"Nick" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... guessed the girl must have had wealthy friends, and as this chest must have belonged to them, it would have been worth my while to get hold of her. As, however, they have never appeared, I have been saved the trouble and expense she would have been to me, and now this store comes just in the nick of time when I want it most. The only difficulty will be to dispose of all these things without raising suspicion as to how I came by them. Still, at the worst, I can but tell the truth should questions be asked, and prove that I got them from a wreck. At all events, there ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... she could gratify any reasonable ambition, and might virtually dictate her own terms. With an engine in his hands as formidable as Russia's adhesion to his commercial policy, he could act at the nick of time,—which, as he declared at this very season to Joseph, was the highest art of which man is capable,—could destroy England's commerce, and in a long peace could consolidate the empire he had already won. His empire thus consolidated, he would ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... EYE, could not but discern all passages in his dominions; and he having always love for his Son as for himself, could not, at what he saw, but be greatly provoked and offended; wherefore, what does he, but takes them in the very nick; and, first trip that they made towards their design, convicts them of the treason, horrid rebellion, and conspiracy that they had devised, and now attempted to put into practice; and casts them altogether out of all place of trust, benefit, honour, and preferment. This done, he banishes them the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... history is gone by: their origin, their foundation, together with the early stages of their settlement, are for ever buried in the rubbish of years; and the same would have been the case with this fair portion of the earth if I had not snatched it from obscurity in the very nick of time, at the moment that those matters herein recorded were about entering into the widespread insatiable maw of oblivion—if I had not dragged them out, as it were, by the very locks, just as the monster's adamantine fangs were closing upon ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... not much, but it is funny how a nick-name travels. There were about five hundred men there still, and I heard one say as I ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... Rosebery is representative, has endeavored to substitute for the moral or social ideals which have hitherto been the motive of politics a general coherency or completeness in the social system which has gained the nick-name of "efficiency." I am not very certain of the secret doctrine of this sect in the matter. But, as far as I can make out, "efficiency" means that we ought to discover everything about a machine except what it is for. There has arisen in our time a most ...
— What's Wrong With The World • G.K. Chesterton
... Sganarelle is a blockhead who will spoil everything. However, as we have nobody else, we must make use of him. But where shall we find him?—Ah! here he is in the very nick of time. ...
— The Flying Doctor - (Le Medecin Volant) • Jean Baptiste Poquelin de Moliere
... him. After all, nothing else mattered during that supreme moment of thankfulness. A few seconds longer beneath that smothering mass and he would have been dead. By what a strange sequence of events had I come to his side just in the nick of time! ...
— A Master of Mysteries • L. T. Meade
... his escape while it was possible, but Braesig came as close up to him as if he had known what he was thinking of, and that only made him rage and chafe the more inwardly. When Braesig asked Mrs. Behrens who it was that had come up in the nick of time, and she had answered that it was Frank, Triddelfitz stood still and shaking his fist in the direction of Puempelhagen, said fiercely "I am betrayed, and she will be sold, sold to that man because of his rank and position!" "Boy!" cried Mrs. Behrens, "will you ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... He was not hard on the captain. Nothing was further from his thoughts. Friend! Of course he was a good friend and a faithful servant. He begged Powell to understand that if Captain Anthony chose to strike a bargain with Old Nick to-morrow, and Old Nick were good to the captain, he (Franklin) would find it in his heart to love Old Nick for the captain's sake. That was so. On the other hand, if a saint, an angel with white wings came ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... the Romans. However, he who first of that house was surnamed Cicero seems to have been a person worthy to be remembered; since those who succeeded him not only did not reject, but were fond of that name, though vulgarly made a matter of reproach. For the Latins call a vetch Cicer, and a nick or dent at the tip of his nose, which resembled the opening in a vetch, gave him the ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch
... put us all in good nick," said Tresco, as he drew the cork of the bottle, and poured some of the spirit into the pannikin. "Here's luck," and he drank his dram at ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... "Now, come on, Mas' Nick, honey, and go to bed. I'll pour a bucket of cistern water over you and rub you down so as you'll sleep like a bug in a rug," the staunch old comrade crooned, with a mother note in his voice, as he took father's heavy hoe and ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... 'the maid spoke out of kindness. I know that half your cough is but a catch to trick the vulgar; and that's a pity. There's honesty enough in you, Nick, ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... brought the doctor in the nick of time to perform an inestimable service to the Motor Maids and to all those who knew ...
— The Motor Maids at Sunrise Camp • Katherine Stokes
... kind of a nick you have got!" said Webster, examining the arm with some skill once acquired in a doctor's shop to which run-over and fainted people were sometimes brought for sudden assistance. "No, the bones are not broken—all right! ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... that the deacon arrived, like Sheridan at Winchester, in the nick of time; that he rallied his flustered cohorts and led them to triumph—and then regretted the bargain he had made. But it was too late. He could not draw back. Wife and daughter and townsfolk were all against him, and he could ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland
... the splices are electrically perfect; an imperfect splice may cause considerable trouble. In telegraph and telephone cables the conductors should be of very soft copper, for in stripping the conductor of insulation it is very easy to nick the wire, and if of hard drawn copper open wires ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 821, Sep. 26, 1891 • Various
... were held out to him, he would proceed to the northern metropolis, and there settle for ever a case which apparently had kept the newsmongers of Edinburgh in aliment for a length of time much exceeding the normal nine days. Opportune and happily come in the very nick of time as the latter was—for the delay allowed by the court had all but expired—Mr. White saw the danger of promising anything which could be construed into a reward; but he could use other means of decoying the shy bird into his meshes; and these he ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various
... price; Galway horses always do; and it was easy to see that Nicholas Blake was in earnest, and Nick was a man that wouldn't come from Loughrea to Carrick-on-Shannon, and lose a day with the Galway dogs for nothing; George Brown made the purchase, for if anything could beat Conqueror it ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... salutation I pressed forward. Madam, I give you my word, he behaved to the full pitch as I myself should have done under similar circumstances. Retiring upon an inclination of his structure, he draws up and fetches me a bow of the exact middle nick between dignity and service. I advance, he withdraws, and again the bow, devoid of obsequiousness, majestically condescending. These, thinks I, be royal manners. I could have taken him for the Sable King in person, stripped of his ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Law," as it was called, was carefully observed afterwards in Laramie City; and so great has been the change in that town in the habits of the people and the quiet appearance of the streets on Sunday, as compared with other towns in the territory, that it has been nick-named the "Puritan town" of Wyoming, and, I may add, rejoices in ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... that you?" he returned. "No, thanks; rather painful, but not very serious, I hope. By Jove, but those Frenchmen fought stubbornly; if you had not come up in the very nick of time it would have gone pretty badly with us, I can tell you. You seem to have come off scot free, by ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... written a letter to give me my choice between The wee little whimpering Love and the great god Nick o' Teen. ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... recovering from the shock of surprise, ordered Edward from the house. He would sooner see his child dead than the wife of Nick Crown's son,—Nick Crown, a drunken rascal who had been known to beat his wife,—Nick Crown who was not even fit to lick the feet ...
— Quill's Window • George Barr McCutcheon
... sure your dilatory ways are unparalleled. Had not my good genius inspired me, my happiness had been already wholly overthrown. There was an end to my good fortune, my joy. I should have been a prey to eternal grief; in short, had I not gone to this place in the very nick of time, Anselmo would have got possession of the captive, and I should have been deprived of her. He was carrying her home, but I parried the thrust, warded off the blow, and so worked upon Trufaldin's fears as to make him ...
— The Blunderer • Moliere
... many threatening gestures and a complete loss of temper on both sides. Ste. Marie, from his bed, cheered them on, but there came a commotion in the ivy which draped the wall below, and the two birds fled in ignominious haste, and just in the nick of time, for when the cause of the commotion shot into view it was a large black cat, of great bodily activity and an ardent single-heartedness ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... or three houses and an inn; there is likewise a species of barrack, where half a dozen soldiers are stationed. In the whole of Portugal there is no place of worse reputation, and the inn is nick-named Estalagem de Ladroes, or the hostelry of thieves; for it is there that the banditti of the wilderness, which extends around it on every side for leagues, are in the habit of coming and spending the money, the fruits of their criminal daring; there they dance and sing, ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... human beings. The old Vendeen knew better than any one that if there is an art in choosing the right moment for coming forward on the boards of the world, on those of the Court, in a drawing-room or on the stage, it is still more difficult to quit them in the nick of time. So during the first winter after the accession of Charles X., he redoubled his efforts, seconded by his three sons and his sons-in-law, to assemble in the rooms of his official residence the best matches which Paris and the various deputations ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac
... fascinated her by their very fierceness. Forgetting where she was for the instant, she stared dumbly at them until called to life and action by a scream from the locomotive's whistle. Then she sprang from the track just in the nick of time. She actually laughed as she saw two grayish-white wolf-tails bob here and there among the sage brush, as the wolves took flight ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... new fellow," answered Kenrick, Henderson, and all who knew him, as fast as they could, in reply to the general queries. They were proud to know him just then, and this little triumph occurred in the nick of time to raise poor ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... couldn't eat; she called her children 'little tots,' and said she couldn't get so much as a 'serviette' washed in the house. I thought nobody talked of serviettes outside Wells and Arnold Bennett. Mrs. Duff-Whalley rescued me in the nick of time before I could do anything desperate, and then she cross-examined me as to my reasons ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... Lor'! how she larrupped 'em,—she has a cruel heart, has n't she, Bob? Bob is a 'cute child, Mr. R——. Just as I was a thinking of turning her out neck an' crop, a gemman what lodges aloft, wot be a laryer, and wot had just saved my nick, Mr. R——, by proving a h-alibi, said, 'That's a tidy body, your Peg!' (for you see he was often a wisiting here, an' h-indeed, sin' then, he has taken our third floor, No. 9); 'I've been a speakin' to her, and I find ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... night. Despite his precautions, it was a wild night. There was continued tumult in the streets and, at one time, shortly before dawn, a gang of rioters actually broke into the palace and groped about in search of the queen's apartments. Just in the nick of time the hated Marie Antoinette hurried to safer quarters, although several of her personal bodyguard ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... nick-named, as Chicago, the Windy City; Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love, etc. The hostess requests her guests to wear something suggestive of the nickname of the city represented. Each guest writes on a piece of paper what cities he supposes ...
— Entertainments for Home, Church and School • Frederica Seeger
... of your hatchet; keep it free from the ground when chopping, to avoid striking snags, stones, or other things liable to nick or ...
— On the Trail - An Outdoor Book for Girls • Lina Beard and Adelia Belle Beard
... ways in their places, loosened the cradle, and wedged up the fore part of the vessel; then the stays were hastily removed; it was Begmand who had taken away the last from the stern amidst the fire and smoke, and so away went the ship just in the nick of time. Tom Robson ought really to have all the praise, since everything was ready to hand, and in the most ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland
... the feast-board, and he demanded Tristrem's name and business. Tristrem boldly declared himself, and at the end of an angry parley the Duke struck him a sore blow. A moment later swords were flashing, and it might have gone ill with Tristrem had not Rohand with his men come up in the nick of time. In the end Duke Morgan was slain and his followers routed. Having now recovered his paternal domains Sir Tristrem conferred them upon Rohand, to be held of himself as liege lord, and having done so he took leave of his ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... is truth, if the devil spoke it," said the knight; "and I thank Heaven I can follow good counsel, though old Nick gives it. And so, friend, touching these same Commissioners, bear them this message; that Sir Henry Lee is keeper of Woodstock Park, with right of waif and stray, vert and venison, as complete as any of them have to their estate—that is, if they possess any estate but what ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... spirits were his! what wit and what whim! Now breaking a jest, and now breaking a limb; Now wrangling and grumbling to keep up the ball; Now teasing and vexing, yet laughing at all. In short, so provoking a devil was Dick, That we wish'd him full ten times a day at old Nick, But, missing his mirth and agreeable vein, As often we wish'd ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... knows," said her brother. "I lost count—and lost some of the knives, too. I've an idea Bill Beresford picked up one I dropped—the one Lance Western gave me; it's got a tortoise-shell handle, and a nick out of the big blade—and gave it to me ...
— Mates at Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... well as the boy. Nicodemus is a long name to write at full length, and Nick is vulgar. Besides, as there will be two Nicks, they will naturally call my boy young Nick, and of course I shall be styled old Nick, ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... was spent—but for the heroism of Ray, who had run the gauntlet through the Cheyennes all alone in the darkness, found Truscott's squadron going rapidly away in another direction, turned him to the rescue just in the nick of time, and now, weak and wounded, was being sent in to Russell; that there had been several men killed, quite a number wounded, and that among these latter were Blake, Wayne, and Dana; and that Blake, too, would be sent to Russell. Further particulars came every hour or two. Every report had ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... St. this evening. I wish your brother wouldn't drink. It's a blemish in the greatest characters. You send me a modern quotation poetical. How do you like this in an old play? Vittoria Corombona, a spunky Italian Lady, a Leonardo one, nick-named the White Devil, being on her trial for murder, &c.—and questioned about seducing a Duke from his wife ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... Captain is his own father; and the old woman is his grandmother. The robber chief's father was known as "Nick, the Highwayman," a terrible person whose name made everybody's heart ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... Nick, you've been too fast, To get Turkey within your grasp, But a Tartar you have caught at last, In the shape of our tars and Charley. Then here's success with three times three, To all true hearts by land ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... her, because she is one of those people who just can't stand losing. When Miss Thompson reached the place where she was about to ask Anne to step up and get the prize, Miriam half rose in her seat. Mrs. Nesbit pulled her back in the nick of time. I honestly believe she would have reached the stage before Anne did, if her mother hadn't stopped her. Hippy told me they left before the benediction. I suppose Miriam was not equal ...
— Grace Harlowe's Plebe Year at High School - The Merry Doings of the Oakdale Freshmen Girls • Jessie Graham Flower
... said, mopping his brow. "Sure, Miss Norah, y' kem in the nick av time—'twas run clane off ...
— Mates at Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... tell us a thing that's puzzled me, and I daresay more than me?" ventured a young assistant manager, voicing the thoughts of others present. "How the deuce did those wild elephants happen to turn up just in the nick of time for you?" ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... to-night, just in the nick of tune, and I enclose a letter which I was just about to send to the Editor of the London 'Standard.' Please send it to that or any other paper you like, barring the 'Times,' 'Saturday Review,' or 'Pall Mall Gazette.' I wrote another letter to the 'Times,' by which they corrected the discrepancy ...
— Canada and the States • Edward William Watkin
... time has now arrived, and let it teach you not to despise even the smallest creature in the world." "I thank you with all my heart," returned Hans. "My bones are almost pulverised with their blows, and I should hardly have escaped with life if you had not arrived in the very nick of time." ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... occurred in an aged Macacus cynomolgus, kept in confinement whose moustaches were "remarkably long and human-like." Altogether this old monkey presented a ludicrous resemblance to one of the reigning monarchs of Europe, after whom he was universally nick-named. In certain races of man the hair on the head hardly ever becomes grey; thus Mr. D. Forbes has never, as he informs me, seen an instance with the Aymaras and Quichuas ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... bought but one bill of the other dry goods house, and did not like their traveling man; but now he would have bought of Old Nick rather than buy of Luce. He went over to Keeler's and again introduced himself (the task was getting as disagreeable as it was monotonous), saying he wanted to buy some goods. The gentleman made an excuse to go to the desk for a moment, and Solomon knew it was to consult the reference ...
— A Man of Samples • Wm. H. Maher
... the gaugers and their crony, Ould Nick, ran off wid the uncle of him, Nance and he and the childer lived together in their father's and mother's house; and if they didn't live and die happy, I wish that ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... and finds, to his grief and astonishment, that he has but eleven cents in his pocket. Of course, he has coppered and won. But why—tell me why, could he not have given me the sentiment, which I had a right to expect from him? He bears the stamp of a bad Kopper; a regular old Nick, and has done that unbecoming thing so often that it is becoming monotonous And General X——— and Mr. K——— are types of a large class who come before me to take acknowledgments and the like, for whom I have no liking; who may as well acknowledge now, severally each for himself, ...
— Punchinello, Vol.1, No. 4, April 23, 1870 • Various
... but it seems that I came down just in the nick of time," replied the little fop. "The fact is, I drank too much wine last night, and it makes me thirsty to-day. I was almost choked, and the ladies had seated themselves on a rock, to enjoy a view of the boundless ...
— The Coming Wave - The Hidden Treasure of High Rock • Oliver Optic
... from the pump room. He was in the nick of time. A large locker in the main compartment gave him refuge just as Pauline ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard
... into all this with the red coat of a soldier and the keen, ambitious heart of a Jew, at the very nick of time. He saw at once the enormous possibilities hidden in the near future for a man who took this country at its proper value, handling what he secured with coolness and foresight. He know that he only possessed one thing to risk, namely, his life; and ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... that was old Nick's wife, who was with us just this instant, and now, indeed, Gyp, if we are to see the Hidden House this afternoon, ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth
... arrival of the second ship from Police Terminal—and believe me, that ship came in just in the nick of time!—the dead Abzar city which the criminals were using as their main base for this time line, and from which they launched the air attack against us, was located, and now word has come in that it is entirely in the hands ...
— Time Crime • H. Beam Piper
... time of their accidents, and so their machines were smashed; fortunately Mr. Brock was comparatively high up in the air, and though his machine rocked about and banked in an ominous manner, yet he was able to gain control just in the nick ...
— The Mastery of the Air • William J. Claxton
... was a robbery of no great importance, but Nick had taken it to oblige a personal friend, who wished to have the business managed quietly. This affair would not be worth mentioning, except that it led Nick to one of the most peculiar and interesting criminal puzzles that he had ever ...
— The Crime of the French Cafe and Other Stories • Nicholas Carter
... not until the end of the week that Dick Rover came into contact with Tad Sobber, a stocky youth, with a shock of black hair and eyes which were cold and penetrating. Sobber was with a chum named Nick Pell, and both eyed Dick in a calculating manner which was ...
— The Rover Boys on the Farm - or Last Days at Putnam Hall • Arthur M. Winfield (AKA Edward Stratemeyer)
... same time that he is working very hard, and studying to improve himself in branches of knowledge in which he feels himself deficient. He is practising very temperate habits: for half a year past he has taken to drinking water only, avoiding all sweets, and eating no "nick-nacks." He has "sowens and milk,' (oatmeal flummery) every night for his supper. His friend having asked his opinion of politics, he says he really knows nothing about them; he had been so completely engrossed by his own business that he has not ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles
... drummers talked with him a long time, and they had glib tongues, and the aid of the ever-welcome angels. Toth Janos the poultry-dealer, who could not vote in his own name, voted as Toth Janos, the potter, but he had a great sacrifice to make. The deceased potter was nick-named the "gap-toothed," because he had lost his front teeth in a brawl. Now the poultry-dealer's front teeth were as sound as ivory, yet so great and effective were the persuasions of the "angels" that, in half an hour's time, Toth Janos, the poultry-dealer, so closely resembled Toth Janos, the ...
— Dr. Dumany's Wife • Mr Jkai
... Calcutta with prominent leaders and educators, a long talk with the young Maharaja of Kasimbazar, a financial appeal to my father, and lo! the shaky foundations of Ranchi began to be righted. Many donations including one huge check arrived in the nick of time from my ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... was like a bugle spaking. There's nobody can spake but himself. When the others are toot-tooting, it's just 'Polly, put the kettle on' (mimicking a mincing treble). See the lil Puffin on his throne of turf there? Looked as if Ould Nick had been thrashing peas on his face for ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... well "as one who has been where they grow;"—his little ragamuffin who indignantly denies that he has broken his promise not to gamble away his sixpences at pitch-and-toss because he has gambled them away at "neevie-neevie-nick-nack,"—and similar figures abound in his tales,—are all creations which make one laugh inwardly as we read. But he has a much higher humour still, that inimitable power of shading off ignorance into knowledge ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... ship's sailing, cannot now be known. It may have been an article brought expressly from Jamaica for the fascination of the Indians. But honi soit qui mal y pense. The truth of the matter will never be learned. It is sufficient that the man produced it in the very nick of time, and laid the blue tissue over the copper-coloured lady. She was so much pleased with it "that she immediately began to chatter to her Husband, and soon brought him into a better Humour." He relented at once, and said that he knew the trail to the North Sea, ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... fighting—blood—men injured, perhaps killed. Even the thought of violence of any kind hurt her. But perhaps the guerrillas would run in time to avoid a clash with her men. She hoped for that, prayed for it. Through her mind flitted what she knew of Nels, of Monty, of Nick Steele; and she experienced a sensation that left her somewhat chilled and sick. Then she thought of the dark-browed, fire-eyed Stewart. She felt a thrill drive away the cold nausea. ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... dissipate all the affrighting menace of the city beyond the station. Miss Thompkins had fluffy red hair, with the freckles which too often accompany red hair, and was addressed as Tommy. Miss Nickall had fluffy grey hair, with warm, loving eyes, and was addressed as Nick. The age of either might have been anything from twenty-four to forty. The one came from Wyoming, the other from Arizona; and it was instantly clear that they were close friends. They had driven up to the terminus before going to a fancy-dress ball to be given that night in the ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... almost. They used to wonder how I got so much for the money. But I'm always afraid o' being found out—or of losing the blessed spy-glass—or of some one pinching it. So we got to do what I always said—make some use of it. And if I go along and nick your father's dibs we'll make ...
— The Magic World • Edith Nesbit
... than delicate, and at length two or three of the elder women (for the girls were somewhat diffident and bashful) began to assail Raymond with various pungent witticisms. Some of the men took part and an old squaw concluded by bestowing on him a ludicrous nick name, at which a general laugh followed at his expense. Raymond grinned and giggled, and made several futile attempts at repartee. Knowing the impolicy and even danger of suffering myself to be placed in a ludicrous ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... passing the entrance to a factory yard when he felt a hand on his shoulder, and wheeling around found himself confronted by Jack Sagger, Nick Sammel, and half a dozen others, who had gathered to see their leader ...
— Joe The Hotel Boy • Horatio Alger Jr.
... said to be a typical United States Army officer. His figure would probably fall short of the standard, but he was no less strong and healthy than his brother knights of the sword. His strength was more to be compared to that patient animal after which he was nick-named, the mighty carabao, but he lacked the grace of form and dignity of bearing that the average wearer of shoulder-straps in Uncle Sam's army is ...
— Bamboo Tales • Ira L. Reeves
... horrified exclamation, seized, held it fast, wrapped round it a great woollen shawl from his own shoulders, and in one moment put out the deadly fire which was snatching at the sweet young life. Who was this gentleman, do you think, thus arrived at the very nick of time? Why, no other than Lady Bird's own Papa, come home from China a few weeks before ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... his father quietly. "You were just in the nick of time. Another second and U Saw's pony would have trampled the life out of the ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore
... "In the nick of time, Ralph!" exclaimed Lord Tamerton, clasping his hand warmly. "We are trying to create a mediaeval atmosphere in keeping with our surroundings, and as host I was about to announce in the approved ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, September 9, 1914 • Various
... among us, jist as we was nabbing the girl and sodger, was as much as to say there was no good could come of it; and so the Injuns thought too—you saw how hard it was to bring 'em up to the scratch, when they found he had been knifing a feller right among 'em! I do believe the crittur's Old Nick himself!" ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... to him by his cousin, Sir Rufus Hockin, had long been far more plague than profit to that idle baronet. Sir Rufus hated all exertion, yet could not comfortably put up with the only alternative—extortion. Having no knowledge of his cousin Nick (except that he was indefatigable), and knowing his own son to be lazier even than himself had been, longing also to inflict even posthumous justice upon the land agent, with the glad consent of his heir he left this distant, fretful, and naked spur ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... his pridefulness towards me; for, observing me standing in serenity at the window, he came, and in a vehement manner cried to me for the love of heaven to come to his assistance, and pacify the people. It would not have been proper in me to have refused; so out I went in the very nick of time: for when I got to the door, there was the soldiers in battle array, coming marching with fife and drum up the gait with Major Blaze at their head, red and furious in the face, and bent on some bloody ...
— The Provost • John Galt
... "Nick," said Lafayette at another time to this aged man, as the two old friends sailed up the Hudson, "do you remember when we used to slide down that hill with the Newburgh girls, on ...
— Hero Stories from American History - For Elementary Schools • Albert F. Blaisdell
... mate, "the Rock-scorpions are right. They have pounced upon the derelict like wolves. I almost wish I was there to see the effect when they realize they have been fooled, and they find that that craft is loaded with stones. It was just done in the nick of time; they might have ...
— Looking Seaward Again • Walter Runciman
... "I have been seeking you for weeks, and I find you in the nick of time. But there is no time to explain now. There were others with your captors; I saw the sledge following behind. We ...
— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns
... him on the subject. To Canobie Dick, for so shall we call our Border dealer, a chap was a chap, and he would have sold a horse to the devil himself, without minding his cloven hoof, and would have probably cheated Old Nick into the bargain. The stranger paid the price they agreed on, and all that puzzled Dick in the transaction was, that the gold which he received was in unicorns, bonnet-pieces, and other ancient coins, which would have ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous
... psychologic expression. He notes it with so hasty a pencil, that one might almost say that he writes with colour. He is also an etcher of great merit, and an original sculptor. He has invented small bas-reliefs in bronze which can be attached to the wall, like sketches or nick-nacks; and he has applied his talent even to renewing the material for painting. He is an ingenious artist and a prolific producer, a roguish, but sympathetic, observer of the life of the small people, which has not prevented him from painting ...
— The French Impressionists (1860-1900) • Camille Mauclair
... eager to escape from the hunters, by whom he had been pursued, but too weary to reach the river, across which he had hoped to be able to swim to safety. Just as he reached the three friends, he fell to the ground, almost crushing the mouse, who darted away in the nick of time. Strange to say, the hunters did not follow the deer; and it was evident that they had not noticed the way ...
— Hindu Tales from the Sanskrit • S. M. Mitra and Nancy Bell
... as a boy—and your father's tale just now put me in mind of him—paid half a crown to a conjurer, one time, to have his fortune told; which was, that he would marry the ugliest maid in the parish. Whereby it preyed on his mind till he hanged hisself. Whereby along comes the woman in the nick o' time, cuts him down, an' marries him out o' pity while he's too weak to resist. That's your Future; and, as I say, I keeps en at ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... the far-off Polar seas, Far beyond the Hebrides, Where the icebergs, towering high, Seem to pierce the wintry sky, And the fur-clad Esquimaux Glides in sledges o'er the snow, Dwells St. Nick, the merry wight, Patron saint ...
— Ballads • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... He'd back Old Nick himself if he came with a good tale. We've got to act; we've got to settle his hash before ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... that of a slight, strong creature who was not a man. Lightfoot, wild with love and anxiety, had shot past Old Mok just as he laid down his bundle of arrows, and, when she saw her husband's peril, had leaped forward with arrow upon string and slain his latest assailant in the nick of time. Now, with arrow notched again and a face ablaze with murderous helpfulness, she hovered near, intent only upon sending a second shaft into the breast ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... growing for market at Bay Lake was back in 1886. Nick Newgard, one of our first settlers, sold quite a few berries that year. Bay Lake is seven miles from Deerwood, the nearest railroad point, and at that time there was only a trail between these places, and it was necessary for Mr. Newgard to pack his ...
— Trees, Fruits and Flowers of Minnesota, 1916 • Various
... very amusing and natural manner: the Little Boy's Dance has been liked by some; and please to remark the richly dressed figure of the Wicked Nobleman, on which no expense has been spared, and which Old Nick will fetch away at the end of this ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... like your cretonne; it is so frightfully common!" said she. "Where did you buy that abominable pink stuff? There's a chair that would be nice if the wood weren't covered with gilding. Not a picture, not a nick-nack—only your chandelier and your candelabra, which are by no means in good style! Ah well, my dear fellow; I advise you to continue laughing at ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola
... said Murphy, "a sjambak can lick twenty men in space-suits. A little nick doesn't hurt him, but a little nick bursts open a space-suit, and ...
— Sjambak • John Holbrook Vance
... not happen as often in real life, at least one cannot count upon it with the certainty of the theater. But when Miss Primrose Cash knocked upon the door of the Phipps' sitting room and delivered her call to the seance, she was as opportune and nick-of-timey as was ever a dramatic Governor's messenger. Certainly that summons of hers was to Galusha Bangs a reprieve which ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... lodged might have been solved by what is called an accommodating disposition, but not by the disposition incidental to the esprit de corps of a large staff of domestic servants. To control them is notoriously the deuce's own delight, and old Nick's relish for it must grow in proportion as they become more and more corporate. As Mr. Norbury said—and we do not feel that we can add to the force of his words—her young ladyship had not took proper account of tempers. Two of these qualities, tendencies, ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... over to Ashbridge 'All," said Mr. Baker eagerly, "you'd a bin shot but for me. Some gents will never learn 'ow 'to 'old their guns. I knocked the barrel up just in the nick. That ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... court nor valid law. If you judge the King, 'tis on grounds of policy. Can you defend that policy, Oliver? You yourself have no clearness. Who has; Not Vane. Not Fairfax. Not Whitelocke, or Widdrington, or Lenthall. Certes, not your old comrade Nick Lovel." ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... Old Nick is now used to frighten children with, and by-and-bye he may be employed like the old garden-god to frighten away the crows. Even his scriptural reputation cannot save him from such a fate, for the Bible itself is falling into disbelief and ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (First Series) • George W. Foote
... to his head. He was still throbbing and aching all over from the ill effect of the treatment accorded him by the Burmese visitors. Berrington had come down in the nick of time and saved him from a terrible fate, but Sartoris was not feeling in the least grateful. To a certain extent he was between the devil and the deep sea. Desperately as he was situated now, he could not afford to dismiss Berrington ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... such accuracy and deliberation that they remained the standard authority on the outlines of the islands for some seventy years. He took possession of the country in the name of George the Third. Some of its coast-names still recall incidents of his patient voyaging. "Young Nick's Head" is the point which the boy Nicholas Young sighted on the 6th of October, 1769—the first bit of New Zealand seen by English eyes. At Cape Runaway the Maoris, after threatening an attack, ran away from a discharge of firearms. ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... Cissie's appearance just in the nick of his inspiration, her surprising proposal of marriage, and his refusal, had accomplished one thing: it had committed Peter to the program he had outlined to ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... transformed us at once from rather fashionable young men into a set of forlorn-looking beggars. Each laughed at the appearance of the other, unconscious of his own transformation; but Bob, with more truth than politeness, informed us that we all 'looked like the Old Nick;' whence it appeared that in Bob's opinion the Enemy is usually sorely afflicted with a shabby wardrobe, and that, in the words of ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... to recall. "So we did! Wouldn't it have been somewhere at Christmas? But it wasn't by arrangement!" he laughed, giving with his forefinger a little pleasant nick to his hostess's chin. Then as if something in the way she received this attention put him back to his question of a moment before: "Have ...
— Some Short Stories • Henry James
... that ends well," replied Colonel Zane cheerily. "But we must thank Providence that Wetzel and Jonathan came up in the nick ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... the "old nick" was to pay, "Truth indeed is stranger than fiction," His prayers were so tedious and long, People slept, till the benediction. And then came another, on trial, Who actually preached in his gloves, His manner so awkward and queer, That we settled ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... bored into the side of the Isthmus, reaching, well, about up to the rising slope of Gatun. Beyond this there were scratches in the soil for about forty miles. There was a notch nicked in the hills of Culebra—just a nick bearing no resemblance to what you see before you at ...
— Boy Scouts in the Canal Zone - The Plot Against Uncle Sam • G. Harvey Ralphson
... three pieces of wood of half an inch square by one foot long, we call one the "upright," which is simply brought to a point at one end, somewhat like a chisel. The second is the "slanting stick," which should be cut to about 8 in. long, having a nick in it about half an inch from one end, about half way through its depth; the other end is brought to a chisel point on its upper surface; the third, which is the "foot" or "bait stick," has a square notch, the thickness ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... end of his small war budget, I set him on to tell me how he came to be at hand to help me so in the nick of time on the night of the ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... went down to his office in the morning, all the nurses in the neighborhood were accustomed to stop in his path, that he might have some playful conversation with the little ones in their charge. He had a pleasant nick-name for them all; such as "Blue-bird," or "Yellow-bird," according to their dress. They would run up to him as he approached home, calling ...
— Isaac T. Hopper • L. Maria Child
... floundering once again over the partition, and guarding my loins, I leapt into the next compartment, seeing the affair had become a sauve qui peut, and devil take the hindmost: and at the nick of time, when she was about to descend like a wolf on a fold, I most fortunately perceived a bell-handle provided for such pressing emergencies and rung it with such unparalleled energy, that ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey
... {IRC} version of the venerable trivia game "20 questions", in which one user changes his {nick} to the initials of a famous person or other named entity, and the others on the channel ask yes or no questions, with the one to guess the person getting to be "it" next. As a courtesy, the one picking the initials starts by providing a 4-letter hint of the form sex, nationality, ...
— THE JARGON FILE, VERSION 2.9.10
... were spent in a few days. He borrowed from everybody, and never paid them back; he lived like a real Indian, and was as cowardly as a half-drowned chicken. His light-coloured hair, sallow complexion, and beardless face, gave him the nick-name among the Indians of Onela-Dogou, Tagalese words, that signify ...
— Adventures in the Philippine Islands • Paul P. de La Gironiere
... appearance had excited the school children and boys working in nearby iron factories to ridicule him. It became known that this young officer, while instructing his men, had insulted the French flag and had called the Alsatian recruits Wackes, a nick-name meaning "square-head," and frequently used by the people of Alsace-Lorraine in a jocular way, but hotly resented by them if used towards them by others. It was further reported that he had promised his men a reward of ten ...
— My Four Years in Germany • James W. Gerard
... the very nick of time, George came walking leisurely by, hatchet in hand; who, upon seeing how matters stood, without a moment's hesitation, ran up to his father, and, dropping his hatchet, caught him round the leg, just as the first stroke of the switch was about to descend on the ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... sacrificed as an expiatory offering for the whole country. So the people decked him with garlands like a victim and led him to the altar, where they were just about to sacrifice him when he was rescued either by his grandson Cytisorus, who arrived in the nick of time from Colchis, or by Hercules, who brought tidings that the king's son Phrixus was yet alive. Thus Athamas was saved, but afterward he went mad, and mistaking his son Learchus for a wild beast, shot him dead. Next he attempted ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... I can say is, the company recovered the safe in the nick of time, from whom I don't pretend to say. We've got it, and that's enough." There was a grin of cunning defiance on his face. He had entered a covert where ...
— Blue Goose • Frank Lewis Nason
... nick of time there came forth one from amidst the bushes that edged the pool of the stream and strode dripping on to the shallow; a man brown and hairy, and naked, save for a green wreath about his middle. Tall he was above the stature of most men; ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris
... future than pale with the promise of pride in the past; Flushed with the famishing fulness of fever that reddens with radiance of rathe recreation, Gaunt as the ghastliest of glimpses that gleam through the gloom of the gloaming when ghosts go aghast? Nay, for the nick of the tick of the time is a tremulous touch on the temples of terror, Strained as the sinews yet strenuous with strife of the dead who is dumb as the dust-heaps of death: Surely no soul is it, sweet as the spasm of erotic emotional exquisite error, Bathed ...
— A Nonsense Anthology • Collected by Carolyn Wells
... on 1st July, after a heavy night's rain, a voice from the high wet grass, about a hundred yards distant, cried out to the sentries in Arabic, "Don't fire! I am a messenger from Rionga to Malegge!" (my former nick-name). ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... you came very seasonably; you are come in the Nick of Time; I was just now wishing for you; I am ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus
... general thing, these ship-keepers are as hardy fellows as the men comprising the boats' crews. But if there happen to be an unduly slender, clumsy, or timorous wight in the ship, that wight is certain to be made a ship-keeper. It was so in the Pequod with the little negro Pippin by nick-name, Pip by abbreviation. Poor Pip! ye have heard of him before; ye must remember his tambourine on that dramatic midnight, so gloomy-jolly. .. In outer aspect, Pip and Dough-Boy made a match, like a black pony and a white one, of equal ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... at the nick of fortune? Do you know that a sub-lieutenancy is vacant in my company? Sub-lieutenant, with rank of a Colonel ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... States. The late Professor Moses Coit Tyler, of the University of Cornell, gave it as his opinion, "That the side of the Loyalists, as they called themselves, of the Tories, as they were scornfully nick-named by their opponents, was even in argument not a weak one, and in motive and sentiment not a base one, and in devotion and self-sacrifice not an unheroic one." The same sentiments were even more emphatically ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... for the most delicate operations known in surgery. And it was to be used for a delicate operation that night. You must know, with your wide experience of turf matters, Colonel Ross, that it is possible to make a slight nick upon the tendons of a horse's ham, and to do it subcutaneously, so as to leave absolutely no trace. A horse so treated would develop a slight lameness, which would be put down to a strain in exercise or a touch of rheumatism, but never to ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... better than matches," growled Watson. He had just been saved from pitching out upon the roadside by the quick efforts of one of his companions, who had seized him around the waist in the nick of time. Andrews went to the forward platform of ...
— Chasing an Iron Horse - Or, A Boy's Adventures in the Civil War • Edward Robins
... said Mrs. Pett proudly, "there was not a child in America who had to be more closely guarded. Why, the kidnappers had a special nick-name for Oggie. They called him ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... Just in the nick of time the Regent surrendered the town to Duke Philip, not, we may be sure, without many regrets for having recently refused him Orleans. He realised that thus, by returning to its French allegiance, the chief city of the realm ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... Aurelian is designated by a soldier under the nick-name of 'Hand-to-his-Sword.' Vopiscus also mentions this as a name by which he was known in the army. 'Nam quum essent in exercitu duo Aureliani tribuni, hic, et alius qui cum Valeriano captus est, huic signum (cognomen) exercitus ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... low. Mr. Aubrey went up and entered into conversation with them for some minutes. Their families and farms, he found, were well and thriving. There was quite a little crowd of women about the shop of Nick Steele, the butcher, who, with an extra hand to help him, was giving out the second ox which had been sent from the Hall, to the persons whose names had been given in to him from Mrs. Aubrey. Farther on, some were cleaning their little windows, others sweeping their floors, and sprinkling ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... arrived in the nick of time, they would have saved Candia, but by a sudden accident all was lost, and after so terrible a reverse, the Isle of Candia, wrested from the potentates of Europe and Christendom, fell a prey ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... subsist upon free lunches. It is so arranged that when the fellow gets both hands into the victuals, a large hand descends upon him, jams his hat over his eyes—he is seized, turned toward the door, and just in the nick of time an immense boot comes from the other side, kicks him in italics, sends him out over the sidewalk and lands him rolling in the gutter. I never hear of such a man—a boss—that I don't feel ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... found her tongue—in the nick of time, too, for a paralysis of fright had finished ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... largest and finest cat—San Francisco. This saint had always manifested a most singular and inveterate propensity, to hunt tarantulas. More than once he had been discovered when just on the point of beginning a battle with one of those monsters, and had been stopped in the nick of time. With almost constant watchfulness, the Father had succeeded in preserving the life of his cat for many years; but the reader has already guessed what the end was to be. After an absence of three ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... readily; when they were all inside he managed to slip out and lock them in. He then ran back for weapons: a broad-headed barbed spear, his sword and helmet. Now the berserkers knew they had been entrapped; breaking down the panelling of a wall they rushed out into the passage, where in the nick of time arrived Grettir, who thrust Thorir through with his spear; Ogmund the Evil was pressing close behind, so that the same thrust which pierced the one transfixed the other also. The remainder defended themselves with logs and whatever lay ready to hand, ...
— The Book of Romance • Various
... life were not in the least understood, because he never saw the possibility of talking about them. For example, when at the marriage of his son, Young Nick, he made over the farm, and kept his own residence in the little gambrel-roofed house where he had been born, and his father and grandfather before him, the act was, for a time, regarded somewhat gloomily by the public at large. There were Young Nick and his Hattie, living in ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... his vision; he felt himself grasped firmly and drawn swiftly through the water, and the next thing he knew, he was in the light and air again, and was being handed up to the top of the wharf by men who passed him carefully from one to the other. In the very nick of time rescue had come, and Bert was brought back ...
— Bert Lloyd's Boyhood - A Story from Nova Scotia • J. McDonald Oxley
... to fight in the Vende, where he was noticed for his courage and his quality of leadership. He was an excellent tactician, a skill which he had learned in Prussia, where he had served for a considerable time in the Foot-guards of Frederick the Great; hence his nick-name of "The Big Prussian." He had an irreproachable military turn-out, spick and span, curled and powdered, with a long pig-tail, big, highly polished riding boots and withal, a very martial bearing. This smart appearance was the more remarkable because, at this time it was not something ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... thus unmolested by the native tribes, but our safety consisted chiefly in the rapidity of our movements, and their terror of strangers wholly unknown, perhaps unheard of, arriving on the backs of huge animals, or centaurs whose tramp they had only heard at nightfall. Like Burns's "Auld Nick," ...
— Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia • Thomas Mitchell
... Peg was the nick-name which had followed Percy Egbert Grant all the way from the Chicago suburb, where, for some years, he had played the part of both dude and bully. His father was very wealthy, and Peg always had more money than was ...
— The Saddle Boys of the Rockies - Lost on Thunder Mountain • James Carson
... the man was almost wholly ignorant of military matters and utterly incapable of handling such a situation, he leaped on his horse and, spurring his way across the frozen ground to the sound of the firing, confronted the huddled and beaten division just in the nick of time. Meanwhile, General Lew Wallace—afterwards famous as the author "Ben Hur"—had arrived and thrown forward a brigade to cover the confused retreat, so that for the moment the Confederate advance was held in check. But despite ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... do him good," Captain Doolan said disdainfully. "I have no patience with a man who is forever working himself to death, riding about the country as if Old Nick were behind him, and never giving himself a minute for diversion of any kind. Faith, I would rather throw myself down a well and have done with it, than work ten times as hard ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty
... way myself," agreed Douglas. "But he didn't hold a grudge against me. He's not that kind. And I think he was so lonely he'd have been glad to feed the Old Nick himself." ...
— Judith of the Godless Valley • Honore Willsie
... saved from annihilation by the quick wit and daring courage of a single Brigadier General who had moved his five regiments on his own initiative in the nick of time and saved the Confederates ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... and broken ground. The Infantry and Artillery wheeled round and attacked the battery in front, while Hugh Gough pushed on with his squadron of Cavalry to see if he could find a way through the apparently impassable swamp to the enemy's right and rear. Bourchier's battery coming up in the nick of time, the hostile guns were soon silenced, and Gough, having succeeded in getting through the jhil, made a most plucky charge, in which he captured two guns and killed a number of the enemy. For his gallant conduct on this occasion Gough was awarded the Victoria Cross, ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... Saw: which inequality of their limbs, I have further observ'd, not to remain always the same, but to be continually chang'd by a kind of fluctuating motion, not unlike that of the waves of the Sea, so as that part of the limb, which was but even now nick'd or indented in, is now protuberant, and will presently be sinking again; neither is this all but the whole body of the Luminaries, do in the Telescope, seem to be depress'd and slatted, the upper, and more especially the under side appearing neerer to the middle then ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... how things were going on without him. "I'm a little hoarse to-night," quoth VAN DYCK, pleasantly. "Nonsense!" cries Sir DRURIOLANUS, cheerily, "a 'Van' can never be a little hoarse." Much merriment. "DYCK, my boy," continues Sir D., "you've come in the very nick of time—quite a Devil's Dyke, you are,"—the accomplished vocalist was in ecstasies at his Manager's joke,—"and you shall distinguish yourself to-night as Lohengrin!" Oh, what a surprise! No sooner said than done. Armour for one ordered immediately. ISAAC of York Street ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, July 9, 1892 • Various
... legends say, To buy him a sheep a certain day; For he had solemnly vowed to slay, In sacrifice, a sheep that day, And wanted a sheep his vow to pay. Three neighboring rogues (The cunning dogs!) Finding this out, Went straight about (Moved, I ween, by the very Old Nick,) To play the ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... heeded its summons—cagy boy that he was—the telephone rang oftenest for Nick. Because of the many native noises of the place, the telephone had a special bell that was a combination buzz and ring. It sounded above the roar of outgoing cars, the splash of the hose, the sputter and hum of the electric battery in the rear. Nick heard it, unheeding. ...
— Gigolo • Edna Ferber
... "He is not young; he is not handsome; he is not funny. I did not fancy him one bit; and, if I had only known where to find shelter for the night, I'd soon have sent him to the old Nick,—him and his brilliant position. But, not having enough money to buy myself a penny-loaf, it wasn't the time to put on any airs. So I tell him that I accept. He goes for a cab; we get into it; and he ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... has its counterbalancing virtue represented. Lady Clonbroney, vulgarly ashamed of her country, is set off by the patriotic Lady Oranmore; the virtuous Mr. Burke forms too obvious a pendant to the rascally agents old Nick and St. Dennis. It is needless to say that the exclusively virtuous people are deadly dull. It is the novel with a purpose written by a novelist whose strength lies in the delineation of character. Miss Edgeworth can never carry you away with her story, as Charles Reade ...
— Irish Books and Irish People • Stephen Gwynn
... being wholly obsessed by the one thought of escape, Sally flew on down the drive until, on the point of leaving the grounds by the gate to the highway, she pulled up perforce and jumped back in the nick of time to avoid disaster beneath the wheels of a motor-car swinging ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... was just in the nick of time; but even with him we should have had to fall back if Cooke had not arrived with the guards. By the way, has any one heard what has taken ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... quarrel was that Mr. Job, the agent, took a dislike to Jacka. He was one of your sour, long-jawed sort, a bit of a lawyer, with a temper like Old Nick, and just the amount of decent feeling that makes a man the angrier for knowing he's unjust, especially when the fellow that's hit takes it smiling instead of cursing; and more especially still when he carries but one eye ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... asked for "Nick Carter" she gave them those classics, "The Rollo Books"; and to the French-Canadians she gave, reasonably enough, the acknowledged masters of their language, Voltaire, Balzac, and Flaubert, till the horrified priest forbade ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... jester, indeed, he seemed more ridiculous that came to a feast of his own accord than he that was invited; but to well-bred and civil friends it is more obliging for men of the same temper to come at the nick of time with other friends, when uninvited and unexpected; at once pleasing both to those that invite and those that entertain. But chiefly you must avoid going to rulers, rich or great men, lest you incur the deserved ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch |
