"Button" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... maybe they are imps—whose business in life seems to be to catch up any needed trifle—a suddenly dropped needle, the very leaf in the morning paper that the reader held a moment ago and that holds "continuations," the scissors just now at his elbow, his collar button—and to hide it until the loser swears his ultimate, ...
— Moriah's Mourning and Other Half-Hour Sketches • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... without some tall partner, attracted by her gentillesse and naive prattle—a moustached Austrian or Prussian officer, perhaps, in white or blue uniform, or one of her counts or barons, with a bit of ribbon dangling from his button-hole; or, if all else failed, there was always her father, who was ever ready to indulge her in any of her fancies, and never resisted her coaxing ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... room Number 420, and during the evening were visited by several strangers, including a plain-clothes officer from the New Orleans Police Head-quarters. Little Hummel, dining in Long Acre Square in the glare of Broadway, was pressing some invisible button that transmitted the power of his influence even to the police government of a city two thousand ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... still dripping blood, the ache of his overstrained eyes—even the soaring arena around him with the thousands of spectators—were trivialities not worth thinking about. There was only one thing in his universe: the button-tipped length of shining steel that hovered before him, engaging his own weapon. He felt the quiver and scrape of its life, knew when it moved and moved himself to counteract it. And when he attacked, it was always there to ...
— Planet of the Damned • Harry Harrison
... mine that would blow up the whole house. He was wearing finer clothes than she had ever seen him in before—a frock coat, quite new but fitting him badly, so that it was buttoned too tightly across his stomach and loose across the back. He had a white flower in his button-hole, and a rather soiled white handkerchief protruded from his breast-pocket. One leg of his dark grey trousers had been creased in two places, and there were little spots of blood on his high white collar because he had cut himself shaving. His complexion was of the same old suppressed purple, ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... didn't mind," said Rose. "The yellow shoe buttons are like the grains of corn the chickens eat. One button did come off and a rooster picked it up and swallowed it." Rose ...
— Six Little Bunkers at Grandma Bell's • Laura Lee Hope
... of the hall there was a grim portal marked "lift." I pressed an electric button and heard an answering tinkle in the heavens. There was an upholstered settle near at hand, and I discovered the reason. A deer-stalking peace drooped upon everything, and in it a man could invoke the passing of a ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... "we'd better see what he's got." He dropped to his knees, and his hands approached the body of the dead officer. But his hands wavered over the buttons of the tunic. The first button was brick- red with drying blood, and he did not seem to dare ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... was all of Lyncolne clothe so fyne, With a gold button fastened neere his chynne; His autremete was edged with golden twynne, And his shoone pyke a loverds mighte have binne— Full well it shewn he thoughten coste no sinne; The trammels of the palfrye pleasde his sighte, ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... His dress was a blue coat and buff waistcoat, half boots remarkably well blacked, and a silk handkerchief tied with military precision. The only antiquated part of his dress was a cocked hat of equilateral dimensions, in the button-hole of which he wore a very small cockade. Mrs. Dods, accustomed to judge of persons by their first appearance, said, that in the three steps which he made from the door to the tea-table, she recognised, without the possibility of mistake, the gait of a person who was well to pass in the world; ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... only commonplaces, awkwardly and spasmodically and slowly, she rose and pressed the button ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... I'll tell you after my own fashion," replied old Tom, smiling; and then singing, as he held the Dominie by the button of his spencer— ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... together. Grandma peeped in, and smiled at the busy group, saying, "Sew away, my dears; dollies are safe companions, and needlework an accomplishment that 's sadly neglected nowadays. Small stitches, Maud; neat button-holes, Fan; cut carefully, Polly, and don't waste your cloth. Take pains; and the best needlewoman shall have a pretty bit of white satin for ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... soon had everything ready. But suddenly she remembered that she had left a very nice pair of button-hole scissors in Mrs. Montague's boudoir on the day they left for ...
— True Love's Reward • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... there, fat as mutton, Then held her master by the button: "Master, my heart and soul are wrung—till They can't abide that dirty dunghill: Master, you know I make your beer— You boast of me at Christmas cheer; Then why insult me and disgrace me, And next to that vile dunghill place me? By Jove! it gives my nose offence: Command the hinds ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay
... Well, one day he was out with a party of them same coons, and they began to run the old rig on him as usual. And he jumps up on eend, and in a joking kind o' way, said: 'Gentlemen, can any of you stitch a button-hole, with the button in it?' Well, they all roared out at that ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... can stand the weather;" and he thrust his pipe deeper into his mouth, and twirled the button of ...
— Scenes in Switzerland • American Tract Society
... was required to remove his coat, and then another took a fancy to his vest. The one who took his coat gave him in exchange a very ragged, greasy, and altogether disgusting cavalry jacket, much too short, and not large enough to button. The carriage was almost torn in pieces in the search for treasure. Swords and bayonets were thrust through the panelling; the cushions were ripped open, the cover torn off, and every possible hiding-place examined. ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... lives; for Orlando was there, and a band of fresh knights were about him, and Agrican in vain attempted to rally his troops. The Paladin kept him constantly in his front, forcing him to attend to nobody else. The Tartar king, who cared not a button for Galafron and all his army,[1] provided he could but rid himself of this terrible knight (whom he guessed at, but did not know), bethought him of a stratagem. He turned his horse, and made a show of flying in despair. Orlando ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... attachment to him proceeded from interested motives. When Monsieur, misled by his favourites, did something which was neither just nor expedient, I used to say to him, "Out of complaisance to the Chevalier de Lorraine, you put your good sense into your pocket, and button it up so tight ...
— The Memoirs of the Louis XIV. and The Regency, Complete • Elizabeth-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Orleans
... button, and, her hand shaking so much that she could scarcely hold the receiver to her ear, ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... associations among the lower Irish Catholics, organised in opposition to Orangeism, the name being derived from a green ribbon worn as a badge in a button-hole by the members; they were most ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... of this journey, Netta went one evening, in company with Emma Lee, to pay Mrs John Marrot a friendly visit, ostensibly for the purpose of inquiring after the health of baby Marrot, who, having recently fallen down-stairs, swallowed a brass button and eaten an unknown quantity of shoe-blacking, had been somewhat ailing. The real object of the visit however, was to ask Mrs Marrot to beg of her husband to take a special interest in Mrs Durby on her journey, as that excellent nurse had made up her mind to go by the ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... for his own machine, a powerful low-slung roadster. A single vicious jab at the starting button, and the big motor leaped into roaring life. Gordon shot out from the parking lot onto the main boulevard. A hundred yards away the sedan was fleeing ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... the Sergeant, "though a foil does not cut, the button, if the leather is off, as I often see is the case, will give a very ugly scratch round the wrist, and if this is repeated two or three times, a fencer will rather stand clear of the man who can do it. Just do you try it on Blackall, and you'll see if my word ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... "creakers," as he found out long ago, when he used to 'hook' maple sugar from the other side of the house. The door at the top was closed and buttoned, but he put his jack-knife blade through the crack and turned the button. After listening awhile and hearing no sound in the kitchen, he gently opened the squeaky old door. There was no one to be seen but the baby, sound asleep in her cradle. The outer door was open, but no Dog lying on the step as usual. Over the kitchen ...
— Two Little Savages • Ernest Thompson Seton
... tickled to frenzy by the caress of a female's velvet lips upon his rump, with a hoarse bubbling scream, wheeled suddenly, snapping the thin lead-cord that reached from the tail of the camel in front to the button in his nostril, and charged the lady in an exuberance of affection with a full broadside—thrust from his chest that bowled her over, where she lay among the fragments of two huge broken burnt-clay gumlas, that, filled with water, had ...
— Caste • W. A. Fraser
... poet. We didn't tell him, either—though we longed to. He was standing outside his prosperous-looking planing-mill, at about half-past eight of a dreaming October morning. Inside, the saws were making that droning, sweet-smelling, sawdust noise that made Colin think of "Adam Bede." The willows and button-wood trees at the back of the workshops were still smoking with sunlit mist, and the quiet, massive, pretty water looked like a sleepy mirror, as it softly flooded along to its work on ...
— October Vagabonds • Richard Le Gallienne
... their comfortable broughams, with their glasses down and their blinds drawn, to receive the air and to exclude the dust; some less provident were cavaliers, but, notwithstanding the well-watered roads, seemed a little dashed as they cast an anxious glance at the rose which adorned their button-hole, or fancied that they felt a flying black from a London chimney light upon the tip of ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... I'm tougher than the rest of them, or maybe I'm not as deeply conditioned. For one thing, I'm tone-deaf. Well, here's the way it is. Gregory can set the machine to function automatically. You stand where he shows you, press the button he shows you, and fifteen seconds later it'll take you forward in time five seconds and about a kilometer in space, to The Guide's office. He'll be at his desk now. You'll have forty-five seconds to do the job, from the time the field ...
— Hunter Patrol • Henry Beam Piper and John J. McGuire
... black horse hair; a black thimble-like cup, not much longer than the cup of an acorn, made of the black switch of a mule containing the liver of a scorpion. The horny head and neck of the huge black beetle, commonly known to negroes as the black Betsy Bug; the rattle and button of a rattlesnake; the fang-tooth of a cotton-mouth moccasin, the left hind foot of a frog, seeds of the stinging nettle, and pods of peculiar plants, all incased in a little sack made of a mole's hide. These were all given sufficient charm ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... Caffe Florian was under the superintendence of a female chef, and the waitresses used, in the case of certain visitors, to fasten a flower in the button-hole, perhaps allusively to the name. In the Piazza itself girls would do the same thing. A good deal of hospitality is, and has ever been, dispensed at Venice in the cafes and restaurants, which do ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... clothes, of course!" the tailor answered. "If you had a tailor's shop, as I have, you'd find that bill of yours a handy thing to have. When you wanted to make a button-hole in a piece of cloth all you'd need do would be to stick your ...
— The Tale of Ferdinand Frog • Arthur Scott Bailey
... "Edinburgh Review," were rising into celebrity.' Principal Robertson, the historian, had departed this life in 1793, a kindly old man. With beaming eyes underneath his frizzed and curled wig, and a trumpet tied with a black ribbon to the button-hole of his coat, for he was deaf, this most excellent of writers showed how he could be also the most zealous of diners. Old Adam Ferguson, the historian of Rome, had 'set,' also: one of the finest specimens of humanity had gone from among his people in him. Old people, not thirty years ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... I thought," said his niece, "but it wasn't, because I got her off at last and searched it through and through. I never saw anything like her clothes in all my life. There was hardly a button or a tape on; ...
— Lady of the Barge and Others, Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... When a button rolls under the bureau The search is a woeful affair; And the humorous weekly describes it but meekly In saying the hunter will swear. But what is that limited anger? The impotent rage of a cub! I only grow what you ...
— Tobogganing On Parnassus • Franklin P. Adams
... best!' quoth the Frenchman, who, in the firm faith that he had said a good thing, called Pierre to help him adorn the lion, and turned his back on the Swiss, who, in revenge, amused himself feeding the monkeys with an old button, a stump of a cigar, and various ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... surprise (Which competition still defies) - Our celebrated "Sir!!!" Then all the crowd take down our looks In pocket memorandum books. To diagnose, Our modest pose The kodaks do their best: If evidence you would possess Of what is maiden bashfulness, You only need a button press - And WE ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... of the present generation and the inconveniences of having whitewash falling into salads and puddings on their way to the dining room, and now at the back of the mermaid's tail was a potent little bone button, coloured black and practically invisible, and thus the bell-pull had been converted into an electric bell-push. In this way visitors could make their advent known without violent exertion, the ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson
... quality, of better reputation than Dr Feasible's; seven or eight baronets and knights; a bishop of Fernando Po; three or four general officers; and a dozen French and German visitors to the country, who had not only titles, but wore orders at their button-holes. Thus far had he advanced, when he met Newton Forster, and added him to the list of the invited. In about two hours afterwards, Dr Plausible returned home to his wife, ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... the church from the pastorate—a fine new brick residence standing flush upon the street. Theron mounted the steps, and looked about for a bell-pull. Search revealed instead a little ivory button set in a ring of metal work. He picked at this for a time with his finger-nail, before he made out the injunction, printed across it, to push. Of course! how stupid of him! This was one of those electric bells he had heard so much of, ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... many times. True, Joan was easily his master, but it made a good show for all that, for La Hire was a grand swordsman. What a swift creature Joan was! You would see her standing erect with her ankle-bones together and her foil arched over her head, the hilt in one hand and the button in the other—the old general opposite, bent forward, left hand reposing on his back, his foil advanced, slightly wiggling and squirming, his watching eye boring straight into hers—and all of a sudden she would give a spring forward, and back again; ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... been made, the Professor's next move was to apply a blowpipe to some of the metal from the pulverized ore, thus forming a small yellow button. This he dissolved in the aqua regia, formed by the combination of the two acids, and applied the usual ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Rockies • Frank Gee Patchin
... handkerchief, on opening which I perceived a new suit of livery of the most gaudy and showy description and lace; of which colour was also the coat, which had a standing collar and huge cuffs, deeply ornamented with worked button holes and large buttons. As I turned the things over, without even a guess of what they could mean, for I was scarcely well awake, I perceived a small slip of paper fastened to the coat sleeve, upon which, in Waller's hand-writing, the ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... knew that trick of absent-minded motion always presaged senatorial sermonizing, just as the soft laugh down in the crinkles of the white vest forewarned danger. ("When I see the tummy wrinkles coming, I always feel like telling the other fellow to get the button off his fencing sword—You bet that means business," Bat often confided to ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... Gaunt, who stood at some distance, had not time to observe the button on the glove, or she would have recognized her ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... have no concern in it': you cannot put him off in that way. He retorts the Latin adage upon you-Nihil humani a me alienum puto. He has got possession of a subject which is of universal and paramount interest (not 'a fee-grief, due to some single breast'), and on that plea may hold you by the button as long as he chooses. His delight is to harangue on what nowise regards himself: how then can you refuse to listen to what as little amuses you? Time and tide wait for no man. The business of the state admits of no ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... 'New York,' sir, and nothing else—Yes, here is 'Forwarded by Cane, Spriggs, and Button, Rio de Janeiro.' It must have been put into a ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... backed away from the bell, but the retreat was merely for the convenience of the moment. He understood that it might be inconvenient to press the button just then; but he had recovered his composure by this time, and he saw that the game must be his. Jimmy was trapped, and he hastened to ...
— The Gem Collector • P. G. Wodehouse
... contented herself with dressing in perfection. She lived in Paris, which she pretended to detest, because it was only in Paris that one could find things to exactly suit one's complexion. Besides out of Paris it was always more or less of a trouble to get ten-button gloves. When she railed at this serviceable city and you asked her where she would prefer to reside, she returned some very unexpected answer. She would say in Copenhagen, or in Barcelona; having, while making the tour of Europe, spent a couple of days at each of these places. On ...
— The American • Henry James
... tipped back against the wall, reading the evening paper while the giant wheels of the dynamo purr softly and steadily. He lowers his paper—looks at the clock—then out into the early twilight .... then slowly turns to the wall, pushes a bit of a button, takes up his paper again, and goes on with his reading—while a thousand lights burn ...
— The Long Ago • Jacob William Wright
... like men, and got shot by dozens; but till we struck you, I never laid eyes on one of you fellows all day long, and my eyesight's pretty good, too. Don't you think it is? I nailed you right under the nipple, there, within a hair of the button I sighted on. I leave it to you if that ain't pretty ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... a frock coat all buttoned up before, each button constricting his fat, with a bulge between. His trousers were made from a blanket once white, with a wide black band around the calf of each leg, and he wore fine doeskin moccasins, ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... of the boys, the captain lumbered towards them, waving a dirty piece of paper. "Read that," he roared, "just brought in by that copper-faced, shoe-button-eyed ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... brim; a high stiff checked cravat; a white vest; and lacquered military boots, over which his tightly-strapped trousers fell without a crease. He had white buckskin gloves, a stout silver-headed malacca cane, and carried a choice geranium in his button-hole. ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 2, February, 1891 • Various
... familiar voice and howled for release. Dr. Halding struck him roughly over the head and scrambled into the machine with him, reaching with his one disengaged hand for the self-starter button. Before he could touch it, the Mistress was on the running-board ...
— Bruce • Albert Payson Terhune
... this deprecatingly, since, very likely, it may substitute something more real and genuine, instead of the many shams on which men have heretofore founded their claims to public regard; but it behooves civilians to consider their wretched prospects in the future, and assume the military button ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 6, June, 1886, Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 6, June, 1886 • Various
... down the overdrive button. The universe of stars went out, while everything living in the ship felt the customary sensations of dizziness, of nausea, and of a spiraling fall to nothingness. ...
— This World Is Taboo • Murray Leinster
... "to pick up my men—and to get my uniform." When telling the story, Dawson again and again described to me his uniform, with which I happened by family association to be intimately acquainted. He did not spare me a badge or a button. I am convinced that no girl wore her first ball-dress with half the palpitating pride with which Dawson surveyed himself in his captain's kit. When I chaffed him gently, and hinted that the stars ...
— The Lost Naval Papers • Bennet Copplestone
... hold on by your throat, by your throat, As of old in the terrible tale; But he grapples you tight by the coat, by the coat, Till its buttons and button-holes fail. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... not tell; and then a groping hand lightly touched his face and drew away again. Walker said nothing, but held his breath and did not move. The hand was stretched out again. This time it touched his breast and moved across it until it felt a button of Walker's coat. Then it was snatched away and Walker heard a gasping in-draw of the breath and afterwards a sound as of a man turning in a flurry. Walker sprang forward and caught a naked shoulder with one hand, a naked arm with ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... once firm and good-humoured. He wore a pair of brogues[484],—Tartan hose which came up only near to his knees, and left them bare,—a purple camblet kilt[485],—a black waistcoat,—a short green cloth coat bound with gold cord,—a yellowish bushy wig,—a large blue bonnet with a gold thread button. I never saw a figure that gave a more perfect representation of a Highland gentleman. I wished much to have a picture of him just as he was. I found him frank and polite, in the true sense of ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... corner to be found anywhere. In the house it was the same. Perkins led the amazed procession from room to room of the house they had shut up for the winter. On the wall in the hall outside of every room was a button which he pushed, and the room became as light as day before they entered. The cellar door, in opening, automatically lighted a lamp illuminating that cavern as it had never been lighted before since the day a house ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson
... d'Uxelles.—Chop fine a dozen small button mushrooms, or half a dozen large ones; parsley and chives, of each enough to make a teaspoonful when finely chopped; of lean ham a tablespoonful, and one small shallot. Fry gently in a tablespoonful of butter, ...
— Choice Cookery • Catherine Owen
... don't offend me. They can't aim; They only set their own rent sails on fire.— But if they could, I would not hide a button To save ten lives like mine. I have no cause To prize it, I assure 'ee.—Ah, look there, One of the women hit,—and badly, too. Poor wench! Let some one shift her ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... 509. The whole place seemed pitched to that subdued note, as if it were a sanctuary from the clash and clamor without its walls. Thompson walked down a hushed corridor over a velvet carpet that muffled his footfalls and so came at last to the proper door, where he pressed a black button in the center of a brass plate. The door opened almost upon the instant. A maid eyed him ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... man had sunk back in his chair, and only his little deep-blue eyes seemed living. Then he moved one hand, and Mr. Ventnor saw that he was fumbling to reach the button of an electric bell at the end of a cord. 'I'll show him,' he thought, and stepping forward, he ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... a sign to her husband, as if to encourage him in cutting the enemy out of the commission, coute que coute; then she glanced ironically at the two Cruchots, who looked chap-fallen. Grandet seized the banker by a button and drew him into ...
— Eugenie Grandet • Honore de Balzac
... restaurant Mr. Brunelli conducted Katy. The house was dark and the shades were lowered; but Mr. Brunelli touched an electric button by the basement door, and they ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... may look, lass,' said he, 'but a'd thought better on thee. It's like last week thy last sweetheart were drowned; but thou's not one to waste time i' rememberin' them as is gone—if, indeed, thou iver cared a button for yon Kinraid—if it ...
— Sylvia's Lovers — Complete • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... reverend with books—however his horses may out-trot other horses, and his yachts outsail all yachts—the gentleman is king and master of these and not their servant; he wears them for ornament, like the ring upon his finger or the flower in his button-hole, and if they go the gentleman remains. He knows that all their worth came from human genius and human training; and loving man more than the works of man, he instinctively shuns whatever in the shape of man is degraded, outraged, and forsaken. He ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... for the hen to lay a new one to; a very little will do, but even the boys know that there must be a germ of increment left, and when they stole the coppers from the Ecce Homo chapel not long since, they still left one centesimo and a waistcoat button on the floor. ...
— Ex Voto • Samuel Butler
... the way of it; but after I had gone to dress Mrs. Wimbush came up to see him, with the inevitable result that when I returned I found him under arms and flushed and feverish, though decorated with the rare flower she had brought him for his button-hole. He came down to dinner, but Lady Augusta Minch was very shy of him. To-day he's in great pain, and the advent of ces dames—I mean of Guy Walsingham and Dora Forbes— doesn't at all console me. It does Mrs. Wimbush, however, for she has consented to his remaining ...
— The Death of the Lion • Henry James
... according to testimony elicited by our reporter, simply caused a slight perturbation of the lights in the tunnel, but did not extinguish them. Five minutes later the work of disconnection and reconnection began, but only two of the six charges were ready for the pressure of the button when the last flash interrupted the proceedings. The fact that the time of the explosion corresponded to the second with that of the aerial electrical discharge furnishes indubitable evidence that the accident was not caused ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 324, March 18, 1882 • Various
... said Mr. Brown. He pressed a button in the toy bear's back and, all of a sudden, its ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue in the Big Woods • Laura Lee Hope
... worth anything here below! Do you know the story of the man who found a button in his hash, and called the waiter? 'What do you call that?' says he. 'Well,' said the waiter, 'what d'you expect? Expect to find a gold watch and chain?' Heavenly apologue, is it not? I expected (rather) to find a gold watch and chain; ...
— Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 2 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... room as possible, dusting each one thoroughly, and cover the larger ones which must remain with old sheets or large squares of common unbleached cotton cloth, kept for this purpose. If the furniture is rep or woolen of any description, dust about each button, that no moth may find lodgment, and then cover closely. A feather duster, long or short, as usually applied, is the enemy of cleanliness. Its only legitimate use is for the tops of pictures or books ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell
... head, listened for the beating of his heart, tried to feel his breath. He then dragged him into the room, and placed him upon a divan; he loosened the fastenings about his neck; the head drooped, and there was not a sign of life. Next he looked for a bell; the electric button caught his eye, and he pressed it. To prevent any one from coming in, he took his stand close by the door. In a moment there was a knock, the door opened, and he showed his ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... expected. Boswell tells us that Guthrie's reports were sent to Johnson for revision (ante, p. 118). Nay, even a whole speech now and then may be from his hand. It is very likely that he wrote, for instance, the Debate on buttons and button-holes (Gent. Mag. viii. 627), and the Debate on the registration of seamen (ib. xi.). But it is absurd to attribute to him passages such as the following, which in certain numbers are plentiful ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... intrenched in the deep fireplace; and the tender joints of the enormous boeuf roti were ready to bear their share in the festivities almost as soon as the invited company. Separated with great cleavers, and laid into white button-wood trays hollowed out for the purpose, they were borne rapidly to the shady nook selected for the dining-place, followed by vast supplies of sweet potatoes, roasted in the ashes, and of rich, golden maize bread. A barrel of rare cider was broached; while good old-fashioned puddings, and the luscious ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid
... Cross in the supreme critical moment when the mere war with Germany was being stupendously precipitated into forty wars of forty nations with themselves, at the very moment when with one touch of a button the new vision of the people could have been turned on instead of the old one and the hundred million people stood there asking them, snapped off the light, dismissed the hundred million people—clapped them back into their ten thousand cities ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... Palmer, holding Mr. Walsingham by the button, proceeded to recapitulate some of Dr. Wheeler's prognostics; and at every pause, Mr. Walsingham turned impatiently, so as almost to twist off the detaining button, repeating, in the words of the king of Prussia to his physician, "C'est un ane! C'est un ane! C'est un ane!"—"Pshaw! ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... caring a button for its being very dark. Darkness is cheap, and Scrooge liked it. But before he shut his heavy door, he walked through his rooms to see that all was right. He had just enough recollection of the face to ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... vestibule below was a letter-box into which no letter would go, and an electric button from which no mortal finger could coax a ring. Also appertaining thereunto was a card bearing the name "Mr. James Dillingham Young." The "Dillingham" had been flung to the breeze during a former ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... call and see me?" Sylvie Argenter asked one day, when she had walked over to the shop with a small basket, in which to put brown bread, little fine rolls for her mother, and some sugar cookies. Ray and Dot were both there. Dot was sitting with her sewing, putting in finishing stitches, button-holes, and the like. She was behind the counter, ready to mind the calls. Ray had come in to see what was wanting of fresh supplies ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... which had brought up my dinner contained another set of electric buttons, corresponding with the numbers on the mirror; and he explained to me that if I would select any state or country and touch the corresponding button the news of the day, from that state or country, would appear in the mirror. He called my attention to, the fact that every guest in the room had in front of him a similar mirror, and many of them were reading the news of the day as they ate. ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... went on the porter, escorting Roy to a deep, soft chair. "I'll be right back yeah, an' if youh wants me, all youh has to do is push this yeah button," and he showed Roy an electric button fixed near ...
— The Boy from the Ranch - Or Roy Bradner's City Experiences • Frank V. Webster
... Pressing the push-button beside my bed, I strove to hear the sound of the bell, though I well knew it was impossible for the sound to rise three stories to me even if the bell did ring. It rang all right, for a few minutes later Brown ...
— The Strength of the Strong • Jack London
... by nearly three months of buffeting on the element he so loathed, Wolfe spared himself no effort. He was not only a fighting, but to the highest degree an organizing, general. Every sickly and unlikely man, small as was his force, was weeded out. Every commissariat detail down to the last gaiter-button was carefully scrutinized. Seldom had England sent out a body of men so perfect in discipline, spirit, and material of war, and assuredly none so well commanded since the days of Marlborough. It was well it was so, seeing that they were destined to attack one of the strongest ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... compliments," he said; "and hopes you have slept. Entre nous, you know, he doesn't care a brass button for such things as we saw last night; but if we didn't keep discipline here, we should have our throats cut ...
— The Iron Pirate - A Plain Tale of Strange Happenings on the Sea • Max Pemberton
... as loudly as you can!" cried his uncle, quickly. "We must warn the others." And thus admonished, Dave put his finger on the button of the electric horn and held it down for some time. Looking backward, those in the Wadsworth car soon saw the Basswood machine come into sight and then slow down. The heavy clap of thunder was now followed by another fierce downfall of rain, while the sky grew blacker than ever. ...
— Dave Porter At Bear Camp - The Wild Man of Mirror Lake • Edward Stratemeyer
... the church, had been too completely quelled by outward circumstances to take any notice of Joe Mixet, who was standing there, quite unabashed, with a splendid nosegay in his button-hole. She certainly had no right on this occasion to complain of her husband's silence. Whereas she could hardly bring herself to utter the responses in a voice loud enough for the clergyman to catch the familiar words, ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... hadn't I, when I saw the whole thing? And didn't you get throwed further than any of the rest? That was because you didn't have any oar left to hold on to. You ought to be made to pay for the boat, that's what. No back talk now, or else I'll show you who's boss here. Button up your lips, d'you hear, ...
— Fred Fenton on the Crew - or, The Young Oarsmen of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... recommend to our ministers the most probable method of raising a large sum for the payment of the troops of the electorate, I should, instead of the tax and lottery now proposed, advise them to establish a certain number of licensed wheelbarrows, on which the laudable trade of thimble and button might be carried on for the support of the war, and shoeboys might contribute to the defence of the house of Austria, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... marching ever forward since the beginnings of the World. The enormous, all-conquering, flame-crowned Host, noble every soldier in it; sacred, and alone noble. Let him who is not of it hide himself; let him tremble for himself. Stars at every button cannot make him noble; sheaves of Bath-garters, nor bushels of Georges; nor any other contrivance but manfully enlisting in it, valiantly taking place and step in it. O Heavens, will he not bethink himself; he too is so needed ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle
... the mail—or anybody else that wants the job. Uncle Sammy won't hop on to my collar button, because of the fine send-off my friend the inspector'll give. And somebody will get orry-eyed up in town, and come down to find what's loose. He'll take the bags then. It's ...
— The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch • Henry Wallace Phillips
... He followed closely and entered the room just as Ferriday found the electric button and switched on ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... soundings, for fear of being driven back again or on some unknown sand. I lay still all night. At 5 o'clock the next morning the tide began to slacken: at 6 I weighed with the wind at south-east by east, a handsome breeze. We just weathered the Button; and, sounding several times, had still between 30 and 40 fathom. When we were abreast of the Button, and about 2 leagues from the westermost point of Java, we had 34 fathom, small peppery sand. You may either come between this island and Java, or, if the ...
— A Continuation of a Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier
... Foo Chow, Mr. Gouverneur was fortunate in securing the services of a Chinese interpreter named Ling Kein, a mandarin of high order, who wore the "blue button," significant of his rank. In addition to this distinction he wore on his hat the peacock feather, an official reward of merit. He was a Chinese of remarkable intelligence, well versed in English as well as in the Chinese vernacular, and was also the master of several dialects. ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur
... in a very thoughtful mood, already conscious that she was more than half in love with this good-looking lad who had come so strangely into her life. And at the corner of Praed Street she ran up against Mr. Melky Rubinstein, and button-holed him, and for ten minutes talked seriously to him. Melky, who had good reasons of his own for keeping in his cousin's favour, listened like a lamb to all she had to say, and went off promising implicit obedience ...
— The Orange-Yellow Diamond • J. S. Fletcher
... life like Nick's; and he repeated that for his part he would never allow it. It would be on his conscience to interfere. To which Peter returned disingenuously that they might all do as they liked—it didn't matter a button to him. And with an effort to carry off that comedy he ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... eyes, and a moustachio. He was dressed in a complete suit of pink and white plaid, cut jauntily enough. A bright blue cap, a thick gold watch-chain, three or four large rings, a dog-whistle from his button-hole, a fancy cane in his hand, and a little Oxford meerschaum in his mouth, completed his equipment. He lounged in, with an air of careless superiority, while Tom, who was behind the counter, cutting up his day's provision ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... there were the two younger girls altering the position of chairs according to their mother's directions; there were actually two guests—not very alarming ones, only the curate and his wife, both rather gaunt, bony people. He was button-holing the Canon, and she was trying to do the same by the Canoness about some parish casualty. The Canon hoped to escape in the welcome to his sister-in-law and niece, but he was immediately secured again, while his wife found it requisite to hurry off else where, leaving Mrs. ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... have ye the conscience to send hame such a piece o' wark as that coat to ony decent man? Do ye dare to imagine that I am a Jerusalem spider, that I could be crammed, neck and heels, into such a thing as that? Fye, shame—it would not button on yourself, man, scarecrow-looking mortal though ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... know the Paris police—that's evident," returned the journalist. "They would throw fits on the floor if I were so much as to carry off a coat-button. No, we must hide the coat and stick in the bushes again, and ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... ceased, and two tears which had gathered in the czarina's eyes stole down her cheeks. As if drawn by an invisible hand, she crossed the room, and, stooping down, pressed a tiny golden button which was fastened to the floor. A whirr was heard, the floor opened and revealed a winding staircase which led from her cabinet to the room ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... shirt-bands and ruffles were worked in silver; and his gloves, Spanish, breathing out the choicest perfume; his hat was of French murrey, the brims thick set with gold twist and spangles; round it was a band of goldsmith's work, looped with a crystal button. ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... good for me; and as for Maurice he has got back his old round boyish face; he eats like an ogre, walks all day, sleeps like a top, bathes in the morning and has laid on flesh so that his clothes won't button. At Esneh we fell in with handsome Hassan, who is now Sheykh of the Abab'deh, as his elder brother died. He gave us a letter to his brother at Syaleh, up in Nubia; ordering him to get up a gazelle hunt for Maurice, ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... 'slush' and snow, on the borders of a picturesque ditch and roadside, winterly delights, Sunday and week day alike. The tendency of human nature is to look on the bright side of things; and it is much more pleasant to go to the edge of a large swamp, lie down and bask in the summer's sun, making 'button-holes' of daisies, buttercups, and the like, and return home and extol the fine scenery and praise the richness of the land, than to take the spade, in shirt-sleeves and heavy boots, and drain the poisonous water from the roots of vegetation. Nevertheless, it has ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... on the instrument board to assist in starting. Pulling out this button closes a butterfly choker valve (see cut) in the air intake passage of carbureter which restricts the air opening of the carbureter, and consequently produces ...
— Marvel Carbureter and Heat Control - As Used on Series 691 Nash Sixes Booklet S • Anonymous
... mind telling you. You know I tried to mark Merriwell for life by punching my foil through the mask that protected his face while we were engaged in a fencing bout. I had prepared my foil for that in advance by fixing the button so I could remove it, and by sharpening the point of the foil. I wanted to spoil ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish
... accompany her father, and hoped to be a real comfort to him. She would take charge of his cabin and keep it in beautiful order, and repair his clothes, and take care that a button was never wanting; and would pour out his coffee and tea, and write out his journal and keep his accounts, she hoped. And should he fall sick, how carefully she would watch over him; indeed, she flattered herself that she could be of no slight use. Then, she might be a companion to Walter, who ...
— The South Sea Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston
... certain extent took my place in Therese's favour was the old father of the dancing girls inhabiting the ground floor. In a tall hat and a well-to-do dark blue overcoat he allowed himself to be button-holed in the hall by Therese who would talk to him interminably with downcast eyes. He smiled gravely down at her, and meanwhile tried to edge towards the front door. I imagine he didn't put a great value on Therese's favour. Our ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... mode" of treating lumbago, advocated by Dr. Day, is a form of counter-irritation, said to have been introduced into this country by the late Sir Anthony Carlisle, and which consists in the instantaneous application of a flat iron button, gently heated in a spirit-lamp, to the skin. Dr. Corrigan published, about three years ago, an account of some cases very successfully treated by nearly similar means. Dr. Corrigan's plan was, however, to touch the surface of the part affected, at intervals of half an inch, as lightly ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... Knight-mare who was standing close beside her, laid a protecting hand upon her shoulder. When she saw what had been holding her down, she gave a little shriek. It was a small spotted cow in a red flannel petticoat. She wore stout button boots on her hind feet, and she now reared herself upon these to flourish two angry hoofs over the sleek head of a little man in a white linen coat who held a tiny mirror in one hand and a pair of pincers ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... Ardel pressed a button and gave an attendant the necessary order. "Be so good as to bring the ...
— The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantmas" Detective Tales • mile Souvestre and Marcel Allain
... navel. I remained with her for some time, during which she was endeavouring to get it off, to effect which she made use of the small bone of the leg of the kangaroo, round the point of which Bennillong had rolled some punk, so that it looked not unlike the button of a foil. She held it every now and then to the fire, then applied and pressed it to the navel until it cooled. This was persevered in, till the mother thought the cord sufficiently deadened, and then with a shell ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... Clementine: "I have not yet shown you all the nice things I brought. His majesty, the Emperor of all the Russias, made me a present of a little enamelled gold star hanging at the end of a ribbon. Do you like button-hole ribbons?" ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... while Franklin remained at the market. It was Franklin who, bethinking himself of the commercial difference between hard black horn and soft, spongy bone, began the earliest shipments of the tips of the buffalo horns, which he employed a man to saw off and pack into sacks ready for the far-off button factories. Many tons of these tips alone he came to ship, such had been the incredible abundance and the incredible waste; and thus thriving upon an industry whose cause and whose possibility he deplored, he came to realize considerable sums and ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough
... may without Vanity say, that I have struck some of the boldest and most successful Strokes of any Man in Great Britain. I was the first that struck the Long Pocket about two Years since: I was likewise the Author of the Frosted Button, which when I saw the Town came readily into, being resolved to strike while the Iron was hot, I produced much about the same time the Scallop Flap, the knotted Cravat, and made a fair Push for ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele |
