"Stray" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... dry-sow rye late this fall. I want some leguminous plant to seed with the rye for a wind-break crop, not to plow under. The land varies from heavy loam to blow-sand. I have under consideration sweet clover, burr clover, vetches. I see occasional stray plants of sweet clover (the white-blossomed) growing in the alfalfa on both hard and sandy soil. I read in an Eastern bee journal that sweet clover can be sowed on hard uncultivated land with success. ...
— One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered • E.J. Wickson
... edifice imaginable, situated at the end of the Rue Nationale. Seeing a number of persons entering the church at that early hour, and recognising among them my friend the President of the Oberlin (Ohio) Institute, and wishing not to stray too far from my hotel before breakfast, I followed the crowd and entered the building. The church itself consisted of a vast nave, interrupted by four pews on each side, fronted with lofty fluted Corinthian columns standing on pedestals, supporting colossal arches, ...
— Three Years in Europe - Places I Have Seen and People I Have Met • William Wells Brown
... however, to bringing out money, is the liability there is of losing, or being robbed of it." Live stock is much wanted: "dogs would be very valuable if trained to bring home the cattle, which often stray into the woods; with careless settlers, indeed, one half of the day is often spent in hunting up, and driving home the oxen." The water of the St. Lawrence is, it appears, more deleterious than our Thames: "when you arrive in the St. Lawrence, having been ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XX. No. 557., Saturday, July 14, 1832 • Various
... the remains of dairies burnt down, stockyards in ruins, untrodden roads. We hoped to find within the territory of the native, ponds of clear water, unsoiled by cattle, and a surface on which we might track our own stray animals, without their being confused by the traces ...
— Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia • Thomas Mitchell
... Kellogg's goodness in his mood, simply determination no longer to be a charge upon it. To contemplate the sum total of the benefits he had received at Kellogg's hands, since the day when the latter had found him ill and half-starved, friendless as a stray pup, on the bench in Washington Square, staggered his imagination. He could never repay it, he told himself, save inadequately, little by little—mostly by gratitude and such consideration as he purposed now to exhibit by removing himself and his ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... farther side of the river. Nevertheless, the enthusiastic fellows threw themselves into the game with the same spirit with which, twenty years before, they had faced the danger of a runaway by the tandem of rampant hall chairs. A stray Boer or two would have made an interesting diversion; but, even without the Boers, a night guard in the open possessed its ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... and I tell him to wait a minute and let him cool his heels downstairs for a while, and then when I do send for him to come up he is more glad to see me and manages to amuse himself in hunting for a stray glove or ...
— The Sorrows of a Show Girl • Kenneth McGaffey
... prolonged stare to the portrait of Heyst's father, that severe profile ignoring the vanities of this earth. His eyes gleamed sideways at the heavy silver candlesticks—signs of opulence. He prowled as a stray cat entering a strange place might have done, for if Ricardo had not Wang's miraculous gift of materializing and vanishing, rather than coming and going, he could be nearly as noiseless in his less elusive movements. He noted the back door standing just ajar; and an the ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... live-oak, yet there were numberless things in it that, to the last, remained wrapped in obscurity, or concerning which I could only lose myself in vague speculations. I was as a Roman Jew of the Middle Ages, confined to the Jews' quarter of the town, and forbidden to stray beyond my limits. Or I was as a modern traveller in the same famous city, forced to quit it at last without gaining ingress to the most mysterious haunts—the innermost shrine of the Pope, and the dungeons and cells ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... like many of his fellow-workmen, Stephenson had not yet learnt to read. All that he could do was to get some one to read for him by his engine fire, out of any book or stray newspaper which found its way into the neighbourhood. Buonaparte was then overrunning Italy, and astounding Europe by his brilliant succession of victories; and there was no more eager auditor of his exploits, ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... music still in this trampled reed of the river, into which the gods had once bidden the stray winds and the wandering waters breathe their melody; but there, in the press, the buyers and sellers only saw in it a frail thing of the sand and the stream, only made to be woven for barter, or bind together the sheaves of the roses ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... wealth, which his your bounty only makes. 80 Thus vulgar dishes are by cooks disguised, More for their dressing than their substance prized. Your curious notes so search into that age, When all was fable but the sacred page, That, since in that dark night we needs must stray, We are at least misled in pleasant way. But what we most admire, your verse no less The prophet than the poet doth confess. Ere our weak eyes discern'd the doubtful streak Of light, you saw great Charles his morning break. 90 So skilful seamen ken the land from far, Which shows like mists ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... pretty well the state of his finances, he began to search his pockets to see if he could not somewhere find a stray dime, or, better still, a quarter, with which to purchase the meal of which he stood so much in need. But his search was unproductive, or, rather, it only resulted in the ...
— The Young Musician - or, Fighting His Way • Horatio Alger
... excellent editor; appreciative, discriminating, and alert. He prided himself on Carlyle's approval, though perhaps Carlyle was not the best judge of such things. His energy was multifarious. Besides his History and his magazine, he found time for a stray lecture at odd times, and he could always reckon upon a good audience. His discourse at the Royal Institution in February, 1864, on "The Science of History," for which he was "called an atheist," is in the main a criticism of Buckle, the ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... under this unpromising exterior, possessed the kindliest heart in Christendom. Her dress, if of rigid severity, was of saintly purity, and almost pained the eye with its precision and neatness. So fond are we of some freedom from over-much care as from over-much righteousness, that a stray tress, a loose ribbon, a little rent even, will relieve the eye and hold it with a subtile charm. Under the snow white hair of Dame Rochelle—for she it was, the worthy old housekeeper and ancient governess of the House of Philibert—you saw a kind, intelligent ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... boots, and put on their hats neatly; to make Milly and Kitty wear their gloves, and prevent Robin and Wilfred from filling their pockets with nut shells, stones, frogs, or other unsuitable articles which were apt to stray out in class and call down the vials of the mistress's wrath upon their heads. She saw that they learnt their home lessons, did their sums, practised their due portions upon the piano: and it took up so much ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... dewy lair Crossing the stream, the kine are seen Round the wall to stray— The churchyard wall that clips the square Of open hill-sward fresh and green Where last year they lay. But all things now are order'd fair Round the ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... addition of a rotunda leading from the main room. If ever rectangular windows were more exquisitely and nobly proportioned I should like to see them. The library is free for students, and the attendants are very good in calling stray visitors' attention to illuminated missals, old MSS., early books and so forth. One of Galileo's fingers, stolen from his body, used to be kept here, in a glass case, and may be here still; but I did not see it. I saw, however, the portraits, in an old ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas
... was not light as he went over in his mind each moment of their hours together. Poor little 'Tana! poor little stray! ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... is this Miss Olcott's?" asked a trembling voice on the piazza. A shabby woman stood looking at them with wild eyes; her gray hair had escaped from the torn shawl that was pinned over her head, and stray locks blew across ...
— Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch • Alice Caldwell Hegan
... been the very first time in her life that she had ever walked alone, and if words cannot describe the joy and triumph of it how was it likely that she should have been able to resist the temptation to stray aside up a lovely little lane that lured her on and on from one bend to another till it left her at last high up, breathless and dazzled, on the edge of the heath, with Exmoor rolling far away in purple waves to the sunset and all the splendour ...
— The Princess Priscilla's Fortnight • Elizabeth von Arnim
... that betokened they were not far from the spot where some ship, less lucky than themselves, had been overwhelmed by the treacherous waters of the ill-fated bay; and the news that a waif was now in sight, supporting a stray survivor, affected all hearts on board, and ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... not appear generally to inhabit the N.W. interior. The present was a very large specimen, with a beautifully soft skin, and as it was the only one noticed during a residence of nearly six months at the same place, it was in all probability a stray animal. ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt
... content merely to stray from Suma's side only to return at her summons or when the odds were against him. Self-reliance came to him bit by bit. He learned that mastery in the wilderness depended largely upon a game of bluff—especially ...
— The Black Phantom • Leo Edward Miller
... didn't you?"—he made a sign of miserable assent—"but I made them promise not to tell! There was an old mistress of novices there still who used to be very fond of me. She got one of the houses of the Sacre Coeur to take me in—at Poitiers. They thought they were gathering a stray sheep back into the fold, you understand, as I was brought up a Catholic—of sorts. And I didn't mind!" The familiar intonation, soft, complacent, humorous, rose like a ghost between them. "I used to like ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Stray guests visited our circle too; a Jew, called Lyamshin, and a Captain Kartusov came. An old gentleman of inquiring mind used to come at one time, but he died. Liputin brought an exiled Polish priest called Slontsevsky, ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... that Mrs. Burke knew, except to give up the child, and she was not unselfish enough for this. The thought of sending him away was always attended with pain. It would take the light out of her poor lonely life, into which he had brought a few stray sunbeams. ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... dog's flesh, putrid and unsaleable, flung to us by the mocking butchers; minari, a water-cress gathered from stagnant pools of slime; spoiled kimchi that would revolt the stomachs of peasants and that could be smelled a mile. Ay—I have stolen bones from curs, gleaned the public road for stray grains of rice, robbed ponies of their steaming bean-soup on ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... all but little Benjamin. Benjamin was still too young to be interested in the game of "dressing up." So he toddled about the deserted table, picking stray crumbs from the plates and turning over the empty glasses in the hope of finding a few drops of ...
— The New Land - Stories of Jews Who Had a Part in the Making of Our Country • Elma Ehrlich Levinger
... strings thy fingers are straying, O'er my heart stray the tones; And it wanders obeying, Far away from the zones; Up tending, Round thee bending, Round thy heart to be growing And clinging, Round thee flinging, Its glad mirth overflowing— Oh! thou Spirit from me springing, Life on me bestowing! Dazzled, ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... And Mycalessia's ample piny plain; Those who in Peteon or Ilesion dwell, Or Harma where Apollo's prophet fell; Heleon and Hyle, which the springs o'erflow; And Medeon lofty, and Ocalea low; Or in the meads of Haliartus stray, Or Thespia sacred to the god of day: Onchestus, Neptune's celebrated groves; Copae, and Thisbe, famed for silver doves; For flocks Erythrae, Glissa for the vine; Platea green, and Nysa the divine; And they whom Thebe's well-built walls inclose, ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... whose untutored mind Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind; His soul proud Science never taught to stray Far as the solar walk, or milky-way; Yet simple Nature to his hope was given Behind the cloud-topt hill an humbler heaven; Some safer world in depth of woods embraced, Some happier island in the watery waste, Where slaves once more ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... by changing the subject, for they had entered an octagonal chamber on the first floor, presumably full of pictures and curiosities; but the shutters were closed, and only stray beams of light gleamed in to ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... about, drawing away just a hair's-breadth from the detaining hand, and surveying her steadily, the boyish expression in her eyes changing to an amused calculation such as one would fancy a cowboy held up on his native plains by a stray lamb ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... how rude soe'er the hand That ventures o'er thy magic maze to stray; 20 O wake once more! though scarce my skill command Some feeble echoing of thine earlier lay; Though harsh and faint, and soon to die away, And all unworthy of thy nobler strain, Yet if one heart throb higher at its sway, 25 The wizard note has not been touched in vain. Then ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... highest prosperity, than it doth at this crisis—I ask nothing of thee, but the assurance that my lenity to thee hath been the means of perverting no soul to Satan, that I have not given to the wolf any of the stray lambs whom the Great Shepherd of souls had ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... settle that point before night. My wits are working, but I like to trust to chance for a stray idea or so; we must walk fast, or we shall be ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... humble circumstances as the son of a carpenter and his wife, Joseph and Mary. Of Joseph we hear nothing after the boyhood of Jesus, who followed the same trade, supporting himself and perhaps his mother and younger brothers and sisters. Of this period we have only a few fragmentary anecdotes and a stray reference or two. At thirty years of age he appeared in public, and after a short period (we cannot determine how long, but possibly eighteen months) he was crucified, upon the accusation of his countrymen, by the Roman authorities. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... sight of a stray cat at the other end of the garden. In the character of a cannibal chief he hunted the white man (otherwise the cat) with blood-curdling war-whoops, but felt no real interest in the chase. He bound up his scratches mechanically with an ink-stained handkerchief. Then he ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... old he leads a miserable life. Unable to master the larger game, he prowls about the villages in the hope of picking up a stray goat. A woman of child venturing out at night does not then come amiss. When the natives hear of one prowling about the villages, they say, "His teeth are worn; he will soon kill men," and thereupon turn out to kill him. This is the only foundation for the common belief that when the lion has once ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... mercy. Fearing lest some of these monsters learn of the presence of her boys, Yolkai Estsan kept them hidden away on the mountain side, but they chafed under confinement, so she made them bows and arrows and let them play about, but admonished them not to stray far from home. The boys promised to obey, but not long afterward, because in reply to their questions their mother told them she did not know who their father was, they became sulky and broke their promise, going off toward the east. They would go and search ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... such an errand, felt to the full the weird quality of mountains and forest, over which darkness and silence brooded. The foliage was very heavy, and it rustled now and then as the stray winds wandered along the slopes of the Blue Ridge. But for that and the hoofbeats of their own horses, there was no sound save once, when they heard a scuttling on the bark of a tree. They saw nothing, but Billy pronounced it a wildcat, ...
— The Scouts of Stonewall • Joseph A. Altsheler
... my desire, The bitter paths wherein I stray— Thou knowest Who hath made the Fire, Thou knowest Who ...
— Songs from Books • Rudyard Kipling
... some having to clamber over the heaps of duffle that took up so much room aboard, the scouts saw that it was no false alarm. A number of men were hurrying toward them, splashing through water that was in places almost knee deep, even when they took the upper levels. Should they make a blunder, and stray off the ridges, it was likely they would speedily have to ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren
... her arms in the water and, taking them out again, amused herself by watching the bright drops race down to her rosy fingertips. The sport was good, apparently, for she laughed and flung back her head so that the stray locks of hair might not spoil her sight of it. On either side of this lowest step there was a margin of smooth level grass, and, being unable as she sat to bathe both arms at once, presently she moved on to the grass and lay down, sinking her elbows in the pond ...
— Comedies of Courtship • Anthony Hope
... are you ladies going to do with yourselves?" he said. "Will you come out and sit under the trees and look on—taking the chance of being hit by a stray nut ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... flock had come back under charge of Piers, and was answered that all were safely at home, and after 'telling the tale' Hob had set out to find him. 'Thou shouldst not stray so far,' ...
— The Herd Boy and His Hermit • Charlotte M. Yonge
... is no longer a deracine. Deeply rooted to the soil of Jewish reality, he is like the best of the academic youth of other nations responsive to the needs of his own people. If in spots he is still groping in the dark, he is no longer a lone, stray wanderer, but is seeking his way out to light in the company of kindred souls. A comprehensive and exhaustive study of native Jewish student bodies in countries like England, Germany, Austria, France ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... call yourself my 'Father Confessor,' you know, if you entertain any scruples as to the propriety of a staid old bachelor's fathering a stray young cub like me—that will make it all right, surely! You will let me, won't you? In all the world there is no one so close to me as you, and such dreams as I may happily bring to fulfillment will be, more than you know, because of your guidance, your inspiration. ...
— One Day - A sequel to 'Three Weeks' • Anonymous
... was the shock and confusion of the two parties meeting, with stray shots, the clatter of sword against sword, with sparks flying in the darkness, and the shouts and cheers ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... jumped, ran up the rampart, and then down again into the fosse. He liked the trench best, and ran along it in the hollow, picking up stray flints and throwing them as far as he could. The trench wound round the hill, and presently when he saw a low hawthorn-bush just outside the broad green ditch, and scrambled up to it, the waggon was gone and the plain, for he had reached the other side of the camp. There the ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies
... Burton. Mr. Payne printed 500 copies for private circulation, a mere drop in the ocean. His edition was instantly absorbed, clutched with avidity, and is unprocurable—unless, as has happened several times, a stray copy finds its way into the market, and is snatched up at a fancy price. It so happened that Mr. Payne and Captain Burton applied themselves to the same task quite unconscious of each other's labour. They were running on the same ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... now presented one unvaried scene of devastation and misery. Instead of being aided by the inhabitants, whom we had ruined, for the sake of delivering them from the yoke of the beys, we found all against us: Mamelukes, Arabs, and fellahs. No Frenchman was secure of his life who happened to stray half a mile from any inhabited place, or the corps to which he belonged. The hostility which prevailed against us and the discontent of the army were clearly developed in the numerous letters which were written to France at ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... criminals. They condemned him to four years of solitude and silence. For four years not a classmate spoke to Cadet Flipper; for three years he did not hear his own voice, except in the recitation-room, on leave of absence, or in chance conversation with a stray visitor. Then another negro entered West Point, and he had one companion. The prison walls of a Sing Sing cell are more sympathetic than human prejudice. And in all that class of '77 there were not to be found a dozen men brave enough ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... these rats, that squeak so wild, Squeak not unconscious of their father's guilt. Did he not see her gleaming thro' the glade! Belike 'twas she, the maiden all forlorn. What the she milk no cow with crumpled horn, Yet, aye she haunts the dale where erst she stray'd: And aye, beside her stalks her amorous knight Still on his thighs their wonted brogues are worn, And thro' those brogues, still tatter'd and betorn, His hindward charms gleam an unearthly white. Ah! thus thro' broken clouds at night's high noon Peeps to ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... were glistening. I closed my own eyes in order to avoid his look. At the next moment I felt his hand stray down my body and in a fury of indignation I broke out of his arms and leapt to ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... the troop. Occasionally a stray horse in the fields whinneyed, and was answered from the road; sometimes the howl of a dog broke the monotony. On and on they rode; hour and mile were left behind them. The moon fell lower and lower, and the mountains rose higher and higher, and the wind which had risen had a frosty ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... would be quite as vague as his narratives. As for his own earlier history, he never gave any clear account of it, probably having none to give, and the neighbours' speculations upon this point were somewhat wide of the mark, which was not surprising, as what stray hints he did let fall could be very deviously construed. The opinion most commonly received held that he had "took and run off from home, and he but a gossoon, be raison of doin' some quare bit of mischief, and had a mind yet to be keepin' out of his people's way; ...
— Strangers at Lisconnel • Barlow Jane
... much as a matter of course that they also receive scant mention in the annals of the fort. It is from the General Regulations for the Army that one gets the daily program of a military post; and the few fragmentary pages of Taliaferro's diary and letters, together with the stray remarks of travellers and pioneers, indicate the joys and sorrows of a ...
— Old Fort Snelling - 1819-1858 • Marcus L. Hansen
... complete, and I may perhaps become a superior woman, as I have always desired to do; but I need much study and close application to bring me to that point; above all, must I chain my wandering fancies, and not suffer them to stray about so vaguely as I have ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... fluttering breath for the sound of Fletcher's footsteps along the road. On that day it had seemed to him that the hand of the Lord was in his own Godlike vengeance nerving his little wrist. He had meant to shoot—for that he had saved every stray penny from his sales of hogs and cider, of watermelons and chinkapins; for that he had bought the gun and rammed the powder home. Even when the thud of footsteps beat down the sunny road strewn with brown honeyshucks, he had felt neither fear nor ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... and incidents were supplied by Madam Camilla Urso herself at such stray moments of leisure as could be found during a busy concert season at Boston, in the months of January and February, 1874; and the work was done at such spare moments as the writer could find in the midst of journalistic cares. Such events as could be noted ...
— Camilla: A Tale of a Violin - Being the Artist Life of Camilla Urso • Charles Barnard
... or Russia. There we shall meet whole communities, large enough to form cities elsewhere, which are little more than aggregations of paupers. Shall we find in any of these homes a daily or a weekly paper, or a monthly magazine, or even a stray book? Not one, except perhaps in the house of a priest. These masses of people live on the earth, to be sure, but they do not live in the world. No currents of the great, splendid life of the twentieth century ever reach them; and they live in equal isolation from the ...
— The Booklover and His Books • Harry Lyman Koopman
... thickets, avoiding the warm forest. The dark brown coati (Nasua montana, Tsch.) howls, and digs at the roots of trees in search of food; the shy opossum crawls fearfully under the foliage; the lazy armadillo creeps into his hole; but the ounce and the lion seldom stray hither to contest with the black bear (Ursus frugilegus, Tsch.) the possession of his territory. The little hairy tapir (Tapirus villosus, Wagn.) ventures only at twilight out of his close ambush to forage in the ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... the corners of old narrow streets, an unsavoury acquaintance with the regions of trampery, and an uncomfortable perambulation along corn-torturing causeways and clumsily paved roads. Pigeon flyers, dog fanciers, gossipping vagrants, crying children, old iron, stray hens, women with a passion for sitting on door steps, men looking at nothing with their hands in their pockets, ancient rags pushed into broken windows, and the mirage of perhaps one policeman on duty constitute ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... and stood gazing over the autumn-tinted country. A stray bird twitted among the trees, but the great silence was settling down every hour as the feathered immigrants mounted from copse and dell into the blue vault ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... heavens, doth endless worlds contain; Each day's a world where good or ill holds sway: For through life's spacious vistas as we stray Hour after hour we sow with varying grain. Sown even to the wayside, down the plane Of Time thus passes every flying day— Never, till Time's brief seasons fade away Into Eternity, to rise again. But 'neath the ripening ...
— Welsh Lyrics of the Nineteenth Century • Edmund O. Jones
... In vain it is for me to describe the tints of it. It seemed as though the Divine Artist had taken the beautiful colors from his palette and mixed them for this especial head. There was a touch of sunshine in it also, and it seems but yesterday that I saw the old gardener take a stray one from the sleeve of his baize jacket, where by chance it had strayed and caught—for the fair owner liked to visit the greenhouse— and hold it admiringly and enthusiastically up in the morning sunlight, and I remember the golden shimmer it had in it, for he called my attention to it. A French ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman
... young June even London sky and air were wonderful. Stray breaths of fragrance came and went. The green of the trees in the Gardens was light and fresh and in the bedded-out curves and stars and circles there were more flowers every hour, so that it seemed as if blooming things with scents grew thick ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... the very strength of the stream, until the diminished pace again demands their labour; but if any timbers are severed from the parent bed by the leap, as is frequently the case, the sternmost gang leisurely dart their pile-headed poles of an almost unwieldy length into the stray logs, and thus drawing them quickly back again, secure them in their places preparatory to the next fall ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... grass and flowers, borne there by the winds, which leave no track. There is no animal life even in this secluded spot save the birds, and they too leave no track. By and by there comes a hard winter, or a dearth of food, and a pair of stray squirrels emigrate from their home in the valley below; and the history of our hill and its woods begins. Mere chance decides the choice of the particular oak-tree in which the squirrels make their home. From ...
— Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) - Wonders of Earth, Sea and Sky • Various
... will permit me to eat my Christmas dinner with you and the family. I am a waif and stray, alone in the world. I am almost a stranger here. The few acquaintances I have made are dining out and I am at the hotel with Mr. Barclay, whom you know and, ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... struggled up and was knocked back again, perceived that a number of black-badged men were all about him firing at the rebels below, leaping from seat to seat, crouching among the seats to reload. Instinctively he crouched amidst the seats, as stray shots ripped the pneumatic cushions and cut bright slashes on their soft metal frames. Instinctively he marked the direction of the gangways, the most plausible way of escape for him so soon as the ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... Burgomaster, certainly, you are right," said the soldier, in a still more affable and conciliating voice. "It is not for a poor devil like me to contradict you. But supposing my horse was let loose out of pure malice, in order that he might stray into the menagerie—you will then acknowledge that it was not my fault. That is, you will acknowledge it if you think fit," hastily added the soldier "I have no right to ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... stray crop on the roofs, the harvest of which will fall to the neighboring sparrows, has carried my thoughts to the rich crops which are now falling beneath the sickle; it has recalled to me the beautiful walks I took as a child ...
— An "Attic" Philosopher, Complete • Emile Souvestre
... he not lost much wealth by wreck of sea? Buried some dear friend? Hath not else his eye Stray'd his affection in unlawful love? A sin prevailing much in youthful men Who give their eyes the liberty of gazing. Which of these sorrows is ...
— The Comedy of Errors • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... from the forest; taking long strides over the grass, and sowing it with little white pearls, breathing on the bare branches of the trees, and sheathing them in glittering mail, pouncing slyly on stray wayfarers, and pinching their ears and noses till they roared again! Then Captain Jack laughed; it sounded like the sharp crack of a pistol through the ...
— Funny Big Socks - Being the Fifth Book of the Series • Sarah L. Barrow
... each other by this remembrance how, just before they had consumed the last of the water in their recent home and buried the last of their neighbors and friends, the reflecting Mirror had brought a view of a few stray wisps of vapor above the Great Sahara which once had been reclaimed by man, where teeming millions in by-gone ages had ...
— Omega, the Man • Lowell Howard Morrow
... seen, queer little creatures with the nature of a fish and the ambition of a bird. Dolphins sometimes played round the ship for hours together, and a few hideous man-eating sharks kept in our wake day after day, as if they hoped for a stray victim to tumble from the decks and appease their cannibal appetites. The sea-gulls, already mentioned, with tireless pinions followed the ship thousands of miles to pick up the refuse from the cook's galley,—the mystery being how they could sustain such continuous ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... food and primitive habits, to the peasantry as represented in Burns's Cotter's Saturday Night or Scott's Heart of Midlothian, when the poor man was part of a social, political, and ecclesiastical order, disciplined, trained, and self-respecting, not a loose waif and stray in a chaotic welter of separate atoms. These were the facts which really suggested his theory of the 'excrescent' population, produced by the over-speculation of capitalists. The paupers of Glasgow ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) - James Mill • Leslie Stephen
... must, He punishes; but when He can, He complies. Faith is the condition of our receiving His highest gifts; but even unbelief touches His heart with pity, and what He can give to it, He does, if it may be melted into trust. The farther men stray from Him, the more tender and penetrating His recalling voice. We ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... of a company, which, taking to be theirs, they perish likewise. Concerts of musical instruments are sometimes heard in the air, like noise of drums and armies. {94b} They go therefore close together, hang bells on their beasts' neck, and set marks, if any stray." ...
— Old Roads and New Roads • William Bodham Donne
... about this time next year, anyhow. You an' me'll celebrate the birthday between ourselves with that contrac'. You needn't git oneasy Thanksgivin', or picnic-time, or Easter, or no other time 'twixt this an' nex' Christmas—less'n, of co'se, you stray off ...
— Sonny, A Christmas Guest • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... he passed, looking with a curious eye at the couples sitting side by side in friendly or in loving companionship. He felt so utterly alone, and all these about him were mated. The tones of women sounded soft and sweet in his ear. Stray verses of Canticles began to float through his mind as wisps of vapor drift across the sky before the fog comes in from the sea. He repeated the collect for the day, and through it all he was thinking that it was possible ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... spoons being nearly as large as the bowls), they would sit staring at the copper, with such eager eyes, as if they could have devoured the very bricks of which it was composed; employing themselves, meanwhile, in sucking their fingers most assiduously, with the view of catching up any stray splashes of gruel that might have been cast thereon. Boys have generally excellent appetites. Oliver Twist and his companions suffered the tortures of slow starvation for three months: at last they ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... no more, whither do stray The golden atoms of the day; For, in pure love, heaven did prepare Those powders to enrich your hair. Ask me no more, whither doth haste The nightingale, when May is past; For in your sweet dividing throat She winters, and ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... table d'hote in the Rue des Martyrs, where big Laure Piedefer ran a dinner at three francs a head for little women in difficulties. A nice hole, where all the little women used to kiss Laure on the lips! And as the Countess Sabine, who had overheard a stray word or two, turned toward them, they started back, rubbing shoulders in excited merriment. They had not noticed that Georges Hugon was close by and that he was listening to them, blushing so hotly the while that a rosy flush had spread from his ears to his girlish throat. The infant ...
— Nana, The Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille • Emile Zola
... sun had beamed upon me, and turned the sky to blue. But why so? Why is it, sometimes, that sweet odours seem to be blowing through a courtyard where nothing of the sort can be? They must be born of my foolish fancy, for a man may stray so far into sentiment as to forget his immediate surroundings, and to give way to the superfluity of fond ardour with which his heart is charged. On the other hand, as I walked home from the office at nightfall my feet seemed to lag, and my head to be aching. ...
— Poor Folk • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... also of endeavouring to cut off any stray parties of Boers who might be making their way north from Colesberg and that neighbourhood. Broadwood was in command of us. There was a stray party, sure enough, but it was 7000 strong. It passed across our bows, fifteen miles east of us, and we ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... most exquisite portion of the enjoyment which we may extract from books; but they do not, in my opinion, form the largest portion if we take into account mass as well as quality in our calculation. There is the literature which appeals to the imagination or the fancy, some stray specimens of which Mr. Harrison will permit us to peruse; but is there not also the literature which satisfies the curiosity? Is this vast storehouse of pleasure to be thrown hastily aside because many of the facts which it contains are alleged to be insignificant, because the ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... winter and attracted almost instantly the respectful attention of the citizens. Not because she was a strikingly beautiful woman, for a student of statues might find some faults in her features, but because out of the shy, violet eyes a high, indomitable spirit occasionally gleamed and a stray flash from them, combined with her radiant freshness of complexion and perfect grace of figure and of carriage, would light up the common sordid streets of the common masculine mind and turn them, for the ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various
... teach those who have eyes exactly how it should be grown. There will appear here and there in a garden stray or rogue Parsley plants. No matter how regularly the hoeing and weeding may be done, a stray Parsley plant will occasionally appear alone, perhaps in the midst of Lettuces, or Cauliflowers, or Onions. When these rogues escape destruction they become superb ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons
... on the hill I saw one mounted and four dismounted Boers capture five of our horses which had been allowed to stray in grazing. ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... with a kind of wan and quaint dignity, so that I could not help thinking he must have arrived in that stray ship from the Spanish armada, "neither did ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... rollicking band of stockmen from the outlying ranches celebrating in the open in front of an ancient wooden hotel. One great roisterer from the sheep country who had just instigated a movement toward the bar, swept Curly in like a stray goat with the rest of his flock. The princes of kine and wool hailed him as a new zoological discovery, and uproariously strove to preserve him in the diluted alcohol of their compliments ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... for the restitution of the holy order. You shall subject to it all minds; make the rich, the powerful, the eminent and great, serviceable to it. Into the Orders of the Rosicrucians and Egyptian Masons you shall gather all the stray and isolated sheep into a flock, to await with longing the coming of the shepherd, and prepare a place for him. To the holy Church you shall consecrate the band of brothers, the only blessed Church, which is the lofty abode of the father of our order. To us ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... to Coleridge at Keswick in November 1802, Lamb wrote—"If you find the Miltons in certain parts dirtied and soiled with a crumb of right Gloucester, blacked in the candle (my usual supper), or peradventure, a stray ash of tobacco wafted into the crevices, look to that passage more especially: depend upon it, it contains good matter." To Lamb, a book read best over ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... the drama of the flowing and ebbing tides may be watched with ever increasing wonder and delight The sea is caught by the islands and goes whirling down the channels. It is turned backwards by some stray spit of land and set beating against some other current of the same tide which has taken a different way and reached the same point in strong opposite flow. The little glistening wavelets leap to meet each other, ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... about, and kept up a snarling animadversion upon every topic that drifted through her kinky head. She called the kitchen a rat-hole, stated the Captain must be as mean as the devil to live as long as he did, complained that no one ever paid any attention to her, that she might as well be a stray cat, ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... late, when fate has rendered Spain powerless for adventurous undertakings. If she revives she will have to follow a direction which will certainly not be that of the sword. For this reason I say that these youths stray from the right path when they seek for glory where their ancestors thought ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... come to her, sitting on the terrace in the sunshine, an overwhelming flood of joy, reckless and cruel and triumphant. Now he was hers forever, the restless wanderer—delivered to her bound and helpless, never to stray again. Hers to worship and serve and slave for, his troth to ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... little wooden case into which a peg, joining the ends of the two lower lines of the bridle, is set in such a way that a jerk on the line will free it, causing the log to lie flat so that it can be hauled in. The first 10 or 15 fathoms of line from the log-chip are called "stray line," and the end of this is distinguished by a mark of red bunting. Its purpose is to let the chip get clear of the vessel's wake. The marks on the line (called knots) are pieces of fish line running through the ...
— Lectures in Navigation • Ernest Gallaudet Draper
... his infant did the feeble monarch stray, And the jungle was his palace, darksome ...
— Maha-bharata - The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse • Anonymous
... against the bitter wind rushing down the valley of the Rhone and spreading itself as an invisible fan across the delta, and wandered about the dark alleys of the town, twisting like rabbit-burrows, lighted only here and there with a stray lamp socketed to a stone wall. Now he had left the big-thoughted age of the Romans, and was carried forward to the crafty, treacherous Middle Ages. In such an alley as this, bravos had lurked with daggers ready to thrust between the shoulder-blades of their victims. Now ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... to be in the Little Antelope a she dog, stray or outcast, that had a litter in some forsaken lair, and ranged and foraged for them, slinking savage and afraid, remembering and mistrusting humankind, wistful, lean, and sufficient for ...
— The Land of Little Rain • Mary Austin
... would not cohere readily enough. Marconi also discovered that a larger proportion of silver in the powder and a smaller amount between the plugs increased the sensitiveness of the receiver. Yet he found it well not to have it too sensitive lest it cohere for every stray current and so ...
— Masters of Space - Morse, Thompson, Bell, Marconi, Carty • Walter Kellogg Towers
... old life which they had both so loved? Polly did some serious thinking on the way to the big city, and wore such a sober face as they drew near the end of their journey that Captain Stewart asked, as he tweaked a stray lock ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... of childhood, I have already spoken. Many novelists, perhaps one might even say, most novelists, have no freedom of utterance when they come to speak about children, do not know what to do with a child if it chances to stray into their pages. But how different with Dickens! He is never more thoroughly at home than with the little folk. Perhaps his best speech, and they all are good, is the one uttered at the dinner given on behalf of the Children's Hospital. Certainly ...
— Life of Charles Dickens • Frank Marzials
... intricate lacework of sandbagged trenches stretching from the tip of Cape Helles behind us to the top of Achi Baba. But for the constant booming of the guns and the plague of flies, these first days on Gallipoli were days of peace and happiness under a quiet, blue sky. Our men were hopeful, and a stray memorandum of mine of the 3rd August records that "P.H. Creagh bets Fawcus L1 that the Turks will be driven out of the Peninsula within a month." Our faith was ...
— With Manchesters in the East • Gerald B. Hurst
... household at Shoulthwaite Moss, following his occupations with constancy, and always obsequious in the acknowledgment of his obligations. It was observed that he manifested a peculiar eagerness when through any stray channel intelligence was received in the valley of the sayings and doings in the world outside. Nothing was thought of this until one day the passing pedler brought the startling news that the Lord Protector was dead. The family were at breakfast in the kitchen of the old house ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... talk so loud and fast in the cars," she said, with tender pleasantness, standing her upon the seat and brushing back the stray golden waves from the baby's temples, and the brown ones, so like them, from her own. She turned a look of amused apology to the gentleman, and added, "She gets almost boisterous sometimes," then gave her ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... sent it with the others. You must be satisfied with the original, for you can more easily get it copied for six kreutzers a sheet than I for twenty-four. Is not that dear? Adieu! Possibly you have heard some stray bits of this sonata; for at Cannabich's it is sung three times a day at least, played on the piano and violin, or whistled—only sotto voce, ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... Francisco to conjecture that every time any of the banditti had come forth from their stronghold they were accustomed to strew a little fresh earth over the entire spot, and thus afford an additional precaution against the chance of detection on the part of any one who might chance to stray in that direction. We may also add that the trap-door was provided with a massive bolt which fastened it inside when closed, and that the handle of the bell-wire, which gave the signal to open the trap, was concealed in ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... about them now. They are almost all herring gulls, although occasionally a stray bird of another species may be seen. The dark-gray ones are the young. They grow lighter and more innocent-looking as they grow older, until they are pure white, except the back and the top of the wings, ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... we caught sight of a lion stalking amid the trees; but after looking at us for some time, as if he would like to pounce upon some of the sheep or goats, he walked off, intimidated by the shouts and cries of the Arabs. We took warning, and did not stray from the camp. ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston
... conditions—there had been enough excitement in the air to start with when the hijacker crowd boarded the rum-runner and joined issues with the crews of the two allied boats but when from out of the skies there descended a swooping monster, apparently about to fall upon them as might a stray meteor from unlimited space in the firmament, and that strange, racking pain gripped their eyes, nothing but panic could describe their condition with any degree ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb
... publication with which the onlooker is not familiar. Ardent partisans of the Journal always mention it in reports and speeches at meetings and even in debates. They are usually persons who have been converted to the principle of equal suffrage by a stray copy of the Journal sent to them ...
— The Torch Bearer - A Look Forward and Back at the Woman's Journal, the Organ of the - Woman's Movement • Agnes E. Ryan
... regeneration, and justification by faith, but were careful to add to these Calvinistic dogmas admonitions to such practical Christianity as was taught by Arminian preachers. The Separatists feared lest the doctrine of works would cause men to stray too far from the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and they were often very intemperate in their denunciation of such "false teachers." It was a day of freer speech than now, and at least two of the great leaders in the ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.
... he heard that she had died. "The general," writes his aide-de-camp, "wept freely when I brought him the sad news." Yet in the administration of discipline Jackson was far sterner than General Lee, or indeed than any other of the generals in Virginia. "Once on the march, fearing lest his men might stray from the ranks and commit acts of pillage, he had issued an order that the soldiers should not enter private dwellings. Disregarding the order, a soldier entered a house, and even used insulting language to the women of the family. This was reported to Jackson, who had the man arrested, ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... At times there could be seen, in the little clearings, animals darting along. There were numbers of monkeys, an occasional herd of buffaloes were observed, sometimes a solitary stray elephant was noted, and as for birds, there were thousands of them. It was like living over a circus, ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton
... from my story, and that I must not do, for I have many things to tell, so many that it will not be well for me to stray away from ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... said, adjusting a stray lock of hair which had escaped from her radiant crop, "I am not clever enough for that. It is a dream. Your great-uncle Ralph had ridden too long and too far in the sun, and imagined the treasure, which has driven your Uncle Malcolm crazy, and his housekeeper dumb, ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt
... the most comfortable hotels in Germany are the smaller ones supported entirely by Germans. A stray Englishman, finding one of these starred in Baedeker and put in the second class, may try it from motives of economy, but in many of them he would only meet merchants on their travels and the unmarried men of the neighbourhood who dine there. In such ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... floats now in the creek— Flags at her mast, and garlands at her beak; High on the yard-arm hoisted is the sail, Half spread it flutters in the evening gale. The night before he goes, young Harrald stray'd Into the wood where first he saw his maid: Burning impatience fever'd all his blood, He wish'd for wings to bear ...
— Romantic Ballads - translated from the Danish; and Miscellaneous Pieces • George Borrow
... Five Towns Mr. Bennett loses something of the power of his touch. He is an interesting example of a writer with a definite "milieu" out of whose happy security he is always ill-advised to stray. ...
— One Hundred Best Books • John Cowper Powys
... his work is known." A piece of honey-comb, one day, Discovered as a waif and stray, The Hornets treated as their own. Their title did the Bees dispute, And brought before a Wasp the suit. The judge was puzzled to decide, For nothing could be testified Save that around this honey-comb There had been seen, as if at home, Some longish, brownish, ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... must 'ave seen A fearful swag of scrappin'." And Tom agrees "Where men are keen That's pretty sure to 'appen. One night a little bloke from Hay Who plugged a Pentridge warder Got such a doin' that at day, Amazed, they ticked him for a stray Distinguished Service Order. ...
— 'Hello, Soldier!' - Khaki Verse • Edward Dyson
... stray grains of snuff from the front of his faded cassock—once black, but now of a greeny brown. He was a singularly tall man, gaunt and grey, with deep lines drawn downwards from eye to chin. His mouth was large and tender, with a humorous corner ever awaiting a jest. His eyes were sombre ...
— In Kedar's Tents • Henry Seton Merriman
... on earth this only day, In fifty years we're given to stray, We'll keep it as a holiday! So brothers, ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke
... —story-telling. Neither Mr. Oakhurst nor his female companions caring to relate their personal experiences, this plan would have failed too, but for the Innocent. Some months before he had chanced upon a stray copy of Mr. Pope's ingenious translation of the Iliad. He now proposed to narrate the principal incidents of that poem—having thoroughly mastered the argument and fairly forgotten the words—in the current vernacular of Sandy Bar. And so for the rest of that ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... this dishonor against all the land-spirits of this land, that they may all stray bewildered and none of them find his home until they have driven King Erik and Queen Gunhild out ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 9 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. Scandinavian. • Charles Morris
... apparently in a desperate situation. Famine and consequent sickness were in his camp. His army was daily dwindling away. He was emphatically in an enemy's country. Not a soldier could stray from the ranks without danger of assassination. He had taken Madrid, ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... herself critically in the glass. Her maid Fanchon—a little French waif picked up in the slums of Soho—helped to readjust a stray curl which ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... this alone Had 'scaped oblivion—like the one Stray fragment of a wreck which thrown With the lost vessel's name ashore Tells who they were that live no more. When thus the heart is in a vein Of tender thought, the simplest strain Can touch it with peculiar power— As when the air ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... they thus beguile the way, Untill the blustring storme is overblowne; When weening to returne, whence they did stray, They cannot finde that path, which first was showne, 85 But wander too and fro in wayes unknowne, Furthest from end then, when they neerest weene, That makes them doubt their wits be not their owne: So many pathes, so many turnings seene, ...
— Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Book I • Edmund Spenser
... touching the snow with the point of the short iron-shod stick I held in my hand, the toboggan span round the curve with the delicious clean cut of a skate. It seemed only a moment, and already I was approaching the critical part of my journey. The stray oil-lights of the village street began to waver irregularly here and there beneath me. I saw the black gap in the houses through which I must go. I listened for the creaking runners of the great Valtelline wine-sledges which constituted the main danger. All was silent ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... dozen natives who had preached sedition. And, being lucky enough to secure convictions in every case, he was promoted. The last I heard of him he was fighting in the very heart of German East in command of a whole brigade. So it is advantageous sometimes to do favors for stray noblemen, provided you are clever enough, and man enough to make good when the favors ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... several times a day to dine; the nut-hatch came, and even the snow-bird took a taste occasionally; but this sap-sucker never touched it; the sweet of the tree sufficed for him. This woodpecker does not breed or abound in my vicinity; only stray specimens are now and then to be met with in the colder months. As spring approached, the one I refer ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs
... to coax the gentleman into adopting me, I devoted myself entirely to him for the evening, and ignored the rest of the party, as serenely as a cat knows how. Again and again did he put me down with firm, but not ungentle hands, saying—"Go down, Toots," and pick stray hairs in a fidgety manner off his dress-trousers; and again and again did I return to his shoulder (where he couldn't see the hairs) and purr in his ear, and rub my long ...
— Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... woman's face—they wanted spirit and firmness to fit them for the face of a man. His hands had the same wandering habit as his eyes; they were constantly changing from one position to another, constantly twisting and turning any little stray thing they could pick up. He was undeniably handsome, graceful, well-bred—but no close observer could look at him without suspecting that the stout old family stock had begun to wear out in the later generations, and that Mr. Francis ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... essentially a modest man, and he did not risk the supposition that Miss Garland had contrasted him with Roderick to his own advantage; but he had a certain consciousness of duty resolutely done which allowed itself to fancy, at moments, that it might be not illogically rewarded by the bestowal of such stray grains of enthusiasm as had crumbled away from her estimate of his companion. If some day she had declared, in a sudden burst of passion, that she was outwearied and sickened, and that she gave up her recreant lover, Rowland's expectation would have gone half-way to meet her. And ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... MASHA). So here you are—you cursed little stray sheep. No disrespect to you, sir. (To MASHA.) You black-hearted, ungrateful little snake. How dare you treat us like this, how ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al |
