"Pile" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to avoid its congested air-lanes, the fleet descended toward an immense building just outside the city proper, and all landed upon its roof save the flagship, which led the Skylark to a landing-dock nearby—a massive pile of metal and stone, upon which Nalboon and his retinue stood to welcome the guests. After Seaton had anchored the vessel immovably by means of the attractor, the party disembarked, Seaton ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... kingly pile, towering above its vassal woods, kindled high and ambitious thoughts in ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... pierced, and the number of his wounds. Now there was nothing to be seen but confusion; some cried out to kill the murderers, others (as was formerly done when Clodius led the people) tore away the benches and tables out of the shops round about, and, heaping them all together, built a great funeral pile, and, having put the body of Caesar upon it, set it on fire, the spot where this was done being moreover surrounded with a great many temples and other consecrated places, so that they seemed to burn the body in a kind of sacred solemnity. As ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... Asher sprang to his feet, backing up against the pile of cavings beside the Miner. A long tentacle whipped out and wrapped around his leg. A short, snout-tentacle quivered toward his face. There was strength beyond imagining in the ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... that you are so much better." She paused and turned quite away, busying herself with a pile of books and magazines. "The other," she went on too indifferently, "was unfortunately to be foreseen. ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... rest and water. He relates that he has seen Arjuna engaged with Duryodhana, Bhima having been previously slain by the latter, and gives his hearers to understand that Arjuna also has fallen. Draupadi determines to mount the funeral pile, and Yudhishthira, to put an end to himself when the Rakshasa, satisfied with the success of his scheme, which was intended to prevail on this couple to perish, departs. The pile is prepared, and Yudhishthira and Draupadi are about to sacrifice ...
— Tales from the Hindu Dramatists • R. N. Dutta
... laughing Buddha, who is made of bronze and was once covered with lacquer, which is now mostly split off. At present the only shade the god has is a roof of mats which they have braced up on the pile of ruins that once made a roof. The President of the Republic has built a lovely big gate like the old ones, because it is propitious and would bring him good fortune. But he has decided it was not propitious, something went ...
— Letters from China and Japan • John Dewey
... of work in Paris have carried my mind on beyond the point at which I left the narrative. I sit as it were among a pile of memories that are now all disordered and mixed up together, their proper sequences and connexions lost. I cannot trace the phases through which our mutual passion rode up through the restrained and dignified intentions of our friendship. But I know that presently ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... property, a picturesque but inconvenient residence, which did not at all come up to his ideas of a country gentleman's place. It was therefore incontinently pulled down, and one of the most fashionable architects of the day, having carte blanche to build, erected a Palladian pile of wide frontage and imposing dimensions on the most prominent site he could find. It ought to have haunted its author like a crime; but he was spared, and the punishment fell upon the innocent who dwelt around. ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... Foster, the designation SCN means Space Cruiser, Nuclear. This ship is powered by a nuclear reactor—in other words, an atomic pile. ...
— Rip Foster in Ride the Gray Planet • Harold Leland Goodwin
... meeting. Here and there are ragged street Arabs, selling matches and newspapers; and against the verandah post, in the full blaze of the electric light, leans a weary, draggled-looking woman, one arm clasping a baby to her breast, and the other holding a pile of newspapers, while she drones out in a hoarse voice, "'ERALD, third 'dition, one penny!" until the ear wearies of the constant repetition. Cabs rattle incessantly along the street; here, a fast-looking hansom, ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... moreover, the last of the Tories. He had, indeed, by his own concluding action made Toryism impossible; for, in 1867, he had thrown the ramparts of Toryism into a heap, and had himself mounted the structure and fired the funeral pile." Disraeli succeeded him as ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell
... sounded and Kennedy, always alert, jumped up, pushing aside a great pile of papers which had accumulated ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... to toast bread. A formidable pile of browned slices already lay on the plate, and she was preparing, in absent-minded fashion, to attack another slice, when suddenly the long toasting-fork hung aimlessly from one hand, while the other began fumbling in her pocket. ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... four-wheeled affliction than has ever been seen in that neighbourhood. Such is the assemblage of armorial bearings on coach panels that the Herald's College might be supposed to have lost its father and mother at a blow. The Duke of Foodle sends a splendid pile of dust and ashes, with silver wheel-boxes, patent axles, all the last improvements, and three bereaved worms, six feet high, holding on behind, in a bunch of woe. All the state coachmen in London seem plunged into mourning; ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... and shut in by those rhododendron thickets, a long, rambling pile of building, which had been added to, and altered, and taken away from, and added to again, like that well-known puzzle in mental arithmetic which used to amuse us in our childhood. It was all gables, and chimney-stacks, and odd angles, and ivy-mantled ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... cracker on their family whip. They could not have bought my little woodland pasture, where for a generation has been picnic and muster and Fourth-of-July ground, and where the brave fellows met to volunteer for the Mexican war. They could not have bought even the heap of brush back of my wood-pile, ...
— A Kentucky Cardinal • James Lane Allen
... the frequently ponderous rejoicings. In the Bilberry school-room, among dog-eared French grammars and lead-pencilled music, education did not appear actually dispiriting; and now, as she sat by the fire, with the bright, sharp little scissors in lier hand, and the pile of white merino on her knees and trailing on the hearth-rug at her feet, Griffith found her simply irresistible. Ah! the bliss that revealed itself in the prospect of making her Mrs. Donne, and taking possession of her entirely! The joy of seeing her seated in an arm-chair of his own, by a fire ...
— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... those who were likely to prove most valuable to him, as they were escaping from the burning building. He immediately issued an order to the men with torches to rush forward, at the same time directing others to collect all the dry brushwood they could find, and to pile it up in the verandah. Those, however, who first advanced were received with so hot a fire that several were killed or wounded, and the rest sought safety in flight. Again and again Higson urged them to renew the attempt, and finding this did not avail, he ordered the main ...
— The Heir of Kilfinnan - A Tale of the Shore and Ocean • W.H.G. Kingston
... fill every one with several sorts of Fruits, and the biggest sort in the middle, you must lay them in very good order, and pile them up till one more will not lie; then stick them with little green Sprigs and fine Flowers, such as you fancy best; then serve in another such Salver, with Plates piled up with all manner of Sweet-meats, the wet Sweet-meats round about and the dry in the middle, your wet Sweet-meats ...
— The Queen-like Closet or Rich Cabinet • Hannah Wolley
... heavy thud echoed along the rocky walls, and the outer light was cut off by the falling of the great stone. In a moment Milo stood beside her and, taking her hand in his, led her along the utterly invisible floor until she stood before a massive door. Her feet sank into the pile of heavy carpets; her nostrils quivered to the delicate odors of burning spices; at the top of the door a great jeweled lantern cast a rich, yellow light down the panels, and the girl gasped involuntarily at the sight revealed to her. Each panel was formed of scales ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... the city that I love there is a tall, dingy pile of offices that has evidently seen more prosperous fortunes. It is not the aristocratic end. It is remote from the lordly street of the fine shops of the fair women, where in the summer afternoons the gay bank ...
— Prose Fancies (Second Series) • Richard Le Gallienne
... vassals come, And crowd with sudden wealth the rising dome; The price of boroughs and of souls restore, And raise his treasures higher than before: Now bless'd with all the baubles of the great, The polish'd marble, and the shining plate, Orgilio sees the golden pile aspire, And hopes ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... rubbed his hands, and looked as though he meant business; and Mrs. Wittleworth actually trembled with fear lest some new calamity was about to be heaped upon the pile of misfortunes that already weighed her down. Mr. Checkynshaw had never before darkened her doors. Though she had once been a welcome guest within his drawing-rooms, she had long since been discarded, and cast out, and forgotten. ...
— Make or Break - or, The Rich Man's Daughter • Oliver Optic
... world's heroes. Most great discoverers, most deep-thinking philosophers, most earnest reformers, most toiling pioneers of progress, have in their turn had flung at them the name of Atheist. It was howled over the grave of Copernicus; it was clamoured round the death-pile of Bruno; it was yelled at Vanini, at Spinoza, at Priestley, at Voltaire, at Paine; it has become the laurel-bay of the hero, the halo of the martyr; in the world's history it has meant the pioneer of progress, and where the cry of 'Atheist' is raised there may we ...
— Annie Besant - An Autobiography • Annie Besant
... quay, was a large pile of timber, behind which Father Absinthe immediately concealed himself, while Lecoq, seizing a spade that was lying idle, hurried to a little distance and began digging in the sand. They did well to make haste. The van came onward ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... severe trial of skill and muscle. After we had run two miles at this rate, the whales turned flukes, going dead to windward. "Now for it, my lads!" cried P——. "We'll have them the next rising. Now pile it on! a long, steady pull! That's it! that's the way! Those whales belong to us. Don't give out! Half an hour more, and they're our whales!" The other boats veered off at either side of us, and continued the ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... than ever in gold and amethyst brocade, was presiding over a mountainous pile of white boxes, behind which the ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... Even we, who then were nothing, kneel In homage there, and join earth's general peal. But the doomed Indian leaves behind no trace, To save his own, or serve another race; With his frail breath his power has passed away, His deeds, his thoughts are buried with his clay; Nor lofty pile, nor glowing page Shall link him to a future age, Or give him with the past a rank: His heraldry is but a broken bow, His history but a tale of wrong and wo, His very name ...
— An Ode Pronounced Before the Inhabitants of Boston, September the Seventeenth, 1830, • Charles Sprague
... was so doleful and so blank, that he drew a heavy sigh as he thought of it. Mr. Blinkhorn heard it, and rose awkwardly from the rickety little writing-table, knocking over a pile of marble-covered copy-books as ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... said Hugh, the perspiration starting out about his lips, as he thought how fast his pile was diminishing, and that he could not go ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes
... speaking, the old man fumbled in his pockets and produced a large pile of papers, which he strove to push into Mr. Barton's hand, alluding all the while to the losses he had sustained. Two pigs had died on him, and he had lost a fine mare and foal. His loquacity was, however, cut short by a sturdy, middle-aged peasant ...
— Muslin • George Moore
... which he should impress it on Francie and Delia—but notably on Delia, who would then herself impress it on Francie—that it would be time for their French friend to talk when he had brought his mother round. BUT HE NEVER WOULD—they might bet their pile on that! He never did, in the strange sequel—having, poor young man, no mother to bring. Moreover he was quite mum—as Delia phrased it to herself—about Mme. de Brecourt and Mme. de Cliche: such, Miss Dosson learned from Charles Waterlow, ...
— The Reverberator • Henry James
... interested in hearing what you are about, and in reading your many discoveries. It is a surprising fact that the peninsula of Florida should have remained at the same level for the immense period requisite for the accumulation of so vast a pile of debris. (535/2. Alexander Agassiz published a paper on "The Tortugas and Florida Reefs" in the "Mem. Amer. Acad. Arts and Sci." XI., page 107, 1885. See also his "Three Cruises of the 'Blake,'" Volume ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... is just what such a woman would say." They all voted the Parlor Car perfection—except me. I said they wouldn't have been allowed to court and quarrel there so long, uninterrupted; but at each critical moment the odious train-boy would come in and pile foul literature all over them four or five inches deep, and the lover would turn his head aside and curse—and presently that train-boy would be back again (as on all those Western roads) to take up the literature ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... visit to Father Letheby. The atmosphere of absolute primness and neatness struck my senses when I entered. Waxed floors, dainty rugs, shining brasses, coquettish little mirrors here and there, a choice selection of daintily bound volumes, and on a writing desk a large pile of virgin manuscript, spoke the scholar and the gentleman. My heart sank, as I thought how sick of all this he will be in a few weeks, when the days draw in, and the skies scowl, and the windows are washed, and the house rocked under the fierce sou'westers that sweep up the ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... Zambesi; and when the commandant of Tete sent an officer with his company to summon him to his presence, Nyaude asked permission of the officer to dress himself, which being granted, he went into an inner apartment, and the officer ordered his men to pile their arms. A drum of war began to beat a note which is well known to the inhabitants. Some of the soldiers took the alarm on hearing this note, but the officer, disregarding their warning, was, with his whole party, in a few minutes disarmed and bound hand and foot. The commandant of Tete then ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... removing the prizes as fast as he could scamper up and down a nearby hollow oak. Our ideas concerning appropriate locations for walnut trees did not coincide with those of Mr. Bushytail. We learned that the simple way to plant walnuts in the woods was to pile a half a bushel here and there. The tree climbers took their toll, but did a good job of planting. Survival seemed better than when we placed individual nuts ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Thirty-Eighth Annual Meeting • Northern Nut Growers Association
... and he wasn't provisioned for whaling—still, the concession papers are made out in Hales's name and mine, and the duplicate documents stored. . . . All I can say is, that I'm ready to put my own little pile upon it, to the last guinea. And I thought of you from the first; you having done me a good turn more than once, or tried to. Yes, sir: but the best of all would be your going out and making sure for yourself. ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Bryant aroused the only man in sight, a Mexican who slept on the counter with his head pillowed on a pile of overalls. ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... was half in Doctor West's honour. Do we want to meet and hurrah for the man that sold us out? As for the water-works, it looks as if, for all we know, he might have bought us a lot of old junk. Do we want to hold a jubilee over a junk pile? You ask what we ought to do. God, man, there's only one thing to do, and that's to call the whole ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... fell. "I spent it at first as though there was no end to my little pile," he said. "I had pulled up when your letter came, but I only had enough left to pay my way back to Florida, buy this pony, and the outfit you suggested. There's nothing left. The fellows tried to get me to stay and work in the city until the next school ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... pile of stones do you?" asked Nan, as she sat on a wall to rest a moment and take ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... nothing can be more perfect than clear moonlight nights. There is a terrace upon the roof of the inn at Courmayeur where one may spend hours in the silent watches, when all the world has gone to sleep beneath. The Mont Chetif and the Mont de la Saxe form a gigantic portal not unworthy of the pile that lies beyond. For Mont Blanc resembles a vast cathedral; its countless spires are scattered over a mass like that of the Duomo at Milan, rising into one tower at the end. By night the glaciers glitter in the steady moon; domes, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... Lady Franklin having, in 1855, sent a tablet of black marble to Dr. Kane, gave another in 1858 to MacClintock to be placed on Beechey Island. MacClintock discharged his duty, and placed this tablet near a funeral pile raised to the memory of Bellot ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... tablespoons of the milk into the bottom of the can while Barney collected a small pile of kindling. Removing the milk pail to a safe distance, Hetty lighted the little pile of kindling, set the tin can atop the burning wood and scooted several yards away to join Barney who had been watching from afar. ...
— Make Mine Homogenized • Rick Raphael
... been burnt, the bones are collected, laid in a vase, and thrown into the Ganges, or some other holy river. The nearest relation is obliged to set fire to the pile. ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... were summoned to the lodge of an old man, in good truth the Nestor of his tribe. We found him half sitting, half reclining on a pile of buffalo robes; his long hair, jet-black even now, though he had seen some eighty winters, hung on either side of his thin features. Those most conversant with Indians in their homes will scarcely believe me when I affirm that there was dignity in his countenance ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... another bobload to look around and wonder who the jolly ladies were. Most of the mothers lost their breath in the swift rush and had to be helped up the hill to the starting point. Once Sahwah turned too short at the bottom of the street and upset the whole sledful into a deep pile of snow, from which they emerged looking like snowmen. "Oh-h-h," sputtered Mrs. Brewster, "the snow is all going down inside of my collar! Sarah Ann, you wretch, you deserve to have your face washed for that!" She picked up a great lump of snow ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at School • Hildegard G. Frey
... horses are nerves. They pile excitement too high. When cool, they're among the best. None of them had head for ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... thing of all, that you should be happy whilst you are a child of wrath,—that you should smile, and eat, and drink, and be merry, and sleep sound, when this very night you may be in hell? Happy while unforgiven!—a terrible happiness. It is like the Hindoo widow who sits upon the funeral pile with her dead husband, and sings songs of joy when they are setting fire to the wood with which she is to be burned. Yes, you may be quite happy in this way, till you die, my boy; but when you look back from hell, ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar
... the cautious pair who were dodging and watching in her rear as cleverly as a couple of young detectives. After a hasty glance round the room she advanced to the Principal's desk, and deeming herself quite unobserved, rapidly exchanged the pile of envelopes there for those which she had brought with her. She gave one look of satisfaction at the substituted set—they were such an excellent imitation—and bore off the genuine ballot to the Fifth Form room. Ida and Peggie, with breathless interest, followed, and saw her ...
— The Youngest Girl in the Fifth - A School Story • Angela Brazil
... and demand 'expression' as Bab Crane calls it. What I need is something new to develop my special gifts and talents, and mother darling, if you would only consent to let me go for even two or three months, I will come back to you a perfect angel, besides doing Uncle Cassius and Aunt Daphne a pile of good, I know." ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester
... than a week, however, to bring Kari and Kopee together. One day there was a pile of fruit lying in the open, and the elephant stood at one end eating and the monkey at the other, both enjoying the feast. Of course, the elephant ate faster than the monkey, and realizing this, Kopee began to eat more quickly and soon had enormous pouches on each side of his face. ...
— Kari the Elephant • Dhan Gopal Mukerji
... full of old silver, glassware, and china. On a writing table, inlaid with mother-of-pearl which, in places, had broken away and left behind it a number of yellow grooves (stuffed with putty), lay a pile of finely written manuscript, an overturned marble press (turning green), an ancient book in a leather cover with red edges, a lemon dried and shrunken to the dimensions of a hazelnut, the broken arm of a chair, a tumbler containing the ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... therefore, seemed to be but an empty honor. The country a wilderness, the capital in hopeless ruins, the Temple a pile of smoking and smouldering ashes—it was not a picture to bring ...
— Stories of the Prophets - (Before the Exile) • Isaac Landman
... were silent and sleepy till they arrived at Lisle Court. The sun had then appeared, the morning was clear, the air frosty and bracing; and as, after traversing a noble park, a superb quadrangular pile of brick flanked by huge square turrets coped with stone broke upon the gaze of Lord Vargrave, his worldly heart swelled within him, and the image of Evelyn became ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book VII • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... of all this. His gaze was anxiously bent on the earth below, to find a landing for the great machine. He skimmed the broad brow of the mountain, hardly a hundred feet above the spires of the massive concrete pile that still reared itself steadfastly upon the height facing ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... Most of the slaves said they had been "raised" in Virginia and Kentucky. To avoid the suspicion of being a spy, I resolved to put a few questions too. I found myself at the establishment where those named in the advertisement which had drawn me thither were to be disposed of. A pile of handbills—each containing an exact copy of the advertisement, and a French translation—was lying on the platform. Taking one up, I observed the name of "Squires, a carpenter." Assuming all the confidence I could muster, I said, "Which ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... planetary influences, and spirits, and "suffumigation," presently set fire to a little pile of chips, and when the flame was at the highest flung in a handful of perfumes, which produced ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... hair, eyes like the fishpools of Heshbon, and a nobly modelled neck, short at the back and low between her shoulders in front. Unlike her sister she is uncorseted and dressed anyhow in a rich robe of black pile that shows off her white ...
— Heartbreak House • George Bernard Shaw
... visitor. He took a chair, pulled out a giant cigar, and lighting it up smoked like a pile of burning leaves. "You seem to be pretty well fixed," he added, taking a huge black pistol from his pocket and laying it before him on the table. "Looks like money ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels
... took it for the signal, and promptly delivered a mellow laugh that touched off the whole audience; and the explosion that followed was the triumph of the evening. I thought that that honest man Sawyer would choke himself; and as for the bludgeons, they performed like pile-drivers. But my poor little morsel of pathos was ruined. It was taken in good faith as an intentional joke, and the prize one of the entertainment, and I wisely let ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... marching against a Thracian town called Eion, situated on the banks of the river Strymon, and now garrisoned by a Persian noble. The town was besieged (B. C. 476), and the inhabitants pressed by famine, when the Persian commandant, collecting his treasure upon a pile of wood, on which were placed his slaves, women, and children—set fire to the pile [145]. After this suicide, seemingly not an uncommon mode of self-slaughter in the East, the garrison surrendered, and its defenders, as usual in such warfare, were ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... If they were to part he could not trust himself to see her. He called a waiter, asked for pen and paper, and pushed aside a pile of unread newspapers on the corner of the table where his coffee had been served. As he did so, his eye lit on a Daily Mail of two days before. As a pretext for postponing his letter, he took up the paper and glanced down the ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton
... those that devolved to me by fatal necessity in 1818, but also all the papers possessed from her childhood to her decease of that sister you so well, dear madam, know to have been my heart's earliest darling. When on this pile are heaped the countless hoards which my own now long life has gathered together, of my personal property, such as it is, and the correspondence of my family and my friends, and innumerable incidental ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... able to knock the opposing center out of the way till they struck George. How well I remember this giant, who was able to hold the whole wedge until he could knock the sides in and pile them up in a bunch. Yale soon gave him up and tried to ...
— Football Days - Memories of the Game and of the Men behind the Ball • William H. Edwards
... came with him. H. went to the box of Confederate money and took out four hundred dollars, and the officer took off his watch, a plain gold one, and laid it on the table, saying, "We have not been paid, and I must get home to my family." H. added a five-dollar greenback to the pile, and wished him a happy meeting. The townsfolk continued to dash through the streets with their arms full, canned goods predominating. Toward five, Mr. J. passed again. "Keep on the lookout," he said; ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various
... for following up the introduction, and they all stood as still as the rocks around them, obscured behind the pile of brushwood, which had been probably placed there to break the cold wind from the sea, without totally intercepting the supply of air. The branches were laid so loosely above each other that, looking through them towards the ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... his knotty arms, the smith, John Proudfoot, stood waiting for his heat. His striker, Geordie Moore, had fallen to at the bellows. On the tool chest sat Gubblum Oglethorpe, leisurely smoking. His pony was tied to the hasp of the gate. The miller, Dick of the Syke, sat on a pile of iron rods. Tom o' Dint, the little bow-legged fiddler and postman, was sharpening at the grindstone a penknife already worn obliquely to a point ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine
... got a little axe and set to work at once. He split and clove away, and thought that he was getting on fast; but the day wore on until it was long past midday, and he was still very far from having finished. He thought, in fact, that the pile of wood rather grew bigger than smaller, in spite of what he took off it; so he let his hands fall by his side, and dried the sweat from his forehead, and was ill at ease, for he knew that it would be bad for him if he was not finished with the work ...
— The Pink Fairy Book • Various
... necessary finish did the figure give to the dark pile of hills that it seemed to be the only obvious justification of their outline. Without it, there was the dome without the lantern; with it the architectural demands of the mass were satisfied. The scene was strangely homogeneous, in that the ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... A huge pile of decoys stood near, of which about two dozen were of wood, such as the Micmac Indian whittles out with his curved waghon, or single-handed draw-knife, in the long winter evenings. He has little cash to spend for paint, and less skill in its use, but scorches the ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... its thousand-mile course carries a vast amount of this stolen earth, so much indeed that every year it deposits in the Gulf of Mexico an amount of mud which would make a pile one mile ...
— The Great Round World And What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1. No. 23, April 15, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... been known to the patriotic mountaineer of a hoary pile of winters, with little life remaining in him, but that little on fire for his country, that by the brink of the precipice he has flung himself on a young and lusty invader, dedicating himself exultingly to death if only ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... beginning to move, and to the porter who breathlessly enquired about his luggage he shouted, "This is all," and flung a small leathern case on to the seat. As he settled himself into his plate, his eye fell upon the pile of baggage which I had bribed the station-master to establish in my corner of the carriage—a portmanteau, a hat-box, a rug wrapped round an umbrella, and one or two ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... company we found there." About the same time, the Council of Virginia also put forth a narrative of "the disasters which had befallen the fleet, and of their miraculous escape," wherein we have the following: "These Islands of the Bermudas have ever been accounted an enchanted pile of rocks, and a desert inhabitation of devils; but all the fairies of the rocks were but flocks of birds, and all the devils that haunted the woods were ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... been told by every generation, handed down by grandames at the fireside, narrated night and day, and the chronicle has changed its complexion somewhat in every age. Like some great building that has suffered many modifications of successive generations of architects, some sombre weather-beaten pile, the delight of a poet, the story would drive the commentator and the industrious winnower of words, facts, and dates to despair. The narrator believes in it, as all superstitious minds in Flanders likewise believe; and is not ...
— Christ in Flanders • Honore de Balzac
... then mounted my pile, clawing the wall to keep my balance. My fingers were still many inches from the coping. I jumped down and gave another ten minutes to the back-breaking work of carrying more boulders from the water to the wall. Then I widened my cairn below, so that I could stand firmly ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... Katies. I could have stopped the engine if I'd only had sense enough to know what to take hold of to reverse her! But I was too drunk! And that grand little angel stood up to it, trying to warn us in time, and we just swept right along into a pile of ties some wretch had placed on the track!—right over my baby! Oh, my ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... clothing of bark and palm-fibre, fetishism, &c., but cattle-breeding is found as well as agriculture. However, the Negroid tribes are more and more adopting the customs and mode of life of the Hova, among whom are found pile-houses, the sarong, yadi or tabu applied to food, a non-African form of bellows, &c., all characteristic of their original home. The Hova, during the 19th century, embraced Christianity, but retain, nevertheless, many of their old animistic beliefs; their original social ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... carried to Rome, and exposed naked to the people. They were violently excited at the sight, and their feelings were still farther inflamed by the harangues of the Tribunes. The benches and tables of the Senate-house were seized to make a funeral pile for their favorite; and not only the Senate-house, but several other public buildings, were reduced to ashes. As the riots still continued, the Senate had no longer any choice but to call in the assistance of Pompey. They therefore commissioned him to collect troops and put an end to the disturbances. ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... making an astonishing impression upon Mr. Tutt who obviously thought him a great man; and after keeping him in reasonable doubt about it for awhile he modestly admitted to Mr. Tutt that this was so. Then he drank several more glasses of Burgundy and ate an enormous pile of waffles covered with maple syrup. "I'se in town, honey!" Mr. Tutt had grown several sizes larger—the whole room was full of him. Lastly he had black coffee and some port. It was an occasion, he asserted,—er—always goo' weather,—or somethin'—when ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train
... hear, oh hear my last entreaty! Let the funeral pile arise once more; Open up my wretched tomb for pity, And in flames our souls to peace restore. When the ashes glow, When the fire-sparks flow, To the ancient gods aloft ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... her beauty, and she was coming to it mighty fast. If they could only break that will, but it was no use trying. The doctors said he was of sound mind for at least two years after making it. If Silence Withers got the land claim, there'd be a pile, sure enough. Myrtle Hazard ought to have it. If the girl had only inherited that property—whew? She'd have been a match for any fellow. That old Silence Withers would do just as her minister told her,—even chance whether she gives ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... down his frow and mallet and seated himself on the pile of shingles, with an air which said very plainly, that with such an amount of money in prospect there was no need that any more work should be done. "That's a fortin, Davy. It's an amazin' lot fur poor folks like us, an' I can't somehow git it ...
— The Boy Trapper • Harry Castlemon
... friends was so attentive to his comfort. He said in his own mind, "I will catch her to-day, and give her a sound beating; she is causing me to be ashamed before the others." So saying, he hid himself in a corner in a pile of firewood. In a short time the girl came out of the bamboo fiddle, and began to dress her hair. Having completed her toilet, she cooked the meal of rice as usual, and having eaten some herself, she placed the young man's portion under his bed, ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Collected by Joseph Jacobs
... a copy of Romeo and Juliet perched on top of a pile of books. "That was the cause of all my trouble," he said, pushing it so that it fell off the pile on to the floor at his feet. He picked it up and opened it, and as he did so, his eyes rested on Mercutio's speech, If love be rough with you, be ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... was draped in black, and in the middle of the market-place stood a circle of stakes round a large centre pillar. This circle contained a huge pile of tar-soaked wood. ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... Rome was also the man who first put harmony and consistency into the architecture of Rome. We think that, if it was in truth the crown of Diocletian which passed to every Caesar from the first Constantius to the last Francis, it was no less in the pile which rose into being at his word that the germ was planted which grew into Pisa and Durham, ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume VI • Various
... up the job," broke in Mr. Ryan, emphasising the statement by allowing his walking stick to fall heavily on a pile of music which lay ...
— The Music Master - Novelized from the Play • Charles Klein
... later the room had resumed a more or less—though principally less—normal appearance. The books and chairs were back in their places. The ink was sopped up. The broken photographs were stacked in a neat pile in one corner, with a rug over them. The mantelpiece was still empty, but, as Clowes pointed out, it now merely looked as if Trevor had been pawning some of his household gods. There was no sign that a devastating secret society had raged through ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse
... directly, and turning the cob's head, began to ride slowly in the direction of Kopfontein, whose granite pile lay like an ant-hill far away, low ...
— Diamond Dyke - The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure • George Manville Fenn
... sense is well mixed up with medicine, and common manhood with theology, and common honesty with law, We the people, Sir, some of us with nutcrackers, and some of us with trip-hammers, and some of us with pile-drivers, and some of us coming with a whish! like air-stones out of a lunar volcano, will crash down on the lumps of nonsense in all of them till we have made powder of them like ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... stones, which, as he rightly thought, they were far more inclined to heave at Sir Eustace's head than to place in the spot he pointed out. They were, however, compelled to obey, and, with unwilling hands, built up such a pile upon the secret door, that it could not be lifted from beneath without gigantic strength, and a noise which would re-echo through the Castle. This done, Sir Eustace watched them all out of the vault himself, closed the door, locked it, and announced to the Seneschal his intention ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... defend these, according to ability, at all hazards; nay, it was partly with a view to such defence that he engaged in this undertaking. To stem, or if that be impossible, profitably to divert the current of Innovation, such a Volume as Teufelsdrockh's, if cunningly planted down, were no despicable pile, or floodgate, in the ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... he should be burnt alive. Their request was no sooner granted, but every one ran with all speed to fetch wood from the baths and shops. The Jews were particularly active and busy on this occasion. The pile being prepared, Polycarp put off his garments, untied his girdle, and began to take off his shoes; an office he had not been accustomed to, the Christians having always striven who should do these things for him, regarding it as a happiness to be admitted to touch ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... who remained below had to sit on their hard edges, or on the sofas, which were cumbered with, hand-bags and rolls of shawls. At an early hour after breakfast the bedroom stewards began to get the steamer trunks out and pile them in the corridors; the servants all became more caressingly attentive; and people who had left off settling the amount of the fees they were going to give, anxiously conferred together. The question whether you ought ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... found a few years ago shows how well this kind of hunting succeeds. It was in a gloomy evergreen swamp, in a big tree, some eighty feet from the ground. I found it by a pile of pellets of hair and feathers at the foot of the tree; for the owl devours every part of his game, and after digestion is complete, feathers, bones, and hair are disgorged in small balls, like so many sparrow heads. When I looked up, there at the top was a huge mass of sticks, which had been added ...
— Wilderness Ways • William J Long
... Rainscourt to pass a few weeks there—when he hoped that, having her in a more isolated position, she might be induced to accede to his wishes. Workmen had been employed for some time repairing the exterior of the ancient pile—the interior had been embellished under the guidance of a man of taste, and without any regard to expense. Splendid furniture had already been forwarded from London; so that Mr Rainscourt's agent had written to him that in ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... house for strangers. This is no more than a large room, with a stable at one end. The walls are made of wicker-work, plastered with clay. There is no ceiling but the rafters, and no floor but the bare earth. Yet there is a wide chimney, where a blazing fire is kept up with a pile of logs. And there is a sofa or divan, covered with striped silk, and many neat mats to serve as beds for as many travellers as may arrive. The wind may whistle through the chinks, and the rain come through the roof, but the stranger is well warmed, and comfortably ...
— Far Off • Favell Lee Mortimer
... cue. His long left arm uncoupled like the loosening of the weight of a pile-driver. It caught Mr. Donnelly under the chin, fairly lifted him from his feet, and dropped him on his back among his followers. It seemed to me that the predominating expression in his face as he went, over was that of profound wonder as to where that blow could have ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... landed him on the beach, and Diaz pointed without a word to the pile of stores, and then, grasping his steer-oar, motioned to his crew to ...
— The Trader's Wife - 1901 • Louis Becke
... conceited, vain man he is that ever I met withal, in his own praise, as I have heretofore observed of him. Thence home, and upon Tower Hill saw about 3 or 400 seamen get together; and one, standing upon a pile of bricks, made his sign, with his handkercher, upon his stick, and called all the rest to him, and several shouts they gave. This made me afeard; so I got home as fast as I could. And hearing of no present hurt did go to Sir Robert Viner's about my plate ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... friend; "I know the people very well. "A little, tidy, good-looking woman sat by the fire, nursing an infant at the breast. The house was clean, and all the humble furniture of the poor man's cottage seemed to be still in its place. There were two shelves of books hanging against the walls, and a pile of tracts and pamphlets, a foot deep, on a small table at the back of the room. I soon found, however, that these people were going through their share of the prevalent suffering. The family was six in number. The comely little woman said that her husband ...
— Home-Life of the Lancashire Factory Folk during the Cotton Famine • Edwin Waugh
... It was a bed of acacia wood, at the head and foot of which were cross-pieces and straps, apparently forming part of an apparatus for lifting and moving the sick man. M. de Balzac lay in this bed, with his head supported on a pile of pillows, to which had been added some red damask cushions taken from the sofa in the same room. His face was purple, almost black, and was turned towards the right. He was unshaven, but his gray hair was cut short. His eyes were wide open ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... at the growing pile of bags and bedding on the brig's quarter-deck. "Look. Don't they mean to sleep soft—and dream of home—maybe. Home. Think of that, Captain. These chaps can't get clear away from it. It isn't like ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... driven back against the nearest pile of freight. Drew was after him before he could recover from that first blow, and he got in a couple of other punches that ended the encounter—for the time being, at least. His antagonist went to the floor of the dock and ...
— Doubloons—and the Girl • John Maxwell Forbes
... who had closed up with us unperceived. "I've been listening to it, and it sounds to me like a waterfall. Depend upon it we shall find that the river comes down over some pile of rocks, and if we were clear of the forest and could take a good look round we should find that the country is growing ...
— Bunyip Land - A Story of Adventure in New Guinea • George Manville Fenn
... occupy the minimum of room, and to be rather ornamental than unsightly. These kegs were made by le Bourdon himself, who had acquired as much of the art as was necessary to that object. The woods always furnished the materials; and a pile of staves that was placed beneath a neighboring tree sufficiently denoted that he did not yet deem that ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... red and blue gum, growing in the moister and more open space near the creek. In front of them was a slab hut of rich mahogany colour, by no means an unpleasing object among the dull unbroken green of the forest. In front of it was a trodden space littered with the chips of firewood. A pile of the last article lay a few yards in front of the door. And against the walls of the tenement was a long bench, on which stood a calabash, with a lump of soap and a coarse towel; a lamp oven, and a pair of black top-boots, and underneath ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley |
