"Mess" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... outlet. Here is where the leader plays an important part in handling the case; he provides an outlet for the expenditure of this surplus energy by planning games demanding use of muscle and the expenditure of energy and noise. The big mess tent, or dining hall, is cleared and romping games ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson
... home and sleep the sleep of the unjust, and you're to keep the sixth commandment, and you're to tell no more lies. You've made a shameful mess of your son's life, and you're to die now as soon as you can without attracting notice. You're to pray for an accident to take you out of the world: a wind to blow you over a cliff, a roof to fall on you, a boat to go down with you, a ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... a mess for sure, Uncle Noah," he apostrophized himself. "Whut'll yoh do when it come time foh dinnah? Yere yoh has a Christmas dinnah fit foh a King, an' de Colonel he know right well dat we has only a little 1ef from de money whut we done get when we sold ...
— Uncle Noah's Christmas Inspiration • Leona Dalrymple
... pond east of us that is said to hold perch," Dave answered. "I'm going to take fishing tackle and go in search of a mess of fish. ...
— The High School Boys in Summer Camp • H. Irving Hancock
... was among the ways of good Queen Bess, Who ruled as well as ever mortal can, sir, When she was stogg'd, and the country in a mess, She was wont to send for ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... doing this. I call it micro-jigsaw puzzles. This book, here, really is a mess. Selim found it lying open, with some heavy stuff on top of it; the pages were simply crushed." She hesitated briefly. "If only it would mean something, after I ...
— Omnilingual • H. Beam Piper
... arrived off their appointed rendezvous, five miles from the landing-place, and stopped. The soldiers were aroused from their slumbers, and were served with a last hot meal. A visit to the mess decks showed these Australians, the majority of whom were about to go into action for the first time under the most trying circumstances, possessed at 1 o'clock in the morning courage to ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne
... again without my seeing Grim, although I called on him repeatedly at the "Junior Staff Officers' Mess" below the Zionist Hospital. Suliman, the eight-year-old imp of Arab mischief, who did duty as page-boy met me on each occasion at the door and took grinning ...
— Jimgrim and Allah's Peace • Talbot Mundy
... lamentable. He had not spoken a word throughout the interview. He had taken refuge in nodding, exhausting the significance of nods in reply to the various appeals that the other three addressed to him. If their meaning had been developed, his nods must have landed him in a pitiable mess of inconsistencies; he had tried to agree with everybody, to sympathize all round, to indorse universally. He had won momentary applause, and in the end created ...
— Tristram of Blent - An Episode in the Story of an Ancient House • Anthony Hope
... hard, I'm afraid I'm making a mess of it," she whispered to herself anxiously, as she ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... a commission in one of the crackest cavalry regiments," he began dramatically, and yet with a great air of sincerity. "I was considered one of the most promising officers in the mess. It nearly broke my ...
— The Lunatic at Large • J. Storer Clouston
... eat in the mess there compounded? For roast beef, the gravy the soap-man should claim— The soup some odd things might turn up if sounded, And other "made-dishes" might turn up ...
— Nothing to Eat • Horatio Alger [supposed]
... is very rich—but the thing fell through in some way. Then, they say, SHE wanted to marry that Spaniard, young Pico, of the Amador Ranche; but his family wouldn't hear of it. Somehow, she's deuced unlucky. I suppose she'll make a mess of it with Captain Greyson she was out riding with ...
— A Phyllis of the Sierras • Bret Harte
... 1538, upon occasion of "the Quenis (Magdalene's) saull mess and dirige, quham God assolze," Maister George Balquhanan received a goun of Paryse blak, lyned with blak satyne, &c. Also ...
— The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6) • John Knox
... reminder that many of these are simply the incomplete obligations of the past. The American people deserve to be impatient, because we do not yet have the public house in order. We've had great success in restoring our economic integrity, and we've rescued our nation from the worst economic mess since the Depression. But there's more to do. For starters, the Federal deficit is outrageous. For years I've asked that we stop pushing onto our children the excesses of our government. And what the Congress finally needs ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Ronald Reagan • Ronald Reagan
... sneering reflection upon the humble and toilsome beginnings of Charles and herself. She believed—not without reason—that, under Ross's glossy veneer of gentleman, there was a shrewd and calculating nature; it, she thought, would not permit the gentleman to make mess of those matters, which, coarse and sordid though they were, still must be looked after sharply if the gentleman was to be kept going. But she was, not unnaturally, completely taken in by Arthur's similar game, the more easily as Arthur put into it an intensity of energy ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... came back; "couldn't you ha' headed him, and driv' him into the barnyard? Now that plaguy beast will just be back again by the time I get well to work. He han't done much mischief yet there's Mr. Van Brunt's salary he's made a pretty mess of I'm glad on't! He should ha' put potatoes, as I told him. I don't know what's to be done I can't be leaving my cheese to run and mind the garden every minute, if it was full of Timothys; and you'd ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... ideal place for work you've been, But soon a Bedlam once again, A mess, a wreck. But say, I wonder will it make us mad. No, House, I'll bet we both are glad The kid comes ...
— Bib Ballads • Ring W. Lardner
... We Tire Them Out; the Indians Capture Mess Wagon and Cook; Our Bill of Fare Buffalo Meat without ...
— The Life and Adventures of Nat Love - Better Known in the Cattle Country as "Deadwood Dick" • Nat Love
... of Grant Hall by this time and were strolling slowly along, their voices hushed for the moment by the cheery hum of boyish talk and the clatter of mess furniture, as the Corps sat at their late supper. Then several officers, gathered about the steps of the club rooms in the south end, lifted their caps to Mrs. Graham and smiled greeting to ...
— To The Front - A Sequel to Cadet Days • Charles King
... a mess, as usual, consisting of fried mullet and rice, and a sort of chowder in which the only ingredients I recognised were ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... interest whatever in building universities, or providing free libraries, or subsidizing hospitals. I didn't make the world, and I have never seen why I should spend my energies in trying to mend what the Demiurge has made a mess of. In my view the object of everybody should be to live, as acutely as possible—to get as many sensations, as many pleasant reactions as possible—out of the day. Some people get their sensations—or say they do—out of fussing about the poor. Forty years ago I got them out of politics—or ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... like you to know that I am your friend. I'd do anything I could for you—for Masters' sake as well as your own. It's an awful mess. Perhaps you'll ...
— Sleeping Fires • Gertrude Atherton
... are in the most damnable mess that politics have ever been in in my time. Gladstone and Dizzy seem to cap one another in folly and in pretence, and I do not know which has made the greatest ass of himself. Blessed are they that hold their tongue ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... be all right then! He'll follow me like a lamb. He doesn't want to mess around with such. But she's got some ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... through Front Royal but no enemy was found. He then recrossed and took position on commanding ground half a mile or so back from the river, and ordered the horses to be unsaddled and fed and the men to cook their dinner. Headquarters wagons were brought up, mess chests taken out, and we were just gathering around them to partake of a hastily prepared meal, when Fitzhugh Lee's cavalry, which had stealthily approached the ford, charged across and made a dash at our pickets. ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd
... the salad let the woodwinds moan; Then the green silence of many watercresses; Dessert, a balalaika, strummed alone; Coffee, a slow, low singing no passion stresses; Such are my thoughts as — clang! crash! bang! — I brood And gorge the sticky mess these fools call food! ...
— Young Adventure - A Book of Poems • Stephen Vincent Benet
... to talk with men when they are full, and the colonel will have no business to disturb him then. Our own dinner will be ready directly; I can smell a goose that I picked up, as it might be by accident, at the place where we halted last night. There are four or five of us old soldiers who always mess together when we are not on duty with our troops, and if I mistake not, you will know every one of them, and right glad they will be to see you; but of course I shall say no word as to who the lad is, save that he is a friend ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... remiss also in his duties," said Brother Paul. "The Prior, holy man, perceives nothing of these things. On Sunday's feast one served him with a most unsavoury mess in the refectory, the dish thereof being black and broken; yet he ate the meat in great content, ...
— The Gathering of Brother Hilarius • Michael Fairless
... Ursie Firikins had made ready a mess of porridge, and the mournful Magdalen being soothed and consoled, was persuaded to partake. And afterwards, when they had sat some time, and the crowd which had gathered out of doors in the street ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... called some of us to move the mess boards into the pavilion, because it was beginning to blow from the east and the awnings and thatch roofs over the mess boards didn't keep the rain off, because it blew sideways. Out on the lake the water was churning ...
— Roy Blakeley's Adventures in Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... the military school he had chosen for himself had been so unsatisfactory that his father had been advised that he would not be received for another year. It was now Mrs. Bassett's turn to cavil at her husband for the sad mess he had made of the boy's education. She would never have sent Blackford to a military school if it had been her affair; she arraigned her husband for having encouraged the boy in his dreams of ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson
... hero of Tippecanoe, and afterward President of the United States. In this connection Fenimore Cooper, just before Harrison's inauguration as President, uncovered a long forgotten bit of romance which he related confidentially in a letter to his old mess-mate Commodore Shubrick as a "great political discovery." "Miss Anne Cooper was lately in Philadelphia,"—the letter is dated February 28, 1841,—"where she met Mr. Thomas Biddle, who asked if our family were not Harrison men. The reason of so singular a question was asked, and Mr. ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... if you'd make me. You have a good big bump of order, and I haven't any at all in little things. Tom Watterly was right. If I had tried to live here alone, things would have got into an awful mess. I feel ashamed of myself that I didn't clear up the yard before, but my whole mind's been ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... man, with an apron tied round his waist, a long red toque on his head, and his shirt-sleeves rolled above his elbows, put his hands to his mouth, and gave a loud halloo. Then from every part of the works poured the men belonging to his mess, going first to the creek to wash their hands. As soon as they were seated, the little fellow filled their plates first with soup and next with pork and beans, out of another steaming pot. Ten minutes of rapid feeding satisfied their appetites, ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... and mean enough, but the conception of a single poem in my brain, till it found birth on paper, was, I swore, bigger and finer than all this world-mess at its best. Also there was in me somewhat the thwarted, sinister ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... heading inland, all right," rumbled Sergeant Madden. "Lucky! If it'd been heading the other way, it could've gone out and landed in the sea. That would ha' been a mess! But where is it?" ...
— A Matter of Importance • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... with some poor skill, and fortified with stakes and buildings against the entrance of the larger marauding beasts. My wound was dressed with a poultice of herbs, and at the other side of the cavern there squatted a woman, cooking a mess of wood-grubs and honey over ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... reprovingly, 'you do make such a mess.' She brushed tobacco ashes from his coat. Mother, without looking up, went on talking to him about the bills-washing, school-books, boots, blouses, oil, and peat. And as she did so a puzzled expression ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... Kemp, of Mount Vernon at the mess at the Macquarie Hotel, "you see a sample before you, of what this colony can produce, which we are now, one and all, making an unanimous effort to insure the enjoyment of in peace and comfort: if, when not only the necessaries, but ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West
... a pretty go," yelled one of them to the other in an access of impotent fury. "A dandy old mess you've made of this job, Mister bloomin' Peter Burton, haven't you? and dragged me into it along with yer! I wish I'd never had nothin' at all to do with the cussed business, now, I do; I knowed it was boun' to go a mucker, from the very fust! But you and that bloomin' skowbank of a Turnbull ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... generally, he speaks to the father, or those who have authority over her. If his proposal be accepted, he is admitted into the tent, and lives with the family, generally a year, bringing in the produce of his hunting for the general mess. He then separates to a tent of his own, and adds to the number of wives, according to his success and character as a hunter. The Indians have been greatly corrupted in their simple and barbarous manners, by their intercourse with Europeans, many of whom have borne scarcely ...
— The Substance of a Journal During a Residence at the Red River Colony, British North America • John West
... hell of a mess of everything." He paused. "I'd better start at the beginning—or will it ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... but wonder about the neighbors she did not know and tell her maid how much admired her daughters were and how hard she had worked herself until the good God had seen fit to take her brother from his packing plant. "If you're the janitor's niece you can come in and clean up the mess the plumber made on my floor. It isn't the place of the girl I pay wages to, to clean up the dirt the ...
— Mary Rose of Mifflin • Frances R. Sterrett
... "I will do so, dear Hans." And when he was gone, she cooked herself a nice mess of pottage to take with her. As she came to the field she said to herself, "What shall I do? Shall I cut first, or eat first? Ay, I will eat first!" Then she ate up the contents of her pot, and when it was finished, she thought to ...
— The Fairy Book - The Best Popular Stories Selected and Rendered Anew • Dinah Maria Mulock (AKA Miss Mulock)
... impossible man! His whole harvest had gone up in his haystacks and barn. It was uninsured, I knew. And yet, in the face of famine and the rigorous winter, he went out gayly in quest of a mess of trout, forsooth, because he "doted" on them! Had gloom but rested, no matter how lightly, on his brow, or had his bovine countenance grown long and serious and less like the moon, or had he removed ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... spite of earnest remonstrance and pressure on his friend's part. "No," he said; "I've got myself into a nice mess by my folly; but what I've undertaken I mean to carry out, and take my own burdens upon myself." And so, notwithstanding the applause and fine speeches showered on him by his friends, Walter returned home considerably crestfallen and out of spirits, the only thing that ...
— Amos Huntingdon • T.P. Wilson
... alone, but this fact never daunted Kit. She rowed up the river with a firm level stroke, thoroughly enjoying herself and the novelty of solitude. When she passed the island, Stanley was down on the little stretch of beach cleaning a mess of fish for supper. She sent him a hail across the water, and he held up a string of pickerel invitingly. There had been a thunder-storm and a quick midsummer rain the early part of the afternoon, and the campers had been quick to ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester
... the train late? Two hours at least. [Yawns and stretches himself] I have made a rotten mess of it! I came here on purpose to meet them at the station, and then overslept myself... in my chair. It's a pity. I wish you'd ...
— Plays by Chekhov, Second Series • Anton Chekhov
... sister," said the loudest of her three companions. "Kill him? not if ye don't make a mess of it by interferin'. It's only boilin' tar ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall
... began the lord, "what a mess your father did make of it last night." And he frowned ...
— The Landleaguers • Anthony Trollope
... he muttered to himself, pausing for a few minutes' rest, "little did you think you'd git into such an 'orrible mess as this w'en you left 'ome. Sarves you right for quittin' ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... themselves away in the long run. It's lucky, in a way, that you had paper money instead of gold; the big bills will be their downfall if they undertake to spend them in this country—and if old Hans had it straight, they're not going to pull out with a measly ten thousand dollars. It's an ugly mess, and liable to be worse before it's cleaned up. If there is a stake like that cached around the Stone, these land pirates will camp mighty close on the trail of anybody that goes looking for it. And it won't be any Sunday-school ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... shadow, showing the position of the Ducal Palace upon the river bank. Behind and above it shone a blood-red gleam like an angry eye; this Rallywood knew to be the great stained dome of the historic mess-room of the Guard. ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... surrounding Jonas's twenty acres. "I guess I belong to the Square. And I have just been thinking that as long as Mr. Brown has been living alone around that house he has probably got it into a pretty bad mess. Most likely the kitchen is a sight and the place is all out of order. Somebody ought to go over and sweep and dust and scrub and red things up. If the young lady was to come along to-morrow and see things like that she would think we was a pretty ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... Calvert proceeded on his way to Namur, Givet, and Treves, where different detachments of Lafayette's troops were garrisoned. He was made welcome at every mess-table, and his scheme was received with such enthusiasm that it seemed almost an unnecessary precaution to cross the frontier and seek a possible asylum for the Royal Family in case the great plan failed. But the ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe
... watched their mates march away through the woods, and then turned back, sick at heart, to the shelter of the huts, where the Indians looked at them sulkily, and flung them green plantains, "as you would Bones to a Dog." One of the Indians made a mess of aromatic herbs and dressed Wafer's burn, so that, in three weeks' time, he ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... compelled him to interfere in Flint's program. Such a move on his part was contrary to his standards, to his training in comradeship, to all his acquired philosophy. He had the well-bred man's distaste for getting into a mess. He ...
— The Blood Red Dawn • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... loike a stanniel. Boh for running, rostling, an' throwing t' stoan, he'n no match i' this keawntry. Ey'n triet him at aw three gams, so ey con speak. For't most part he'n a big, black bandyhewit wi' him, and, by th' Mess, ey canna help thinkin he meys free sumtoimes wi' yor ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... been a preacher. But look at that bin of potatoes— Grown in all singular shapes— Red and in clusters, like grapes, Or more like tomatoes. Those are Merinoes, I guess; Very prolific and cheap; They make an excellent mess For a cow, or a sheep, And are good for the table, they say, When the winter ...
— Bitter-Sweet • J. G. Holland
... suppose, account for the sloping terraces along the Spean. I further presume that sharp transverse moraines would not be formed under the waters of the lake, where the glacier came out of L. Treig and abutted against the opposite side of the valley. A nice mess I made of Glen Roy! I have no spare copy of my Welsh paper (527/2. "Notes on the Effects produced by the Ancient Glaciers of Caernarvonshire, and on the Boulders transported by Floating Ice," "Edinb. New Phil. Journ." Volume ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... heap mess. Cut up feather-bed hy-as ten-as (very small) and eat big dinner, hu-hu! Sugar, onions, meat, eat all. Then they find litt' cats walkin' ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... we brought our own luncheons," said Laura. "We didn't expect you to do anything for us—-unless you boys had happened to catch a mess of fish." ...
— The High School Boys in Summer Camp • H. Irving Hancock
... thinking of a couple of clubs in Cairo from which he had been asked to resign. Then he laughed callously as he added aloud: "You see there's a regiment stationed there, just now, which I'd rather not meet. I used to belong to its mess—once upon ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... at all times singularly calm. I was not, however, surprised at his anxiety, for it seemed more than likely that quite unwittingly, and with the best intentions, Dick Challoner had not merely landed us in a terrible mess, but that he had certainly turned the tables upon us, leaving Dulcie and myself at the mercy of this desperate gang. On board the boat I had mentioned Dick to the detective, and told him about the cypher, and the part that Dick had played. He had not seemed ...
— The Four Faces - A Mystery • William le Queux
... detection, as in the case of a girl, who, giving her affections to a sailor, and not being able to follow him in her natural and recognised character, put on jacket and trousers, and became, to all appearance, a brother of his mess. In other cases, a pure masculinity of character "seems to lead women to take on the guise of men. Apparently feeling themselves misplaced in, and misrepresented by, the female dress, they take up with that of men simply that they ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer
... mythological mess is clear enough. It arises from the poetic embodiment and personification of phenomena, the grouping together of all evil and of all good, then imaginatively universalizing the conflict, and carrying it out in idea to its inevitable ultimatum. The process of thought was obviously ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... proprieties. Finally a fez is wantonly flung, by an extra-enterprising youth, at my ink-bottle, knocking it over, and but for its being a handy contrivance, out of which the ink will not spill, it would have made a mess of my notes. Seeing the uselessness of trying to write, I meander forth, and into the leading mosque, and without removing my shoes, tread its sacred floor for several minutes, and stand listening to several devout Mussulmans reciting the Koran aloud, for, be it known, the ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... know about the time the pseudomen from the Fifth managed to sneak in and lay a mess ...
— The Weakling • Everett B. Cole
... between Tung-chow and Pekin. I accompanied the infantry and artillery during the day's proceedings. We encamped after the battle, where we now are, among some trees. We sleep in tents, but we have a house where we mess. I am living with the General, as my establishment has not yet been brought up from Ho- see-woo. I rode over yesterday to see the Russian Minister, who, with his sixteen Cossacks, is occupying the village, or rather town, of ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... payday, if it hadn't been for this lid liftin' business up at Albany. Course, you've read how they uncovered first one lot of grafters and then another, and fin'lly, with that last swipe of the muck rake, got the Corrugated rung into the mess? And, say, anyone would think, from some of the papers, that we was all a bunch of crooks down here, spendin' our time feedin' wads of hundred-dollar bills to the yellow dog. Maybe it don't stir up Mr. Robert ...
— Torchy • Sewell Ford
... what. Maybe he didn't let his stabilizing rotors have time to lock in. Maybe a lot of things. Anyway, he flipped about fifty meters up. Came down pretty fast, and burned right by the parking lot. Quite a mess." He nodded sadly. ...
— The Best Made Plans • Everett B. Cole
... Winkie took an interest in any one, the fortunate man was envied alike by the mess and the rank and file. And in their envy lay no suspicion of self-interest. 'The Colonel's son' was idolised on his own merits entirely. Yet Wee Willie Winkie was not lovely. His face was permanently freckled, as his legs were permanently scratched, and in spite of his mother's almost ...
— The Kipling Reader - Selections from the Books of Rudyard Kipling • Rudyard Kipling
... well; we eat together when our tents are not too long a journey from the mess tent, a matter of consequence with a brimming dish, and in general we have a constant eye out for each other's movements. But more than this, we are taking Squad Nine into a little confederation; they are men of the most diverse sorts but very ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... at table nobody could find fault with their behavior, except for the extreme rapidity with which they stowed away their rations. They seemed afraid to drop a crumb or mess themselves in any way and the furtive looks they shot out from beneath their long lashes were pitiful, as if they feared their food would be snatched from them and themselves punished with blows. That many blows had been administered, ...
— Dorothy's House Party • Evelyn Raymond
... a sweet acceptance of my invitation, and together we sat down at the little table of the officers' mess. ...
— The Land That Time Forgot • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... nagged him as he us, preferred to take his meals at home. Smallweed, who had somehow got made quartermaster, couldn't go old Heavysterne, he said, and so kept as long as he could to his desultory habits of living as a citizen and a bachelor. So our mess consisted of the major, who exercised a paternal care over the rest of us, superintending, indeed often joining in, our amusements and discussions, our quarrels and makings up; of Quartermaster-Sergeant Oates, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... marched down the glen, with the minister at its head, to condemn the school. When the dominie, who had heard of their design, saw the Board approaching, he sent one of his scholars, who enjoyed making a mess of himself, wading across the burn to bring over the stilts which were lying on the other side. The Board were thus unable to send across a spokesman, and after they had harangued the dominie, who was in the best of tempers, from the wrong side of the stream, the siege was raised by ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... accommodate a variety of furniture, whose shape or appendages suggest such disposition. And finally, a rack or framework is set up next the rear wall of the tent, for the support of the muskets of the mess. ...
— Our campaign around Gettysburg • John Lockwood
... mean to go. She often and often didn't want to. Don't be angry with Susie. Nurse often said, 'I can't think where you get your stockings in such a mess.' But the twins asked Susie, and she went; often and often she ...
— Troublesome Comforts - A Story for Children • Geraldine Glasgow
... up yondeh to dat resteraw an' git me de bigges' mess o' fried fish I kin hol'—dat's me; ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... another glance at me, I suspect of commiseration, he tottered off to his daily avocations. My chest, which was a very small one, was stowed away by one of the seamen under a bunk in the forecastle. I thought that I was to have a cabin under the poop, and to mess with the captain; but when I made inquiries, no one could give any information, and the captain was nowhere to be seen. Everything on board appeared in the wildest confusion; and I must own that I got most unaccountably in everybody's way, ...
— Peter the Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston
... Must be ashamed of himself. Ask the engineer. He can't do without an engineer—don't you see—and as no respectable man can be expected to put up with such a table, he allows them fifteen dollars a month extra mess money. I assure you it is so! You just ask Mr. Ferdinand da Costa. That's the engineer he has now. You may have seen him about my place, a delicate dark young man, with very fine eyes and a little moustache. He arrived ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad
... had often told at the mess table; and I remarked with some pain in a future part of the voyage, that every time my boat's crew went to embark with me in the Lady Nelson, there was some degree of apprehension amongst them that ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... the officer upstairs. He put on his blue jacket, with the black braid down the front, lighted a cigar, and wrote letters on every other than official matters, and forgot about recruits. He was to have leave of absence on Christmas, and though the others had denounced him for leaving the mess-table on that day, they had forgiven him when he explained that he was going to spend it with his people at home. The others had homes as far away as San Francisco and as far inland as Milwaukee, ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis
... in a humbler rank of life,—men of shrewdness and sagacity, in whose homely conversation Park felt much pleasure. He enrolled himself a member of a volunteer corps raised in the district, and proved a great acquisition to the mess-table. One thing was remarkable about Park, that, go where he would, he never introduced his own adventures, seldom ever answering queries concerning them, unless when asked by intimate friends. He shewed the true modesty of a brave man, ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... book and went out to investigate. "At any rate, they will be good for the pigs," she remarked on returning. "I shall have Behavior boil them in that great pot of hers and give them a mess every day. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... added another of remarkable character. No one was allowed to take his meals at home. Public tables were provided, at which all must eat, every citizen being forced to belong to some special public mess. Each had to supply his quota of food, such as barley, wine, cheese, and figs from his land, game obtained by hunting, or the meat of the animals killed for sacrifices. At these tables all shared alike. The kings and the humblest citizens were on an equality. No distinction was permitted except ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... laughed that the whole house might hear him, yet none of them saw him, or knew where he was. The pope persuaded his company that it was a damned soul, commanding mass presently to be said for his delivery out of purgatory, which was done; the pope sat still at meat, but when the latter mess came to the pope's board, Dr. Faustus laid hands thereon, saying, "This is mine," and so he took both dish and meat, and flew into the Capitol or Campadolia, calling his spirit unto him, and said, "Come, ...
— Mediaeval Tales • Various
... be as sharp with your work min' as you are with your tongue, I don't care if I give you a job. Look here: my coachman left me in a huff this morning, and it was time too, as I find now he is gone. The stable is in a shocking mess: if you clean it out, and set things to rights—but I don't believe you can—I ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... with changes!" Ah! I said that to good Mister MOULD years agone; which 'ow memory ranges All over them dear "Good Old Times," as I wish them wos back agen, bless 'em! Which the new ones ain't much to my mind; there's too many fresh "monthlies" to mess 'em. No; monthlying ain't wot it were; the perfession's too open, a lump. Nusses now ain't no more like old SAIREY, no not than the old Aldgit Pump. Like the Cristial Palluses fountings; A Pilgjian's Projiss is life, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 100, May 9, 1891 • Various
... on with his canoe building. He melted together in a pot, resin and pitch. The proportion he determined by experiment, for the mixture had to be neither hard enough to crack nor soft enough to melt in the sun. Then he daubed the mess over all the seams. Wallace superintended the operation for ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... a pinched face at the receding beach, and reflected that he wasn't giddy; then he made a superficial survey of the cords and ropes about him with a vague idea of "doing something." "I'm not going to mess about with the thing," he said at last, and sat down upon the mattress. "I'm not going to touch it.... I wonder what one ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... a good account of him," the squire replied. "He is sharp and intelligent, and will make his way in life, or I am mistaken. His father was an uncommonly clever fellow, though he made a mess of it, just at the end; and I think the boy takes ...
— A Final Reckoning - A Tale of Bush Life in Australia • G. A. Henty
... Girls realized what a narrow escape Harriet Burrell and the three other girls had had. There was nothing to be seen of the tent save here and there a white patch of canvas observable under the mass of limbs and foliage. Jasper was at work stoically chopping away, both for the sake of clearing up the mess and providing some excellent wood for the campfire. After dinner enough of the wreckage was cleared away so that the girls were able to catch a glimpse of the four cots drawn up close together, though they were now crushed down and ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls Under Canvas • Janet Aldridge
... Mr. Gallilee became interested in looking at the fragments of manuscript. "What an awful mess!" he exclaimed. "May I try if I can read a bit?" Ovid smiled. "Try by all means; you will make one useful discovery at least—you will see that the most patient men on the face of ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... quite perfect but the best I could get. It is of a small size, but of characteristic form, and I think will be interesting to you. I was quite unable to get the honey out of it, so fear you will find it somewhat in a mess; but no doubt you will know how to clean it. I have told Stevens to send ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Marchant
... short sojourn on board the Covadonga Jim had formed a rather intimate acquaintanceship with her first lieutenant, a man named Jorge Montt; and one evening, after he had returned from one of his periodical surveys of the town, Jim entered the tiny mess-room to find Montt discoursing at length to an eager circle of listeners upon the legends and traditions ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood
... section. This is quite a novel experiment, as it is the first time in the history of the navy of the United States that colored women have been employed in any clerical capacity. And it may be noted that while many young colored men have enlisted in the mess branch of the service, it was reserved to young colored women to invade successfully the yeoman branch, thereby establishing a precedent. They are all cool, clear-headed and well-poised, evincing at all times, in the language of a white chief yeowoman: "A tidiness and appropriate ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller
... or could not otherwise agree. Assemblies of the people with judicial functions were unknown in Carthage. The powerlessness of the citizens probably in the main resulted from their political organization; the Carthaginian mess- associations, which are mentioned in this connection and compared with the Spartan Pheiditia, were probably guilds under oligarchical management. Mention is made even of a distinction between "burgesses of the city" and "manual labourers," which leads us to infer that ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... her maid,' cried Captain Lake to Larcom. 'This is your d—d work. A nice mess you have made of it ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... really must not 'lord' me any more; I hate it. I must be plain Scoutbush here among my own people, just as I am in the Guards' mess-room. And as for owing me any,—really, it is we that are in your debt—to see my sister so happy, and such beautiful children, and so well too—and altogether—and Valencia so delighted with your ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley
... from the bushes at the Devil's Hole, do you? Yes, I am quick-eyed enough to read every thought in your black heart. Do I not know that you came in the canoe with the white medicine man from Oswego? Do I not know that you listened outside the open window of the mess-room at Fort Niagara, while the white chiefs talked at night? Do I not know that you painted your face, with the thought that the white man was a fool and would no longer recognize you? Then you came in this canoe that you might make it go ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... "I've made an awful mess for 'em all, and they just come home," groaned Mr. Tisbett; drawing his fur mitten across his eyes, and leading his horses, he followed at a funeral pace, careful not to stop at the gate until the door was closed, when he began ...
— Five Little Peppers Midway • Margaret Sidney
... had met George at the Opera and in the streets, but nowhere else. It is true, there was an exception to this, in the case of a hair-brained young midshipman; who stated that he had dined at George's regimental mess, and had there heard that George "had fallen in love with some young lady, and had fought with her brother or uncle, or a soldier-officer, he did ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... had put you off, so you gave in an' robbed the bank, Rathburn, an' just naturally made a mess of things when you had a chance," said the old man stoutly. "That ain't actin' with a lick of sense. You wasn't gettin' square with anybody, an' you wasn't doin' that girl right by takin' the ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... so, and Margarita, dark and slim like a plain brown nightingale, who leaves plumage to the raucous peacock because it matters so little what she, the real queen of us all, wears—Margarita spelled it out remorselessly, to the tune of a mess-room waltz, and told us that youth is only once and so sweet and for so little time! And the boy beside her smiled with pleasure and embroidered her rich, clear-cut phrasing and annotated it and threw jewels and flowers of unexpected chords through it and mocked ...
— Margarita's Soul - The Romantic Recollections of a Man of Fifty • Ingraham Lovell
... Shepherd" of Allan Ramsay, it was long the custom on stages north of the Tweed to present a real haggis, although niggard managers were often tempted to substitute for the genuine dish a far less savoury if more wholesome mess of oatmeal. But a play more famous still for the reality of its victuals, and better known to modern times, was Prince Hoare's musical farce, "No Song no Supper." A steaming-hot boiled leg of lamb and turnips may be described as quite ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... Brighton on Monday, apparently quite recovered; in good looks, good voice, and good spirits. The horrible mess in which everybody is mixed up who has anything to do with Covent Garden, and in which she is so deeply involved, renewed her annoyances and vexations immediately on her arrival in town; but I passed the evening with her yesterday, and she did not seem the worse for work or ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... subsiding into mutterings. He got breakfast, bringing to her some of the mess he cooked. She ate it, though it nauseated her, determining that she would endeavor to keep her strength ...
— Louisiana Lou • William West Winter
... that lived on a tree by a great city in the East thought that the day dawned because of his cawing. One day he said to himself, "How important I am! But for my care, I confess, the world would get into a mess." ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... perceive Johnson come in and take his seat at another table. The mode of dining, or rather being fed, at such houses in London, is well known to many to be particularly unsocial, as there is no Ordinary, or united company, but each person has his own mess, and is under no obligation to hold any intercourse with any one. A liberal and full-minded man, however, who loves to talk, will break through this churlish and unsocial restraint. Johnson and an Irish gentleman got into a dispute concerning the cause of some part of mankind being black. ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... lasted,—of that he felt sure. His comrades were as competent to press on, or to journey homeward without him as under his leadership. So he argued with himself and even as he argued, yielded to a great temptation, and like Esau, sold his honour for a mess of pottage. ...
— Ten Boys from History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... he said, waving attention to the boy, who was making a mess of the effort to arrange Uncle Charlie's loaf into a neat package, "a pretty name. They call it Norman—Norman McGregor." Uncle Charlie laughed heartily and again stamped upon the floor. Putting his finger to his forehead to suggest deep thought, he turned to the minister. ...
— Marching Men • Sherwood Anderson
... his past for affairs of the heart. She pointedly had him alone, and her intimation was that he might talk freely, as to a woman of understanding and broad sympathy. But Bean made a wretched mess of it. ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... vessel was secured, we visited the shore, and recognised the site of our last year's encampment, which had suffered no alteration, except what had been occasioned by a rapid vegetation: a sterculia, the stem of which had served as one of the props of our mess-tent, and to which we had nailed a sheet of copper with an inscription, was considerably grown; and the gum had oozed out in such profusion where the nails had pierced the bark that it had forced one corner ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... be telling you anything but a mess of words, I am so full of such a mess of crowding emotions. I want to talk and talk and talk myself into coherence. But, anyway, I stood alone in the winter twilight, and I took a deep breath of clear cold air, and I ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... "Nice looking mess that," he growled, surveying the repast with undisguised disgust. "No wonder we don't do no business with thet kind ov a cook. I reckon I'd a done better to hav' toted a nigger back with me. No, yer needn't stay—go an' make up them beds in the other ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... excitement and adventure. My brother was much the youngest of the party, and the least experienced; but he was well-grown, strong and healthy, and very fond of boxing, wrestling, running, riding, and shooting; moreover, he had served an apprenticeship in hunting deer and turkeys. Their mess-kit, ammunition, bedding, and provisions were carried in two prairie-wagons, each drawn by four horse. In addition to the teams they had six saddle-animals—all of them shaggy, unkempt mustangs. Three or four dogs, setters and half-bred greyhounds, trotted along behind the wagons. Each man ...
— Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches • Theodore Roosevelt
... laundresses as these women climb into their carts. Ah! Marius! Ah! you blackguard! to go and vociferate on the public place! to discuss, to debate, to take measures! They call that measures, just God! Disorder humbles itself and becomes silly. I have seen chaos, I now see a mess. Students deliberating on the National Guard,—such a thing could not be seen among the Ogibewas nor the Cadodaches! Savages who go naked, with their noddles dressed like a shuttlecock, with a club in their paws, are less of brutes than those bachelors of arts! ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... and the devil to pay?" said Meeks. "It is near time for me to start some daisy wine, too. I shouldn't have a minute free. There'd be suits for damages, and murder trials, and the Lord knows what. I'd rather make my daisy wine. Leave this damned sticky mess with me, and I'll see to it. What in creation any young woman in her senses wants to spend her time in making such stuff for, anyway, beats me. Women are all more or less fools, anyhow. I suppose they can't help it, but we ought to have it ...
— The Shoulders of Atlas - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... gold; came down in his own carriage, congratulated me as heartily—well almost as heartily as you do, Tom—and took us both round, with the files, to Mr. McDermot, the Chairman of the House Committee. He was dining with his mess, at the Seaton House, but we called him out, and I declare, I believe he was as much pleased ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale
... the Colonel's groom an' pinched the joint from the Warrant Orficers' Mess. She never oughtn't to be at large, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, May 5, 1920 • Various
... him but be gentle and persuade him that its fer his good.' Child, he sho did act funny when I told him I wanted to treat his side. I had ter tell him I wuz carrying out doctors orders so he could get well. He reared and fussed and said he didn't want that mess on him. I told him the doctor says you do very well till you go ter the horse lot then you go blind and you can't see. He looked at me. 'Sho nuff, Ma, he said, 'that sho is the trufe. I have ter always call one of the chillun ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... great deal about the mess, and the fellows, and the boys, and the others, and an inexplicable fuss there is about a speculation the mess entered into with some illicit dealer for an additional supply, not of liquor, but of sugar,—which I believe was detected, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various |
