"Button" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... frequent attempts at more soldierly costume in the shape of worn tunics of the French National Guards or Moblots, and some half-dozen uniforms of the Spanish Line, with the glazed kepi exchanged for the boina. On the top of many of the boinas, fastening the tassel, was a huge brass button, with the monogram of the "King," and the inscription, "Voluntarios, Dios, Patria, y Rey." Another sign particular of this irregular force that impressed me much was a bleeding heart embroidered on a small ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea
... the beginning. After a while he starts writing you fan letters, wanting autographed portraits, wanting a souvenir—sometimes nothing more exciting than a button off your uniform. More often they want a gun, sword or combat knife, particularly one they saw you using in some fracas or other. They usually offer to pay for such, sometimes quite fabulous amounts. Other times they want a bit of bloody ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... lake. Regular amphitheater of mountains. Reminds one of the Psalmist's description of Jerusalem." Darting here and there, trying to get snap-shots, were two "kodak fiends," two city girls who pointed the thing at you, bungled over it, reset it, pressed the button, and giggled as they flew off. They fairly bubbled over with delight as they saw Job, and debated how much to offer to get him to sit for a scene of rustic ...
— The Transformation of Job - A Tale of the High Sierras • Frederick Vining Fisher
... perturbation of the lights in the tunnel, but did not extinguish them. Five minutes later the work of disconnection and reconnection began, but only two of the six charges were ready for the pressure of the button when the last flash interrupted the proceedings. The fact that the time of the explosion corresponded to the second with that of the aerial electrical discharge furnishes indubitable evidence that the accident was not caused by any carelessness ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 324, March 18, 1882 • Various
... train's gone and left us! I knew it would, when Sallie stopped to put the starch on her face all over again. And Cousin James, he's as slow as molasses, and I couldn't dress two twins in not time to button one baby. Oh, damn, oh, damn!" And the sobs rose to a ...
— The Tinder-Box • Maria Thompson Daviess
... to itself, and Nature had, moreover, wrote gentleman with so fair a hand in every line of his countenance, that even his tarnished gold-laced hat and huge cockade of flimsy taffeta became him; and, tho not worth a button in themselves, yet the moment my uncle Toby put them on, they became serious objects, and, altogether, seemed to have been picked up by the hand of Science to ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IV (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland II • Various
... these papers should influence to patronise merit in distress, without any other solicitation, were directed to be left at Button's Coffee-house; and Mr. Savage going thither a few days afterwards, without expectation of any effect from his proposal, found, to his surprise, seventy guineas, which had been sent him in consequence of the compassion excited by Mr. ...
— Lives of the Poets: Addison, Savage, and Swift • Samuel Johnson
... this unpleasant impression deepens. In the "little Mother Isle" I have just left, bus-drivers have quite a coaching air, with hat and coat of knowing form. They sport flowers in their button- holes and salute other bus-drivers, when they meet, with a twist of whip and elbow refreshingly correct, showing that they take pride in their calling, and have been at some pains to turn themselves out as smart in ...
— Worldly Ways and Byways • Eliot Gregory
... an armoury, and all kinds of weapons for military practice were kept in it. Each had helped himself to his foil. One of the weapons was without a button, and sharp enough to be dangerous in the hands of an angry man. I noticed that my antagonist had ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid
... incapable of reasoning. He went around vaguely examining his rooms, peering behind curtains and even moving bits of furniture, as if Mlle. Fouchette were the elusive collar-button and might have rolled out of sight somewhere among ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... these papers are really what they profess to be, done at bye-hours. Dulce est desipere, when in its fit place and time. Moreover, let me tell my young doctor friends, that a cheerful face, and step, and neckcloth, and button-hole, and an occasional hearty and kindly joke, a power of executing and setting agoing a good laugh, are stock in our trade not to be despised. The merry heart does good like a medicine. Your pompous man, and your selfish man, don't laugh much, or care for laughter; it discomposes the fixed ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... Jacob Dyer and his wife. "I never saw the doctor so taken with a child before. 'Twas a pity he had to lose his own, and his wife too; how many years ago was it? I should think he'd be lonesome, though to be sure he isn't in the house much. Marilla Thomas keeps his house as clean as a button and she has been a good stand-by for him, but it always seemed sort o' homesick there ever since the day I was to his wife's funeral. She made an awful sight o' friends considering she was so little while in the place. Well I'm glad ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... The same person blows the bellows, stirs or mends the fire as there is occasion, heats the iron, and forges every part of the nail: in forging the head, too, he is obliged to change his tools. The different operations into which the making of a pin, or of a metal button, is subdivided, are all of them much more simple, and the dexterity of the person, of whose life it has been the sole business to perform them, is usually much greater. The rapidity with which some of the operations of those manufactures are performed, ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... were back at the compression chamber, and at the touch of a button the blasts were silenced from ...
— Wanted—7 Fearless Engineers! • Warner Van Lorne
... Fouquet, touching him on the shoulder; "there are certain kindnesses which can never be repaid. This profit is only what you have earned; but the interest of your money still remains to be arranged." And, saying this, he unfastened from his sleeve a diamond button, which the goldsmith himself had often valued at three thousand pistoles. "Take this," he said to the goldsmith, "in remembrance of me. Farewell; you ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... button wanst I escaped from the eye of your father; anyhow, bad luck to it for whiskey; I have a murdherin' big heddick all day ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... the door and endeavoring to button his collar at the back, "reminds me of an afternoon in the Argentine. Two other men and myself tried for three quarters of an hour to get into an empty house, where there looked as if there might be something to eat, and we'd just got ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse
... for a locality unsavory beyond credence! ... As they emerged on the street level and turned west on Bermondsey Wall, Kirkwood was fain to tug his top-coat over his chest and button it tight, to hide his linen. In a guarded tone he counseled his companion to do likewise; and Calendar, after a moment's blank, uncomprehending stare, acknowledged the wisdom of the advice with ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... the wounded member. "You put in a regular button-hole stitch," said he, grinning, "didn't you? About three stitches would have been plenty. You put in about two dozen—and with black thread! Like ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... top of the stairs an entrance slide showed darker on the left. Wat fumbled for a moment until he found the button. The door whirred open, even as they heard Joan's clear voice below: "Come in, Magnificents!" There was a ...
— Slaves of Mercury • Nat Schachner
... of the old soldier. He wore a hat rather wide in the brim; a high stiff checked cravat; a white vest; and lacquered military boots, over which his tightly-strapped trousers fell without a crease. He had white buckskin gloves, a stout silver-headed malacca cane, and carried a choice geranium in his button-hole. ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 2, February, 1891 • Various
... to button his frock-coat against the outer cold. If only to oust this 'Ophelia,' he must be at the ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... exceedingly disconcerted. He knows not what to do with his hands or his hat, but either puts one of them in his pocket, and dangles the other by his side: or perhaps twirls his hat on his fingers, or perhaps fumbles with the button. If spoken to he is in a much worse situation; he answers with the utmost difficulty, and nearly stammers; whereas a gentleman who is acquainted with life, enters a room with gracefulness and a modest assurance; addresses even persons he does ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... never do! Look at mine now,' and turning out his pockets, he displayed a double-bladed knife containing several implements, including a corkscrew and an attachment for extracting stones from horses' feet, a piece of string, a watch spring, twenty or thirty shot, a button, a magnet, a cog-wheel, a pencil, a match-box, a case of foreign stamps all stuck together with salt water, a whistle, a halfpenny with a hole in it, and a soaked and swollen cigar which ...
— The Flamp, The Ameliorator, and The Schoolboy's Apprentice • E. V. Lucas
... action, as in the Florentine, the hopper rises with the key. To the direct leverage of Cristofori's first action, Backers combined the check of the second, and then added an important invention of his own, a regulating screw and button for the escapement. Backers died in 1776. It is unfortunate we can refer to no pianoforte made by him. I should regard it as treasure trove if one were forthcoming in the same way that brought to light the authentic one of Stein's. As, however, Backers' ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 385, May 19, 1883 • Various
... Snitchey,' he continued, rising and taking him by the button, 'and Craggs,' taking him by the button also, and placing one partner on either side of him, so that neither might evade him. 'I don't ask you for any advice. You are right to keep quite aloof ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens
... next floor. Julius preceded us down the thickly carpeted corridor leading the way to a large apartment, or rather a suite of rooms, as handsomely furnished as any in other hotels. He switched on the lights and left us, with the remark, "When you want the waiter or anything, just press the button." ...
— The Ear in the Wall • Arthur B. Reeve
... stood up and languidly surveyed the house through their opera-glasses, Kavanagh had a sardonic amusement in the recollection as he thought that a fortnight before he had sat in that fourth stall in the third row, in evening dress, with a gardenia in his button-hole, and had similarly inspected the inferior beings around him. Froggy Barton occupied that seat to- night. Kavanagh took a squeeze at his orange, and thought he could hit Froggy with the skin. But of course ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... at work on a button on his gaiter (gaiters were then worn tight at the ankle); the effort brought ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Chinese mandarins, stood disclosed in all their charms. The lady of this mansion was seated at table covered with works of a different description: it exhibited the various arts of woman, in regular gradation, from the painted card-rack and gilded firescreen, to the humble thread-paper and shirt-button. Mrs. Fox was a fine, fashionable-looking woman, with a smooth skin, and still smoother address. She received her visitors with that overstrained complaisance which, to Mary's nicer tact, at once discovered that all was hollow; but poor Miss Grizzy was scarcely seated before she was already transfixed ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... me. Let a woman say something at a dinner or a reception, and my neck would begin to swell like a pouter pigeon's and my collar would close down like a pair of hedge clippers centered at the back collar button. This would cause no alarm in the young woman, for she would imagine the choking symptoms were only signs of an embarrassment produced by her interest in me. This would not have been a bad thing, for bashful men always get the most encouragement, and if persistently bashful, are ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... three days enjoyed there in his hotel bedroom; but evidently his languor of charity needed some admonition finer than any it might trust to chance for, and by the time he at last, Winch's residence recognised, was duly elevated to his level and had pressed the electric button at his door, he felt himself acting indeed as under stimulus of a sharp poke in ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James
... her throat, where it shone like the jet ring which fantastic nature had fastened round the tail of a white angora cat. She knew all the little tricks of a girl who seeks to marry; her fingers arranged her curls which were not in the least out of order; she entreated Rogron to fasten a cuff-button, thus showing him her wrist, a request which that dazzled fool rudely refused, hiding his emotions under the mask of indifference. The timidity of the only love he was ever to feel in the whole course of his life took an external appearance of dislike. ...
— Pierrette • Honore de Balzac
... and roughly pushed his employer into the time machine as the mob burst through. "Push the starting button, push the starting button. Quick!" he screamed as the first ...
— Benefactor • George H. Smith
... method that Germany could suggest if mine were not acceptable. In fact, mediation was ready to come into operation by any method that Germany thought possible, if only Germany would 'press the button' in the interests ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... herself in the mirror, she almost laughed aloud. The night-dress was of thick, unbleached muslin, made with tight bands to button around the neck and wrists. These bands were edged with a row of narrow tatting; and it was this trimming, Patty felt sure, that differentiated Miss Winthrop's best night-gown from her others. Then Patty tried on the dressing-gown, which was of dark grey flannel. This, too, ...
— Patty's Social Season • Carolyn Wells
... steps as though pursued. Eph went after him as soon as that youth with the sun-kissed hair had time to pull on his visored cap and button his blouse. No matter what the need of haste, Somers never appeared on deck looking less natty than ...
— The Submarine Boys for the Flag - Deeding Their Lives to Uncle Sam • Victor G. Durham
... made between their girls and her own daughter. Then it was common talk that old Jim Norton, for obvious reasons, was displeased with Joe's matrimonial plans, but Mrs. Robinson professed to believe that the wife and daughter were really the ones disappointed. Now Esther began twisting a button of Joe's coat. ...
— Different Girls • Various
... a state of delight ever since his favourite 93rd landed five days ago.[43] He went to see them on board their transport before they disembarked, and when Lord Canning asked how he found them, replied that the only thing amiss was that they had become too fat on the voyage, and could not button their coats. But, indeed, all the troops of the China force have been landed in the highest possible condition of health and vigour. The 23rd, from its large proportion of young soldiers, is perhaps the one most likely to suffer from the climate and the hardships ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... the trunk was an inlaid box that she did not remember having seen before. She slid back the cover and found a lace handkerchief, a broken cuff-button, a gold locket enamelled with black, a long fan-chain of gold, set with amethysts, a small gold-framed mirror evidently meant to be carried in a purse or hand-bag, a high shell comb inlaid with gold and set with amethysts, and ...
— Flower of the Dusk • Myrtle Reed
... wanderings—O, stop! I didn't tell you why I was going to write you—well, I went on Thursday to dine with Governor and Mrs. Fish, a dinner in honor of me—and before I went I arrayed myself in a certain white garment of which the collar-button-holes had been altered, and I thought of the kind, friendly little hand that had done that deed for me; and when the Fisheses told me how they lived in the Second Avenue (I had forgotten all about 'em)—their house and the house opposite came back to my mind, ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... When a button rolls under the bureau The search is a woeful affair; And the humorous weekly describes it but meekly In saying the hunter will swear. But what is that limited anger? The impotent rage of a cub! I only grow what you could really call hot When the soap ...
— Tobogganing On Parnassus • Franklin P. Adams
... degrees, as that swells, the skin cleaves, and at length falls off, with its thorny top and all (which is a part of it) and leaves the seed Case to ripen, and by degrees, to shatter out its seed at a place underneath this cap, B, which before the seed is ripe, appears like a flat barr'd button, without any hole in the middle; but as it ripens, the button grows bigger, and a hole appears in the middle of it, E, out of which, in all probability, the seed falls: For as it ripens by a provision of Nature, that end of this Case turns downward after the same manner as the ears ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... the wooden "button" that fastened the door from the inside. At once it was snatched from his hand and flung open. A burst of wind rioted in, extinguished the candle, flared up the fire in the stove, and hurled a loose ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... left alone! An' how quick I get my own skates strapped on,—none o' your new-fangled skates with springs an' plates an' clamps an' such, but honest, ol'-fashioned wooden ones with steel runners that curl up over my toes an' have a bright brass button on the end! How I strap 'em and lash 'em and buckle 'em on! An' Laura waits for me an' tells me to be sure to get 'em on tight enough,—why, bless me! after I once got 'em strapped on, if them skates hed come off, the feet w'u'd ha' come with 'em! An' now away we go,—Laura ...
— A Little Book of Profitable Tales • Eugene Field
... coolness could seem to prevent. In the meantime the casual manner of the little grey horse struck Coleman with maddening vividness. If the blank darkness was simply filled with ferocious Albanians, the horse did not care a button; he leisurely put his feet down with a resounding ring. Coleman whispered hastily to the dragoman. " If they rush us, jump down the bank, no matter how deep it is. That's our only chance. And try ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... convince us, but that they carry to our senses almost an assurance of their own inefficiency. When we hear that a people have declared their intention of being henceforward better than their neighbors, and going upon a new theory that shall lead them direct to a terrestrial paradise, we button up our pockets and lock up our spoons. And that is what we have done very much as regards the Americans. We have walked with them and talked with them, and bought with them and sold with them; but we have mistrusted them as ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... closed door—he did not seek admission there at all; but climbing, unseen, a small, bushy-topped, live oak, which grew beside the wall, he leaped, without sound or warning, through a lofty window. He was clothed altogether in buckskin, carried a long and heavy rifle in his hand, wore at the button of his left suspender a large bowie-knife, and had in his leathern belt a couple of pistols half the length of his gun. He was tall, straight as an arrow, active as a panther in his motions, with dark complexion, ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... remember the Forsythes; they used to visit here; let me see, fifteen years ago was the last time, I think. Well, they are going to take the empty house near us for the summer. She was a Robinson; not really Ashurst people, you know, not born here, but quite respectable. Her father was a button manufacturer, and he left her a great deal of money. She married a person called Forsythe, who has since died. She has one boy, about your age, who'll be immensely rich one of these days; he is not married. Heaven knows ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... full gas and tail up at once. Through the interpreter, our moniteur explained very carefully what we were to do, and mounted the step, to show us, in turn, the proper handling of the gas manet and of the coupe-contact button. Then he stepped down and shouted, "Allez! en route!" with a ...
— High Adventure - A Narrative of Air Fighting in France • James Norman Hall
... night we met," she said, passionately, "I found a carnation you had worn in your button-hole. I put it under my pillow, and felt for it in the dark like a talisman. You had stood between me and Lady Henry twice. You had smiled at me and pressed my hand—not as others did, but as though you understood me, myself—as though, at least, you wished to ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... even after you have paid your fee, to add with stentorian emphasis: "I had forgotten one caution: avoid kippered sturgeon as you would the very devil!" The unfortunate Joseph was cut to the pattern of Sir Faraday in every button; he was shod with the health boot; his suit was of genuine ventilating cloth; his shirt of hygienic flannel, a somewhat dingy fabric; and he was draped to the knees in the inevitable greatcoat of marten's fur. The very railway porters at Bournemouth (which was a favourite ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... beautifully hung, some with silk and some with cashmere, some with tent drapery, with end ottomans, and lamps in profusion. These rooms, with busts and pictures of kings, swarmed with old nobility, with historic names, stars, red ribbons, and silver bells at their button-holes: ladies in little white satin hats and toques, with a profusion of ostrich or, still better, marabout powder-puff feathers; and the roofs were too low for ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... on a' Sabbath! He was three times at the kirk, an' he roostit an' sang till the bit lassies i' the very koir lookit aboot akinda feard like. But Sandy never jowed his jundie. He put in anither button o' his coat, an' stack in till the Auld Hunder like the Jook o' Wellinton at the battle o' Waterloo. The koir sang an anthem i' the efternune, an' Sandy sang anither at the same time, the rest o' the fowk harkenin' to the competition. Sandy gaed squawlin' an' squawkin' up an' doon ...
— My Man Sandy • J. B. Salmond
... females come into my stall. The roan pony, wot's got sentimental thro' being everlasting driven in the governess-cart, sez she was a pretty young woman. I never noticed nothing 'bout 'er 'cept the pink rose in 'er button-'ole. I never 'eard tell of a farm 'and with a pink rose in 'is shirt before. Maybe such carryings on is all right for they grooms an' kerridge-'orses, but it ain't 'ardly decent for a respectable farm 'orse. So when this 'ere woman come ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 29, 1917 • Various
... "Bless my collar button!" cried Mr. Damon. "It's like the puzzle of the fox, the goose and the bag of corn on the banks of a stream. I guess ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Runabout - or, The Speediest Car on the Road • Victor Appleton
... paper, he undid a button of Benita's blouse and thrust it away there, knowing that thus she would certainly find it should she survive. Then he stepped out on to the deck to see what was happening. The vessel still steamed, but made slow progress; moreover, the list to starboard ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... said Tony between his teeth. He hit up with his left at the keeper's wrist. The hand on his collar loosed its grip. Its owner rushed, and as he came, Tony hit him in the parts about the third waistcoat-button with his right. He staggered and fell. Tony hit very hard when the spirit ...
— The Pothunters • P. G. Wodehouse
... suddenly they fell on something—a crushed and rumpled hat of her own, a milliner's masterpiece, laden with florid plumage, lying almost behind him on a couch end where some prying detective had dropped it, with a big, round black button shining dully from the midst of its damaged tulle crown. She knew that button well. It was the imitation-jet head of a hatpin—a steel hatpin—that was ten inches ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... him? Well, they talk of a Jew's eye; give me a woman's. My dear, the second-hand description is not worth a button. I must write fresh notices from yours, and, above all, instruct the detectives. You have given me information that will lead to that man's capture. As for the gold ring and the tweed suit, they disappeared ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... the sorceress in a simple but rich dress. Her peplos was fastened on the shoulder, not by an ordinary gold pin, but by a button which betrayed her taste for fine jewels, as it consisted of a sapphire of remarkable size; this had at once caught the eye of the witch, showing her that she had to deal with a woman of rank and wealth. She ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... swell cop who is with the missus—shining topper, button-hole, buckskin gloves, patent leathers, all complete. Footmen ain't in it with ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... supercilious smile at Mr Chegg's toes, then raised his eyes from them to his ankles, from that to his shin, from that to his knee, and so on very gradually, keeping up his right leg, until he reached his waistcoat, when he raised his eyes from button to button until he reached his chin, and travelling straight up the middle of his nose came at last to his eyes, ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... implored Morris, tugging at a button on his jacket, and fixing a studious, inquiring gaze ...
— The Little Gold Miners of the Sierras and Other Stories • Various
... of the waggons. There were a good many people about, and those near paused and looked at her transit, in the full stroke of the level October sun, which went under the brims of their hats, and pierced through their button-holes. From the group she heard murmured ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... Rhineland. The action of the Courts of Vienna and London was not unlike that of the sun and the wind in the proverbial saw. Viennese suavity induced Bonaparte to take off his coat and show himself as he really was: while the conscientious bluster of Grenville and Pitt made the First Consul button up his coat, and pose as ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... Miss Allan. "Then I consider that it is your duty to try now. Why, you may add a new pleasure to life, and as you are still young—" She wondered whether a button-hook would do. "I make it a rule to try everything," she said. "Don't you think it would be very annoying if you tasted ginger for the first time on your death-bed, and found you never liked anything so much? I ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... is obtained in the form of a button, by mixing thoroughly 100 parts of dried chloride of silver, 70 parts of chalk or whitening, and 4 parts of charcoal. This mixture is to be exposed in a crucible to a fierce red heat for at least half an hour. When completely cold the crucible is broken, and a ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 238, May 20, 1854 • Various
... I don't mind telling 'ee I've been through a fire of temptation. You know why I jumped into that boat: it vexed you a bit, I dare say. And strickly speakin', mind you"—Billy took his friend by the button-hole—"strickly speakin' I'd the right on my side. 'Let the best man win' was our agreement. But you needn' to fret yourself: I ben't the man to take an advantage of an old friend, fair though it be. Man, I ha'n't been to Ardevora—I turned back. So finish your beer and come'st along with me, ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... theatre—or when that was closed at the Rossini— and might have been supposed absorbed by her professional duties. It proved necessary, however, that she should hover about the premises in a velvet jacket and a pair of black kid gloves with one little white button; as also, that she should apply a thick coating of powder to her face, which had a charming oval and a sweet weak expression, like that of most of the Venetian maidens, who, as a general thing—it was not a peculiarity of the ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... of England. In this voyage he reached the strait which bears his name: his crew mutinied at this place, and setting him on shore, returned to England. As soon as the Russia Company learned the fate of Hudson, they sent one Captain Button in search of him, and also to explore the straits which he had discovered: in this voyage Hudson's Bay was discovered. Button's journal was never published: it is said, however, to have contained some important observations on the tides, and other ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... over the gate and the supporting piers, and discovered a bell, evidently brand new, and recently fixed. He made no attempt to press the little white button, but continued his reconnaissance. About half-a-dozen yards inside the gateway was a small cottage, from which a light showed, and apparently the bell communicated with this dwelling. Whilst he was waiting, he heard a whistle and a quick ...
— The Daffodil Mystery • Edgar Wallace
... saw; the wood is very brittle, and easily split; there is a very little variety of sorts, having seen but two. The leaves of one are long and narrow; and the seed (of which I got a few) is in the shape of a button, and has a very agreeable smell. The leaves of the other are like the bay, and it has a seed like the white thorn, with an agreeable spicy taste and smell. Out of the trees we cut down for fire-wood, there issued some gum, which the surgeon called ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Volume 1 • James Cook
... habits to which, in their native soil, they had been strangers. Every small litterateur wore conspicuously his cunningly entwined wreath. Ladies appeared at 'aesthetic tea-parties,' crowned with the most delicate of the new importations. Young clergymen were not complete without a flower in their button-holes, and the tables of staid old professors groaned beneath the weight of huge pyramidal bouquets. The cursory examination of foreign literature had given rise to an eclecticism which reflected the distinguishing ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... lbs. Two men sufficed to raise it and to fill it with gas, but it took eight to hold it down till the signal was given. The different pieces of the covering were fastened together with buttons and button-holes. It remained ten minutes in the air, but the loss of gas by the button-holes, and by other imperfections, did not permit it to continue longer. The wind at the moment of the ascent was from the north. ...
— Wonderful Balloon Ascents - or, the Conquest of the Skies • Fulgence Marion
... manufacture. The other girls were busy over various kinds of fashionable fancy-work, but the little Bothams were expected, in their leisure moments, to make half-a-dozen linen shirts for their father, button-holes and all. They had never learnt to net, to weave coloured paper into baskets, to plait split straw into patterns, nor any of the other amateur handicrafts of the day. But they were clever with their fingers, and could copy almost anything that they had seen done. 'We could buckle ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... than four now, honey. Let me button your nightgown, and lie down and try to go to sleep while mamma sings to you. Does your throat ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... all right," said Arthur, though somehow he did not feel as wildly delighted as he should have done at hearing it so clearly demonstrated that Mildred did not care a brass button about him; but then that is human nature. Between eighteen and thirty-five, ninety per cent. of the men in the world would like to centre in themselves the affections of every young and pretty ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... spats, turned from the breezy, open window to inspect him; the lean, well groomed, rather lank type of gentleman suggesting a retired colonel of cavalry; unmistakably well bred from the ends of his drooping gray mustache to the last button on his immaculate spats. ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers
... ghost of Parson Ford, in which Johnson believed, awaits us at the doorway of the Hummums. There are several duels to witness in the Piazza; Dryden to call upon as he sits, the arbiter of wits, by the fireside at Will's Coffee House; Addison is to be found at Button's; at the "Bedford" we shall meet Garrick and Quin, and stop a moment at Tom King's, close to St. Paul's portico, to watch Hogarth's revellers fight with swords and shovels, that frosty morning that the painter sketched the prim old maid ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... had been advertising, writing, canvassing, and button-holing in England, had kept a newspaper on foot, and was able to point to powerful friends in Parliament and in London mercantile circles. By giving scrip supposed to represent plots and farms in its New Zealand territory, it secured numbers of settlers, many of ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... kicked at his donkey. For a long time this had no effect whatever; the donkey not only was not stimulated by it, but he did not even seem to be conscious of it. At last Bob determined to resort to other methods. Drawing a pin from his shirt collar, where it was filling the place of a lost button, he stuck it two or three times in the ...
— Among the Brigands • James de Mille
... everything in order, and also to make the winter clothes for the farm hands. The madam and I had cut out these clothes before she left, and it was my principal duty to run the sewing machine in their manufacture. Many whole days I spent in this work. My wife made the button holes and sewed on the buttons. I made hundreds of sacks for use in picking cotton. This work was always done in summer. When the garments were all finished they were shipped to the farm at Bolivar, to be ready for the fall and winter wear. In like manner the clothes for ...
— Thirty Years a Slave • Louis Hughes
... would not care a button for the cooking of our victuals—perhaps they don't need it—but it's so dismal to eat one's supper in the dark; and we have had such a capital day that it's a pity to finish off in this glum style. Oh, I have it!" he ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... Puddinghams lying on the floor of his bedroom, flat on his back, his eyes closed, and with one foot resting on an overturned chair; and horrified, as I came closer, to see a large purple bruise on his forehead, and a heavy iron poker lying on the floor beside him. The diamond cuff-button was also gone from his right cuff, but the rays of the morning sun, coming through the east windows, shone on the other glittering bauble, still in ...
— The Adventures of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons • James Francis Thierry
... of cotton reaching from the waist to the knee is generally the only garment of the poorest. Those better off wear also a piece of plaid thrown gracefully across the shoulders. The right nostril is ornamented with a small copper ring; as a substitute, a shirt-button is much esteemed, and during our stay our buttons were in ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... presently increased to a steady downpour, which drove Lermontoff to his cabin, and that room being unprovided with either window or electric light, the Prince struck a match to one of the candles newly placed on the washstand. He pushed the electric button summoning the steward, and, giving him some money, asked if there was such a thing as a piece of stone on board, carried as ballast, or for any other reason. The steward said he would inquire, and finally returned with a sharpening stone used for the knives in the galley. Bolting his door, ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... gods are of one grand Host; immeasurable; marching ever forward since the beginnings of the World. The enormous, all-conquering, flame-crowned Host, noble every soldier in it; sacred, and alone noble. Let him who is not of it hide himself; let him tremble for himself. Stars at every button cannot make him noble; sheaves of Bath-garters, nor bushels of Georges; nor any other contrivance but manfully enlisting in it, valiantly taking place and step in it. O Heavens, will he not bethink himself; he too is so needed in the Host! It were so blessed, thrice-blessed, for himself ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle
... little cry she rattled the hook and repeatedly pressed the round button which operated the bell. "Buck! Buck!" ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... mak a clean fireside, Put on the mukle pot; Gie little Kate her button gown And Jock his Sunday coat; And mak their shoon as black as slaes, Their hose as white as snaw; It's a' to please my own gudeman, For he's ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... this, Tom began pulling on some clothes and a pair of shoes. At the same time he reached out with one hand and pressed a button that sounded an alarm in the sleeping quarters of Koku, the giant, and in the rooms of some of the older and ...
— Tom Swift and his Aerial Warship - or, The Naval Terror of the Seas • Victor Appleton
... good thing Mary Jane started putting on her gloves just when she did. For before she had the last button safely tucked in its button hole, the porter had slipped in to a white coat and had picked up her bag and Dr. Smith's big grip and started for the door of the car; the great long train was slowing up at ...
— Mary Jane—Her Visit • Clara Ingram Judson
... girls upstairs, then Haimet followed, and Agnes went at last. But Gerhardt sat on, his eyes fixed on the cold hearth. It was evident that he regarded the news which he had heard as of no slight import. He rose at length, and walked to the window. It was only a wooden shutter, fastened by a button, and now closed for the night. Looking round to make sure that all had left the lower room, he threw the casement open. But he did not see Isel, who at the moment was concealed by the red curtain drawn half-way across the house-place, ...
— One Snowy Night - Long ago at Oxford • Emily Sarah Holt
... hopped the little rabbit, and pretty soon he saw the old gentleman bullfrog catching flies, and undoing his waistcoat one button every time a fly disappeared down ...
— Billy Bunny and Uncle Bull Frog • David Magie Cory
... village, let them select the goods themselves, then helped them to cut out and make the garments. Eddie assisted by threading needles and sewing on buttons, saying "that would do for a boy because he had heard papa say he had sometimes sewed on a button for himself when he ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... recollection, judgment, esthetic taste, represent organized results of the occupation of native active tendencies with certain subject matters. A man does not observe closely and fully by pressing a button for the observing faculty to get to work (in other words by "willing" to observe); but if he has something to do which can be accomplished successfully only through intensive and extensive use of eye and hand, he naturally observes. Observation is an outcome, a consequence, of the interaction of ...
— Democracy and Education • John Dewey
... am His,' and to live Christ, and to say by conduct 'I am His,' 'Whosoever shall confess Me before men, him will I also confess before My Father, and whosoever shall deny Me, him will I also deny.' Do not button your coats over your uniform. Do not take the cockade out of your hats when you go amongst 'the other side.' Live Jesus, and, when ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren
... have dropped them," said Winston as he turned. He glanced back at the rear rack where his main stock of currency was piled. He stood paralyzed for a moment and then reached under the counter and pushed a button. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science February 1930 • Various
... myself was a very dapper gentleman of what I should call lively middle age, with very upstanding gray mustaches. I took him to be a marooned motorist, also. He was well-dressed, with the added touch of an orange blossom in his button-hole, and he had a slightly roving eye. His hand-baggage was most "refined." I had noticed him looking my way at intervals, and wondered if he craved a hard-boiled egg; I could easily have spared him one! While I am certainly not in the habit of ...
— The Smiling Hill-Top - And Other California Sketches • Julia M. Sloane
... had stowed Mrs. von Minden and her rocker inside Ernest slammed the door shut and turned the button. "If Gustav tries to get back through this, he'll lose his way, ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... explosions followed, but when the smoke was gone the gang still beheld the terrible woman beating away at their unhappy comrade, too absorbed in a congenial occupation to care a solitary button for the fire of the outlaws. This was too much for Jacker. The brothers were always ready to fight each other's battles, let the odds be what they might, and the elder rushed to the rescue. The onslaught did not seem ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... the darkness, she laid her left hand tenderly on the flaxen head of her youngest grandchild. Her hand stroked down the smooth, round head; the child stirred in her dreams, murmured "Grannie," and turned over on her other side. She was very well, and very happy—as plump as a little button—a bonny, bright-eyed creature. Grannie used to adore her ...
— Good Luck • L. T. Meade
... took off his three-cornered hat with the gold button on a white rosette at the side. Adam did the same with his more ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... they went out fust and hid themselves round the corner. Ten minutes arterwards old Sam came out, walking as though 'e was going to catch a train; and smiling to think 'ow he 'ad shaken them off. At the corner of Commercial Road he stopped and bought 'imself a button-hole for 'is coat, and Ginger was so surprised that 'e pinched Peter Russet to make ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs
... was like some living thing writhing in anguish. George could think of nothing to say. He looked about helplessly, buttoned a glove button briskly, folded the letter, and made some work of putting it away ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... their gorges, and vomit what was upon their stomachs before all the world, as if they had flayed the fox; and ten or twelve of them died of the plague, fourteen became lepers, eighteen grew lousy, and about seven and twenty had the pox, but he did not care a button for it. He commonly carried a whip under his gown, wherewith he whipped without remission the pages whom he found carrying wine to their masters, to make them mend their pace. In his coat he had above six and twenty little fobs and pockets always ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... which had been noble. So careful was he, so fearful of facing eternity and judgment—if drown he must—without them, that, although the time was short and the danger instant, and the man by this time a coward, he had stripped off oilskin coat and pea-jacket to indue them again and button them over ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... all sorts of ways of making their wants known, but I think you will admit that a little dog called Button was particularly clever in his way of doing it, when you hear how he managed. He used to have goat's milk for breakfast, and one morning, when he thought breakfast-time had passed without any being brought to him, he made up his mind that ...
— Twilight And Dawn • Caroline Pridham
... during the Crimean war, I was vainly trying to make out the meaning of the letters on the military button of an officer sitting before me; when one of his companions, who happened to be at my side, a well-educated, intelligent man, good-naturedly informed me that they indicated that the wearer belonged ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... of the Faithful, bear witness against me that this damsel is more learned than I in medicine and what else, and that I cannot cope with her." And he put off his clothes and fled forth. Quoth the Caliph to Tawaddud, "Ree us thy riddle," and she replied, "O Commander of the Faithful, it is the button and the button-loop.[FN414]"—Then she undertook the astronomers and said, "Let him of you who is an astronomer rise and come forward." So the astronomer advanced and sat down before her; and, when she saw him, she laughed ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... Turn up your nose at a doctor, indeed, Harry!—pshaw, good English style that! Doctor! my aunt married a Doctor of Divinity—excellent man—wore a wig, and was made a dean! So long as Rickeybockey is not a doctor of physic, I don't care a button. If he's that, indeed, it would be suspicious; because, you see, those foreign doctors of physic are quacks, and tell fortunes, and go about on a stage with ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... gentleman in the next box suffered the most violent indignation. The bespeak party occupied two boxes, the ladies were full-dressed, and the gentlemen, to a man, in white gloves with flowers in their button-holes. It amused us mightily, and was really as like the Miss Snevellicci business ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... a small brass megaphone, and, having wound the motor, pressed the starting-button. Almost at once a stentorian voice rang ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... first thing I ever remember. The good sisters were very kind to us. They taught all the older girls to read and write, and sew and knit, not only plain sewing, but fine stitching, and open-work, and fine darning, and button-holes, and lace-work, and so on. They also taught them to make beds, and sweep, and dust, and cook a little,—that is, how to make broth, and pappa, and such simple things. From twelve to two every day there was recreation. At twelve all the children, big and little, sat down to dinner ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various
... dancing of their Favorita, and when Sturgis, after wildly searching in his pockets, tore a large pearl from the lace of his stock, he doubted no longer—nor hesitated. Fastened by a blue ribbon to the fourth button of his closely fitting coat was a golden key, the outward symbol of his rank at court. He detached it, then made a sudden gesture that caught her attention. For a moment their eyes met. He tossed her the bauble, and mechanically she lifted her hand and ...
— Rezanov • Gertrude Atherton
... the distant-information transmitter aimed at what she'd said might be a dead comet. Baird pressed the button. An extraordinary complex of information-seeking frequencies and forms sprang into being and leaped across emptiness. There were microwaves of strictly standard amplitude, for measurement-standards. There were frequencies of other ...
— The Aliens • Murray Leinster
... collar button, and Dick, she found, had a box of pearl and gold buttons that Sister was sure she had never seen before. She played with them, tossing them up and down and watching them glitter, until a sudden thought ...
— Brother and Sister • Josephine Lawrence
... Pepperill complacently set about the preparation of his case, utterly unconscious of the dangers with which his legal path was beset. As he sat at his shiny oaken desk and pressed the button that summoned the stenographer it seemed to him the simplest thing in the world to satisfy any jury of what had taken place and the summit of impudent audacity on the part of Mr. Tutt to have suggested that Hassoun should be dealt with otherwise than a first-degree murderer. And it should be added ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train
... don't offend me. They can't aim; They only set their own rent sails on fire.— But if they could, I would not hide a button To save ten lives like mine. I have no cause To prize it, I assure 'ee.—Ah, look there, One of the women hit,—and badly, too. Poor wench! Let some one shift her ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... nose. After this feature, I noticed next his beautiful brown wig; his sparkling little gray eyes; his rosy complexion; his short military whisker, dyed to match his wig; his white teeth and his winning smile; his smart blue frock-coat, with a camellia in the button-hole; and his splendid ring, a ruby, flashing on his little finger as he courteously signed to me to ...
— The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins
... condemned as a fabrication for this and other neologies. The button is not a conspicuous item of female attire as of the male, and Shakespeare has been attacked for the vulgarity of even making Lear say, 'Prithee, undo this button,' though ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... red, half-open lips, which seemed to promise so many caresses and delicious words, that had attracted him like some strange, fragrant fruit. Sometimes she came with gentlemen in evening dress, and with gardenias in their button-holes, who seemed to bore her terribly, if not to disgust her. And he was happy, although he had never yet spoken to her, that she had not that smile for them which she had for him, and that she appeared dull and sad, like somebody who ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... and her father would get out the old set, made of button moulds, with the name printed on with ink, Lottie would think what a surprise there ...
— Kristy's Rainy Day Picnic • Olive Thorne Miller
... strings. There are oysters and maoao, alive and dripping. The maoao is the turbo, a gastropod, a mysterious inhabitant of a twisted shell, who shuts the door to his home with a brightly-colored operculum, for all the world like half of a cuff-button. One eats him raw or cooked or dried. But he is not so odd as the varo one of the most delicious and expensive of Tahitian foods. These sea centipedes, as the English call them in Tahiti, are a species of ibacus, and are from six to twelve inches long, and two wide. They have ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... patent leather boots of about size seven and very little used. There are five buttons, but on the left boot one button—the third up—is missing, leaving loose threads and not the more usual metal fastener. Mr. Carlyle's trousers, sir, are of a dark material, a dark grey line of about a quarter of an inch width on a darker ground. The bottoms are turned permanently up and ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... were jokes. Yesterday, when they asked him if he'd have some more tea he said 'Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,' and then sniggered all over. I didn't see anything funny in that. And then somebody asked him about his button-hole and he said ''Tis but a little faded flower,' and exploded again. I thought ...
— The Golden Age • Kenneth Grahame
... paines, he was contented to doe this, and the day being come that hee should deliuer it, the partie came, who liking it exceedingly, gaue him the money promised, which the poore man gladly put up into his purse, that hung at a button hole of his wascoate before his brest, smiling that he was so well paid for so small a trifle: the partie perceiuing his merry countenance, and imagining he gest for what purpose the knife was, sayde, ...
— The Third And Last Part Of Conny-Catching. (1592) - With the new deuised knauish arte of Foole-taking • R. G.
... writing their verse in their own language, I can hardly understand. I find it very difficult to write poetry which will be greedily snapped up and paid for, even when written in the English language, but if I had to paw around for an hour to get a button-hook for the end of the fourth line, so that it would rhyme with the button-hook in the second line of the same verse, I believe ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... his teeth, which like some obstinate iron-grating still obstructed its deliverance—his puny frame convulsed, and face reddening all over at an unfairness in the logic which he wanted articulation to expose, it has moved our gall to see a smooth portly fellow of an adversary, that cared not a button for the merits of the question, by merely laying his hand upon the head of the stationer, and desiring him to be calm (your tall disputants have always the advantage), with a provoking sneer carry the argument clean from him in the opinion of all ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... was twisting his imperial with one hand and fingering his Loyal Legion button with ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... fine young button mushrooms, let them stew gently in a white veal gravy seasoned with salt, pepper, a blade of mace, and if approved, the grated peel of half a lemon, it should be thickened with flour and the yolk of an egg stirred ...
— The Jewish Manual • Judith Cohen Montefiore
... in two braids; one rosy bare foot showed under her nightgown, as she sat, her hands clasped about her knees, like a boy. The upper button of the gown was loose and I saw my milky, gleaming pearl around her neck; it was no whiter ...
— Margarita's Soul - The Romantic Recollections of a Man of Fifty • Ingraham Lovell
... I tried a big bluff. I took hold of the lapel of her waist, intending to undo just one button. I let go in fright when I found there was no button,—only an awful complication of hooks or some other feminine method for keeping things together,—and I grew red and trembled, thinking what might have happened had I, by bad luck, made ...
— The Great K. & A. Robbery • Paul Liechester Ford
... me from the vessel, and another stalwart son of Mars took charge of the doctor. After walking a few steps up the street we all stepped into an empty carriage without saying as much as "by your leave," Thorwald touched a button, and ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... twice some slender figure passed, glancing brightly at him, and he looked as shyly receptive as he could, but to no purpose. Gloom settled over him; hunger tormented him; he gazed disconsolately at the yellow ribbon in his button-hole, and ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... where he pressed the emergency release. The port swung wide. For an instant, the control console was blurred. Lanko waited, then as the panel returned to focus, he walked back to it. He snapped the drive switch on and pushed the drive to maximum. Nothing happened. He punched the emergency power button, and waited an instant. There was no result. ...
— The Players • Everett B. Cole
... under garments were concerned, unless it were that they were of a finer quality. He wore a short green velvet jacket, profusely studded with knobs and chains, like small chain—shot, of solid gold, similar to the shifting button lately introduced by our dandies in their waistcoats. It was not put on, but hung on one shoulder, being fastened across his breast by the two empty sleeves tied together in a knot. He also wore the red ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... pans are two pan-arrests operated by a button from the front of the case. These arrests exert a very slight upward pressure upon the pans and minimize the displacement of the beam when objects or weights are being placed upon ...
— An Introductory Course of Quantitative Chemical Analysis - With Explanatory Notes • Henry P. Talbot
... groom wear very large boutonnieres of stephanotis and gardenias, or equally large bunches of lilies-of-the-valley, in their button-holes. ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... "though God save me from his arrows! This Grey Dick," he added to the Count, "is a wild, homeless half-wit whom they call Hugh de Cressi's shadow, but the finest archer in Suffolk, with Norfolk thrown in; one who can put a shaft through every button on your doublet at fifty paces—ay, and bring down wild geese on the wing twice out of four times, for I have seen him do it with that ...
— Red Eve • H. Rider Haggard
... pressed a button and summoned the ticket-sellers, one after the other. The first had no recollection of having received the notes, but with his ...
— The Destroyer - A Tale of International Intrigue • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... saw so much excitement and hurry in all my life," exclaimed a boy, who with three companions stood on the deck of the brig and looked on at these activities without actually taking part in them themselves. The speaker was Fred Button. He was a tiny little fellow, known affectionately among his friends as Stub, or Peewee or Pygmy. This last name was frequently shortened into Pyg, much to Fred's disgust, though he had learned better than to lose his temper because of teasing ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and the Treasure Cave • Ross Kay
... they are as stupid as owls. It is no trouble to them to master geology, mineralogy, anatomy, and other things, the very name of which gives me a headache. They can see through politics, mature mighty water reservoir schemes, and manage five stations at once, but they couldn't sew on a button or fix one's hair to ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... have to say to doctors, all the better—ugh! ugh! ugh! When it's your misfortune to be in company with an old maid—I mean a reputed one—ugh! ugh! always be on the muzzle—for in her next issue of scandal she'll be sure to quote you as her authority. If a saint comes in your way, button your breeches-pocket, and look now and then at your watch-chain. I'm brought nearly to a fix, for bad bellows won't stand ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various
... fun, I feel as if I had come out of a tomb—" she checked herself: but she might have been as indiscreet as she liked, for her companions were not listening. Laura was faintly, very faintly startled by their attitude—Hyde leaning forward in the half-light of the brougham to button Isabel's glove—but she was soon smiling at her own fancy. "Poor Isabel, poor simple Isabel!" She was only a ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... left at four; passed over a bridge of wood suspended by iron chains, took a seat with the driver; a little drizzling rain; the button trees[31] again; apples more plentiful; the drive beautiful along the river (Delaware), high hills on each side; the woods a little tinted; some thorn hedges; a good many walnut trees. Had coffee and pancakes, paid 30 cents. The land generally better ...
— A Journey to America in 1834 • Robert Heywood
... afflicted with my complaint. But I do,—for I have informed myself on the subject. Their skins are scarified, and their sores blistered, lanced, cauterized, and sometimes burned away with a knob of red-hot iron, called 'the button.'" ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... that banquet came, with other guests, "a fop in a gay coat," a coxcomb wearing the bright vestment of the hunter, albeit in the hour of chase he only hunted gates and gaps; and upon the white satin lining of his "pink" there was a tiny button-hole bouquet, such as Mab might have held with her fairy fingers at the time of her coronation; and in collar, if in nothing else, he resembled the immortal Shakespeare; and his bosom was broad and snowy as the swan's; and his pumps were glossy as the raven's ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... till at last she struck the one along which she had passed after leaving Ram and his companion, and turned down here, believing that, if the boy selected it, there would be good reason for his so doing. She walked steadily on, finding a button mushroom here and a bunch of blackberries there. For one minute she paused, struck by the peculiar sweet and sickly odour of a large-leaved herb which she had crushed, and admired its beautifully veined blossoms, in happy ignorance of the fact that it was the deadly poisonous henbane, and then ...
— Cutlass and Cudgel • George Manville Fenn |
