"Prick" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... purchaser had ultimately to pay for the risks incurred by his shopkeeper, by British merchants, and by their smugglers, who "ran in" from Heligoland, Jersey, or Sicily. These classes vied in their efforts to prick holes in the continental decrees. Bargees and women, dogs and hearses, were pressed into service against Napoleon. The last-named device was for a time tried with much success near Hamburg, until the French authorities, wondering at ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... o' your deil's play-books for me,' said Lucky Dods; 'it's an ill world since sic prick-my-dainty doings came into fashion. It's a poor tongue that canna tell its ain name, and I'll hae nane o' your scarts upon ...
— The Proverbs of Scotland • Alexander Hislop
... things so in thy mind that they may be as a Goad in thy sides, to prick thee forward in the way thou must go. Then Christian began to gird up his loins, and address himself to his Journey. Then said the Interpreter, The Comforter be always with thee, good Christian, to guide thee in the way that ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... not have your will, sirrah, are ye running? Have ye gotten a toy in your heels? Is this a season, When honour pricks ye on, to prick your ears up, After your ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (2 of 10) - The Humourous Lieutenant • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... the ordinary cactus. We have been very careful, however, not to touch it as the spines are sure to prick us. It is interesting to know that the cactus is a desert plant—that, though millions of acres of arid land in the West can produce little else, they can produce enormous quantities of cactus. Unfortunately, these plants have always been useless as neither man nor beast ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford
... upon all his advances; and now what perfect revenge! Lucius was more in love with Cornelia than he admitted even to himself. He would even give up Clyte, if he could possess her. And so the mental battle went on all day; and the prick of conscience, the fears of superstition, and the lingerings of religion ever grew fainter. Near nightfall he was at his post, at the Temple of Saturn. Pratinas was awaiting him. The Greek had only ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... once in a while she could have the things she "loved." It was only a small mess of pottage—some chops, a cup of real coffee, some after-dinner mints. The doctor had proscribed them all, but "Once won't hurt." Her conscience did prick, but days passed; there was no spell, no chill, no headache. "It didn't hurt me" was her triumphant conclusion; and again she ventured and nothing happened—and again, and again. Then the coffee every day and soon sweets and meats, regardless; then coffee ...
— Our Nervous Friends - Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness • Robert S. Carroll
... kongoni standing quite near, watching me with curious interest, but without fear. Perhaps I was intent upon something else and hardly noticed them. Suddenly a villainous thought might enter my head, such as "That big kongoni has enormous horns," and instantly the herd would prick up their ears, run a few steps, and then turn to verify their suspicions. Then, if the villainous thought still lurked in my brain, they would sneeze shrilly and go galloping away in the distance. There is no way to explain ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon
... At flush. At love. At primero. At the chess. At the beast. At Reynard the fox. At the rifle. At the squares. At trump. At the cows. At the prick and spare not. At the lottery. At the hundred. At the chance or mumchance. At the peeny. At three dice or maniest bleaks. At the unfortunate woman. At the tables. At the fib. At nivinivinack. At the pass ten. At the lurch. At one-and-thirty. ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... he dismounts to hunt, but that time he was some distance away, and had slipped his hand through the bridle rein and was leading Bettie that way. Both horses are perfectly broken to firearms, and do not in the least mind a gun. I have often seen Bettie prick up her ears and watch the smoke come from the barrel with ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... in leaving Rome (no, the other was that I had not seen Mr. Browning) was that I could not send Una some flowers the morning of our departure. I had set my heart upon it, but could not find any pretty enough. Every fresh spray of hawthorn on our journey renewed the prick of my disappointment. We should have liked to take Julian along with us as our traveling artist, to lay up the flowers for us in imperishable colors [he already painted flowers remarkably]; we were reminded of him very often. I saw dear little Rose's patron, St. Rosa, in the Staffa Gallery ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... came up on deck. Joyce bethought himself of some cigars in his state-room and went back. For the moment I was alone with his wife by the rail, watching the stars beginning to prick through the darkening sky. The Sylph was running smoothly, with the wind almost aft; the scud of water past her bows and the occasional creak of a block aloft were the only sounds audible in the silence that lay like ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... to prick or incise each lesion and press out the contents. In some milia it may be necessary also, in order to prevent a return, to touch the base of the excavation with tincture of iodine or with silver nitrate. Electrolysis is also effectual. In those cases where the lesions ...
— Essentials of Diseases of the Skin • Henry Weightman Stelwagon
... you no message, and have not been to see you because I was sorry for you; you must allow me to be sorry for you, since you 're sorry for me!... I didn't want to put you in a false position, to make your conscience prick.... You talk of a tie between us... as though you could remain my friend as before your marriage! Rubbish! Why, you were only friendly with me before to gloat over your ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... the prick, nor film of breath upon the bronze mirror. They have had the best of the faculty in Akragas, Gela, and Syracuse, all save you; and I am sent by the dazed parents to beseech you to leave for a time the ...
— The Flutter of the Goldleaf; and Other Plays • Olive Tilford Dargan and Frederick Peterson
... socks and his extra pair of shoes from his surplus kit. If the skin is tender, or the feet perspire, wash with warm salt water or alum water, but do not soak the feet a long time, as this, although very comforting at the time, tends to keep them soft. Should blister's appear on the feet, prick and evacuate them by pricking at the lower edge with a pin which has been passed through the flame of a match and cover them with zinc oxide plaster applied hot. This plaster can be obtained on request at the regimental ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department
... from among the green leaves, like a jolly face, and promised good cheer. The horse-trough, full of clear fresh water, and the ground below it sprinkled with droppings of fragrant hay, made every horse that passed, prick up his ears. The crimson curtains in the lower rooms, and the pure white hangings in the little bed-chambers above, beckoned, Come in! with every breath of air. Upon the bright green shutters, there ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens
... see and hear Seem'd in her frame residing; Before the watch-dog prick'd his ear She heard her lover's riding; Ere scarce a distant form was kenn'd She knew and waved to greet him, And o'er the battlement did bend As on the ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... way and then that, he decided that the only thing possible for him was to put a "great divide" of distance between himself and her. This he had done—and to what purpose? Apparently merely to excite her ridicule!—and to prick her humor up to the mischievous prank of finding out where he had fled and following him! And she—even she—who had kept him aloof ever since that fatal moment on the seashore,—had discovered him on this lonely hill-side, and had taunted him with her light mockery—and actually said that "to ...
— The Secret Power • Marie Corelli
... to help me, whereon three more Kaffirs following on the dead soldier's path crawled out from under the waggon. Two of them gained their feet and ran at him lifting their assegais. I thought that all was lost, for one hole in our defence was like a pin prick to a bladder, but with a shout Jan dropped the empty gun and rushed to meet them. He caught them by the throat, the two of them, one in each of his great hands, and before they could spear him dashed their heads together with such desperate strength that they fell down and never stirred again. ...
— Swallow • H. Rider Haggard
... way. Lenny's eye followed him with the sullenness of despair. The tinker, like all the tribe of human comforters, had only watered the brambles to invigorate the prick of the thorns. Yes, if Lenny had been caught breaking the stocks, some at least would have pitied him; but to be incarcerated for defending them, you might as well have expected that the widows and orphans of the Reign of Terror would have pitied Dr. Guillotin when ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... father called him to the window to see the moon, which pleased him very much; but presently he said,—Father, do not pull the string and bring down the moon, for my naughty brother will prick it, and then it will all shrivel up and we shall not ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... provoking vanity, nor courting notice, Mr. Fossett was without an enemy, and seemed without a care. Formal were his manners, formal his household, formal even the stout cob that bore him from Cheapside to Clapham, from Claphain to Cheapside. That cob could not even prick up its ears if it wished to shy—its ears were cropped, so were its ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... arm with a small instrument which swabbed it with antiseptic, drew a minute blood-sample, and medicated the needle prick, all in one almost painless operation. He put the blood-drop on a slide and inserted it at one side of a comparison microscope, nodding. It showed the same distinctive permanent colloid pattern as the sample he had ready for comparison; the colloid pattern given in infancy by injection ...
— Police Operation • H. Beam Piper
... comfort of being relieved from a burden of gratitude." The saying is a little too much like Rochefoucauld, and too true to be pleasant; but it was one of those keen remarks which Johnson appreciated because they prick a bubble of commonplace moralizing without demanding too literal an acceptation. He went home to sup with Reynolds and became his intimate friend. On another occasion, Johnson was offended by two ladies ...
— Samuel Johnson • Leslie Stephen
... being excessively disagreeable to everybody. There was a rose in a glass beside her plate, and she took it out, and began to twiddle it between her fingers and thumb impatiently, till she managed to prick herself with the thorns, and then she complained ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... arm across the fire. "I'll show you," said he. Taking Godefroy by the ear, with a prick of the sword he led the lazy knave quick march to the beach, where ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... she said at length, "even as I came alone to these coasts, so will I go from them;" and slowly she drew from its sheath a little knife which she carried at her girdle. She tried the point upon her finger, so that the blood sprang from the prick and dropped on her white gown. At the sight she gave a cry and dropped the knife, and "I cannot do it" she said, "I have not the courage. But you, madame! Ever have you been kind to me, and therefore show ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... until perfectly free from dirt and mould, bake them, and when done prick with a fork to allow the steam to escape, then wipe with a cloth to remove any charred skin, etc. Have ready a good-sized saucepan (enamelled for preference) in which the milk and butter have been heated, halve the potatoes and squeeze them into it, add salt and pepper (the ...
— New Vegetarian Dishes • Mrs. Bowdich
... is irritating and disfiguring. Bathe with warm water; at night apply a bread-and-milk poultice. When a white head forms, prick it with a fine needle. Should the inflammation be obstinate, a little citrine ointment may be applied, care being taken that it does not get ...
— Our Deportment - Or the Manners, Conduct and Dress of the Most Refined Society • John H. Young
... a mark on the skin that will be permanent, you have to prick the colors into it so deeply that they will go through the basement layer and reach cells which will not grow toward the surface. This "pricking-in" operation is known as tattooing; and it is as foolish as it is painful, for blood-poisoning and other diseases may be carried ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson
... to be present at the second interview between Mr. Chelm and Mr. Prime, for several reasons. I was curious to have another look at my beneficiary, and I had an impression that Mr. Chelm might feel his legal conscience prick him, and so spoil the plot, if I were not within earshot. When the interview took place, however, the lawyer took a mild revenge by toying with his visitor a little at first, as though about to give an unfavorable answer; and ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... or copyist, had in addition to his quill, ink, and vellum, a pair of compasses to prick off the spacing of his lines, a ruler and a sharpened instrument or pencil with which to draw the lines upon which he was to write, a penknife for mending his pens, an erasing knife for corrections, and pumice and agate, or other smooth substance, for smoothing the scratched surface. The ...
— Books Before Typography - Typographic Technical Series for Apprentices #49 • Frederick W. Hamilton
... the wrong man and at the wrong time," he said angrily, "and you talk as though I was a fool. Well, I am a fool, perhaps, and I blow bubbles. Prick this one, if you can. I ...
— The Hill - A Romance of Friendship • Horace Annesley Vachell
... Veal or Mutton with some beef-suet or fat bacon, and some sweet herbs minced also, and seasoned with some cloves, mace, nutmeg, pepper, two or three raw eggs and salt: then prick it up, the breast being filled at the lower end, and stew it between two dishes with some strong broth, white wine, and large mace, then an hour after have sweet herbs picked and stripped, time, sorrel, parsley, ...
— The accomplisht cook - or, The art & mystery of cookery • Robert May
... native limb, that its old possessor was always sensible of any injury done to it. Upon these transplanted pieces were tatooed the letters of the alphabet; so that, when a communication was to be made, either of the persons, though the wide Atlantic rolled between them, had only to prick his arm with a magnetic needle, and straightway his friend received intimation that the telegraph was at work. Whatever letter he pricked on his own arm pained the same letter on the ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... either, as I think, A monument of one long since deceased, 420 Or was, perchance, in ancient days design'd, As now by Peleus' mighty son, a goal. That mark in view, thy steeds and chariot push Near to it as thou may'st; then, in thy seat Inclining gently to the left, prick smart 425 Thy right-hand horse challenging him aloud, And give him rein; but let thy left-hand horse Bear on the goal so closely, that the nave And felly[13] of thy wheel may seem to meet. Yet fear to strike the stone, lest ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... avoid one of the goat's playful assaults, Sally stumbled up against Matthew Quintal, deranged the work on which he was engaged, and caused him to prick his hand with a sail-needle, at which William McCoy, who was beside ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... practically identified the boarding-house of the Autocrat with any boarding-house I happened to know in Brompton or Brighton. No doubt there were differences; but the point is that the differences did not pierce the consciousness or prick the illusion. I said to myself, 'People are like this in boarding-houses,' not 'People are like ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... towards evening. On the next morning they marched again at daybreak. There was sharp cold, with a storm of snow,—not the large, moist, lazy flakes that fall peacefully and harmlessly, but those small crystalline particles that drive spitefully before the wind, and prick the cheek like needles. It was the kind of snowstorm called in Canada la poudrerie. They had hoped to make a long day's march; but feet and faces were freezing, and they were forced to stop, at noon, under such shelter as the thick woods of pine, spruce, and fir could supply. In the ...
— A Half-Century of Conflict, Volume II • Francis Parkman
... touch any thread! All you're good for is to prig things to stuff that mouth of yours with! The skin of your phiz is shallow and those paws of yours are light! But with the shame you bring upon yourself before the world, isn't it right that I should prick you, and ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... who have said it," I continued; "and I will even suppose it is a mother's mark, to please you for a little, though it has no more that character than this sword-prick in my left cheek. But taking it in your own way, I have a theory I could propound to you about these marks. We say that the soul is in the body. It is just as true that the body is in the soul. Every member of the entire physical person is represented ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII • various
... speak unkindly of the absent. Half a cent had to be paid every time I did any of these things, and I kept my own account of them, and punished myself. I always knew when I had violated one of mother's golden rules by her grieved look, or father's surprised one, or by a little prick from my conscience. ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... Dr. Hudson, "into that wonderful world which lies in a drop of water, crossed by some stems of green weed, to see transparent living mechanism at work, and to gain some idea of its modes of action, to watch a tiny speck that can sail through the prick of a needle's point; to see its crystal armour flashing with ever varying tint, its head glorious with the halo of its quivering cilia; to see it gliding through the emerald stems, hunting for its food, snatching at its prey, fleeing from its enemy, chasing its mate (the fiercest of our ...
— The Beauties of Nature - and the Wonders of the World We Live In • Sir John Lubbock
... report of him," Pilate went on. "He is not political. There is no doubt of that. But trust Caiaphas, and Hanan behind Caiaphas, to make of this fisherman a political thorn with which to prick Rome ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... play upon a fiddle, and herself played upon the bass-viol; and the two together would play in the Great Chamber after supper for an hour or two, when the dishes were washed. In this manner we had many a corrant and saraband; and I was able to prick down for them too some Italian music I remembered, which she set for the two instruments. Sometimes, too, when Cousin Tom was not too drowsy after his day and his ale, the three would sing and I would listen; for my Cousin ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... Susy, with a positive shake of the head. "It's of no use to keep fussing so long over a name, and I feel a great deal easier, now I've made up my mind! Dear little Wings, you prick up your ears, and I know you like it, too. I wish you had a soul, so you could be taken to church, and christened like ...
— Little Prudy's Sister Susy • Sophie May
... be short-lived, she divined from the lay of the land ahead, but the ride she lived then for a flying mile was something that would always blanch her cheeks and prick her skin in remembrance. ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... give salt and water to drink. Where death has resulted from seeing goblins, take the heart of a leek and push it up the patient's nostrils—the left for a man, the right for a woman. Look along the inner edge of the upper lips for blisters like grains of Indian corn, and prick them with ...
— Chinese Sketches • Herbert A. Giles
... objections to this arrangement; and yet, though she knew she must speak now or never, she could not speak. Whether it were the spell of the minister's manner, which, as I said, worked its charm upon her as it did upon others; whether it were the prick of conscience, warning her that she had interfered once too often already in her daughter's life affairs; or whether, finally, she had an instinctive sense that things were gone too far for her hindering hand, she ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... she did not tell you that I wanted to marry her for the sake of her money, and that she refused me indignantly and scornfully (you need neither start nor blush; nor yet need you prick your trembling fingers with your needle. That is the plain truth, whether you like it or not)—if such was not the subject of her august confidences, on what point did they turn? You say you talked the ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... some of these were the size of an average turnip, and the hill was steep. So the old horse poked out his nose, and stood almost dozing, till the sound of the Cheap Jack's shuffling footsteps caused him to prick his ears, and brace his muscles for a ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... of dispute was whether he should be killed at once or carried away prisoner. As after a time he was lifted up, the cords round his legs taken off, and he was hurried along with many curses and an occasional sharp prick with a spear, he judged that those in favour of sparing his life for the ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... allusions gayer for the zest Of one who hurt no friend and spared no jest. What arts were yours that taught you to indite What all men thought, but only you could write! That wrung from gloom itself a fleeting smile; Rippled with laughter but refrained from guile; Led you to prick some bladder of conceit Or trip intrusive folly's blundering feet, While wisdom at your call came down to earth, Unbent awhile and gave a hand ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 2, 1917 • Various
... affairs in their just perspective, so that its happy possessor at once perceives anything odd or distorted or overblown to be an excrescence, a protuberance, a swelling, literally a humour: and the function of Thalia, the Comic Spirit, as you may read in Meredith's "Essay on Comedy," is just to prick these humours. I will but refer you to Meredith's "Essay," and here cite you the words of ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... imperfect idea of all those works. Poetry is a kind of music in which a man should have some knowledge before he pretends to judge of it. When I give you a translation of some passages from those foreign poets, I only prick down, and that imperfectly, their music; but then I cannot express the taste ...
— Letters on England • Voltaire
... Lane, upon which the Person whom he spoke to, instead of answering his Question, call'd him a young Popish Cur, and asked him who had made Anne a Saint? The Boy, being in some Confusion, enquired of the next he met, which was the Way to Anne's Lane; but was call'd a prick-eared Cur for his Pains, and instead of being shewn the Way, was told that she had been a Saint before he was born, and would be one after he was hanged. Upon this, says Sir ROGER, I did not think fit to repeat the former Question, but going into every Lane of the Neighbourhood, asked what they ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... of War, forsooth! They treated us worse than Galley Slaves. Our hands were bound behind us with cords, Halters were put about our necks, and, the Grenadiers prodding us behind with their bayonets,—the Dastards, so to prick Unarmed Men!—we were conducted in ignominy through the rascal Crowd, which made a Grinning, Jeering, Hooting lane for us to pass to the Guardhouse at the Entrance of the Gardens. The Officer of the Guard was at first for having both of us strapped ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... in a buzz of human activities. Some of the men, Dion among them, were trying to learn Dutch under an instructor who knew the mysteries. A call came for volunteers for inoculation, and both Dion and Worthington answered it, with between forty and fifty other men. The prick of the needle was like the touch of a spark; soon after came a mystery of general wretchedness, followed by pains in the loins, a rise of temperature and extreme, in Dion's case even intense, weakness. He lay in his bunk trying to play the detective ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... feeble authority. First she sought to justify her inclination by reminding herself that her mother had never by word or look signified the slightest opposition to her intimacy with Kenneth. This attitude of resignation on her mother's part, however, was a constant thorn in her side, a prick to her conscience. It ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... coloured up with a dull, painful red, as if he'd said something attached to a disagreeable memory. That was what his expression suggested to me; but as I know for a fact that he has not at all a nice, kind character, I suppose in reality what he felt was only a stupid prick of vanity at having inadvertently given his age away. I nearly blurted out the truth about mine, which would have got me into hot water at once, as Ellaline's hardly nineteen and I'm practically twenty-one—worse luck ...
— Set in Silver • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... pretty sight, as big as half a melon, and I doubts ever being able to put it to the ground again, though they says I shall. I gets very stiff at nights and the pain sometimes is cruel, but they gives me a prick with the morphia needle then which makes me ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, October 31, 1917 • Various
... very much above us in rank," said Amy. "He is related to grand people. I dare say he leans on some of the satin cushions we prick our ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... alongside, and we beheld six wild-looking half-naked creatures—two men, three women, and a very small boy, who was crouching over a fire at the bottom of the boat. There were also four sharp, cheery-looking little dogs, rather like Esquimaux dogs, only smaller, with prick ears and curly tails, who were looking over the side and barking vigorously in response to the salutations of our pugs. One man had on a square robe of sea-otter skins, thrown over his shoulders, and laced together in front, two of the ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... repairs, and will close by hastily speaking of the more rare cases, and the adjustment of the hair spring, etc., etc. It is often the case that there is never end shake to the balance to make it absolutely safe when screwed into the case, and when this happens I take the point of a sharp graver and prick up a burr on the bridge, and never on the plate, as any unskilled workman does, for the under side of the bridge never being finished, you really mar nothing, and sometimes this raising of the cock (or bridge) becomes a necessity, to have it clear the rim of the balance, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 664, September 22,1888 • Various
... assured him. "To be sure, a careless blacksmith could prick you. But Farmer Green always takes us to the best one ...
— The Tale of Pony Twinkleheels • Arthur Scott Bailey
... you prick up your ears and wipe your spectacles. That is the motto, as every one of the learned family of antiquaries is well aware, and, as you have often told me, of your great forbear, the venerable and praiseworthy ...
— Old Friends - Essays in Epistolary Parody • Andrew Lang
... very sunshine, pointed and tipped with fire like a spear, so that it could prick her, had come in through the frosting on the window pane and smote upon Matilda's face, she would not more keenly have felt the touch. It had never touched her before, that verse, with anything but rose leaf softness; now it pricked. Why? The little girl was troubled; ...
— The House in Town • Susan Warner
... front, drove Jack and Jill, who, he said, were "feeling their oats." Betty did not wonder, for oats are sharp and must prick their stomachs. She sat with grandfather,—he had promised she should the night before,—and Jamie was tucked in between them. He ought to have been in behind with grandmother, but his scream of rebellion as he was lifted in brought instant yielding from Betty, when grandfather ...
— The Eye of Dread • Payne Erskine
... admiration of a plant, whose stem was about two feet high, and which had a round, shining, pale purple, beautiful flower, the waggoner, with a look of extreme scorn, exclaimed, 'Help thee, lad, does not thee know 'tis a common thistle? Didst thee not know that a thistle would prick thee?' continued he, laughing at the face I made when I touched the prickly leaves; 'why my horse Dobbin has more sense by half! he is not like ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... took a vow that if at noon the rain should not have begun to descend upon Avignon I would repair to the head-spring of the Sorgues. When the critical moment arrived, the clouds were hanging over Avignon like distended water-bags, which only needed a prick to empty themselves. The prick was not given, however; all nature was too much occupied in following the aberration of the Rhone to think of playing tricks elsewhere. Accordingly, I started for the station in a spirit which, for a tourist who sometimes had prided himself ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... the needful—look'a here!' I just plumps out Uncle Zack Brewster's letter, and having fascinated his eye, tells him how Cochran and Riggs 'll do the dust. Like an hydraulic current let loose did the fellow prick up his ears: then he said, 'do tell,' with a musical emphasis that seemed so full of credit. Again he drew a long breath, and a seriousness came over his face that could only be likened to that of a South Carolina locomotive when ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... I prick up my ears and listen intently. But I did not suffer my awakened interest to betray itself in look or tone ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... possible!" said the colonel, with a grin—"that is, by drink. Failing that, by force. It's essential that the old man shouldn't get wind of anything being up; and if Carr told him about last night he'd prick up his wicked old ears. No, ...
— A Man of Mark • Anthony Hope
... of these words, which were spoken so cheerily and with such a pleasant smile, seemed to pierce the princess like the prick of a needle, and caused her to press her lips together in just such a way as if she wanted to check an outcry of pain or suppress some hidden rage. Marie Antoinette, while speaking of the sharp ears which madame always had, had hinted at the ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... tea-cakes are made like biscuits, by rubbing into a pound of flour six ounces of butter, and three large spoonfuls of yeast. Work up the paste with a sufficient quantity of new milk, make it into biscuits, and prick them with a clean fork. Or melt six or seven ounces of butter, with a sufficient quantity of new milk warmed to make seven pounds of flour into a stiff paste. Roll it thin, and ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton
... broth—in other words, boiled mussels—with Mr. Farquharson's family t'other day. Now I see you prick up your ears. They are all well, and mademoiselle is particularly well. She begs her respects to you all—along with which please present those of your humble servant. I can no more. I have so high a veneration, or rather idolatrization, ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... years ago," said he musingly. "The sword and I have been close friends in life, but my companion has been a blade of coarser make, carrying no inscriptions to prick at a man's conscience and make a craven ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... disappointing. No traces of poison were to be found in the stomach nor was there to be seen on the body any mark of violence with the exception of a minute prick upon ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... know what this word meant. But his keeper gently pricked him with a sharp hook, called an "ankus," and to get away from the prick, which was like the bite of a big fly, Umboo stepped out and ...
— Umboo, the Elephant • Howard R. Garis
... peevish, morose disposition soon find themselves left alone in a mighty solitude; they are avoided like thistles which prick whoever touches them. Our Blessed Father always spoke with the highest praise of the dictum of St. Louis, that we should never speak evil of anyone, unless when by our silence we should seem to hold with him in his wrong-doing, and ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus
... pensively: "I suppose it is the chastisement of Heaven, too, that flies should prick the squires of vanquished knights, and lice eat them, and hunger assail them. If we squires were the sons of the knights we serve, or their very near relations, it would be no wonder if the penalty of their misdeeds descended upon us, even to the fourth generation. ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... cowardly. Why can it not go on so, she thought. As the little crucians lie motionless on the surface of the water in the sunshine, only stirring their fins a little from time to time, just to feel they are alive,—that must feel good. But suddenly she had a recollection that was like a prick of conscience. She felt as if she were neglecting or ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... of the town, crowning the gentle hills that lie to the north and west, villas in acre plots, belonging to business men in the county town some ten miles distant, "prick their Cockney ears" and are strangely at variance with the sober gravity of the indigenous houses. So, too, are the manners and customs of their owners, who go to Stoneborough every morning to their work, and return by the train that brings them ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson
... horses were quiet and tractable, and would at a whispered order lie down and remain in perfect quiet; but no sooner had they left them and again settled to sleep than, at the first howl which told that the pack were at all approaching, the horses would lift their heads, prick their ears in the direction of the sound, and rise to their feet and stand trembling, with extended nostrils snuffing the unknown danger, pawing the ground, and occasionally making desperate efforts to break loose from their ...
— The Young Carthaginian - A Story of The Times of Hannibal • G.A. Henty
... appeased by the inspector's final offer. Goaded by the merciless pin-prick of his superior's tongue, Fyles had finally offered to set out for Rocky Springs, the place, both were fully agreed, whence the trouble emanated, and bring all those concerned in ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... exclaimed, "have you succeeded? Is your languid muse stirred? Have you seen a face, a look, a gesture—anything to prick your imagination?" ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... to-day. Turnus himself, accoutred for the fray, Wakes up his warriors with the morning light. At once each captain marshals in array His company, in brazen arms bedight, And rumours whet their rage, and prick them to the fight. ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... and he was going now where it would shout. Wanted to know what was the use of being a nob if a fellow wasn't the nobbiest sort of a nob. Said he'd bought a house on Beacon Hill, in Boston, and that if I'd prick up my ears occasionally I'd hear something drop into the Back Bay. Handed me his new card four times and explained that it was the rawest sort of dog to carry a brace of names in your card holster; that it gave you the drop on ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer
... one and eleven-sixteenths of an inch, ten inches in length—and broad enough to allow the outline to be properly cut for further operation. After I get this cut exactly by a band saw, I place the outline on the wood cut for the scroll, and with a sharp-pointed, hard pencil, prick the holes where the volute has to come on to the sides, both of them. After that, on the face of the wood—that is to say, the front, as though looking at the fingerboard, I mark at four-and-a-quarter inches from end of the head, which is to be the end of ...
— Violin Making - 'The Strad' Library, No. IX. • Walter H. Mayson
... methinks a Cloak-Cabal I see, Whose Prick-ears glow, whilst they their Jealousie In Essence find; but Citty-Sirs, I fear, Most of you have more cause to be severe. We yield ...
— Sganarelle - or The Self-Deceived Husband • Moliere
... dragon, but he was not at all like the dragons of our imagination. With his great bullet head and prick ears, his beetling brows and deep sunken eyes, his ferocious mouth and protruding tusks, his short thick neck and massive shoulders, his large, gawky, and misshapen trunk, coated with dingy brown fur, shading ...
— A Trip to Venus • John Munro
... strong enough to produce the illusion which is sometimes fatal to the suffering member; but each dog mistakingly thinks that the others, or one of the others, inflicted the injury, and his impulse is to take the part of the injured animal. If the cry for help—caused perhaps by a sudden cramp or the prick of a thorn—is not very sharp or intense, the other dogs will not attack, but merely look and growl at each ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson
... yearling a muzzle set full of sharpened nails. These of course pricked the cows, and they would not stand to be drained of their milk. The next day the farmer saw the yearling rubbing the nails against a rock in order, as he thought, to dull them so they would not prick the cows! How much easier to believe that the beast was simply trying to get rid of the awkward incumbrance upon its nose. What can a calf or a cow know about sharpened nails, and the use of a rock to dull them? This is a kind ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... continued to flaunt her Christian humility in the eyes of her own circle, and to withhold her pity from the poor, lonely old woman whom hate had made bitter and to whom the world, after all, had not been over-kind. But prosperity is usually cruel, and one needs the prick of the thorn one's self to know ...
— The heart of happy hollow - A collection of stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... himself of a habit he had of shrugging up his shoulders, and making himself appear hump-backed, he hung up a sword over his back, so that it might prick him, with its sharp point, whenever he ...
— Parker's Second Reader • Richard G. Parker
... and keep in shady place. After caponizing, feed the bird what soft feed he will eat up and let him have plenty of water. Then leave him to himself as he will be his own doctor. In two or three days look them over and if there are any wind-balls, simply prick with a needle to let the air out; this may have to be done two or three times before the wound heals up, but after it has healed, treat just as you would other chickens and feed them about twice a day. There is nothing made by trying to rush nature; it takes fifteen months ...
— One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered • E.J. Wickson
... friends, and again to recoil before them. Nevers held his own on one side; Lagardere held his own on the other. Nevers delivered his thrust at AEsop, and for the second time that day the hunchback felt the prick of steel between his eyes and saved himself by springing backward, his blood's fire suddenly turned to ice. Lagardere's sword was like a living fire. "Look out, Staupitz! Take that, Pepe!" he cried, and wounded both men. Then, while the German and the Spaniard fell back ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... aforesaid Lupin, as you are counting on that poor devil to crush me and to work a miracle in favour of your innocent Gilbert, come, let's dispel that illusion. Oh! Lupin! Lord above, she believes in Lupin! She places her last hopes in Lupin! Lupin! Just wait till I prick you, my ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... but ungrateful to her that did it, that the bird may not talk largely of her abroad for non-payment, closeth her chaps, intending to swallow her, and so put her to perpetual silence. But nature, loathing such ingratitude, hath armed this bird with a quill or prick on the head, top o' th' which wounds the crocodile i' th' mouth, forceth her open her bloody prison, and away flies the pretty tooth-picker from her ...
— The White Devil • John Webster
... gave her a sharp prick. Could it be her doing that trouble was coming upon the old house? What a punishment for a moment's fit ...
— The Cuckoo Clock • Mrs. Molesworth
... manhandle that atrocious scoundrel, and smoke him along to the quarter-deck. At intervals, he ran close up to the revolving border of the confusion, and prying into the heart of it with his pike, sought to prick out the object of his resentment. But Steelkilt and his desperadoes were too much for them all; they succeeded in gaining the forecastle deck, where, hastily slewing about three or four large casks in a line with the windlass, these sea-Parisians ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... has the murderous Moor, who slays his guest with felon blow, Save sorrow he can slay no more, what prick of ...
— The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi • Richard F. Burton
... should do wrong merely out of ill nature, why, yet it is but like the thorn or brier, which prick and scratch because they can ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... that any organism is limited in its choice of behavior. A hamster, for instance, cannot choose to behave in the manner of a Rhesus monkey. A dog cannot choose to react as a mouse would. If I prick a rat with a needle, it may squeal, or bite, or jump—but it will not bark. Never. Nor will it leap up to a trapeze, hang by its tail, and chatter curses ...
— Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... morning at the point on the coral embankment where the Potii Moorea was made fast, the gasolene-propelled cargo-boat which we had rented for the voyage. A hundred were gathered about a band of musicians in full swing when I appeared at the rendezvous on the prick of the hour. The bandsmen, all natives but one, wore garlands of purau, the scarlet hibiscus, and there was an atmosphere of abandonment to pleasure about ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... sight. But just level with my head there was a hole in the rock. It was quite small—I could only just get my hand in, but it went a long way back. I took the oilskin packet from round my neck and shoved it right in as far as I could. Then I tore off a bit of gorse—My! but it did prick—and plugged the hole with it so that you'd never guess there was a crevice of any kind there. Then I marked the place carefully in my own mind, so that I'd find it again. There was a queer boulder in the path just there—for all the world like a dog sitting ...
— The Secret Adversary • Agatha Christie
... Chinamen, probably asking what they were. I took advantage of his unguarded pause to plunge my bayonet in his body, with a thrust so rapid that he had not time to make the least movement to avoid it. He fell at once where he stood, but attempted to rise again, when I gave him another prick which settled his business. He fell back heavily against the counter with a groan. One of the heads above was shaken off its spike by the concussion and struck him on the shoulder as he lay. His eyes, opening and shutting convulsively, seemed ...
— Under the Dragon Flag - My Experiences in the Chino-Japanese War • James Allan
... enough to travel and there were many preparations to be made about the loads, and so forth, since the waggon must be left behind. Also, and this was another complication—Hans had a sore upon his foot, resulting from the prick of a poisonous thorn, and it was desirable that this should be quite ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... Dragon-fly. She is dead, really and truly dead. Laid upon my table and left alone for twenty-four hours, she makes not the slightest movement. A prick of which my lens cannot see the marks, so sharp-pointed are the Epeira's weapons, was enough, with a little insistence, to kill the powerful animal. Proportionately, the Rattlesnake, the Horned Viper, the Trigonocephalus and other ill-famed ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre
... foolish rogue thought more efficacious than ointments and medicines for the wretches he had made! And of the chaplains and clerks he instituted in that dormitory, one was to teach grammars and another prick-song. How history makes one shudder and laugh by turns! But I fear I have wearied your lordship with my idle declamation, and you will repent having commanded me to send you ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... be told, they were sometimes as troublesome to the Giant as a swarm of ants or mosquitoes, especially as they had a fondness for mischief, and liked to prick his skin with their little swords and lances, to see how thick and tough it was. But Antaeus took it all kindly enough; although, once in a while, when he happened to be sleepy, he would grumble out a peevish word or ...
— Tanglewood Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... charming, and though he hasn't a university education, he has a universal one, which counts for far more in this world where a stab is given in return for a pin prick. ...
— Letters of a Dakota Divorcee • Jane Burr
... (as, the pain of hunger or bereavement), or from some abnormal action of bodily or mental functions (as, the pains of disease, envy, or discontent). Suffering is one of the severer forms of pain. The prick of a needle causes pain, but we should scarcely speak of it as suffering. Distress is too strong a word for little hurts, too feeble for the intensest suffering, but commonly applied to some continuous or prolonged trouble or need; as, the distress of a shipwrecked ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... trembling girl to Craig's side, and with a prick of his sword in their backs made them go forward. The American was too bewildered to think evenly. Why, the god Aten was the Sun God!—the divinity Egypt worshipped in five hundred B.C.? How had these warm-blooded people come to the ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... years in these hot latitudes it becomes horribly full of rats and cockroaches. My husband, taking a trip in H.M.S. Contest, in 1858, woke one morning unable to open one eye. Presently he felt a sharp prick, and found a large cockroach sitting on his eyelid and biting the corner of his eye. They also bite all round the nails of your fingers and toes, unless they are closely covered. It must be said that insects are a great discomfort at Sarawak. Mosquitoes, and sand-flies, ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... them had made their promises, suddenly the thirteenth came in. She wished to avenge herself for not having been invited, and without greeting, or even looking at any one, she cried with a loud voice, "The King's daughter shall in her fifteenth year prick herself with a spindle, and fall down dead." And, without saying a word more, she turned round ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers
... looked foolish. "Of course," they cried. "We didn't think of that. But we are quite sure that these queer things that prick so are not claws, and certainly they ...
— The Adventures of Prickly Porky • Thornton W. Burgess
... But 'tis not well to be reserved and close. Act Davus in the drama: droop your head, And use the gestures of a man in dread. Be all attention: if the wind is brisk, Say, "Wrap that precious head up! run no risk!" Push shouldering through a crowd, the way to clear Before him; when he maunders, prick your ear. He craves for praise; administer the puff Till, lifting up both hands, he cries "Enough." But when, rewarded and released, at last You gain the end of all your service past, And, not in dreams but soberly awake, Hear "One full quarter let Ulysses take," Say, once or twice, ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... not precisely 'receiving' them, and that if 'in Thy name' so sanctified deeds, perhaps the unattached exorcist, who could cast out demons by it, was 'a little one' to be taken to their hearts, and not an enemy to be silenced. Pity that so many listen to the law, and do not, like John, feel it prick them! ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... he perchance forgot. The footstool bring me hither; I am Queen, And I shall fasten to the chair this King. They say that witches who compel to love Stick needles, thus, in images of wax, And every prick goes to a human heart To hinder or ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... greedy rush of excitement that often a strong man will, at a prick of the shears, fall in a ...
— On the Track • Henry Lawson
... positive in his opinions, and vehemently eager to convince and conquer in such discussions, I seldom or never saw the least anger in him against me or any friend. When the blows of contradiction came too thick, he could with consummate dexterity whisk aside out of their way; prick into his adversary on some new quarter; or gracefully flourishing his weapon, end the duel in some handsome manner. One angry glance I remember in him, and it was but a glance, and gone in a moment. "Flat Pantheism!" ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... The weapons a rapier, a backsword, and target; Brisk Monsieur advanced as fast as he could, But all his fine pushes were caught in the wood; While Sawney with backsword did slash him and nick him, While t'other, enraged that he could not once prick him, Cried, "Sirrah, you rascal, you son of a whore, Me'll fight you, begar, if you'll come from your door!" Our case is the same; if you'll fight like a man, Don't fly from my weapon, and skulk behind Dan; For he's not to be pierced; his leather's ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... at him, her dry lips apart, a glaze over her eyes. He thought her expression strange. As she said nothing, he added, with a little sour pleasure in defending his dead friend, even if it should give a prick to a survivor, "The Judge was so scrupulously honest, you know." The widow sat down and laid her arms across the table, still staring hard at the doctor. It came to him that she was not looking at him at all, but at some devastating ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... could he forget it? Every morning, some pin-prick renewed his wound. Three days running, Angelique received a wonderful sheaf of flowers, with Arsene Lupin's card peeping from it. The duke could not go to his club but ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc
... prick up his ears and become interested. Was it possible that his good luck was to continue, and that he was to have an opportunity of earning some more money through his faithful friend, the violin? He didn't think it well to exhibit ...
— The Young Musician - or, Fighting His Way • Horatio Alger
... sweet and flattering. He allowed the imputation to pass without denial. Without protest, he allowed her to twine about his brow this spurious bay of Spanish scholarship. He let it grace his conquering head, and, among its soft convolutions, he did not feel the prick of the thorn that was to ...
— Waifs and Strays - Part 1 • O. Henry
... after dark. Meanwhile the Federals were also feeling their way forward over the same ground to get into a good flanking position for next day's battle. So the two sides met; and it was past midnight when Longstreet settled down. Lee wanted a sword thrust. Longstreet gave a pin prick. We shall meet Longstreet again, in the same character of obstructive subordinate, at Gettysburg. But he was, for the most part, a very good officer indeed; and the South, with its scanty supply of trained leaders, could not afford to make changes like the North. The fault, ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood |
