Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Cuff   /kəf/   Listen
Cuff

noun
1.
The lap consisting of a turned-back hem encircling the end of the sleeve or leg.  Synonym: turnup.
2.
Shackle that consists of a metal loop that can be locked around the wrist; usually used in pairs.  Synonyms: handcuff, handlock, manacle.



Related searches:



WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Cuff" Quotes from Famous Books



... room had none, and the lamp being broken, I had to depend upon the bit of candle which might fail while I still had need of it. I separated it carefully from its bed of grease on the mantel, and as I did so the wavering light touched my hand and shirt cuff. Both were stained red, and I turned slightly sick at the sight. There was blood on my brown boots, too, and the grey tweed clothes which I had not had time to change since arriving ...
— The Powers and Maxine • Charles Norris Williamson

... hedgerows green must not be over-particular. Il faut heurler avec les loups. "Ain't it wrong to steal dese here chickens?" asked a negro who was seized with scruples while helping to rob a hen-roost. "Dat, Cuff, am a great moral question, an' we haint got time to discuss it—so jist hand down ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland

... officer, looking at the single star that adorned Dennis's cuff, and waxing furious. "What the dickens is the service coming to? Do you know who I am, sir?" And he fixed his eyeglass into the frown that was intended to slay this young whippersnapper who presumed to dictate to a man with a crown on ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry

... with admiration. When it came to spinning a convincing yarn right off the cuff, so to speak, Cap'n Mike was a master. Rick hid a smile. What had the old man said about ham actors a ...
— Smugglers' Reef • John Blaine

... uninformed of the true character of the person who has to-night won at ecarte a large sum of money from Lord Glendinning. I will therefore put you upon an expeditious and decisive plan of obtaining this very necessary information. Please to examine, at your leisure, the inner linings of the cuff of his left sleeve, and the several little packages which may be found in the somewhat capacious pockets ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill

... Among them was a very old couple with numerous progeny who lived not far from us in a hut in the woods on the Hazard estate. In subsequent years I heard my mother remark, upon the occasion of a marriage in the family connection, that when "Cuff" and "Sary" were married her father gave the clergyman five dollars for his services. Cuff was an old-fashioned, festive negro born in this country, and with the firm belief that existence was bestowed upon him solely for his own enjoyment. He possessed a genius ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur

... and faded. A misty shadow hid it from his eyes. He could just see the shining of the silver strings, and the white line of his linen cuff. ...
— The Upas Tree - A Christmas Story for all the Year • Florence L. Barclay

... best brown silk dress, with a lace collar and cuff set contributed the Christmas before by her Aunt Kate from Ontario, and at her waist, one of the doctor's roses. The others had been brought over by Mary, and were in a glass jar on the tidy desk, where they attracted much attention and speculation as to where they had come from. They seemed ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung

... bracelets of emeralds. She nestled herself comfortably in Dorothy's lap until the kitten gave a snarl of jealous anger and leaped up with a sharp claw fiercely bared to strike Billina a blow. But the little girl gave the angry kitten such a severe cuff that it jumped down ...
— Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz • L. Frank Baum.

... and all his teeth, perhaps to show he was born into the world grown old in vice." A certain scoffer "being one day to pass a river with two companions, was visibly taken up by an invisible hand into the air. One of his companions, going to take hold of him by the feet, had such a cuff given him that he fell down in the boat, and the offender was seen no more." Father Merolla talks of a breed in the Cabo Verde Islands "between bulls and she-asses, which they compassed by binding a cow's hide upon the latter:" it would be worth inquiring if ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... you don't, every time you take a grain, I'll take two. And she did! I'd come home, and she'd see what I'd been doing, and she'd up with her sleeves, and—" In horrible pantomime, the boy lifted the cuff of his shirt, and pressed his right thumb against the wrist of his other arm. At the memory of it, he gave a shiver and, with a blow, roughly struck the cuff into place. "God!" he muttered, "I couldn't stand it. I begged, and begged her not. I cried. ...
— Vera - The Medium • Richard Harding Davis

... shirt-sleeve and tucked the cuff into the folds, his naked sabre under his arm. Von Steyr, in shirt, riding-breeches, and boots, stood with one leg crossed before the other, leaning on his bared sabre. The surgeon and the two seconds walked apart, speaking in undertones, with now and then a quick gesture ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers

... with its gentlemanly pearl scarfpin, was set forth, and the fact that the buttonhole in the left lapel of his morning coat showed signs of use was duly noted. What Parkinson saw he recorded, but he made no deductions. A handkerchief carried in the cuff of the right sleeve was simply that to him and not an indication that Mr. Carlyle was, ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah

... school I never heard the end of this, for they would call me "Half-and-half" and "The Great Britain," and sometimes "Union Jack." When there was a battle between the Scotch and English boys, one side would kick my shins and the other cuff my ears, and then they would both stop and laugh as ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle

... forbearing—the General was so undecided in his opinions. Pretty soon, the negro, having wound his way high up in the world, turned a corner, gave a tremendous guffaw, and opened the door of a place that looked very much like a closet in which to stow away lean lawyers. 'Now, Cuff! ye ain't goin to stow this citizen away in that ar ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton

... you are not to imagine the water is to be very hot. I would not coddle the child. No, Sir, the hardy method of treating children does no good. I'll take you five children from London, who shall cuff five Highland children. Sir, a man bred in London will carry a burthen, or run, or wrestle, as well as a man brought up in the hardiest manner in the country.' BOSWELL. 'Good living, I suppose, makes the Londoners strong.' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell

... he caught up the boy's hand by the cuff of his jacket, and surveyed the warts with an edifying aspect ...
— Standard Selections • Various

... "Bless my cuff-links!" ejaculated Mr. Damon, his rosy face one beaming smile. "You couldn't expect to do better than this. You save one locomotive on the haul, and you beat the schedule ten minutes, so that you had to lay by to get right of way into the yard here. ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Locomotive - or, Two Miles a Minute on the Rails • Victor Appleton

... met in the street a man in uniform. His coat sleeves were embroidered from shoulder to cuff with bars, stripes, insignia and chevrons of the most gorgeous colors and fantastic designs. My curiosity was too much for me, and I was about to stop and question him, when I discovered he had already halted and was bursting ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher

... you are." Yates drew back his coat sleeve, and presented his wrist. The dangling cuff was speedily clamped upon it. The constable mounted the patient horse that stood waiting for him, watching him all the while with intelligent eye. The two prisoners, handcuffed together, took the middle of the road, with a horseman on each side of them, ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr

... what to do. I first caressed the soft velvet on his cuff, and then. I stroked the hand it surrounded. It was his foresight, his goodness, his silent, strong, effective goodness, that overpowered me by their proved reality. It was the assurance of his sleepless interest which broke on me like a light from heaven; it was his—I will ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte

... the priest Should ask if Katherine should be his wife? Ay, by gogs woons, quoth he; and swore so loud, That, all amaz'd, the priest let fall the book; And as he stooped again to take it up, This mad-brain'd bridegroom took him such a cuff, That down fell priest and book, and book and priest. Now take them up, ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt

... appearances in his face, chest, and shoulders, - the more alarming because unaccompanied by any noise whatever. These emotions, however, gradually subsided, and after three or four short relapses he wiped his eyes with the cuff of his coat, and looked about ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens

... cuff buttons which I had from Prince Eugene I presented to the watchman in the cemetery. They are worth a ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various

... slunk away. There was a sudden look of horror in his white face. He started back but Quest was too quick for him. In a moment there was the click of a handcuff, the mate of which was concealed under the criminologist's cuff. ...
— The Black Box • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... devil's shoulders. Many a time, with the yardstick in one hand, he came to our houses with whole pieces of calico and got a few pennies from us for his trouble. And now he is a man of some importance! Many's the time we gave him a cuff and sent him back and forth with his goods. And, Salome, do you know that he lied? God save us from such lies! But what could he do? One would die of hunger, to be sure, if ...
— Armenian Literature • Anonymous

... was dressed with a childish attempt at display. His shirt-front was decorated with a diamond, and his cuff-buttons were of onyx with diamond settings. His clothes were expensive and perceptibly new, and he often changed his costumes, but with a noticeable disregard for propriety. He was very conscious of his silk hat, and frequently wiped it with a handkerchief on which his ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie

... far when he was overtaken, and knocked flat with a cuff on the side of the head. As he rose slowly with his head ringing, Pokopokowo grasped him by the shoulder, and ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor

... the bedstead, tables and bureaus were literally covered with articles, such as a bath-robe, pajamas, underwear, shirts, collars, cuffs, gloves, hats, shoes, etc., all brand new and marked "John Convert." Upon the dressing case was a small jewel box, containing several kinds of gold cuff buttons, diamond scarf pins, and a solid gold watch, on the inside of which was inscribed, "From ...
— Born Again • Alfred Lawson

... grant, And said he lik'd him dearly, Which gave to Donald more content, Than Twenty Shillings yearly: This wily Leard Rode in the Guard, And lov'd a strong Beer Barrel; Yet stout enough, To Fight and Cuff, But ...
— Wit and Mirth: or Pills to Purge Melancholy, Vol. 5 of 6 • Various

... me, I managed, at considerable risk, to keep a rough record of the return journey, on a small piece of paper that had remained in my pocket when I had been searched by the Tibetans. My hands being supple, I was able to draw my right hand out of its cuff. Using as a pen a small piece of bone I had picked up, and my blood as ink, I drew brief cipher notes and a rough map of ...
— An Explorer's Adventures in Tibet • A. Henry Savage Landor

... Promenade Costume.—A high dress of black satin, the body fitting perfectly tight; has a small jacket cut on the biais, with row of black velvet laid on a little distance from the edge; the sleeves are rather large, and have a broad cuff turned back, which is trimmed to correspond with the jacket; the skirt is long and full; the dress is ornamented up the front in its whole length by rich fancy silk trimmings, graduating in size from the bottom of the ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various

... the air, and Gaspare, clad in a pair of bathing drawers, bounded out from behind the boat, gave Nito a cuff on the cheek, executed some steps of the tarantella, whirled round, snatched up one end ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens

... pale face; he was thin and deaf, and very silent; he scarcely opened his lips during the dinner, and he made one pun. Some gentleman missed his snuff-box, and Hood said,—(the Freemasons' Tavern was kept, you must remember, by Mr. CUFF in those days, not by its present proprietors). Well, the box being lost, and asked for, and CUFF (remember that name) being the name of the landlord, Hood opened his silent jaws and said * * * Shall I tell you what he said? It was not ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray

... fishmonger's son is going by to his lessons and dare not play at ball. Azariah would whip him if he did. One a little bolder than the rest dangled a piece of rope in his face saying: this is what you'd get if you stayed with us. He was moved to run after the boy and cuff him, but the quires under his arms restrained him and he passed on, keeping a dignified silence. Soon thou'lt be reading to us in the synagogues! was the last jeer cried after him that day, but for many a day he caught sight of a face grinning ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore

... watch upon the hill, Then he lets fall his bale of coloured words. At frosty midnight June shall rise in flame, Move at his magic with her bells and birds, The rose will redden as he speaks her name. He shall release earth's frozen bosom there, And with great words shall cuff the whining air. ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various

... ever more in need of a Boswell than Henley. Dr. Weir Mitchell once complained to me that in America nobody waited upon great men to report their sayings, while in England a young man was always somewhere near with a clean cuff to scribble them on. The enthusiast, with his cuff an impatient blank, never hung about Henley. Anyway, that was not what our Thursday evenings were for. Of all his Young Men who climbed up the Buckingham Street stairs with him on Thursday night and sat ...
— Nights - Rome, Venice, in the Aesthetic Eighties; London, Paris, in the Fighting Nineties • Elizabeth Robins Pennell

... when Breitmann came in. The latter's velvet collar was worn; there was a suspicious gloss at the elbows; the cuff buttons were of cheap metal; his fingers were without rings. But the American readily understood. There are lean years and fat years in journalism, and he himself had known them. For the present this man was a little down on his luck; ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath

... had known as Douglas turned up his own coat and cuff to show a brown triangle within a circle exactly like that which we had seen upon the ...
— The Valley of Fear • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

... you? Too late I closed the blind! Alas! List! there's another trump!—There, two of 'em!— Two? A quintette at least. Mosquito chorus! A—ah! my cheek! And oh! again, my eyelid! I gave myself a stunning cuff on the ear And all in vain. Flap we our handkerchief; Flap, flap! (A smash.) Quick, quick, bring in a lamp! I've switched a flower-vase from the shelf. Ah me! Splash on my head, and then upon my feet, The water poured;—I'm ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various

... in the breeding season, and many of them show signs of dire distress when he goes near their nests. They often utter pitiful cries, droop their wings, and the bravest of them dash at him savagely, giving him many a cuff on the head and back. The wood pewee and the kingbird succeed, I think, in driving him away; but the vireos and warblers, being so much smaller, suffer greatly from his depredations. If there were no real cause for it, these birds would not be filled with panic and rage on ...
— Our Bird Comrades • Leander S. (Leander Sylvester) Keyser

... go after the women with my comrades, you would be lost in amazement. God's faith! on one of those nights there was one of them, a poor sickly creature she was too, and stood not a cubit in height, who would not come with us; so first I treated her to many a good cuff, and then I took her up by main force, and carried her well-nigh as far as a cross-bow will send a bolt, and so caused her, willy-nilly, come with us. And on another occasion I mind me that, having none other with me but my servant, ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio

... had appeared all pride and sunny smiles regarding her noon-mark (particularly after hearing it was not to be paid for), fell suddenly into a stormy mood, and once more began to cuff the children ...
— The Young Surveyor; - or Jack on the Prairies • J. T. Trowbridge

... days, He was verra lang legged hungry-lookup an lean, His claes werna' new, nor weel hained nor clean, Tight straps his short trews to meet shiny boots drew, Where wee tae an' big tae alike keeked through, His coat ance black braid-claith, was rusty enough, It was oot at the elbows an' frayed at the cuff, It was white at the seams, it was threadbare and thin An' to hide a defects, buttoned up to the chin Bruised and dinged in the crown and the brim was his hat, But set jauntily on his few hairs for a that, Paper collar an' cuffs showed ...
— Verses and Rhymes by the way • Nora Pembroke

... pocket, Lige fashioned a collar about the neck of each cub, leaving a leash four or five feet long to lead the animal by. However, this was not accomplished without vigorous protest on the part of the cubs. Tad was highly amused at their efforts to cuff their captor with their little paws, which they wielded with more or less skill. Yet, they were too young to be able to make any great resistance, and the guide did not give the slightest attention to their ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Rockies • Frank Gee Patchin

... the palace and smote out three stones. Then cried the King, "O dog, thou hast destroyed mine army and hast forsaken thy faith and comest now to make me do likewise!" With this Gharib went up to him and dealt him a cuff on the neck which knocked him down; whereupon the Marids bound him fast and all the Harim- women fled. Then Gharib sat down on the throne of kingship and said to Ra'ad Shah, "Do thou justice upon ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 7 • Richard F. Burton

... the attack. We sit down on a firing-step with our backs to the holes cut for our exodus at the last minute by the sappers. Euterpe, the cyclist, passes and gives us good-day. Then he turns in his tracks and draws from the cuff of his coat-sleeve an envelope, whose protruding edge had conferred a ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse

... to him to be exactly the poison he wanted. It was swift— indeed, almost immediate, in its effect—perfectly painless, and when taken in the form of a gelatine capsule, the mode recommended by Sir Mathew, not by any means unpalatable. He accordingly made a note, upon his shirt-cuff, of the amount necessary for a fatal dose, put the books back in their places, and strolled up St. James's Street, to Pestle and Humbey's, the great chemists. Mr. Pestle, who always attended personally on the aristocracy, was a good deal surprised at the order, and in a very deferential ...
— Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories • Oscar Wilde

... by her side, as had obviously been his first impulse—but some little distance away, where he could watch the expression of her face. Mrs Ramsden pushed the tea-table aside, and fidgeted with the jet trimming on her cuff. ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... dumb. Fandor lifted the cuff of Nanteuil's coat, and pointed out to Monsieur Havard, and to Juve, a sort of thin film of glove-like form. It was fastened to the wrist by an almost imperceptible ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre

... hint, a breath of rumour here; there an allusion, half taken back. The man, whose incinerated body still lay curled in its bed of cinders, had been dressed at the moment of disaster; even to the watch, the cuff-buttons, the studs, the very scarf-pin. Fully clothed to the last detail, precisely as those who had dealings at the bank might have seen Campbell Wood any week-day morning for the past eight months. A man does not sleep with his clothes on. The skull of the man had been ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various

... ottoman, in a soldier-like, fur-trimmed waist, high, upright collar, enormous cuff-links, a veil over her face and her hands clasped convulsively in her muff. Schoen stands down right. Lulu, in a big-flowered morning-dress, her hair in a simple knot in a golden circlet, sits in the arm-chair ...
— Erdgeist (Earth-Spirit) - A Tragedy in Four Acts • Frank Wedekind

... the Corps have brought in trophies from the battle-field—a fine grey cloak with a scarlet collar, a spiked helmet, a cuff with three buttons cut from the ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair

... city incarnate. He loved it, calling it God's country, as he called the smoke Prosperity, breathing the dingy cloud with relish. And when soot fell upon his cuff he chuckled; he could have kissed it. "It's good! It's good!" he said, and smacked his lips in gusto. "Good, clean soot; it's our life-blood, God bless it!" The smoke was one of his great enthusiasms; he laughed at a committee ...
— The Turmoil - A Novel • Booth Tarkington

... he scribbled it upon his shirt-cuff. Then, looking into her beautiful countenance, he asked: "Have you no idea of the nature of this man's ...
— The Doctor of Pimlico - Being the Disclosure of a Great Crime • William Le Queux

... Sigurd's fiery impulse to cuff him was cooled by a sudden frost. He said as carelessly as possible: "You are a churlish fool; but it is likely you have seen Robert Sans-Peur in Nidaros. He was there shortly before we ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz

... instruments of ignition and combustion in Sam Winnington's hair, singeing it and scorching his ears. Had Sam not been the best-natured and most politic fellow in the world, he would have dragged the aggressor by the collar or the cuff over the smoking crackling wood, and made the ladies shriek ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler

... subject. Its exhaustive treatment would require a large volume. In a little chapter such as this I have no intention of doing more than to cast a glance at its cuff buttons and some of the frills on its shirt. Those who want a ...
— America Through the Spectacles of an Oriental Diplomat • Wu Tingfang

... rolling up his gold-laced cuff, he proceeded to manipulate me. He punched me in the ribs, smote me across the chest, commanded me to stand on one leg and hold out the other horizontally. He asked me whether any of my family were consumptive; whether I ever felt a tendency to a rush of blood ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville

... are a lot of crazy schoolboys and expect to settle our disagreements with a regular fist-a-cuff bout? You must come from a very ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson

... hundred yards. For a time my beach walks resulted in inarticulate reaction. After months in the blindfolded canyons of New York's streets, a hemicircle of horizon, a hemisphere of sky, and a vast expanse of open water lent itself neither to calm appraisal nor to impromptu cuff-notes. ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe

... thort you cared to know it," returned the other, wiping his eye on the cuff of his coat. "The boys call me King Richard, because, as they say, he was stoop-shouldered like me, Monsieur. They daren't exactly call me humped for fear of my crutches, hih! hih! You can call me Richard, or Dick, or what ...
— The Brother Clerks - A Tale of New-Orleans • Xariffa

... beard. His opponent was of a much smaller build, with pale features, a tiny moustache, and watery blue eyes. He wore a pince-nez, and from the length of his hair and a dab of crimson lake upon his shirt cuff, I argued him ...
— A Bid for Fortune - or Dr. Nikola's Vendetta • Guy Boothby

... I forget. Him who rocks the little boat, or him who rides the cyclemotor I dislike a little more than just enough; But you might as well be knowing that the guy who gets me going Is the man who wears his kerchief in his cuff. ...
— Tobogganing On Parnassus • Franklin P. Adams

... Anne's diamond ring (a present from the Southards) testified. Then there were the less expensive but equally valued remembrances in the way of embroidered sofa pillows, center pieces, and collar and cuff sets, every stitch of which had been taken by the patient fingers ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower

... called "the Artful Dodger" - as he produced a shirt from a drawer. "Look here, at the wristbands! Here are all the Kings of Israel and Judah, with their dates and prophets, written down in India-ink, so as to wash out again. You twitch up the cuff of your coat, quite accidentally, and then you book your king. You see, Giglamps, I don't like to trust, as some fellows do, to having what you want, written down small and shoved into a quill, and passed to you by some man sitting in the schools; that's dangerous, don't you see. And I don't ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede

... 975; beating &c.v.; flagellation, fustigation[obs3], gantlet, strappado[obs3], estrapade[obs3], bastinado, argumentum baculinum[Lat][obs3], stick law, rap on the knuckles, box on the ear; blow &c. (impulse) 276; stripe, cuff, kick, buffet, pummel; slap, slap in the face; wipe, douse; coup de grace; torture, rack; picket, picketing; dragonnade[obs3]. capital punishment; execution; lethal injection; the gas chamber; hanging &c.v.; electrocution, rail-riding, scarpines[obs3]; decapitation, decollation[obs3]; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget

... talked; and before it was time to go he was telling her how different life might have been if he had known her years before. With ingenuous frankness he spoke of what a wicked, ill-disciplined boy he had been, and impulsively drew up his cuff to exhibit upon his wrist the scar from a saber cut which he had received in a duel outside of Paris when he was nineteen. She touched his hand as she scanned the red cicatrice on the inside of his white wrist. ...
— The Awakening and Selected Short Stories • Kate Chopin

... in the dress Kindles in clothes a wantonness: A lawn about the shoulders thrown Into a fine distraction: An erring lace, which here and there Enthrals the crimson stomacher: A cuff neglectful, and thereby Ribbons to flow confusedly: A winning wave, deserving note, In the tempestuous petticoat: A careless shoe-string, in whose tie I see a wild civility: Do more bewitch me than when art Is too precise in ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... horseman extended also to his gloves. The cowboy was very careful in the selection of his gloves. They were made of the finest buckskin, which could not be injured by wetting. Generally they were tanned white and cut with a deep cuff or gauntlet from which hung a little fringe to flutter in the wind when he rode at full speed ...
— The Passing of the Frontier - A Chronicle of the Old West, Volume 26 in The Chronicles - Of America Series • Emerson Hough

... to Pennie just now to cuff and scold Jemima, and to pet the Lady Dulcibella, who was a wax doll with a lovely pink and white complexion, and real golden hair and eyelashes. She had everything befitting a doll of her station and appearance—a comfortable ...
— The Hawthorns - A Story about Children • Amy Walton

... 'n' says suthin' right 'n his ear. Could n't hear whut 'twus. Did n' set well. T' other feller he flew mad, 'n' Ray he fetched 'im a cuff, luk thet, with the back uv his hand. Ye see, he did n' know he hed been a-fightin' Yankees, 'n' he did n' like the idee. 'Gentlemen,' says he, 'I 'll fight anybody, but ef this chap ain't a coward, he 'll fight me himself.' ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller

... trumpeter round to all the towns of the neighbourhood where there were garrisons, to make known to the gentlemen that if they would make their way within four days, on the next Sunday, to the town of Carignano, in the costume of men-at-arms, he would give a prize, which was the cuff of his lady, from whence hung a ruby of the value of a hundred ducats, to him who should be victorious in three encounters with the lance, without a barrier, and ...
— Bayard: The Good Knight Without Fear And Without Reproach • Christopher Hare

... any capers right now, I'll cuff your ears!" cried father. "This is no proper time for ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter

... the old creature, shaking her head and administering an unintentional cuff to the poor cat; "folk write a heap o' lees noo-a-days, ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne

... have done that!" he said. He extended his cuff and added the words "Vitally important" to what he had just written. "It was probably that which ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse

... now, have I mentioned all the uses of celluloid? Oh, no, there are handles for canes, umbrellas, mirrors and brushes, knives, whistles, toys, blown animals, card cases, chains, charms, brooches, badges, bracelets, rings, book bindings, hairpins, campaign buttons, cuff and collar buttons, cuffs, collars and dickies, tags, cups, knobs, paper cutters, picture frames, chessmen, pool balls, ping pong balls, piano keys, dental plates, masks for disfigured faces, penholders, eyeglass frames, goggles, playing cards—and ...
— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson

... it were any sich good luck," she could hear Will say; "'tis my wife, oh dear!" and he cowered down, expecting the hearty cuff which he received duly, as the White Witch, leaping out of the boat, dared any man to touch it, and thundered to her husband ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley

... should like to pass the evening with you, in the midst of music, both reclining on the same cushion, under a purple awning, in a gilded gondola on the soft expanse of ocean! Insult me, beat me, kick me, cuff me, treat me like a brute! ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo

... name Pagratide?" The man mechanically drew his handkerchief from his cuff, and wiped beads of ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck

... her cuff. She looked at her wrist wonderingly as if surprised that the trinket had disappeared; then she glanced at Kirkwood, casually, as though she were in the habit of saying such things to him, which was not, ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson

... us in the second row, had at last seated herself so that a considerable portion of the back part of her head-dress was in my mother's face: moreover, the citizen's huge arm, with its enormous gauze cuff, leaning on the partition which divided, or ought to have divided, her from us, considerably passed the line of demarcation. Lady de Brantefield, with all the pride of all the De Brantefields since the Norman Conquest concentrated in her countenance, threw an excommunicating, ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth

... audacity, and revolt. 3. Literature having up to now glorified thoughtful immobility, ecstasy, and slumber, we wish to exalt the aggressive movement, the feverish insomnia, running, the perilous leap, the cuff and the blow." While I am quite willing to exalt the cuff within reason, it scarcely seems such an entirely new subject for literature as the Futurists imagine. It seems to me that even through the slumber which fills the Siege of Troy, the ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton

... He put his hand to a ticket-pocket inside his regulation cuff, showed me two very small black box-spurs: drawing up a gaitered foot, he snapped them into the box in the heel, and when I had ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling

... promenade and evening dresses being cut with an open corsage and loose sleeves, the chemisettes and wristbands become of the greatest importance. There is something very neat in the close coat dress, buttoned up to the throat, and finished only by a cuff at the wrist; but it is never so elegant, after all, as the style now so much in vogue. This season, the V shape from the breast has given place to the square front, introduced from the peasant costumes of France and Italy. It will be seen in fig. 1, which is intended to ...
— Godey's Lady's Book, Vol. 42, January, 1851 • Various

... shortsightedness. Lady Dolly, in front, repeated Lord Ingleton's phrase with ingenuous wonder. "I know it's clever," she insisted, "but what does it mean? Now that other thing—what was it?—'Subtract vice, and virtue is what is left'—that's an easy one. Write it down on your cuff for me, will you, Colonel Cummins? I shall be so sick ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan

... said the voice, and a large Belgian Hare leaped lightly into the room. He was handsomely dressed in a light overcoat and checked trousers, and wore gaiters over his patent-leather boots. He had a thick gold watch-chain, gold studs and cuff buttons besides other jewelry, and in one hand he carried a high hat, in the other a small dress-suit case and a ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels

... chiefly on the neck, arms or buttocks. If very large they are known as carbuncles, and if they occur on the fingers or toes they are described as whitlows. It is often the friction of a frayed-out collar or cuff, of tight waist clothing, or, in the case of whitlows, the introduction of some irritant or poison between the nail and the skin that determines the precise site at which ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various

... young lubber, if the luff warn't a-lying there and I didn't want to wake him, I'd give yer such a cuff over the ear as 'd make ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn

... cries Gal, as soon as he hears my voice, and laid hold of my cuff (a pretty bit of Mechlin as ever you saw, by ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray

... opportunities for exhibition are few. Three mortal pounds having at length disappeared, together with the greater part of a quartern loaf, and two bottles of porter, for Raymond had made bold to call for a second, he now wiped his mouth with the cuff of his coat first, and afterwards, by way of a more delicate touch, with the gathered palm of his hand; then, looking at Mr. Lucre, who sat perspiring with terror in his gorgeous easy chair, our readers may judge of the ease it just then communicated to that reverend gentleman, when he ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... the past, leaving its record of misspent hours, false hopes, and disappointed expectations. May a morrow dawn that will bring recompense and requital for the sorrows of the days gone by, and a new order of things when there will be more starch in cuff and collar, and ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry

... attracted the female portion of the passengers, and the little time of each day that was left to him after that which was occupied in the management of this characteristic, the manipulation of his eye-glass, and the exposure of the correct four inches of shirt-cuff, was devoted to the invention of inane practical jokes. He had successfully played "ripping good jokes, don't yer know" on most of the passengers, and one old squatter who was returning with his "missus" after ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang

... for poetry and can find him a stub of pencil and an unoccupied cuff, he will be most completely in his element; for if there is any one occupation more closely identified with him than another, it is that of poet. And though all Auto-Comrades are not poets, all poets are Auto-Comrades. Every ...
— The Joyful Heart • Robert Haven Schauffler

... love stammers a charming slang? Our gardens consisted of a pot of tulips; thou didst mask the window with thy petticoat; I took the earthenware bowl and I gave thee the Japanese cup. And those great misfortunes which made us laugh! Thy cuff scorched, thy boa lost! And that dear portrait of the divine Shakespeare which we sold one evening that we might sup! I was a beggar and thou wert charitable. I kissed thy fresh round arms in haste. A folio Dante served us as a table on which to eat merrily a centime's worth of chestnuts. ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... one day be handling twenty-knot liners in such a fog. In the ghostly light of fog and breaking day he performed an uncanny pantomime, presenting a liner's officer, resplendent in collar and cuff, strutting, mincing, on a steamer's bridge. (Sailormen walk fore ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone

... nothing of a blow "straight from the shoulder," but they know how to cuff. Oolalik brought his open hand down on Gartok's cheek with a pistol-shot crack that tumbled that fire-eater head over heels ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne

... you, you unlucky hangin' bone thief!" cried the widow, seizing him by the hair, and giving him a hearty cuff on the ear, which would have knocked him down, only that Oonah kept him up by an equally well-applied box ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover

... up penknives, cigarette-cases, match-boxes, and key-rings from the profundities of hip-pockets. An essential portion of the man's braces, visible sometimes when he played at tennis, consisted of chain, and the upper and nether halves of his cuff-links were connected by chains. Occasionally he was to be ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett

... other process, has employed himself in climbing up, and then hooking himself on with his elbows—an uneasy perch, from which he has fallen at intervals, generally alighting on the toes of the person in his immediate vicinity. In the present case, the unfortunate little wretch has received a cuff which sends him reeling to this door; and the donor of the blow is immediately ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... scored a point, was in a rage. "And I'll not have him here," he shouted, giving poor Hugo a cuff which sent him stumbling over the stake. And turning to me; continued insolently: "Ever since we came here I have marked your manner toward us, as though my father had no ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... redoubled his bite and made his teeth meet in the ear, whilst the damsels were diverted from him with hearkening to the singing-girls, and Abu al-Hasan cried out for succour from the boy and the Caliph lost his sense for laughter. Then he dealt the boy a cuff, and he let go his ear, whereupon all present fell down with laughter and said to the little Mameluke, "Art mad that thou bitest the Caliph's ear on this wise?" And Abu al-Hasan cried to them, "Sufficeth ye not, O ye wretched Jinns, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... with painful clearness that his entire conception of existence had been wrong, and that he must begin again at the beginning. Nothing in his luggage at the Majestic would do. His socks would not do, nor his shoes, nor the braid on his trousers, nor his cuff-links, nor his ready-made white bow, nor the number of studs in his shirt-front, nor the collar of his coat. Nothing! Nothing! To-morrow would be a ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett

... conventional thigh-length of green embossed leather breeches, rough green stockings, and fleece-lined hob-nailed shoes. And over the boy's shirt the mountaineer's frieze jacket!—with staghorn buttons. And the rough wool cuff fell on the hands of a duchess!—pistols at either hip, and a ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers

... officer was seen scribbling for dear life upon his shirt-cuff, while others, to the common danger, endeavoured to practise the complicated sword-brandishment which is consequent upon the ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren

... a chain of forts and distribution of troops as will entirely secure possession of the country—till we lose it. Thus having composed the Eastern and Western worlds, we are at leisure to kick and cuff for our own little island, which is great satisfaction; and I don't doubt but my Lord Temple hopes that we shall be so far engaged before France and Spain are ripe to meddle with us, that when they do come, they will not be ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole

... simply seemed to find a certain: malevolent amusement in a contemptuous appraisal of his, Jimmie Dale's, person; but the other, in spite of the new, glad exhilaration Jimmie Dale was experiencing, annoyed Jimmie Dale—the blatant expanse of pink shirt cuff, for instance, in order to display the Pippin's diamond-snake links, famous from One end of the underworld to the other, was eminently typical of the man. The cuff links were undoubtedly an object of envy to the society in which the Pippin moved; they were even beautiful cuff links, it was ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard

... Lloyd, holding the linen cuff she was embroidering at arm's length, and studying it between half-closed lids. "I am only too glad to turn Mabel over to somebody else part of the time. You don't know what she is when she ...
— The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne • Kathleen Norris

... knows more than all those chaps put together. I'd give anything if I could show him off as I used to. Folks always liked it, and I was ever so proud of him. He's mad now because I had to cuff him, and wont take any notice of me till I make up," said Ben, regretfully eyeing his offended friend, but not daring to ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, Nov 1877-Nov 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various

... have been beating you about the head with a stick this minute. He'd come up to you like this, and say: "Koman voo porty voo?" and then a box on the ear!' 'But I'd give him one in the belly with my fist' 'But he'd go on: "Bonzhur, bonzhur, veny ici," and then a cuff on the head.' 'And I'd give him one in his legs, his bandy legs.' 'You're quite right, their legs are bandy.... Well, but suppose he tied your hands?' 'I wouldn't let him; I'd call Mihay the coachman to help me.' 'But, Vasya, suppose you weren't a match for the Frenchy even with ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev

... given to playing tricks, and teasing each other. A bear sleeping out in the open den is regarded as a proper subject for hectoring, by a sudden bite or cuff, or a general assault. It is natural to expect that wrestling bears will frequently become angry and fight; but such is not the case. This often happens with boys and men, but bears play the game consistently to the end. I can not recall ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday

... pouring the water? How did I look when I did it? Did you not really see that I shut my eyes? Did you not really see that I stuck my tongue out? Was I pouring the water while I did it? Or before, or after? Did I wear a ring on my hand? Was my cuff visible? What was the position of my fingers while I held the glass? These questions may be multiplied. And it is as astonishing as amusing to see how little correctness there is in the answers, and how people quarrel about the answers, and what extraordinary ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... homely of feature, so radiant of goodhumour, so eager and simple, in a very plain dress—a Brandon housemaid would not have been seen in it, leaning so pleasantly on his lean, long, clerical arm—made for reaching books down from high shelves, a lank, scholarlike limb, with a somewhat threadbare cuff—and who looked round with that anticipation of pleasure, and that simple confidence in a real welcome, which are so likely to insure it? Was she an helpmeet for a black-letter man, who talked with the Fathers in his ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... in low tones to the man, so that Braman could not hear. Levins departed shortly afterwards, grinning crookedly, tucking a piece of paper into a pocket, upon which Corrigan had transcribed something that had been written on the cuff of his shirt sleeve. Corrigan went to his desk and busied himself with some papers. Over in the courthouse, Judge Lindman took from a drawer in his desk a thin ledger—a duplicate of the one he had shown Corrigan—and ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer

... store in America, in a smallish town. I glanced at his reddish, smooth, rather knuckly hands, and thin wrists in the frayed cuff. They ...
— Twilight in Italy • D.H. Lawrence

... pouch full of bloody knives buckled to his side. I skreighed out in his face when I looked at him, but he did not stop a moment for that. With a girn that was like to rive his mouth, he twisted his nieve in the back of my hair, and off with me hanging by the cuff of the neck, like a kittling. My eyes were like to loup out of my head, but I had no breath to cry. I heard him thraw the key, for I could not look down, the skin of my face was pulled so tight; and in he flang me like a pair of old ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir

... attached—round 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. Sylvie and her friend Celeste Habert ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac

... then the spell was broken—really as if some formidable spectacle had been swept away from before our eyes; and there was Barber, a most ordinary looking young man, quiet and respectable, and so dazed that he scarcely heeded the cuff which the gentleman managed to get in before we could drag our ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... barber, who happened to be sitting insolently in the tap-room of the New Inn near the harbour, where the captain had entered to buy an ounce of tobacco. After paying for his purchase with three half-pence extracted from the corner of a handkerchief which he carried in the cuff of his sleeve, Captain Hagberd went out. As soon as the door was shut the barber laughed. "The old one and the young one will be strolling arm in arm to get shaved in my place presently. The tailor shall be set to work, and the barber, and the candlestick maker; high old times are coming for Colebrook, ...
— To-morrow • Joseph Conrad

... not been over long, when a telegram from Mr. Blake, the elder, arrived, in answer to his son. It informed us that he had laid hands (by help of his friend, the Commissioner) on the right man to help us. The name of him was Sergeant Cuff; and the arrival of him from London might be expected ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins

... Banking Cartel's lawyer, and Howlett, the Personnel Chief, and Buhrmann, the Commercial Secretary, have made up a sort of quadrumvirate and are trying to run things. I don't know what would happen if anything came up suddenly...." A blue-gray uniformed arm, with a major's cuff-braid, came into the screen, handing a slip of paper to M'zangwe; he took it, glanced at it, and swore. Von Schlichten waited until he had read ...
— Uller Uprising • Henry Beam Piper, John D. Clark and John F. Carr

... cuff; an old man. To cuff Jonas; said of one who is knock-kneed, or who beats his sides to keep himself warm in frosty weather; called also ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.

... with a Hatchet, alias A fig for my godson! or Crack me this nut, or A country cuff that is a sound box of the ear for the idiot Martin for to hold his peace, seeing the patch will take no warning. Written by one that dares call a dog a dog, and made to prevent Martin's dog-days. Imprinted by John-a-noke and John-a-stile for the baylive [sic] of ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury

... have growed up on a hickory helve he'd a known that his was nothing to brag of. I didn't know just how good a man Abe was and I was kind o' scairt for a minute. I never found it so hard work to do nothin' as I did then. Honest my hands kind o' ached. I wanted to go an' cuff that feller's ears an' grab hold o' him an' toss him over the ridge pole. Abe went right up to him ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller

... leaped out on deck, selected a small head of cabbage from a broken crate and hurled it forward. Then he sprang back into the pilot house and straightened the Maggie on her course again. He leaned over the binnacle, with the cuff of his watch coat wiping away the moisture on the glass, and studied the instrument carefully. "I don't trust the danged thing," he muttered. "Guess I'll haul her off a coupler points ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne

... the pronunciation. The blood-pressure cuff." He traced the circuit, then inflated the rubber ...
— The Scarlet Lake Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin

... said MacMaine. "The food that was captured with you has nearly run out, and we haven't been able to capture any more. But rather than let you suffer, they would have killed you painlessly." He glanced at the watch on his instrument cuff. ...
— The Highest Treason • Randall Garrett

... two packets of photographic plates, some soiled handkerchiefs, collars and cuffs, a box of fancy note-paper, a bottle of scent, a pair of embroidered pantoufles, and a lot of patent brass studs and cuff links. ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... of the Up-Against-It Association were waiting at the Dock to cop the prospective Meal Ticket. Not one of them had ever Shaved or Worked and each wore his Handkerchief inside his Cuff and had Yellow Gloves stitched down the Back, and was fully entitled to sit in an Electric Chair and have 80,000 Volts distributed through the ...
— Knocking the Neighbors • George Ade

... try again and again. He did not win the capital prize but in lieu of $4 he had two brass rings, a pair of brass cuff buttons and a lead pencil with a sharpener on the end ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field

... said to an elderly man beside him. "You stick to the beer. The sperits in here is clean poison, and it's a sin and a shame as they should be let sell such stuff to Christian men. See here—see my sleeve!" He showed the threadbare cuff of his coat, which was corroded away in one part, as by a powerful acid. "I give ye my word I done that by wiping my lips wi' it two or three times after drinkin' at this bar. That was afore I found out that the whisky was solid vitriol. If thread and cotton can't stand it, ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... the flicker of an eyelash did Fuller betray the pain that must have come with that grip. He did not even wince, but swiftly lashed out with a bony fist, raking Luke's cheek with sharp knuckles. The blow stung, but was utterly futile. With a single cuff Luke could send the man sprawling; with a single wrench of his powerful hands, snap his spine. Yet he did neither, and the impulse to laugh coarsely died in his throat. Here was courage of a kind he never had encountered; ...
— Vulcan's Workshop • Harl Vincent

... was beginning to feel frightened. I could see right down it. He extended it straight towards me, slowly, slowly—just like that—until the cuff was six inches from my face. Queer thing to see an empty sleeve come at you ...
— The Invisible Man • H. G. Wells



Words linked to "Cuff" :   shackle, leg, bond, lap, slap, sleeve, handcuff, trammel, arm, hamper, facing, overlap, fetter, trouser cuff



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com