Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Loosened   Listen
adjective
loosened  adj.  
1.
Having constraints removed.
Synonyms: freed.
2.
Straightened out; untangled.
Synonyms: disentangled, unsnarled.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Loosened" Quotes from Famous Books



... Bank, looking out through slender bars—exactly as the Penniman lion did—upon a world that wanted money, but couldn't have it without some good reason. He had not been present when the Whipple money was so thoughtlessly loosened, and he would be just the man to make a fuss about it now. He would want to take it back and put it behind those bars in the bank where no one could get it. But he couldn't ever have it back, because it was spent. Still, he might do something ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson

... with a start, half puzzled, seeking and finding an explanation in the faint, conscious humour which loosened the lines ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore

... picked up his pipe—which he had left on the stone—slipped across toward the window, moved a loosened stone and drew out from a cavity in the wall a green bundle from which some straps were hanging. These he buckled on as a body-harness. Stuart had never seen fingers that moved so quickly, or which had less ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... a sharper quality; Cally lay wide-eyed, in a dazed chill wonder. Once in the night she pushed up the curtain, raised herself on an elbow in the stateroom berth; and her splendid gay hair, loosened with much tossing, streamed downward over her shoulders. Outside was a world of moonlit peace. The flying trees had tops of silver; meadows danced by in splotches of light and shade; once they sped over a lovely river. Strange to think, that if she had but said on that far-away day, ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison

... threatened in turn. But all to no avail. The horses held stolidly to their gait, plodding—even, after a time, dropping into slower movement. Whereat Felipe, abandoning all hope, flung down reins and whip, and leaped off the reach of the rigging. Prompt with the loosened lines the team came to a full stop; and Felipe, snatching up a blanket, covered his head and shoulders with it and squatted in the scant ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton

... should not forget to recall the strong impression he made upon his contemporaries as a man of genius, the testimony to the charm of his conversation and the goodness of his heart, nor the pioneer service he rendered to letters before the provincial fetters were at all loosened. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... longed to destroy the pillory; and had the lightning of his eye had power to blast, the gypsy girl would have been reduced to ashes long before she reached the platform. Without a word she approached the sufferer, loosened a gourd from her girdle, and raised it gently to the parched lips of the miserable man. Then from his eye a great tear trickled, and rolled slowly down the misshapen face, so ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... said he, "has by this time a considerable body of prisoners. There is at least one criminal among the number to whom justice should be dealt. Our oath forbids us all recourse to law; and discretion would forbid it equally if the oath were loosened. May I inquire ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson

... down the bank and stood beside him so close that her hair, loosened by the wind, was blown against his shoulder. She pressed it back and gazed into his eyes. The inner glow had worn through at last. She was all warmth, all flame now. She smiled with soft and parted lips. "Do you think that was the truth of you, my dear," she said, "my truth of you? ...
— Snow-Blind • Katharine Newlin Burt

... pinafore and trousers, and wearing a flat, black skull-cap, made of rolls of some material joined together, suddenly stood up and threw a small bundle on board, after which he scrambled over the side himself, nodding and smiling to all around. The rope was loosened by the man in the boat, the paddle-wheels began to beat the water again, and I watched the canoe as it ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn

... white wine. During the first quarter of an hour nothing could be heard but the noise of jaws masticating, glasses and forks clinking; but when the savory pastries, the cold game and the hams had disappeared, and had been replaced by goblets of hot Burgundy and boiling coffee, then tongues became loosened. Julien, to his infinite disgust, was forced again to be present at a conversation similar to the one at the time of the raising of the seals, the coarseness of which had so astonished and shocked him. After the anecdotes of the chase were exhausted, the ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... kneeled down and called her name: there was no sound. Gently he turned her face upward: it was ghastly white and the eyes were closed. "Annie, dear Annie, do speak!" But there was no answer. He unbuttoned her habit, loosened her collar, felt her hands and wrist, then started up and looked wildly round him ...
— Black Beauty • Anna Sewell

... found that they felt more pain than pleasure from such visits. Emily hardly ever uttered more than a monosyllable. Charlotte was sometimes excited sufficiently to speak eloquently and well—on certain subjects; but before her tongue was thus loosened, she had a habit of gradually wheeling round on her chair, so as almost to conceal her face from the person ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell

... trial. Several little children were examined, and these shouted out in the witness-stand, that when the afflicted woman bit her lip in her grief, they were seized with bodily pains, which continued until she loosened her teeth. The chronicles of the court tell us, with much solemnity, that when the woman's hands were tied her victims did not suffer, but the moment the cords were removed ...
— My Native Land • James Cox

... a moment of suspense and suppressed excitement, when, with a sharp cry, the miner loosened his hold, and by the impulse of our own weight we shot, with a velocity not to be described, two hundred and forty-feet into the earth. The miner acting as a brake brought us up gently enough, so that ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 • Various

... ready or too extended a publicity. There is some danger lest there be no real religion in the heart which craves too much of daily sympathy. Through your mind the stream of life has coursed with such rapidity that it has often swept away the seed or loosened the roots of the young plants before ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... leader of the broncho boys loosened his revolvers and glanced to see if his rifle was ready for ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor

... drinking wine, vermouth, and greenish opaline draughts of absinthe. Staggering in unnerved and stupefied from the previous night's debauch, they show few signs of vitality until four or five glasses of the absinthe have been drunk, and then they awaken; their eyes brighten and their tongues are loosened—the routine of play, smoke, and ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice

... crest. It was all I could do to cross this space, and there was no foundation to enable us to widen it so as to make a path for an animal. It was forlorn hope but we made the most of it. We unpacked the mule and getting all our ropes together, made a leading line of it. Then we loosened and threw down all the projecting points of rocks we could above the narrow shelf, and every piece that was likely to come loose in the shelf itself. We fastened the leading line to her and with one above and one below we thought we could help her to keep her ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly

... the chimney-piece is as solid as it looks?' Henry proceeded. 'When you came in, I was just wondering whether this figure here had not accidentally got loosened from the wall behind it.' He laid his hand on the marble forehead, for the third time. 'To my eye, it looks a little out of the perpendicular. I almost fancied I could jog the head just now, when I touched it.' He pressed the head inwards as he said ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins

... Esquimaux chief approached the captives, who had been drawn close together on their sleds. The leader of the natives had in his hands some queer looking stuff. At a sign from him several of the other Esquimaux loosened the ...
— Through the Air to the North Pole - or The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch • Roy Rockwood

... sensation of fear came over me as I thoroughly realised that I was buried alive in that sand-cave. I felt that my climbing about on the top of the cliff had loosened or cracked the compressed sand. Shock and I had jumped about over it when we threw down the wood we had gathered, and that seemed to be the explanation of ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn

... slides, etc., and these and other forms of erosion can best be prevented by leaving the brush on the ground, either laid in the incipient washes or scattered over the soil that is likely to wash. Brush burning destroys the valuable soil cover, and on the spots where the piles are burned the soil is loosened, which renders it ...
— Practical Forestry in the Pacific Northwest • Edward Tyson Allen

... as a ruler, the idea of omnipotent control, refusal to allow his subordinates to take their share of responsibility, like many similar instances which history records, loosened the bond of patriotic interest, love and integrity for country, and made easy the ingress of the French in subduing and appropriating ...
— Shadow and Light - An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century • Mifflin Wistar Gibbs

... councillor, as he loosened his clasp, "my political fortune is made; this morning all the newspapers, without exception, have spoken of the seizure of my pamphlet; and you ought to see how the opposition ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... was in nearly complete darkness. Gordon loosened his knife and tightened his grip on the ...
— Police Your Planet • Lester del Rey

... The boy loosened the traces and led the horse to water, and Babcock, after a word with the Captain, and an encouraging smile to Tom, turned away. He meant to go to the engineer's office before his return to town, now that his affairs with Grogan were settled. As he swung ...
— Tom Grogan • F. Hopkinson Smith

... delicate features seemed cold and rigid enough for a cenotaph. Even the lips were still and compressed, and a bluish shadow lay about their dimpled corners, and under the heavy jet eyelashes. Her silver comb had become loosened, and was finally dragged down by the coil of hair that slipped slowly until it fell upon the morocco cushion of the seat, and the glistening waves of gray hair rolled around her shoulders, and rippled low on her brow. Sea fog had dampened and sea wind tossed this mass of white ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson

... moment the lighthouse-keeper issued from the door of the building. Running towards the old man, he and his wife quickly raised him and loosened his neckcloth. His face had been slightly cut by the fall. Blood and dust besmeared it ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne

... bank, and all traces of its origin were quite lost, except that an old lady, who was born in 1724, remembered having seen in her youth, persons kneeling before this stone and praying. The transmission of the tradition through very nearly three centuries proved correct, for on its being loosened by the frosts of a severe winter, it fell, and its religious distinction became immediately apparent from the sculpture with which it was adorned.—Eddowes' Shrewsbury ...
— Folklore as an Historical Science • George Laurence Gomme

... scattered instantly. They screamed and ran. Their skirts fluttered; their head cloths loosened; their milk-pails rolled about ...
— Invisible Links • Selma Lagerlof

... the holes in the walls and the loosened boards in the flooring where Zerkow had been searching for the gold plate. Of late he had been digging in the back yard and had ransacked the hay in his horse-shed for the concealed leather chest he imagined he would find. But he was becoming ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris

... songs, and his strength by such gymnastic exercises as he could carry out without the aid of any movable article. At first he struck out his arms as if fighting, so many hundred of times; then he took to walking on his hands; and at last he loosened one of the stones which formed the top of the bed, and invented all sorts ...
— The Cornet of Horse - A Tale of Marlborough's Wars • G. A. Henty

... not go to bed while this was going on, so she sat listening, till she should hear the noise of feet about the house. Silently she loosened the lock of her own door, so that the sound might more certainly come to her, and she sat thinking what she might best do. It had not been quite eleven when she came upstairs, and at twelve she did not hear anything. And yet she was almost sure that they must be still together ...
— Miss Mackenzie • Anthony Trollope

... the guides had not dissuaded them from attempting to go up Mont Blanc—only advised them to wait till a threatening cloud had passed. When it was gone, they all set out in high spirits; the guides cutting holes in the snow for their feet. This it is supposed loosened the snow newly fallen, and a quantity poured down over their heads. Mr. Dornford had pushed on before the guides; he shook off the snow as it fell, and felt no apprehension: on the contrary, he laughed as he pawed it away, and was making his way on, when he heard a cry from his companions, ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth

... find so many contradictions to our sentiments in society and conversation, and such an uncertainty from the incessant changes of our situation, that we seek some other standard of merit and demerit, which may not admit of so great variation. Being thus loosened from our first station, we cannot afterwards fix ourselves so commodiously by any means as by a sympathy with those, who have any commerce with the person we consider. This is far from being as lively ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume

... would be very likely to be shot before he got his gun. I remember going through the Red Sea; at the mouth of it where the entrance is narrow, and the currents run strong, when the ship approaches the dangerous place, the men take their stations at appointed places, and the ponderous anchors are loosened and ready to be dropped in an instant if the swirl of the current sweeps the ship into dangerous proximity to the reef. It is no time to cut the lashings of the anchors when the keel is grating on the coral rocks. And it is no time to ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren

... awakened by the noise of a loosened blind, and slipping into a dressing-gown went through the passage to fasten the latch. Passing Nancy's room I heard a moan, and, startled out of myself, listened to hear another, and still another, as though a heart were breaking. There was a light in the room, and through a small ...
— Nancy Stair - A Novel • Elinor Macartney Lane

... widening of the field of Nature by geographical and astronomical discovery; the revelation of the noble ideals of antique literature by the revival of classical learning; the stir of thought, throughout all classes of society, by the printers' work, loosened traditional bonds and weakened the hold of mediaeval Supernaturalism. In the interests of liberal culture and of national welfare, the humanists were eager to lend a hand to anything which tended to the discomfiture ...
— Lectures and Essays • Thomas Henry Huxley

... for about a hundred miles, panted and palpitated like a dying horse. The great locomotive was, indeed, in a pitiable condition. The brass of the journals and boxes was melted by the heat; the steel tires were actually red-hot, and the steam issued from all the loosened joints. ...
— Chasing an Iron Horse - Or, A Boy's Adventures in the Civil War • Edward Robins

... my gown, and ran after with noisy footsteps. I started, and quickly turned to face my assailant, expecting to see a bear at least. I found instead—a dead branch which had caught in my dress and was dragging behind me. I loosened the branch from its hold, and went on. But though I laughed at the absurdity, I found my nerves a little shaken. Just as I reached the wren corner a shriek arose, as if I had stepped on a whole family of birdlings. Again I started, when a saucy squirrel ran out on the branch of a tree, scolding ...
— Upon The Tree-Tops • Olive Thorne Miller

... roof was as golden, Though dusty the straw was and old, The wind had a peal as of trumpets, Though blowing and barren and cold, The mother's hair was a glory Though loosened and torn, For under the eaves in the ...
— Poems • G.K. Chesterton

... the outer office he came back to his desk. He took a deep breath and loosened his tie. Dreams like Miss Ralston didn't materialize every day. For a first meeting he figured he hadn't fared too badly at all. And if this first date went well he was sure he'd be seeing a ...
— The Observers • G. L. Vandenburg

... follow him," he said, drawing on his stockings and boots. "Tiles were loosened the whole way along, and in his hurry he had dropped this. It confirms my diagnosis, as you ...
— The Sign of the Four • Arthur Conan Doyle

... startling discovery. The canoe had been carelessly tied and the jar of her tumble had loosened it altogether. Yielding to the current it began to move down the stream, and Dorothy's alarm found vent in an ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith

... by salt sad kisses, By Pity's webs that still with fiery strands Wove us together, by the unplumbed abysses Where we have gazed and never loosened hands, By holy water we have given each other At Beauty's blessed doors, and by the hearts Of sweet Delight and Agony her brother, By bright new marriages in all great arts, By the rare wisdom like miraculous amber Won by the desolate grey sound of tears, By wedding-music ...
— The Hours of Fiammetta - A Sonnet Sequence • Rachel Annand Taylor

... upon my soul, this is the whole truth: When I saw you drop the pistol and sink back upon the floor, I knew that you had fainted. I ordered the vaqueros to secure the weapon and make Basilio descend to the ground. Then I ran upstairs, placed you on the bed, loosened your clothing, and did what I could to restore you. ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow

... saw it on the third day, when much heat and swelling had taken place. I ordered the parts to be frequently bathed with warm water. The heat and tenderness to a considerable degree subsided, and the pitch-plaster was carefully applied. At the expiration of a week the plaster began to be loosened. A second one was applied, and when a fortnight longer had passed, a slight degree ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt

... rods in the wake. The mother watched the race, breathless, numb, with all-seeing eye. Her hands gripped the oaken bar fastened across that end of the ferryboat which was farthest out in the river and she stretched forward head and body, heedless of the down-tumbling mass of her loosened hair, reckless of everything but the fate of her boy. Her strained gaze kept focussed on the precious ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable

... a prey to alarm as we were. We rubbed her hands and let the hose play gently but perseveringly on her unconscious brow. The girls loosened her dress, though it was only the kind that comes down straight without a waist. And we were all doing what we could as hard as we could, when we heard the click of the front gate. There was no mistake ...
— The Wouldbegoods • E. Nesbit

... by the arms and with mock violence shook and thrust him deep down into the damaged hillock. She seemed to be making an outlet for some happiness too great to be contained. He laughed and shouted and struggled, pushed and pulled her. Her hat fell off, her hair loosened and the sun showered gold of many shades upon it. She released him and stood up, straightening and smoothing her hair and breathing quickly, the color high in ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips

... loosened and the lips parted to hear the first diminution in the growl of the flame. But it ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge

... hand will lose not, Nor the loosened tongue betray. Signed, and with our sailing orders, We will ...
— Songs from Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey

... loosened his tongue; I had but to choose my time for learning his story. Something told me that I had gained his confidence and that, so far as attention and attitude might go, I was "in" for responsibilities. But somehow I didn't dread them. "Before you ...
— A Passionate Pilgrim • Henry James

... by earth, straw, or litter thrown over them. In the Spring, they may be transplanted to their permanent locations; the tops shortened in to six inches, and the roots shortened in to about six inches from the stem. The soil for their reception should be moderately light and rich, and loosened up to the depth of ...
— The Cultivation of The Native Grape, and Manufacture of American Wines • George Husmann

... 1945 marked not only the end of Britain's planetary domination but the termination of Europe's planetary regency. The events of the period also loosened the bonds that had ...
— Civilization and Beyond - Learning From History • Scott Nearing

... Allow it to stand at least thirty minutes. Then rub down with a cloth to an even stain. It is better to allow the stain to stand a day or so. This gives time for the stain to set before applying the wax. Otherwise, some of the stain will be loosened and removed when waxing and a lighter shade of stain ...
— The Library of Work and Play: Gardening and Farming. • Ellen Eddy Shaw

... business to throw away his money in that way. Gervaise listened with a faint smile; she had no idea of scolding. Oh no, it was not worth the trouble, but she was much agitated at seeing the two men together so soon again, and with trembling hands she knotted up her loosened hair. ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... have thought this the case with those especially who have been reared in the principles of prejudice, and often in none other, for "prejudices, it is well known, are the most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilized by education. They grow there as ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper

... he was presented to the vicarage of Hursley, which he held till his death; he was author of "Lyra Innocentium," and along with Newman and others of "Lyra Apostolica"; the secession of Newman rather riveted than loosened his attachment to ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... at my good luck as I reached the high bank. There, a few rods down shore, beside the open water sat Tom Barrett, calling something out to his folks across the river, and from upstream came the deafening thunder of the Onondaga Jam that, loosened by the rain, was shouldering its terrific force downwards with the strength of a ...
— The Moccasin Maker • E. Pauline Johnson

... this, so as to use the protection of the shadow, and was dreaming of no danger, when a rattling of gravel and debris caused him to look up, and he saw an immense mass of rock, that had become loosened in some way, descending straight ...
— In the Pecos Country • Edward Sylvester Ellis (AKA Lieutenant R.H. Jayne)

... cups and saucers;—it will be twice as good in them;' and as the handsome mistress of the mansion, sitting in the deal chair, loosened her cloak and untied her bonnet, she chatted away, to the edification of Margery and ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... authority, and had loved self to an unusual degree; and when he simply heard some one mention the Divine, and especially when he heard him mention the Lord, he was so excited by hatred arising from anger as to burn with the desire to kill; and when the reins of his love were loosened he wished to be the devil himself, that from his love of self he might continually infest heaven. This is the desire also of some of the Papist religion when they perceive in the other life that the Lord has all power ...
— Heaven and its Wonders and Hell • Emanuel Swedenborg

... my malady is rapid. Like the stone that is loosened from the mountain-top and gathers force as it falls, so is it with ...
— Pepita Ximenez • Juan Valera

... there being strong gales to the westward, I brought-to, with the ship's head to the northward; but in the mooring of the 3d, the wind being more moderate, we loosened the reef of the mainsail, set the top-sails, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr

... thousand feet into a wadi, now a rushing torrent, and up a rocky and almost as steep hill on the other side. Nobody could see where he was going, but direction was kept perfectly and silence was well maintained, the loosened stones falling into mud. The assault was launched at a quarter-past five, and in ten minutes under two hours the two brigades (the 181st Brigade being in reserve just south of Kustul) had penetrated ...
— How Jerusalem Was Won - Being the Record of Allenby's Campaign in Palestine • W.T. Massey

... this one loosened up a bit and down to her trim, she'll sail some or I don't know," said our skipper. He stood in the cabin gangway then and filled his boots with water, but he wouldn't take in sail. Back behind us was another seiner. We could just make out that they were soaking it to her too. The ...
— The Seiners • James B. (James Brendan) Connolly

... his hand, he pushed me upwards. "Go back!" he whispered, in a voice shaking with in-tensest emotion, "go back." And catching me by the arm, he literally pulled me up the stairs. Arrived at the top, he loosened his grasp, and leaning, quivering from head to foot, over ...
— The Leavenworth Case • Anna Katharine Green

... the day. The masonry-work, he discovered, had been done with a painstaking thoroughness which spoke of the abundance of slave labor, and time had barely begun to affect it. Here and there a piece of the mortar had loosened and come away, but for the most part it stood as solid as the stones between which it was laid. Shoulder-high to O'Reilly there appeared to be a section of the curbing less smoothly fitted than the rest, and through an interstice in this he detected what seemed ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach

... and neckties, and refused to allow Frenchmen to enter his territory—and when he had compelled his people to get out of their carriages and kneel in the mud as he passed—he supposed he was strengthening the foundations of authority which Catherine II. had loosened. ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele

... Again it breezed up. A loud clap was heard. I thought one of the masts had gone by the board; but it was the fore-topsail blown to ribbons. What next might follow we could not tell. The very masts began to shake; and it was evident that the fire had begun to burn their heels. Their working loosened the deck, and allowed more vent for the escape of smoke. There was again a lull. The foam no longer flew from the white-crested waves; gradually they subsided in height. The motion of the ship was less violent, though she still rolled ...
— Peter the Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston

... splinters, hammocks, and other wreck that was flying across it. Man after man was killed at the wheel; the fourth lieutenant, the master, and the boatswain were slain; and at 5.56, having had her jib sheet and foretop-sail tie shot away, and her spanker brails loosened so that the sail blew out, the Chesapeake came up into the wind somewhat, so as to expose her quarter to her antagonist's broadside, which beat in her stern-ports and swept the men from the after guns. One of the arm chests ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt

... the teeth is the most important point to observe. Owing to displacement of the fragments there is a difference in the level of the teeth or line of the teeth, or both, at the place where the fracture occurs. Also one or more of the teeth are usually loosened at this point. In addition, unusual movement of the fragments may be detected as well as a grating sound ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume I (of VI) • Various

... That loosened Alwin's tongue. "In my own country," he said haughtily, "you would be done honor by a look from me. Editha will tell you that my father was Earl of Northumbria, and my mother a princess of the ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz

... never cared for plants Until it happed, a-walking in the fields, He noticed all at once that plants could speak, Nay, turned with loosened tongue to talk with him. That day the daisy had an eye indeed— Colloquized with the cowslips on such themes! We find them extant yet in ...
— Jacob Behmen - an appreciation • Alexander Whyte

... long in reasoning it out. The strength of his resolution imparted a fictitious vigor to his muscles. While unaided he could never have stirred the heavy board, his efforts made it give, loosened as it had already been, so that his thin, wiry body could slip between its edge and the rest of the wall. He had one moment of intense terror lest it slip elastically back and hold him pinioned there, but a convulsive ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock

... took him by surprise; he did not fire. I struck up the barrel, and closed on him. We grappled pretty tightly, and in the wrestle the gun went off. The man loosened his hold. "Lord ha' mercy! I have not hurt you?" he ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... shines almost warmly, and breakfast has oiled all springs and loosened all tongues. Tom is encouraged by a remark or two of the guard's between the puffs of his oily cheroot, and besides is getting tired of not talking. He is too full of his destination to talk about anything else, and so asks the guard if he ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes

... with the brushwood from the sides of the mountains, the waters falling in rain are no longer impeded in their course; and instead of slowly augmenting the level of the rivers by progressive filtrations, they furrow, during heavy showers, the sides of the hills, bearing down the loosened soil, and forming sudden and destructive inundations. Hence it results, that the clearing of forests, the want of permanent springs, and the existence of torrents, are three phenomena closely connected together. ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt

... ever knew how long they stood there, close-clasped and motionless in silence; but finally her muscles loosened. She lifted her ...
— The Galaxy Primes • Edward Elmer Smith

... rose to her feet and stood erect. As she did so, one of the great strands of her hair which had become loosened during their flight, fell in a soft curling mass of blue jet down her back to within a few inches of her ankles. Captain Forest did not know then that it was a sign of ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown

... is my vexation always, when reading a play, to find its progress constantly being halted and its structure loosened by elaborate explanatory parentheses, that I resolved when I should publish Aria da Capo to incorporate into its text only those explanations the omission of which might confuse the reader or lend a wrong interpretation to the lines. Since, however, Aria da Capo ...
— Aria da Capo • Edna St. Vincent Millay

... they grew red and black in the face instead of Ananias, until, after a few attempts, they decided that aggressive truth was not their vocation, and confined themselves thenceforward to silent honesty, except on rare occasions, when either an extreme outrage, or a happier inspiration, loosened their tongue. But a soul is now and then incarnated, whom indulgent nature has not afflicted with any cramp or frost, but who can speak the right word at the right moment, qualify the selfish and hypocritical act with its real name, and, without any loss of serenity, hold up the offence ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... the hillside to him that day, her eyes—the blue-grey eyes of her people—wide with horror, her long, straight, fair hair, that she wore in two Marguerite plaits, loosened and swinging in the wind. Hunchback Wullie was in the first hut, threading the herrings through their gills on the long strings that went from side to side high up under the roof. His ruddy brown beard glistered with the shining scales of the fish, for he had a habit ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles

... cord on his wrist, and found he could unfasten it. While so doing, one of the Indians moved in his sleep, and immediately all was still as death with the captives. At length the time had arrived, the complicated knot was loosened, and the noose slipped over his hand, which at once gave him and his partner liberty of action. They knew where the arms lay, and each in the twinkling of an eye secured a large navy revolver without disturbing the Indians. They then simultaneously struck the two sleeping guards a powerful blow on ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens

... last all her bonds were loosened, she stood very erect, and lifted her arms, and each moment seemed to make her more lovely and more beautiful. Then she grasped the circle of emeralds, about which the enchanter had wound her golden hair, and waving it high in the air, cried: "Falcon, return to the ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... Mr. Finnerty finally loosened his hold on George and said slowly and painfully, "An' if I lose me job I'll be knowin' who was to blame for it. I always told Michael Finnerty that he was too soft-hearted to go ...
— Robert Hardy's Seven Days - A Dream and Its Consequences • Charles Monroe Sheldon

... each other a week!" she cried tremulously, while her gloved fingers felt inquiringly for loosened hairpins. "You've no right—you're perfectly horrid! ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower

... I have not done. But I suppose I must go," and she proceeded to re-tie the strings of her bonnet, which she had loosened. ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope

... out of the tubes, and with a long wire, loosened the gelatinous contents. Then, inverting the tubes he flung them into the lake close to the beginning of the ...
— The Blue Germ • Martin Swayne

... preceding year. Seventy or eighty families had crowded in at the commencement of the year 1820. The heavy timber of poplar, (whitewood) oak and beech, had been cut down, the brush burned, and the logs left on the ground. By June the bark was loosened, an intolerable stench proceeded from the timber,—sickness followed, and about two thirds of the population died! And yet, to look about the place, there is no local cause that would indicate sickness. In the summer of 1821, sickness prevailed very extensively, ...
— A New Guide for Emigrants to the West • J. M. Peck

... dropped to the holster at his side, the dark-faced man who stood near Singleton anticipated the movement. His right hand moved like a streak of light. It went down, then up again with the same motion. The air rocked with a crashing report, mingled with Ruth's scream of terror. And Hamlin's gun loosened in his hand, his knees doubled and he tumbled headlong, to fall face down at the feet of the dark-faced man who stood, sneering, some blue-white smoke curling upward in mocking laziness from the muzzle of ...
— The Trail Horde • Charles Alden Seltzer

... about in satin slippers. Something had happened. She had been dressed for one thing and then had done another thing. Could it be that ever since the night before she had been out of her place in the scheme of things?—loosened from the great human unit?—seeking destruction, perhaps, because she could not regain her place therein? "Where have you been?" Katie murmured to the ruined slippers. "What did it? What do you know? What ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell

... so,' Clare said. She was kneeling by the tin bath with her sleeves rolled up, holding a warmed towel. Her face was flushed from the fire, and her hair was loosened where Charles had caught his toe in it. She looked pretty and maternal, and looked up at Gideon with the kind of conventional, good-humoured scorn that girls and women put on when men talk of babies. They do it (one believes) partly because they feel ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay

... poised like a serpent about to strike, then I saw his eyes fix in a frightful stare, his face turned livid, and with a strangled cry, he fell back and down. Together we lifted him to the low window-seat, pursuers and pursued alike, loosened his collar, chafed his hands, bathed his temples, did everything we could think of doing; but he lay there staring at the ceiling with clenched teeth. At last Royce bent and laid his ear against his breast. Then he arose and turned gently ...
— The Holladay Case - A Tale • Burton E. Stevenson

... held great quivering drops upon them. Her hair—what swathes there were of it—had become loosened, and hung about her in long, thick, wet tresses. Her cheeks were warmed to a vivid tinting by the cordial, the excitement by the deep emotion that filled her, so that, in that ...
— The Mark of the Beast • Sidney Watson

... The other loosened the clasp of his hand upon the wood and drew himself upright. "I eat the bread and drink the water which you give your servants," he answered, speaking with the thickness of hardly restrained passion. "The wine cup goes from ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston

... second descent of male and female harpies. Human nature, loosened from long restraint by the war, has flooded the coast with the moral debris of the conflict. It is a reign ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage

... loosened the straps in his chair, he noticed Captain Strong rising from his position beside him and he grinned sheepishly in answer to ...
— Stand by for Mars! • Carey Rockwell

... struggled to rise, to turn, or hardly to move. He was fettered, bound fast by invisible manacles. The brethren were summoned to witness the sight. In the space of perhaps half an hour the clairvoyant returned, loosened his fetters, and he arose mortified and confounded. Singularly disposed, he ever after treated these gifts with virulent ridicule, and never was heard to utter any serious remarks concerning this transaction. The ...
— The Communistic Societies of the United States • Charles Nordhoff

... trotting and walking, don't let the saddle be whisked off at once, for if you do your horse will have such a sore back as will frighten you, but let your saddle remain on your horse's back, with the girths loosened, till after his next feed of corn, and be sure that he has no corn, much less water, till after a long hour and more; after he is fed he may be watered to the tune of half a pail, and then the ostler can give him a regular rub down; you may then ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow

... it must have been getting toward the end of the afternoon; so I prepared to leave my watery retirement. I had made a plan, and it worked very well. I placed the end of my air-tube far into the bung-hole of the hogshead, so that I might not accidentally pull it out; I loosened myself from the bit of timber; and then I made my way to the bow of the vessel on which I was. Looking upward, I found that our brig, which was resting on the tall poops of the two sunken vessels, was so suspended ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton

... whistle less loudly, as though now it felt satisfied at having driven so much productive rain into the ground, and washed clean the mountain tops, and loosened ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky

... is lined with dry soft grass, and five white pear-shaped eggs are laid. The oven is a foot or more in diameter, and is sometimes very massive, weighing eight or nine pounds, and so strong that, unless loosened by the swaying of the branch, it often remains unharmed for two or three years. A new oven is built every year, and I have more than once seen a second oven built on the top of the first, when this has been placed very advantageously, as on a ...
— The Industries of Animals • Frederic Houssay

... best interests of the country?"—"Yes. The strengthening of the hold of a Government so wicked us the present one is not desirable for the best interests of the people. Not that I want the bond between England and India to become loosened for the sake of loosening it but I want that bond to become strengthened only in so far as it adds to the welfare ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi

... facts established by the enquiry was the wide-spread demoralisation which had developed itself in certain districts. Home had lost its sanctity. The ties that bind parents and children were loosened, and natural affection gave place to intense selfishness, which often manifested itself in the most brutal manner. Workmen grew lazy and dishonest. Young women lost the virtue which is not only the point of honour with their sex, but the chief support of all other virtues. Not only women ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin

... brick and struck it repeatedly against the stone that closed the entrance, hoping that the noise would spread through the house. But an avalanche of small stones, loosened by the blows, at once fell upon him, knocking him down again and fixing him ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc

... to cloven hoof, in azure velvet. Lord Farquhart still sat quite unmoved, seemingly as indifferent as ever to the world, apparently unmindful of his champion. Ashley's face was black with rage, and he stood all alone in the midst of the crowd. Lady Barbara had flung aside her mask; her loosened cloak and its hood had fallen from her, but her white face was hidden behind her white hands. Jack Grimsby, Treadway, all of Farquhart's friends, were watching eagerly, intently, the door through ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various

... over slumbering prudence. In a moment the silver cord was loosened, and all the boisterous winds rushed forth and bore them weeping and wailing far from their native land. Roused by the tumult of the tempest, and the despairing cries of his men, Odysseus sprang up, just in time to see the last glimpse of the hills of Ithaca as they melted ...
— Stories from the Odyssey • H. L. Havell

... in its exuberant setting forth of how much was to be won by obedience. God does not hide the sacrifices that have to be made if we will be true to His command. He will enlist no recruits on false pretences. All ties of country, kindred, and father's house have to be loosened, and, if need be, to be cut, for His command is to be supreme, and clinging hands that would hold back the pilgrim have to be disengaged. If a man realises God's hold on him, he feels all others relaxed. The magnetism of the divine command overcomes gravitation, and lifts him high above earth. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren

... been broken by the heart of the torrent, you have been dashed against each other and have been tossed about amid the daphnes of the ravine, you have been whipped by hailstorms and tempest, buried under the avalanche, uncovered by the sun, loosened by the feet of the chamois, you are cold and beautiful but above ...
— Romance of the Rabbit • Francis Jammes

... all the Roman Catholic girls of the district are married. On one occasion a young bride was receiving the congratulations of her friends, when a feather which had been fastened across her head became loosened, and waved around it. A bystander remarked that he would be a good shot who could carry away the feather without injuring the head. The girl upon hearing this looked round and said, "If you have the courage to fire, I will stand." Upon which the bystander drew ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot

... of Scotland beheld the lofty situation of the castle, and the invincible strength it seemed to be of, he suspected some strange adventure to befall him; so, buckling close his armour, which, on account of the heat he had loosened, and drawing his sword, he climbed the mountain, when he espied, on a craggy rock, the headless body of the Giant, on which the ravens and other birds of prey were feeding. Then he approached the castle gate, when, what was his astonishment to see a long ...
— The Seven Champions of Christendom • W. H. G. Kingston

... to the bar which Marius had loosened. As he was on the point of grasping this bar, a hand emerged abruptly from the darkness, fell upon his arm; he felt himself vigorously thrust aside by a push in the middle of his breast, and a hoarse voice said to him, ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... Smoking," by G.L. Apperson. Alas, a friend of mine, John Marshall (he lives somewhere in Montreal or Quebec), borrowed it from me, and obstinately declines to return it. If he should ever see this, may his heart be loosened and relent. Dear John, I wish you would return that book. ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley

... thought of sticking up the place. He said he had been quite mistaken about them, and that another time he should know better than to volunteer for work that was not part of his duty. By that time the claret had gone round pretty often; and without being screwed we'd all had our tongues loosened a bit. ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood

... ground and began to examine the cellar windows. They seemed to be fitted with iron bars set into the solid masonry. He went all around the house and found each one unshakable, until he reached the last at the back. There he found a bit of stone cracked and loosened and it gave him an idea. He set to work with his few tools, and finally succeeded in loosening one rusted bar. He was much hindered in his work by the necessity of keeping a constant watch out, and by his attempts to be quiet. There was no telling when Link and Shorty might come ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill

... persons we admire, than the belief that we know and understand their unhappiness, and that our admiration for them is lifted higher than a mere mutual instinctive sympathy with beauty or strength. This adorable woman had suffered. The very thought aroused his chivalry. It loosened, also, I fear, his quick, ...
— Susy, A Story of the Plains • Bret Harte

... I, "you can explain to me jest as well how the hoe and the planter cause the seed to spring up in the loosened ground. You put the seed in the ground, Josiah Allen, and the hoe loosens the soil round it. You may assist the plant some, but there is a secret back of it all, Josiah Allen, that you can't explain ...
— Samantha at the World's Fair • Marietta Holley

... her large, dark grey eyes, her round, healthy cheeks, her narrow white teeth, her long light-brown tresses wound twice round her head, and the strong young breasts rising and sinking underneath her white blouse. Her white, slightly tanned neck was innocent of collar or scarf. A hasty movement loosened one plait of hair over her head and back, but she took no notice, but continued to scatter the corn, taking care that all received their share and that sparrows and daws did not obtrude too much, and looking as fresh and ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov

... which served her instead of virtue of the more ordinary sort. He had a doable claim upon it, because, in addition to being tall and fair and misunderstood by most people, with a thin nose that went beautifully with a medieval costume, he was such a gentleman. Phyllis loosened her purse-strings instinctively, with genuine gratification, whenever this young man approached. She believed in him; he had ideas, she said, and she gave him more; in the end he would be sure to "catch on." Through the invariable period of obscurity which comes before the appearance of ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)

... the thousand and one topics of vital importance to be even touched upon while the service was in progress, but once the recessional rolled forth Peggy's and Polly's tongues were loosened and went a-galloping. ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson

... section, and is fixed in one position to the frame of the apparatus. Abutting against this, and working in the block to which the two ends of the band are screwed, is a thumb screw, S, by turning which the band may be loosened for adjusting, and tightened when the right position is found. The cylinder is covered with asbestos sheet, and the wire, which is of nickel, and measures altogether from 3 to 4 ohms, is wound helically round this. The switch arm, to which the handle ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 711, August 17, 1889 • Various

... original superiority of James as probably the elder. There was a time when John was known as 'James's brother.' But the time came, as Acts shows, when John took precedence, and was closely linked with Peter as the two leaders. So the ties of kindred may be loosened, and new bonds of fellowship created by similarity of relation to Jesus. In His kingdom, the elder may fall behind the younger. Rank in it depends on likeness ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren

... the multitude below Live, for they can, there: This man decided not to Live but Know— Bury this man there? Here—here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds form, Lightnings are loosened, Stars come and go."[A] ...
— Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher • Henry Jones

... Livingstone's fingers loosened their grasp, while her face grew livid with mingled passion and fear. Her fraud was discovered—her stratagem had failed—and she was foiled in this, her second darling scheme. But she was yet to learn what ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes

... cry out for help or to reach the bell, but her enemy was too strong for her, and she had grown weaker; then, using strategy, she let herself fall limp under the murderous hands, whereupon Fauvette, laughing triumphantly, had loosened her grip for a moment and allowed Seraphine to ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett

... girl, without a hat and with her loosened hair streaming down her back, headed the power-boat straight for the creature, which was distant about the eighth of a mile. Twice the grass choked the wheel and twice with desperate haste it was cleared ...
— Dick in the Everglades • A. W. Dimock

... now walk quite up to her when the tide was out. I was surprised with this at first, but soon concluded it must be done by the earthquake: and as by this violence the ship was more broken open than formerly, so many things came daily on shore, which the sea had loosened, and which the winds and water rolled by degrees to ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe

... no other passengers for the east-bound Flyer; and finding he still had some minutes to wait, Ormsby lounged into the telegraph office. Here the bonds of ennui were loosened by the gradual development of a little mystery. First the telephone bell rang smartly, and when the telegraph operator took down the ear-piece and said "Well?" in the imperious tone common to his kind, he evidently received a communication ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde

... materials, producing new minerals of a platy or columnar type adapted to this parallel arrangement. Even the composition of the rock may be substantially changed, though this is perhaps not the most common case. Whereas by weathering the rock is loosened up and disintegrated, substances like carbon dioxide, oxygen, and water are abundantly added, and light minerals of simple composition tend to develop,—by dynamic metamorphism on the other hand, carbon dioxide, oxygen, and water are usually expelled, the minerals ...
— The Economic Aspect of Geology • C. K. Leith

... the other world may have gained, there can be little doubt that this one lost heavily by the change. A general disintegration of the body politic set in. The ties of the state and the family were loosened: the structure of society tended to resolve itself into its individual elements and thereby to relapse into barbarism; for civilisation is only possible through the active co-operation of the citizens and their willingness ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer

... of blood ran from his right temple, where it had struck against the bed-post. His eyes were closed. She loosened his collar, put forth all her strength—her old maiden strength for a moment restored to her—and lifted him on ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch



Words linked to "Loosened" :   untangled



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com