"Nib" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... pen you a dozen of the latter every ordinary year, and thirteen, perhaps, in the bissextile. So banish that Christmas cloud from your brow; leave off nibbling your pen at the wrong end, and clap a fresh nib to the right one. I have an hour ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat
... about him, that I hardly liked to suggest a third alternative, namely, that he should put down his feet and let me pass. So I climbed over, much to his indignation (which he expressed by sticking a nib into me as ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed
... gold nib," went on Sam, with the painful exactitude which comes only from embarrassment or the ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... writing was an impossibility under the circumstances, but she was determined that he should not recognise her embarrassment. Her nib flew relentlessly over the sheets, but the letter was disconnected and dry. At last she gathered her writing materials together, and ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... was silence. Mr. Taynton had picked up a quill pen, the same with which he had been writing before, for the nib was ...
— The Blotting Book • E. F. Benson
... through a low, swampy tract overgrown with black alder and at length reached the "colt pasture," upon a cleared hill. Here a handsome black colt, along with a sorrel and a white one, was feeding, and at once came racing to meet me, in the hope of a nib of provender, or salt. Continuing my voyage of discovery, I came to a tract of woodland beyond the pasture through which a cart road led to a clearing where there was a small old house, deserted, and also a small barn. This, as I had ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... "I nib my pen and impart to it a fine hair stroke in order that I may give the more delicate touch which can alone show forth the character of this distinguished gentleman. If I hold the pen in hand in idle reverie, it is because my mind ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... forward to join the group. Pinned to the board with an old pen-nib was a half-sheet of scribbling-paper, and inscribed thereon, in what was evidently a disguised handwriting, were some verses, which were seen at once to refer to the previous afternoon's defeat. They ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery
... mind at the time was just this one. But that is neither here nor there. When candles came, we drew our chairs together, and he told me in substance the following story. I will tell it in my own words,—not that they are so good as his, but because they come more readily to the nib of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... by eighteen Mid[-e]/ Man/id[-o]s (Nos. 77 to 94), placed there by Ki/tshi Man/id[-o]. When the Otter approached the entrance (No. 95) he was again arrested in his progress by two evil man/id[-o]s (Nos. 96 and 97), who opposed his admission, but Mi/nib[-o]/zho overcame them and the Otter entered. Just inside of the door, and on each side, the Otter saw a post (Nos. 98 and 99), and at the western door or exit two corresponding posts (Nos. 100 and 101). These symbolized the four legs of the Makwa/ Man/id[-o], ...
— The Mide'wiwin or "Grand Medicine Society" of the Ojibwa • Walter James Hoffman
... one open on the table, he would lie down by it, gaze attentively at the page and turn the leaves with his claws; then he ended by going to sleep, just as if he had really been reading a fashionable novel. As soon as I picked up my pen, he would leap upon the desk, and watch attentively the steel nib scribbling away on the paper, moving his head every time I began a new line. Sometimes he endeavoured to collaborate with me, and would snatch the pen out of my hand, no doubt with the intention of writing in his turn, for he ...
— My Private Menagerie - from The Works of Theophile Gautier Volume 19 • Theophile Gautier
... in a good humour for working that day, and I had just dipped the nib of my pen into the ink-bottle when I heard some one ring. Should any one ever read these pages written by an unimaginative old man, he will be sure to laugh at the way that bell keeps ringing through my narrative, without ever announcing the arrival of a new personage or introducing ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... arts and inspiration of them,—waited on the nib of the pen, such talk as passed between these two could not be written. Some things—and those not the least profound and admirable of life—transcend the cunning of man to interpret them, unless to an apprehension as fine as they! We are fain to ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... pen and ink and a supply of hotel note paper, which Micky looked at with great satisfaction, before he took up a pen, carefully examined the nib, squared his ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres
... Clara, which Miss Ingamells had certainly overheard, prevented him, as an independent man, from beginning his work for at least ten minutes. He whistled, opened his father's desk and stared vacantly into it, examined the pen-nib case in detail, and tore off two leaves from the date calendar so that it should be ready for Monday. He had a great scorn for Miss Ingamells, who was a personable if somewhat heavy creature of twenty-eight, because she kept company with a young man. He had ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... And she added, pressing the nib of her pen on her finger-nail, "They say he doesn't marry just because he is poor ...
— Our Friend the Charlatan • George Gissing
... that letter I became full of the noblest resolutions. Not another day should pass, I vowed, before I answered it. So I prepared a great many sheets of thin note-paper, carefully selected a clean nib and sat down at my writing-table to begin. As I did so my eyes fell upon Martin Chuzzlewit, which was lying within easy reach. The book seemed positively to command me to read it for the tenth time. I took it up, and in another moment Mrs. Gamp had taken possession of me. My ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, December 12, 1891 • Various
... peculiar fitness in this appointment; for is not his Lordship son-in-law to old Goldsmid, whilom editor of the Anti-Galliean, and for many years an honoured and withal notorious resident of Paris! Of course BEN D'ISRAELI, his Lordship's friend, will get a slice of secretaryship—may be allowed to nib a state quill, if he must not ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... well-groomed gentleman, smooth-shaven and with hair that was none too gray, more than once caught himself standing before Lloyd's picture that stood on the mantelpiece in Hattie's room, looking at it vaguely as he clipped the nib from his cigar. ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris
... of mistaking writing produced by a stylograph for that of an ordinary steel nib. The strokes are absolutely uniform in thickness. No nib-formed writing can be so, for it is impossible for a writer, however careful, to avoid putting pressure on his pen at some point; and the opening of the nib, however slight, must ...
— The Detection of Forgery • Douglas Blackburn
... arc of the egg-shaped tube was a concave platinum cathode, at the narrow arc a nib of some sort, ending in a socket. From this socket, two heavy insulated wires extended sixty feet or so across the sand to the secondary unit of the mechanism, which was roughly a series of resistance coils, resembling those in an ordinary ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930 • Various
... parchment, upon which is written in contracted law Latin, "Preceptum fuit Vicecomiti per breve hujus Scaccarii." To the right of the last-named figure is another officer of the court, who is in the act of examining his pen by placing its nib at a short distance from his eyes; and this person carries in his left hand a piece of parchment upon which are written, in like character, the words "Memorandum quod x die Maii, &c." To the right of this officer, who is probably the Chief Remembrancer, is placed another officer, wearing a cap, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 62, January 4, 1851 • Various
... announcement at breakfast that this was one of the mornings was greeted with a surprised enthusiasm which was most flattering. Archie offered me his own room where he does his thinking; Simpson offered me a nib; and Dahlia promised me a quiet time till lunch. I thanked them all and settled down ...
— The Holiday Round • A. A. Milne
... night before Christmas. He waited till the master and mistress and the assistants had gone out to an early church-service, to procure from his employer's cupboard a small phial of ink and a penholder with a rusty nib; then, spreading a crumpled sheet of paper in front of him, ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... in the place of the tiny nib permitted the modification of the quality of sound by differences in the pressure of the fingers, and also the production at will of such nuances as forte and piano without recourse to the different registers. This is the reason why ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... broad flights of steps. How intensely eager do these dusky believers in the efficacy of "Mother Ganga" as a purifier of sin dip themselves beneath the yellow water, rinse out their mouths, scrape their tongues, nib, duck, splash, and disport; they fairly revel in the sacred water; happy, thrice happy they look, as well indeed they might, for now are they certain of future happiness. What the "fountain filled with blood" is to the Christian, so ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... end gained by taking notes of this reply, so I amused myself by making a good nib to my pen while I waited for something better worth ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... with its green-shaded electric light, and littered with proofs and copies of Hesperus, "A Paper for Doubters," which, with her assistance, he edited, published, compiled, wrote, and (without her help) paid for and read. A pen, flung down forcibly, quivered erect with its one surviving nib in the blotting pad. Mr. Lagune had ...
— Love and Mr. Lewisham • H. G. Wells
... intruder on his desperate hurry. Then he motioned Tyrrel into a chair with an imperious wave of his ivory penholder. After that, he went on writing for some moments in solemn silence. Only the sound of his steel nib, traveling fast as it could go over the foolscap sheet, broke for several ...
— Michael's Crag • Grant Allen
... not a very gay beginning for a young officer's active service, but Gordon, like his mother, had a way of making the best of things. Even when, as he wrote, the ink was frozen, and he broke the nib of his pen as he dipped it, "There are really no hardships for the officers," he wrote home; "the men are ...
— The Story of General Gordon • Jeanie Lang
... to the encounter twirling my moustache, bowing down to the ground, all smiles and compliments; and that I should select my rapier with a pleasant kind of feeling, like that experienced by the satirist about to write a brilliant article while picking out a pen with a suitable nib. On the other hand, if a murderous brute with truculent eyes and gnashing teeth attempts to disembowel me with a butcher's knife, the instinct of self-preservation comes out in all its old original ferocity, inspiring the heart with such implacable fury that after spilling ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson
... A piece of bravado which occurred to him when he had the watch. Look at this paper. You can imagine him searching his pocket for a piece of waste paper and taking the first that came to his hand. It is written in ink with the pawnbroker's own pen. The inkwell is open," he lifted up the pen, "the nib is still ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace
... long drink. Thus far he had made no attempt to examine the victim. Pulling out a bulging note-case from the inside pocket of his blue serge coat, he unscrewed a fountain-pen, carefully tested the nib upon his thumb nail, and made three or four brief entries. Then, stretching out one long arm, he laid the wallet and the pen beside his glass upon the top of a bookcase, without otherwise changing his position, and glancing ...
— The Yellow Claw • Sax Rohmer
... matter to get Coutts to further on to Paris—to Mrs. Kemble in Paris. And I have written it all in my best MS. with a pen that has been held with its nib in water for more than a fortnight—Charles Keene's recipe for keeping Pens in ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble (1871-1883) • Edward FitzGerald
... is being fooled near by, regularly all the time, fooled from the sole of his poor tired feet to the poor helpless nib at the top of him which he calls his head, is naturally hard to argue with about the immortality of the soul, or the League of Nations. Reforms and reformers which overlook these facts must not be surprised if they seem to some of us a ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... shame! I can't write with a Waverley!" protested Raymonde in much indignation. "It'll spoil my whole exam. I call that tyranny! Look here! I'm not going to be done! I shall send for a fountain pen with a broad nib. I saw one advertised in ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... burning smoothly. Anon, as he reads by that light his lesson, lifting his eyes now and then it may be, the fire of candle lays hold of the petre with a spluttering noise and a leaping. Then should the pupil seize his pen, and, regardless of the nib, stir bravely, and he will see a glow as of burning mountains, and a rich smoke, and sparks going merrily; nor will it cease, if he stir wisely, and there be a good store of petre, until the wood is devoured through, like the sinking of a well-shaft. ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... wholesome pleasures. Now," I continued, "if only Queen TITA and the rest will help us, I think we can do something to satisfy this clamour." For all answer, my pen-holder nestled lovingly in my hand. I placed my patent sunset-nib in its mouth, waved it twice, dipped ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, April 30, 1892 • Various
... in the inkpot, and then did he mend them, one and all, and then did he slit them with his thumb-nail, and then did he pare and slash away at them again and then did he cut off the tops, until at last he left upon them neither nib nor plume, nor enough of the middle to serve as quill to a virginal. It went to my heart to see such a power of pens so wasted; there could not be fewer than five. Sir Thomas was less wary than usual, being ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... sell, some with smaller news to give. Nobody knew whether Washington was taken. Nobody knew whether Jeff. Davis was now spitting in the Presidential spittoon, and scribbling his distiches with the nib of the Presidential goose-quill. We were absolutely in doubt whether a seemingly inoffensive knot of rustics, on a mound without the inclosure, might not, at tap of drum, unmask a battery of giant columbiads, and belch blazes ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... polished and smelling so good with your beeswax! Like your master, you have wrinkles, often my work, I admit; for how many times, in my impatience, have I not dug my pen into you, when, after its dip in the muddy inkpot, the nib ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre |
