"Prick" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the fool, "whom have we here that he cannot wait? A Caesar in disguise? Nay, be off—be off! if thou wouldst not learn how a spear-prick feels behind." ...
— Cleopatra • H. Rider Haggard
... His black coat off and his old clothes on, "Now I'm myself," said Farmer John, And he thinks, "I'll look around." Up leaps the dog: "Get down, you pup! Are you so glad you would eat me up?" And the old cow lows at the gate to greet him, The horses prick up their ears to meet him. "Well, well, old Bay, Ha, ha, old Gray, Do you get good food ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... but the calm, the dignified, the measured march of poetical conception. No wonder, when superstition steps in to prick on imagination, that all should vividly team with spirit life. Or that on Walpurgis' night, bush and streamlet and hill bustle and hurry, with unequal pace, towards the haunted Brocken: the heavy ones lag, indeed, a little, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... so long and white, A road all dust, Smooth monotony; And the night at the end, A hill to be climbed, Slowly, laboriously, While the stars prick ...
— Precipitations • Evelyn Scott
... something foreign to his mission, never wholly faded from his purview, or ceased to enlist his active interest. He wrote again in 1539 against usury, much as he had written at an earlier period, remarking to his friends that his book would prick the consciences of petty usurers, but that the big swindlers would only laugh at him in their sleeves. And in publishing his Schmalkaldic Articles he briefly refers again in his preface to the 'countless matters of importance' which a genuine Christian Council would have to mend in the ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... 's all right," the man laughed. "That little prick frightened him though. Shut up ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... that war, And bid my good knights prick and ride; The gled shall watch as fierce a fight As e'er was fought ...
— Verses 1889-1896 • Rudyard Kipling
... him. "To be sure, a careless blacksmith could prick you. But Farmer Green always takes us to the ...
— The Tale of Pony Twinkleheels • Arthur Scott Bailey
... they by the end of the day, With dancing, and jumping, and leaps by the sea? For wintry weather They won't hold together, Seal-skins and bear-skins all dropping round Off from our shoulders down to the ground. The thorns, the tiresome thorns, will prick, But none of them ever consented to stick! Oh, won't the men let us this new thing use? If we mend their clothes they can't refuse. Ah, to sew up a seam for them to see— What a treat, ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... and nursery. Still, the thorns did their duty to some extent when Brian Green of the red head leaped across the big dry ditch, rudely crushing a great clump of primroses and forcing them down the slope, for when the freckled-faced lad thrust his hand in to grasp the nest a sharp prick made him withdraw it, while this action brought it in contact with a natural chevaux de frise, scarified the back, and made a long ...
— First in the Field - A Story of New South Wales • George Manville Fenn
... side of his character had been almost unknown to him. He had been quite unaware that he possessed a conscience most painfully sensitive with regard to the interests of others, a conscience that would prick him and poison his peace were he to leave even little things undone in the fulfilment of the trust he had ...
— The Ghost Girl • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... skins, prick them all over with a large darning-needle or fork; throw them into a saucepan of boiling water and boil for one minute. Take out, wipe dry, and lay in a hot frying-pan, in which has been melted a tablespoonful of hot lard or drippings. Turn often. As soon as brown they ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell
... taught in our childhood, and practise it all our lives; which, nevertheless, is but a superstitious relict, according to the judgment of Pliny, and the intent hereof was to prevent witch-craft [to keep the fairies out]; for lest witches should draw or prick their names therein, and veneficiously mischief their persons, they broke the shell, as Dalecampius hath observed." This is what Sir Thomas Browne tells us about eggshells. And Dr. Wren adds, "Least ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... America and Germany on the question of the submarine war are resented. The sharp British replies to American representations on the question of the 'black list' and the 'post-blockade,' and, England's latest pin-prick, the refusal of the request for a free passage for the Austrian Ambassador, condemned even by such a pro-British paper as the Philadelphian Public Ledger as a 'British affront,' have created a very bad impression. 'It is unmistakable,' ...
— My Three Years in America • Johann Heinrich Andreas Hermann Albrecht Graf von Bernstorff
... played. 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. At doublets or queen's game. ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... Kennedy, his will-power overcoming his weakness, "with a poison which is apparently among the most subtle known. A particle of matter so minute as to be hardly distinguishable by the naked eye, on the point of a lancet or needle, a prick of the skin not anything like that wound of Mendoza's, were necessary. But, fortunately, more of the poison was used, making it just that much easier to trace, though for the time the wound, which might itself easily have been fatal, ...
— The Gold of the Gods • Arthur B. Reeve
... the prick, she gave a cry and awoke to a sense of undeserved escape. A little ruby spot of blood was the reward of that great act of desperation; but the pain had braced her like a tonic, and her whole design ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... were good to eat. Also, live things when they were large enough, could give hurt. It was better to eat small live things like ptarmigan chicks, and to let alone large live things like ptarmigan hens. Nevertheless he felt a little prick of ambition, a sneaking desire to have another battle with that ptarmigan hen—only the hawk had carried her away. May be there were other ptarmigan hens. He would go ...
— White Fang • Jack London
... done to it. Upon these transplanted pieces were tattooed 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 arm of his correspondent. ["Foreign Quarterly Review," vol. xii. p. 417.] Who knows but this ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... therefore, impracticable proportions. At no time have I gone a-tilting at windmills. A pen rather than a lance has been my weapon of offence and defence; for with its point I have felt sure that I should one day prick the civic conscience into a compassionate activity, and thus bring into a neglected field earnest men and women who should act as champions for those afflicted thousands least able to fight ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... to her desk, her tears combining with the coal dust to produce an effect truly grotesque. Never before had her beloved, sympathetic teacher spoken to her in such a tone or fashion, and Barbara was heartbroken. Anne herself felt a prick of conscience but it only served to increase her mental irritation, and the second reader class remember that lesson yet, as well as the unmerciful infliction of arithmetic that followed. Just as Anne was snapping the sums out St. Clair Donnell ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... up, will you! Prick him with the point of your lance, Ivanovich. Come, move yourself," added the officer, as McKay slowly yielded to this painful persuasion, "move yourself, or you shall feel this," and the officer cracked the ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... though for awhile no further down than his enormous coon-skin cap, made, it is said, of the biggest raccoon that was ever trapped, treed, or shot in the Paradise. But presently, observing the old horse prick up his ears at some object ahead, Burl sighted the woods from between them, and caught a glimpse of the little figure perched up there on the topmost rail of the fence, square in front. Whereat, snapping short his melody in its ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... are miles away. Always in the back of our minds is the thought of what you expect of us and demand of us, and added to what we demand and expect of ourselves, it sways us level. We don't talk a great deal about you, but now and then some fellow says, 'My wife,' and we all prick up our ears and want to ...
— The Tin Soldier • Temple Bailey
... new life was like walking barefoot on a path of thorns. Until now she had been so sheltered and guarded, kept from the wind blowing too roughly upon her, that every hour brought a sharp pin-prick to her. To have no carriage at her command, no maid to wait upon, her—not even a skilful servant to discharge ordinary household duties well and quickly—to live in a little room where she felt as if she could hardly breathe, to hear every sound through the walls, to have the smell of cooking ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... last man, with a whispered injunction to secrecy. The soldier handed the papers to the captain as soon as he was aboard again. A few minutes later Nick and Ned Johnson were sent for into the cabin. The first question caused each one to prick up his single ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... is the melinite and the shrapnel. To be sure they give us the only pin-prick of interest to be had in Ladysmith. It is something novel to live in this ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens
... coal-black Christian, of sad and resigned demeanor, waiting ruefully to see the roof torn off,—the only roof that had afforded shelter to the perishing outcast. Mr. Frisbie is not one of the "soft kind," but he feels the prick of conscience in ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various
... make a trot of it, but with such a terrible jingle, what with the tire tete, forceps, and squirt, as would have been enough, had Hymen been taking a jaunt that way, to have frightened him out of the country; but when Obadiah accelerated his motion, and from a plain trot assayed to prick his coach-horse into a full gallop—by Heaven! Sir, the ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... coming up to them, the native let go his hold and retired, but returned in a moment, with a spear in one hand and a dagger in the other; and his countrymen had much ado to restrain him from trying his prowess with the soldier. This fray was occasioned by the latter's having given the man a slight prick with his bayonet, in order to make ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... the present. In his case, that which should speak loudest for his recovered loyalty is wanting. Others there are who have that witness. Let Mr. Digges ride abroad, and from his cabin-door some prick-eared cur cried out, 'Renegade!' (Pardon me, the word is not mine.) The Oliverian and schismatic servants spit at him. Is it so with Major Carrington? By G—d, no! These people uncover to him as though he were the arch rebel himself. Speak of his Majesty's Surveyor-General ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... Then Jenny prick'd up a brant breeght broow, She was as breeght as onny clock; As Moggy always used to do, For fear her ...
— Wit and Mirth: or Pills to Purge Melancholy, Vol. 5 of 6 • Various
... Her conscience did prick her a little for the anxiety she was bringing upon her mother (her own sufferings she never forecast); but she could not give up her Christmas-tree without a struggle, and she hoped by a few familiar remedies to ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... long as you possibly can. I neither intend nor wish to leave you in the charge of any person, but leave you to be your own guardian. Truly, there is no duenna, however watchful, who can prevent a woman from doing what she wishes. When therefore your desires shall prick and spur you on, I would beg you, my dear wife, to act with such circumspection in their execution that they may not be publicly known,—for if you do otherwise, you, and I, and all our friends will be ...
— One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories - Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles • Various
... lay on your under crust, and trim the edge. Fill the dish with the ingredients of which the pie is composed, and lay on the lid, in which you must prick some holes, or cut a small slit in the top. Crimp the ...
— Seventy-Five Receipts for Pastry Cakes, and Sweetmeats • Miss Leslie
... This became one main topic of his tirades, and represented, as he said, the 'Alpha and Omega' of English politics. The theory was simple. The whole borough-mongering system depended upon the inflated currency. Prick that bubble and the whole would collapse. It was absolutely impossible, he said, that the nation should return to cash payments and continue to pay interest on the debt. Should such a thing happen, he declared, he would 'give his poor body up to be broiled ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) - James Mill • Leslie Stephen
... Make me a cake as fast as you can: Pat it, and prick it, and mark it with T, And there will be enough ...
— The Little Mother Goose • Anonymous
... came distinctly through the quiet night. The young man felt a distinct pain for the Christ by his side, like the pressing of a thorn into the brow. He seemed to know the prick himself. For these were some of those ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... 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 ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... With prick of spur he urged his horse forward. But quick as thought the Hermit with his staff drew a circle around himself and John and the doe, which still lay panting at his feet, wrapped ...
— John of the Woods • Abbie Farwell Brown
... according to the fashion of the times. He still pursues his ancient avocation. Res acu tetigit. But the point of the needle is not the means by which the rents in the garment of Rome are to be mended,—much less by which her wounds are to be cauterized and healed. The sharp satiric tongue may prick her moral sense into restlessness, but the Roman spirit is not thus to be roused to action. Still Pasquin deserves credit for his efforts; and while other liberty is denied, the Romans may be glad that there is a single voice that cannot ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... they could with difficulty breathe, and a desire to sleep seized all the party. Tom, knowing the danger of giving way to it, urged his companions to keep moving. Once Peter sat down, declaring that he could go no further. Tom and Desmond dragged him up, and told Casey to prick him on with the point of his stick if he attempted to stop again. Poor Billy puffed and panted, and at last declared that "he must have ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... from a lilac bush. Robin learned that if you laid a leaf flat on the seat of a bench you could prick beautiful patterns on the leaf's greenness. Donal had—in his rolled down stocking—a little dirk. He did the decoration with the point of this ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... down. The same tune, sung under the windows, did for 'Viva la republica!' and 'Viva Leopoldo!' The genuine popular feeling is certainly for the Grand Duke ('O, santissima madre di Dio!' said our nurse, clasping her hands, 'how the people do love him!'); only nobody would run the risk of a pin's prick to save the ducal throne. If the Leghornese, who put up Guerazzi on its ruins, had not refused to pay at certain Florentine cafes, we shouldn't have had revolution the second, and all this shooting in the street! Dr. Harding, who was coming to see ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... means of a brazier of charcoal; I had enough of that once; twice raises your gorge, as Mariette says. No, I will go a long way off, out of France. Asie knows the secrets of her country; she will help me to die quietly. A prick—whiff, it is ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... little sealing Wax, so as that the threads stand upwards, and then on a Whetstone first grind off a good part of them, and afterward on a smooth Metal plate, with a little Tripoly, rub them till they come to be very smooth; if one of these be fixt with a little soft Wax against a small needle hole, prick'd through a thin Plate of Brass, Lead, Pewter, or any other Metal, and an Object, plac'd very near, be look'd at through it, it will both magnifie and make some Objects more distinct then any of the great Microscopes. But because these, though exceeding easily made, are yet very troublesome ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... at 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
... while it disjoints and renders painful the meditations of the thinker; just like the executioner's axe when it severs the head from the body. No sound cuts so sharply into the brain as this cursed cracking of whips; one feels the prick of the whip-cord in one's brain, which is affected in the same way as the mimosa pudica is by touch, and which lasts the same length of time. With all respect for the most holy doctrine of utility, I do not see why a ...
— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer
... one known to every scoundrel in Southern Europe. A ring—yes! a ring, which has a tiny hollow needle capable of holding a sufficient quantity of prussic acid to have killed two persons instead of one. The man in the tweed suit shook hands with his fair companion—probably she hardly felt the prick, not sufficiently in any case to make her utter a scream. And, mind you, the scoundrel had every facility, through his friendship with Mr. Errington, of procuring what poison he required, not to mention ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... magnified a hundred times; and it wanted but Bob Roberts' quick sharp halt, form in line two deep, and the firing in of a couple of volleys, to send all to the right-about, a few of the hindmost getting a prick of the bayonet ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... prepared by the king, was chanted in the great congregation, and was a prick to the consciences of the sinners and a public reproof of all the sins mentioned. He that putteth out his money to increase received thus a public reproof in the great ...
— Usury - A Scriptural, Ethical and Economic View • Calvin Elliott
... go out! He would appreciate you all the more if you did leave him alone sometimes," I said, talking to myself as much as to her, for it was four days since I had been a walk with my father, and my horrid old conscience was beginning to prick. "Do come, Rachel. I want you particularly," but she went on refusing, so then I thought I would try what jealousy would do. "We shall be such a merry party; Vere is prettier and livelier than ever, and her friends are very amusing. Lady ...
— The Heart of Una Sackville • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... a queer little smile on her sensitively cut lips. Once she noticed a hasty twist of the knob as if Bea had snatched at it from the other side under the prick of the comments floating over the transom. As she walked slowly away the smile faded before a shadowing recollection. She was wondering if her own manner had truly been so unpardonable on that autumn morning when Robbie had carried her a baked apple with cream on ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... prick with their knives those who press them. The contagion of fear changes the direction of the human wave; it bends back upon itself and breaks to escape danger. If, then, the enemy fled before the phalanx there was no melee. If he gave way ...
— Battle Studies • Colonel Charles-Jean-Jacques-Joseph Ardant du Picq
... not especially sweet to my palate now, but those with which I used to prick my fingers when gathering them in New Hampshire woods are exquisite as ever to my taste, when I think of eating them in Spain. I never ride horseback now at home; but in Spain, when I think of it, I bound over all the fences in the country, barebacked upon ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... gave her a sharp prick. Could it be her doing that trouble was coming upon the old house? What a punishment for ...
— The Cuckoo Clock • Mrs. Molesworth
... has the murderous Moor, who slays his guest with felon blow, Save sorrow he can slay no more, what prick of penitence ...
— The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi • Richard F. Burton
... letting myself down each day to less and less honest actions, so that I lied on each day without blushing, cheated poor people out of their rent, struggled with the meanest thoughts of making away with other men's blankets—all without remorse or prick of conscience. ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... very soon understood how the sharp, sparkling, audacious Fanny Newt had become the inert, indifferent woman before her. A clever villain might have developed her, through admiration and sympathy, into villainy; but a dull, heavy brute merely crushed her. There is a spur in the prick of a rapier; only stupidity follows ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... undertook the task, and bidding the king lie down, he pretended to fish in his pocket, having another fish concealed ready in his hand, and giving him a sly prick with a needle, he held up the fish, and ...
— More English Fairy Tales • Various
... about an Inch and a half of dry Powder for the Bounce, but if you are to place the fore-mention'd things on the Head of a great Rocket, you must close down the Paper or Paste-board very hard, and prick two or three holes with a Bodkin, that it may give fire to them when it Expires, placing a large Cartoush or Paste-board on the head of the Rocket, into which you must put the Stars or small Rockets, Paper-Serpents, ...
— The School of Recreation (1696 edition) • Robert Howlett
... she could only learn that a packman had come into the village and brought the report that the King had been defeated, and had fled from the field. They knew no more, and Walter pronouncing it to be all a cock-and-bull story of some rascally prick-eared pedlar, declared he would go down to the village and enquire into ...
— The Pigeon Pie • Charlotte M. Yonge
... talking of my household affairs before him; but when Aunt Lina discoursed so eloquently and learnedly in his presence, slipping in once in a while such high-sounding words as "domestic economy," "well-ordered household," "proper distribution of time and labor," &c., &c., he began to prick up his ears, and fancy his thrifty little daughter Enna was not quite so excellent in her management as he had blindly dreamed. Poor man! his former ignorance had surely been bliss, for his unfortunate knowledge ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... splendid was that eloquence of yours, when you harangued the people stark naked! What could be more foul than this? more shameful than this? more deserving of every sort of punishment? Are you waiting for me to prick you more? This that I am saying must tear you and bring blood enough if you have any feeling at all. I am afraid that I may be detracting from the glory of some most eminent men. Still my indignation shall find a voice. What can be more scandalous than for that man to live ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero
... and 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 betraying ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... she employed in addressing what she feared were only his mortal remains caused him to prick up his ears. He certainly was one of the meanest ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... 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 ...
— Police Operation • H. Beam Piper
... keenest powers to 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 wing ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... pastor John would often on her leer, just as a cur, when store of bones are near, That would good pickings for his teeth afford, Attentively behold the precious hoard, And seem uneasy; move his feet and tail; Now prick his ears; then fear he can't prevail, The eyes still fixed upon the bite in sight, Which twenty times to these affords delight, Ere to his longing jaws the boon arrives, However anxiously the ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... but the very deil has turned as hard-hearted now as the Lord Keeper and the grit folk, that hae breasts like whinstane. They prick us and they pine us, and they pit us on the pinnywinkles for witches; and, if I say my prayers backwards ten times ower, Satan will never gie me amends ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... Ruth sang low a brooding song, such as she remembered her mother singing long ago. Now and then she stopped to look at Leonard, who was labouring away with vehement energy at digging over a small plot of ground, where he meant to prick out some celery plants that had been given to him. Ruth's heart warmed at the earnest, spirited way in which he thrust his large spade deep down into the brown soil, his ruddy face glowing, his curly hair wet with the ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... on the mind, through sight, by the same means as those that will excite physical sensations. A single prick of a pin is nothing, but a hundred such will be intolerably painful. Repetition produces pleasurable sensations, as well as painful ones." An insignificant form can become interesting by repetition, and by the suggestion which, singly, it could not originate. For example, ...
— Needlework As Art • Marian Alford
... founded upon a proficient practice of that sort of reckoning. The practical politician, as every connoisseur of ochlocracy knows, is not a man who seeks to inoculate the innumerable caravan of voters with new ideas; he is a man who seeks to search out and prick into energy the basic ideas that are already in them, and to turn the resultant effervescence of emotion to his own uses. And so with the religious teacher, the social and economic reformer, and ...
— The American Credo - A Contribution Toward the Interpretation of the National Mind • George Jean Nathan
... not so weak but I can strike, and I've a good old gun, To get the range of traitors' hearts, and prick them one by one. Your Minie rifles and such arms, it ain't worth while to try; I couldn't get the hang o' them, but I'll ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... prick your ears up at the word. Well, I have found a legend among the people here about the original acquisition of Strasburg by the French. You know Louis XIV. bagged the city quite unwarrantably in 1681, in ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... of him," said Kitty. Tears slowly welled up into her eyes; her heart began to ache; she tried to prick her finger again to ...
— Red Rose and Tiger Lily - or, In a Wider World • L. T. Meade
... the twist bit (Fig. 197) it is a good plan to prick the board at the point of intersection of the marked lines with a sharp, circular-pointed marking awl. This obviates any tendency of the boring bit to run out of truth and thus cause unevenness on the face side of the jointed ...
— Woodwork Joints - How they are Set Out, How Made and Where Used. • William Fairham
... consequently, an undersized student is usually chosen for this considerate office. The heads and faces of the duellists are swathed in bandages—no small incentive to perspiration, the vital parts of their bodies are well protected against a fatal prick or blow, and the pricks or slashes must be delivered with the hand and wrist raised head-high above the shoulder. It is considered disgraceful to move the head, to shrink in the smallest degree before the adversary, or even to show feeling when the medical student who ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... And learns to fiddle most melodiously, And sings, 'twould make your ears prick up, to hear him Gent. Shortly she'l make him spin: and 'tis thought He will prove an admirable maker of Bonelace, And what a rare gift will that be ...
— The False One • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... I saw Charles prick up his ears, though he took no open notice. This Maria Vanrenen, as it happened, was a remote collateral ancestress of the Vandrifts, before they emigrated to the Cape in 1780; and the existence of the ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen
... quickly. The thorn-trees cover Her grave with spines. I pray That each in its fall will prick her and shove her To colder clay. But ... yonder! ... she's up! and moans in the heather A whimpering thing! I'll bury her deeper in Autumn weather ... Or Winter ... ...
— Nirvana Days • Cale Young Rice
... am essentially anti-theatrical at heart. For the stage, this mob art par excellence, my soul has that deepest scorn felt by every artist to-day. With a stage success a man sinks to such an extent in my esteem as to drop out of sight; failure in this quarter makes me prick my ears, makes me begin to pay attention. But this was not so with Wagner, next to the Wagner who created the most unique music that has ever existed there was the Wagner who was essentially a man of the stage, an actor, the most enthusiastic mimomaniac ...
— The Case Of Wagner, Nietzsche Contra Wagner, and Selected Aphorisms. • Friedrich Nietzsche.
... themselves. The Frankfurter Zeitung is no doubt distinguished for the reasonableness of its outlook, but I think that anyone reading the better German newspapers must (in the days when they were available) have felt a little prick of wounded pride when he compared them with our own. The Koelnische Zeitung is, for instance, like all belligerent newspapers, ridiculously biased; but in the earlier days, when I was able to see it, I did not find gross misrepresentation or absurd hate. ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... while I shall get quite old and pin-cushiony," she assured herself, "and pricks won't prick; and nothing will matter. I must be quite affable, and quite indifferent, and always polite—for women are only rude to men they care about." Her lips trembled. "It's all happened before, hundreds of ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, July 1908. • Various
... made him prick up his ears. He quickly closed the door, blew out his candle and hid behind a stack of empty wine-cases. After a few seconds, he noticed that one of the iron bins was turning slowly on a pivot, carrying with it the ...
— The Blonde Lady - Being a Record of the Duel of Wits between Arsne Lupin and the English Detective • Maurice Leblanc
... had time to squeeze out a single tear a sound broke the stillness, making her prick up her ears. It was only the soft twitter of a bird, but it seemed to be a peculiarly gifted bird, for while she listened the soft twitter changed to a lively whistle, then a trill, a coo, a chirp, and ended in a musical mixture of all ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... ponies were far from being as tuckered out as they appeared, despite their sunken flanks and distended nostrils. As the cool night drew on, and they approached more nearly to the upraised form of the mesa, the little animals even began to prick their ears and whinny softly. The pack animals, too, seemed ...
— The Border Boys Across the Frontier • Fremont B. Deering
... retainers look as fine— That's comfort. Lord, how Richard holds himself With his white staff! Will not a knave behind Prick him upright? ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... life with all its "lyings and its lusts." But it is a healthy book. So fearful is its portrayal of social disease, so ruthless its stripping of the painted charms from vice, that its tendency cannot but be strongly for good. It is a goad, to prick sleeping human consciences awake and drive them into the battle ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... told his office boy to prick his patient with a pin, and when Pat opened his mouth to yell the dentist seized the ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... prognosticated by the pricking up of asses' ears? A. Because the ass is of a melancholic constitution, and the approach of rain produceth that effect on such a constitution. In the time of rain all beasts prick up their ears, but the ass before ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous
... perhaps it isn't right ter mind 'em, after all; Perhaps we ought ter thank the Lord our souls ain't quite so small; And they, with all their sneakin' ways, must be, I rather guess, The thorns that prick your fingers 'round the roses of success: Fer, when yer come ter think of it, they never bark until A feller's really started and a good ways up the hill; So, 'f I was climbin' up ter fame I wouldn't care a ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... rear of the army most of the stragglers threw down their arms as a heavy and useless burden. The officers of the armed police had orders to return by force those who abandoned their corps, and often they were obliged to prick them with their swords to make them advance. The intensity of their sufferings had hardened the heart of the soldier, which is naturally kind and sympathizing, to such an extent that the most unfortunate intentionally caused commotions in order that they might seize from some ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... the same time I set about composing an air in the old Scotch style.—I am not musical scholar enough to prick down my tune properly, so it can never see the light, and perhaps 'tis no great matter; but the following were the verses I composed to ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... forc'd to speak, or burst. And is not mine, my friend, a sorer case, When ev'ry coxcomb perks them in my face? A. Good friend, forbear! you deal in dang'rous things. 75 I'd never name Queens, Ministers, or Kings; Keep close to Ears, and those let asses prick; 'Tis nothing—P. Nothing? if they bite and kick? Out with it, DUNCIAD! let the secret pass, That secret to each fool, that he's an Ass: 80 The truth once told (and wherefore should we lie?) The Queen of Midas slept, ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... it," returned 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 ...
— Little Prudy's Sister Susy • Sophie May
... hail! Little for you the gathered Kings avail. Little you reck, as meekly past you go, Of that solemnity of formal woe. In the strange silence, lo, you prick your ear For one loved voice, and that you shall not hear. So when the monarchs with their bright array Of gold and steel and stars have passed away, When, to their wonted use restored again, All things ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann
... will not find Pleasure-seeking pays in the long run! If you are feeling that Pleasure with a big "P" is your due, then all the little annoyances prick and irritate. If you pay heavily for a new dress which hangs badly, it is trying; if you never expected a new dress at all, and that same dress was unexpectedly given you, the drawback would be looked ...
— Stray Thoughts for Girls • Lucy H. M. Soulsby
... to me is true; but I see so many thorns on every side that it will go very hard but some of them will prick me full sore. You know well enough that my cousins, the princes of the blood, and ever so many other lords, such as D'Epernon, Longueville, Biron, d'O, and Vitry, are urging me to turn Catholic, or else they will join the League. On the other hand, I know for certain that Messieurs de ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... he said, "you have seen that before. It does not hurt a pin-prick. But what does it show? The capacity for pain is not needed in the muscle, and it is not placed there,—is but little needed in the skin, and only here and there over the thigh is a spot capable of feeling pain. ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells
... distress. I think there will be a great deal of talking and complaining, a great many half-measures suggested, but no opposition, and that the Duke will do nothing, and get through the session without much difficulty. There was to have been a Council on Thursday to prick the sheriffs, but it was put off on account of my gout, and I was not able to attend at the dinner at the Chancellor's on Wednesday for the same reason. I remember once before a Council was put off because I was at Egham for the ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... ease with which Mr. Rivers conversed in both Spanish and French. Of the latter I was not wholly ignorant myself,—although in my quiet country life I had had little opportunity of putting my knowledge to the test, seldom attempting to do more than "prick in some flowers" of foreign speech upon the fabric of my mother tongue; so it was with great timidity that I essayed at first to thread the mazes of ...
— Margaret Tudor - A Romance of Old St. Augustine • Annie T. Colcock
... horse to answer questions. This is done by pricking him with a pin; for instance, you may say to the horse, is your name Tom? and at that moment prick him with a pin so that he will squeal; then ask him is your name Sam? don't prick him and he will not squeal. Then say again is your name Tom, prick him again, and he will squeal; so continue, and after a time he will squeal without being ...
— Young's Demonstrative Translation of Scientific Secrets • Daniel Young
... things, or daub with her color-box, while people brought me oranges and waited upon me, did very well. I was not a gentle, timid, feminine sort of a child, as I have said before—one who would faint at the prick of a pin, or weep showers of tears for a slight headache; I was a complete little hoyden, full of life and spirits, to whom the idea of being in bed in the day-time was extremely disagreeable—and when I had been "awful," ...
— A Grandmother's Recollections • Ella Rodman
... a dog of quality, of distinct characteristics, cobby in appearance, not long in the back, nor high on the leg; the muzzle must not be weak and thin, nor short and blunt; and, finally, he is not a prick-eared, black wire-haired terrier. ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... flints; 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
... the Viceroy. "Now prick forward to the city, all. We'll refresh ourselves in view of the arduous work before us and then ...
— Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer - A Romance of the Spanish Main • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... kind, is the very knightliest memorial an English gentleman could have. A plain slab of brass, on which has been elaborately engraved the figure of a soldier in full chain mail, with his six-foot lance and its fringed pennon, his long prick-spurs, and his great two-handed sword, it has lain in an English church for nearly six centuries and a-half. The Lombardic lettering which runs round the brass is half illegible, but the form of the old inscription, perfect in its simple dignity, is ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... fashion. 120 Whose sundry cullers of one kinde First from one Root derived, Them in their seuerall sutes Ile binde, My Garland so contriued; A course of Cowslips then I'll stick, And here and there though sparely The pleasant Primrose downe Ile prick Like Pearles, which will show rarely: Then with these Marygolds Ile make My Garland somewhat swelling, 130 These Honysuckles then Ile take, Whose sweets shall helpe their smelling: The Lilly and the Flower delice, For colour much contenting, ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton
... Indian conjurers, who are both surgeons, divines, and sorcerers; and who told me he would cure me by sucking the place where I felt my pain. He made several scarifications upon the part with a sharp flint, each of them about as large as the prick of a lancet, and in such a form, that he could suck them all at once, which gave me extreme pain for the space of half an hour. The next day I found myself a little better, and walked about into my field, where they advised ...
— History of Louisisana • Le Page Du Pratz
... masculine. The education of girls at this time admitted of scarcely any accomplishment but music: they were taught to read, write, sew, and cook, to play the virginals, lute, and cithern, and to read prick-song at sight,—namely, to sing from the score, without accompaniment. Those who were acquainted with any language beside their own were the few and highly-cultured; and a girl who knew French or Italian was still more certain to ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... of a prick. This was not the way to steady the march of twenty thousand. All the sand has left some clay and more chance than enough is that and the season has any number ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein
... recourse to the frequent application of dilute spirit, or lemon juice, or a lotion formed by adding acetic, hydrochloric, nitric, or sulphuric acid, or liquor of potassa, to water, until it is just strong enough to slightly prick the tongue. One part of good Jamaica rum to two parts of lemon juice or weak vinegar is a good form of lotion for the purpose. The effect of all these lotions is increased by the addition of a ...
— The Ladies Book of Useful Information - Compiled from many sources • Anonymous
... 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 and ruin me." ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... prolonged until their patrons were in good-humor. But just at this moment it was impossible for Johnny to be of any service. He had tried to alter the position of some of the pins in his trousers, so that they would not prick him so badly, and the consequence was that the entire work was undone, while one leg fell down over his foot in a manner that prevented him from stepping, unless at the risk of tumbling flat on his face. Ben did his ...
— Left Behind - or, Ten Days a Newsboy • James Otis
... divide either the upper or lower petal, or both, into two lobes, and so present a six-lobed outline. The entire plants, but chiefly the leaves, are nearly always fragrant, and always innocent. None of them sting, none prick, and none poison. ...
— Proserpina, Volume 2 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... Master was indeed too strong for her, but Miss would not yield in the least point; but even when Master had got her down, she would scratch and bite like a tiger; when he gave her a cuff on the ear, she would prick him with her knitting-needle. John brought a great chain one day to tie her to the bedpost, for which affront Miss aimed a penknife at his heart. In short, these quarrels grew up to rooted aversions; they gave one another nicknames, though the ...
— The History of John Bull • John Arbuthnot
... Hazeldean, all his wrath reawakened, whether by the reference to the donkey species, or his inability to reply to the Parson, or perhaps by some sudden prick too sharp for humanity—especially humanity in nankeens—to endure without kicking; "Ugh, you beast!" he exclaimed, shaking his cane at the donkey, who, at the interposition of the Parson, had respectfully recoiled ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... might be fallen on to keep up their value or purchase them in. I fear the split betwixt Constable and Cadell will render impossible what might otherwise be hopeful enough. It is the Italian race-horses, I think, which, instead of riders, have spurs tied to their sides, so as to prick them into a constant gallop. Cadell tells me their gross profit was sometimes L10,000 a year, but much swallowed up with expenses, and his partner's draughts, which came to L4000 yearly. What there is to show for this, ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... perjurous Prince Who has done wickednesse at which even heaven Shakes when the Sunne beholds it; O yet I'de rather Ten thousand poyson'd ponyards stab'd my brest Then one should touch his: bloudy slave! I'le play My selfe the Hangman and will Butcher thee If thou but prick'st his finger. ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... thought it advisable to await the arrival of the captain. Beds and blankets were not supplied that evening: the boats were hoisted up, sentries on the gangways supplied with ball-cartridges to prevent desertion, and permission granted to the impressed men to "prick for the softest plank," which they could find for ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... uniformly kind to them and faithful with their food, but there was lacking that sense of cordial sympathy which should exist between hog and man if both would appear at their best. Even when Anderson came to their pens reeking with the rich savor of the food they loved, their ears would prick up (as much as a Chester White's ears can), and with a "woof!" they would shoot out the door, only to return in a moment with the greatest confidence. I never heard that "woof" and saw the stampede without ...
— The Fat of the Land - The Story of an American Farm • John Williams Streeter
... in her tone to make Lanyard mentally prick forward his ears. He sketched a point ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... heels About in jigs an' vow'r-han' reels; While aell the stiff-lagg'd wolder vo'k, A-zitten roun', do talk an' joke An' smile to zee their own wold rigs. A-show'd by our wild geaemes an' jigs. Vor ever since the vwold church speer Vu'st prick'd the clouds, vrom year to year, When grass in meaed did reach woone's knees, An' blooth did kern in apple-trees, Zome merry day 'v' a-broke to sheen Above the dance at Woodcom' green, An' all o' they that now do lie ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes
... disuse, I drew my sword and lay about me lustily, striving to get between the villains and my young master (which is no credit to me, as I was so wrought with rage that I verily believe I would have no more felt the thrust of a rapier than Marian's housewife the prick of a needle). But there was no method in aught, neither could anything be seen; for the moon had withdrawn behind the clouds, and we seemed to be fighting underneath clear water, so pale and ghastly was the light shed about us from the pale clouds. ...
— A Brother To Dragons and Other Old-time Tales • Amelie Rives
... 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 ...
— Essentials of Diseases of the Skin • Henry Weightman Stelwagon
... laughed and said: "Poor old Louis! What about him? What about his suffering? He thinks he is making such a fine bargain, but the Lord pity him, when he has my little sister in his side for a thorn. He had better employ some energetic soul to prick him with needles and bodkins, for I think there is more power for disturbance in this little body than in any other equal amount of space in all the universe. You will furnish him all the trouble ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... to cry for a prick," said Cecilia wearily. "People who are nearly seven really don't cry except ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... 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; ...
— One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered • E.J. Wickson
... in the general cataract. Nevertheless I 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 on his unfailing supply ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... would not be there. I was a blind fool not to have seen it. I examined his arm just before we came in here,—the discolourment has nearly passed away. In an hour there'll be only a little spot about the size of a pin-prick. Do you feel free to tell me anything of your suspicions? Remember, they can only be suspicions. There can be no possible proof of anything, and even although you may have drawn conclusions, which to you are unanswerable, ...
— "The Pomp of Yesterday" • Joseph Hocking |
