"Span" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Geologic Cycles. But these vast cycles of geographic and climatic change will take millions of years to accomplish their course. The brief span of human life, or even the few centuries of recorded civilization are far too short to show any perceptible change in climate due to this cause. The utmost stretch of a man's life will cover perhaps one-two hundred thousandth part ...
— Dinosaurs - With Special Reference to the American Museum Collections • William Diller Matthew
... get up, thou leaden man! Thy track, to endless joy or pain, Yields but the model of a span: Yet burns out thy life's lamp in vain! One minute bounds thy bane or bliss; Then watch and ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various
... the incline were similar, except that those below 16 ft. in height were of single-deck construction. The spacing of the bents varied from 9 ft. 6 in. to 12 ft., except the three outer bays, which had a span of 23 ft., all to agree with the position of the pile bents. The double-deck construction extended for the full length of the original pier. A single-deck extension, of full width and 180 ft. in length, was ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 - The Site of the Terminal Station. Paper No. 1157 • George C. Clarke
... happy in the nicknames they employ. None could be more apt than that of Bubbles. Some of them lasted for a week, or a fortnight, and were no more heard of, while others could not even live out that short span of existence. Every evening produced new schemes, and every morning new projects. The highest of the aristocracy were as eager in this hot pursuit of gain as the most plodding jobber in Cornhill. The Prince ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... tidy officers who so love to see a ship kept spick and span clean; who institute vigorous search after the man who chances to drop the crumb of a biscuit on deck, when the ship is rolling in a sea-way; let all such swing their hammocks with the sailors; and they would soon get sick of this daily damping ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... I felt uncomfortable in our smart civilian clothing. We looked too soft, too clean, too spick-and-span. We did not feel that we belonged there. But in a whispered conversation we comforted ourselves with the assurance that if ever America took her rightful stand with the Allies, in six months after the event, ...
— High Adventure - A Narrative of Air Fighting in France • James Norman Hall
... scarcity was unknown. Food for the body and food for the mind were without price. It was owing to this that poverty was unknown to them, as well as disease. The absolute purity of all that they ate preserved an activity of vital power long exceeding our span of life. The length of their year, measured by the two seasons, was the same as ours, but the women who had marked a hundred of them in their lifetime, looked younger and fresher, and were more supple of limb than myself, yet I had barely passed ...
— Mizora: A Prophecy - A MSS. Found Among the Private Papers of the Princess Vera Zarovitch • Mary E. Bradley
... he fell, pierced with many wounds. He appeared to be full grown, and six years old, measuring eleven feet from the nose to the tip of the tail. His fore leg, below the knee, was so thick, that I could not span it with both hands; his head was almost as large as that of an ordinary ox. His flesh, which I had the curiosity to taste, resembled very white, coarse beef, and ...
— Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals • R. Lee
... with men when they are from sixty to eighty years old, begins after twenty to thirty months in a rat. He is then about through. But when an operation is performed on a senile rat he gets from six to eight months' new life. In other words, the addition to his normal span is 20 to 30 per cent. That would be a large fraction of life for a man to live over again. The rat lives it vigorously, ...
— The Goat-gland Transplantation • Sydney B. Flower
... Indian women appeared, there were tracks of women, scores of them, plainly imprinted in the soil of the river-bank. Those slender impressions, scarcely a span in length, smoothly moulded in the mud, were not to be mistaken for the footsteps of an Indian squaw. There was not the wide divergence at the heels with the toes turned inward; neither was there the moccasin-print. No: those tiny tracks must have been ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... disturb me; and it is high time for me to be considering what I am to make of the remainder of my days. Too many of them have been wasted, too great a portion of my span has been sacrificed to vanities. One must not forget one is in a fair way to become a grandfather; it is plainly an urgent duty to reconcile oneself to that estate and cultivate its proper gravity and decorum. Yet a little while and one must ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... even the one-wheeled wheelbarrow has never been seen. The grass grows thick among the broken stones, and men and beasts have made a narrow beaten track along the extreme outside edge of the precipice. The new bridge which was standing in all its spick and span newness when you came last year, is a ruin now, washed away by the spring freshets. A glance tells you that the massive-looking piers were hollow, built of one thickness of stone, shell-fashion, and filled with plain earth. ...
— The Children of the King • F. Marion Crawford
... if from a finite magnitude a continual subtraction be made in the same quantity, it will at last be entirely destroyed, for instance if from any finite length I continue to subtract the length of a span. If, however, the subtraction be made each time in the same proportion, and not in the same quantity, it may go on indefinitely, as, for instance, if a quantity be halved, and one half be diminished ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... the belief of the Hidatsa Indians, as reported by Dr. Matthews, in the "Makadistati, or house of infants." This is described as "a cavern near Knife River, which, they supposed, extended far into the earth, but whose entrance was only a span wide. It was resorted to by the childless husband or the barren wife. There are those among them who imagine that in some way or other their children come from the Makadistati; and marks of contusion on an infant, arising from tight swaddling or other causes, are gravely attributed ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... Barbara, to comfort her, "you mustn't take on now. Zeen has lived his span and has ...
— The Path of Life • Stijn Streuvels
... of a thousand crowns, crammed with all the vulgar magnificence that money can buy, occupied the first floor of a fine old house between a courtyard and a garden. Everything was as spick-and-span as the beetles in an entomological case, for Crevel lived ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... of enormous span run down each side of the nave to the choir, which expands with unrivalled majesty under the magnificent dome. Walk in and behold its beautiful proportions. Do not struggle to perceive by means of the ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black
... walking in the light, now plunged in darkness, at one time treading firmly the ground of the narrow path, and then at times wandering into the quagmires and morasses of sin and lust, passed through the pilgrimage of life, and, at length, when their allotted span was completed, were assigned to the place which awaited them, to the place which was their own and was fitted ...
— The Life of the Waiting Soul - in the Intermediate State • R. E. Sanderson
... of three converging roads to Rome. Three triumphal arches span them where they debouch on a square at the gate of the city. Looking north through the arches one can see the campagna threaded by the three long dusty tracks. On the east and west sides of the square are long stone benches. An old beggar sits on the east side of the square, ...
— Androcles and the Lion • George Bernard Shaw
... and his sufferings, he drew courage from nature itself. While a portion of the Southern army was across it must be a minor portion, and certainly the major part could not span such a flood and attack. The storm and time allied were now fighting ...
— The Sword of Antietam • Joseph A. Altsheler
... bestride without such a structure. You can hire logic, in the shape of a lawyer, to prove anything that you want to prove. You can buy treatises to show that Napoleon never lived, and that no battle of Bunker-hill was ever fought. The great minds are those with a wide span, that couple truths related to, but far removed from, each other. Logicians carry the surveyor's chain over the track of which these are the true explorers. I value a man mainly for his primary relations with truth, as I understand truth,—not for any secondary ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... the squires and gentlemen? Very truly does M. Taine say, "These three syllables, as used across the channel, summarize the history of English society." Democracy may make self-confident retorts to such a statement and fling back the question—"When Adam delved and Eve span, where then was the gentleman?" All the more pity that a gentleman was not present in Eden! The first parents missed him sorely and paid a high price for his absence. Had he been there, not only would the garden have been more tastefully dressed, but they would have learned without ...
— Bushido, the Soul of Japan • Inazo Nitobe
... lashing of the rain and the roaring of the wind did not disturb him in the least. They were disagreeable, but he accepted them as he accepted existence and all its vanities, without remark or mental comment. There is a class of mind of which this is the prevailing attitude. Very early in their span of life, those endowed with such a mind come to the conclusion that the world is too much for them. They cannot understand it, so they abandon the attempt, and, as a consequence, in their own torpid way they are among ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... the ends of the world have been drawn together, and every family has one or more relatives abroad, a grief like Hilary's has become so common that nearly every one can, in degree, understand it. How bitter such partings are, how much they take out of the brief span of mortal life, and, therefore, how far they are justifiable, for any thing short of absolute ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... he spake, for of the countless threads, Drawn from the heap, as white as unsunn'd snow, Or as the lovely lilly of the vale, Was never one beyond the little span Of infancy untainted: few there were But lightly tinged; more of deep crimson hue, Or deeper sable [4] died. Two Genii stood, Still as the web of Being was drawn forth, Sprinkling their powerful drops. From ebon urn, The one unsparing dash'd the bitter wave ...
— Poems, 1799 • Robert Southey
... the toll-bridge to the town proper he passed two brown-shirted militiamen, lounging on the rail of the middle span. They grinned at him, and, recognizing the outsider from his clothes, one of ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... fall, we'll span the creek, not fall into it," murmured Ned, as he looked from the ...
— Tom Swift and his War Tank - or, Doing his Bit for Uncle Sam • Victor Appleton
... sovereignty which criticises intellect, art, talent, fame, virtue, absurdity, and even truth; whoever has occupied that tribune erected by his own hands, fulfilled the functions of that magistracy to which he is self-appointed,—in short, whosoever has been, for however brief a span, that proxy of public opinion, looks upon himself when remanded to private life as an exile, and the moment a chance is offered to him puts out an eager hand ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... the architect was conversant with Roman buildings, though he has Normanized their features, and adopted the lines of the basilica to a barbaric temple. The Coliseum furnished the elevation of the nave;—semi-circular arches surmounted by another tier of equal span, and springing at nearly an equal height from the basis of the supporting pillars. The architraves connecting the lower rows of pillars are distinctly enounced. The arches which rise from them have plain bold mouldings. ...
— Account of a Tour in Normandy, Vol. II. (of 2) • Dawson Turner
... forest. A rank night sweetness of mints and other lush plants mixed its spirit with the body of leaf earth. I felt happy in being a part of all this, and the woods were to me as safe as the bed-chamber of a mother. It was fine to wallow, damming the span of escaping water with my fevered head. Physical relief and delicious ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... strike, Olivier and Rollant, A thousand blows come from the Archbishop's hand, The dozen peers are nothing short of that, With one accord join battle all the Franks. Pagans are slain by hundred, by thousand, Who flies not then, from death has no warrant, Will he or nill, foregoes the allotted span. The Franks have lost the foremost of their band, They'll see no more their fathers nor their clans, Nor Charlemagne, where in the pass he stands. Torment arose, right marvellous, in France, Tempest there ...
— The Song of Roland • Anonymous
... spick-and-span house on the main street, built of brick and wood, with a verandah, and picked out in bright colours, was pointed out to me by this amiable citizen as the residence of a "returned American." This was a man, he said, who had made some money in America, but ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (1 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert
... to get out the double sleigh and span, for he prided himself on his horses, and a fall of snow came most opportunely to beautify the landscape and add a new pleasure ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott
... don't believe you could drag them away from Gretchen with nine span of horses. But if you want to see them, put on your hat and come along; they're out somewhere trapseing along with ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... had now diminished to seventeen. The readers of Voltaire will remember that in The Man with the Forty Ecus his "geometer" gives it as twenty-two or twenty-three years for Paris, and contrives to reduce this brief span to practically two or three years of active, enjoyable life,—ten years off the twenty-three for the period of youthful immaturity, ten more for the decline of old age, sleep, sickness, ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton
... as you always was!" she cried "Indeed I am!" said Mrs. Cliff. "Did you clean this dining-room yourself, Willy? It looks as spick and span as if I had ...
— Mrs. Cliff's Yacht • Frank R. Stockton
... his companion, the old man with the great gray glittering eyes. Peter Bradley, of Rookwood—comitatu Ebor—, where he had exercised the vocation of sexton for the best part of a life already drawn out to the full span ordinarily allotted to mortality, was an odd caricature of humanity. His figure was lean, and almost as lank as a skeleton. His bald head reminded one of a bleached skull, allowing for the overhanging and hoary brows. Deep-seated, ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... the tips of the thumb and middle finger extended and opposed is the shortest linear measure used by the Igorot, although he may measure by eye with more detail and exactness, as when he notes half the above distance. This span measure is called "chang'-an" or "i'-sa chang'-an," "chu'-wa ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks
... is little more than the following of an outline or example in the textbook and substituting values in formulas. The design of an ordinary short-span steel truss bridge, as ordinarily taught, is an example of this method of instruction. Another example is the design of a residence for which no predetermined limiting conditions are laid down and which does not differ materially from those found ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper
... the pilgrimage, We found a sort of natural divan, Whence we could view the landscape, or engage Our eyes in rapture on the heaven's wide span. ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... love them again; and if we do not, why, there will be others to love. One of the worst limitations I feel is the fact that there are so many thousand people on earth whom I could love, if I could but meet them—and I am not going to believe that this wretched span of days is my only chance of meeting them. We need not be in a hurry—and yet we have no ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... will see 'em all down that man's throat." And says she, in still more bitter axents, "You will see four mules, and a span of horses, two buggies, a double sleigh, and three buffalo-robes. He has drinked 'em all up—and 2 horse-rakes, a cultivator, and ...
— Sweet Cicely - Or Josiah Allen as a Politician • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... Buster, looking as clean as whistles, found Button and Tiger who also looked spick and span, and the four entered the clubroom, which was on one of the upper floors and as light as day for the light from four big electric street lamps came streaming in the window, lighting the room from corner to corner and making it as bright ...
— Billy Whiskers' Adventures • Frances Trego Montgomery
... aide-de-camp, simply, as he explained, to return the calls of the officers of the garrison, six or eight of whom had known enough to present themselves and pay their respects in person when he arrived in town. Braxton swelled with gratified pride at the general's praise of the spick-span condition of the parade, the walks, roads, and visible quarters. But it was the very first old-time garrison the new chief had ever seen, a splendid fighting record with the volunteers during the war, and the advantage of taking sides for the Union from a doubtful State, having conspired ...
— Waring's Peril • Charles King
... lies in the span of memory of "Aunt Ferebe" Rogers. The interviewers found her huddled by the fireside, all alone while her grandaughter worked on a WPA Project to make the living for them both. In spite of her years and her frail physique, her memory was usually clear, only occasionally becoming too misty ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... Castello ("castle bridge"), for they seem but parts of one great fortification, turreted and battlemented, built by Can Grande II. in 1355. The bridge is an extraordinary structure, the arches being extremely unequal in size: the span of the largest is about a hundred and sixty feet. The mass, the irregularity, the strength of these piles, the dark river hurrying below, give the spot a grimness not often found on the sunny side ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... offered the obvious answer to the question, 'The Serpent.' But few seem to have noticed what would be the more modern answer to the question, if that innocent agitator went about propounding it. 'Adam never delved and Eve never span, for the simple reason that they never existed. They are fragments of a Chaldeo-Babylonian mythos, and Adam is only a slight variation of Tag-Tug, pronounced Uttu. For the real beginning of humanity we refer you to Darwin's ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... Darwinism does not tell us what they were. The whale also was once a land animal, but the testimony of the rocks throws no light upon its antecedents. The origin of any new species is shrouded in the obscurity of whole geological periods, and the short span of human life, or of the whole human history, gives us no adequate vantage-ground from which ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... the holding when the ardor of conception was over. I swear to you that death alone—and I believe that nothing is further aloof—shall prevent my giving this country to Russia before five years have passed, and within another brief span the trade of China and Japan. It is a glorious destiny for a man—one man!—to pass into history as the Russian of his century who has done most to add to the extent and the wealth and the power of his empire! Does that sound vainglorious, and do you resent it? You must ...
— Rezanov • Gertrude Atherton
... to Eliab, holy man Of God he came: "Ah, give me, friend, The herb of death, that now the span Of my vain life ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... are capable of Cutting and Spreading, with one span of horses and driver, from ten to fifteen acres per day, of any kind of grass, heavy or light, wet or dry, lodged or standing, and do it as well as is done with a scythe by ...
— The Elements of Agriculture - A Book for Young Farmers, with Questions Prepared for the Use of Schools • George E. Waring
... streets, it is hoed again. A week after this, the field is hoed two or three times, and is well pulverized with the mallet. About the 12th of May, after a shower of rain, the field is slightly hoed, and the mould is broken, and smoothed with the hand. Small drills, at a span’s distance from each other, are then made by the finger, which is directed straight by a line. At every span-length in these drills are placed four or five seeds of the rice, called Uya Dhan, which is the only ...
— An Account of The Kingdom of Nepal • Fancis Buchanan Hamilton
... Half the span of a generation has passed since W. E. Henley, after reading two chapters, sent me a verbal message: "Tell Conrad that if the rest is up to the sample it shall certainly come out in the New Review." The most gratifying recollection ...
— The Nigger Of The "Narcissus" - A Tale Of The Forecastle • Joseph Conrad
... process no less melting and fleeting than an act of feeling or of will, and I comprehended the older doctrine of association of 'ideas' to be no longer tenable.... Besides all this, experimental observation yielded much other information about the span of consciousness, the rapidity of certain processes, the exact numerical value of certain psychophysical data, and the like. But I hold all these more special results to be relatively insignificant by-products, ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... down. Just such is Man, who vaunts himself to-day, Decking himself in all his best array; But in the midst of all his bravery Death rounds him in the ear, "Friend, thou must die." Or like a shadow in a sunny day, Which in a moment vanishes away; Or like a smile or spark,—such is the span Of life allowed this microcosm, Man. Cease then vain man to boast; for this is true, Thy brightest glory's as the morning dew, Which disappears when first the rising sun Displays his beams above ...
— The History of Thomas Ellwood Written by Himself • Thomas Ellwood
... dropping in its aerial flight, and lo! presently weedlings and seedlings are wrestling together, and you hesitate to deal roughly with one for fear of injuring the constitution of the other. To go to the other extreme and keep the hardy garden or border as spick and span clean as a row of onions or carrots in the vegetable garden, is to do away with the informality and a certain gracious blending of form and colour that is one of its ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright
... and crowd of children on the avenue! No wonder, for there is a pretty barouche, to which is harnessed a large ostrich, which marches up and down, drawing its load as easily as if it were a span of goats or a Shetland ...
— Harper's Young People, September 28, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... is the Triumphal Arch supposed to have been erected in honour of Tiberius for his victory over Sacrovir and Floras, A.D. 21. It stands E. and W., is of a yellowish sandstone, 75 ft. high, 64 wide, 27 deep, and consists of 3 arches, of which the centre one has a span of 17 ft. and each of the other two a span of 10 ft. The soffits are ornamented with six-sided sculptured panels. By the side of each arch is a grooved Corinthian column. Over the small arches are sculptured trophies in the shape of shields, boars, bulls, rostra, ropes, masts, dolphins, ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black
... deprived her of days and weeks of happiness. Such a short span of joy had been allotted to her, and he had not allowed her to have even that. He had called her away. He dared not trust himself to write any word of sympathy. It seemed to him that to do so would be a hideous ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens
... the Life of Man Less than a span: In his conception wretched, from the womb, So to the tomb; Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years With cares and fears. Who then to frail mortality shall trust, But limns on water, or but writes ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... grandeur,—the broken pillars of the Forum; the lofty columns of Trajan and Marcus Aurelius; the Pantheon, lifting its spacious dome two hundred feet into the air; the mere vestibule of the Baths of Agrippa; the triumphal arches of Titus and Trajan and Constantine; the bridges which span the Tiber; the aqueducts which cross the Campagna; the Cloaca Maxima, which drained the marshes and lakes of the infant city; and, above all, the Colosseum. What glory and shame are associated with that single edifice! ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume III • John Lord
... very diversified, since no two bridges are alike. At one time he might be ordered to span a stream in the midst of a populous country where every aid is at hand, and his next commission might be the building of a difficult bridge in a foreign wilderness far beyond the ...
— Stories of Inventors - The Adventures Of Inventors And Engineers • Russell Doubleday
... professors, on the whole, rank quite so high to-day for originality and vigor of research as did their predecessors forty years ago. Wherein lies the secret, then, of this wonderful change wrought in the brief span of two generations, between 1770 and 1830, and amid the dire confusion of the great Revolution and the Napoleonic era? The change was twofold. It consisted, first, in allowing to the professor ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... dykes, splendid streets and suburbs, were constructed on every side, and still there was not room for the constantly increasing population, large numbers of which habitually dwelt in the shipping. For even of that narrow span of earth called the province of Holland, one-third was then interior water, divided into five considerable lakes, those of Harlem, Schermer, Beemster, Waert, and Purmer. The sea was kept out by ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... wanted—an' I'd come far—t' see my godson. But bein' a bachelor-man I held my tongue for a bit: for, thinks I, they're washin' an' curlin' the child, an' they'll fetch un in when they're ready t' do so, all spick-an'-span an' polished like a door-knob, an' crowin', too, the little rooster! 'Twas a fair sight to see Mary Mull smilin' beyond the tea-pot. 'Twas good t' see what she had provided. Cod's-tongues an' bacon—with new greens ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan
... such are still All floating States built on the people's will: Hearken all you! whom this bewitching lust Of an hour's glory, and a little dust Swells to such dear repentance! you that can Measure whole kingdoms with a thought or span! Would you be as Sejanus? would you have, So you might sway as he did, such a grave? Would you be rich as he? command, dispose, All acts and offices? all friends and foes? Be generals of armies and colleague ...
— Poems of Henry Vaughan, Silurist, Volume II • Henry Vaughan
... to-day, so that we can go there now whenever we can get the house ready. Then we shall have horses and vehicles more at our disposal; you may hear of our carriage and span yet, but I shall hate to leave here. This moon is lovely, and to-night the flats are covered with water by the full moon tide, and the sea looks as if it came ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various
... Jew, "thou beauty of the Gentiles, I gave thee life but for a span, and thou seemest to bring to me ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... a considerable time after the tide had begun to flow, the artificers were occupied in removing the forge from the top of the building, to which the gangway or wooden bridge gave great facility; and, although it stretched or had a span of forty-two feet, its construction was extremely simple, while the roadway was perfectly firm and steady. In returning from this visit to the rock every one was pretty well soused in spray before reaching the tender at two o'clock p.m., where things awaited the landing party in as comfortable a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Eve span," agriculture has been the principal occupation of civilized man. With the advance of chemistry, particularly that branch known as agricultural chemistry, farming has become more of a science, and its successful pursuit demands not only ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... shapeless things all driven In cloud and flame athwart the heaven, By that tremendous blast— Proclaimed the desperate conflict o'er On that too long afflicted shore:[403] Up to the sky like rockets go 1030 All that mingled there below: Many a tall and goodly man, Scorched and shrivelled to a span, When he fell to earth again Like a cinder strewed the plain: Down the ashes shower like rain; Some fell in the gulf, which received the sprinkles With a thousand circling wrinkles; Some fell on the shore, but, far away, Scattered o'er the isthmus ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... ascending like sweet incense to the throne above, and every eye was bathed in tears, a rumbling noise was heard in the distance, like a mighty chariot winding its way near, when all at once a fine span of horses, before a beautiful coach, stood before the door, out of which alighted a noble and elegant-looking man. In a moment's time he entered the room, and embraced the hand of his dear father and mother. She clasped her arms around ...
— History of the Comstock Patent Medicine Business and Dr. Morse's Indian Root Pills • Robert B. Shaw
... of the train rushing upon the broken span, and plunging from sight in the whirling flood below, Alex felt the blood draw back ...
— The Young Railroaders - Tales of Adventure and Ingenuity • Francis Lovell Coombs
... neither avert from him strangerhood, if he could desire a comelier than thou or aught goodlier than these fair qualities of thine! By Allah, he is of little wit and judgment!" presently adding, "But, O King of the Age, punish him not for that he hath done; more by token that an thou love me a span, verily I love thee a cubit. Indeed, I have fallen into the net of thy love and am become of the number of thy slain. The love that was with thee hath transferred itself to me and there is left thereof with thee but a tithe of that which is ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 7 • Richard F. Burton
... 1 foot, so that there will be 8 feet between each column or pilaster, supposing we make them to stand on a square foot. Draw the first archway EKF facing us, and its inner semicircle gh, with also its thickness or depth of 1 foot. Draw the span of the archway EF, then central line PO to point of sight. Proceed to raise as many other arches as required at the given distances. The intersections of the central line with the chords mn, &c., will give the centres from which ...
— The Theory and Practice of Perspective • George Adolphus Storey
... sting, too, when dragged from their graves by some remorseless resurrectionist—some sound, like that piano; some smell, like those lilies of the valley. Measure her case against your own experience, if its span of time is long enough to supply ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... the nearest point to the disputed ground and the best place from which to transmit information, there was a small and select British colony, mostly consisting of retired naval and military officers. A dear friend of mine amongst them was Major Russell, who had spent a lengthened span of years in the East—an admirable type of the calm, firm, courteous Anglo-Indian—who had never soured his temper and spoiled his liver with excessive "pegs," who understood and respected the natives, who had shown administrative ability, and ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea
... man Who used to pilgrim to your gate, At whose smart step you grew elate, And rosed, as maidens can, For a brief span. ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... why? "Because," said Belle, "because, Mr. Ludgate, the furniture of this house is as old as Methusalem's; and my friend, Mrs. Pimlico, said yesterday that it was a shame to be seen: and so to be sure it is, compared with her own, which is spick and span new. Yet why should she pretend to look down upon me in point of furniture, or any thing? Who was she, before she was married? Little Kitty Coxeater, as we always called her at the dancing school; and nobody ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... at that age! The man is surely in his dotage. Pray, in the name of common sense, What fruit can he expect to gather Of all this labour and expense? Why, he must live like Lamech's father! What use for thee, grey-headed man, To load the remnant of thy span With care for days that never can be thine? Thyself to thought of errors past resign. Long-growing hope, and lofty plan, Leave thou to us, to whom such things belong.' 'To you!' replied the old man, hale and strong; 'I dare ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... got a letter a span long after hoping so much for an answer that I lost patience; and I had good cause to do so before receiving yours at last. The German blockhead having said his say, now the Italian one begins. Lei e piu franca nella lingua italiana di quel che mi ho immaginato. Lei mi dica la cagione perche ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... hydrant, and industriously washed, scrubbed, and holystoned the decks and cleaned paintwork for an hour, after which the planks were thoroughly squeegeed and dried. Then all hands went to work to polish brasswork until eight bells, by which time the ship looked as spick and span as if she had been kept under ...
— The First Mate - The Story of a Strange Cruise • Harry Collingwood
... the old Newgate where Penn lay imprisoned is left; a spic-and- span new Newgate, still in process of building, replaces it, but there is enough left for a monument to him who was brave in such a different way from his brave father, and was great far beyond the worldly greatness which the admiral hoped his comely, courtly son would achieve. It was in ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... well fitted out, spick and span in fresh carpets and paint, and crowded to the utmost capacity for comfort. Every stateroom was full; each seat at the tables occupied. Not a foot of space above or below decks was left unused, but provision was made for all, and ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... in the estimation of mankind; but this must not be the highest place. Let them know their just subordination. They deserve not to be the primary concern, for there is another, to which in importance they bear no more proportion than our span of ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... borrowed from the stable, carries with it only sweet and wholesome suggestions. It is "well-groomed." A well-groomed woman is not only a well-gowned woman, but one who, like a favorite mare, is always spick and span in her person, and happy in her quiet consciousness of it. And every woman, whether she possesses a maid or not, indeed, whether she has fine gowns or not, may win the admiration of all her ...
— Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife • Marion Mills Miller
... has heard the song about the star-span-gled banner. Nearly everybody has sung it. It was written ...
— Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans • Edward Eggleston
... and when he emerged from the room in his spick and span outfit, his hat set side-wise on his wet, newly combed hair, he stood up very straight, surveying himself as best he could from head to foot, and exclaimed,—"Gee! I feel just like George Washington." The bath and the new suit were a realization ...
— The New Education - A Review of Progressive Educational Movements of the Day (1915) • Scott Nearing
... wilt thou do? how shalt thou bear The cruel world, the sickening still despair, The mocking, curious faces bent on thee, When thou hast known what love there is in me? O happy only, if thou couldst forget, And live unholpen, lonely, loveless yet, But untormented through the little span That on the earth ye call the life of man. Alas! that thou, too fair a thing to die, Shouldst so be born to double misery! "Farewell! though I, a god, can never know How thou canst lose thy pain, yet time will go Over thine head, and thou mayst mingle ...
— The Earthly Paradise - A Poem • William Morris
... it's worth while to have everything in such spick-and-span order," said Patty to herself, "for the Barlows won't appreciate it, and what's more they'll turn everything inside out and upside down before they've been in the ...
— Patty at Home • Carolyn Wells
... harrowing accompaniments, in which woman's rights and demands were prominent. Then, on the fifth, they rested from their labors in the clean, soap- charged atmosphere—walking gingerly over spick and span carpets, laying each book and paper demurely in place, and gazing, at a proper distance, through diamond-bright windows; and on the sixth the ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... remember that the present is only one domain of God's administration. The whole span of time which is to us so vast, is but a passing epoch to Him. If we would keep this in mind, it would ...
— Love's Final Victory • Horatio
... grass. The success of Benjamin Franklin as an inventor had fired the heart of Paine. He devised a plan to utilize small explosions of gunpowder to run an engine, thus anticipating our gas and gasoline engines by nearly a hundred years. He had also planned a bridge to span the Schuylkill. Capitalists were ready to build the bridge, provided Paine could get French engineers, then the greatest in the world, to endorse his plans. So he sailed away to France, intending also to visit his parents in England, instructing ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... pride that folks no longer eyed him with sly, amused, knowing smiles whenever he opened a newspaper. Perhaps some of their amusement had been the sight of a youngster struggling with a full-spread page, employing arms that did not quite make the span. But most of all he hated the condescending tolerance; their everlasting attitude that everything he did was "cute" like the little girl who decked herself out in mother's clothing from high heels and ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith
... gold possessed a power To lengthen life's too fleeting hour, And purchase from the hand of death A little span, a moment's breath, How I would love the precious ore! And every day should swell my store; That when the fates would send their minion, To waft me off on shadowy pinion, I might some hours of life obtain, And bribe him back to hell again. But since we ne'er can charm away The ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... they do not bear the choicest pecan nuts, make interesting and beautiful lawn trees. Indeed, as an ornamental tree, the pecan is superior to the native hickory in two definite ways: by its exceedingly long life, which may often reach over 150 years as contrasted with the average hickory span of 100 years, and by its greater size. One pecan tree I saw growing in Easton, Maryland, in 1927, for example, was then seventeen feet in circumference at breast-height, one hundred twenty-five feet in height and having a spread of ...
— Growing Nuts in the North • Carl Weschcke
... come sooner," she mourned, "before I was all dressed up so spick and span for your grand speechifying occasion? I always feel as if I ought to be fumigated when I come back from there. More than likely it's just another complaint that old Mrs. Donegan wants to lodge against the universe. ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston
... and floated out to the front line. The pier was drawn quickly into position, and as many men as could work with freedom soon had the flooring spiked down. The actual bridging commenced at eight o'clock; the span was complete at ten minutes after twelve. The extra ten minutes were accounted for by the fact that on one or two occasions passing bodies of other troops necessitated a temporary cessation ...
— A History of The Nations and Empires Involved and a Study - of the Events Culminating in The Great Conflict • Logan Marshall
... best of that of Great Britain or the Continent; and if America does not show a Thames Tunnel, a Conway or Menai Tubular Bridge, or a monster steamer, yet she has a railroad-bridge of eight hundred feet clear span, hung two hundred and fifty feet above one of the wildest rivers in the world,—locomotive engines climbing the Alleghanies at an ascent of five hundred feet per mile,—and twenty-five thousand miles of railroad, employing upwards ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... Hobb, a handloom weaver, browt his slay boards, and as he wur goin' daan th' hill he did mak sum manoevures yo mind, for talk abaat fugal men i' th' army wen thay throw thair guns up into th' air an' catches em agean, thay wur nowt ta Joe, for he span his slay boards up an' daan just like a shuttlecock. But wal this wur goin' on th' storm began to abate, and th' water seemed to get less, but still thay kept at it. Wal at last a chap at thay called Dave Twirler shaated aat at he saw summat, and thay look't way at he pointed, ...
— Th' History o' Haworth Railway - fra' th' beginnin' to th' end, wi' an ackaant o' th' oppnin' serrimony • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... Lamennais, the close friend of Liszt, once said, "Liszt is a great musician, the greatest the world has ever seen, but his wife can easily take a mental octave which he can not quite span." ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... a neatly built little fellow, very spick and span. First America and then England had done their best—or worst—by him. Just as every hair on his head was properly brushed, so Dr. Parkman felt quite sure that every idea within the head was properly beaten down with a pair of ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... the threshold of the temple of love, fearing these shadows which will pass away when thou shalt stand within the great radiance of the goddess. Yea! and fearful art thou of the sand out of which shall spring a tree of many branches, and in the shade of which thou shalt encompass thy life's span. Behold," and the finger drew a line upon the sand, "the grey cloud encloses thee yet once again, and the goddess weeps without! Yet will she rejoice! Before many moons have come and gone, the great god Amen shall tear ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest
... seated on the veranda, looking so spick and span in their white duck yachting caps and trousers, and keeping the waiters running ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... unemployment, sickness, invalidity, and widowhood. The circumstances and conditions are entirely different. The prospect of attaining extreme old age, of living beyond threescore years and ten, which is the allotted span of human life, seems so doubtful and remote to the ordinary man, when in the full strength of manhood, that it has been found in practice almost impossible to secure from any very great number of people the regular sacrifices which are necessary ...
— Liberalism and the Social Problem • Winston Spencer Churchill
... for the conveyance of coals from collieries in the vicinity of Tanfield, which were the property of an association called "the Great Allies." It is a magnificent stone structure, one hundred and thirty feet in the span, springing from abutments nine feet high, to the height of sixty feet: a dial is placed on the top with a suitable inscription. The expense of its construction is stated to have amounted to 12,000l.; the masonry is reputed to be extremely good, and the arch itself is nearly perfect, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 578 - Vol. XX, No. 578. Saturday, December 1, 1832 • Various
... shall fall, The saddening word "farewell" No more a parting hour, but all In perfect union dwell. This world is not the home of man; Death palsies with its gloom, Marks out his life-course but a span, And points him to the tomb; But, thanks to Heaven, 't is but the gate By which we enter bliss; Since such a life our spirits wait, O, cheer thy soul in this,— And let the sorrow that doth press Thy spirit down to-day So minister that ...
— Town and Country, or, Life at Home and Abroad • John S. Adams
... of Shrewsbury, was first employed to prepare a design of the intended structure, which is still preserved. Although Mr. Pritchard proposed to introduce cast-iron in the arch of the bridge, which was to be of 120 feet span, it was only as a sort of key, occupying but a few feet at the crown of the arch. This sparing use of cast iron indicates the timidity of the architect in dealing with the new material—his plan exhibiting a desire to effect a compromise between the tried and the untried in bridge-construction. ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... this present time have fixed our faith firm as a rock upon our righteous cause, and upon the superior power and the inflexible will for victory that abide in the German nation. Nevertheless the deplorable fact remains, that the boundless egotism already mentioned has for that span of the future discernible to us destroyed the collaboration of the two nations which was so full of promise for the intellectual uplift of humanity. But the other party has willed it so. Upon England alone rests the monstrous guilt and the responsibility ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter
... that, certes, I confess; But, natheless, well born and nobly bred; I'm read by both the people and noblesse, Throughout the world: 'That's Clement,' it is said. Men live their span; but I shall ne'er be dead. And thou—thou hast thy meadow, well, and spring, Wood, field, and castle—all that wealth can bring. There's just that difference 'twixt thee and me. But what I am thou couldst not be: the thing Thou ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... when first the world began, Time that was not before creation's hour, Divided it, and gave the sun's high power To rule the one, the moon the other span: Thence fate and changeful chance and fortune's ban Did in one moment down on mortals shower: To me they portioned darkness for a dower; Dark hath my lot been since I was ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... Memory by Practice. All aspects of memory can be improved by practice, some aspects much, other aspects little. The memory span for digits, or letters, or words, or for objects cannot be much improved, but memory for ideas that are related, as the ideas of a story, can be considerably improved. In extensive experiments conducted ...
— The Science of Human Nature - A Psychology for Beginners • William Henry Pyle
... a straight line with those of the next boy, each shoulder-strap set at the same angle as its fellows, each gun was as well polished as its neighbor, and the spick and span appearance the line presented, after its long fatiguing march, spoke volumes in ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 27, May 13, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... these clearings—her parents were old country folks, and she had most grand larning, and was out and out a regular first-rater. Washington and her didn't feel at all small together—they took a liking to each other right away, and a prettier span was never geared. Well, our Jake was born, and the old woman got smart, and about house again. Wash took one of our team horses, and he and Ellen went off to the squire's to get yoked. It was a most beautiful morning when they started, but the weather soon began to change—there had been ...
— Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick • Mrs. F. Beavan
... he sat pondering, thinking first of his children, for whom he had had such high ambitions, then of himself, who would like to live his allotted span, when across the pasture he saw blind Mac coming. It was a hot September afternoon, and he had evidently been to the creek to cool off and to get away from flies. He came steadily along, and though nobody was near his ...
— Frank of Freedom Hill • Samuel A. Derieux
... The good of the vast human whole is now acknowledged as the end of all social union. Humanity embodies love; the object of our activity; the source of what we have; the ruler of the life under whose span we work, ...
— The Jericho Road • W. Bion Adkins
... high navy blue kid boots and small navy blue silk hat. The other occupants of the carriage consisted of a well-to-do old gentleman in mufti, who, I decided, was a commercant de vin, and two French officers, very spick and span, obviously going on leave. La petite dame bien mise, as I christened her, sat in the opposite corner to me, and the following conversation took place. I give it in English to ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp
... fair bridge is builded o'er the gulf Between two cities, some ambitious fool, Hot for distinction, pleads for earliest leave To push his clumsy feet upon the span, That men in after years may single him, Saying: "Behold the fool who first went o'er!" So be it when, as now the promise is, Next summer sees the edifice complete Which some do name a crematorium, Within the vantage of whose greater ...
— Shapes of Clay • Ambrose Bierce
... "Not one word against your father. Because you never could appreciate him, you needn't belittle him now. Not one word," as Jason would have spoken. "He was my husband and I loved him, God knows. O Ethan, Ethan, how shall I finish my span of years alone!" she ...
— Benefits Forgot - A Story of Lincoln and Mother Love • Honore Willsie
... principles of action which will guide us in attaining a state of society more congruent with our knowledge of the possibilities of the world and human nature, more thoroughly inspired by human love, love of man for man as a being living his span of life here and now, under conditions which call for a concentration of skill and effort to realize the best. The breaking of the old Catholic synthesis, narrow but admirable within its limits, took place at what we call the Renascence ...
— Progress and History • Various
... clear, indeed, that we could see the Dover lights almost from Calais harbor. But we had considerably more than a capful of wind, and there was a turgent ground-swell on, which made our boat—double-engined, and as trim and tidy a craft as ever sped across the span from shore to shore—behave rather lively, with sportive indulgence in a brisk game of pitch-and-toss that proved anything but comfortable ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... and straight flaxen hair. He wore spectacles, and a big gold ring on his fat finger. He was twenty-seven. He had on a light grey fashionable loose coat, light summer trousers, and everything about him loose, fashionable and spick and span; his linen was irreproachable, his watch-chain was massive. In manner he was slow and, as it were, nonchalant, and at the same time studiously free and easy; he made efforts to conceal his self-importance, but it was apparent at every instant. All his acquaintances ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... she saw the King's son gazing in at her, she blushed red all over, cast down her eyes and span on. Whether the thread was quite as even as usual I really cannot say, but she went on spinning till the King's son had ridden off. Then she stepped to the window and opened the lattice, saying, 'The room is so hot,' ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various
... place to yourself, even if it's a small one. A shop or a barn has saved many a man's life and reason Cephas, for it's ag'in' a woman's nature to have you underfoot in the house without hectorin' you. Choose a girl same's you would a horse that you want to hitch up into a span; 't ain't every two that'll stan' together without kickin'. When you get the right girl, keep out of her way consid'able an' there'll ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... of the court and he frequently took upon himself the adjudication of petty quarrels and the summary punishment of small offenses committed within his view. He was appointed by the chief for one or more days' service and he made the most of his brief span of authority. In addition to executing the orders of the court he was always on watch to preserve the tranquility of the camp during the day and he stood upon guard at night. When ordered to do a thing it was a point of honor to accomplish it or die in the attempt. He was a peace ...
— Sioux Indian Courts • Doane Robinson
... this rare August afternoon, were at the flag station to meet the "Wanderer"—the banker's private car, with a spick-and-span three-seated buckboard and a fast team of bays. Aboard the car were Alice and Margaret, Blakeman ...
— The Lady of Big Shanty • Frank Berkeley Smith
... if their enlistment had been desired and stimulated by beat of drum and blare of trumpet and "all the pomp and circumstance of glorious war?" But no State can afford to accept military service from its women, for while a nation may live for ages without soldiers, it could exist but for a span without mothers. Since woman's exemption from war is not an un-bought privilege, it is evident that in justice men have no superior rights as citizens on ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... the wine palm was the height of my man! Broader than the temple was the span of his chest! More graceful than antelope was the carriage of him! More slender than saplings was the build ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... given to him in his short life—for he condensed into the span of forty-two years the literary labours of a long life—to materially add by his charming boys' books to the happiness of the youth of his generation. It was given to him also by his labour and ...
— Kilgorman - A Story of Ireland in 1798 • Talbot Baines Reed
... to dress. Most frequently she might be seen in a gown ten years behind the fashions, driving a dashing span of horses along the rough mountain roads in search of some member of the mission school in which she was interested. Most of the miners were Catholics, but here and there among them she found members of her own church ...
— Elizabeth Hobart at Exeter Hall • Jean K. Baird
... sound of reveille every young man sprang from his bed. Then followed hasty but orderly dressing and the making of the toilet. The cadet must be spick and span. ...
— Dick Prescott's First Year at West Point • H. Irving Hancock
... caress, Was the young bronze-orange leaf, That clung to the tree as a tress, Shooting lucid tendrils to wed With the vine-hook tree or pole, Like Arachne launched out on her thread. Then the maiden her dusky stole In the span of the black-starred zone, Gathered up for her footing fleet. As one that had toil of her own She followed the lines of wheat Tripping straight through the fields, green blades, To the groves of olive grey, Downy-grey, golden-tinged: and to glades Where the pear-blossom ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith |
