"Alert" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the Channel shore for fifteen miles. All the Friday night "the mayor, with the aldermen, and twenty of the council, had kept privy watch," and searched suspicious houses at Master Wilkyns's instance; the whole population were on the alert, and when the next afternoon, a week after his escape, the poor heretic, footsore and weary, dragged himself into the town, he found that he had walked into the lion's mouth.[524] He quickly learnt this danger to which he was ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... rumor of the poor fisher folk who worked the southern fringe areas. What else could you expect from such types, who had never even learned to read in a thousand cycles. Nevertheless, as he patrolled the sunken rocks, he was alert, scanning the water on all sides constantly for the great shape he sought, his skin alert for the first strange vibration. By neglecting the broken bottom, brown with laminaria and kelp, he missed the great, ...
— Join Our Gang? • Sterling E. Lanier
... by the warmth began to bleat, and the sound entered Gabriel's ears and brain with an instant meaning, as expected sounds will. Passing from the profoundest sleep to the most alert wakefulness with the same ease that had accompanied the reverse operation, he looked at his watch, found that the hour-hand had shifted again, put on his hat, took the lamb in his arms, and carried it into the darkness. ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... history, it is impossible to survey the rapid energy of Napoleon—his alert transitions from enemy to enemy, his fearless assaults on vastly superior numbers, his unwearied resolution, and exhaustless invention—without the highest admiration which can attend on a master of warfare. But it is equally impossible to suppress astonishment and indignation in following, ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... in swimming- baths to make diving automatic, and beneath each cage was a hole a foot in diameter. The spectators and participants crowded outside the enclosure, and the thing was to throw balls, which were hired for the purpose, into the holes. Nothing could exceed the alert and eager interest taken by the little pigs in the efforts of the ball-throwers. They quivered on their little legs; they pressed their little noses against the bars of the cages; their little eyes sparkled; their tails ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, August 4th, 1920 • Various
... lasted thirty-eight years, namely, till 1837, that she cost for hull, spars, sails, and rigging, when ready to receive her armament and stores, but $75,473.59, and that under the gallant Porter, in the War of 1812, she captured the British corvette Alert, of twenty guns, a transport with one hundred and ninety-seven troops for Canada, and twenty-three other prizes, valued at two millions of dollars; she also broke up the British whale-fishing in the Pacific; and when finally captured at Valparaiso ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... every street corner." "Thus," she would conclude, "are our necessities supplied. For luxuries we have the sun in sheltered cloisters, the rain to cleanse the ways in which we walk, the splendours of the church to feast our eyes, the chances and changes of the streets and taverns to keep our minds alert. No, no, Don Francis," quoth she, "let them sweat and grow thin who must. We ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... attorney, and Harry Stevens, whose father was a well-known automobile manufacturer, were the other members of the group. These latter two were members of the Black Bear Patrol of New York. All the lads appeared to be about eighteen years old. Their tidy uniforms, their well-knit frames and their alert attitudes bespoke the ...
— Boy Scouts in the North Sea - The Mystery of a Sub • G. Harvey Ralphson
... looked hesitatingly at Tania, who had been listening with alert ears. The child's black eyes took on a look of lively terror. "Please, please let me stay," she begged, clasping her thin little hands in ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... behaved charmingly, eating his dinner with enjoyment, looking interestedly from one face to the other, sympathetic, alert, and amused. But Margaret writhed in spirit at what he ...
— Mother • Kathleen Norris
... this time disappeared, and Somerset walked on to his rooms at the Lord-Quantock-Arms, where he remained till he had dined, picturing the discomfiture of his alert rival when there should enter to him as Princess, not Paula Power, but Miss Bell of the Regent's Theatre, London. Thus the hour passed, till he found that if he meant to see the issue of the plot it was time to ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... gauged as dyspeptic or eupeptic, friend or foe. On the march, Javert was on the alert, snuffing up the air, until some savory odor crossed his path, when he would shut himself up, like a snail within his shell. Yet he was not sleeping, for no titbit ever passed the portals beneath. Perhaps, however, they were themselves trusty now, having made habit ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... difficulty, originating in the pack itself, which refused to supply from its ranks the necessary quota of amateur hares required by the riders. By this token, it was high time something should be done! At length the auspicious day dawned when the sporting world (already on the alert to contrive less unturf-like proceedings than the last mentioned) was agreeably saved from the embarrassment of further thought on the subject, by a spirited announcement, noticed with becoming gratitude in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... hotel world the alert young widow made her court and ruled as a queen. Here little Jim slept away his babyhood and grew to consciousness with sounds of coming horses, going wheels; of chicken calls and twittering swallows in their nests; shouts of men and the clatter of tin pails; the distant song of saw mills and ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton
... to give their undivided attention to this new topic of interest. Some sat alert, only partly on the chair; some sat forward with their chins resting in the palms of their hands. So absorbed were all in astonishment and amazement, that no other thought gave them any concern save that of the vessel. The side door had opened and closed, ...
— The Loyalist - A Story of the American Revolution • James Francis Barrett
... them came to where, in the middle of the road, I was stranded and trying not to feel as lonely as I looked. He was much younger than myself and dark and handsome. His face was smooth-shaven, his figure tall, lithe, and alert. He wore a uniform of light blue and silver that clung to him and high boots of patent leather. His waist was like a girl's, and, as though to show how supple he was, he kept continually bowing and shrugging his shoulders and in elegant protest gesticulating with ...
— With the Allies • Richard Harding Davis
... talent for bold repartee were further characteristics which had made Gregoire's departure keenly felt among certain belles of upper Red River. His features were handsome, of sharp and refined cut; and his eyes black and brilliant as eyes of an alert and intelligent animal sometimes are. Melicent could not reconcile his voice to her liking; it was too softly low and feminine, and carried a note of pleading or pathos, unless he argued with his horse, his dog, or a "nigger," at which ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin
... design or accident cannot be stated) had sped continually in the direction of New Boston, and was dashing down toward that point. The pioneers were on the alert, and the instant they could distinguish pursuers from pursued, they opened on the former, with the result of tumbling several from the backs of their steeds. This so disorganized the hot pursuit that in the flurry of the moment the scout shot in ...
— In the Pecos Country • Edward Sylvester Ellis (AKA Lieutenant R.H. Jayne)
... were it not for that sort of mutual support. And when a fair Jack has made a slip into the unprotected ditch at the back of the milkman's yard, or a cherry-cheeked Lizzie has, after all, tumbled down into the canal, the young brood raises such cries that all the neighbourhood is on the alert and ...
— Mutual Aid • P. Kropotkin
... could not yet be time to get up. A slight noise—a very slight noise it was—at the side of her bed made her at last, though reluctantly, open her eyes again and turn slightly round. Quick ears and watchful eyes were on the alert— ...
— A Christmas Posy • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... discovered Trenchard in an ecstasy of happiness. He did not speak to me but his shining eyes, the eagerness with which standing back from the group he watched us all, told me everything. Marie Ivanovna had been kind to him, and when I found her in the centre of them, her whole body alert with excitement, I forgot my anger at her earlier unkindness or, if I remembered it, laid it to the charge of my own imagination ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... so alert, so apprehensive, so swift; in perception so instant, in execution so prompt, so silent in action, so punctual in destruction? The vestry keeps, as it were, a tryst with the grass. The "sunny spots of greenery" are given just time enough to grow and be conspicuous, and the barrow is there, ...
— The Colour of Life • Alice Meynell
... sprinkling of Germans, Italians and Swiss, it was almost solidly Slav. Slavs of all varieties from all provinces and speaking all dialects were there to be found: Slavs from Little Russia and from Great Russia, the alert Polak, the heavy Croatian, the haughty Magyar, and occasionally the stalwart Dalmatian from the Adriatic, in speech mostly Ruthenian, in religion orthodox Greek Catholic or Uniat and Roman Catholic. By their non-discriminating ...
— The Foreigner • Ralph Connor
... evening told me something which had placed me very much upon the alert. I had not been mistaken when I suspected that he might know something of the woman Yolanda Romanelli—the woman whom Rayne had sent me to inquire about—and I felt that I had done well to first inquire ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... lips of the dying man bent the ear of Dyke Darrel, every nerve on the alert to catch the ...
— Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective - Or, The Crime of the Midnight Express • Frank Pinkerton
... apprised, the sergeant hastily left the window at which he and I had been seated, and, stealing with soft and cautious steps through the house, visited each of his posts to see that the men were on the alert. To each he whispered instructions to put their pieces on cock, to go down on their knees at the window, and to rest the muzzles of their muskets on the sill, but not project them out more than two or three inches. He concluded by telling them not to fire a shot until they heard the report of ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII • various
... happens, that trembles on the verge of a panic over the unguarded utterance of a financier, and founds a new religion every month or so. But after a while self-deception ceases to be a comfort. This is when the reformer notices how indifference to politics is settling upon some of the most alert minds of our generation, entering into the attitude of men as capable as any reformer of large and imaginative interests. For among the keenest minds, among artists, scientists and philosophers, there is a remarkable inclination to make ...
— A Preface to Politics • Walter Lippmann
... Bear Islands; so many bears on them, they kept the camp so scared up all the time, they had to make up a boat party and go over and hunt them off. They used to swim this river like it was a pond, those bears! They kept the party on the alert all day and all night. They had a dozen big ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Missouri • Emerson Hough
... written by Governor Mason to the War Department wherein he said that in his opinion, "There is more gold in the country drained by the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers than would pay the cost of the late war with Mexico a hundred times over." The public immediately was alert. And then, strangely enough, to give direction to the restless spirit seething beneath the surface of society, came a silly popular song. As has happened many times before and since, a great movement was set to the lilt of a commonplace melody. Minstrels started it; ...
— The Forty-Niners - A Chronicle of the California Trail and El Dorado • Stewart Edward White
... alert now, descried in this naught more poetical than the fact that Selwyn considered that his sister resembled a man of his acquaintance. As for that fairest of all spring flowers, it had never gladdened the backwoods range of ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... separation, wrote daily, but sent no tidings of his progress, told her nothing when they met that night, and had left her an hour before asking her to have patience till he could show his finished work. Now, with her eye upon the door, her ear alert to catch the coming step, her mind disturbed by contending hopes and fears, she sat waiting with the vigilant immobility of an Indian on the watch. She had not long to look and listen. Manuel entered hastily, locked the door, closed the windows, ...
— Pauline's Passion and Punishment • Louisa May Alcott
... evening found the family grouped about the long table listening with bulging eyes and hectic cheeks to the Boarder, who had before him a sheet of figures. Amarilly was at once alert, although somewhat resentful of this encroachment upon her ...
— Amarilly of Clothes-line Alley • Belle K. Maniates
... at once communicated to Barton, with the result that every man on duty was instructed to keep an extra sharp look-out. The order was, as a matter of fact, not needed; for the sentries were as alert as they possibly could be. Hour after hour they peered into the darkness, but without seeing any ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... Coming away from the colder outside air he felt the warmth of the room all the more cosy, the scent of the burning wood and the roses more piercing sweet, the shadow of the curtains and portieres more delightfully mysterious. At that moment the whole room seemed on the alert for the arrival of the woman he loved. He imagined Elena's sensations on entering. It was hardly possible that she should be able to resist the influence of these surroundings, so full of tender memories for her; she would suddenly lose all sense of time and reality, would fancy ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... the thing off as well as he could, but he felt that the movements he would have wished to appear alert were only convulsive, and that the smiles with which he attempted to relax his features were but distorted grimaces. However, the church was not the place for further inquiries; and whilst Natalie gently pressed ...
— Little Classics, Volume 8 (of 18) - Mystery • Various
... bills; and the momentary sensation produced upon the throng of business men by the sudden change on the two faces, vanished like the furrow cut by a ship's keel in the sea. News of the greatest importance kept the attention of the world of commerce on the alert; and when commercial interests are at stake, Moses might appear with his two luminous horns, and his coming would scarcely receive the honors of a pun; the gentlemen whose business it is to write the Market Reports would ignore ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... zebu, the sacred bull of India, in spite of its domestication, has an agile body and a quick, alert mind 95 ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... in a city horse-car I watched the faces of my fellow-passengers,—women, most of them—with a pain at my heart. Oh, the tired, strained, impatient faces, and the eager, alert, and anxious expression that belong to the people of this new and free country! Some of these wretched mortals had babies with them,—babies whose fretful wails seemed but to voice the mother's expression of countenance. ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... creek by a little footbridge used by those who kept boats near by, climbed the fence by the meadow, and then started straight across, Dick keeping his eyes eagerly on the alert for any sign ...
— Dick the Bank Boy - Or, A Missing Fortune • Frank V. Webster
... Army, and of the party who had been engaged under his command in scientific observations at Lady Franklin Bay. The fleet consisted of the steam sealer Thetis, purchased in England; the Bear, purchased at St. Johns, Newfoundland, and the Alert, which was generously provided by the British Government. Preparations for the expedition were promptly made by the Secretary of the Navy, with the active cooperation of the Secretary of War. Commander George ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... were subjected to brutal violation, and then turned out naked, with their children, to starve on the barren heaths. One whole family was enclosed in a barn, and consumed to ashes. Those ministers of vengeance were so alert in the execution of their office, that in a few days there was neither house, cottage, man, nor beast, to be seen in the compass of fifty miles: all was ruin, silence, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... arroyo. Rabbits were frisking in the short willows, and some were so tame he could have kicked them. Gale walked swiftly for a goodly part of the distance, and then, when he saw blue smoke curling up above the trees, he proceeded slowly, with alert eye and ear. From the lay of the land and position of trees seen by daylight, he found an easier and safer course that the one he had taken in the dark. And by careful work he was enabled to get closer to the well, ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... up. He was thin and tall, with a small face. His way of looking was alert. Then he glanced round to the other end of the room, where was a glass office. And then he came forward. He did not say anything, but leaned in a gentle, ...
— Sons and Lovers • David Herbert Lawrence
... secretly orderly and in person spick and span—his friends declared that they had never seen his hair rumpled. His nose was too sharp; his mouth was one of those unfortunate mirrors of mood inclined to droop perceptibly in moments of unhappiness, but his blue eyes were charming, whether alert with intelligence or half closed in an ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... arrival at Jenny Man's I saw an alert young fellow that cocked his hat upon a friend of his, who entered just at the same time with myself, and accosted him after the following manner: "Well, Jack, the old prig is dead at last. Sharp's the word. Now or never, boy. Up to the walls of Paris, directly;" with ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... ships at Abydos, which had nevertheless been warned by their approaching friends to be on the alert to prevent their sailing out, at dawn they sighted the fleet of Mindarus, which immediately gave chase. All had not time to get away; the greater number however escaped to Imbros and Lemnos, while four of the hindmost were overtaken off Elaeus. One of these was stranded ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides
... she tosses you as misers count their treasures; and you pocket the change for a five uncomputed. Perhaps the brass-bound inaccessibility multiplies her charms—anyhow, she is a shirt-waisted angel, immaculate, trim, manicured, seductive, bright-eyed, ready, alert—Psyche, Circe, and Ate in one, separating you from your circulating medium after ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... having a carousal, he overheard a proposal to kill the young Yankee, and take his scalp to the fort, and sell it for rum. In a few moments one of them took a large brand from the fire and hurled at him, but being on the alert he dodged it, and made his escape. The Indians pursued, but it was dark and they did not ...
— An account of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha - Red Jacket and his people, 1750-1830 • John Niles Hubbard
... record of no less than forty operatic librettos, plays, romances, memoirs, pamphlets, and innumerable articles. I wish I knew what to say about the man himself, his unwearying goodness, his loyalty, his scrupulousness, his good humor, his originality, his continual common sense, and his intellect, alert to everything ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... down. He heard the charge against her made by Barratt, and seconded by his creatures—heard her appeal—sprang to her aid—dragged the ruffian into the street, when in less time than the tale could be told, and before the police (though tolerably alert) could effectually interpose for his rescue, the mob had so used or so abused the opportunity they had long wished for, that he remained the mere disfigured wreck of what had once been a man, rather than a creature with any resemblance ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... more, When suddenly I looked up at a star, And then, a thought I could not fail to heed, From the soul's awful region unexplored, Rushed, crying, 'Back! Go back!' And back I went, As hastily as if it were a thing Of life or death. I did not stop to pull The door-bell, but sprang up alert and still To the piazza of the open window, Drew back a blind inaudibly, looked in, And through the waving muslin curtain, saw— Well, she was seated in a young man's lap, Her head ...
— The Woman Who Dared • Epes Sargent
... ending loudly, as he would o'erleap His destiny, alert he stood: but when Obstinate silence came heavily again, Feeling about for its old couch of space And airy cradle, lowly bow'd his face Desponding, o'er the marble floor's cold thrill. But 'twas not long; for, sweeter than the rill 340 To its old channel, or a swollen tide To margin sallows, ...
— Endymion - A Poetic Romance • John Keats
... midgets laughing outright in the mist of smoke; the chatter narrowly escaped being a din; and at intervals a diminutive boy entered and bawled the name of a midget at the top of his voice, Priam was suddenly electrified, and Mr. Oxford, very alert, noticed the electrification. ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... one at all; but that was chiefly because he did not want to meet any one. He went with his ears and his eyes alert, and was not above hiding behind a clump of stunted bushes when two horsemen rode down a canyon trail just below him. Also he searched for roads and then avoided them. It would be a fat morsel for Marie ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... the fisherman as he threw the line far out, with a strong, high swing of his long arm. And as she looked, a lusty bass—heavy, full of fight—took the hook, and she saw the man stand motionless, intent, alert, at the instant he first felt the fish. Then she caught the skillful turn of his wrist as he struck—quick and sure; watched, with breathless interest as—bracing himself—the fisherman's powerful ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright
... gentlemen made eloquent speeches which proved to the entire satisfaction of their authors that railways would disarrange all the conditions of society and business and bring untold evils in their train. If the alert and progressive Anglo-Saxon took this initial position, is it surprising that it should be taken with far greater intensity by Orientals who for uncounted centuries have plodded along in perfect contentment, and who now find that the whole order of living to which they ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN
... chipped at the shell of a hard-boiled egg she glanced toward the horse, which had stopped grazing and stood facing down stream with ears nervously alert. A few moments later the soft rattle of bit-chains and the low shuffling of hoofs told her that a rider was approaching at a walk. "Probably my guardian devil, ostensibly paying strict attention to his own business of ...
— The Gold Girl • James B. Hendryx
... gathered, naked to the waist, black with powder and spattered with blood, cutlas and pistol in hand. But the Americans were ready. Their marines were drawn up on deck, the pikemen stood behind the bulwarks, and the officers watched, cool and alert, every movement of the foe. Then the British sea-dogs tumbled aboard, only to perish by shot or steel. The combatants slashed and stabbed with savage fury, and the assailants were driven back. Manners sprang to their head to lead them again ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... scarred veteran, an old soldier of Napoleon, capitulating now before the witchery of genius and wit. Here the noble Russian exile forgets his sorrows in those smiles that, unlike the aurora, warm while they dazzle. And our celebrated composer is discomposed easily by alert and nimble-footed mischief. And our professor of Greek and Hebrew roots is rooted to the ground with astonishment at finding himself put through all the moods and tenses of fun in a twinkling. Ah, culpable sirens, if the pangs ye have inflicted were reckoned ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... of the International Garment Workers' Union, all these three men of middle age, intellectual faces, and sociological education, keenly identified with the ideas and principles of the workers; three or four rather younger representatives of the cloak makers, alert and thoroughly Americanized; and three older men, who had fought throughout the quarter-of-a-century contest, men with the sort of trade education that nothing but a working experience can give, deeply imbued with the traditions of that struggle, ...
— Making Both Ends Meet • Sue Ainslie Clark and Edith Wyatt
... also other denizens of the dismal places. At noon the marsh deer with wide-spreading antlers sought them out as the only available protection from the blistering sunlight. But they were wary creatures, ever on the alert, sensing danger and fleeing from it before their position was really imperilled. The tapirs too were shy but not so apprehensive of their welfare, for they were powerful animals and well versed in jungle strategy. Once Suma had essayed to try her prowess on one of the big ungulates by springing from ...
— The Black Phantom • Leo Edward Miller
... and I met him also in consultations which took place. Since then I have crossed swords with him too, and always I must confess with keen enjoyment. His knowledge of railway matters was so remarkable, his mind so practiced, alert, and luminous, that it was rare excitement to undergo cross-examination at his hands. In his book, Forty Years at the Bar, he himself says: "I have not had many opportunities of giving evidence, but I confess that when I have been called as a witness I have enjoyed myself." Well, I can ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow
... enough, for her clothes, fitting like an Englishwoman's, and put on like a Frenchwoman's (the Polkingtons all knew how to dress), were unlike any others in sight. Her face, too, dark and thin and keenly alert, was unlike, and her light, easy walk; and if this was not enough it must be added that she was now walking in the road because ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... to take in unsuitable and unwholesome feed, for which its stomach is as yet unprepared. So, if fed from the pail, it is safer to do so three times daily than twice. There should be the utmost cleanliness of feeding dishes, and the feeder must be ever on the alert to prevent the strong and hungry from drinking the milk of the weaker in addition to their own. In case the cow nurse has been subjected to any great excitement by reason of travel, hunting, or carrying, the first milk she yields thereafter should be ...
— Special Report on Diseases of Cattle • U.S. Department of Agriculture
... what she said. Like no client at law that ever sought his lawyer's chambers, on any errand. Before Mr. Inchbald had reached the first landing, she was posted before the desired door, and had tapped there with very alert fingers. Winthrop opened ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... self-content often came near to shockingly bad taste, and that his reminiscences of poor Mr. Fitzball and the green-room and all the rest of the Bohemia in which he had once dwelt, were too racy for his company, still found it hard to resist the alert intelligence with which he rose to every good topic, and the extraordinary heartiness and spontaneity with which the wholesome spring of human laughter was touched ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol 3 of 3) - The Life of George Eliot • John Morley
... and finding a safe berth in an American port in the summer of 1916, she showed such hesitation in setting out on the return trip that doubts were general as to whether the dangers of capture by alert Allied cruisers were not too great to be risked. The attempt nevertheless was finally made on August 2, 1916, when she darted under water after passing out of the three-mile limit at the Virginia Capes and was successful. ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... in his most musing moods, observes things around sufficiently to avoid a porter's knot or a butcher's tray. But the man with strong ganglions—of pushing, lively temperament, who, though practical, is yet speculative; the man who is emulous and active, and ever trying to rise in life; sanguine, alert, bold—walks with a spring, looks rather above the heads of his fellow-passengers, but with a quick, easy turn of his own, which is lightly set on his shoulders; his mouth is a little open, his eye is bright, rather restless, but penetrative, his port has something of defiance, his form ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... indeed, had they learned horsemanship that on a certain glorious morning before sunrise, the seven youngsters were already in saddle, alert for the long-coveted ride to Bald Eagle Rock, under the guidance of Captain Lem himself, with Silent Pete and another ranchman to carry the luncheon upon two soberer steeds. It was to be an all-day's outing and a goodly little company which would enjoy it. As soon as possible ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... interfering—these Metellas and Metelluses, probably. There is a son who is the natural heir. Let us say that he killed his own father. The courts of law, which have only just been reopened since the dear days of proscription, disorder, and confiscation, will hardly yet be alert enough to acquit a man in opposition to the Dictator's favorite. Let us get him convicted, and, as a parricide, sewed up alive in a bag and thrown into the river"—as some of us have perhaps seen cats drowned, for such was the punishment—"and then he at least will not disturb ...
— Life of Cicero - Volume One • Anthony Trollope
... however, he felt that there was a change in the atmosphere, and he saw by the strained looks and the compressed lips of the men that something desperate was expected. The officers gave their orders with more sternness than usual; every one was alert. ...
— Tommy • Joseph Hocking
... the "good master-workman" that made them, on the violets "for which neither the Grand Turk nor the emperor could pay," on the yearly growth of corn and wine, "as great a miracle as the manna in the wilderness," on the "pious, honorable birds" alert to escape the fowler's net, or holding a Diet "in a hall roofed with the vault of heaven, carpeted with the grass, and with walls as far as the ends of the earth." Or he wrote to his son a charming fairy-tale of a pleasant garden where good ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... after the chaplain, his toe having given him an alert hint to quit the dining-table, though he saw every feature in the poor woman's face swoln with desire to procure information concerning the ways and customs of the place, passed on the other side of the way, regardless of ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... Julia's alert, small-featured face expressed some vague disappointment at what she heard, but her words were cheerful enough. "Oh of course—whatever he likes best," she said. "I will tell Potter to make everything ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... another month before Don's fiancee would be back. And this month would count a whole lot to him. It was the deciding month. Farnsworth had been watching him closely, and had about made up his mind; but he was still on the alert for any break. He had seen men go so far and then break. So had she. It was common enough. She herself had every confidence in Don, but she was doubtful about how long it was wise to leave even him ...
— The Wall Street Girl • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... on their excursion, and found native civility on the alert every where. Some orders to this effect appeared to have been sent to the Dutch authorities. At the first post-house where they stopped, a man stepped forward with a tray of cups of tea, glasses of cocoa and water, and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... these and other facts of their appearance, and curiously questioned whether this were the best that a great material civilization could come to; it looked a little dull. The men's faces were shrewd and alert, and yet they looked dull; the women's were pretty and knowing, and yet dull. It was, probably, the holiday expression of the vast, prosperous commercial class, with unlimited money, and no ideals that money could not realize; fashion and comfort were all that they desired ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... inside the little house before he entered. There was no one there, and he sat down on the bench. Then, with eyes and ears on the alert for the first suspicious sight or sound, he waited. He could hear the distant tramping of the guards as they paced ...
— Frank Roscoe's Secret • Allen Chapman
... and alert, was waiting in the school-yard until the teacher should be ready to start. Having warned away several smaller children who had hung around after school as though to share his prerogative of accompanying the teacher, Plato had swung himself into the ...
— The House Behind the Cedars • Charles W. Chesnutt
... asleep on the spar would have been to subject themselves to the danger, almost the certainty, of dropping off, and getting drowned; and, notwithstanding their need of sleep, increased by fatigue, and the necessity of keeping constantly on the alert,—up to that moment not one of them had obtained any. The thrill of pleasure that passed through their frames as they felt their feet upon terra firma for a moment aroused them. But the excitement could ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid
... everybody was smiling and chatting; and I noticed that the men weren't so preternaturally alert as the men in New York. Some had actually taken time to get fat, which, so far I'd had reason to suppose, was a thing that never ...
— Lady Betty Across the Water • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... pictured on the opposite page, reduced one third. After the operation the child was visited by the assistant medical inspector. There was a marked improvement in his facial expression,—he looked intelligent, was alert and interested. When asked how he felt, he answered, "I feel fine now." It required about fifteen minutes to get his history, during all of which time he was responsive and interested, constantly correcting statements of his father and volunteering other information. ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... prepared, as I imagined, for every emergency. The night we left our ship we anchored late under the shelter of a small island, and all hands being tired from a long row in a hot sun, I let my men go to sleep during the short tropical darkness. As soon as the day was breaking all hands were alert, and we saw with delight a beautiful rakish-looking brig, crammed with slaves, close to the island behind which we had taken shelter, steering for a creek on the mainland a short distance from us. I ought to mention that the island in question was within four miles of this ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha
... exhibition of what the American people are said to like - namely, humbug. Let us say in passing, that the American does not like humbug. Take the average of him as he is found in the little world in which the routine work of his life is done and you will find him alert and close enough to deal with, and that in all things in which he has his experience to rely on humbug (swindling) is practically impossible. But when he gets outside of that experience, then, like the experienced traveler, he ...
— Confiscation, An Outline • William Greenwood
... they came, not sunk in sleep Found they the leaders; but on wakeful watch Intent, and all alert beside their arms. As round a sheepfold keep their anxious watch The dogs, who in the neighbouring thicket hear Some beast, that, bold in search of prey, has come Down from the mountain; loud the clamours rise Of men and dogs; all sleep is banish'd thence; So from their ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... are many things to admire about the Spanish Tommy. In the seven fortified cities which I visited, where there were thousands of him, I never saw one drunk or aggressive, which is much more than you can say of his officers. On the march he is patient, eager and alert. He trudges from fifteen to thirty miles a day over the worst roads ever constructed by man, in canvas shoes with rope soles, carrying one hundred and fifty cartridges, fifty across his stomach and one hundred on his back, weighing in ...
— Cuba in War Time • Richard Harding Davis
... was being stowed away, her manner was chillingly conventional. It was so conventional that it bordered on the unfriendly. About the unfriendliness of the chauffeur there could be no doubt. The elaborate care with which he tucked the robe about her Ladyship had a distinct air of alert possessiveness. ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... one another's welfare they are all firmly united. They constitute a full Akshauhini of wrathful warriors, O Bharata, and are staying carefully for my sake, well-protected by the Kuru heroes. They are on the alert, O king, with their eyes on me. I shall certainly destroy them all, like fire destroying a heap of straw. Therefore, O king, let those that equip cars, place quivers and all necessaries on my car in proper places. Indeed, in such a dreadful battle, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... gravely, "but they may be lurking in this neighborhood yet? If so, we shall probably have some signal. We must be on the alert!" ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... join the ladies?" said Blakeney after a long pause, during which the mental workings of his alert brain were almost visible, in the earnest look which he cast at his friend. "You shall keep the papers in your desk, give them into the keeping of your saint, trust her all in all rather than not at all, and if the time should come that your heaven-enthroned ideal fall somewhat heavily to earth, ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... ranks, exhibit more reserve, and not unfrequently a considerable amount of ignorance and prejudice. Perhaps the most general feature of the Norwegian character is an excessive national vanity, which is always on the alert, and fires up on the slightest provocation. Say everything you like, except that Norway in any respect is surpassed by any other country. One is assailed with questions about his impressions of the scenery, people, government, &c.—a very natural and pardonable curiosity, it is true, and ...
— Northern Travel - Summer and Winter Pictures of Sweden, Denmark and Lapland • Bayard Taylor
... this autumn day in 1937, alert and happy for all his ninety-six years. Bless you, he ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... times, the lonely horseman, in a dangerous region, relies much on his intelligent steed for warning. While Monteith Sterry could do a great deal of thinking in the saddle, he was too alert to drop into a brown study that would divert ...
— Cowmen and Rustlers • Edward S. Ellis
... he answered, with quiet mockery. "There always are. I will see to them. Difficulties are not without a certain advantage. They keep one on the alert." ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... three or four hours was subsequently restless. The mind, when agitated, watches for the body, and wakes it at the time when it should be on the alert. Newton woke up: it was not yet daylight, and all was hushed. He turned round, intending to get up immediately; yet, yielding to the impulse of wearied nature, he again slumbered. Once he thought that he heard a footstep, roused himself, and listened; but ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... rooms; and not unfrequently the poor children, under the stinging terrors of their lonely situation, stole away from their "forms," to speak in the hunter's phrase, and sought to rejoin each other. But in these attempts they were liable to surprises from the enemy; papa and mamma were both on the alert, and often intercepted the young deserter by a cross march or an ambuscade; in which cases each had a separate policy for enforcing obedience. The father, upon his general system of "perseverance," compelled the fugitive back to his quarters, and, in effect, exhorted him to persist in being frightened ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... joined him. He was a slim, well-preserved man, alert-eyed and active, yet he had aged five years in his son's eyes. His face was unusually pale, but he exhibited ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... Marjorie Marlowe, alert, swung the bottle of champagne in its silken net on a silken cord and it crashed on the bow as she cried, gleefully, "I christen ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve
... best left to themselves were those who were most amenable to suggestion and even correction, who took the blue pencil with a smile, and bowed gladly to the rod of the proof-reader. Those who were on the alert for offence, who resented a marginal note as a slight, and bumptiously demanded that their work should be printed just as they had written it, were commonly not much more desired by the reader than ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... with the air of a man who already felt the cares of high responsibility upon his shoulders. His head was erect and his chest thrown forward. He was ten years younger; his manner was alert, assured, and gracious. As he passed through the halls he was impatient of the familiar settings of Government House; they seemed to him like the furnishings of a hotel where he had paid his bill, and where his luggage was lying strapped ...
— The Lion and the Unicorn and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... or so, routine guard and patrol. The survey team wouldn't associate with us, of course, but we were used to that. We kept our eyes open and our mouths shut. That's our job, and we give value for money received. So we were alert and ready. But it wasn't the attack that nearly got us this time. It was the cold of the dead planet lost in ...
— Dead World • Jack Douglas
... meeting." "Why so," asked Miss Anthony, "when Mrs. Stanton is first vice-president? It would be not only an insult to her but a direct violation of parliamentary usage. I shall never consent to it." Finding that, nevertheless, there was a scheme to carry out this plan, she put Mrs. Stanton on the alert and, as the officers filed on the platform, gave her a gentle push to the front, whereupon she opened the convention ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... faced growing intolerance and malignity. It was only by exercising the utmost vigilance and firmness that he was able to snatch for himself and cause a hearing. Under these circumstances all the powers of the man became braced, eager, alert, determined. It was many against one, but that one was a host in himself, aroused as he then was, not only by the grandeur of his cause, but also by a keen sense of personal indignity and persecution. Whoever else did, he would not submit to senatorial insult ...
— Charles Sumner Centenary - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 14 • Archibald H. Grimke
... inferior numbers, alert, resourceful, vigilant, had checked and baffled him at every turn, and Richmond's fall was no nearer to human eye than ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... I seem to any of you to indulge a vein more serious than befits the wine-cup, marvel not. It has long been my wont to share our city's passion for noble-natured souls, alert and ...
— The Symposium • Xenophon
... a fair test, the superiority of the American gunner was incontestable. The greater losses of the British whenever the armies met on even terms proved the superior marksmanship of the American militiaman. The adaptation of the fast-sailing schooner to privateering was further evidence of an alert intellect which was quick to adapt means to ends. This quality, to be sure, has been bred in every frontier folk by the very necessities of existence, but it appeared in marked strength in the American of ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson
... head that never studied any thing that in worldly language is called useful. The tranquillity of my remnant of life will be lost, or so perpetually interrupted, that I expect little comfort; not that I am already intending to grow rich, but, the moment one is supposed so, there are so many alert to turn one to their own account, that I have more letters to Write, to satisfy, or rather to dissatisfy them, than about my own affairs, though the latter are all confusion. I have such missives on agriculture, ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... down, but because the British were suspicious of counter-attacks, and the Germans afraid of a continued British movement, the opposing lines were very fully on the alert; the artillery on both sides were indulging in constant dueling, and the infantry were doing everything possible to prevent any sudden advantage being snatched ...
— Action Front • Boyd Cable (Ernest Andrew Ewart)
... trembling with nervous excitement, a little more and hysterics would set in—they dared not disobey. They left her alone, with a watchful attendant on the alert ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... rustle of movement. And presently another, this time closer. Every sense in him was alert, keyed up to closest attention. He knew that some one, for some sinister purpose, had come into this apartment and been ...
— Tangled Trails - A Western Detective Story • William MacLeod Raine
... Christian people, should have settled down to an acceptance of a faulty established order, should not be alert to all that Our Lord's life signified, was one of the problems. It was, too, a matter of that cosmic loyalty which he analyses more fully in Orthodoxy. Here ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... a few minute spots of reddish brown. Freak situations in which to locate their nests are often chosen by these birds, such as the brake beam of a freight car, in the crevices of old wells, hen houses, etc. The birds are one of the most useful that we have; being very active and continually on the alert for insects and beetles that constitute their whole ...
— The Bird Book • Chester A. Reed
... was constantly dartling, and her ear was alert to catch every syllable Pierce uttered. She paid no attention to Sheldrake, who responded guardedly to his ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... from personal preference, to be alleged in support of this omission. Those who are no chimney-cornerers, who rejoice in the social thunderstorm, have a ground in reason for their choice. They get little rest indeed; but restfulness is a quality for cattle; the virtues are all active, life is alert, and it is in repose that men prepare themselves for evil. On the other hand, they are bruised into a knowledge of themselves and others; they have in a high degree the fencer's pleasure in dexterity displayed and proved; what they get they get upon life's terms, paying for ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... yarns innumerable while I was there about shrieks and footsteps heard, and bedclothes torn off. But I did not experience these.... I don't think the noises were done by a practical joker, as there were too many people on the alert...." ...
— The Alleged Haunting of B—— House • Various
... sound upon the kitchen floor, and she turned, alert, to listen. This was Mrs. Eli Pike in her carpet slippers; she had stood so much over soap-making that week that her feet had taken to swelling. She was no older than Dilly, but she had seemed matronly in her teens. She looked very large, as ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... altogether of that desire for pity and condolence, and that humility, which we often find in adversity. As then we esteem those persons vain and without sense who in walking hold themselves very erect and with a stiff neck, yet in boxing or fighting we commend such as hold themselves up and alert, so the man struggling with adversity, who stands up straight against his fate, "in fighting posture like some boxer,"[777] and instead of being humble and abject becomes through his boasting lofty and dignified, seems to be not offensive and impudent, but ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... that frail boat? What forgotten names deserve honour for the invention of the paddle and the sail? The whole story is beyond recovery in the rapidly closing backward perspective of time. Man's eyes are set in his head so that he may go forward, and while he is healthy and alert he does not trouble to look behind him. If the beginnings of European civilization are rightly traced to certain tribes of amphibious dwellers on the coast of the Mediterranean, who reared the piles of their houses in the water, and so escaped the greater perils of the land, ...
— The War in the Air; Vol. 1 - The Part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force • Walter Raleigh
... know what the lure must be when a busy man, an active man, an alert man, a man saturated with the nervous spirit of American commercial life, sits down in one of the seats overlooking the Lake, or spreads out his full length upon the grass, or on the beds of Sierran moss, which make ...
— The Lake of the Sky • George Wharton James
... positive anger, the name of Gallia escaped his lips, as though he were dreaming that his claim to the discovery of the comet was being contested or denied; but although his attendant was on the alert to gather all he could, he was able to catch nothing in the incoherent sentences that served to throw any real light upon the problem that they ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... quitted the house on one side, while her husband did so on the other; and forthwith, shunning observation as best she might, she hied her to the wood, and hid her where 'twas most dense, and there waited on the alert, and glancing, now this way and now that, to see if any were coming. And while thus she stood, nor ever a thought of a wolf crossed her mind, lo, forth of a close covert hard by came a wolf of monstrous size and appalling aspect, and scarce had she time ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... was so tired, acquiesced with some eagerness, the fact being that his brain was more alert and that he had all the curiosity of the monkey tribe which he so much resembled in appearance, and wanted to see this queen ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... also on the alert. The Duke had been very much in earnest when he made up his mind that the old custom should be abandoned at Silverbridge and had endeavoured to impress that determination of his upon his wife. The Duke knew more about his property and was better acquainted with its details than his wife ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... mine in regard to admitting any of those persons whose seats are in dispute—probably those orders were misconstrued. My guards are very zealous—very alert," affirmed the adjutant-general, putting as good a face on the matter as was possible. He fully realized that this was no time to mention that exception in favor of Mayor Morrison, or to explain that he had intended to have Captain Sweetsir accept humorously instead of ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... her at the head of the table, till he jestingly told me it was reckoned off the bill. The place was indeed suited to the student's pocket. But this morning I was surprised at the sprightliness of her share in the dialogue of mutual apologies. Her mind seemed as alert as her step, her voice was pleasing and gentle, and there was a refreshing gaiety in her attitude ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... that I had turned over two pages instead of one, and had not noticed my mistake until I was well down the page. This was becoming serious. What was the disturbing influence? It could not be physical fatigue. On the contrary, my mind was unusually alert, and in a more receptive condition than usual. I made a new and determined effort to read, and for a short time succeeded in giving my whole attention to my subject. But in a very few moments again I found myself leaning back in my chair, staring ...
— The Empty House And Other Ghost Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... "Prize question for the Erotic Academy: How far may friendship toward women go and what is the difference between it and love?" That Richter called this circle his "erotic academy" is significant. He was ever, in such relations, as alert to observe as he was keen to sympathize and permitted himself an astonishing variety of quickly changing and even simultaneous experiments, both at Hof and later in the aristocratic circles that were presently to open to him. In his theory, which finds fullest expression in ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... handle it. The good writer may be one who disclaims all literary pretension, but there he is, at work among words,—binding the vagabond or liberating the prisoner, exalting the humble or abashing the presumptuous, incessantly alert to amend their implications, break their lazy habits, and help them to refinement or scope or decision. He educates words, for he knows ...
— Style • Walter Raleigh
... winters in the cocoon, emerges early in May, if the weather be warm, pairs readily, and lays from 150 to 200 eggs. These hatch out in about fourteen days, and like Yamamai, always about 5 or 6 o'clock in the morning. It is necessary to be on the alert to catch them on hatching only, and to remember that they are vagabonds, even to a greater extent than Yamamai. Consequently ...
— Scientific American, Volume XXIV., No. 12, March 18, 1871 • Various
... Sunday our intention was, after taking bearings from the summit of Luxmore Head, to delay our further proceeding until the next morning, but the circumstance that occurred kept us so much on the alert that it was anything but a day of rest. Having landed at the foot of the hill we ascended its summit, but found it so thickly wooded as to deprive us of the view we had anticipated; but, as there were some openings in the trees through which a few distant objects could ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... some one had slipped into the library after her. He was a little man—a poor little man of puny appearance, wearing a thin jacket. He approached me with a number of little bows and smiles. But he was very pale, and, although still young and alert, he looked ill. I thought as I looked at him, of a wounded squirrel. He carried under his arm a green toilette, which he put upon a chair; then unfastening the four corners of the toilette, he uncovered a heap ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... coloured dark blue. In the space between Australia and New Caledonia, called by Flinders the Corallian Sea, there are numerous reefs. Of these, some are represented in Krusenstern's "Atlas" as having an atoll-like structure; namely, BAMPTON shoal, FREDERIC, VINE or Horse-shoe, and ALERT reefs; these ...
— Coral Reefs • Charles Darwin
... jar or haste, and suddenly it came to a stop before a door made of a number of thin steel bars placed horizontally. As the lift stopped, the steel-barred doorway opened noiselessly. All Poltavo's senses were now alert; he, a past master in the art of treachery, had been at last its victim. He did not leave the tiny lift for a moment, but prepared for eventualities. He took a pencil out of his pocket and wrote rapidly ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace
... came two shells from our guns. Everyone was alert. I sprang to my camera. Two men were standing by me, ready to take down the screen. Boom came another shell, and at a sign ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... their long poles and quick movements, looking not unlike a band of savages, have enough to do, with steady feet, and eyes on the alert. For of all the vast array of logs—and I once saw twenty-four thousand in one drive—not one goes through the sluice but is guided on to it by one or more of the drivers. They often ride standing on the floating logs, ...
— Illustrated Science for Boys and Girls • Anonymous
... details of national income and expenditure, his eloquence rose to an unusual height and power. At the same time, he was a most vigilant guardian of the public purse, and he was incessantly on the alert to prevent the national wealth, which his finance had done so much to increase, from being squandered on unnecessary and unprofitable objects. This jealousy of foolish expenditure combined with his love of peace to make him very chary of spending money ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... the mind of the reformer, is "what effect will this step have upon the workmen?" Through some means (it would almost appear some especial sense) the workman seems to scent the approach of a reformer even before his arrival in town. Their suspicions are thoroughly aroused, and they are on the alert for sweeping changes which are to be against their interests and which they are prepared to oppose from the start. Through generations of bitter experiences working men as a class have teamed to look upon all change as antagonistic to their best interests. ...
— Shop Management • Frederick Winslow Taylor
... There may be differences of opinion from time to time on suitability of features for this classification as we have a considerable number of public judges of our decisions, but we shall do our best. All auditioning officers will be fully alert ...
— Report of the Juvenile Delinquency Committee • Ronald Macmillan Algie
... breaking the contact. Instantly the room became black. David stared, still stupidly, at the dull red spot on the safe until it faded into blackness. Then he realized. He stood very still, muscles tense, senses sharply alert. He heard a faint rustling but he could not make out from what part of the room ...
— The House of Toys • Henry Russell Miller
... sleep. Driving a plane through clouds, mist and sunshine for hours had made every nerve alert. And the strain of that last sagging slide through the air was not to be relieved instantly. So he lay there in his blankets, a tumult of ideas in his mind. This wheat-field now? Had he really been misdirected by the compass on the plane? To prove ...
— Lost In The Air • Roy J. Snell
... across at Elizabeth and caught the alert sign of approval in her face. He had heard Silas and some others discuss the Hunter mortgages, but here was a still more significant evidence. Elizabeth had not signalled him, but the look told the story; in fact, it told more than the ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger
... Philadelphia. Here he came so near to the English that he could plainly see them carrying provisions across the river to aid in the projected taking of the city, and he so heedlessly exposed himself to danger that he might easily have been shot or imprisoned if the English had been alert. By urgent entreaty he was called back. After gaining this information, he met a detachment of Hessians in the service of the British army, and though they numbered more than his own detachment, he succeeded in driving them back. ...
— Lafayette • Martha Foote Crow
... North was our direction. And to our surprise, and exceeding gladness, the road down this ridge proved to be a highway compared to what we had passed. In the open forest we had to follow it altogether by the blazes on the trees. But with all our eyes alert that was easy. The grade was down hill, so that we traveled fast, covering four miles an hour. Occasionally a log or thicket halted rapid progress. Toward the end of the afternoon sheep and cattle trails joined the now well-defined ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... fresh honey. He forgot any dread of the myriad creatures buzzing about his head, he forgot even his plan, and his impatience of delay. He bent to peer into the hive, to examine the young bees just hatching, the fat, black, and brown drones and the slim, alert queen bee. The girl, now that the responsibility of helping was off her hands, forgot her own nervousness and pressed forward also to look and ask questions. She must be about thirteen or fourteen years old, was Oliver's vague impression of her; she ...
— The Windy Hill • Cornelia Meigs
... new hints of malignity into features that were malign enough in repose. Now it may be that the sight of that frightful smile had its effect in cooling the hot blood of the Biscayan, for, indeed, the hunchback, as he stood there, so quietly alert, so demoniacally watchful, seemed the most terrible antagonist he had ever challenged. At least, in a little while the Biscayan, drinking in swiftly the warnings of his companions, consented to be pacified, consented ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... necessary to be less prodigal with the public land indicated that the supply was no longer inexhaustible, and led the President in his last annual message to urge that the remaining supply be husbanded with great care. Congress was not alert to the demands of the time, however, and no effective steps were taken ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... had observed the Hoop at once, and greeted it with a solitary smile, accepting it for a happy sign and a token; for she had recognized Simon Blount when she turned into the shop, that night, out of the darkness and the cold, and, with the alert intelligence of a woman, even so self-absorbed as she was then, had construed his gallant "good-night." She thought she understood Miss Wimple's Hoop, because she had not discovered the poetry in Miss Wimple's quilted petticoat. They had not spoken of those things again. Delicacy was the law for ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... standing and peered under his hand, resolved to be alert till the last, determined ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... was, he had only the instincts of his kind. All his senses were alert, and his eyes looked for enemies in all directions but one, and that one direction was above. He never looked up, and it never occurred to his stupid, old head, sharp as he thought himself, that the little fire-carriers might have climbed ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... both conscientious and alert, he caused a most rigorous search to be made of the ground overlooked by the above mentioned window; a search in which the police joined, but which was without any result save that of rousing the attention ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... train, the men of the evening shift, just come on, were swarming about the end of the overhang like ants upon the tip of a broken twig,—alert-eyed, quick-handed, cool-brained "Sons of Martha," who, balanced unconcernedly in mid-air on narrow stringers, clenched fast the rivets in Death's steel harness. During the lulls between the furiously rattling volley-blows of the electric riveting-machines they grumbled about the deterioration ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... delighted in scrubbing and scouring and who would make an excellent kitchen maid. The other was Marilla Bond, an orphan with no relatives that any one knew; a fair, nice looking intelligent child, with light curly hair cropped close, rather slim, and with a certain ready, alert ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas
... some known tune. Truly, under such continuous strain (which none but such a trained actress could maintain for a single day) her spirit must have wearied. And if this part was hard to play in public, where we are all, I take it, actors of some sort and on the alert to sustain the character we would have our own, how much more difficult must it be in private when we drop our disguise and lay our hearts open to those we love! And here, as it seemed to me, I did hit rightly at the true cause of her present secret distress; for at home as abroad she ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... astonishment was considerable, as the servants, in the times I write of, were more alert and attentive than they are at present. However, I knocked a second time. ...
— Parker's Second Reader • Richard G. Parker
... their incessant march past of blighted and blasted, of maimed and crippled and worm-eaten. Until that day Susan had been about as unobservant of the obvious things as is the rest of the race. On that day she for the first time noticed the crowd in the street, with mind alert to signs of the ravages of accident and disease. Hardly a sound body, hardly one that was ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... his course to the Moor, and stole along softly, listening for the least sound of the deer, and keeping his eye on the alert ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould |
