"Tail" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... past those stately buildings fluttering with handkerchiefs, and through streets black with people thronging to see the man who had solved the riddle of Africa. And then it would be pleasant, too, to make a neat little speech to the Common Council,—letting the brave show catch its own tail in its mouth, by proving, that, if America did not achieve everything, she could appreciate—yes, appreciate was the word—those who did. Yes, this would be a fitting ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... intellectual and spiritual entities wrapped in the garments of isolation, robed with questioning. Her genius is in this sense essentially local, as much the voice of the spirit of New England as it is possible for one to hold. If ever wanderer hitched vehicle to the comet's tail, it was the poetic, sprite woman, no one ever rode the sky and the earth as she did in this radiant and skybright mind ...
— Adventures in the Arts - Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets • Marsden Hartley
... of the paper from most every side," remarked Tyke; "an' I guess we're all agreed that it looks like a bona fide confession. We've seen, too, how it was possible for it to git into the hands of Manuel. Now let's see if we can make head or tail ...
— Doubloons—and the Girl • John Maxwell Forbes
... have missed it for worlds," she said coolly. She looked up into his eyes, a slight frown puckering her brow. "Do you know, Madame Obosky had the impertinence to say that you would have turned tail and fled if ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... sunlight filled the dome and its buildings; and on the tail of the first of these, even as the sable tide swept all vision from him, the Hawk arrived at the door of one wing of the central building. He had not seen Ku Sui, and he had no time for exploration, but he did have a hunch ...
— The Passing of Ku Sui • Anthony Gilmore
... tip of the bow, Pascualet reared his diminutive and motionless manhood, looking more like a walrus than an eight-year-old boy, the figure-head of the boat, as it were. Barefoot, and as dirty as could be, his shirt-tail out on one side and flapping in the wind, his breast exposed to the sea-air and as tanned and red as the bust of a statue of mud, he was the admiration of a crowd of little beach-combers, who had gathered round, hardly a stitch on their bronzed limbs, ...
— Mayflower (Flor de mayo) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... the mare struck out for shore, with Ridge swimming beside her, and the young Spaniard, who was a poor swimmer, clinging desperately to her tail. Fortunately the channel into which they had plunged was so narrow that within two minutes they had reached its farther side in safety, and could once more touch bottom. Wading up-stream to a point where the road left the river, they emerged from the water, ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... front of the frightened pony lay coiled a gigantic rattlesnake, its ugly head and tail raised and its rattles singing ominously. Two more steps and the pony would ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... to watch and see who it was who swept up their sleeping place. The cow pretended to be too ill to rise, and Ledha after watching for some time came out and swept the ground as usual, and then tried to pull the sick cow up by the tail; but she would not move so he went back to his hollow tree. When the buffaloes returned they heard that it was a kindhearted man who cleaned their sleeping place; so they called Ledha out and said ...
— Folklore of the Santal Parganas • Cecil Henry Bompas
... color, he has certain peculiarities that remind one of the Passenger-pigeon. His eye, with its red circle, the shape of his head, and his motions on alighting and taking flight, quickly suggest the resemblance; though in grace and speed, when on the wing, he is far inferior. His tail seems disproportionately long, like that of the Red Thrush, and his flight among the trees is very still, contrasting strongly with the honest clatter of the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... truth, is that grey September day, when, on the tail of a country hay-cart, I rode tremulously at my dear father's side into London; where, with much pomp and taking of oaths, I was bound apprentice, body and soul, to Master Robert Walgrave, the printer, in the presence of the worshipful Master, Wardens, and Assistants of the Company of Stationers, ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... while being raked, now, at the captain's call, ran from them to get the side-arms. At the Court of Inquiry it was in evidence that these men were unarmed; and one of them, a petty officer, stated that he had defended himself with the monkey tail of his gun. Whatever the cause, although there was fighting to prevent the "Chesapeake" from being lashed to the "Shannon", no combined resistance was offered abaft the mainmast. There the marines made a stand, but were ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... were seething with new ideas, destined to bring about the strangest results a few years afterwards; but the old order still prevailed, had not yet yielded to the new. Let us remember how short a time had passed since Haydn retired, after a life spent at a pig-tail German Court in the service of a princeling whose position was about as lofty as that of an English country squire, though it must be admitted that his tastes were a little more elevated. Railways had not defiled the landscapes of Europe, nor gas ...
— Wagner • John F. Runciman
... but he say he didn't wanter lose his religion trying to make slaves work, so he took to preaching. He rode 'bout on his mule and preach at all the plantations. I never 'member seein' granma, but granpa came to see us of'en. He wore a long tail coat and a big beaver hat. In that hat granma had always pack a pile of ginger cakes for us chilrun. They was big an' thick, an' longish, an' we all stood 'round to watch him take off his hat. Every time he came to see us, granma sent us clothes and ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... who smiled, as if in gratitude; but his attention was called away by the Newfoundland dog, who fawned upon him, and after having received his caresses, squatted down upon the sand, which he beat with his tail as he ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... are hourly bred The bold assailants that surround thine head, Poor patient Ball! and with insulting wing Roar in thine ears, and dart the piercing sting: In thy behalf the crest-wav'd boughs avail More than thy short-clipt remnant of a tail, A moving mockery, a useless name, A living proof of cruelty and shame. Shame to the man, whatever fame he bore, Who took from thee what man can ne'er restore, Thy weapon of defence, thy chiefest good, When swarming flies contending ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield
... history that families improve with time. It is rather discovered that the whole matter is like a comet, of which the brightest part, is the head; and the tail, although long and luminous, is gradually ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... well mounted by being cut across from one hind limb to the other, just under the tail, skinned out, preserved, and the skin then filled ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... are a thousand other men in Memphis who feel the same, and still more the women you may be sure—but many a one has shed bitter tears on his account for all that.—But, by all the saints!—Talk of the wolf and you see his tail! Look, there he is!—Halt! Stop a minute, you men; it is worth while, Sir, to tarry ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... was nothing worth while but instant participation in her geniality, and whatever subject it might at the moment be taken up with. This conviction of Ella's had been wont to overawe Flora, and it still overwhelmed her; so that now, as she followed in the tail of Ella's marshaled force, she had a guilty feeling that there should be nothing in her mind but a normal desire ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain
... dared not yield, though heaven and earth should fall. The mass he denounced as the greatest and most horrible abomination, inasmuch as it was 'downright destructive of the first article,' and as the chiefest of Papal idolatries; moreover, this dragon's tail had begotten many other kinds of vermin and abominations of idolatry. With regard to the Papacy itself, the Augsburg Confession had been content to condemn it by silence, not having taken any notice of it in its articles on the essence and nature of the Christian Church. ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... crammed into his pocketbook, but none of a later date than Christmas at any other place, except one, which bore date that morning. This was crumpled up with a hand-bill about a horse-fair in one of his tail-pockets, and represented the cost of three days' stay at an inn at Bilkley, where the fair was held—a town at least forty miles from Middlemarch. The bill was heavy, and since Raffles had no luggage with him, ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... have passed both state and interstate regulations concerning the sale of nursery stock. The insects usually legislated against are San Jose scale, gypsy moth and brown-tail moth, while the diseases usually interdicted are yellows, black knot, ...
— The Young Farmer: Some Things He Should Know • Thomas Forsyth Hunt
... my thirst the King's, brother called me aside, and drawing from his coat-tail pocket a piece of stale black bread, divided it with me, and while munching on this the Prince began talking of his son—General Prince Frederick Charles, popularly called the Red Prince—who was in command of the Second Army in this battle—the ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... number we hope to give a glance at the individualities of the present, and see whether the cast shall be head or tail—whether we or the readers of the Lapsus ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... bottled beer. Until this concession was obtained our liquid refreshment would have satisfied the most immoderate advocate of temperance, and the only relief was found when the Secretary of State for War, a kind-hearted Portuguese, would smuggle in a bottle of whiskey hidden in his tail-coat pocket or amid a basket of fruit. A very energetic and clever young officer of the Dublin Fusiliers, Lieutenant Grimshaw, undertook the task of managing the mess, and when he was assisted by another subaltern—Lieutenant Southey, ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill
... of March last, about ten o'clock in the morning, a thin, spare-looking man, dressed in a black cashmeret suit, swallow-tail coat, loose-cut pants, a straight-breasted vest, with a very extravagant shirt-collar rolling over upon his coat, with a black ribbon tied at the throat, stood at the east corner of Broad and Meeting street, holding a very excited conversation with officers Dusenberry and Dunn. His ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... as of usual occurrences: but it is quite fair when, as frequently happens, the proposer insists upon a perfectly general acceptance of his assertion. And yet many who go the whole hog protest against being tickled with the tail. Counsel in court are good instances: they are paradoxers by trade. June 13, 1849, at Hertford, there was an action about a ship, insured against a total loss: some planks were saved, and the underwriters refused to pay. Mr. Z. (for deft.) ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... Why have squirrels these ample tails, and why Have rabbits these prominent eyes?" She smiled and said, as she twirled her veil, "For some nice little cause, no doubt— If you lift a guinea-pig up by the tail His eyes ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... like to see children fond of animals. Now, I've got a new kitty upstairs, a zebra kitty, that you'd be pleased with. It's a beauty, and such a tail! Come up to my room and see it if you want to. My room's Number Five. But don't you come now; I shall be busy an hour and a half. Remember, an ...
— Jimmy, Lucy, and All • Sophie May
... cousin, on points of extra-judicial import. One morning, just as he was about to get down from his horse.—(NOTE BY ED.—The middle of this anecdote is so long, so dull, and has so little connection with either the head or the tail, that ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 33, November 12, 1870 • Various
... "What!" said the Doctor, with a sudden start. "As a Corsican," Dr. Goldsmith repeated mildly. "You don't mean to say," said the Doctor to him, gazing at him with solemn sternness, "that it is your intention to put yourself into a green velvet jacket with a two-inch tail?" "Such is my intention, sir," replied Goldsmith warmly; "and why not, sir?" "Because, sir," said the Doctor, considerably excited, "you are too old." "Too old!" exclaimed Goldsmith. "And if any further ground of objection be wanting," said Dr. Johnson, "You are too fat, sir." "Sir," said ...
— Pickwickian Manners and Customs • Percy Fitzgerald
... service the indentured servants went west and helped to democratize the frontier. Caste too was secured by the peculiar land tenure of the East. The king and the proprietors granted land for small sums on feudal terms. The grantees in their turn settled these holdings in fee tail on the oldest son in accordance with the law of primogeniture. This produced a class described by Jefferson who said: "There were then aristocrats, half-breeds, pretenders, a solid independent yeomanry, looking askance at those above, ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various
... Chulduns all worship a god called Muz-Azin. Muz-Azin is a crocodile with wings like a bat and a lot of knife blades in his tail. He makes this Yat-Zar look downright beautiful. So do his habits. Muz-Azin fancies human sacrifices. The victims are strung up by the ankles on a triangular frame and lashed to death with iron-barbed whips. Nasty sort of a deity, but this is a nasty time-line. The people here get a big kick ...
— Temple Trouble • Henry Beam Piper
... deck his glittering head; His temples are with double glory spread; From his fierce eyes two fervid lights afar Flash, and his chin shines with one radiant star; Bow'd is his head; and his round neck he bends, And to the tail of Helice[176] extends. ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... heard more than one French soldier say in a voice tinged with admiration, "Ah, ce sont de bons soldats!" At the front and in the trenches one gets down to basic principles and realizes that "the other man" is a fellow human being and not something with horns and a forked tail. The French soldier is grimly determined to go through the war to the bitter end and to accept nothing short of a complete victory, but at the same time he realizes that this mutual slaughter is indeed a sorry business. I shall never forget ...
— The Note-Book of an Attache - Seven Months in the War Zone • Eric Fisher Wood
... beautiful but a moment before, were suddenly whitened with clouds of vapor upon which the rays of the western sun produced a most charming effect. A gentle breeze gave to each spouting jet, a misty tail, comet-like in appearance to ...
— The Youthful Wanderer - An Account of a Tour through England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany • George H. Heffner
... still, on some great festivals, borne through Saint Peter's Church to the high altar. His Holiness was generally accompanied by a train of Cardinals and Jesuits. At his ear stood a buffoon disguised as a devil with horns and tail. No rich and zealous Protestant grudged his guinea on such an occasion, and, if rumour could be trusted, the cost of the procession was sometimes not less than a thousand pounds. After the Pope had been ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... two young fellows had urged their curraghs into a cave where the seals were known to breed, and they were killing them right and left when, in the farthest end of the cave and sitting up on its bent tail in a corner, there sat an old seal. One of the boys was just making ready to strike him, when the seal cried out, "Och, boys! och, ma bouchals, spare your old grandfather, Darby O'Dowd." He then proceeded to tell the boys his story. "It's true I was dead and dacently ...
— Folklore as an Historical Science • George Laurence Gomme
... written in the morning. I now take up my pen to add, that the addresses having been reported to the House, it was moved to disagree to so much of the amendment as went to the putting France on an equal footing with other nations, and Morgan and Machir turning tail (in consequence, as is said, of having been closeted last night by Charles Lee), the vote was forty-nine to fifty. So the principle was saved by a single vote. They then proposed that compensations for spoliations shall be a sine qua non, and this ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... Massereene, with a little curve of her neck, glances back expressively to where an unkind nail has caught the tail of her long soft gown. That miserable nail—not he—has caused her delay. Stooping, he extricates the dress. She bows coldly, without raising her eyes to his. A moment later she is free; still another moment, and she is gone; and Luttrell, with a suppressed but naughty word upon his lips, returns ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... no more about the matter; but two days after this I found the people more busy than ever talking about Bobby Smudge's ghost. Numbers declared they had seen it. Some described it as having one shape, some another. Not a few gave it a tail, and horns, and fiery eyes. All described it as black; and several were ready to affirm on oath that it smelt strongly of sulphur and other horrible odours. At length many of the men showed a great unwillingness to go below, and to ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... and coaxed and he hopped, and flirted his tail and twittered. It was as if he were talking. His red waistcoat was like satin and he puffed his tiny breast out and was so fine and so grand and so pretty that it was really as if he were showing her how important and like a human person a robin could be. Mistress ...
— The Secret Garden • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... wing-and-wing, was headed directly in for the anchorage. She rose and fell lazily over a glassy swell flawed here and there by catspaws from astern. It was the tail-end of the monsoon season, and the air was heavy and sticky with tropic moisture, the sky a florid, leaden muss of formless clouds. The rugged land was swathed with cloud-banks and squall wreaths, through which headlands and interior peaks thrust darkly. On one promontory a slant of ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London
... bright little terrier, came trotting into the library He saluted the company briskly with his tail, not excepting Mr. Mool. No growl, or approach to a growl, now escaped him. The manner in which he laid himself down at Mrs. Gallilee's feet completely refuted her aspersion on his temper. Ovid suggested that he might have been provoked by a cat ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... of the tail of his eyes and fell in beside him. His foreman's manner was new, and he wondered at it. However, Jim made no effort to open his lips again until ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum
... a horse with your legs before you rein him back, because if you press him back first with the reins he may throw all his weight on his hind legs under him, stick out his nose, hug his tail, and then he cannot stir—you must recover him to his balance, and give him power to step back. This rule is often neglected by carters in trying to make the ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... Dandy.—A small, squat, puffy figure incased within a large pack-saddle, upon the back of a lean, high-boned, straw-fed, cream-coloured nag, with an enormously flowing tail, whose length and breadth would appear to be each night guarded from discolouration by careful involution above the hocks. Taken, from his gridiron spurs and long pointed boots, up his broad, blue-striped pantaloons, a la Cossaque, to the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 560, August 4, 1832 • Various
... came in at the windows thick and gloomy, so that the lamp could scarcely prevail against it, the cats crawled shivering to the back of the stove, and the dog scratched at the kitchen door and crawled under the stove with his tail between his legs, Freneli at length said, "Now Uli, get ready and we'll go; now folks certainly won't be watching ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... You have threatened to fight me." Letting go the buffalo's head, Grizzly Bear went around and seized him by the tail, turning him round and round. Then he left, but as he did so, he gave him a hard blow ...
— Myths and Legends of the Great Plains • Unknown
... account of the length of hair on the body. Little tufts of hair growing between the toes indicate high breeding. The Angora cat, in good condition, is one of the most beautiful and elegant creatures in the world, and few can resist its charm. The tail is long and like an ostrich plume. It is usually carried, when the cat is in good spirits, straight up, with the end waving over toward one side. The tail of the Angora serves as a barometer of ...
— Concerning Cats - My Own and Some Others • Helen M. Winslow
... who had a real Chessy Cat head which Gertrude Wells had manufactured and painted, and who wore Arline's long squirrel coat with a squirrel scarf trailing behind for a tail, executed a dance of quaint steps and low bows. The Dodo jumped or rather walked through three paper hoops, which had to be lowered to admit his chubby person. The King and Queen gave a dialogue, every other ...
— Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... That hops and cheeps, And perks his tiny tail, And sideway peeps, And flitters little wing, Seems in his consequential way To ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson, an Elegy; And Other Poems • Richard Le Gallienne
... that these bounties of nature are in the greatest perfection. It is there that you should listen to the love-song of the mocking-bird, as I at this moment do. See how he flies round his mate, with motions as light as those of the butterfly! His tail is widely expanded, he mounts in the air to a small distance, describes a circle, and, again alighting, approaches his beloved one, his eyes gleaming with delight, for she has already promised to be his and his ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... tail came down on the water with a whack that sent the echoes flying back and forth across the pond, and its owner ducked his head, arched his back, and dived to the bottom. It was a very curious tail, for besides being ...
— Forest Neighbors - Life Stories of Wild Animals • William Davenport Hulbert
... hamlets we passed are of farm-houses only, the deep-eaved roofs covering in one sweep dwelling-house, barn, and stable. In every barn unclothed people were pursuing various industries. We met strings of pack-mares, tied head and tail, loaded with rice and sake, and men and women carrying large creels full of mulberry leaves. The ravine grew more and more beautiful, and an ascent through a dark wood of arrowy cryptomeria brought us to this ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... shrieked. She felt how naughty she was, but her overweening vanity quite stifled her conscience. She scratched the bird's poll, treated him to several lumps of sugar, and, when he was not looking, suddenly jerked one of the finest feathers out of his tail. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 28, 1893 • Various
... attention, he blessed himself for that unresting sense which held the outposts and stood a trusty sentinel upon his life. His head turned continually on his neck; his eyes, which seemed starting from their orbits, scouted on every side, and on every side were half-rewarded as with the tail of something nameless vanishing. The four-and-twenty steps to the ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... did (he produces an enormous nose and cheeks from his tail-pocket). But it's no mortal use; the minute I put it on I'm recognised (plaintively). And I gave one-and-ninepence for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, April 23, 1892 • Various
... The tail of the column was followed and much harassed by the enemy; but they were kept at bay by the steadiness of the gallant Gurkhas, and so successful were they in safe-guarding the baggage, that, although many of the drivers ran away at the first shot, leaving the soldiers ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... golden sheen among some stones. Maynard gave a grunt of relief, but as his hand closed round it a tiny flutter passed through the fingerling; it gave a final gasp and was still. Knitting his brows in almost comical vexation, he hastened to restore it to the stream, holding it by the tail and striving to impart a life-like ...
— Uncanny Tales • Various
... what'd be the good? He'd only turn up next time in a tail-coat and a black bow!" said Clarence gloomily. "The poor old governor's one of the people ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey
... its prosperity; which throne, to show the majesty and commanding awe that then that city had over all, both far and near, it had, for the bearers of the steps, twelve lions, six on this side, and six on that side of the throne (1 Kings 10:18-20). This city shall then be the head and chief, but the tail and reproach no more. 'Glorious things are spoken of thee, O ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... illustrate the work, thought fit, in their eleventh 'Argumentum,' to figure two of these "Simiae magnatum deliciae." So much of the plate as contains these apes is faithfully copied in the woodcut (Fig. 1), and it will be observed that they are tail-less, long-armed, and large-eared; and ...
— Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature • Thomas H. Huxley
... he is, Blacky flew over the tree-tops, his sharp eyes watching for something interesting below. Presently he saw ahead of him the old nest of Red-tail. He knew all about that nest. He had visited it before when Red-tail was away. Still it might be worth another visit. You never can tell what you may find in old houses. Now, of course, Blacky knew perfectly well that Redtail was ...
— Blacky the Crow • Thornton W. Burgess
... wished he would go down the path where he had scattered burrs! But the rabbit took another path and Fleetfoot ran to catch him. He was almost sure he could lay his hands on the rabbit's stumpy white tail. ...
— The Later Cave-Men • Katharine Elizabeth Dopp
... cars thundered by on the other side of the brook not thirty yards from his feet. He did not change his position, but looking down the long length of his legs, he saw the roaring, snorting beast of an engine rush by, trailing its tail of cars ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller
... almost dull men, by comparison with the tete exaltee from some upper element of fire, or limbo of the moon, who conceived this sublime idea of leaping forward by a thousand miles, to lay salt on the tail of a possible or a conceivable enemy. The enemy—the tail—the salt—these were all in nubibus; the only thing certain was the leap, and the thousand miles. And then, having achieved this first stage on the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... Florida there is an animal of very massive, clumsy build, long considered to be a Cetacean, but now recognized, by some naturalists at least, as belonging to the order of Pachyderms. In form it resembles the Cetaceans, though it has a fan-shaped tail, instead of the broad flapper of the Whales. It inhabits fresh waters or shoal waters, and is not so exclusively aquatic as the oceanic Cetaceans. Its most striking feature is the form of the lower jaw, which is bent downward, with the front ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Svil to a feast. Hroar and Helgi expressed a wish to join him; but Svil commanded them to remain at home. Nevertheless, when Svil and his retinue had started off, Helgi got an untamed colt, and mounting it with his face toward the horse's tail, set out, acting all the while very foolishly. Hroar also mounted a colt, and joined him; and the two overtook the company. They galloped back and forth beside Svil's retinue, until finally Helgi's mask fell ...
— The Relation of the Hrolfs Saga Kraka and the Bjarkarimur to Beowulf • Oscar Ludvig Olson
... the jagged walls of moss-covered rock, in varied tints—black, red, green, and white. The shadows slowly deepened, the long grey clouds hung like a curtain in the sky, where the stars began to gleam softly. The varied foliage turned to a deep, rich blue, shading into green like a peacock's tail. Silence was around us, broken only by the weird cry of the loon diving in the distant bay, and the ceaseless, monotonous puff-puff of the little tug as she pursued her way ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... a carrot and hit the one time beauteous white one with the curly tail, so smart a rap on his snout that he squealed his disapproval while his relatives bagged ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... the trench with soft sand, and retired to the place of vantage which I had occupied the previous day, and from which we could see the crocodile make his evening raid. Towards sundown he came forth with a rush among the terrified goats, four of which he slew with a stroke from his powerful tail, after which he proceeded to drag their mangled carcases into his lair. We waited an hour, when, just before sundown, the reptile came forth again on his way to the water. We watched him with bated breath, and Sylvia, who now, for the first time, began to understand the trap ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes
... you!" snapped the royal cat. "I'm glad you are turned out of the house. Let us hope a body can take a nap in comfort now, without having her tail stepped on or snuff sprinkled ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam
... swiftness and vigour to everything she did. And for ten minutes or more there was nothing to be heard in the room but the little drop of ashes from the fire, the sudden burst of a little gas-flame from the coals, the rustle of Elinor's arm as it moved. The cat sat with her tail curled round her before the fire, the image of dignified repose, winking at the flames. The two human inhabitants, save for the movements of their hands, might have been in wax, they were so still. Suddenly, however, the quietness was broken by an energetic movement. Elinor ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... used to be the Viceroy's house. State—state! They had cried out upon the Genoese's keeping it—but Don Nicholas de Ovando kept more. While we waited in the antechamber I saw, out of window and the tail of my eye, files of soldiery go by. Ovando would not have riot and disturbance if twenty Admirals hung in the offing! He kept us waiting. He would be cool and distant and impregnable behind the royal word. Juan Lepe saw plainly that that lavish and magnanimous person ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... woman in," he explained, "you've got to strip yourself to get her out, no matter whether you care for her or not. The moment a woman gets caught out, you can't do too much for her. It's like seeing a dog with a tin can tied to its tail; you've got to get it off. A man ought to pay for his fun; even if it isn't his fault, he ought to pay just the same. It's not so much that he's the responsible person, but he's the least had. That ought ...
— The Dark Tower • Phyllis Bottome
... adoration, respectful, passionate, without hope. Only now and then his poor sensitive snout quivered his despair. Sometimes happier rivals, with two legs, mais pour ca pas moins cochons que lui, admitted him into the cafe. He would sit before the counter, his little tail well arranged behind him, his ears cocked up politely, his eyes full of tears—he wept like a cow this poor Nepomucene—they called him Nepomucene—and when Mimi looked at him he would utter little cries of the heart like a strangulated troubadour. Ah, it was hopeless this passion; but for one ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... agreeable companion, a witty conversationalist, and a born raconteur. He seemed to have visited every part of the known globe; had been a sailor, a revolutionist in South America, a blackbirder in the Pacific, had seen something of what he called the "Pig-tail trade" to Borneo, some very queer life in India, that is to say, in the comparatively unknown native states and had come within an ace of having been shot by the French during the war ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... bizarre beauty of the scene was tiring to the youth. For some reason he thought again of the sea serpent. It occurred to Madden that an enormous scaly thing, in vivid spangling colors, embossed with sword-like spines, with a long convoluted tail, huge red-fanged mouth, would be in keeping with the scene before him, would indeed produce a gorgeously decorative effect, such as he had ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... when we look at our trials as unmixed evils. They "are blessings in disguise." The dripping clouds which hide the sun, enrich the earth. The difficulties with which we have to contend, increase our strength. The tail of the kite, which seems to pull it down, helps it to rise. And the afflictions, which seem to press us to the ground, help to raise ...
— Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again - A Life Story • Joseph Barker
... then slipped downstairs and went out through the back way. She had to go through the yard, but no one saw her except Betty, who, as she afterwards remarked, did observe the flutter of a white dress with the tail of her eye. But Betty at that moment was immersed in a fresh installment of the wonderful adventures of the Duke of Mauleverer-Wolverhampton and his bride, and what did it matter to her if the young ladies chose to run out in their ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade
... day of its acting: a silly tragedy; but Lacy hath made a farce of several dances—between each act one: but his words are but silly and invention not extraordinary as to the dances; only some Dutchmen come out of the mouth and tail of ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... advancing host. Jasper was perfectly conscious that his own gesture and speech of greeting were too eager, too ingratiating, that they had a touch of servility. He hated them himself, but they were inherited with his blood, as instinctive as the wagging of a dog's tail. They were met by a precise bow, no smile, no ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... at the top of Slattern Alley where it turns into Britain Street, and she in the best of good tempers, when a lady came by with two young daughters beside her—a tall woman, with a fine blossoming colour in her face and an air like a peacock spreading his tail and her eyes as clear as spring water. It would be hard to see a finer woman of her age in a day's walk, and all the gentlemen going to and from the Castle must turn to have another look at the three of them. Her dress ...
— The Ladies - A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty • E. Barrington
... they comprehind that there ar-re other candydates in th' field. But th' other candydates know it. Th' sthrongest iv thim—his name is Flannigan, an' he's a re-tail dealer in wines an' liquors, an' he lives over his establishment. Flannigan was nomynated enthusyastically at a prim'ry held in his bar-rn; an' before Willie Boye had picked out pants that wud match th' color iv th' Austhreelyan ballot this here Flannigan ...
— Mr. Dooley in Peace and in War • Finley Peter Dunne
... cock his foot over it again and walk on without any abatement of his dignity. At last, finding these interruptions become rather too frequent, he depressed the hilt of his great sword in order to elevate the point, and so strutted onwards like a bantam cock with a tingle straight feather in its tail. ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Every hair, every particle of dirt, every bit of dried manure, is a lurking place for millions of bacteria. The hind quarters of a cow are commonly in a condition of much filth, for the farmer rarely grooms his cow, and during the milking, by her movements, by the switching of her tail, and by the rubbing she gets from the milker, no inconsiderable amount of this dirt and filth is brushed off and falls into the milk pail The farmer understands this source of dirt and usually feels it necessary to strain the milk after the milking. But the straining it receives ...
— The Story Of Germ Life • H. W. Conn
... was vehemently discussed for four hours, in five-minute speeches, Judge Frank Doster leading the affirmative. The debate was closed by Mrs. Diggs, and the resolution was adopted, ayes 337, noes 269; carried by 68 majority in a delegate body of 606. During the fray a tail in some way tacked itself on to the resolution, which said, "but we do not regard this as a test of party fealty." So the party adopted a plank declaring that it did not regard a belief in one of its own fundamental ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... and grinding went on between my hands. I give you my word I was convinced at the moment of holding between my palms a sentient force. I felt as Franklin must have felt when he played with the lightning in the bottle at the tail of his kite. Once I heard the writing going on in a half-opened slate, but I did not see the pencil in motion. Some of these cases of 'direct-writing' are the most convincing of all my experiences. People ask me why I didn't talk with the spirits about heaven ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland
... trying to see all the intricate details of the motive and action on the field, and it was not easy to watch several players at once. But while Berne and Callopy were having their troubles with the Rube, I kept the tail of my eye on Cogswell. He was prowling up ...
— The Redheaded Outfield and Other Baseball Stories • Zane Grey
... so. Probably a cat couldn't possibly understand how a human mother can properly bring up a child when she has no tail for her offspring to ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... poor turkeys that their tails contain no moisture; for on a night like this they would freeze stiff, and the least incautious movement of a fowl in the morning would serve to crack its tail off—up ...
— Aftermath • James Lane Allen
... returned to each a deed, duly placed on record, to the best lot, at the price, on hand that day. All this time the catamount screeched upon the reserved lot of the Skyland Board of Trade, the opossum swung by his tail over the site of the exposition hall, and the owl hooted a melancholy recitative to his audience of young squirrels in opera house square. Later, when the money was coming in fast, J. Pinkney caused to be erected in the coming city half a dozen cheap box houses, and persuaded ...
— Waifs and Strays - Part 1 • O. Henry
... be sillier than usual," said Harriet, and her voice began to quaver. "Look here, read it, Mother; I can't make head or tail." ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... after it with such a blank look that Joan laughed gleefully. Away it went, sailing slowly along, the blue ribbon trailing like a tail behind; on, on, farther and farther, until at length, behind a clump of osiers that hung over the bank and dipped into the water at a bend in the canal, the watchers lost sight of ...
— Two Little Travellers - A Story for Girls • Frances Browne Arthur
... replied he, "that I am Ralph Jobson? Why it knew me, and seemed to wag its tail; nay, made as though ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... 4 And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and the dragon stood before the woman to devour her child as soon as ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton
... implied compact between you that he shall by no means think of doing it. A poor wretch he must be who would wantonly sit down on one of these bandbox reputations. A Prince-Rupert's-drop, which is a tear of unannealed glass, lasts indefinitely, if you keep it from meddling hands; but break its tail off, and it explodes and resolves itself into powder. These celebrities I speak of are the Prince-Rupert's- drops of the learned and polite world. See how the papers treat them! What an array of pleasant kaleidoscopic phrases, which can be arranged ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... his hand to his hat. Fatal error! For the hundredth-part of a second the horse seemed to cower under him as if about to sink to the ground, then tucked his head in between his front legs, and his tail in between the hind ones, forming himself into a kind of circle, and began a series of gigantic bounds at the rate of about a hundred to the minute; while in the air above him his rider described a catherine ...
— An Outback Marriage • Andrew Barton Paterson
... publication of Corinne she returned to Germany, and completed the observation which she thought necessary for the companion book De l'Allemagne. Its publication in 1810, when she had foolishly kindled afresh the Emperor's jealousy by appearing with her usual "tail" of worshippers or parasites as near Paris as she was permitted, completed her disgrace. She was ordered back to Coppet: her book was seized and destroyed. Then Albert de Rocca, a youth of twenty-three, who had seen some service, made his appearance at Geneva. Early in 1811, Madame ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... confiscation. Those who, strong in innocence, dared to brave a trial were lost without resource. The accused were forced to its bar without previous warning. Many a wealthy citizen was dragged to trial four leagues' distance, tied to a horse's tail. The number of victims was appalling. On one occasion, the town of Valenciennes alone saw fifty-five of its citizens fall by the hands of the executioner. Hanging, beheading, quartering and burning were the every-day spectacles. The enormous confiscations only added to the thirst for gold ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... stuff of which Erec's robe was made, all worked and woven with thread of gold. The fur lining that was sewed within, belonged to some strange beasts whose heads are all white, and whose necks are as black as mulberries, and which have red backs and green bellies, and dark blue tail. These beasts live in India and they are called "barbiolets". They eat nothing but spices, cinnamon, and fresh cloves. What shall I tell you of the mantle? It was very rich and fine and handsome; it had four stones in the tassels—two chrysolites on one side, and two amethysts ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... which kept settling. I saw that they were pulling the machine down by the rear, turning her over. We tore the tail-fabric to lessen the impact of the waves. It wasn't any use. The tail-flat was smashed and its box filled ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... incontinently ran over that officer, throwing him down and keeping on his headlong course, hat off, coat-tail streaming and legs and arms flying like the sails of a windmill, as he tried to ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth
... Jean May and Louis Bruseau, whose punishment for petty larceny is noted in the Gazette of 11th August, 1766, the whipping was supplemented with a walk—tied at the cart's tail—from the Court House door to St. Roch and back to the Court House. May had to whip Bruseau and Bruseau had to whip May the day following, at ten ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... hitching spirally up a tree-trunk, a closer look will show that it is a brown creeper, seeking tiny insects and their eggs in the crevices of the trunk. He looks like a small piece of the roughened bark which has suddenly become animated. His long tail props him up and his tiny feet never fail to find a foothold. Our winter birds go in flocks, and where we see a brown creeper we are almost sure to ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe
... great gold ear-ring Harold Tugged back the feathered tail, And swift had sprung the arrow, ...
— The Ballad of the White Horse • G.K. Chesterton
... existence. At the moment that the Islanders, crowned with flowers, and waving goblets and garlands, burst from their retreats, upon each mountain peak a lion starts forward, stretches his proud tail, and, bellowing to the sun, scours back exulting to his forest; immense bodies, which before would have been mistaken for the trunks of trees, now move into life, and serpents, untwining their green and glittering folds, and ...
— The Voyage of Captain Popanilla • Benjamin Disraeli
... Southampton county, Va., in 1831. Looking over the diary of Colonel Godfrey for thirty years, we notice that he said "Nat Turner," when he appeared in the avenue of Dr. Blount, on that fatal night, he rode at the head of the column, mounted on a sorrel mule, with flax mane and tail. But the question arises, how that mule got into the Dismal Swamp, and how he came in possession of the Dismal Swamp Land Company. Col. Godfrey states that there were several guns in the house of Dr. Blount, and several visitors there at the time; that the young Blount loaded ...
— The Dismal Swamp and Lake Drummond, Early recollections - Vivid portrayal of Amusing Scenes • Robert Arnold
... past us, and showing us the soles of his naked feet as he ran adown the path and up the opposite side." In another place he devotes a page to a description of a dog whom he saw running round after its tail; in still another he remarks, in a paragraph by itself—"The aromatic odor of peat-smoke, in the sunny autumnal air is very pleasant." The reader says to himself that when a man turned thirty gives a place in his ...
— Hawthorne - (English Men of Letters Series) • Henry James, Junr.
... simple, and a simple fee, And all the fees in tail, Are nothing when compared to thee, Thou ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 540, Saturday, March 31, 1832 • Various
... represented a forest. Wotan was waking up the dragon. At first the dragon said, 'I want to go to sleep'; but eventually he came out of his grotto. The dragon was represented by two men clothed in a green skin with some scales stuck about it. At one end of the skin they wagged a tail, and at the other end they opened a crocodile's mouth, out of which came fire. The dragon, which ought to have been a frightful beast—and perhaps he would have frightened children about five years old—said a few words in ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... trained listener and the person of merely general musical tendencies is that the former gains a definite meaning from the music often at a first hearing; whereas, to the latter, many hearings are necessary before he can make head or tail of the composition. Since the creative composer of music is a thinker in tones, our perceptions must be so trained that, as we listen, we make sense of the fabric of sounds ...
— Music: An Art and a Language • Walter Raymond Spalding
... cried Quatremain, who had finished his task at the same time. "I have discovered what I have long suspected, that treasure is hidden in Saint Paul's Cathedral. Mercury is posited in the north angle of the fourth house; the dragon's tail is likewise within it; and as Sol is the ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... same time 'All aat for Haworth.' One man wur trying th' dodge on, an' th' cat wur i'th' ovan, an' poor thing expectin' 'at it wur i'th' wrong place jumpt aat just at th' time 'at he wur wistling to start, an' wur catcht bi th' tail an' th' poor thing lost it, for it wur cut off as clean as a wistle. A crookt legg'd pedl'r come fra Keighla one day wi' winter edges, an' thay tuk him for a sapper an' miner 'at hed com to mezhur for th' railway, an' mind yo they did mak sammat on ...
— Th' History o' Haworth Railway - fra' th' beginnin' to th' end, wi' an ackaant o' th' oppnin' serrimony • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... puzzled, the police officers hastily sent down from Arad had vainly tried to make head or tail of the mass of conflicting accounts which were poured into their ears in a continuous stream of loud-voiced chatter for hours at a stretch: and God only knows what judicial blunders might have been committed before the culprit was finally brought ...
— A Bride of the Plains • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... sneaking along presently, at the tail of some black coat or other," Judy responded. "It's in you. The ...
— Trading • Susan Warner
... and lean and shrewd. With pointed ears And tail cropped short, half lurcher and half cur, ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... sunshine, the fly bouncing up and down the little window, the movements of the cat, who, rising from her nap, stretched every limb separately, yawned, lazily lapped at her saucer of milk, and then, seating herself in the patch of lurid sunshine, with her tail curled round her fore-paws, blinked drowsily for a few minutes, and then dozed ...
— Outpost • J.G. Austin
... great dexterity, he managed to do, and we came to a standstill not more than a foot or so from the wall. This proved a chastening experience; we pictured our aeroplane dashed against the wall, and reduced to a mass of wreckage. Very cautiously we lifted round the tail of the machine. It was impossible to switch off the motor and have a rest, because, if we had stopped it, we should not have been able to start it again without our gear, which was away on the ...
— Learning to Fly - A Practical Manual for Beginners • Claude Grahame-White
... send one of the gods to bring them to him. When they came he threw the serpent into that deep ocean by which the earth is engirdled. But the monster has grown to such an enormous size that, holding his tail in his mouth, he encircles the whole earth. Hela he cast into Niflheim, and gave her power over nine worlds (regions), into which she distributes those who are sent to her, that is to say, all who die through sickness or old age. Here she ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... a few words to Hetty, and then took his place by her side. Now was Marie's moment of joy. Springing to one side as quickly as her rheumatic old joints would permit, she revealed what she had been trying to hide behind her scant petticoat. It was a white lamb, decorated from ears to tail with knots of ribbon and with flowers. The poor little thing tugged hard at the string by which it was held, and shook its pretty head in restless impatience under its load of finery, and bleated piteously: but for all that it was ...
— Hetty's Strange History • Anonymous
... little pin-feathers sticking out over him! Some spots here and there are almost bare, but he is ever so much more active. Ha! Listen to that! He is so strong that you can hear his beak as he pecks at the table. He is actually growing bigger and bigger before our very eyes! See that funny little tail, how it begins to stick up, and quills are showing at the ...
— The Magic Egg and Other Stories • Frank Stockton
... we do not go much into the world; so you will always find us at home, and we will do what we can to amuse your young friend. Why, I should think he was about the same age as Digby? Is he at Eton? His grandfather was. I shall never forget the time he cut off old Barnard's pig-tail. He was a wonderful man, poor Sir Ferdinand! he ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli
... out," said Conroy, "they mean to rebel. That's what they say, anyhow, and I believe they mean it. I don't care a cent whether they call themselves Loyalists or not. It's up to them to twist the British Lion's tail, ...
— The Red Hand of Ulster • George A. Birmingham
... Exo 32:26-28). Paul also must go from place to place to preach, though he knew beforehand he was to be afflicted there (Acts 20:23). God may sometimes say to thee, as he said to his servant Moses, 'Take the serpent by the tail'; or, as the Lord Jesus said to Peter, Walk upon the sea (Exo 4:3,4). These are hard things, but have not been rejected when God hath called to do them. O how willingly would our flesh and blood escape the cross of Christ! The comforts of the gospel, the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... often on her leer, just as a cur, when store of bones are near, That would good pickings for his teeth afford, Attentively behold the precious hoard, And seem uneasy; move his feet and tail; Now prick his ears; then fear he can't prevail, The eyes still fixed upon the bite in sight, Which twenty times to these affords delight, Ere to his longing jaws the boon arrives, ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... the fun, anyway," snorted the Cow, switching her tail. "All the choice bits of torturing. Why, I've not had so much as a single toss since I've been on this job; no I haven't!" And she shook her sharp curved ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... which was drawing the ramshackle carryall in which Flint sat, toiled on with sweating haunches, switching his tail, impatient of the flies, and now and then shaking his head deprecatingly, as if in remonstrance against the fate which destined him to work so hard for the benefit of a lazy human being ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... defeated it in the Senate. It was during this contest that the friends of Clinton called his opponents "Bucktails"—the name growing out of a custom, which obtained on certain festival occasions, when leading members of Tammany wore the tail of a ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... beginning—the little mountain home, the family of three, the disappearance of the child. He described the perils of the mountains, the storm, the search, the wait, the listening mother, scene by scene, ending with mother and child together again and the dog racing around them, with wagging tail and hanging tongue. He wrote swiftly, making no changes, without a trace of his usual self-consciousness in composition. When he had done he went into the restaurant car and dined almost gaily. He felt that ...
— The Great God Success • John Graham (David Graham Phillips)
... about the mare's arched neck, started off, and, without so much as flicking her long tail, Queen Bess fell in behind, obedient ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... like a suggestion of catastrophe, and represented the horrid fish's tail with which the allegorical geniuses of Greece have terminated their chimeras and sirens, whose figures, like all passions, are so seductive, ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... the regular tastes of the refined, fastidious Eton boy; wrote of the cut of his first tail-coat that 'this is really an important thing;' and had grown choice in the adorning of his room and the binding of his books, though he never let these tastes bring him into debt or extravagance. ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... nothing rare or ancient—only the tail and woolly hind-quarters of a toy lamb extruded from the imperfectly closed door of a cupboard below a bookcase. Instantly he jumped up and went to shut the cupboard; but first he must open it to thrust in the lamb, and out it tumbled bodily, and after it a wagon ...
— The Vicissitudes of Bessie Fairfax • Harriet Parr
... so throbbed that here and there it rent the sheer cloud-veil that lay in delicate illusion over the blue. Through the trees played frightened flashes of colour, the whisk of a cardinal's wing, the burnt-red plume of a fox-squirrel's tail. In the air there was a palpitancy that was to the dream senses what colour ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young
... thought Mary, "how such a picture popped right up in front of me. Now, if Joyce had such a fancy she'd do something with it. It would suggest a title design or a tail piece of some kind. Oh, why wasn't I born with a talent for writing! My head is just full of things sometimes that would make the loveliest stories, but when I try to put them on paper it's like trying ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston
... a Seminole named Tiger-tail sitting there, his feet dangling above his moored canoe, evidently waiting for the tide to turn before he went out to spear crayfish. I merely noticed he was sitting there in the sunshine, that's all. And then I opened my mythology book and ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... analysis—especially of what made us want things, or not like them. It's one of his sayings—he's always getting it off to his University classes—that if you have once really called an emotion or an ambition by its right name, you have it by the tail, so to speak—that if you know, for instance, that it's your vanity and not your love that's wounded by something, you'll stop caring. But I never noticed that it really worked if you cared hard enough. Diagnosing a disease doesn't ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... up to as long as my hand and as thick as my finger; and they say that a bite from one of them will put a man in a raging fever, and maybe kill him. Then there are scorpions, the savagest looking little bastes ye ever saw, for all the world like a little lobster with his tail turned over his back, and a sting at the end of it. Then there's spiders, some of 'em nigh as big as ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... she opened the gate leading into the street, intending to crush me as I passed through. Dog though I was, I saw through her design, and stung into presence of mind by the greatness of the danger, I timed my movements so well that I contrived to rush through, and only the tip of my tail received a squeeze as she banged ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Andrew Lang.
... have we seen on one little shell. But there is more to see close to it. Those yellow plants which I likened to squirrels' tails and lobsters' horns, and what not, are zoophytes of different kinds. Here is Sertularia argentea (true squirrel's tail); here, S. filicula, as delicate as tangled threads of glass; here, abietina; here, rosacea. The lobsters' horns are Antennaria antennina; and mingled with them are Plumulariae, always to be distinguished ...
— Glaucus; or The Wonders of the Shore • Charles Kingsley
... him apart, and poured forth so interminable a string of rigmarole, all about the theft of the purse, and the prospect of recovering it, that the poor Sacristan could do nothing but listen with open mouth, unable to make head or tail of what he said, although he made him repeat it two ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... four corners of a large, thin silk handkerchief when extended; tie the corners of the handkerchief to the extremities of the cross, so you have the body of a kite; which being properly accommodated with a tail, loop, and string, will rise in the air, like those made of paper; but this being of silk, is fitter to bear the wet and wind of a thunder-gust without tearing. To the top of the upright stick of the cross is to be fixed a very sharp-pointed wire, ...
— Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... doctrine of his; I never from the first believed it, and I cannot but think that the same power is concerned in producing aphides without fertilisation, and producing, for instance, nails on the amputated stump of a man's fingers, or the new tail of a lizard. By the way, I saw somewhere during the last week or so a statement of a man rearing from the same set of eggs winged and wingless aphides, which seemed new to me. Does not some Yankee ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... ground; With a branch form'd a mast, and some matting a sail, And thus rudely equipp'd dared the perilous gale; Of the winds and the waves both the mercy and sport, His bark was long tost without guidance to port, And the storms of the ocean went nigh to o'erwhelm, When the tail of the dolphin suggested a helm. Ry degrees, the canoe to a cutter became, And order and form newly-moulded the same, Ropes, rigging, and canvas, and good cabin room, A bowsprit, a mizen, a gib, and a boom. From the ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... the tail of his eye O'mie caught sight of Judson falling in behind them here and he ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter
... merchant of this city. The night before I was born, he dreamed that I came into the world with the head of a dog, and the tail of a dragon; and that, in haste to conceal my deformity, he rolled me up in a piece of linen, which unluckily proved to be the grand seignior's turban; who, enraged at his insolence in touching his turban, commanded that his ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... him and went to the Dalmatian who crouched quaking on the path. He wagged an ingratiating tail at her approach. It was evident that in her hand the whip had no terrors for him. He ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... still stranger way, a fight against London itself—not London, a place of streets and houses, of Oxford Street and Piccadilly Circus but London, an animal—a kind of dragon as far as Stephen could make it out with scales and a tail— ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... market, or wheresoever she went or rode. But this helped little or nothing, for if he rode before her, then would he make mouths and ill-favoured faces at those he met; if he rode behind her, then would he clap his hand on his tail; so that his mother was weary of the many complaints that came against him, yet knew she not how to beat him justly for it, because she never saw him do that which was worthy blows. The complaints were daily so renewed that his mother ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick
... in silence out of the tail of his eye understood better what was going on behind his nephew's quiet exterior demeanor, and wondered sometimes if it had not been a mistake to keep the boy bound to the wheel like that, if he should not rather have packed ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... spinning fly-wheel. Against the bright horizon stand the profiles of Garden City: the thin cathedral spire, the bulk of St. Paul's school, the white cupola of the hotel. The tree-lined vistas of Mineola are placidly simmering in the morning sun. A white dog with erect and curly tail trots very purposefully round the corner of the First National Bank. We think that we see the spreading leaves of some rhubarb plants in a garden; and there are some of those (to us very enigmatic, as we are no gardener) little glass window frames set in the soil, as though a whole house, ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... and I know something of these 'bloody currents,' and we know they take a ship one way, while she looks as fiercely the other as a pig that is dragged aft by the tail. If we had run down the 50th degree of longitude, now, we might have had plenty of sea-room, and been laying past the Cape, with this very wind; but, no, the old fellow would have had no islands in that case, and he never could be happy without half-a-dozen ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper |
