"Arm's length" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... important that all persons sitting in the same room as the seer should be at arm's length away from him—farther if possible. Silence should be uniformly observed by those present. A recorder should be at hand to set down everything the seer may give voice to. If any questions are addressed to the seer while the sitting is in progress, they should be spoken in ...
— How to Read the Crystal - or, Crystal and Seer • Sepharial
... Mr. Flanagan made a sudden start for the stairs, with the boot and lamp at arm's length before him, and stopped as suddenly. "Yull go up? or wud she come down to ye?" There was as much anxious indecision in Mr. Flanagan's general aspect, pending the reply, as if he had to ...
— Little Classics, Volume 8 (of 18) - Mystery • Various
... faith in her future,' answered Lady Maulevrier. 'There seems to be a fatality about the career of particularly attractive girls. They are too confident of their power to succeed in life. They trifle with fortune, fascinate the wrong people, and keep the right people at arm's length. I think if I had been Lesbia's guide in society her first season would have counted for more than it is likely to count for under Lady Kirkbank's management. I should have awakened Lesbia from the dream of dress and dancing—the mere butterfly life of a girl who never looks beyond the present ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... proficiency in wielding the pick, was masked, and his name kept a profound secret. Brandreth's neck received only one stroke, but it was not clean done, and the assistant (also masked) finished it off with a knife. Then the executioner laid hold of the head by the hair, and holding it at arm's length, to the left, to the right, and in front of the scaffold, called out three times—'Behold the head of the traitor, Jeremiah Brandreth.' The other two were served in like manner. Turner's neck received ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews
... horse and threw his rifle sharply to his face. His antagonist made no attempt to swerve, but instead spurred forward sharply. The brown horse sprang breast to breast with the cream-colored mustang. The two men were within arm's length. At this minute there rang out two reports, almost at the same instant. The ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... disappeared we caught a glimpse of a man leaning out of it. He seemed to be swinging something around and around at arm's length. Suddenly he let it go and it shot high up in the air on the roof ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... advice had been followed, and that the blockhouse contained the person she had so anxiously and almost hopelessly sought. They embraced each other, and the unsophisticated Tuscarora woman laughed in her sweet accents as she held her friend at arm's length, and made ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... meet her, and setting his hands upon her shoulders, he held her at arm's length, looking down into ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... you all I had, it would be beggary for one handicapped with a title. You may think my anger unreasonable, but it comes solely of anxiety on your account. Nothing but a suitable marriage—the most suitable of all is within your arm's length—can save you from the life of a moneyless peer—the most pitiable object on the face of the earth. Were it possible to ignore your rank, you have no profession, no trade even, in these trade-loving times, to fall back upon. Except you marry as I please, ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... of the satisfactions which art offers to human nature as a whole. Between sensation and abstract discourse lies a region of deployed sensibility or synthetic representation, a region where more is seen at arm's length than in any one moment could be felt at close quarters, and yet where the remote parts of experience, which discourse reaches only through symbols, are recovered and recomposed in something like their native colours ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... stood transfixed, with the article held at arm's length, while the Sauk stared in turn, as if he thought the youth ...
— Footprints in the Forest • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... when you had got a sufficiency of these, like glimpses of the country seen by flashes of lightning, you could hope to get a collective idea of it all. The procedure led to the most promising results as Mrs Lucas sat with the sheets at arm's length, occasionally altering the range to try the effect of a different focus. "Benares" blinked at her, also "Brahmin"; also "highest caste"; "extraordinary sanctity," and "Guru." And when the meaning of this latter was ascertained from the article on "Yoga" in her Encyclopaedia, she progressed very ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson
... silence; she had a way of thus leaving one space in which to contemplate one's folly at arm's length. Glennard turned on his heel and went upstairs. As he dropped into a chair before his dressing-table he said to himself that in the last hour he had sounded the depths of his humiliation and that the lowest dregs of it, the very bottom-slime, was the hateful ...
— The Touchstone • Edith Wharton
... object of greater interest to me. I began to understand that strangely human look in his eyes, those deep lines upon his care-worn face. He was a man who was fighting a ceaseless battle, holding at arm's length, from morning till night, a horrible adversary who was forever trying to close with him—an adversary which would destroy him body and soul could it but fix its claws once more upon him. As I watched the grim, round-backed figure ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Larks flock a good deal, as they do in England. The Sky Lark breeds in all the Islands, and occasionally places its nest in such exposed situations that it is wonderful how the young escape. One nest we found by a roadside near Ronceval; it was within arm's length of the road, and seemed exposed to every possible danger. When we found it, on the 15th of June, there were five eggs in it, fresh, or, at all events, only just sat on, as I took one and blew it for one of my daughters. On the 19th we again visited the nest; there ...
— Birds of Guernsey (1879) • Cecil Smith
... departed, bearing his heaving bag at arm's length. The cook and the parlour-maid addressed themselves to comforting and healing the scullery-maid. Wrench went off to polish silver, Lady Wetherby to resume her letters. The cat was the last of the party to return to the ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse
... the row," he said briefly, for he liked the gentle, slow man. "But they're a bad lot. We've got to keep that crew at arm's length ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... seeing one of the Kaffirs dig. Instead of using the spade in the English fashion, he grasped the handle with both hands, holding it at arm's length, with the face turned towards him, and then stuck it into the ground with a swing of his arms, never pressing it with his foot. He used the handle as a lever to shovel out the loose earth, all being done with a jerk, and yet he managed to dig into the hard ground ...
— Hendricks the Hunter - The Border Farm, a Tale of Zululand • W.H.G. Kingston
... washed on Saturdays, had just put Tim's shirt through the wringer. Holding it at arm's length with one hand and steadying herself on the side of the tub with the other, she stared blankly at Eloise for a moment, and then said, "Your mother's cloak! Child alive, that's Mrs. Amy's. I've seen her wear it a hundred times when she was a little girl. She has got on a spell of givin' ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... in the tables, and put the palettes away in these with the colour neatly covered over with a basin when you leave work. Dust is a great enemy in a stained-glass shop, and it must be kept at arm's length. ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall
... they, in their turn. And the crowd opened before them as though before the prow of a vessel. At that moment D'Artagnan and Menneville found themselves face to face. "Passage, passage!" cried Menneville, seeing that he was within an arm's length of the door. ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... and sat down to think things over. Wherever I went, the figure was behind me and always in the same threatening attitude. I began to talk to it at last in set phrases: "I know perfectly well what you are," I said; "you are an inhabitant of the land of Mental Overwork. I'm going to hold you at arm's length, because if I allowed you to take liberties, you might grow dangerous. We will travel together if you will insist upon it until this book is finished and then I will take you into some quiet, rural, restful place and ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray
... and no air to breathe, on the sultriest day that Canada had known for years. What windows there were opened by swinging inwards and upwards, which they could not do for the press, and after you had got them up, there was no way to keep them there except to stand and hold them at arm's length. So we waddled across the river. Now we have all read of shipwrecks, and the moral grandeur of resignation and calmness which they have developed. We have read of drowning, and the gorgeous intoxication ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... keep a Lady Fast, he or she repaired to the church to determine by the aid of the wheel which of the days or anniversaries should be observed. Thereupon the sexton took the wheel, which he either hung up or held at arm's length by means of a ring at the termination of the handle. He then set the wheel in motion, and the votary, standing by, caught at the strings as they spun round. Whichever string was caught decided the question on what day the ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... Tool alone has been proved to be highly effective. When troops are "digging themselves in" at night with this weapon care must be taken that some system is adopted to obtain a more or less regular line facing in the right direction. By the extension of the men of an infantry section at arm's length facing the enemy, and by moving the two men on each flank two paces outwards, and the two centre men two paces backwards, and then causing the section to dig "on the line of their toes," there will result (even on ...
— Lectures on Land Warfare; A tactical Manual for the Use of Infantry Officers • Anonymous
... it is not altogether easy for any of us. We need some common meeting ground—some neutral activity which we could share. If you have any suggestions, I shall be glad to have them. Of course, I visit school and the teachers visit me, and we are friendly in an arm's length sort of fashion. That is largely because they believe in corporal punishment and practice it freely and it is hard for us to look straight at each ...
— Study of Child Life • Marion Foster Washburne
... dead by being chained to the shelves or tables of the library. The librarian might be a monk, or a professor, or a priest, or a doctor of law, or theology, or medicine, but in any case his function was to guard the books, and not to dispense them. Those who resorted to the library were kept at arm's length, as it were, and the fewer there were who came, the better the grim or studious custodian was pleased. Every inquiry which broke the profound silence of the cloistered library was a kind of rude ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... the woman, who had been crouching against the wall nursing the rifle that her husband had put into her charge, rushed forward clutching the barrel of the gun, swung it at full arm's length as she would have swung an axe, and brought the stock down on ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... and froze upon the dressings, which were of the most primitive character. And yet not once through those hours of anguish did he utter a word of complaint. Many a strong man would have cried out in his agony, but one might have sat within arm's length of the mountaineer without knowing he was hurt ...
— The Life of Kit Carson • Edward S. Ellis
... The effort he makes in doing this appears to you a sign of domination, an order he gives the object to come nearer, or to you to bring it to him. It is nothing of the kind. It means only that the object seen first within the brain, then upon the eye, is now seen at arm's length, and that he does not conceive of any distance beyond his reach. Be careful, then, to walk often with him, to transport him from one place to another, to let him feel the change of position, and, in this way to ...
— Emile - or, Concerning Education; Extracts • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... beauty of form, may present pleasingly objects, emotions, ideas, not in themselves beautiful or pleasing. The clearest case of this kind is tragedy, where we may enjoy at arm's length and through the medium of art, experiences which would in the near actualities of life be only unmitigated horror. Refracted through the medium of poetry and drama, they may appear ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... Dassett saw the act, and this is a resume of his evidence at the trial on 25 Aug.: He said he saw the royal carriages coming along, and saw the prisoner come from the crowd, draw a pistol from his breast, and present it at the carriage, at arm's length, and breast high; and then he heard the click of a pistol hammer upon the pan; but there was no explosion. He seized him, and, assisted by his brother, took him across the Mall, and gave him to Police Constable ...
— Gossip in the First Decade of Victoria's Reign • John Ashton
... Thankful for small mercies, I made the best of a bad job, and, having no dish or bucket from which to give Satan a drink, I was obliged to make him lie down close to the narrow hole, whilst into his willing throat I poured the water which at arm's length I scooped up with my quart pot. This tedious process finished, I still had a potful at my disposal, so, taking a long drink myself, I stripped off my clothes and indulged in a shower bath, Not a luxurious bathe ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... Hoeflinger. He seemed beside himself and positively dangerous. He showed his teeth, looked Hoeflinger up and down and rattled away about crazy hooks, danger to life, and stupidity. Hoeflinger looked at him in amazement and was getting ready to keep him at arm's length. Victor had been so much praised by the tailor's daughter that his conceit had grown; he was firmly convinced that he was the latest guest, not only in her house, but also in her heart. Undisciplined as his mentality was, he forgot ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... We live in a country between you both; the land belongs to neither of you. The Great Being allotted it to us as a residence. So, fathers, I desire you, as I have desired our brothers the English, to withdraw, for I will keep you both at arm's length. Whichever most regards this request, that side will we stand by and consider friends. Our brothers the English have heard this, and I now come to tell it to you, for I am not afraid to order ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... sex then threw themselves into attitudes that would have done honour to a Mendoza; but Sawney's wife, who was a real Lady Barrymore hussey, proved the master at arms. Tall and bony, she slashed her opponent at arm's length, with the cutting force of a Curtis and presently ended her share of ...
— Sinks of London Laid Open • Unknown
... off at arm's length, and then putting on his glasses, "them fellers that thought they was all hogs up West, are havin' a change of heart, are they? I reckoned they would 'fore they got through with it. It's ben ruther a ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott
... sale and purchase of the vast landed estate of the Company had to be accepted from Canada; and the "wintering partners," not made real partners, as recommended by Governor Dallas and myself, but held at arm's length, had, at last, to be compensated for giving up the old "deed poll" with a sum of 107,055l., paid in 1871—ten years after the date of our report to ...
— Canada and the States • Edward William Watkin
... advanc'd With airy step, protected by the shield: At him Meriones with glitt'ring spear Took aim, nor miss'd his mark; the shield's broad orb Of tough bull's-hide it struck; but pass'd not through, For near the head the sturdy shaft was snapp'd. Yet from before his breast Deiphobus Held at arm's length his shield; for much he fear'd The weapon of Meriones; but he Back to his comrades' shelt'ring ranks withdrew, Griev'd at his baffled hopes and broken spear. Then tow'rd the ships he bent his steps, to seek Another spear, which in his tent remain'd. ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... space they cover. You know from your lessons at school that our sun warms and lights up a large number of different worlds like ours, all circling round it in the Heavens. And when you hold up a shilling at arm's length and look at the sky, the shilling covers no less than two hundred of those suns, each with their different little worlds circling around them. And you then begin to realize what an enormous endless space the Heavens comprise. You realize perhaps for the first time the enormous ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... he protested. "I've come twenty-five miles to-day already, and I'm about beat." He slapped the breast pocket of his coat a bit obviously, and as his companion slowed to a walk, produced a silver-mounted, seal-covered flask and proffered it at arm's length. "The cork unscrews to the left," he ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge
... this matter, even if I have bowed in the house of Rimmon." As he said this, he threw himself back, lifting his narrow eyes towards the ceiling; then thrusting out his hand with the despatch at arm's length, he was striding forward, but Ogle intervened ere he had made his ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... Council. Behind Ned's windy bragging Mahony thought he discerned tokens of a fond, brotherly pride. If this were so, the affair had its pathetic side; for, from what the boy said, it was evident that the successful man of business held his relatives at arm's length. And as Ned talked on, Mahony conceived John to himself as a kind of electro-magnet, which, once it had drawn these lesser creatures after it, switched off the current and left them to their own devices. Ned, young as he was, had tried his hand at many ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... for his part, held his turban at arm's length between his finger and thumb, and looked at it with a mixture of reverence and embarrassment highly provocative of laughter. The contemplation over, he was about coolly to deposit the delicate fabric ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... not heard me coming, because of the noise of the wind. They startled me also, as one of them flapped out, close to my face, and flew screaming away, as I pulled myself up into shelter, but the other stood on its jut of rock, almost within arm's length, and looked at me. I saw its ugly long head as it turned, its great beak and its neck of a bird of prey, and then it flew off; and though I sat very still for a long time, hoping they might return, they only flew round me and past me, showing me ...
— Lynton and Lynmouth - A Pageant of Cliff & Moorland • John Presland
... every movement of the army, which, as it slowly neared the Miami towns, was putting itself within easy striking range of the most formidable Indian confederacy in the Northwest. The density of the forest was such that only the utmost watchfulness could prevent the foe from approaching within arm's length unperceived. It behooved St. Clair to be on his guard, and he had been warned by Washington, who had never forgotten the scenes of Braddock's defeat, of the danger of a surprise. But St. Clair was broken down by the worry and by continued sickness; time and again it was doubtful whether ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt
... did not hear but only felt it—made me turn my head quickly. There, not six feet away, a huge head and shoulders were thrust out of the bushes on the bank, and a pair of gleaming eyes were peering intently down upon me in the grass. He had been watching me at arm's length probably two or three minutes. Had a muscle moved in all that time, I have no doubt that he would have sprung upon me. As it was, who can say what was passing behind that curious, half-puzzled, half-savage ...
— Ways of Wood Folk • William J. Long
... to prison, and send him to the Abbaye "for his greater safety." At these significant words from Danton,[2674] he is murdered at the door as he leaves by Rossignol, one of Danton's acolytes, with a pistol-shot at arm's length.—After tragedy comes comedy. At the repeated entreaties of Petion, who does not want to be requisitioned against the rioters,[2675] they send him a guard of 400 men, thus confining him in his own house, and, apparently in ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... had any intention of taking me I might be more grateful," Jean answered, fastening the gown of the doll she was dressing, and holding her at arm's length to enjoy ...
— The Story of Glass • Sara Ware Bassett
... her game was. Previous to his visit she had arranged a meeting with Freddie's fiancee, with the view of opening negotiations for the sale of the letters. She had held him, Jones, at arm's length because she was going to sell the letters to whoever would pay the best price. But for the accident of his happening to be here when Miss Peters arrived, Freddie and his fiancee would have been bidding against each other and raising each other's price. He had worked the same game ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... Even the temporary presence of a jailer is a boon to such, a break in the ghastly solitude. But he was fast succumbing to a despair of reaching across the barrier of this critical silence and he was about to rise and leave when he happened to look about and see Sophie Carr standing within arm's length, gazing at him with a peculiar intentness, a mild look of surprise upon her vivid young ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... with such heinous appetites be compared,) Pleased in some open field to exercise A toy that mimics with revolving wings The motion of a wind-mill; though the air Do of itself blow fresh, and make the vanes 370 Spin in his eyesight, that contents him not, But, with the plaything at arm's length, he sets His front against the blast, and runs amain, That it may whirl the faster. Amid the depth Of those enormities, even thinking minds 375 Forgot, at seasons, whence they had their being; Forgot ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... mingled pain and rage, Farrington endeavoured to free himself from this human wild-cat. He struggled and fought, and at length succeeded in tearing away that writhing, battering form. With one hand he held him at arm's length and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Dan struggled, squirmed and bit, but all in vain; he was held as in a vice. Not satisfied with shaking the lad, Farrington reached over and, seizing a broken ...
— The Fourth Watch • H. A. Cody
... my submission to the inevitable. Before departing, he requests the humble present of a pencil-sketch of the bicycle as a souvenir of my visit to Furrah. During the day I get on quite intimate terms with my guard, and among other things compete with them in the feat of holding a musket out at arm's length, gripping the extreme end of the barrel. Tall, strapping fellows some of them are, but they are not muscular in comparison; out of a round dozen competitors I am the only one capable of ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... thanks and blessings when she came away. Not pride, surely—the great dark fathomless eyes were wondrously sweet and soft; the lips, that might once have been haughty and hard, tender and gentle now, and yet there was a vague, intangible something about her, that held all at arm's length, that let no one come one inch nearer than it was her will they should come. Lady Catheron had been their interest from the first—she was their ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... produced a repellent effect; and it must be confessed that the Grenville strain in his nature dowered him with a fund of more than ordinary English coldness. Such was the opinion not only of the French emigres, whom he designedly kept at arm's length, but even of his followers, to whom his aloofness seemed a violation of the rules of the parliamentary game. But it was not in his nature to expand except in the heat of debate or in congenial society. In general his stiffness was insular, his pre-occupation profound. Lady Hester Stanhope, who ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... me!" Mrs. Lloyd, holding the linen cuff she was embroidering at arm's length, and studying it between half-closed lids. "I am only too glad to turn Mabel over to somebody else part of the time. You don't know what she is when she ...
— The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne • Kathleen Norris
... strange about this," said Mrs. Dunham, as with ruffled dignity she emerged from the hall closet, holding her lost rain-coat at arm's length. "You don't suppose your brother could be playing some kind of a joke on us, do you, Cornie? I never ...
— The Mystery of Mary • Grace Livingston Hill
... the party, decidedly out of his element. He did not like tobacco much, and only took a cigar as a sacrifice to the exigencies of the occasion, consuming the same with great toil and exertion of the lungs, and when he removed it from his lips, holding it at arm's length, like a viper ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... of battle. This was to prevent any sudden or unexpected attack, and this was always liable to occur in the thickly wooded country. The troops were also taught to march in open formation, each file to be more than an arm's length from those on the right and left. The old European system of fighting men shoulder to shoulder was entirely impracticable in a wilderness of woods, for it invited too great a slaughter, interfered with the movement of the troops, and shortened the ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... lastly, though not leastly, Mrs. Vansittart, in ten minutes than Tony Cornish could have learnt in a month of patient investigation. The first five of these ten precious minutes were spent in kissing Dorothy Roden, and admiring her hat, and holding her at arm's length, and saying, with conviction, that she was a dear. Then Joan asked why Dorothy had ceased writing, and Dorothy proved that it was Joan who had been in default, and lo! a bridge was thrown across the years, and they ...
— Roden's Corner • Henry Seton Merriman
... her long before the coming of financial reverses. She was nearing thirty, and in spite of her beauty and the rarer distinction that can best be described as breeding, she had never married. Men admired her, but from a distance; she kept them at arm's length, they said: strangers who visited the city invariably picked her out of an assembly and asked who she was; one man from New York who came to visit Ralph and who had been madly in love with her, she had amazed many people by refusing, spurning all he ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... bowing with a quaint ceremonial gesture that contrasted with and yet somehow matched the homeliness of his greeting. "You slipped in so quiet on them dainty little feet of yours I never heared you comin' a-tall." He took her small hands in his broad pudgy ones, holding her off at arm's length. "And don't you look purty! Mighty nigh any woman looks cool and sweet when she's got on white fixin's, but when a girl like you puts 'em on—well, child, there ain't no use talkin', you shorely are ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... anything that was thrown in for him. Sometimes he came to meals. He was very quiet and shy. He blushed a good deal. And there was a weight on his mind. He had a condition to make up—political economy. He could hold Jock and Hurry out at arm's length, one in each hand, but the weight on his mind was too much for him. Every time the Fultons mentioned it to him, he groaned. He was truly comical when he groaned. Toward autumn he began to get gloomy. Summer was over, college would open. No more sails; no more Mrs. Fulton. Below ...
— We Three • Gouverneur Morris
... She acknowledged all that went before, even in its application to herself; but she was not willing, or certainly she was not ready, to take the pains and bear the restraint that should make her and it at one. She did not put the case so fairly before herself. She kept that fourth verse at arm's length, as it were, conscious that it held something she could not get over; unconscious what was the precise why. She rushed back to her conclusion that the Bible teaching was unsatisfactory, and that she wanted other; and so travelling ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... they occupied, and it was said that none of them could have endured the position for a moment but for plentiful doses of opium. Next passed a girl standing on the moving platform, holding a spear at arm's length, and a three-year-old girl standing on its point. Then a little boy holding a long rod from which was suspended a tiny child. A girl passed sitting on a stool and holding a sword by its point with a child of four suspended from its handle, and next a girl holding a sword by ...
— Heathen Slaves and Christian Rulers • Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew and Katharine Caroline Bushnell
... the Wondersmith had stridden a few paces, and grasped the poor cripple, who was yet quivering with the departing thunder of his passion. He seized him in his bony, muscular grasp, as he would have seized a puppet, and held him at arm's length gasping and powerless; while Zonla, pale, breathless, entreating, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... wicked we are, and how good they were then! They kept at arm's length those detestable men; What an era of virtue she lived in!—But stay Were the men all such ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... believe that they were possessors of the philosopher's stone, if it were once suspected that they did not know how to procure bread for their subsistence. They still gained a little by casting nativities, and kept starvation at arm's length, till a new dupe, rich enough for their purposes, dropped into their toils, in the shape of a royal personage. Having procured an introduction to Stephen king of Poland, they predicted to him that ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... mount and dash off, I did not run. I stepped into the middle of the road and faced the beast. Of course, he stopped, stood still and stared at me. I walked towards him, very deliberately, even pausing between paces, till I was an arm's length from him. He cringed and cowered. I took him by the scruff of his neck, turned him round, led him back to his cage, which was not broken, only jarred open, made him enter it, and closed ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... cried Prescott, cheerily, picking up a wee little girl of four and holding her at arm's length. "Hello, you're crying. ...
— The High School Boys' Training Hike • H. Irving Hancock
... stamping and struggling, and the noise of hoarse, quick shouts and the rebound of bodies falling and rolling upon the hard, smooth beach. The thing had not been a farce, after all. This was fighting at last, and there within arm's length were men grappling and gripping and hitting one another, each honestly striving to kill his fellow—Chinamen all, fighting in barbarous Oriental fashion with nails and teeth when the knife or hatchet failed. What did he, clubman and college man, in that hideous trouble that wrought ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... the bridle; and Pegasus darted down aslant, as swift as the flight of an arrow, right towards the Chimaera's threefold head, which, all this time, was poking itself as high as it could into the air. As he came within arm's length, Bellerophon made a cut at the monster, but was carried onward by his steed, before he could see whether the blow had been successful. Pegasus continued his course, but soon wheeled round, at about the same distance from the Chimaera as before. Bellerophon ...
— My First Cruise - and Other stories • W.H.G. Kingston
... never to be reckoned upon. Didn't you hear what he called her. La Forno-Populo? Englishmen never talk of a lady like that if they have any great respect for her; but it can't be denied that this lady has a great deal of charm. And I would just keep her at arm's length, Lucy, if ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... serenely, holding the rich corded silk at arm's length, and half closing her eyes as she readjusted the deep flounce of Spanish lace. "Remember, we shall ride and dance and play games together for a week with all of you, dear friends, before I go away with him. I shall know him quite well by that time. And did ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... advanced towards him with a menacing gesture. Immediately Faustina's sisters-in-law began to whimper and cry with fright, while her brothers made undecided movements as though wishing to part the two angry men, but afraid to come within arm's length ...
— Sant' Ilario • F. Marion Crawford
... holding it out at arm's length that he might see, but when his eye rested on the familiar characters he uttered a sharp, inarticulate cry and let it fall. The blood rushed to his face till it was crimson, and then receding, left him ...
— David Fleming's Forgiveness • Margaret Murray Robertson
... Jamie backed faster, his haunches dropped, his feet slipping under him. Lance dared not crowd him, dared not reach for the bridle, still more than an arm's length away. So Jamie came out of the Slide backwards, saw with a sudden panic-stricken toss of his head that he had open daylight all around him, whirled short and gave one headlong leap away from the place that had terrified ...
— Rim o' the World • B. M. Bower
... it," cried Father Brown, holding out the crooked knife at arm's length, as if it were some glittering snake. "Don't you see it is the wrong shape? Don't you see that it has no hearty and plain purpose? It does not point like a spear. It does not sweep like a scythe. It does not look like a weapon. It looks like an ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... shoulders, these notes which bore so much the atmosphere of Crooked Lane, and at the same time they formed the indictment against her which was, perhaps, best calculated to weigh upon her conscience. She saw it, holding them at arm's length, in enormous characters that ever stamped and blotted out the careful, taught-looking writing, and the invariable "God bless you, yours truly," at the end. They were all there, aridly complete, the limitations of the lady to whom she was helping Lindsay ...
— The Path of a Star • Mrs. Everard Cotes (AKA Sara Jeannette Duncan)
... overthrew the Brunswickers; the 8th of cuirassiers defeated two Scotch battalions, and took from them a flag. The 11th, equally intrepid, pursued them to the entrance of the wood: but the wood, which had not been examined, was lined with English infantry. Our cuirassiers were assailed by a fire at arm's length, which at once carried dismay and confusion into their ranks. Some of the officers, lately incorporated with them, instead of appeasing the disorder, increased it by shouts of "Every one for himself (sauve qui peut!)" ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... held him at coolest arm's length, and repelled any slightest attempt at abridgment of the distance, he still rejoiced in the sight of her and found the world good because of her presence ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... great space) 180; to the uttermost parts, to the ends of the earth; out of hearing, nobody knows where, a perte de vue [Fr.], out of the sphere of, wide of the mark; a far cry to. apart, asunder; wide apart, wide asunder; longo intervallo [It]; at arm's length. Phr. distance lends enchantment [Campbell]; it's a long long way to Tipperary; out of sight, out ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... Roberts, who, after all, was the boldest man of the party, seized the tongs from the landlord, and, kneeling cautiously down, slowly raised the drapery that surrounded the bed. "Hold the light here, landlord." He did so, but at arm's length. Roberts peeped timidly into the dark void beyond, dropped the valance, and looked up with a comical, quizzing expression, and ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... pistol, and my father drew the ramrod, thrust it down the barrel, and gave it two or three taps to make sure that it was not loaded. Then replacing the ramrod he cocked it, held it at arm's length, and drew ...
— Devon Boys - A Tale of the North Shore • George Manville Fenn
... far better than that was, Sylvia." He held her off at arm's length, and viewed her deliberately. "We had the sunshine outside that day. This ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham
... on the slope. Stewart was armed with a "Colt's Army," while I had a double-barreled shot-gun, loaded with buckshot. I was sitting on the double-tree, on the right side of the tongue, which was propped up with the neck-yoke. Stewart sat on the tongue, about an arm's length ahead of me, I holding my gun between my knees, with the butt on the ground. Stewart was getting off one of his stories, and, had about reached the climax, when I saw something running low to the ground, in among the stock. Thinking ...
— In the Early Days along the Overland Trail in Nebraska Territory, in 1852 • Gilbert L. Cole
... to cry the name a third time, for before the Provost-Marshal could do more than start at this unexpected action, the landing above us rang under a heavy tread, and the man I called, descending the stairs swiftly, appeared on a sudden within arm's length of M. de Bruhl; who, turning with an oath, saw him, and involuntarily recoiled. At all times Maignan's hardy and confident bearing was of a kind to impress the strong; but on this occasion there was an added dash of recklessness in his ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... could not be done, in war, till the people were roused to the necessity of doing it; and that awakening was still far distant. Even New York, the only exposed colony, except Massachusetts and New Hampshire, regarded the war merely as a nuisance to be held at arm's length. [Footnote: See note at ...
— Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV • Francis Parkman
... into its pattern for a while, held the guitar out at arm's length; and, holding it so, broke into a short laugh—at the thought that this thing had ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... vestibule, the blood leaped to Leo's cheeks, but she walked quickly forward, and met her visitor just beneath the "Salve" in the scroll of olives, putting out her hands across the onyx table with its red and black bowl of violets. Thus at arm's length, she held him ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... her irony and her apparent lack of warmth were mere matters of calculation. Her plan was to inspire him with trepidation, to keep him always at arm's length, for his own safety as well as hers. She knew something of men. Even the best, if suddenly thrown into an affair so strange as this, might commit an irreparable blunder; and this she did not want Hillard to do. ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... two Trans-Tiber rabbis in long solemn robes and mitred, a young copyist, their assistant, together with Chilo. At sight of Caesar the priests grew pale from emotion, and, raising their hands an arm's length, bent their ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... and numerous accessions. His grounds of disaffection were that he suspected the shogun of a design to deprive him of the two provinces of Kii and Izumi, which were far remote from the other five provinces in his jurisdiction and which placed him within arm's length of Kyoto, and, further, that no sufficient reward had been given to the family of his younger brother, who fell in battle. There were minor grievances, but evidently all were pretexts: the real object was to overthrow Muromachi. The shogun, Yoshimitsu, acted with great promptitude. He ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... my darling!" said little Mrs. Aylmer. Florence kissed her with a quick passion, held her then at arm's length, looked into her face, and crushed some moisture out of ...
— A Bunch of Cherries - A Story of Cherry Court School • L. T. Meade
... wait to weigh the remark; indeed he did not hear it, for like a bull-dog in a fury he lunged at the quiet man's throat, laid hold of his collar, shoved him off to arm's length, and struck him, but the blow glanced and the man jerked away. And then amid loud cries, the over-turning of tables and the smashing of glasses, the furious youngster felt himself seized by many ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read
... commonplace, although we may not either of us be able to understand or explain it. My private opinion and worse misgiving is, that there is some woman concealed about the place. If ever I find myself in arm's length of that little gipsy, I shall intercept her, even at the risk of receiving such a spiritual-shock as that which struck Mrs. Alicia Dubarry to the ground," said Lyon, facetiously; for he might well make a jest of this lighter affair of ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... father! Indeed it is," said Cardo, standing up and taking his favourite attitude, with his elbow on the mantelpiece. "Why do you keep me at arm's length? Why do you not tell me plainly what I can do for you, father? There is nothing I would not do, nothing I would not sacrifice, that is—" and he made a mental ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... remove his prisoner, and declared himself quite ready. Therefore, the constable, still holding Kit in the same manner, and pushing him on a little before him, so as to keep him at about three-quarters of an arm's length in advance (which is the professional mode), thrust him into the vehicle and followed himself. Miss Sally entered next; and there being now four inside, Sampson Brass got upon the box, and ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... Islam, with all its jealousy and exclusiveness, had recovered its grasp over Central Asia; the Nestorian Christianity which once had prevailed so widely was vanishing, and the new rulers of China reverted to the old national policy, and held the foreigner at arm's length. Night descended upon the farther East, covering Cathay with those cities of which the old travellers had told such marvels, Cambaluc and Cansay, Zayton and Chinkalan. And when the veil rose before the Portuguese and Spanish explorers ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... such a volume as a man may give to a woman, albeit that woman is his mother, his sister, or his wife, and is richly worth the place it claims on a lower shelf within arm's length, in the most select ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About
... you been?" said he, holding me at arm's length, so that the light from the door fell on my face. "We have both been so busy that we forgot you until about half an hour ago." He led me into the room and sat me down in the deck chair. For awhile I was blinded by the light. "We did not think ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells
... streets in the town of Jubbulpore, quite covered with the nests of the baya birds; and they are seen, every day and all day, fluttering and chirping about there in scores, while the noisy children at their play fill the street below, almost within arm's length of them. I have often thought that such a tree so peopled at the door of a school in England might work a great revolution in the early habits and propensities of the youth educated in it. The European ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... of the land, but he knows not yet the manner by which their confidence may be won, and they, on their side, know him for a stranger within their gates, view him with keen suspicion, and hold him at arm's length. His ideas, his prejudices, his modes of thought, his views on every conceivable subject differ too widely from their own, for immediate sympathy to be possible between him and them. His habits are the habits of a white man, and many little things, ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford |
