"Crank" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... made was to convert my old friend and classmate, Thomas C. Platt, the main manager and, as he was called, the "boss'' of the Republican party in the State of New York, a man of great influence throughout the Union. He treated me civilly, but evidently considered me a "crank.'' He, like Mr. Thurlow Weed, was unable to understand how a party could be conducted without the promise of spoils for the victors; but I have lived to see him take a better view. As I write these lines word comes that his influence is thrown in favor ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... dexterity in the management of their little craft. These boats are extremely light, being hollowed out until little thicker than pasteboard, and even with two Kroomen paddling it is difficult for a European to sit in them, so extremely crank are they. Light as they are the Krooboy can stand up and dive from his boat without upsetting it if he take time; but in the hurry and excitement of diving for coppers, when half a dozen men would leap overboard together, the canoes were frequently capsized. The divers, ...
— By Sheer Pluck - A Tale of the Ashanti War • G. A. Henty
... such a wheel; it was turned by a crank; it did the work perfectly; so, in the year 1793, he had invented the machine the ...
— The Beginner's American History • D. H. Montgomery
... or gas, I suppose, out here. Well, you can raise some kind of a light to trot round by, can't you? I'm a crank on ancient houses and furniture. Wish you had some old mahogany—that's what ...
— Strawberry Acres • Grace S. Richmond
... other. The head was at the same height as the feet, and the body, held up on a trestle, described a half-curve, as though lying over a wheel. To increase the stretch of the limbs, the man gave two turns to a crank, which pushed the feet, at first about twelve inches from the rings, to a distance of six inches. And here we may leave our narrative to ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... case that looked like a knapsack. It had a crank on one side and a pair of electrical connections. "It's not a battery," he explained. "It's a small, ...
— Smugglers' Reef • John Blaine
... the prisoner soon after reverted to the subject, and said that every opportunity was taken in that gaol to wrong and torture the men incarcerated there on political charges. Every petty breach of discipline was availed of to punish them, by sending them down to work the crank, and reducing their scanty rations. For the crime of not saluting Mr. Governor Price, they were placed upon a dietary of seven ounces of what was called brown bread and a pint of Anna Liffey, in the twenty-four hours. Brown, indeed, the article ...
— The Dock and the Scaffold • Unknown
... a hero to his servants. In their eyes he was not the great artist, whose achievement was to go ringing down the ages; he was simply a crank or madman, who did not know his own mind half the time, from whom abuse was as likely to be predicated as gratuities, who could be ridiculed, neglected, circumvented with impunity. When the dereliction became glaring enough to arrest his attention, he would ...
— Beethoven • George Alexander Fischer
... of the Automatic Company's 7 ohm wire between New York and Washington, it happened that Prof. Moses G. Farmer was in the Washington office when the first message was about to be sent, and upon being requested, he turned the "crank" and transmitted the message to New York, at the rate of 217 ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 446, July 19, 1884 • Various
... be left behind in the dregs of the bowl. I have no patience with your long memories; this nursing of grievances, this raking up of last night's squabbles, is unworthy of a king, let alone a king of Gods. Once take away from our feasts the little elegancies of quip and crank and wile, and what is left? Muzziness; repletion; silence;—cheerful accompaniments these to the wine-bowl! For my part, I never supposed that Zeus would give the matter a thought the next morning; much less that he would make such a stir about it, ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... always in one's heart, And twilight in one's cell, We turn the crank, or tear the rope, Each in his separate Hell, And the silence is more awful far Than the ...
— Book of Old Ballads • Selected by Beverly Nichols
... toper with his bottle, the milk-maid sitting by her cow—this fortunate little society might truly be said to enjoy a harmonious existence, and to make life literally a dance. The Italian turned a crank; and, behold! every one of these small individuals started into the most curious vivacity. The cobbler wrought upon a shoe; the blacksmith hammered his iron, the soldier waved his glittering blade; the lady raised a tiny breeze with her fan; the jolly toper swigged lustily at his ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... degree. There were fully five hundred policemen in the streets round about, just as if there was danger of an attack by a ferocious mob; and yet though they had throngs of policemen inside, too, an elderly and harmless crank actually got inside with them to present me some foolish memorial about curing the German Emperor from cancer. Inasmuch as what we needed was, not protection against a mob, but a sharp lookout for cranks, ...
— Letters to His Children • Theodore Roosevelt
... deceive an innocent young girl and blast her life forever; you may stab your friend in the dark, and you are all right: but if you eat a piece of fried pork on Friday you are a lost man! China arranges her prayers in a machine, and turns her obligations to Deity off with a crank. There is usually more or less intimate relationship between prayer and a crank. Our God loved human sacrifice in Galilee, and rewarded Abraham for it. He abhors it in Pocasset, America, and his followers threaten to hang the only consistent ...
— Men, Women, and Gods - And Other Lectures • Helen H. Gardener
... In the form of kneading apparatus, shown in Fig. 14, two thick rollers, which move freely on axes at the extremities of arms, projecting on either side of a shaft turned by a crank or belt, are made to act alternately upon each side of ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... To crank the motor (for the self-starter had not yet arrived) was a task of magnitude, but he accomplished it and pulled himself into the seat. For a moment he lay upon the steering wheel, panting, fighting back his weakness; ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... and growing in numbers, who hate England and all things English. There are many, not stigmatised as dullards or as fools, who publicly oppose the teaching of English history in the State schools. The feeling against England is not a fantastical crank, it is a movement growing yearly in strength. I have seen men keeping their seats in serious protesting silence when the health of the Queen has been drunk at public banquets, and have found in private converse that hundreds approve their action but do not ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray
... performing its duty, and the engine did not seem to be overheated. The manifest fact was that the motor would not run. A few irregular beats, I say, I got out of it by almost winding my arm out of its socket with the crank, only to have the thing die away before I could regain my seat in the car. In my desperation I advanced the spark to a point which resulted in a "back kick" so tremendous that I was nearly ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... wandering among the many cities, the intimate knowledge of streets and of public places burst upon my comprehension. I could see our host looking upward, his strong white teeth flashing in an ingratiating fascinating smile, his right arm revolving with the crank of his organ, his little brown monkey with the red coat and the anxious ...
— Gold • Stewart White
... idiot. Always was a crank and an unsociable cuss when a boy, and he's worse now he's grown up. Oh, I know Forbes, all right; and I haven't got no ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Work • Edith Van Dyne
... inactive was not merely to invite destruction for ourselves, but was sure to bring certain failure upon the purpose of the expedition. All of us began instantly to look about in search of the proper handle, seizing every crank and wheel in sight and striving to ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putman Serviss
... this keep," he added, giving her one addressed to his father. "Don't let him have it till it's all over. You know." Then he took up a pen and a sheet of paper, and got as far, with a shaking hand, as 'Dear Crank—' but there he broke down, and laid his head on ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge
... martyr was thrown to the lions not because he was a Christian, but because he was a crank: that is, an unusual sort of person. And multitudes of people, quite as civilized and amiable as we, crowded to see the lions eat him just as they now crowd the lion-house in the Zoo at feeding-time, not because they really cared ...
— Androcles and the Lion • George Bernard Shaw
... Admiral Boisot, though she recognised the handwriting of Captain Van der Elst. It stated that the fleet led by an enormous vessel, the "Ark of Delft," with shot-proof bulwarks, and moved by paddle-wheels turned by a crank, had reached the Land-Scheiding, and that he hoped, ere long, the large dyke would be broken through and that the way would be opened to the very walls of the city. The Prince also sent a message urging the citizens ...
— The Lily of Leyden • W.H.G. Kingston
... car absolutely, and you ought always to do that, even if you just leave a car outside a store for a couple of minutes when you go in to buy something. This car is great, too, because you don't have to crank it. It has a self-starting device, so that you can start the motor automatically without ...
— The Boy Scout Automobilists - or, Jack Danby in the Woods • Robert Maitland
... she said sharply. "Anybody'd know it wasn't an automobile crank. I don't want to look like a fool! Well, why ain't ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... the speed you can, Tom!" begged Mr. Damon. "We'll catch the scoundrels now. Speed up the motor! Oh, if I only had my automobile now. Bless my crank shaft, but one can go so much faster on ...
— Tom Swift and his Motor-boat - or, The Rivals of Lake Carlopa • Victor Appleton
... efforts at parody. It had been jerking and bucking like a playful mustang for some time past, and behaving in an altogether curious manner, but now it was stiller than the dead. Tryon waggled the levers to no avail, then flung himself out of the car and got busy with the crank. Not a move. Druro then got out and had a go at the crank. No good. Thereafter, the two made a thorough examination of the beast, but poking and prying into all its secret places booted them nothing. As far as the eye of man could see, nothing was wrong ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... called the Pyramidal, because of its form, and was the first move towards what are now called Direct-acting Engines, in which the lateral movement of the piston is communicated by connecting-rods to the rotatory movement of the crank-shaft. Mr. Nasmyth says of it, that "on account of its great simplicity and GET-AT-ABILITY of parts, its compactness and self-contained steadiness, this engine has been the parent of a vast progeny, all more or less marked by the distinguishing features of the ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... court any longer," he stated bitterly. "He's too old and peevish—that's what ails him! For one, I'm certainly not never goin' to vote fur him again. Why, it's gettin' to be ez much ez a man's life is worth to stop that there spiteful old crank in the street and put a civil question to him—that's ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... surface of the water, and at every revolution is splashed all over the working parts, including the interior of the cylinder, which it reaches through holes in the piston. The oil is maintained exactly at one level by a very ingenious arrangement. The bottom of the crank chamber communicates through a hole, C, with an outer box, which receives the water deposited by the exhaust steam. The level of this water is exactly determined by an overflow hole, B, which allows all excess above that level to pass into an elbow ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 481, March 21, 1885 • Various
... the ease with which the spar was lifted. It was an improved crank windlass, and the purchase it gave was enormous. Of course, what it gave us in power we paid for in distance; as many times as it doubled my strength, that many times was doubled the length of rope I heaved in. The tackle dragged heavily across the rail, increasing its drag as the spar ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... as the wall of the women's penitentiary at Christianshafen. The gates are never open, and there is no lodge-keeper. The forest adjoins the garden, and the garden runs down to the water's edge. The original owner of the estate was a crank who lived in a hut, which was so overgrown with moss and creepers that I did not pull it down. Never in my life has anything given me such delight as the anticipation of this hermit-like existence. At the same time, ...
— The Dangerous Age • Karin Michaelis
... "we are ready for a nice long talk, that is, if you feel equal to the task of talking. What I have to say will not take long. It is about a little interview between Mr. Allison and—Judge Thorn's daughter, and if I had been less of a 'crank,' I suppose you would have had another son-in-law ...
— The Daughter of a Republican • Bernie Babcock
... wide applicability. They are equally true for men, animals, or machines; and are wholly independent of the way in which the power is applied: whether, for instance, a man carries his burden, or draws it, or rows or punts it in a boat, or winds it up with a crank or tread-mill. ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... you do your own charity, Bransome, instead of taxing me? That's the crank who wanted to run your lake down, isn't he? I guess I'll never see either ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... governor belt is all right, and if it is, it would be well for you to stop and see if a wheel is not loose. It might be either the little belt wheel or one of the little cog wheels. If you find these are all right, examine the spool on the crank shaft from which the governor is run and you will probably find it loose. If the engine has been run for any length of time, you will always find the trouble in one of these places, but if it is a new one the ...
— Rough and Tumble Engineering • James H. Maggard
... cried Bunker Blue. "The auto-van's got a self-starter on. That's the best of all, I think. You don't have to get out to crank up now. It's great. See, ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue on an Auto Tour • Laura Lee Hope
... in distinctive costume at the front of the car controls a crank, by means of which he is enabled to bring the car to a sudden stop, or to cause it to plunge violently forward. His aim in so doing is to cause all the standing players to fall over backward. Every time he does this ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... all she impressed Martin the most, because there was nothing of the crank about her. She went to theatres, to the seaside in the summer, took in The Queen, and was a subscriber to Boots' Circulating Library. She dressed quietly and in excellent taste—in grey or black and white. She had jolly ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... Hollow Tree people heard about Mr. Man's automobile they at first could hardly say anything at all. Then Mr. 'Possum said he supposed what made it go was some kind of clockwork that Mr. Man wound up when he turned that crank; and Mr. Crow thought he must build a fire in it to make the smoke come out behind. Mr. Dog didn't know, himself, just how the machinery went in, but that Mr. Man called it a motor and had ever ...
— Hollow Tree Nights and Days • Albert Bigelow Paine
... I, Crank Cuffin, do swear to be a true brother, and that I will in all things obey the commands of the great tawney prince, and keep his council, and not divulge the secrets ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... from you than from any one else, because we are acquainted with you. If I do take the measles and anything happens to me Felicity is to have my cherry vase. I'd rather give it to the Story Girl, but Dan says it ought to be kept in the family, even if Felicity is a crank. I haven't anything else valuable, since I gave Sara Ray my forget-me-not jug, but if you would like anything I've got let me know and I'll leave instructions for you to have it. The Story Girl has told us some splendid stories lately. I wish I was clever like ...
— The Story Girl • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... denunciatory language of that day he was called a "proud and pestilent seducer," or, as the modern newspaper would say, a "crank." It is well to make due allowances for the prejudice so conspicuous in the accounts given by his enemies, who felt obliged to justify their harsh treatment of him. But we have also his own writings from which to form an opinion as to his character and views. Lucidity, indeed, was ...
— The Beginnings of New England - Or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty • John Fiske
... helter-skelter. How would he know the man? How could he be certain, in advance? What had he looked like? What was his name? How had he acted, before he spoke? Would he be an ordinary person, or some strange outlandish crank? ...
— The Skull • Philip K. Dick
... we could not decide instantly that we should run after Judith. It was all so sudden," said spokesman Dozia. "And of course we realized any more commotion would really get us all in trouble; that old officer is such a crank." ...
— Jane Allen: Junior • Edith Bancroft
... pictures show a variety of overhead coverings to shelter the well and its users. The well was a large one, appearing to be four or five feet in diameter at the top, and was surrounded by a raised platform. Standing on this platform, one drew water from the well by a windlass operated by a hand-crank. Later the box on which the windlass was mounted was fitted with a hand pump, and a trough for filling buckets or other containers was placed at the side of the well. This well served the courthouse into the twentieth century, ...
— The Fairfax County Courthouse • Ross D. Netherton
... as a crank and as a joke, but none of them, try as they would, could get to know him or win his confidence. They used to wonder what Fletcher did with his spare time, what were his pursuits, what were his hobbies, if he had any. They suspected that Fletcher had some hobby of an engrossing kind, since in everyday ...
— Orpheus in Mayfair and Other Stories and Sketches • Maurice Baring
... thief. We do not know the name of the author of the alleged protocols, though obviously it would make all the difference in the world whether these are summaries of statements made by a responsible leader of the Jewish people or the wild vaporings of such a crank as infests practically every conference and convention. We do not know who translated the alleged protocols, nor in what language they were written. Moreover, not one word of assurance does Professor Nilus give on his own account that he knows any of these things. He does not appear ...
— The Jew and American Ideals • John Spargo
... fun of him. They thought he was a crank, if not downright crazy and said that his father was very foolish indeed to encourage him in wasting so much time and money in a way that every person with common sense could see was worse ...
— Radio Boys Loyalty - Bill Brown Listens In • Wayne Whipple
... "He's too old and peevish—that's whut ails him! Fur one, I'm certainly not never goin' to vote fur him again. Why, it's gettin' to be ez much ez a man's life is worth to stop that there spiteful old crank on the street and put a civil question to him—that's ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... by the tenacity with which they hold to and continually enforce a burning personal conviction. But for that tenacity and the unquestionable influence which his conviction exerted upon men, he would be a rather ridiculous figure, for he was almost every sort of crank—certainly a non-resister, and, I think, a vegetarian and teetotaller as well. But his burning conviction was the immorality of Slavery; and by this he meant something quite other than was meant by Jefferson or later by Lincoln. When these great men spoke ...
— A History of the United States • Cecil Chesterton
... tried to turn the crank, but as soon as he had got out the Pater, he wandered; he was obstinate in wishing to grind out the Aves, but then his mind gave way ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... our lives in learning pilotage, And grow good steersmen when the vessel's crank! Gap-toothed he spake, and with a tottering shank Sidled to gain the sunny bench of Age. It is the sentence which completes that stage; A testament of wisdom reading blank. The seniors of the race, on their last ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... said to himself, "what manner of crank is he who would bury himself like this? Of all the crazy ideas ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... another attempt but I listened once more, rather than butt in again, listened and heard, 'Just the sweetest shade of green, you know—' Trials of Job, I was getting out of patience, to put it mildly. I gave the crank a vicious turn but the same party was still talking, she said sweetly, 'I guess someone wants the line.' I assured her I did, it was a case of life and death. 'Someone dead, oh dear, is it any ...
— Cape Cod and All the Pilgrim Land, June 1922, Volume 6, Number 4 • Various
... the Italians accused of crime in the city are included in their number. One of these men is to be seen on the Bowery at almost any time. He seats himself on the pavement, with his legs tucked under him, and turns the crank of an instrument which seems to be a doleful compromise between a music box and an accordion. In front of this machine is a tin box for pennies, and by the side of it is a card on which is printed ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... this fashion: that a highly gifted and carefully educated man shall, like Mr. Pecksniff, squint at a sheet of paper, and that the results of that squint shall set a vast number of well-fed, contented operatives (they are ashamed to call them workmen) turning crank handles for ten hours a-day, bidding them keep what gifts and education they may have been born with for their—I was going to say leisure hours, but I don't know how to, for if I were to work ten hours ...
— Hopes and Fears for Art • William Morris
... down in the morning the hotel clerk winked at them. "I'm not saying a word," he whispered. "But it served the old crank right. Even the boss is doing a little smiling, although he got ...
— The Rover Boys at School • Arthur M. Winfield
... the little office here transcribing the names on to small cards, with the addresses and all necessary information for notifying a winner. On the day of the drawing the forty thousand-odd names will be put into a big hollow drum, fitted with a crank. They'll whirl it, and then a blindfolded child will put his hand into the drum and draw out Number One. Another child will then draw Number Two, and so on until eight thousand names have come out of ...
— Claim Number One • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... old friend to receive your letter of the 31st ult. Mrs. Nation is all right. She is engaged in the very laudable business of abating what our statute declares to be a common nuisance. She is not crazy, nor is she a crank, but she is, a sensible Christian woman and has the respect of our best people. Her crusade is much like that of John Brown's, and I hope and pray that it may terminate as disastrously to the liquor traffic ...
— The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation • Carry A. Nation
... cry of "ishra ankra" for a "crank," and could give the pencil taps telegraphing from counter to counter that a notorious "pill" or an "I'll-come-back-again" was bearing down on the department. She seemed to know by instinct when she could offer to send a toy C.O.D. for a stranger without fear ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... on paper and in text-books, are well-nigh perfect; in actual operation why should they fail? Like a great machine, fed with the material of thought, the crank turns, the wheels go round, and the whole world is a-buzz with the work and the noise, but the creature on whom all this power is expended, is only in rare instances a truly educated man or woman. What, then, is the defect? If the machine is right, then the material with which it is fed must ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 21, August, 1891 • Various
... in on him. All the thinking minds of the centre of civilization were so busy thinking thoughts of their own making, that it was impossible to attract their attention for more than a moment; from Bostoc the dramatist to Bastiche the anarchist, each individual was turning his own crank diligently, and not to be ...
— The Pools of Silence • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... years of patient observations, he finally decided to appear before medical bodies to tell them modestly of some facts which always recurred in his dream and his patients' dreams, he was first laughed at and then avoided as a crank. ...
— Dream Psychology - Psychoanalysis for Beginners • Sigmund Freud
... me of the "Antiquers"—that's what Peter T. Brown called 'em. They put up at the Old Home House—summer before last; and at a crank show they'd have tied for the blue ribbon. There was the Dowager and the Duchess and "My Daughter" and "Irene dear." Likewise there was Thompson and Small, but they, being nothing but husbands and fathers, didn't count for much first along, ...
— Cape Cod Stories - The Old Home House • Joseph C. Lincoln
... his chair swiftly to his work table, and turned the little crank, continuing his ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... twenty-volume edition, and that critics in his own country and in Europe would rank him with Ralph Waldo Emerson. Yet that is precisely what has happened. Our literature has no more curious story than the evolution of this local crank into his rightful place of mastership. In his lifetime he printed only two books, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimac Rivers"—which was even more completely neglected by the public than Emerson's "Nature"—and "Walden," now one of the classics, but only beginning to be talked about ...
— The American Spirit in Literature, - A Chronicle of Great Interpreters, Volume 34 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Bliss Perry
... him again," the captain agreed cheerfully. "Well, that Thunder Bird plane of yours had quite a jolt, from the report. You cracked the crank-case for one thing, and broke the tail. I had the plane run in and repaired last night, so it's all ready now for you to go up. We really are much in your debt for bringing in this man Lowell; though your manner of doing it was ...
— The Thunder Bird • B. M. Bower
... great influence. He obtained a grant of the monopoly of steam-navigation from the State of New York. Fulton took out two patents for his invention; but unfortunately they were not adequate to his protection, for they covered only the application of the steam-engine to the turning of a crank in producing the rotary ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... for fear of outrunning my companion; the wise little beast, for her part, seemed to rise to the occasion, and to understand that we were pursued; for she stepped out bravely. On the other hand, in spite of the low seat and the short crank of a woman's machine, I could pedal up the slope with more force than Hilda, for I am a practised hill-climber; so that in both ways we gained, besides having momentarily disconcerted and checked the enemy. ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... was only twenty-seven at the time, and his fortune made a fool of him, as sudden wealth has a way of doing. It was at this time, being young and impressionable, he met Samuel Adams, a silent and reserved man, fifteen years his senior and regarded by his neighbors as a harmless crank. But there was something about him which touched Hancock's imagination—and touched his pocketbook, too, for about the first thing Adams did was to borrow ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... four little slave girls who were in it. In this way they passed one night, almost in despair of seeing the morrow. But day came, and they repaired the ship by binding other sails that were carried for that purpose. After this storm the ship was very crank, and even in fair weather its sides were under water, although it had a high freeboard. Consequently, it shipped so much water that the waves washed over the decks with great noise and uproar, and entered the berths where the better-class passengers are generally quartered. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVII, 1609-1616 • Various
... over at Epinal the day after tomorrow,' he said as they left the mill, 'and I'll see if I can get the new crank there.' ...
— The Golden Lion of Granpere • Anthony Trollope
... filing motion, take two blocks of wood, and try surfacing them off with a file. When you place the two filed surfaces together after the first trial both will be convex, because the hands, in filing, unless you exert the utmost vigilance, will assume a crank-like movement. The filing test is so to file the two blocks that they will fit tightly together without rolling on each other. Before shaping and planing machines were invented, machinists were compelled to plane down and accurately finish off ...
— Carpentry for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... it amounted to infatuation, would have been comprehensible enough in any other man, but it was unaccountable in Rickman, who was wholly destitute of reverence for the sources of his income. Jewdwine of The Museion had been in Maddox's opinion a harmless philosophic crank; he had done nothing, absolutely nothing for Rickman's genius; but Jewdwine of Metropolis was dangerous, for he encouraged Rickman's talent; and Rickman's talent would, he was afraid, be ultimately destructive to ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... sticking to the roots that had pulled up a big, cake of dirt with 'em. I don't know what give him the idea that there was money in it, but he did think so from the start. I guess, if they'd had the word in those days, they'd considered him pretty much of a crank about it. He was trying as long as he lived to get that paint introduced; but he couldn't make it go. The country was so poor they couldn't paint their houses with anything; and father hadn't any facilities. It ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... own he had missed his picture of her, and they exalted Charmian as a partner in his merit, for being so impossible. The arguments of Wetmore went for something with Mrs. Maybough, though they were mainly admissions to the effect that Ludlow was more of a crank than he had supposed, and would have to be humored in a case of the kind; but it was chiefly the courage and friendship of Mrs. Westley that availed. She enforced what she had to say in his behalf with the invitation to her January Thursdays which she had brought. She had brought it in person ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... to be frozen into the tin can, put the beater in this, and put on the cover. Place in the tub, being careful to have the point on the bottom fit into the socket in the tub. Put on the cross-piece, and turn the crank to see if everything is in the right place. Next comes the packing. Ice should be broken in large pieces, and put in a canvas bag, and pounded fine with a mallet. Put a thick layer of it in the tub (about five inches deep), ...
— Miss Parloa's New Cook Book • Maria Parloa
... is just possible, this could not be called anything more than a highly probable correlation. If now he went a step further, and asked how the reciprocal movement was given to the lever, he would perhaps conclude that it was given by a crank. But if he knew anything of mechanics, he would know that it might possibly be given by an eccentric. Or again, he would know that the effect could be achieved by a cam. That is to say, he would see that there was no necessary correlation between ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer
... spell-bound. He was playing, turning the crank with a swift, steady motion, his ragged hat tipped ...
— The Poor Little Rich Girl • Eleanor Gates
... golf with you the first afternoon we don't have practice, West, honestly. I'm awfully sorry I'm such a crank about lessons, but you see I've made up my mind to try for the—the—what scholarship ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... is attached to a long cast-iron crosshead, from which two bent connecting rods extend downward, the one to a crank, and the other to a crank-pin inserted in the flywheel. The connecting-rods now on this engine were supplied by Mr. Webb, the original ones—which they have been made to resemble as closely as possible—having been broken up. In the Crewe engine as ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XIX, No. 470, Jan. 3, 1885 • Various
... the other beam and threw her over, so that she shipped a bucket or two of water. Had the water got into the belly of the sail, the weight would have dragged her down; but Rob instantly got rid of this danger by springing to the halyards, and, the moment the crank craft strove to right herself, bringing sail and yard rattling down into the boat. By this time, so fierce was the squall, a pretty heavy sea had sprung up, and altogether things looked very ugly. When they allowed the jib to fill, even that was enough ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... permitting its lower surface to pass over dry sand in a box standing on the floor. A workman rolled off the paper, and with his hand he strews sand on the upper surface. The rolling taking place on the edge of a table, by means of a crank, the excess ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 821, Sep. 26, 1891 • Various
... there. Every rung of every chair must be gone over, though ever so clean; every article put up or put out of the way; Miss Fortune made the most of the little province of housekeeping that was left her; and a fluttering tape escaping through the crank of the door would have put her whole spirit topsy-turvy. When all was to her mind, and not before, she would have her breakfast. Only gruel and biscuit, or toast and tea, or some such trifle, but Ellen must prepare it, and ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... “He was a crank and I suppose he got a lot of satisfaction out of concealing his money. But this hunt for it isn’t funny. I supposed, of course, we’d dig it up before Glenarm got here or I shouldn’t have been in such a hurry to send for him. But it’s over ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... PUBLIC OPINION.—The growing power of Public Opinion brings with it increased possibilities for good, but also increased possibilities for evil. In an important sense, this is the age of the propagandist, the crank reformer, and the subsidized newspaper, the age of the agitator who spreads lies through anonymous letters, unsigned posters, and irresponsible whisperings. The individual must be constantly on his guard against this ...
— Problems in American Democracy • Thames Ross Williamson
... his surroundings to note any peculiarity in this neglect of himself and marked respect for 'Captain Cole.' We made the round of the decks, then explored the engine room. Here the designer found himself in an earthly paradise. He button-holed the engineer and inquired into every crank, and piston, and valve, and every bolt, as it seemed to me, till the officer in charge unconsciously began to ask opinions instead of offering explanations. By degrees the captain was equally astonished at the visitor's knowledge, ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... being asked to be President, because I should certainly feel compelled to decline it. I never go, willingly, to London now, and should never attend meetings, so pray say no more about it. Besides, I am so widely known as a "crank" and a "faddist" that my being President would injure the Society, as much as Lord Rayleigh would benefit it, so pray do not put any obstacle in his way, though of course there is no necessity to beg him as a favour to be the successor ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences Vol 2 (of 2) • James Marchant
... man, who always wanted to dash into the middle of every other man's speech. There was the practical man, who came with papers of figures and desired to make it all a question of statistics. There was the 'crank,' who disagreed with everything that everybody else said or suggested or could possibly have said or suggested on that or any other subject. The first trouble of the Dictator was to get at any commonly admitted appreciation of facts. ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... also call attention to the improvements that we have just made in our mill. Last week we put a handle in the upper burr, and we have also engaged one of the best head millers in Pompeii to turn the crank day-times. Our old head miller will oversee the business at night, so that the mill will be in full blast night and day, except when the head miller has gone to his meals or stopped to ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... psychological phenomena I have witnessed, none has appeared to me more curious than a susceptibility of certain minds to become imbued with a violent antipathy to the theory of gravitation. The anti-gravitation crank, as he is commonly called, is a regular part of the astronomer's experience. He is, however, only one of a large and varied class who occupy themselves with what an architect might consider the drawing up of plans and specifications for a universe. This is, no ...
— The Reminiscences of an Astronomer • Simon Newcomb
... unfrequented passages, and stealthy footfalls in unoccupied chambers overhead. I never knew of an old house without these mysterious noises. Next to my bedroom was a musty, dismantled apartment, in one corner of which, leaning against the wainscot, was a crippled mangle, with its iron crank tilted in the air like the elbow of the late Mr. ...
— Miss Mehetabel's Son • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... and on Wednesday, and on Thursday and on Friday, and on Saturday. One afternoon, strolling in the adjacent country, he had seen a horse walking round and round and round in a small paddock, turning a crank which worked some machine or other in an adjoining shed: that horse had ...
— The Chestermarke Instinct • J. S. Fletcher
... the propeller shaft, brought the leaders to the edge of a wider space. Sievers struck a match, and a well-like, vertical opening was revealed. High overhead towered and threatened an enormous steel crank. Before their feet lay a deep pool of slime. The heat ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... and serviceable. They fastened each of these wheels to the end of an iron rod which they passed through the boat from side to side. The rod was bent in the middle so that it could be turned as with a crank. When the work was finished, the old fishing boat looked rather odd, with a paddle wheel on each side which dipped just a few inches into the water. The boys lost no time ...
— Fifty Famous People • James Baldwin
... the spell of their singing raised the fragrant freight, and not the crank. Madagascar and Ceylon appeared at the mystic bidding of the song. The placid sunshine of the docks was perfumed with India. The universal calm of southern seas poured from the bosom of the ship over the ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... was known as the "devil," a term that annoyed me not a little. I worked with Wood, the pressman, as a roller boy, and in the same room was a power press, the power being a stalwart negro who turned a crank. Wood and I used to race with the power press, and then I would fly the sheets,—that is, take them off, when printed, with one hand and roll the type with the other. This so pleased Noel that he advanced my wages to a dollar and ...
— Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail • Ezra Meeker
... crank and Charlie sprang into the cockpit. I cranked until the mechanism was droning dismally, and pulled the lever that engaged it with the engine. I had been in too much haste to get up the proper speed, and the powerful new engine ...
— Astounding Stories, March, 1931 • Various
... and the steamer Peace was built on the Thames, Grenfell watching everything being made from the crank to the funnel. She was built, launched, and tried on the Thames; then taken to pieces and packed in 800 packages, weighing 65 lbs. each, and taken to the mouth of the Congo. On the heads and shoulders ...
— The Book of Missionary Heroes • Basil Mathews
... automobile, but the motor car still had a great drawback-cranking. Owing to the peculiar features of a gasoline engine, it must first be put in motion by some external power before it will begin to operate under its own power. This made it necessary for the driver to "crank" the engine, or start it moving, by means of a handle attached to the engine shaft. Cranking a large engine is difficult, especially if it is cold, and often results in tired muscles, and soiled clothes and tempers. It also made it impossible for the average woman ...
— The Automobile Storage Battery - Its Care And Repair • O. A. Witte
... him of being some kind of parlor radical and although he would doubtless outgrow his youthful notions, it made me uneasy to have a crank in my employ. But beyond urging him to keep his ideas strictly to himself and not leave any more memopads scribbled over with clef signs on his desk, I could do nothing, for upon his retention depended his father's goodwill—the general's assignment ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... by means of a spring pole; but oftener a steam engine of from four to eight horse power. Midway between the well and the engine a post is planted, on which is balanced a working beam about sixteen feet in length: one end of this beam is attached to the crank of the engine, and the other to the implements in the well. The power is applied to raising the bit—the blow is produced by the fall of the same when relieved by the downward motion ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, Issue 2, February, 1864 • Various
... Choate arrived at the same hotel on the day I took up my abode there, so that some of the toil he had inspired went on in his proximity, if not in his presence. I carefully kept out of his sight, however, lest he should think me a "crank" on the subject of reform, ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... out through the nearest door, which, I thanked God, was a side one leading to the street where the crowd was thinnest. He cast a wild look around. His eyes lighted on an empty automobile whose chauffeur had deserted to the crowd. It was the work of a second to crank it; of another to jump into the front seat. Quick as had been his movement, I was behind him in the rear seat. With a bound the great machine leaped ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson
... to those deeds. In the murder trials at Dublin, 1883, those destined to the assassin's knife were spoken of by approvers as persons to be removed, and their death constantly described as their 'removal.' In Sussex it is never said of a man that he is drunk. He may be 'tight,' or 'primed,' or 'crank,' or 'concerned in liquor,' nay, it may even be admitted that he had taken as much liquor as was good for him; but that he was drunk, oh never. [Footnote: 'Pransus' and 'potus,' in like manner, as every ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench
... they read and discussed the letters which poured in upon them from theatrical managers, Wild West shows, music halls, and other similar enterprises, and from romantic girls and shrewd photographers, and every other conceivable kind of crank. The offers of the music halls Jack was inclined to consider worth while. "He'd be a great success there, or as a dead-shot in a Wild West show. They pay pretty ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... very amusing. It is astonishing to see how crank-proof sundry minds are. Everything seems to them on a dead level of categorical proposition. They walk up to every statue with their measuring-line of Barbara, Celarent, Darii, Ferioque Prioris, and measure ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... gave a little shriek of dismay. Complete silence and darkness followed the onslaught, and then with a whisper of "Who's afraid?" she drew forth a lamp of diminutive proportions and Etruscan design, and turning the crank produced a brilliant electric flame, which permeated the damp and ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.
... a voice of distress, and though I am no dreamer and I think no crank, I could not get away from the idea that she was crying to me ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... in war, intelligence, knowledge, friendship all marked him out as a man only too likely to bring discredit on Archducal tradition. His peers in birth shook their heads, and muttered the German synonym for "crank." Worse than all, he was in love—in love with a woman of dangerous virtue. What could such a man do against temptation? Struggle as he might, he could not long repel the seductive advances of honourable action. He loved, ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... girl! I know you're a crank from Crankville on some subjects. Let us have it for all you're worth. I'm on the ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... and durability are steel-bar carpenter clamps, Fig. 176. They vary in length from 1-1/2 ft. to 8 ft. The separate parts are the steel bar A, the cast-iron frame B, the tip C into which fits the screw D, on the other end of which is the crank E, and the slide F with its dog G, which engages in the notches on the bar. Any part, if broken, ...
— Handwork in Wood • William Noyes
... once a year Good protections against temptations; but the surest is cowardice Goody-goody puerilities and dreary moralities Habit of assimilating incredibilities Human pride is not worth while Hunger is the handmaid of genius If the man doesn't believe as we do, we say he is a crank Inherited prejudices in favor of hoary ignorances It is easier to stay out than get out Man is the only animal that blushes—or needs to Meddling philanthropists Melt a brass door-knob and weather which will only make it mushy Moral sense, and there is an Immoral Sense Most satisfactory ...
— Quotations from the Works of Mark Twain • David Widger
... turning of the shaft by the weight. There is a fixed spindle (24) supported on the bracket (23)—which is fixed to the tank or one of the guide-rods—having centred on it a curved bar or quadrant (25) running loose on the spindle (24) and having a crank arm (26) to which is connected one end of a rod (27) which, at the other end, is connected to the arm (28) of the escapement. The quadrant bears at both extremities against the flat bar (29) when the bell (22) ...
— Acetylene, The Principles Of Its Generation And Use • F. H. Leeds and W. J. Atkinson Butterfield
... steady her in entering the crank little craft, I waited until she had seated herself aft and taken the steering paddle in her hand, then, with a powerful push that sent the canoe, stern-first, far out into the rapidly flowing stream, I sprang in over the bows, seized a paddle, and proceeded to force ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... wind was still blowing about twenty miles per hour when we set to work on the machine. I poured some oil straight into the crank-case to make sure that there was sufficient, and we also tested and improved the ignition. At four o'clock the wind dropped, and in an hour the engine was started. While moving along, the idle cylinder was ejecting ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... of one of the pu-pils, said that he had turned the crank of that ma-chine time and time a-gain when he was a boy, and that he was will-ing to go on the stage with it at that time if it would help a-long the "Show," and raise mon-ey for the "Cause." So when the clos-ing scene came Al-lan Frost ...
— Pages for Laughing Eyes • Unknown
... one outside, and then turning about let himself down to arm's-length and dropped to the ground. "Thank God!" he said again. "The two men who were to have come with me didn't show up. I waited as long as I dared, and then came on with only the chauffeur. He's waiting outside by the car ready to crank up when I give the word. The car's just a few yards away, headed out for the road. How are we to get ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... just for the sake of having such a good home. Ginger said if we could do all that, and keep Jonesy and his brother from growing up to be tramps like the man we bought the bear from, it would be serving our country just as much as if we went to war and fought for it. Ginger is a crank about being a patriot. You ought to hear her talk about it. And Aunt Allison said that 'an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,' and that to build such a place as our 'Fairchance' would be a deed worthy of ...
— Two Little Knights of Kentucky • Annie Fellows Johnston
... striking fact that the great mass of Chinese critical scholarship is entirely adverse to the claims put forward on behalf of the treatise,—a man who believes in it as the genuine work of Lao Tzu being generally regarded among educated Chinese as an amiable crank, much as many people now regard any one who credits the plays of Shakespeare to Lord Bacon,—and I think we may safely dismiss the ...
— China and the Chinese • Herbert Allen Giles
... the chicken coop turned around as the lights flashed, and he was looking squarely at the camera. Of course this made his face very plain to the audience, as Tom turned the crank of the reproducing machine. ...
— Tom Swift and his Wizard Camera - or, Thrilling Adventures while taking Moving Pictures • Victor Appleton
... we were looking the Great Panjandrum Himself, with his little round button-at-the-top on his head, was turning a crank in the side of the wonderful Pantoscopticon, which had a hopper on the top of it like that of an old-fashioned coffee-mill. As he turned he ...
— Queer Stories for Boys and Girls • Edward Eggleston
... his word, Roosevelt called at the Ehrich's that afternoon, and no one could have been more charming, more neighborly than he. He told of our first meeting, smilingly called me "a Henry George crank," and referred to other differences which existed between us. "Differences which do not in the least interfere with our friendship," he assured Zulime. "Your husband, for example, doesn't believe in hunting, and has always stood out against my shooting," here he became quite ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... violent controversy arose over appointments to important offices in New York, which led to the resignation of Senators Conkling and Platt. This was followed by President Garfield being shot (July 2, 1881) by a crazy crank (Guiteau) who, in some way, conceived that he, through the controversy, was deprived of an office. In company with General Sherman I saw and had an interview with Mr. Garfield in his room at the White House the afternoon of the day he was shot. His appearance then was that ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... good results, and save so much time and effort that they should be found in every kitchen. Among them is the rotary egg beater shown in Fig. 1 (a). This is so made that one revolution of the wheel to which the crank is attached does about five times as much work as can be done with a fork or with an egg whip, which is shown in (b). Another inexpensive device that is a real help is the potato ricer. This device, one style of which is shown in Fig. 2, is really a press ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 1 - Volume 1: Essentials of Cookery; Cereals; Bread; Hot Breads • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences
... toasting everybody from the "Chief Magistrate of America" down to our very humble selves, she sent a muchacho out to borrow the hand-organ belonging to a neighbour, this musical instrument being highly venerated in Misamis. On its arrival the presidente himself turned the crank, and with such vigour that I feared a stroke of apoplexy on ...
— A Woman's Journey through the Philippines - On a Cable Ship that Linked Together the Strange Lands Seen En Route • Florence Kimball Russel
... cried Macey, and Vane began to work his crank and paddle on the boat's starboard side with the result that they began to move and curve round. Then, applying more force and working hard, he gave himself too much swing in working his lever, with the result that his side rose a little. In the midst of ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... house and a queer printer. There was an old damaged press, on which Franklin exercised his skill in repairing, and a small worn-out font of type. Keimer himself, who seems to have been a grotesque compound of knave and crank, was engaged at once in composing and setting up in type an elegy on the death of a prominent young man. He is the only poet to my knowledge who ever used the composition-stick instead of a pen for the vehicle of inspiration. The elegy may still be read in Duyckinck's ...
— Benjamin Franklin • Paul Elmer More
... a priest of some strange religion, an enquiry agent, or just—a crank?" was the thought that first occurred to him. And the question suggested itself without amusement. The impression of subterfuge and caution he conveyed ...
— Four Weird Tales • Algernon Blackwood
... idea," said Harding. "Clarke's known as a crank, and he takes advantage of it to cover his doings. At first, I thought of the whisky trade; but taking up prohibited liquor would hardly be worth his while; though I dare say he has some with him to be used for gaining his Indian friends' good will. He's on the ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss
... Captain John Hall, in company with the Francis, Captain Newsham; and as the latter ship sailed much better than the Cadogan, she left us immediately after getting out to sea. Finding his ship very tender, or crank, Captain Hill put in at Batavia, to get her into better trim. We continued here about ten days; but I can say little about that place, being all the time unable to stand on my legs, and was only twice out in a coach to take the air, two or three miles out of the city, in which ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... To crank it and leap to the driver's seat required but a moment. The big car moved smoothly forward. A turn of the steering wheel brought it around headed toward the wide gates. Barney shifted to second speed, stepped on the accelerator and the cut-out ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... system of popular education, into a local antiquarian society; but simply let it serve incidentally as a picker-up of unconsidered trifles. A wide-awake, scholarly librarian will like his town, and delight in at least some study of its antecedents. And such a librarian need not be a crank, but must needs be an enterprising, wide-awake, appreciative student, who can scent the tastes ...
— A Library Primer • John Cotton Dana
... plainly seen now, for they were exactly in the path of the strong light. There was some laughter in the audience, and then the man who was turning the crank of the moving picture machine began to understand that ...
— Bunny Brown and his Sister Sue • Laura Lee Hope
... many engineers has been to take advantage of these matters by using the valve with 90 deg. angular advance of eccentric ahead of crank, for the admission, release, and compression of the steam, and provide another means of cutting off, besides the one already referred to, viz., cutting off the supply of steam to the chest, and overcome ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 787, January 31, 1891 • Various
... what my opinion is about this Maurice Kirkwood, I think he is eccentric in his habit of life, but not what they call a 'crank' exactly. He talked well enough about such matters as we spoke of,—the lake, the scenery in general, the climate. I asked him to come over and take a look at the college. He did n't promise, but I should not be surprised if I should get him over there some day. I asked ...
— A Mortal Antipathy • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... himself—" She broke off, and turned her head ungraciously toward the sounder, which seemed to be repeating something over and over with a good deal of insistence. "That's Shoshone calling," she said, frowning attentively. "They've got an old crank up there in the office—I'd know his touch among a million—and when he calls he means business. I'll have to speak up, I suppose." She sighed, tucked a chocolate into her cheek, and went scowling to the table. "Can't ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... intended for us was, like all Indian boats, a trunk of a tree hollowed out partly by the hatchet and partly by fire. It was forty feet long, and three broad. Three persons could not sit in it side by side. These canoes are so crank, and they require, from their instability, a cargo so equally distributed, that when you want to rise for an instant, you must warn the rowers to lean to the opposite side. Without this precaution the water would necessarily enter the ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... can't say THAT! He's regularly cut up, you know! And changed; you'd hardly know him. More like a gloomy crank than the easy fool he used to be," he went on, with brotherly directness. "It wouldn't be a bad thing, you know, if you could manage to see him, Miss Trotter! In fact, as he's off his feed, and has some trouble with his arm again, owing to all this, I reckon, I've ...
— From Sand Hill to Pine • Bret Harte
... called there once, two hundred years in advance of the Glarus—a ship not much unlike the crank high-prowed caravel of Hudson, and her company had landed, and having accomplished the evil they had set out to do, made shift to sail away. And then, just after the palms of the island had sunk from sight below the water's edge, the unspeakable had happened. The ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... mistake. All! says you? Don't you believe it. There's a lot more to come yet, take my tip—a devil of a lot, or I'm the biggest lunatic within a ten-mile circle of w'ere I'm stannin', which is givin' long odds to any other crank in the whole creation." ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... narrow pathway, the pedal of one of the machines struck upon a protuberance, concealed by a tuft of grass, snapping off the axle, and scattering the ball-bearings over the ground. For some miles we pushed along on the bare axle inverted in the pedal-crank. But the wrenching the machine thus received soon began to tell. With a sudden jolt on a steep descent, it collapsed entirely, and precipitated the rider over the handle-bars. The lower part of the frame had broken short off, where it was ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... I sat in the lantern, the great brazen frame of polished reflectors swung around, once in each minute, within a few inches of the side. Beneath was the projecting handle of a crank, or lever, by pressing upon which the revolution could be instantly arrested. Stooping down, I could sit at ease, with my head clear from any contact with the lamps, and in that position could have the ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 9 • Various
... at last on what he would be in our so great America. Once or twice, when he was tired or discouraged, Tish had taken him out in her machine, and he had been thrilled—really thrilled. He did not seem able to learn how to crank it—Tish's car is hard to crank—but he learned how to light the lamps and to spot a policeman two blocks away. Several times, when we were going into the country, Tish took him because it gave her a sense of security ...
— Tish, The Chronicle of Her Escapades and Excursions • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... he turned the crank, and raised the sinker and the cask, so that the skids which supported them could ...
— Haste and Waste • Oliver Optic
... when I was a youngster, except a little rule-of-thumb mathematics. One picked up a sort of smattering of a language or two knocking about the world, but no grammatical knowledge, nothing scientific. If a boy doesn't get a method, he is beating to windward in a crank craft all his life. He hasn't got any regular place to stow away what he gets into his brains, and so it lies tumbling about in the hold, and he loses it, or it gets damaged and is never ready for use. You see ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... besides his being all eye and all ear, so that nothing might be lost: and then, at every pause in the harangue, he gurgled out his pursy chuckle of a cough-laugh (for the machinery of laughter took some time to get in motion, and seemed crank and slack), or else his twanging nasal, Bravo! Das glaub' ich; in either case, by way of heartiest approval. In short, if Teufelsdrockh was Dalai-Lama, of which, except perhaps in his self-seclusion, and ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... hungry an' he ain't a-goin' to eat any more bread made in a wash-basin! Says he'll starve first. Says Nels hed the gang over to big bunk an' feasted them on bread you taught him how to make in some new-fangled bucket-machine with a crank. Jim says thet bread beat any cake he ever eat, an' he wants you to show him how to make some. Now, Miss Majesty, as superintendent of this ranch I ought to know what's goin' on. Mebbe Jim is jest ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... was re-formed. Louis pushed the bicycle on its front wheel, and Rachel tried to help him to support the weight of the suspended part. He had attempted in vain to take the pedal off the crank. ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... tramp by the long trail's border, Given to squalor, rags and disorder. I nap and amble and yawn and look, Write fool-thoughts in my grubby book, Recite to the children, explore at my ease, Work when I work, beg when I please, Give crank-drawings, that make folks stare To the half-grown boys in the sunset glare, And get me a place to sleep in the hay At the end of ...
— The Congo and Other Poems • Vachel Lindsay
... in milk, place in freezer. Add lemon juice after freezer has been packed. Add juice rapidly and with violent stirring, then immediately place in dasher and turn the crank until frozen. ...
— The Suffrage Cook Book • L. O. Kleber
... jobs where it does not pay to install a power mixer a hand power mixer mounted on a frame carried by two large wheels has been found at least as efficient as hand mixing; more convenient and easier on the men. The machine is turned by a crank driving a sprocket chain; it is charged at the stock piles and then hauled to the forms to be discharged. Local conditions determine the capacity of power mixer to be used. Difficulties in supplying material or in taking away the concrete may readily reduce the output of a large machine ...
— Concrete Construction - Methods and Costs • Halbert P. Gillette
... have you with me in Santa Barbara," she said. "But Roberto is what the Americanos call 'crank.' No is use asking him. Santa Barbara no is like in the old time, but is nice sleep place, where no have the neuralgia, and nothing to bother. Then always I have the few old families that are left, and we are so friends,—see each other every day, and eat the Spanish ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... iron frame and Varus standing where I am. There,—Caesar having in a few moments brought the wires—the body you perceive is confined in this manner.—You observe there can be no escape and no motion. Now at the word of the judge, this crank is turned. Do you see the effect upon the wire? Imagine it your body and you will have a lively idea of the instrument. Then at another wink or word from Varus, these are turned, and you see that ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware |
