seemed more than mortal. His boots were of glace kid and as smooth as his cheeks. The cheeks ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett

... wireless began to crackle and splutter in an animated explanation of our unexpected appearance. Our hawsers had scarcely been made fast before a launch left the flag-ship and came plowing toward us, a knot of white-uniformed officers in the stern. From the blue rug with the Italian arms, which, as I could see through my glasses, was draped over the stern-sheets, I deduced that the commander of the flotilla ...
— The New Frontiers of Freedom from the Alps to the AEgean • Edward Alexander Powell

... the eyes went, and the thoughts. And as Madame Defarge moved on from group to group, all three went quicker and fiercer among every little knot of women that she had ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens

... Elizabeth Street. Its front was painted a dull red, and the narrow panes of glass in its windows, and the ostentatious affectation of red curtains and homely comfort, gave to it a spurious appearance of old English jollity. A knot of men round the door melted into air as Captain Frere approached, for it was now past eleven o'clock, and all persons found in the streets after eight could be compelled to "show their pass" or explain their business. The convict ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke

... is very seldom danced—quite a large number of couples are called, who form a ring around the room. The leader, taking the hand of one of the men, breaks the chain, and the couples are wound around until they come together in a knot, when the signal is given to them to waltz. The wheel figure is somewhat similar, and is quite ...
— The Complete Bachelor - Manners for Men • Walter Germain

... whiles the hert o' man may gang the wrang. gait by bein' ower wise in its ain conceit o' expeckin' ower little, jist as weel's in expeckin' ower muckle, an' sae I'm b'un' to tell ye, laird,'at yer expectations frae this knot o'metal,—for metal we maun alloo it to be, whatever else it be or bena—yer expectations, I say, are a'thegither wrang, for it's no more siller nor ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... island. After having passed the night in this condition, the bird flew away as soon as it was daylight, and carried me so high that I could not discern the earth; she afterward descended with so much rapidity that I lost my senses. But when I found myself on the ground, I speedily untied the knot, and had scarcely done so, when the roc, having taken up a serpent of a monstrous length in her bill, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Anonymous

... some other and newly-conceived thought in his mind. He looked two or three times shrewdly and furtively into the face of the young Marchese; and closely compressed his thin lips together, and drew into a knot the shaggy eye-brows over his clear and thoughtful eyes. Some notion had been suggested to his mind which very plainly he did ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope

... disenchantment was anything but glorious. Roughly seizing him, the two men forced him stiffly upright in the chair, drew his arms about the back of it, and there secured them, wrist to wrist, drawing the knot until Alex almost cried out in pain. Then, as tightly, they bound his ankles to the lower rungs, ...
— The Young Railroaders - Tales of Adventure and Ingenuity • Francis Lovell Coombs

... The severity which he had long dealt out toward all sorts of offenders made him the object of the deepest vengeance. In a lonely hollow of his woods, watching at midnight with two of his men, there came a sturdy knot of poachers. An affray ensued. The men perceived that their old enemy, Sir Roger, was there: and the blow of a hedge-stake stretched him on the earth. His keepers fled—and thus ignominiously terminated the long line of the Rockvilles. Sir Roger ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... through which he had passed as at something infinitely remote. He could not realize distinctly what had happened. He was only aware that everything was over, that with a few words he had broken his life into small pieces. Too impatient to unravel the tangled knot, he had cut it, and nothing ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse

... different experiences. From the time he could crawl he had struggled to accommodate himself to the great connection of things; even the life of the prison had not placed him outside it, but had only united him the more closely with the whole. He had no inclination to cut the knot, but demanded ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... so disgusted their Presbyterian confederates, that the latter seceded altogether from the confederacy. The doctrines taught by the party which remained became increasingly bold, and it was soon apparent that the league was a knot of conspirators, whose object was to transfer the property of the Protestant landlords of Ireland to the hands of their Roman Catholic tenants, the former having a sort of rentcharge upon their own land, which would in time have been also taken from ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... think that could ever happen? I want her to live in town, you want her to stay at home. The arithmetical result would be that she remain at the railway station midway between train and home. This is a knot that ...
— Plays: The Father; Countess Julie; The Outlaw; The Stronger • August Strindberg

... The knot was strongly tied, but Darsie's fingers were strong also and in a minute's time it was undone, and the corners of the handkerchief dropped on the grass to reveal an inner bag of thick grey linen tied ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... Hal, and bent his bow, "Just watch this famous shot; See that old willow by the brook— I'll hit the middle knot." Swift flew the arrow through the air, Madge watched it eager-eyed; But, oh! for Harry's gallant vaunt, The ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... medicine man has been down among the spirits of the dead, and in proof of his assertions, a curiously shaped stone, or a knot of wood, is displayed, which has been given by the spirits and is endowed with all sorts of marvellous properties. I have in my possession a Dayong's whole outfit of charms which I bought from his relatives after his death; ...
— Folk-lore in Borneo - A Sketch • William Henry Furness

... then recent history of Asia, Marco is often inaccurate, e.g. in his account of the death of Chinghiz, in the list of his successors, and in his statement of the relation ship between notable members of that House.[13] But the most perplexing knot in the whole book lies in the interesting account which he gives of the Siege of Sayanfu or Siang-yang, during the subjugation of Southern China by Kublai. I have entered on this matter in the notes (vol. ii. p. 167), ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... dream. An old crone is selling roasted chestnuts in the shadow of the temple of Castor and Pollux; a tipsy soldier is reeling to his quarters with his helmet stuck on wrong side foremost; a knot of Hebrew money-changers, with long curls and high caps, are talking eagerly in their own language, clutching the little bags they hide in the sleeves of their yellow Eastern gowns—the men who mourned for Caesar and for Augustus, whose descendants ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford

... hair. This is unusual and he finds a knot that is harder than any Gordian knot whatsoever. He smoothes and strokes his whiskers. He goes so far as to slap himself for dust. He puts a sprig of flowers—amazing!—in the front of his cloak. He practices a smile and gesture. He seems to speak. He claps ...
— Wappin' Wharf - A Frightful Comedy of Pirates • Charles S. Brooks

... have been as well acquainted with your family as with ever a one among the Puritans; and that's no trifle to say. I helped your grandfather, the constable, when he lashed the Quaker woman so smartly through the streets of Salem; and it was I that brought your father a pitch-pine knot, kindled at my own hearth, to set fire to an Indian village, in King Philip's war. They were my good friends, both; and many a pleasant walk have we had along this path, and returned merrily after midnight. I would fain be friends with you ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... to gather. Presently he recovered his breath. The blow had completely sobered and calmed him. He felt that he could face anything now. The jail was just across the street, so they walked, pursued by a knot ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie

... therefore fall down in convulsions when they are hunted—hence their name "eleend." Sailors are said to have purchased on the north-west coast of Norway for ten crowns and a pound of tobacco three knots of wind from the Lapps living there, who were all magicians; when the first knot was loosed, a gentle breeze arose, the second gave a strong gale, the third a storm, during which the vessel was in danger of being wrecked.[146]. Novaya Zemlya is stated to be inhabited by a peculiar tribe, ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold

... she felt, dismiss Lousteau, who affected to be unable to look at her; she herself felt such pity as might cut every social Gordian knot. ...
— The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac

... puffed out clouds of bluish smoke into the clear air of the hot May morning. Then he looked at the position of the sun and verified the fact that his nickel watch had stopped again. The shaky little house hung like a chance knot in an endless wire in the middle of the glittering double row of rails that stretched from east to west across the flowery prairie. It looked like a ridiculous freak in the midst of the wide desert, for nowhere, so far as the eye could reach, was it possible ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff

... the shape of an hour-glass. Their hair is generally cut so as to leave a narrow band in front; this is brushed back, but often falls forward on the face or in front of the ears. Back of this the hair is kept well oiled and is combed straight to the back of the head, where it is tied in a knot. Into this knot is pushed a wooden comb decorated with incised lines filled with lime, or inlaid with beads. On festive occasions more elaborate combs, with plumes or other decorations attached, are worn. Aside from these ornaments ...
— The Wild Tribes of Davao District, Mindanao - The R. F. Cummings Philippine Expedition • Fay-Cooper Cole

... advantage, the worrier allows herself to get more and more oppressed by her anxieties,—as we have seen a child grow cross over a snarl of twine which, with very little patience, might be easily unravelled, but in which, in the child's nervous annoyance, every knot is pulled tighter. Perhaps we ought hardly to expect as much from the worried student as from the child, because the ideas of how to study arc so vague that they seldom bring a realization of the fact that there might be an improvement ...
— Power Through Repose • Annie Payson Call

... impossible not to say something, Cecil laid himself out to be agreeable, and Miss Arminster, who was naturally aware of the awkwardness of his position, did her best to promote conversation, while Spotts almost immediately cut the Gordian knot by excusing himself on the plea ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells

... it. When the preliminary survey was being made, Nicholas learned that the officers intrusted with the task—and the Minister of Ways and Roads in the number—were being influenced more by personal than by technical considerations, and he determined to cut the Gordian knot in true Imperial style. When the Minister laid before him the map with the intention of explaining the proposed route, he took a ruler, drew a straight line from the one terminus to the other, and remarked in a tone that precluded all discussion, "You will construct the ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various

... heights. Helene's breathing, so light and gentle, did not ruffle the chaste repose of her bosom. She was in a beauteous sleep, peaceful yet sound, her profile perfect, her nut-brown hair twisted into a knot, and her head leaning forward somewhat, as though she had fallen asleep while eagerly listening. At the farther end of the room the open door of an adjoining closet seemed but a ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola

... every glimpse of Nature, if you would taste her beauties, even on canvas, with perfect relish and childish self-abandonment. How I loved and blessed those painters! how I thanked Creswick for every transparent shade-chequered pool; Fielding, for every rain-clad down; Cooper, for every knot of quiet cattle beneath the cool grey willows; Stanfield, for every snowy peak, and sheet of foam-fringed sapphire—each and every one of them a leaf out of the magic book which else was ever closed to me. Again, I say, how I loved and blest those painters! On the other hand, ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al

... In heavy weather small bulk must always mean comparatively small speed. In a moderate sea, we are now told, the speed of the torpedo-boat falls from twenty knots to fifteen or less, and the seventeen to nineteen knot cruiser can either run away from the pursuing boats, or else hold them at a distance under fire of machine and heavy guns. These boats are sea-going, "and it is thought can keep the sea in all weathers; but to be on board a 110-foot ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan

... had to do, and I warn't goin' to take no chances of its not doin' it right. As to that boom, I want to tell ye that I picked that boom out o' about two hundred sticks in Tom Carlin's shipyard, in Stonington, and had it scraped and ironed just to please me. There ain't a rotten knot in it from butt to finish, and mighty few of any other kind. That stick's growed right—that's what's the matter with it; and it bellies out in the middle, just where ...
— The Underdog • F. Hopkinson Smith

... said, "are spirits those I hear?" And he to me: "Thou apprehendest truly, And they the knot of anger go unloosing." ...
— Dante's Purgatory • Dante

... herself from the vehicle unhurt; a group immediately formed round the cab, a knot of young thieves, almost young enough for infant schools, a dustman, a woman nearly naked and very drunk, and two unshorn ruffians with brutality stamped on every feature, with pipes in their mouths, and their hands in ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli

... hold two pieces of material together until a permanent stitch can be put in. It is done by taking long stitches (one-fourth inch) from right to left and parallel to the edges that are to be basted together. In starting, the thread is fastened with a knot; when completed, it is fastened by taking two or three stitches ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Science in Rural Schools • Ministry of Education Ontario

... be sure we did drink, for it had been months and months since we had had such water, pure, sweet, free from the terrible alkali and stagnant taste that had been in almost every drop we had seen. Rogers leveled his shot gun at some birds and killed a beautiful one with a top knot on his head, and colors bright all down his neck. It was a California quail. We said birds always lived where human beings did, and we had great hopes born to us of a better land. I told John that if the folks were only there now I could kill game ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly

... steady five-knot breeze was blowing, so that I was now not more than quarter of a mile from the reef. I was soon at the entrance; and as the schooner glided quickly through, I glanced affectionately at the huge breaker as if it had been the same one I had seen there when I bade adieu, as ...
— The Coral Island • R.M. Ballantyne

... table was a fine sword, with a red velvet scabbard, and a beautiful chased silver handle, with a blue ribbon for a sword-knot. "What is this?" says the Captain, going up to ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray

... you! See, my mouth's the same way too. Feels like a knot. Gee, you cute little thing, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1915 - And the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... and in a number of civilized people the man possesses an unlimited right of rejection. The Hovas compare marriage to a loosely tied knot. Among the ancient Jews, Romans, Greeks and Germans, discontent of the husband was a sufficient reason for rejection. On the contrary, among a number of savage races (Westermark mentions about twenty-five) rejection and divorce are extremely rare ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel

... The grapes are not high enough in quality for a home vineyard, and, while they ship well, are hard to handle because of the large size and rigidity of the bunches. Another fault is that the vines are subject to root-knot. The chief asset of the variety is handsome appearance of fruit. This variety is remarkable for the number of second-crop bunches which it produces on the laterals. ...
— Manual of American Grape-Growing • U. P. Hedrick

... knight like Bayard, Without reproach or fear; My light glove on his casque of steel, My love-knot on his spear! ...
— Selections From American Poetry • Various

... Roger Necton, the old vicar of Cranwell, he who had united Christopher and his wife Cicely in strange circumstances, and for that deed been obliged to fly for his life when the last Abbot of Blossholme burned Cranwell Towers, came to tie the knot before his great congregation. Notwithstanding that they were both of middle age, Emlyn in her grand gown and the brawny, red-haired Thomas in his yeoman's garb of green, such as he had worn when he wooed her many years before he put on the monk's russet robe, ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard

... snake, to page 280, No. 18 current volume, for a reply, which you considered "sufficient." With your kind permission I would like to speak a few words about the "snakes" in question. When I resided in Pennsylvania, I, in company with many other lads, used to tie a bundle of horse hairs into a hard knot and then immerse them in the brook, when the water began to get warm, and in due time we would have just as many animals, with the power of locomotion and appearance of snakes, as there were hairs in the ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various

... sich modeshty, youngster. Bear up and be a man. It'll soon be over. And if ye make a fuss," he added in a whisper, "I'll knock the head off ye. Do ye mind that?" Then, as if relating his experience to a large and sympathetic audience: "'Twas just that way I felt meself like, when the knot was tied. Wake in the knees sim'larly, and a faylin' like I was a cold dish-cloth wrung out. But Lord, he'll hold up his head agin, I'll ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II. No. 38, Saturday, December 17, 1870. • Various

... moment the distracted President and wild-eyed Gail pushed through the knot of children huddled about the fallen heroine, and demanded huskily, "How is she? Not dead? Thank ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown

... purposes. Those bejeweled fingers, tremulously eager to caress, surely were not those of a red-handed murderer! Yet if my wiles succeeded, those hands would wear manacles, those fingers convulsively clutch at vacancy, and that musical voice choke with tense strain of the hangman's knot. ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee

... truce to your doubts! no one clothed in flesh is permitted to untie that knot, and therefore a thousand fools will hang, drown, and destroy themselves. Do not, O Faustus, forget the end which we proposed to ourselves at our first interview. I promised to show thee men in their nakedness, in order to cure thee of the prejudices thou hadst imbibed from thy books, ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger

... and greater care is observed as to the scenic arrangements, so that it is no longer the case, as with Plautus, that everything needs to take place on the street, whether belonging to it or not. Plautus ties and unties the dramatic knot carelessly and loosely, but his plot is droll and often striking; Terence, far less effective, keeps everywhere account of probability, not unfrequently at the cost of suspense, and wages emphatic war against the certainly somewhat flat and insipid ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... little slipper, while another was lying in lazy contemplation, still as death, on the damp, warm floor. Six Armenians were standing together, singing a saucy love-song in their native language with clear-toned voices, and a little knot of fair-haired Persians were slandering Nitetis so fearfully, that a by-stander would have fancied our beautiful Egyptian was some awful monster, like those ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... hundred dollars, drawn to his own order and signed by him with the firm's name, and in response to my inquiry as to the meaning of it, he told me it was a little matter he was putting through by a friend for his own accommodation, I cut the knot and insisted on a ...
— The Romance and Tragedy • William Ingraham Russell

... with her eyes, then with her throat, then with her whole body, shaking her head and rocking herself backwards and forwards. She laughed till her hair came down, and he took it and smoothed it into two sleek straight bands, and tied them in a loose knot under her chin. ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair

... "beautiful Demonstration" of his penmanship which he left behind him was a most intricate piece of what was known as "fine knotting" or "knot work." It was written in "all the known hands of Great Britain." This work occupied every moment of what Abiah Holbrook called his "spare time" for seven years. It was valued at L100. It was bequeathed to Harvard College, unless his wife should need the money which could be ...
— Diary of Anna Green Winslow - A Boston School Girl of 1771 • Anna Green Winslow

... as the ship is bowling steadily along with a ten-knot breeze on the port quarter, the deck is hailed from aloft, and the cheery, long-expected, and long-wished-for cry of "land ho!" is taken up by a hundred voices, and rings out across the sea. But there is nothing to be seen for all that; and though more than three hundred ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay

... that any thing assuming the character of a gentleman could be guilty of such a mean, pitiful, and underhanded trick as that which we were told would be played. Scarcely, however, had we reached the door of the Hall, when we met Mr. Sheriff, Mr. Deputy, and a pretty little knot of sycophants and dependants, coming out; and Tinney informed us, that, as no one had come forward when the requisition was read, the Sheriff had dissolved the meeting. We expostulated against such an ungentlemanly like trick, but our expostulations would have been in vain if the tricksters ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 3 • Henry Hunt

... publican and such a name was, of course, frequented by a circle of wits, with whom, in the year just mentioned, originated "Punch." Lemon (how could there be punch without a lemon?) has been the editor from the outset. From which of the knot of good fellows the bright idea of the unique journal first emanated does not appear. The paternity has been ascribed to Douglas Jerrold. Its name might have been suggested by the place of its birth. If so, it at once lost all associations with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various

... second turn or spire, passed through the first loop, which was at first widely open, and in doing so knocked off the card; it then grew perpendicularly downwards, and thus tied itself into a knot, which soon ...
— The Power of Movement in Plants • Charles Darwin

... window behind the back counter was not immediately discernible. It was a fascinating head, as the most unimpressionable visitor could not fail to observe when the tall figure rose from behind the counter,—fascinating by reason of the beautiful hair, escaping in soft tendrils from the confining knot; fascinating still more by reason of the perfect grace of poise. The face was somewhat sallow and very thin; care and privation had left their marks upon it. The mouth was finely modelled, shrewd and humorous; ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller

... to make themselves believe in the grand conspiracy which it denounces, to associate Barthelemy, Carnot, Simeon, Barbe-Marbois, Boissy d'Anglas, Mathieu Dumas, Pastoret, Tronson du Coudray as accomplices with a knot of subordinate intriguers, contemptible "monkeys" (marmosets), dolts or spies, whose papers have been in the hands of the police for six months, and whom it forces to speak under lock and key.[5172] All are enveloped in the same net, all are confounded ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... could fetch, carry, and find so much. Oh, dear! what a seeking and searching love makes, when even one wee maiden is lost! Ay, lost—not a trace of her could Ralph and Rover find, till they came to the babbling river, and there, on the bank, lay a posy of lilies-of-the-valley, and a knot of ribbon from Dorrie's shoulder; the river babbled out the rest of the story. Poor ...
— Golden Moments - Bright Stories for Young Folks • Anonymous

... situation, what an awful outlook for him in such event! They hung men for murder on the jail-yard gallows, with a knot of rope behind the left ear and a black cap over the face. And such a death left a stain upon the name that nothing would purify. It was ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden

... blessed by the law and the Church—quite a gentleman of quality, Annie; far above the likes of you. He'll live to breed hatred and malice in the pack of ye, and every hand of his own flesh and blood'll be against him.... Parson, do your duty, and tie the holy knot—small harm in it now nothing ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse

... alive, Hornby's deformed housekeeper!" whispered Symonds. "This poor devil's knot will be ...
— The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney • Samuel Warren

... Illinois troopers, but he never availed himself of any of the numerous opportunities offered to change his associations. His elegant penmanship would have secured him an easy berth and better society at headquarters, but he declined to accept a detail. He became an exciting mystery to a knot of us imaginative young cubs, who sorted up out of the reminiscential rag-bag of high colors and strong contrasts with which the sensational literature that we most affected had plentifully stored our minds, a half-dozen intensely emotional careers ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... of old gold, is dressed in the Grecian style; and its abundance making the knot unusually ample, there was necessity for the two fillets of pink silk to ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace

... remembrance of 'MY GREAT LOSS.' This loss convinces me that I have nothing now left worth living for, since the strongest cord of my life is broken. By the grace of God, I shall easily renounce a world where my hopes have been vain and perishing. It is time for me to fly from Babylon when the knot that bound me to it ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... maker of music. At his elbow, but talking to a frail-looking woman, was his brother, Nicholas, destined always to be overshadowed by Anton, but to whom the cause of Russian music was to owe far more, in the end, than to the more showy virtuoso. In the knot about Madame Helena's chair were Zaremba, Serov, Glinka, Balakirev, Stassov, Lechetizsky—for the moment a special protege of the Grand-Duchess, and even young Rimsky-Korsakov, at this time merely a Conservatoire pupil. ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter

... Flint, blinking in the golden spring sunshine as he peered out over the swashing brine at a raucous knot of gulls, "on the contrary, Wally, I'm going to push it as fast as the Lord will let me. You can come in, or not, as you see fit—but remember this, no quitter ever gets a daughter of mine! And another thing; we're in the year 1921, now, not 1910 or 1915. Developments, political and otherwise, have ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England

... down, and then, when she had feasted her eyes enough upon her own loveliness, she plaited her hair, and, twisting it up into a rich knot behind, she stuck a high comb into it, and fastened the thick lace veil ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng

... unpainted railroad station, the investigator broke in on Pendleton's thoughts by calling on the chauffeur to stop. There were the usual signboards on each side of the structure, announcing that the place was Cordova; and there was the usual knot of loungers that are always to be found about such places watching with interest ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Investigator • John T. McIntyre

... much worship. Nevertheless, the ports he did shut up, or at least kept a watch on them, that none should pass to or fro that was suspected; but for the rest, he chose to work by counter-mines. His purposes were two—the one to lay open the abuse, the other to break the knot of the conspirators. To detect the abuse there were but two ways—the first, to make it manifest to the world that the Duke of York was indeed murdered; the other to prove that, were he dead or alive, yet Perkin was a counterfeit. For the first, thus it stood. There were but four ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson

... few Cloaths; their Heads are circled with a short turban, fringed or laced at both ends; it goes once about the Head, and is tied in a knot, the laced ends hanging down. They wear Frocks and Breeches, but ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various

... contrasted her own experiences with those of the heroes and heroines, and found in their adventures some far-fetched parallel to her own. But then their experiences were so much wider and more varied in that old charmed, sunny, fairy life; the knot of their difficulties was so readily cut, by a simple reference to some Fortunatus' purse, or the arrival in the very nick of time of some friendly fairy. Madelon did not draw the parallel quite far enough, ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter

... against the limpid blue of the morning sky. On this, some two and a half miles or three miles off, a little group of black dots had appeared. The clear edge of the skyline had become serrated with moving figures. They clustered into a knot, then opened ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle

... said Stratton, tying the last knot securely. "I'll bring your cayuse back to-morrow or the day ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames

... to the pole by a rope tied in a peculiar and very intricate knot. Now, it seems that an ancient prophecy had declared that whoever untied the Gordian knot would surely ...
— The Story of the Greeks • H. A. Guerber

... rendezvous, and the simple, unsuspecting hearts of those nymphs of the mountains, the squaws, caused their husbands to be very jealous of the attentions bestowed upon them by strangers. Often serious difficulties arose, in the course of which the poor wife received a severe whipping with the knot of a lariat, or no very light lodge-poling at the hands of her imperious sovereign. Sometimes the affair ended in a more tragical way than a mere beating, not infrequently the gallant paying the penalty of his interference ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman

... in the lower chancel, and the lady in the higher; from the one grave grew a milk-white rose, and from the other a briar, both of which climbed up to the church top, and there tied themselves into a true-lover's knot, which made all the parish admire. At this part, Anna was seen looking up at the ceiling; but the rest had no eyes but for Mrs Enderby, as she gazed full at the opposite wall, and the shrill, quavering notes of the monotonous air were poured out, and ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau

... favoring breeze, so all sail was spread to help us against the strong five knot current always setting out from this sea. I cannot tell with what feelings you entered upon this, the greatest highway of commerce in the world. For all of us it possesses a certain interest, but to some more so than to others. I ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith

... laid under so many restrictions by her grandmother's close method of bringing up, that it was always ready to rebound in favor of anybody to whom she allowed her to show kindness. So, when the young man stopped and shyly reached forth to her a knot of scarlet poppies intermingled with bright vetches and wild blue larkspurs, she took it graciously, and, frankly beaming a smile ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 50, December, 1861 • Various

... friend, Hattie Matthews, had that very day put a knot in each side, which made it fit very artistically on Rose's head. Philip carefully untied the knots, and draped it over the straw. The effect was beautiful. Philip exclaimed with delight! They looked ...
— The Black Creek Stopping-House • Nellie McClung

... housed. This worked well for a season. But one evening a commotion in the hennery informed her that the depredators were again at work. Hastily seizing an axe in one hand and carrying a lighted pitch pine knot in the other, she hurried to the scene of action, and found Grimalkin feasting sumptuously on her plumpest pullet. The banqueters were evidently a mother and her well-grown son, whom she was instructing in the predatory ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler

... very little of what has to follow courtship and marriage. They think little of the seriousness of the step. They forget that when the pledge has once been given, there is no turning back, The knot cannot be untied. If a thoughtless mistake has been made, the inevitable results will nevertheless follow. The maxim is current, that "marriage is a lottery." It may be so if we abjure the teachings of prudence—if we refuse to examine, inquire, and think—if we are content to choose a husband ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles

... interaction of positive and negative polarity. The electron is a stress in the ether, nothing more, but it is the stuff of which all matter is made. Thought is vibration in one dimension; matter in two. You have just seen me untie the knot, dissociate the electrons, or what you will. In plain language I have caused matter to vanish utterly. That paper is not burned up. It no longer exists in any form. The earth upon which we stand, Parker, can be dissolved like ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 • Various

... Benjamin Turner, was born October 2, 1800. He was mentally precocious and had marks on his head and breast which were interpreted by the Negroes who knew him as marking him for some high calling. In his mature years he also had on his right arm a knot which was the result of a blow which he had received. He experimented in paper, gunpowder, and pottery, and it is recorded of him that he was never known to swear an oath, to drink a drop of spirits, or to commit a theft. ...
— A Social History of the American Negro • Benjamin Brawley

... with Chamberlain on the question whether we could possibly get together a small knot of young peers to help us in the House of Lords. Rosebery seemed the only one that we could find worth thinking of, and we had him to dinner, and went to stay with him, and generally tried to join forces, but ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn

... o' Shanter cap. It had been a difficult task, and the result was far from satisfying. Dropped stitches and uneven rows were in evidence all over the creation of dark red, with its bushy little knot on top. But Janet had an eye for the impressionistic touch, and as she glanced in the mirror of Susan Jane's bureau, the general effect was gratifying. Under the dull red the splendid, dusky gold of the girl's hair shone exquisitely. Janet had ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock

... camp was beside what might be called a serpentine curve or series of loops in the river. This was at the centre of what is known as the Double Bow Knot, three rounded loops, very symmetrical in form, with an almost circular formation of flat-topped rock, a mile or more in diameter in the centre of each loop. A narrow neck of rock connects these formations to the main mesa, all being on the same level, about 700 feet above the river. The ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb

... vicious wrong-doing. It is the sin of this man, the sin of choosing the second best. I read recently of an insane man who spent all his time in an endeavor to sew two pieces of cloth together. But the thread he used had no knot in the end of it. So nothing was ever accomplished. Now, there is no harm in such sewing. But the tragedy of it is that if we spend all our time doing such trivial things we rob ourselves of the privilege of doing something ...
— Sermons on Biblical Characters • Clovis G. Chappell

... long time before he could speak at all, everybody standing and drowning his attempts to speak with roar after roar of applause. It was an extraordinary, overwhelming scene, tier after tier crammed with workmen, the parterre filled, the whole platform and the wings. A knot of workwomen were close to me, and they almost fought to see him, and shouted as if each one were determined that he should hear her in particular. He spoke as usual, in the simplest way, emphasizing the fact that the revolutionary struggle everywhere was forced to use the ...
— Russia in 1919 • Arthur Ransome

... self-government in essentials had been won, the old dividing lines began to melt away. All but a small knot of Tory irreconcilables now agreed that the majority must rule, and that this would neither smash the Empire nor make an end of order and justice in the province itself. But who were to unite to form that majority, and what was to be their platform? In the Reform party there had been many men of ...
— The Day of Sir Wilfrid Laurier - A Chronicle of Our Own Time • Oscar D. Skelton

... him. He entered a waiting room, and to his surprise everything seemed familiar to him. As he says: "I seemed to recognize every object. I said to myself, what is this? I have never been here before, and yet I have seen all this, and if so, there is a very peculiar knot in that shutter." He then crossed the room, and opened the shutter, and after examination he saw the identical peculiar knot that he had felt sure was there. Pythagoras is said to have distinctly remembered a number of his previous ...
— Reincarnation and the Law of Karma - A Study of the Old-New World-Doctrine of Rebirth, and Spiritual Cause and Effect • William Walker Atkinson

... people; but divided into several nations all bearing distinct names, though in general they are entitled Suevians, and occupy the larger share of Germany. This people are remarkable for a peculiar custom, that of twisting their hair and binding it up in a knot. It is thus the Suevians are distinguished from the other Germans, thus the free Suevians from their slaves. In other nations, whether from alliance of blood with the Suevians, or, as is usual from imitation, this practice is also found, yet rarely, ...
— Tacitus on Germany • Tacitus

... Abercrombie next week, or should he push on towards Greece and the Holy Land? It was a little difficult to decide, but somehow Michael never answered that question. Fate took the matter into her own hands, as she often does when the knot becomes too intricate for the bungling fingers of ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... your feet ain't tied like mine was, in rich a hard knot that no mortal being can git it undone. I'll take a chunk, and burn the tarnation string in two," said ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones

... the most fantastic style, but suddenly stopped short at sight of the tea things, and looked very grave. "Well, Mamma, I'll tell you what I'll do," she said, after a pause of consideration; "I'll make the tea the first thing, before I untie a single knot; won't that be best, Mamma? Because I know if I once begin to look, I shan't want to stop. Don't you ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell

... progress was stopped. A great knot of people were swarming about a statue under a pine tree, and shrill, angry voices proclaimed not trafficking, ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis

... all is limited, temporary, imperfect; and reason seeks the perfect, the eternal, the infinite. The doctrine of creation alone explains how the universe subsists in presence of its first cause. In ignorance of this doctrine, some bold thinkers have cut the knot which they could not untie. They have declared that reason alone is right, and that experience is wrong: the world does not exist, it is but an illusion of the mind. Whence proceeds this illusion? If perfection alone exists, how comes that imperfect mind to exist which deceives itself in ...
— The Heavenly Father - Lectures on Modern Atheism • Ernest Naville

... the two sombre mysteries—Death and Life (and which is the darker?); the sense of fate driving life on—the fate of a temperament that restlessly longs for new impressions and intense emotions, without the vigor of action that cuts the Gordian knot of fancy and speculation with the swift ...
— The Story of a Child • Pierre Loti

... hand and took from that shelf a piece of twisted paper, which he opened absently only to find it inscribed with a true lover's knot ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton

... evening, and the cold became intense. Some managed to get blankets from their friends," in the apartment above, "but the guards soon put a stop to that. One man called down to a friend through a knot-hole in the floor, asking him if he wanted a blanket. The guard heard him, cocked his gun, and aimed at the hole; but a call from below gave the man warning and he fled." And all this for singing a song written ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens

... three knots in the hour, leaving behind her a thin, swirling wake of small bubbles and tiny whirlpools that vanished upon the breast of the next on-coming swell. The longboat, under fore and main standing lugs and a small jib, deeply loaded as she was, was doing a knot less than ourselves, and we soon passed and slid ahead of her; while away down in the north-eastern board, broad on our starboard quarter, the topsails and upper canvas of the barque shone primrose-yellow above the ridges of the swell as she stood away ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood

... for three days' monotonous trip on the river. Novel or work in hand, we went into the saloon to read or work, furtively study our fellow-travellers, and by-and-by make acquaintance with them. We were a motley group. Round one table gathered a knot of chatty Americans, evidently travelling together, and quite as much at home on board the boat as in their own drawing-room. Besides this party of friends, there were plenty of solitary units, of more or less ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon

... to him. He glanced at Mara. Her black hair was tied in a knot, looped through a hollowed-out yuke bone. Her face was dark, too, dark and lined with colored ceremonial pigment, green and orange stripes across her cheeks. Earrings were strung through her ears. On her feet were tiny slippers of perruh hide, laced around her ...
— The Crystal Crypt • Philip Kindred Dick

... downwards, and surrounding the limbs as far as the middle of the leg. The upper part of the vest was drawn under the right arm, which was thus left uncovered, and, passing over the left shoulder, was there gathered in a knot, whence it fell in folds across the breast: this flap being tucked into the girdle, formed a cavity which sometimes served as a pocket, and was frequently used as a covering for the head. Its color was white, except in ...
— Roman Antiquities, and Ancient Mythology - For Classical Schools (2nd ed) • Charles K. Dillaway

... advice of Cromwell was acted upon, and by a series of steps England was swiftly and forever carried out from under the authority of the Roman See. Henry first virtually cut the Gordian knot by a secret marriage with Anne Boleyn, notwithstanding a papal decree threatening him with excommunication should he dare to do so. Parliament, which was entirely subservient to Henry's wishes, now passed a law known as the Statute of Appeals, which made it a crime for ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers

... This name is also local, from knot, a hillock, and has of course become confused (Variant Spellings, Chapter III) with the nickname Nott, with cropped ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley

... being nice to the Norwegian girls. I'll warrant you were adept enough at it once. And you'd better be very nice indeed, for if there are many such young valkyrs as Eric's sister among them, they would simply tie you up in a knot if they suspected ...
— A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays • Willa Cather

... long, heavy, and snow-white, swept downward over the indigo flesh and was gathered into a knot on his massive chest. It was the beard of a prophet or a seer, and when Kahauiti rose to his full height, six feet and a half, he was as majestic as a man in diadem and royal robes. He had a giant form, like one of Buonarroti's ancients, muscular ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien

... for the active old man who, with flashing eyes and hand upraised in menace, burst forth "What do you mean? Are we to pick up the ends of the rope the Lord our God has severed? Do you counsel us to fasten it anew, with a looser knot, which will hold as long as the whim of a vacillating weakling who has broken his promises to us and to Moses a score of times? Do you wish to lead us back to the cage whence the Almighty released us by a ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... king was a great state function in which many had a part to play. A servant with a steaming silver saucer hurried past, bearing it to Monsieur de St. Quentin, the state barber. Others, with clothes thrown over their arms, bustled down the passage which led to the ante-chamber. The knot of guardsmen in their gorgeous blue and silver coats straightened themselves up and brought their halberds to attention, while the young officer, who had been looking wistfully out of the window at some courtiers who were laughing and chatting on the terraces, ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle

... a long time and it was filled with leaves, dim and not easy to follow. It ended as nearly all trails do; it branched off to right and left, grew dimmer and slimmer, degenerated to a deer path, petered out to a squirrel track, ran up a tree and ended in a knot hole. I was not sorry. It left me free to follow my nose, ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears

... and to every one else a nuisance. Like all the other Barlows of Barnstable on Cape Cod, Billy had worked for his every penny. He was no shirker. From the first day that he carried a pair of pliers in the leg pocket of his overalls, and in a sixty-knot gale stretched wires between ice-capped telegraph poles, he had more than earned his wages. Never, whether on time or at piece-work, had he by a slovenly job, or by beating the whistle, robbed his employer. And for his honest toil he was determined to be as honestly paid—even by President Hamilcar ...
— Somewhere in France • Richard Harding Davis

... was the matter with the woman? What was it that she wanted to see or do in the street? Why should she run away when she saw me?" These were his thoughts. But he didn't waste time in merely thinking. Muller never did. Action followed thought with him very quickly. He saw a knot-hole in the fence just beside the gate and he applied his eyes to this knot-hole. And through the knot-hole he saw something that ...
— The Lamp That Went Out • Augusta Groner

... especially desirable at this time, in view of the fact that our present governmental contract for ocean mail with the American Line will expire in 1905. Our ocean mail act was passed in 1891. In 1895 our 20-knot transatlantic mail line was equal to any foreign line. Since then the Germans have put on 23-knot, steamers, and the British have contracted for 24-knot steamers. Our service should equal the best. If it does not, the commercial public will abandon it. If we are to stay in the business ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt

... that Paul's eyes fastened, Lydia very white, her face almost translucent, her starry eyes contradicting the tremor of her lips. He drew her to him, crying out: "Why, Lydia darling, you look as though you'd been drawn through a knot-hole! This has been enough sight harder on you than on the baby! What in the world wore you out so? I ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield

... myself in the centre of a knot of men who began eagerly to press me for further particulars of the Amalgamated subscriptions. We all know the story of the comedian informed in the midst of a performance of his beloved wife's death, who yet must laugh and antic to the end of the play. I appreciated ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson

... of this desire is such, that it is ready, so far forth as it can, to dissolve that sweet knot of union that is betwixt body and soul, a knot more dear to a reasonable creature than that can be which is betwixt wife and husband, parent and child, or a man and his estate. For even 'all that a man hath will he give for his life,' and to keep body and soul firmly knit together. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... the whites of her eyes shining. The fire that had been kindled on the hearth so as to give a light (for the weather was not cold) flickered and flared, and little blue flames crept about over the sputtering pine-knot, jumping off into the air and then jumping back. The blue flames flickered and danced and crept about so, and caused such a commotion among the shadows that were running about the room and trying to hide themselves behind the chairs and in the corners, that the big ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris

... pieces of one sol, stamped on one side with a cross fleuree; and on the reverse, with the king's cypher and crown, inscribed as the others: finally, there is another small copper piece, called piccalon, the sixth part of a sol, with a plain cross, and on the reverse, a slip-knot surmounted with a crown; the legend as above. The impression and legend on the gold and silver coins, are the same as those on the pieces of seven sols and a half. The livre of Piedmont consists of twenty sols, and is very near of the ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett

... the gate and slipped the key into his pocket; then he turned and walked toward the centre of the town. As he reached the more populous quarters his walk slackened to a stroll; and now and then he paused to observe a knot of merry-makers or look through the curtains of the tents set up ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... spoke the man rose up, threw the ring of rope on the rock by his side, set the end free, made a knot in it, and gave it to Joe to hold while, after a little examination to make sure that it would uncoil easily, he raised the ring, stood back a couple of yards, swung the coil to and fro horizontally on a level ...
— Sappers and Miners - The Flood beneath the Sea • George Manville Fenn

... remained a riddle, for then it read: "The Mother of the Loves imitates the Shapes of Cynthia," meaning that the planet Venus, when viewed with a telescope, shows phases like those of the moon. The secret imparted in confidence to the knot of astronomers at Juvisy came from a countryman of Galileo's, Signor G. V. Schiaparelli, the Director of the Observatory of Milan, and its purport was that the planet Mercury always keeps the same face directed toward the sun. Schiaparelli had satisfied ...
— Other Worlds - Their Nature, Possibilities and Habitability in the Light of the Latest Discoveries • Garrett P. Serviss

... elapsed when I met him again. I found him by hazard in the Ludgate Bar, which was then a great resort of the bigger men among the London journalists. As I entered he sat among a knot of his companions. Tom Hood was there as I remember, and Henry Sampson, founder of the Referee with Major Henty, the famous writer of books for boys, and poor brilliant young Evelyn Jerrold. Forbes greeted me boisterously, ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray

... wistfully, yet courteously, as if her attention was attracted by something fresh and winning. She looked at the color, ebbing and flowing in the girl's cheeks; at her brows and lashes; at her neck, as white as swan's-down; and finally put out her hand with a sudden impulse and touched the knot of wavy bronze ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin

... leather-faced vaquero with hard eyes of jade. "No hard feelings, friend. All in the way of business." With which he gave a final tug at the knot that tied the hands ...
— Mavericks • William MacLeod Raine

... and Nelly Bascombe was equally interested in your family, and along of that common interest and seeing a lot of each other and unfolding our opinions, we got equally interested in one another. And then nature cut the knot, Jane, and, in a word, I darned soon found I liked Nelly Bascombe a lot better than ever I liked you, if you'll excuse my saying so; and, what was a lot more to the purpose, she discovered how she liked me oceans deeper than she liked ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts

... did so another slight touch of nervousness came over him; and in spite of himself he began to glance at the knot he had made in the rope, and then at the candle to see how much longer it would last, to find that it was half burned down and that the length of time it would keep burning must guide his descent. He was a ...
— Menhardoc • George Manville Fenn

... earnest eye-glasses, and her perpetual attitude of mild misapprehension. I can see Dredge cowering, long and many-jointed, in a diminutive drawing-room chair, one square-toed shoe coiled round an exposed ankle, his knees clasped in a knot of red knuckles, and his spectacles perpetually seeking Mrs. Lanfear's eye-glasses. I never knew if the poor lady was aware of the sentiment she inspired, but her children observed it, and it provoked them to irreverent mirth. Galen was the predestined butt of Mabel and Archie; and secure ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton

... by his side as they walked on in search of a shop where they could make their purchase. It was some time before they found one, and they had already left behind them the busier thoroughfares, and had reached a knot of quieter streets where there were more foot-passengers, for the fine morning had tempted many people out for pleasure as well as business. Tony was particular in his choice of a broom, but once bought, he carried it over his shoulder, ...
— Alone In London • Hesba Stretton

... the great city. Never did the waters of heaven pour down on a forlorner head. Yet I tried ten days at a sort of a friend's house; but it was large and straggling,—one of the individuals of my old long knot of friends, card-players, pleasant companions, that have tumbled to pieces, into dust and other things; and I got home on Thursday, convinced that I was better to get home to my hole at Enfield, and hide like a sick cat in my corner. Less than a month, I hope, will bring home Mary. She ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb

... would rather have by my side in a row than the young Colonel, and his brother Jung evidently thought so too when he chose him to assist in the capture of the conspirators in the attempt upon his life. Cheerful and lively, his merry laugh might be heard in the midst of a knot of his admirers, to whom he was relating some amusing anecdote, while his shrewd remarks were the result of keen observation, and proved his intellect to be by no means of a ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant

... from London, detailing his adventures in the great metropolis, was read in my presence to a circle of admiring friends with expressions of wonder and surprise. This little circumstance made it clear to me that the easiest way out of my difficulty was to out the Gordian knot, run away from Dr. Foshay, and join my father ...
— The Reminiscences of an Astronomer • Simon Newcomb

... at the doors of various dwellings, and a little knot of Indians gathered at the top of the bank, where they waited, staring stolidly until two heavily loaded toboggans came to a halt at the foot of the ...
— Connie Morgan in the Fur Country • James B. Hendryx

... Methuselah; and yet if that old person could come back here it is more that likely that one of the first things he would do would be to take hold of one of these electric wires and tie himself all up in a knot. Now the surer thing and the wiser thing would be for him to ask somebody whether it was a good thing to take hold of. But that would not suit him; he would be one of the self-taught kind that go by experience; he ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... around the grave began to disperse, the little knot of disgruntled spectators moved sullenly away. In the evening they might have been seen, most of them, around Clay Jackson's barroom. Turner, the foreman at Fetters's convict farm, was in town that evening, ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt

... the next, i, we differ farder, and the knot harder to louse, for nether syde wantes sum reason. Thei in mihi, tibi, and sik otheres, pronunce it as it soundes in bide, manere; we as ...
— Of the Orthographie and Congruitie of the Britan Tongue - A Treates, noe shorter than necessarie, for the Schooles • Alexander Hume

... There is a man carrying a pile of books from the boat! What a number of books. What were they for? . . . And an old invalided jurumudi, who had travelled over many seas and had heard holy men speak in far-off countries, explained to a small knot of unsophisticated citizens of Sambir that those books were books of magic—of magic that guides the white men's ships over the seas, that gives them their wicked wisdom and their strength; of magic that makes them great, powerful, ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad

... said he, "above the first knot in the cane. If I draw in my breath in sucking, and thus make a vacuum in my mouth, the outer air then forces itself through the hole I have made to fill this vacuum, and carries the juice along with it; and when this division of the cane is emptied, I can proceed to pierce above the ...
— The Swiss Family Robinson; or Adventures in a Desert Island • Johann David Wyss

... said Madame Henrietta, "I forgot the secret spring; the fourth plank of the flooring—press on the spot where you will observe a knot in the wood. Those are the instructions; press, vicomte! press, ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... withhaud the conclusion I'm driven til, for maybe whiles the hert o' man may gang the wrang. gait by bein' ower wise in its ain conceit o' expeckin' ower little, jist as weel's in expeckin' ower muckle, an' sae I'm b'un' to tell ye, laird,'at yer expectations frae this knot o'metal,—for metal we maun alloo it to be, whatever else it be or bena—yer expectations, I say, are a'thegither wrang, for it's no more ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... contrary imagines that any scent is worth following, that we have an infinite nature, or no nature in particular, that life begins without obligations and can do business without capital, and that the will is vacuously free, instead of being a specific burden and a tight hereditary knot to be unravelled. Some philosophers without self-knowledge think that the variations and further entanglements which the future may bring are the manifestation of spirit; but they are, as Freud has indicated, imposed on living beings by external pressure, and take ...
— Some Turns of Thought in Modern Philosophy - Five Essays • George Santayana

... meetings he had held he had found this an effective beginning. It was new to his present audience. Usually a knot of people stood outside, and if they were there, he made an appeal to them, through the open door, to enter. If no one was there, he had a lesson to impart, based on the silence and the darkness. In this instance ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr

... on the hearth-rug, their eyes fixed on an extraordinarily large bouquet of crimson roses, with a knot of purple pansies at their base, that lay on the sofa where ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton

... more strictly than before. The disappointment of their hopes, the quick breach of the pledges so solemnly given to them, drove the Catholics to despair. They gave fresh life to a conspiracy which a small knot of bigots had been fruitlessly striving to bring to an issue since the king's accession. Catesby, a Catholic zealot who had taken part in the rising of Essex, had busied himself during the last years of Elizabeth in preparing for a revolt at the Queen's death, and in seeking for his project ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green

... few more words she might say before the time she allowed herself had expired, and she found courage to go on, striving to explain to the shifting knot of people that the battle which now threatened civilisation was the terrible and final fight between Order and Disorder and that, under inexorable laws which could never change, order meant life and survival; disorder chaos and death for all ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers

... from the brow apparently as simply as before, twisted it into a low knot slightly eccentric in shape, and recut a bang. Lavinia's eyes seemed bluer, her delicate flush more elusive; the shape of her face appeared changed, it was more pointed and ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer

... reason or another, did not reappear on the pane, and the cat began looking everywhere to find it. Her annoyance when she failed to do so was extreme. It was not only that she had lost her fly, but that she could not conceive how she should have ever come to do so. Presently she noted a small knot in the woodwork of the sill, and it flashed upon her that she had accidentally killed the fly, and that this was its dead body. She tried to move it gently with her paw, but it was no use, and for the time she satisfied herself that the knot ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler

... stranger was directed to the bar-keeper, who stood at the door. The man asked where he should find one Mary Ann Russell,—a question which excited general and hardly-suppressed mirth; for the said Mary Ann is one of a knot of women who were routed on Sunday evening by Barker and a constable. The man was told that the black fellow would give him all the information he ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various

... Meanwhile, however, the chance he had allowed for—the chance of being seen in time from the balcony—had become a fact. Two or three of the windows stood open to the violet air; and, before Strether had cut the knot by crossing, a young man had come out and looked about him, had lighted a cigarette and tossed the match over, and then, resting on the rail, had given himself up to watching the life below while he smoked. His arrival contributed, in its order, to keeping Strether in position; the result ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James

... substituted for their own equipment the Roman spoils of Trasimenus and Trebia. Then, and again somewhat in advance, came alternate companies of Gauls and Spaniards spread out in long thin array; the former stripped to the navel, their hair tied up in a tufted knot, and bearing their great swords upon their shoulders; the Spaniards glittering in their purple-bordered tunics of snowy linen. The waving pikes of phalanges told of more Africans who seemed to lie in echelon beyond, while far away, toward the low hills ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne

... too, had reached the climax of his suspense. Gathering all his muscles in a knot he prepared to leap upon Colter as he mounted the ladder. But, Ellen Jorth screamed piercingly and snatched her rifle from its resting place and, cocking it, she held ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey

... fruit-stalls make gay patches of colour among green piles of banana leaves, and thin yellow strips of bamboo, the approved paper and string of the tropics, in which every parcel is packed. Tall sugar-cane and plumy maize surround each brown desa beneath the knot of palms, and fields of tapioca vary the prevailing rice-grounds with sharp-pointed leaves and paler verdure. The entire tapioca crop of Java belongs to Huntley and Palmer, for use in the manufacture of the biscuits which make a valuable supplement to the Javanese ...
— Through the Malay Archipelago • Emily Richings

... like death she looks, and yet—he knows she is still in the flesh. How strangely her eyes gleam. A dull gleam and so passionless. Her brown hair—not altogether fallen down her back, but loosened from its hairpins, and hanging in a soft heavy knot behind her head—gives an additional pallor to her already too white face. The open eyes are looking straight before them, unseeing. Her step is slow, mechanical, unearthly. It is only indeed when she lays the candle she holds upon the edge of the table, the extreme ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford

... serious purpose. He was admitted to the bar, but he still halted.[1] Society more than ever attracted him and devoured his time. He willingly accepted the office of "champion at the tea-parties;" he was one of a knot of young fellows of literary tastes and convivial habits, who delighted to be known as "The Nine Worthies," or "Lads of Kilkenny." In his letters of this period I detect a kind of callowness and affectation which is not discernible in ...
— Washington Irving • Charles Dudley Warner

... if you cannot hold on with your hands, make use of your teeth and legs; and mind, clutch fast till you've picked out a soft spot to fall on." Dick Derrick taught me to hand, furl, and steer, to knot and splice, to make sinnet and spun-yarn, and the various other parts of a seaman's business. I was ambitious to learn; and I found the work, when taught by him, both ...
— Peter the Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston

... end of the glade was a clump of bamboos. Dermot selected the biggest stem and hacked it down with his kukri. From the thicker end he cut off a length from immediately below a knot to about a foot above it, trimmed the edges and brought it to Noreen. It made a beautifully clean and polished pot, pale green outside, ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly

... with a stern attitude toward the Indians. In the end it was possible to arrive at a peaceful state by force and negotiation. Dale recognized, too, that the Pocahontas-John Rolfe marriage, in 1614, was "an other knot to binde this peace the stronger." This helped to strengthen the treaties worked out with old Powhatan ...
— The First Seventeen Years: Virginia 1607-1624 • Charles E. Hatch

... all that hath been lying in the dim warehouse of fate for England's high future. Be sure that in this thing I have entered into the weigh-house, and I hold the balance, and ye shall be well satisfied. Ye have been fruitful in counsel, ye have been long knitting a knot never tied, ye shall have comfort soon. But know ye beyond peradventure that I have bided my time with good reason. If our loom be framed with rotten hurdles, when our web is well-ny done, our work is yet to begin. Against mischance ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... (p. 274) sense of "wishes." Far worse than occasional errors in the use of words are errors of construction. His sentences are sometimes involved in the most hopeless way, and the efforts of grammar to untie the knot by any means known to it serve only to make ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury

... and intelligent English office, who could tell a good story and make himself agreeable in a grog shop, disguised in the plain dress of a common sailor, one day got admittance to a knot of these unsuspecting "old salts," and by his liberality and good humor acquired their confidence. Under some plausible pretext he induced a dozen or fifteen Dutchmen, Swedes, Britons, and Yankees to ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper

... instructed the country, by word and pen, on the true value and destiny of the Colonies. He moved about, a crusader, indignant at separatism, eloquent to knot, and re-knot, the painter. For the slash of the knife he offered federation, and, springing therefrom, a happier, better world altogether. He did not doubt, to his last days, that the peril of the Empire was very real. Neither ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne

... he should advise or consult. As there is no difficulty nor impediment in the way of his power,—he doth all that he pleases, ad nutum, at his very word or nod, so easy are impossibilities to him,—so there is nothing hard to his wisdom, no knot but it can loose, nothing so curious or exquisite but he can as curiously contrive it, as the most common and gross pieces of the creation, and therefore, "he is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working." ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... beautee which that kinde 1730 In any other lady hadde y-set Can not the mountaunce of a knot unbinde, A-boute his herte, of al Criseydes net. He was so narwe y-masked and y-knet, That it undon on any manere syde, 1735 That nil not been, for ...
— Troilus and Criseyde • Geoffrey Chaucer

... train, without cost, out of the main station—Chehaw, five miles away—to meet him. He arrived on the school grounds about nine o'clock in the evening. Some one had suggested that we give the General a "pine-knot torchlight reception." This plan was carried out, and the moment that his carriage entered the school grounds he began passing between two lines of lighted and waving "fat pine" wood knots held by over a thousand students and teachers. The whole thing was so novel ...
— Up From Slavery: An Autobiography • Booker T. Washington

... into every part of almost everybody's appearance [at Streatham].' And again she writes:—'his blindness is as much the effect of absence [of mind] as of infirmity, for he sees wonderfully at times. He can see the colour of a lady's top-knot, for he very often finds fault with it.' Mme. D'Arblays Diary, i. 85, ii. 174. 'He could, when well, distinguish the hour on Lichfield town-clock.' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell

... appeased with human blood. When the lots were cast into the urn it so fell that the king was required for death as a victim. Then Starkad made a noose of withies and bound the king in it; saying that for a brief instant he should pay the mere semblance of a penalty. But the tightness of the knot acted according to its nature, and cut off his last breath as he hung. And while he was still quivering Starkad rent away with his steel the remnant of his life; thus disclosing his treachery when he ought to have brought ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... but the imperfect weapon would accord with the great oaks, the beech trees full of knot-holes, the mysterious thickets, the tall fern, the silence and the solitude. The chase would become a real chase: not, as now, a foregone conclusion. And there would be time ...
— The Amateur Poacher • Richard Jefferies

... the fourth for Major Edward MacNamara; as he neared the great, squatting shock absorbers he could feel the tension begin to knot his stomach. He had, of course, been overwhelmed by the opportunity to participate in Operation Doughnut. The fact that he had been one of the best mechanical engineers in the Air Force never occurred to him at the time. He was a pilot, and a good one, but he ...
— Tight Squeeze • Dean Charles Ing

... rational connection between the BUNG of a barrel and an eye which has been closed by a blow. One might as well get the simile from a knot in a tree or a cork in a flask. But when we reflect on the constant mingling of Gipsies with prizefighters, it is almost evident that the word BONGO may have been the origin of it. A bongo yakko or yak, means a distorted, crooked, or, in fact, a bunged ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland

... explained his plan in full, and his companions were quite interested in it. There was no chance for a race while only a four-knot breeze favored the Goldwing. With a good stiff breeze the skipper believed he could beat the steamer; but, in the absence of such a wind, he must resort to strategy. But strategy was quite as exciting to his companions as a race. It afforded the opportunity for one craft ...
— All Adrift - or The Goldwing Club • Oliver Optic

... air in an instant, and came down across the road. Again I dug in to the rowels, and clung the tighter, and this time he landed with his head to London. A little knot of people had collected to watch me, and out stepped a strapping fellow in the King's scarlet, from ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... and blood had oozed from the hole in the skull in which yet stuck the pointed end of the mattock sunk deep within. Evidently the instrument had rebounded from the resilient surface of the bamboo. A by-stander pointed to the tiny fracture near the hard knot of the staff. It was a small thing, but enough to destroy all the past labours. Iemon went up to look at the body. "Why! 'Tis Goemon." To their questioning he told how Kamimura had called on the previous night, his rage at the inability of Iemon to aid him in distress. With hanging heads, eyes ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville

... both leaves wide—like all the Redford doors, they were never locked or barred—and drifting over the verandah, sat down on the edge of it, with her feet on the gravel. She had tossed off her pearl necklace and a breast-knot of wilted roses; otherwise, she sat in full evening dress, and the night air bathed her bare neck and arms. Also the mosquitoes found them—a delicious morsel!—so that she had to turn her lacy skirt up over her head to be quite comfortable. From under ...
— Sisters • Ada Cambridge

... cord, lest loss Befall thee on thy way, while thou perchance Shalt sleep secure on board the sable bark. Which when Ulysses heard, Hero renown'd, Adjusting close the lid, he cast a cord Around it which with many a mazy knot He tied, by Circe taught him long before. 550 And now, the mistress of the household charge Summon'd him to his bath; glad he beheld The steaming vase, uncustom'd to its use E'er since his voyage from the isle of fair Calypso, although, while a ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer

... of man can never bind them so fast, but that an easy distinction shall give them a starting-hole to escape the scandal of being baffled. They will cut asunder the toughest argument with as much ease as Alexander did the gordian knot; they will thunder out so many rattling terms as shall fright an adversary into conviction. They are exquisitely dexterous in unfolding the most intricate mysteries; they will tell you to a tittle all the successive proceedings of Omnipotence in the creation of the universe; they will ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus

... Edmond Russell. "Let go the tense hold of your arms that is wearing out your vitality. You will get rest by doing this. Sleepless people will fall asleep. Stop holding yourself in a knot and relax. Hold up the chest, breathe slowly and deeply through the nose, ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke

... and triple-arched there was, All garlanded with carven imageries Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass, And diamonded with panes of quaint device, Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes, As are the tiger-moth's deep-damask'd wings; And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries, And twilight saints and dim emblazonings, ...
— Daisy's Necklace - And What Came of It • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... miles southeast of Point o' Woods. The sun was shining brilliantly, but the coast-line was veiled in a heavy haze. There was a fair ground-swell running, but no sea. The San Diego was ploughing along at a fifteen-knot clip, not pursuing the zigzag course which it is customary for vessels to ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry

... with a knot of fashionable youths; among whom I was rather surprised to discover my at that time ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... that his chance of obtaining a share of the favours of the Crown was seriously diminished by the competition of Bentincks and Keppels, Auverquerques and Zulesteins. But, though the riches and dignities heaped on the little knot of Dutch courtiers might disgust him, the recent proceedings of the Commons could not but disgust him still more. The authority, the respectability, the existence of his order were threatened with destruction. Not only,—such were the just complaints of the Peers,—not only are we to be deprived ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... him, or ignorant of its nature. In describing himself to Buonagiunta da Lucca in Purgatory, he says, "I am one who, when Love breathes, mark, and according as he dictates within, I report"; to which the poet of Lucca replies, "O brother, now I see the knot which kept the Notary and Guittone and me back from that sweet new style which now I hear. I see well how your pens have followed close on the dictator, which truly was not the case with ours."[9] As Love was the common theme of the verses from which Buonagiunta drew his contrast, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various

... to save his neck as you or me either. Awnly Jonathan's bin here and tawld up summat that makes un want to be off to wance, for he says, what us all knaws, without he's minded to it you can't slip a knot round Jonathan's clapper; and 'tain't that Jerrem's afeared o' his tongue, awnly for the keepin' up o' pace and quietness he fancies 'twould be better for un to make ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various

... betray themselves to men as they do to each other; and the Rev. Amos had not a keen instinct for character. But he felt that he was being relieved from a difficulty, and in the way that was easiest for him. Neither he nor Milly suspected that it was Nanny who had cut the knot for them, for the Countess took care to give no sign on that subject. As for Nanny, she was perfectly aware of the relation between cause and effect in the affair, and secretly chuckled over her outburst of 'sauce' as the best morning's work she ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot

... we have seen, must be a substantial personality. Then, first, he must have power of statement,—must have the fact, and know how to tell it. In any knot of men conversing on any subject, the person who knows most about it will have the ear of the company, if he wishes it, and lead the conversation,—no matter what genius or distinction other men there present may have; and in any public ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various

... a sadder scene happened in the Avenue des Ternes. A funeral procession was passing along. The coffin, borne by two men, was very small, the coffin of a young child. The father, a workman in a blouse, walked behind with a little knot of other mourners. A sad sight, but the catastrophe was horrible. Suddenly a shell from Mont Valerien fell on the tiny coffin, and, bursting, scattered the remains of the dead child upon the living father. The corpse ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton

... brought aboard at some hazard to our skiff, and set down in one corner of the cockpit to his appointed task. He had been hired, as one cunning in the art, to make my old men's beards into a wreath: what a wreath for Celia's arbour! His own beard (which he carried, for greater safety, in a sailor's knot) was not merely the adornment of his age, but a substantial piece of property. One hundred dollars was the estimated value; and as Brother Michel never knew a native to deposit a greater sum with Bishop Dordillon, our friend was a rich man in virtue of his chin. He had something of an East Indian ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson

... long windows of the balcony, interrupted the men for a moment. She was dressed in a tunic of silver, of curious texture, like flexible woven metal, reaching to her knees. On her feet were little fiber sandals. Her hair was twisted in coils, piled upon her head, with a knot low at the back of the neck. From her head in graceful folds hung a thin scarf ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings

... won the battle of the Granicus. In this battle nearly all of the Persian leaders were slain, and its result spread terror throughout Persia. Halicarnassus was next reduced. The march of Alexander was ever onward. In the citadel of Gordium he cut the "Gordian knot," and prophecy marked him ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various

... died unknown and unhonored, passed before the dreaming boy, and claimed their immortality. Nay, once the Blessed Face shone through the cloistered twilight, and the Twelve stood roundabout. In this strange solitude and stranger companionship many an old problem untwined its Gordian knot, and whispered ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 78, April, 1864 • Various

... have read that a union of hearts as well as hands is necessary for the felicity of that state;—that there ought to be a simpathy of soul between them, and a perfect confidence in each other, before the indissoluble knot is tied:—and this, according to my notion, can only be the result of a long acquaintance and accompanied with many proofs of affection on ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood

... the recovery of the property, and to make it difficult for the thief to dispose of it, a description of the stolen jewelry was given out, and summarized as follows: a pearl collar; a diamond bow-knot with pear-shaped pearl pendant; a ring set with two diamonds and a ruby; a ring set with diamond and ruby; a small diamond ring; a solitaire diamond ring; a diamond marquise ring; a ring set with two diamonds crosswise; a diamond ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall

... there, every bowman with his shaft nocked on the string, there was a movement in the line opposite, and presently came from it a little knot of three men, the middle one on horseback, the other two armed with long-handled glaives; all three well muffled up in armour. As they came nearer I could see that the horseman had a tabard over his armour, gaily embroidered with a green tree on a ...
— A Dream of John Ball, A King's Lesson • William Morris

... retreated from their own handiwork, and covenanted with the aristocracy and the throne to grant the king the revision of the constitution in a more monarchical spirit. The deputies who met at Madame Roland's lost heart and dispersed, until, at length, there only remained that small knot of unshaken men who attach themselves to principles regardless of their success, and who are attached to desperate causes with the more fervour in proportion as fortune seems to forsake them. Of this number were Buzot, Petion, ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine

... gone for a walk with Katherine, and Betty was dressing for church, when Eleanor Watson knocked at the door. She looked prettier than ever in her long silk kimono, with its ruffles of soft lace and the great knot of pink ribbon at ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton

... horrible to have to sit down upon the heather and pull on stockings and boots under the critical supervision of twenty-two pairs of eyes. Diana's lace broke, and Wendy's fingers seemed all thumbs. Miss Todd superintended till the last knot had been awkwardly tied, then she gave the signal for marching. Considerably crestfallen, the delinquents dropped towards ...
— A harum-scarum schoolgirl • Angela Brazil

... the O-tabako-bon ('honourable smoking-box' style) the hair is cut to the length of about four inches all round except above the forehead, where it is clipped a little shorter; and on the summit of the head it is allowed to grow longer and is gathered up into a peculiarly shaped knot, which justifies the curious name of the coiffure. As soon as the girl becomes old enough to go to a female public day-school, her hair is dressed in the pretty, simple style called katsurashita, or perhaps ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn

... this battle nearly all of the Persian leaders were slain, and its result spread terror throughout Persia. Halicarnassus was next reduced. The march of Alexander was ever onward. In the citadel of Gordium he cut the "Gordian knot," and prophecy marked him for ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various

... of silk twist, and this I tied squarely to the arm of the chair at a point about six feet from the loose end which I intended to hold. I knotted the silk about the psychic's wrists, drawing it to a hard knot each time, and gave the spool to Miller, while retaining the loose end of the thread in my own hands. The psychic could neither touch the tips of her fingers together nor lift her arms an inch from the chair. She was as secure as if bound ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland

... do salute thee, and again, To make this knot the stronger, Paradise Is there: It may be you are yet in doubt, This third kiss blots it out, I wade in sin, And foolishly intice my self along; Take her away, see her a prisoner In her own chamber ...
— A King, and No King • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... not, I hope, lead you into a belief that I am desirous of breaking off the match. To postpone it is all I have in view; for I shall recommend to the young gentleman, with the warmth that becomes a man of honor, to consider himself as much engaged to your daughter as if the indissoluble knot was tied; and, as the surest means of affecting this, to apply himself closely to his studies, by which he will, in a great measure, avoid those little flirtations with other young ladies, that may, by dividing the attention, contribute not a little ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer

... part in Moscow in a religious meeting which used to take place generally in the week after Easter near the church in the Ohotny Row. A little knot of some twenty men were collected together on the pavement, engaged in serious religious discussion. At the same time there was a kind of concert going on in the buildings of the Court Club in the same street, and a police officer noticing the little group ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy

... Beatrice all its most subtle significance. He does not coldly condemn Beatrice; but by re-combining the elements of her case, he succeeds in magnifying into startling distinctness the whole awful knot of crime and its consequence, which lies inextricably tangled up within it. How different from Shelley's use of the theme! There is certainly nothing in the "Marble Faun" to equal the impassioned expression of wrong, and the piercing outcry against the shallow but awful errors of ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop

... medincin' man an' axed him fer ter 'pint de day. Den medincin' man he sont out runners ter tell ev'b'dy, an' de runners dey kyar'd 'memb'ance-strings wid knots tied all 'long 'em, an' give 'em ter de people fer ter he'p 'em 'member. De folks dey'd cut off a knot f'um de string each day, an' w'en de las' one done cut off, den dey know de day fer de darnse wuz come. An' de medincin' man he sont out hunters, too, fer ter git game, an' mo' runners fer ter kyar' hit ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various

... nothing more to be done. He might, it is true, have seen Ida, and working upon her love and natural inclinations have tried to persuade her to cut the knot by marrying him off-hand. Perhaps he would have succeeded, for in these affairs women are apt to find the arguments advanced by their lovers weighty and well worthy of consideration. But he was not the man to adopt such a course. He did the only thing he could do—answered her letter ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard

... of shapely stone, By foliaged tracery combined; Thou would'st have thought some fairy's hand, Twixt poplars straight, the osier wand, In many a freakish knot, had twined; Then framed a spell, when the work was done, And changed ...
— Scottish Cathedrals and Abbeys • Dugald Butler and Herbert Story

... the whole party made off to Caulde, where the betrothal was solemnised. The next day they rode to Cambremer, and the happy pair were married, "le sieur de Boissey," says the manuscript, "espousa sa fiancee sans bans," and no doubt Brother Nicolle de Garsalle helped to tie the knot. No less than sixteen persons being implicated in the capital charge of abduction which followed, you may imagine how lively the Procession of the Fierte was that year, and the cheers of the populace as Jean de Boissey (begarlanded with roses, as ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook

... speech an hour or so later Fanwell Livingston told the astonished company of the attempted kidnaping and of its failure, and never before had Odd Fellows' Hall rang with such laughter and cheering. And a little knot of sophomores, already bewildered by the appearance of the freshman president on the scene, were more than ever at a loss. They stood under an awning across the street, some twenty or thirty of ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour

... a little nearer, Tom heard the cheery voice more clearly. "It's no easy job moving a house and family. I have to watch my step. Oh, boy, coming down! This tree is tied in a sailor's knot." ...
— Tom Slade on Mystery Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... Sunday bombazine, puffed and flounced, her gingham apron so clean, her head "did up" with the flashiest bandana in her wardrobe; it's just the colour for her taste-real yellow, red, and blue, tied with that knot which is the height of plantation toilet: there is as little restraint in her familiarity with the gentry of the mansion as there is in her control over the denizens of the kitchen. Even Dandy and Enoch, dressed in their best black coats, ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... assistance. They pursued Cullingworth; but he, as active and as fit as a greyhound, outraced them all, and vanished into the darkness, down the long, straight street. The pursuers had stopped, and were gathered in a knot talking the matter over, when, looking up, they saw, to their amazement, the man whom they were after, running at the top of his speed in their direction. His little peculiarity had asserted itself, you see, and he had unconsciously turned in his flight. They ...
— The Stark Munro Letters • J. Stark Munro

... that you could have walked about on them; while another testified that he could not have shoved a walking stick between them anywhere. White men could not have supported it for an hour, but these blacks and Egyptians had a hundred miles to go, and the steamers could not make more than a knot an hour against the rapid stream, now swollen to ...
— With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman • G. A. Henty

... quarter for helping with the ironing, too, so that's thirty-five that I've got." Lou exhibited a hard knot tied in the corner of her handkerchief. "I couldn't get all of the egg out of my hat, but it's good enough. Where do we ...
— Anything Once • Douglas Grant

... knuckles. Multiply the quotient by the off-wheel-rein, and add the near leader's blinkers to the result. Then pass your left thumb under your right middle finger, taking care at the same time to tie the off-leading-rein round your neck in a sailor's knot. Add six yards of whipcord to the near leader's shoulders, subtract yourself from the box, and send us your doctor's bill, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 22, 1893 • Various

... coat, cut square across the front and long behind, of a soft shade between a pale-green and a pearl-gray; a waistcoat of buff plush, with eighteen mother-of-pearl buttons; an immense white cravat of the finest cambric; light trousers of white cashmere, decorated with a knot of ribbon where they buttoned above the calves, and pearl-gray silk stockings, striped transversely with the same green as the coat, and delicate pumps with diamond buckles. The inevitable eye-glass was not forgotten. As for the hat, it was precisely ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas

... true; but as Amy said she was mad, so nothing she could do could be otherwise. For if Amy had found her at Redriff, she (the girl) would have concluded presently that the Quaker had given her notice, and so that we were all of a knot; and that, in short, all she had said was right. But as it happened, things came to hit better than we expected; for that Amy going out of a coach to take water at Tower Wharf, meets the girl just come on shore, having crossed ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe

... in the church of Berwick St. James, Wilts, until a few years ago, and now in the British Museum, dates from the beginning of the thirteenth century. Its bowl is broad and shallow, the stem and knot (by which the vessel was held) and foot being plain and circular. Then the makers (from 1250 to 1275) fashioned the stem and knot separately from the bowl and foot, and shaped them polygonally. During the remaining years of the ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield

... Scouting are similar to those of the schools, the church and the home, its methods are less direct and success depends upon the attraction which the program has for the girls. Belonging to an organization, the uniform, such novel activities as knot-tying, hiking, signalling and drilling, the chance for leadership, the laws to which they voluntarily subscribe and the recognition of ability by the system of giving badges are the distinctive elements of Scouting. They succeed in bringing about improved health, approved standards of behavior towards ...
— The Girl Scouts Their History and Practice • Anonymous

... late, as she had that day began her half-yearly wash. Limping more than ever in her haste and hustling the benches, she went down the church to ring the Angelus. The bare, worn bell-rope dangled from the ceiling near the confessional, and ended in a big knot greasy from handling. Again and again, with regular jumps, she hung herself upon it; and then let her whole bulky figure go with it, whirling in her petticoats, her cap awry, and her blood rushing ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola

... far as that goes, this man has a right to judge for himself. He saved your life an' your outfit an' your daughter, an' I don't reckon you're goin' to tie him into a knot so as a doctor can go pokin' around in him ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason

... wildfire through the villages of the Sagra of Toledo, and wherever my people and myself directed our course we found the inhabitants disposed to receive our merchandize; it was even called for where not exhibited. One night as I was bathing myself and horse in the Tagus, a knot of people gathered on the bank, crying, "Come out of the water, Englishman, and give us books; we have got our money in our hands." The poor creatures then held out their hands, filled with cuartos, a copper coin of the value of the farthing, but unfortunately ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow

... came the family were promptly at the 60th street gate at nine o'clock. Johnny espied Louis with his eye over a knot hole that seemed designed by providence to let the hungry outsiders have a morsel of the Midway Plaisance scenery. Inside of the grounds Johnny determinedly led the way at once to the great Ferris go-round. They stood before it measuring ...
— The Adventures of Uncle Jeremiah and Family at the Great Fair - Their Observations and Triumphs • Charles McCellan Stevens (AKA 'Quondam')

... propellers are driven by electricity, which is generated by engines fed with fuel oil. The speed attained is 35 knots an hour, which means the same speed as a train traveling at the rate of 40 miles an hour, since the sea mile, or knot, is longer than the ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller

... more like myself now," exclaimed Brown, as he put on his shirt and jacket, and tied his black handkerchief in a lover's knot round his throat. ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston

... went down, to return in two or three minutes with a small coil of thin, thoroughly trustworthy new rope, and a hammer and some strong nails; and as soon as the lantern and trap-door were secured, he began to knot ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn

... where I lead. Grunne, pick up your bow and arrows; Bechunach, knot your ladder of cords. Follow me, both of you. Leave Chluas sleeping: he is not in his body; his spirit goes with us, and ...
— Edmund Dulac's Fairy-Book - Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations • Edmund Dulac

... Royalist Conspiracy, and that some examples of severity might make the present upheaving the last of the kind, Cromwell had resolved on a few such examples. His information, through Thurloe and otherwise, was unerring. He knew, and had known for some time, who were the members of the so-called "Sealed Knot," i.e. that secret association of select Royalists resident in England who were in closest correspondence with Hyde and the other Councillors of Charles abroad, and were chiefly trusted by them for the management of the cause at home, Indeed, Sir Richard Willis, ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson

... find new modes of warfare; yea, design Carriages to transport their infantry!].— Once on the English soil I hold it firm, Descend on London, and the while my men Salute the dome of Paul's I cut the knot Of all Pitt's coalitions; setting free From bondage to a cold manorial caste A ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy

... extensive handkerchief from his pocket. He folded it into a manner of bandage and soused water from the other canteen upon the middle of it. This crude arrangement he bound over the youth's head, tying the ends in a queer knot at the back ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane

... a general hubbub as two men appeared over the hill leading between them a woman about fifty-five years of age. She was a strong, thin-visaged woman, whose cheek had been bronzed by sun and weather. She was bareheaded, and her hair was gathered in a knot at the back. Her gown, of a thick woollen stuff, fit closely to her person, as if it had been made on purpose for the punishment she had been adjudged to receive. She was talking in a loud voice and gesticulating angrily with her head, ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick

... say the right thing to them we are all done for,' said the Russian at my elbow. The knot of men with the stretcher had stopped too, half-way to the steamer, as if petrified. I saw the man on the stretcher sit up, lank and with an uplifted arm, above the shoulders of the bearers. 'Let us hope that the man who can talk so well of love in general will find ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad

... great and simple "I love." When I came close to Aniela, I noticed that her eyes were brilliant as if from recent slumber; that on her face and the light print dress fell the golden rays of the morning sun filtering through the young leaves; her hair was tied in a loose knot, and the flowing morning dress showed the outline of her shoulders and supple waist, and in its very carelessness had a certain freshness, which enhanced a thousandfold her charm. It did not escape my notice how much smaller than usual she looked among the tall elm trees of the avenue,—almost ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... is, that all the "small stuffs'' which are used on board a ship— such as spun-yarn, marline, seizing-stuff, &c., &c.— are made on board. The owners of a vessel buy up incredible quantities of "old junk,'' which the sailors unlay, and, after drawing out the yarns, knot them together, and roll them up in balls. These "rope-yarns'' are constantly used for various purposes, but the greater part is manufactured into spun-yarn. For this purpose, every vessel is furnished with a "spun-yarn ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana

... man and wife," the words ran. Then the minister hastened on into his little homily upon the marriage state. But the woman's thought rested at those fateful words,—"man and wife,"—the knot of the contract. There should fall a new light in her heart that would make her know they were really one, having now been joined as the book said "in holy wedlock." From this sacramental union of persons there should issue to ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)

... about him, chiefly from among his more special students, a staff of assistants who were familiar with his plans and shared his enthusiasm. To these young friends he was warmly attached. It would be impossible to name them all, but the knot of younger men who were for years his daily associates in scientific work, whose sympathy and cooperation he so much valued, and who are now in their turn growing old in the service of science, will ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz

... came out, and a crowd collected around the tavern, although the air was chill and the muck deep in the street. Stephen caught glimpses of Mr. Lincoln towering above the knots of country politicians who surrounded him, and every once in a while a knot would double up with laughter. There was no sign that the senatorial aspirant took the situation seriously; that the coming struggle with his skilful antagonist was weighing him down in the least. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... ribbon tied to its tail. One, the Northern Fish, lies just below [b] Andromedae,—the other, represented by the circlet, is just below Pegasus. The ribbons, represented by streams of faint stars, from a "V" with elongated sides, and terminate in the star Al Rischa, The Knot. ...
— A Field Book of the Stars • William Tyler Olcott

... mere postscript to the letter I have just sent away. By a few minutes too late, comes what I have all day been waiting for, ... and besides (now it is just too late!) now I may have a skein of silk if I please, to make that knot with, ... for want of which, two locks meant for you, have been devoted to the infernal gods already ... fallen into a tangle and thrown into the fire ... and all the hair of my head might have followed, for I was losing my patience and temper fast, ... and the ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

... with an apparent intention of pushing for a point of land at some distance from the hounds, who were still barking and howling on the shore. Edwards caught the painter of his skiff, and, making a noose, cast it from him with all his force, and luckily succeeded in drawing its knot close around one of ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper

... There was once a nest in a hollow: Down in the mosses and knot-grass pressed, Soft and warm and full to the brim— Vetches leaned over it purple, and dim, With buttercup ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various

... observe that I have, with this gentleman's permission, broken his watch, burnt his collar, smashed his spectacles, and danced on his hat. If he will give me the further permission to paint green stripes on his overcoat, or to tie his suspenders in a knot, I shall be delighted to entertain you. If not, the performance is ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock

... either side of the path we continually passed pieces of rubber vine cut into lengths of some two feet or so, and on the top one or two leaves plaited together, or a piece of bush rope tied into a knot, which indicated whose ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley

... way about the victuals, and the clerk called in a second witness who wouldn't be likely to gossip about it, and soon the knot was tied, and the bride looked smiling and calm forthwith, and Andrey limper ...
— Life's Little Ironies - A set of tales with some colloquial sketches entitled A Few Crusted Characters • Thomas Hardy

... had let a wretched paragraph in a newspaper inflame her wounded vanity, so that she gave her promise to Henry there and then—putting the rope round her neck with her own hands. And afterwards, instead of being brave and true, wounded vanity again had caused her to tighten the knot. She remembered Henry's words when he had implored her to tell him what were the actual wishes of her heart—and how she had cut off all retreat by her answer. She remembered all his goodness to her and how she had accepted ...
— The Man and the Moment • Elinor Glyn

... which, bating large sandy tracts, agriculture employs a large class, and cereals, tobacco, and beetroot are raised; (2) the mountainous district, in the interior of which the Fichtelgebirge is the central knot, in which vast forests abound, and rich deposits of coal, fire-clays, iron, and other metals are worked, giving rise to iron-works and potteries; (3) the basin of the Rhine, on the W., where the vine is largely cultivated, ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... "And 'twere not to save my only son, I could not let thee take such peril. Cross thou to France, I charge thee, and take this favor to my husband. Tell him, because thou wouldst do knightly service for me and mine, I give it thee. Thou wilt not go unrewarded." And she held out a knot of blue ribbon. ...
— A Boy's Ride • Gulielma Zollinger

... days Cicely and Miriam cut and stitched and fitted and took in and let out, and one morning Miriam came down to breakfast attired in the pink chintz gown, its skirt touching the floor, and with her long brown hair tastefully done up in a knot upon ...
— The Girl at Cobhurst • Frank Richard Stockton

... love, himself foregoing, With such delight, such savour, and so well, That both to one sole end their wills combine; If thousands of these thoughts all thought outgoing Fail the least part of their firm love to tell; Say, can mere angry spite this knot untwine? ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds

... and the poor, the prince and the artisan, sit down at the same kind of modest little green-painted tables, with rush-bottomed chairs, all kind, affable, and jovial—all respecting each other. The child of the citizen comes up without restraint, and plays with the sword-knot of the commander-in-chief; and the little princess will naively offer her bunch of grapes to the peasant who sits at the next table with his pipe and his tall glass of Bavarian beer. And yet the truest decorum is observed. There is no noise, no rioting, no intoxication; ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 446 - Volume 18, New Series, July 17, 1852 • Various

... armour; in a knot himself he ties, With his grizzly head appearing in the centre of his thighs, Till the petrified spectator asks, in paralysed alarm, Where may be the warrior's body,—which is leg, and which ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun

... to gather round the bruised mouth, dripping from the teeth only half closed by the leather strap; a drop of blood showed red near the corner, cut by the cruel knot, sweat poured from the silky coat as again and again she vainly tried to scramble to her feet, whilst the eyes of her master, ablaze with hate, watched her ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest

... to mention," Sudden drawled, blowing smoke with maddening placidity under the tirade. "It's none of my business how you hook up with that tramp flyer out there—but you understand, of course, that flying machine is tied up in a hard knot by this note. I couldn't accept any division of interest in it, you know. You have given it as security, affirming it to be your own property. So whatever kind of deal you make with him or any one else, the flying machine must be kept clear. Selling it or borrowing ...
— The Thunder Bird • B. M. Bower

... He entered a waiting room, and to his surprise everything seemed familiar to him. As he says: "I seemed to recognize every object. I said to myself, what is this? I have never been here before, and yet I have seen all this, and if so, there is a very peculiar knot in that shutter." He then crossed the room, and opened the shutter, and after examination he saw the identical peculiar knot that he had felt sure was there. Pythagoras is said to have distinctly remembered a number of his previous incarnations, and at one time pointed out ...
— Reincarnation and the Law of Karma - A Study of the Old-New World-Doctrine of Rebirth, and Spiritual Cause and Effect • William Walker Atkinson

... long as you don't make too much noise, and keep out of reach of his tail, you're all right. If you slip up, you want to jump out of the way about as lively as you know how. But he'll never come after you, or mighty seldom. If you get a slip-knot over his snout, and can throw a half-hitch over his tail, why, the biggest of them is easy enough ...
— The Boy With the U.S. Census • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... the road gates, I looked at the house many times, from window to window, everywhere. Not a glimpse of her until I was almost at the road again. Then I saw her back—the graceful white dress, the knot of blue-black hair, the big white hat, and she directing her workmen with her ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips

... a case of love at first sight," said Wade, scornfully and sleepily. "Pshaw, Kitty, you're barking at a knot. Casey's a fine chap, but Lord! she's got too much money for him. Suppose she did give him a rose! Didn't she call you over to chaperon the transaction? That puts the sentimental ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm

... Audrey Ross solved the Gordian knot of family difficulty, leaving her mother and sister eyeing each other with the aghast looks of defeated conspirators; and it must be owned that many a tangled skein, that would have been patiently and laboriously unravelled by the skilled fingers of Geraldine, was spoilt in this manner by the ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... for us now is to keep her as nearly stationary as we can," said the captain. "Between wind and water, I hope not to move half a knot all night." ...
— Left on Labrador - or, The cruise of the Schooner-yacht 'Curlew.' as Recorded by 'Wash.' • Charles Asbury Stephens

... I found a bird's nest consisting of live leaves sewn together with threads of the spider's web. Nothing could exceed the airiness of this pretty contrivance; the threads had been pushed through small punctures and thickened to resemble a knot. I unfortunately lost it. This was the second nest I had seen resembling that of the ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone

... Ferguson came across the garden, and entered the back door after her, with a knot of choice roses in her hand, and a plate of seed-cakes covered with a hem-stitched napkin. The Fergusons and the Seymours occupied adjoining houses, and were on footing of the most perfect undress intimacy. They crossed each other's gardens, and came without knocking into each other's ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... white plume its floating foliage spread; That from the rampart, thro the troubled air, These eyes may trace thee toiling in the war. She fixt the feather on his crest above, Bound with the mystic knot, the knot of love; He parted silent, but in silent prayer Bade Love and Hymen guard ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow

... bistre stain A century's showery torrents wash in vain; Its starving orchard, where the thistle blows And mossy trunks still mark the broken rows; Its chimney-loving poplar, oftenest seen Next an old roof, or where a roof has been; Its knot-grass, plantain,—all the social weeds, Man's mute companions, following where he leads; Its dwarfed, pale flowers, that show their straggling heads, Sown by the wind from grass-choked garden-beds; Its woodbine, creeping where ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... over the back of the chair, and stuffed a hard bit of roaster-cake under the knot of the bundle, and then his preparations were completed. The German stood contemplating them with much satisfaction. He had almost forgotten his sorrow at leaving in his pleasure at preparing. Suddenly he started; an expression of ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner

... {354} same or a different kind, and separate it from the Nerve of the Eighth pair, and lay it bare above an inch. Then make a strong Ligature on the upper part of the Arterie, not to be untied again: but an inch below, videl. towards the Heart, make another Ligature of a running knot, which may be loosen'd or fastned as there shall be occasion. Having made these two knots, draw two threds under the Artery between the Ligatures; and then open the Artery, and put in a Quil, and tie the Artery upon the ...
— Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society - Vol 1 - 1666 • Various

... her seat, patted Agnes Anne on the top-knot of her hair, shook hands with John MacAlpine, nodded meaningly at my mother, and said, "Come along, young lass," in a tone which showed that the aged shepherdess had unexpectedly found a lamb whom she ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... crew of the schooner, seven all told, drew up in a little knot as the skipper, in his shore-going clothes, appeared on deck, and regarded him with an air ...
— Many Cargoes • W.W. Jacobs

... from the Greek [Greek: tulos], a swelling, pad, or knot, and [Greek: pous], a foot, is applied to the camels and llamas, whose feet are composed of toes protected by cushion-like soles, and not by a horny covering like those of the Artiodactyli generally. The foot of the camel consists of two toes tipped ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale

... him. With your strong beak, break the knot which holds him tied, take him down, and lay him softly on the grass at the foot ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini

... orthodox teaching with which we had been inoculated,—to the effect that matrimony was a moral trial, a shaking-down process. But moral trials were ceasing to appeal to people, and more and more of them were refusing to be shaken down. We didn't cut the Gordian knot, but we managed to loosen ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... saved her! But she's DEAD! and I Out of my sight; out of my way!" And with his hands clenched, his brows knit, and his head uncovered, Houseman sallied forth from the door, and Walter recognized the traveller of the preceding night. He stopped abruptly as he saw the little knot without, and scowled round at each of them with a malignant and ferocious aspect. "Very well, it's very well, neighbors!" said he at length, with a fierce laugh; "this is kind! You have come to welcome Richard Houseman home, have ye? Good, good! Not to gloat at his distress? Lord, no! ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... other. Being brought uniformly before unjust tribunals—that is, tribunals corrupted and bribed by their own vanity—it is not wonderful that this great question should have been stifled and overlaid with peremptory decrees, dogmatically cutting the knot rather than skilfully untying it, as often as it has been moved afresh, and put upon the roll for a re-hearing. It is no mystery to those who are in the secret, and who can lay A and B together, why it should have happened that the most interesting of all literary ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey

... very small bead P; the bead having sufficient friction with the thread to retain any position when acted on only by its own weight, but sliding easily along the thread when moved by the hand. At the back of the card the thread terminates in a knot to hinder it from being drawn through; or better, because giving more friction and a better hold, it passes through the centre of a small disk of card—a fraction of an inch in diameter—and, by a knot, is made fast at the back of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 3 - "Destructors" to "Diameter" • Various

... his affable host's secret animosity and was stimulated by it, or for another reason, suddenly blossomed into an entertainer. When her father was present he addressed Colina's ear, her chin or her golden top-knot, never her eyes. ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner

... By the time we were abreast of the passage, the George Noble had every stitch of her canvas on her, and was fairly "humming" along at nearly thirteen knots over the smooth water, and then when she spun into the narrow passage through which a seven-knot current was tearing, her speed became terrific, and I held my breath. The second mate and boatswain were at the wheel, and the crew were standing by the braces. The silence on board was almost painful, for the terrible roar of the current as it tore along the coral walls ...
— "Pig-Headed" Sailor Men - From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other - Stories" - 1902 • Louis Becke

... took further steps towards completing his disguise by making radical and painful changes in his dress. He bought ready-made French clothes, he put on a pair of square kid boots with elastic sides and patent leather tips, he wore a soft silk cravat artificially tied in a bow knot with wide and floating ends, and he purchased a French silk hat with a broad and curving brim. Having satisfied himself that the effect was good, he laid in a stock of similar articles, and further adorned ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford

... and stretched himself out on his back, "I shan't be sorry when we get to the big river you speak of. Walking is very pleasant exercise, especially when one hasn't half a hundredweight of traps and provisions to carry; but it's very slow work you'll allow. I like to spank along with a ten-knot breeze across the open ocean, with studden-sails alow and aloft; or to glide down a river with a strong current and fair breeze. Ah, mate, if you ever come to sea with me in a smart craft, you'll know what moving ...
— Manco, the Peruvian Chief - An Englishman's Adventures in the Country of the Incas • W.H.G. Kingston

... beauty of the company. A few touches of Mrs. Sandford's skilful hands transformed her appearance wonderfully. She put on an old-fashioned straight gown, which hung in limp folds around her; and Mrs. Sandford arranged a white handkerchief over her breast, tying it in the very same careless loose knot represented in the picture; but her management of Frederica's hair was the best thing. Its soft fair luxuriance was, no one could tell how, made to assume the half dressed, half undressed air of ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 2 • Susan Warner

... when every tie held fast, every button was slippery, and the tighter garments fitted like skins. Kate was subdued and frightened; she gave no trouble, but all the help she gave was to pull a string so as to make a hopeless knot of the bow that her friend ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge

... hour. They then disappeared into the wood as suddenly as they had come forth. When they reappeared, it was to invite Smith to their habitations, where they danced around him again, singing, "Love you not me? Love you not me?" They then feasted him richly, and, lastly, with pine-knot torches lighted him to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various

... not gotten all of his regiments together up to this time. The Second, Seventh, and Eighth were around Charleston, while the Third was at Lightwood Knot Spring, four miles from Columbia. This camp was called "Camp Williams," in honor of their Colonel. That in Columbia was called "Camp Ruffin," in honor of General Ruffin. It was customary to give all the different camps a name during the first year's service, ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert

... flag-staff which mark all the Hudson Bay Co.'s posts in Labrador, came in sight, snugly nestled in a little cove, beneath a high ridge lying just to the north-west of it, and soon we were at anchor. Our intention was to get into the cove, but the six knot current swept us by the mouth before the failing breeze enabled us to ...
— Bowdoin Boys in Labrador • Jonathan Prince (Jr.) Cilley

... was only a short distance to the Indian village of Gold Harbor, where, the following day, I landed and spread out my blankets to dry on the beach. Among the Indians squatting in front of their houses, I noticed one whose hair was tied up in a knot on the back of his head, the size of a large hornets' nest, of which it reminded me. Approaching nearer, his face was seen to be marked with small pox, a piece was missing from his nose, and altogether he presented a more remarkable than attractive appearance. I found him, however, ...
— Official report of the exploration of the Queen Charlotte Islands - for the government of British Columbia • Newton H. Chittenden

... it amusing. She snatched the toy away and began playing with it herself. The lash, at its free end, chanced to be slit almost to the tip, forming a loop. The butt of the handle was formed by a jagged knot, where it had been broken from the parent stem. Idly but firmly, with her strong hands she bent the stick, and slipped the loop over the jagged knot, where ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts

... his lapel. His shoes were of patent leather, his cutaway coat was of very rough black cheviot, his double-breasted waistcoat of tan covered cloth with buttons of smoked pearl. An Ascot scarf—a great puff of heavy black silk—was at his neck, the knot transfixed by a tiny golden pin set off with an ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris

... of sitting down to write to you, as I had intended, I mounted my pony and took a long ride to collect my thoughts. Sitting, walking, or riding is all the same. I feel as much puzzled as ever, and undetermined whether or not to cut the Gordian knot. Except my wife, there is not a friend whom I dare advise with. I have not once ventured to mention the business at all to my brother, on account of the cursed mysteries and injunctions of secrecy connected ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles

... says. That's why men can vote and we can't. That's why they get everything, and we get nothing but our board and clothes. We've humoured and pampered them until they have no sense of us and our needs," she concluded, twisting her hair angrily into a tight knot on the ...
— The Co-Citizens • Corra Harris

... all, but the only one he thought he understood was Peggy, and her he usually misunderstood, because she was so much like him. But he was fair to them all—dangerously fair—except when his subcutaneous conscience reproached him with not doing his duty; then he would cut the knot of family interference with some tremendous stroke of paternal decision unalterable as a law of ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo

... carried it out, and tied it upon the mill-steps. It was no easy matter to fasten it so as to make it look at all like a man naturally mounting stairs. The more difficult it was, however, the more they all became interested in the business. Mildred brought straw, and Ailwin tied a knot here, and another knot there, while Oliver cocked the hat in various directions upon the head, till they all forgot what they were dressing up the figure for. The reason popped into Ailwin's head again, when she had succeeded ...
— The Settlers at Home • Harriet Martineau

... quandary he stared at the trembling, shining giant, who stood with his head high and his tail flaunting, and all the fierce pride of victory in his eye. One knot of people had gathered over the fallen Hal Dunbar, but some remained, dazed and gaping, looking at the form of the conqueror. A wild temptation came to Bull to test the horse even in this crisis of excitement, with every evil passion roused in him. He stepped out again, ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand

... stepmother; on the contrary, Madame de Nailles discussed her projects quietly, affecting to consider them merely temporary, but with no indication of dissatisfaction or resistance. In truth she was not sorry that Jacqueline, whose companionship became more and more embarrassing every day, had cut the knot of a difficult position by a piece of wilfulness and perversity which seemed to put her in the wrong. The necessity she would have been under of crushing such a girl, who was now eighteen, would have been distasteful and unprofitable; she was very glad to get rid of her stepdaughter, ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon

... on her hands that her only resource would be to muse on the absent one and fret. Nay, if he persisted in so false a pride, I told him, fairly, that I should urge my father to leave the Tower. These representations succeeded; and hospitality had commenced in the old hall, and a knot of gossips had centred round my mother, groups of laughing children had relaxed the still brow of Blanche, and the Captain himself was a more cheerful and social man. My next point was to engage my father in the completion of the Great Book. "Ah! sir," said I, "give me ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... wore her riviere of diamonds, dripping, dancing, flashing like water that was perpetually flowing, and yet, by some enchantment, arrested in its flow in glorious suspension. Set in the middle of the enchanted water was such a breast-knot of rare, exquisite, uncannily grotesque orchids as no queen or princess had ever been seen to wear in St. Ambrose's. Indeed, it might have ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler

... was being made, Nicholas I. learned that the officers entrusted with the task—and the Minister of Ways and Roads in the number—were being influenced more by personal than technical considerations, and he determined to cut the Gordian knot in true Imperial style. When the Minister laid before him the map with the intention of explaining the proposed route, he took a ruler, drew a straight line from the one terminus to the other, and remarked in a tone that precluded all discussion, "You will ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace

... was that each applicant should pass an examination in seamanship before a committee of the finest sailors in the world. They had to know how to put a clew into a square and fore-and-aft sail, to turn up a shroud, to make every conceivable knot and splice, to graft a bucket-rope, and to fit a mast cover. The examination was no sham. I remember one poor fellow, who had served five years, was refused membership because he had failed to comply with some of the rules. ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman

... old man entered, leaning on the arm of an indescribably beautiful woman. Not thirty yet, tall and nobly molded, with straight black brows over magnificent eyes; rippling dark hair gathered up in a great knot, and ornamented with a single band of gold. A sweeping dress of wine-colored velvet, set off with a dazzling neck and arms decorated like her stately head with ornaments of Roman gold. At the first glance she seemed ...
— The Abbot's Ghost, Or Maurice Treherne's Temptation • A. M. Barnard

... though I was afraid of her at first. But the grown people have each other and since I don't really belong to them—oh, I can't explain it," and the knot came back to her brow. "You see when you're bound-out and going away for a while they can't feel the same to you. They're never real cross and they don't whip you as they did at the Home, and you have nicer things to eat. Sometimes when you were awful hungry ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas

... after lacing his shoes, adjusted a contrivance resembling a black beetle on the knot to prevent its untying. He also wore “hygienic suspenders,” a discovery of great importance (over three thousand patents have been taken out for this one necessity of the toilet!). This brace performs several tasks at the same time, such ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory

... Alpine heights and the measureless width of his big shirt-collars, and the broad expanse of his shirt-front. But this tie—though it marks a pleasant and becoming individuality of dress—loses half its effect by nearly always getting out of its place; when night is advanced, the knot is always about half across Mr. Gladstone's neck. On the other hand, he is nearly always very carefully dressed; his black frock-coat—a little ancient in make, and always of the smooth black, which has given way with younger men ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor

... the winning Of a kiss at love's beginning, When two mutual hearts are sighing For the knot there's no untying! ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various

... a small-minded man, and ensconced himself behind the bulwark of reticence and inaccessibility. There could hardly have been a more unfit instrument for that dexterous manipulation which the tangled knot of Irish politics required than this narrow, pedantic, tactless peer. The Chancellor soon saw that endless petty bickering would be the result of continuing him in the post. His petty pride was offended ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... along the same valley that we had entered yesterday. The deep bed of a stream, then containing a chain of ponds only, pursued a meandering course through it. We saw in this valley a pair of cockatoos with the scarlet and yellow top-knot. (Plate 23.) We had not been long encamped when intelligence was brought me by Piper that a party of natives were following our track, and soon after, Burnett and he having gone out to encourage them to come up, seven, including an old man ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell

... desert sun rolled upward and onward, blazing down on the huddled adobes, and slowly filtering into the room. With his back to the bar, Pete idly flicked bits of a broken match at a knot-hole in the floor. Tired of that, he rolled a cigarette with one hand, and swiftly. Pete's hands were compact, of medium size, with the finger joints lightly defined—the hands of a conjuror—or, as The Spider thought, of a born gunman. ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs

... bald; his face is rather thin, and his neck is long. He has taken great interest in me and, being a teacher, has tried to teach me. Although I hope to perfect myself in navigation, my knowledge so far consists only of knot and splice seamanship, and I need to master the ...
— A Negro Explorer at the North Pole • Matthew A. Henson

... shooting duck in the marshes below Bowshott, where Peter had given her leave to shoot when she liked; and she came towards the house now, a miniature gun over her shoulder, and clad in a brown shooting dress, with a knot of her ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan

... cheerily and confidently, the next moment in a plaintive and far-away manner. He would half open his wings, and twinkle them caressingly as if beckoning his mate to his heart. One morning she had come, but was shy and reserved. The fond male flew to a knot-hole in an old apple-tree and coaxed her to his side. I heard a fine confidential warble—the old, old story. But the female flew to a near tree and uttered her plaintive, homesick note. The male went and got some dry grass or bark ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various

... is Prince Charlie, Aunt Clara's boy. She has but one, so he is an extra good one. This old fellow is Mac, the bookworm, called Worm for short. This sweet creature is Steve the Dandy. Look at his gloves and top-knot, if you please. They are Aunt Jane's lads, and a precious pair you'd better believe. These are the Brats, my brothers, Geordie and Will, and Jamie the Baby. Now, my men, step out ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott

... heavy, and snow-white, swept downward over the indigo flesh and was gathered into a knot on his massive chest. It was the beard of a prophet or a seer, and when Kahauiti rose to his full height, six feet and a half, he was as majestic as a man in diadem and royal robes. He had a giant form, like one of Buonarroti's ancients, muscular ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien

... says, "On many occasions, where a noun of multitude is used, it is very difficult to decide, whether the verb should be in the singular, or in the plural number; and this difficulty has induced some grammarians to cut the knot at once, and to assert that every noun of multitude must always be considered as conveying the idea of unity."—Octavo Gram., p. 153. What these occasions, or who these grammarians, are, I know not; but it is certain that the difficulty ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... thy consort's crown, New set in heaven, and Pentheus' hall With ruthless ruin thundering down, And proud Lycurgus' funeral. Thou turn'st the rivers, thou the sea; Thou, on far summits, moist with wine, Thy Bacchants' tresses harmlessly Dost knot with living serpent-twine. Thou, when the giants, threatening wrack, Were clambering up Jove's citadel, Didst hurl o'erweening Rhoetus back, In tooth and claw a lion fell. Who knew thy feats in dance and play Deem'd ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace

... had retired, curiosity overcame the influence of the drug, and the Artist got up, determined to find out the cause of the strange apparitions which had so alarmed them all. In a short time he discovered a diagonal knot-hole in one of the window-shutters, and upon placing his hand over it, the visionary paintings on the roof disappeared. This confirmed him in an opinion that he began to form, that there must be some simple natural cause for what he had seen; and, having thus ascertained the ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt

... pillar-punishment, [1] Not this alone I bore: but while I lived In the white convent down the valley there, For many weeks about my loins I wore The rope that haled the buckets from the well, Twisted as tight as I could knot the noose; And spake not of it to a single soul, Until the ulcer, eating thro' my skin, Betray'd my secret penance, so that all My brethren marvell'd greatly. More than this I bore, whereof, O God, thou knowest ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson

... of two nations are so opposed on a particular question as to admit of no possible compromise, the sword may be required to cut the knot which reason ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson

... Andy through thick an' thin. But they ain't everybody feelin' that way, understand? If Andy he's a-goin' to turn on us and be chummy with that crowd, we ain't expectin' to stand it, see?" declared Pet, still struggling with the obstreperous knot. ...
— The Outdoor Chums - The First Tour of the Rod, Gun and Camera Club • Captain Quincy Allen

... repulsion. She had to think back, to remember that he had killed men, in order to realise her own danger. Now, for instance, he merely forced her back to the campfire, pulled the saddle strings from his pocket and tied her feet together, using a complicated knot which he told her she might work on all she darn pleased, for all he cared. Then he went calmly to ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower

... with a hypothesis, no matter how much one distrusts it; so I started with man as a mechanism, this being the strand of the knot that I could then pick at most easily. Having worked upon it a certain time, I drew the inference about machines becoming animate, and in 1862 or 1863 wrote the sketch of the chapter on machines which I afterwards rewrote in "Erewhon." This sketch appeared in the Press, Canterbury, ...
— Unconscious Memory • Samuel Butler









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