"Cutting off" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... unlike the generality of monarchs, could bear to find himself in the wrong; and could discover his vizier to be in the right, without cutting off his head. History farther informs us that the sultan offered to make Saladin a pacha, and to commit to him the government of a province; but Saladin the Prudent declined this honour, saying he had no ambition, was perfectly happy in his present ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... their fancy by regarding that inner man as divine, and constructing a mystical universe. Hence we have angels! A lovely illusion which Lambert would never abandon, cherishing it even when the sword of his logic was cutting off their dazzling wings. ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... Bigottini danced; Potier reigned; Odry did not yet exist. Madame Saqui had succeeded to Forioso. There were still Prussians in France. M. Delalot was a personage. Legitimacy had just asserted itself by cutting off the hand, then the head, of Pleignier, of Carbonneau, and of Tolleron. The Prince de Talleyrand, grand chamberlain, and the Abbe Louis, appointed minister of finance, laughed as they looked at each other, with the laugh of the two augurs; both of them had celebrated, on the 14th of ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... was the reply. "Why shouldn't I play at soldiers if I like. There, what do you say to that?" he continued, drawing a light, keen-looking blade from its curved sheath. "Try it. Mind it don't go off—I mean, don't go slashing it round and cutting off the professor's legs or my ...
— Yussuf the Guide - The Mountain Bandits; Strange Adventure in Asia Minor • George Manville Fenn
... called the boy, pointing in the opposite direction as he ran. "You tell him." The fire was roaring down the air course behind them, and Grant and the three men knew that in a few minutes the reverse air would be sucking the flames up the air shaft, cutting off the emergency escape for the men on the first ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... the feeling of defection among the Northwestern Indians, who could no longer be restrained, as at first, by the threat of cutting off their trade, there being now rivals in the shape of the English, and the French ...
— The Character and Influence of the Indian Trade in Wisconsin • Frederick Jackson Turner
... dreadful march they had, poor creatures; carrying their sacred stone Tai pekong with them. Nearly a thousand women and children delayed their progress. They were harassed all the way by parties of Malays, and Dyaks cutting off the stragglers. The party dwindled by degrees, until nearly all the kunsi were killed, either by the enemy or their incensed countrymen, who found themselves driven from their peaceful homes for the sins of these rebels. It is so painful to think of the many innocent ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... him to send them off to him for wars with Sapor in the east;—how Julian sorrowfully bade them go, judging well by Gallus his brother's experience (whom Constantius had treated in the same way as a first step towards cutting off his head) what the next thing should be;—but how they, (bless their Celtic and Petulant and Herulian and Dutch hearts!) told him very plainly that that kind of thing would not wash with them: "Come!" said they; "no nonsense of this ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... upon the gills of those which are open, the lower part of the stem is cut off. This stem end is then placed in one basket, while the mushrooms which have been trimmed are placed in another basket. In cutting off the stems, just enough is cut to remove the soil, so that the length of the stem of the mushroom varies. The mushrooms are then taken to the packing room in the cleanest possible condition, with no soil scattering therefrom ...
— Studies of American Fungi. Mushrooms, Edible, Poisonous, etc. • George Francis Atkinson
... kindness to himself; he preferred to have for his heir, in case of Arthur's decease, a nephew who would marry his daughter, than a remote kinsman. And should, after all, the lawsuit fail to prove Philip's right, he was not sorry to have the estate in his own power by Arthur's act in cutting off the entail. Brief; all these reasons decided him. He saw Philip—he spoke to Arthur—and all the preliminaries, as suggested above, were arranged between the parties. The entail was cut off, and Arthur secretly prevailed upon his father, to whom, for the present, the fee-simple ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... simplest and most common phase of competition, but a better way to get advantage over your competitor is to improve your business by cutting off wastes and leaks, and reducing fixed and fancy charges so you can give your customers more quality and ...
— Dollars and Sense • Col. Wm. C. Hunter
... other instances, he was completely overruled by the 25 malignant counsels of Zebek-Dorchi. The first tempest of the desolating fury of the Tartars discharged itself upon their own habitations. But this, as cutting off all infirm looking backward from the hardships of their march, had been thought so necessary a measure by all 30 the chieftains that even Oubacha himself was the first to authorize the act by his own example. He seized a torch previously prepared with ...
— De Quincey's Revolt of the Tartars • Thomas De Quincey
... important case where this is a suitable order, which occurs when an army, having taken the initiative in great strategic operations, shall have succeeded in falling upon the enemy's communications and cutting off his line of retreat while covering its own; when the battle takes place between them, that army which has reached the rear of the other may use the parallel order, for, having effected the decisive maneuver previous to the battle, all its ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... happiness forever. You have murdered my son. But I promised you your fill of blood, and you shall have it." So saying, she filled a can with Persian blood, obtained, probably, by the execution of her captives, and, cutting off the head of her victim from the body, she plunged it in, exclaiming, "Drink there, insatiable monster, till ...
— Cyrus the Great - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... majestic in the aspect of aged trees; and the violation of these monuments of nature is severely punished in countries destitute of monuments of art. We heard with satisfaction that the present proprietor of the zamang had brought an action against a cultivator who had been guilty of cutting off a branch. The cause was tried, and the tribunal condemned the offender. We find near Turmero and the Hacienda de Cura other zamangs, having trunks larger than that of Guayre, but their hemispherical heads are not of ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... as halves what we've got to go over again. We've got to make for the mountain-path always till we find those three sugar-loafy bits the poor fellow marked down. Why, neighbour, we're cutting off a lot of pieces that we shan't need to meddle with. You see, it's coming down and getting less every time we ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... terror, Noel Vanstone became like wax in Mrs. Lecount's hands. He at once agreed to draw up a new will at her dictation, completely cutting off his wife. He bequeathed Mrs. Lecount L5,000, and declared that he wished to leave the remainder to his cousin, George Bartram. Such an arrangement, however, Mrs. Lecount foresaw, might be fraught with those very dangers ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... colouring at first given to the contest had mischievous results. English feeling was embittered by the great distress in our manufacturing districts, directly caused up the action of the Northern States in blockading the Southern ports, and thus cutting off our supply of raw material in the shape of cotton. On its side the North, which had calculated securely on English sympathy and respect, and was profoundly irritated by the many displays of a contrary feeling; and the exasperation on both sides more than once reached a point ...
— Great Britain and Her Queen • Anne E. Keeling
... speculators on the matter. It is strange how much of accepted history must be rejected when the statements are carefully criticised and compared with known facts. It has frequently been stated of this or that tribe that mutilations, as the cutting off of fingers and toes, of ears and nose, the pulling out of teeth, &c., are extensively practiced as a mode of mourning find wild scenes of maiming and bloodshed are depicted as following upon the death of a beloved chief or great man yet among ...
— An introduction to the mortuary customs of the North American Indians • H. C. Yarrow
... front panel, places for inkstand, pens, and stationery, etc."—Century Dictionary. PROCRUSTEAN BED: In Greek mythology, Procrustes (derivatively "the stretcher") was a giant who tied those whom he caught on a bed, making them fit by stretching them out if too short, and by cutting off their ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... hardly had forty or fifty men passed the gates than fire was opened on them at such close range that half of them were killed or disabled at the first volley. Upon this, those who were still within the walls closed the courtyard gates, thus cutting off all chance of retreat from their comrades. In the event; however, it turned out that several of the latter contrived to escape with their lives and that they lost nothing through being prevented from returning; for ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... advantages, which they used cruelly enough. This conduct, though natural, considering the country and time, was studiously represented at the capital as arising from an untameable and innate ferocity, which nothing, it was said, could remedy, save cutting off the tribe ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... blackened, with wounded soldiers on board and captured vessels in tow. Plymouth itself was full of French prisoners, who made little models of guillotines out of their meat-bones, and sold them to the children for the then fashionable amusement of 'cutting off Louis ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... immense rewards if he brought back the head of Masinissa, or if, which would be a source of incalculable joy, he took him alive; he unexpectedly attacked his party while dispersed and carelessly employed, and after cutting off an immense quantity of cattle and men from the troops which guarded them, drove Masinissa himself with a small body of attendants to the summit of the mountain. On this, considering the business ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... you are a Heron, and a Heron—it sounds like a paradox!—has never shown the white feather—your father's affairs have been growing worse lately, I am afraid. You know that the estate is encumbered, that the entail was cut off so that you might inherit; but advantage has been taken of the cutting off the entail to raise fresh loans since the steward was dismissed and I have been ignorant of your father's business matters. I came to-day to tell him that the interest of the heaviest mortgage was long overdue, and that ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... mountains, so that his army arrived at Chester in a miserable state. He had many unfortunate hostages in his hands, the children of the noblest families, and on these he wreaked a cowardly vengeance, cutting off the noses and ears of the maidens, and putting out the ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... less than another at the next door; but there they keep a servant, who will 'get you your breakfast,' and preserve you, benevolent creature as she is, from the cruel necessity of going to the cupboard and cutting off a slice of meat or cheese and a bit of bread. She will, most likely, toast your bread for you too, and melt your butter; and then muffle you up, in winter, and send you out almost swaddled. Really such ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett
... nor at what hour to expect it. It is like a giant spectre which, having lain dormant since the carboniferous age, has been raised into life and being at the call of restless humanity; it is now punishing us for our prodigal use of the wealth it left us, by clasping us in its deadly arms, cutting off our brilliant sunshine, and necessitating the use in the daytime of artificial light; inducing all kinds of bronchial and throat affections, corroding telegraph and telephone wires, and weathering away the ...
— The Story of a Piece of Coal - What It Is, Whence It Comes, and Whither It Goes • Edward A. Martin
... general rule, the smaller the eye the better the potatoes. By cutting off a piece from the larger end, you ascertain if they are sound; they must be white, reddish, bluish, etc., according to the species. If spotted, they are not sound, and therefore very inferior. There are several kinds, ...
— The $100 Prize Essay on the Cultivation of the Potato; and How to Cook the Potato • D. H. Compton and Pierre Blot
... seen somewhere long before. One more particularly said, he had formerly been a man of consideration in the world; but was so unlucky, that they who dealt with him, by some strange infatuation or other, had a way of cutting off their own bills, and were prodigiously slow in improving their stock. But as much as I was curious to observe the reception these gentlemen met with upon 'Change, I could not help being interrupted by one that came up towards us, to whom everybody ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... with Jackson or with Lee and Longstreet. They were as confident as their soldiers and no movement of the enemy escaped them. Stuart, with his plume and sash, at which no man now dared to scoff, hung with his horsemen like a fringe on the flank of Burnside's own army, cutting off the Union scouts and skirmishers and hiding the plans ...
— The Star of Gettysburg - A Story of Southern High Tide • Joseph A. Altsheler
... of fungous filaments gradually spreads through the bark in much the same manner as mold spreads over and through a piece of bread, even penetrating the wood to a depth of sometimes five annual rings. The spread of the fungus, resulting in the cutting off of the sap flow, is the immediate cause of the wilting and dying of the leaves and branch above the point of girdling. This wilting of the leaves, followed later by the death of one branch after another as the fungus spreads, has given rise to the term "blight" of ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association, Report of the Proceedings at the Third Annual Meeting • Northern Nut Growers Association
... spending money in London while the respectable psalm-singer was hoarding it in Ullerton. There used to be desperate quarrels between the two men, and towards the end of Jonathan Haygarth's life the old man made half a dozen different wills in favour of half a dozen different people, and cutting off scapegrace Matthew with a shilling. Fortunately for scapegrace Matthew, the old man had a habit of quarrelling with his dearest friends—a fashion not quite exploded in this enlightened nineteenth century—and the ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... annoyed her son, and he jumped his horse into the field and joined Kirsty, letting his mother ride on, and contenting himself with keeping her in sight. After a few moments' talk, however, he proposed that they should overtake her, and cutting off a great loop of the road, they passed her at speed, and turned and met her. She had by this time got a little over her temper, and was prepared to behave with propriety, which meant—the ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... after another week, we found ourselves at one time building up the wall in front of the cave, then catching ducks and gathering eggs, then collecting the fire-plant, and then throwing moss up on the rocks to dry, and then cutting off the blubber and skins of ...
— Cast Away in the Cold - An Old Man's Story of a Young Man's Adventures, as Related by Captain John Hardy, Mariner • Isaac I. Hayes
... can be obtained in fairly long lengths out of narrow boards, whilst on the other hand cross tongues are limited by the width of the board. After cutting off the tongues, they require planing with nicety to fit the grooves, and the advantage of a grooved board (Fig. 105) will be appreciated. A glue spoon similar to a plumber's ladle is generally used to pour the glue into the grooves, and it is customary to glue the ...
— Woodwork Joints - How they are Set Out, How Made and Where Used. • William Fairham
... recorded by Stewart,[125] "Close with a Frenchman, but out-manoeuvre a Russian," for which purpose he would throw his own force, preferably, upon the van of the latter. The reason is obvious, upon reflection; for in attacking and cutting off the head—van and centre—of a column of ships, the rear, coming up under full way, has immediate action forced upon it. There is no time for deliberation. The van is already engaged, and access to it more or less impeded, by the hostile dispositions. ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... engaging the frigate, and did not appear to pay any attention to the Rebiera coming down. At last the breeze reached them and the frigate, light at first and then gradually increasing, while the Rebiera foamed through the water, and had now every chance of cutting off some of the gun-boats. The frigate trimmed her sails and steered towards the flotilla, which now thought proper to haul off and put their heads in-shore, followed by the frigate firing her bow-chasers. But the Rebiera was now within half gun-shot in-shore, ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... river consists in straightening its channel by cutting off bends, securing its banks from erosion by floods, and, where necessary, by constructing embankments to confine the waters and prevent them from overflowing and stagnating upon the low grounds which skirt their current. In the ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... bear again as if no harm had come to them. In bad Soil, it will be better to let them lie, putting the Earth about the Roots, and cultivate at their lower Parts, or Feet, the best grown Sucker, and that which is nearest the Roots, cutting off carefully all the rest: The Tree in this Condition will not give over blossoming and bearing Fruit; and when in two Years time the Sucker is become a new Tree, the old Tree must be cut off half a Foot ...
— The Natural History of Chocolate • D. de Quelus
... policy. He built a castle with the design of seizing the trading trains which should take the road to Munich, perhaps deeming this the best way of magnifying his office as a leader in the church militant. But before he could achieve his purpose of cutting off all supplies from the rival town, and turning trade and tribute all to his own place, a new defender of the rising city had sprung up in the house of Wittelsbocher—the same which still reigns over the kingdom of Bavaria,—and the matter of the feud was finally adjusted ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... the estimates of the War Department for the coming fiscal year, which brings the total estimates down to an amount forty-five millions less than the corresponding estimates for last year. This could only be accomplished by cutting off new projects and suspending for the period of one year all progress in military matters. For the same reason I have directed that the Army shall not be recruited up to its present authorized strength. These measures ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... forms by the ceaseless dashing of the waters of the Atlantic, which have formed various grottoes in the cliffs. We descended into one of these caverns by a narrow gulley, but could not proceed far, as the tide was entering fast, and would soon have surrounded us, cutting off all means ...
— Brittany & Its Byways • Fanny Bury Palliser
... to their wives, year in and year out, as so many convicts in the death-house, and would be no more capable of any such loathsome malpractice, even in the face of free opportunity, than they would be of cutting off the ears of ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken
... the Franciscan, again cutting off the alcalde. "See how one of our lay brothers, the most stupid one we have, built a hospital. He paid the workmen eight cuartos a day, and got them from other pueblos, too. Not much like these young feather-brains who ruin workmen, paying them ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... anything! Luck never let us turn ourselves loose there a-tall. You wait, by cripes, till yuh see us where we git warmed up and strung out proper! You wait! Honest to gran'—" It was Luck's elbow that stopped him by the simple expedient of cutting off his wind. Big Medicine gave a ...
— The Phantom Herd • B. M. Bower
... the apartment, cruelly wounded, sometimes wondering whether he had really acted on a harsh selfish punctilio in cutting off the dying woman from the consolations of religion, and thus taking part with the persecutors, while his heart bled for her. Sometimes it seemed to him as if he had been on the point of earning her consent to his marriage with her daughter, ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... in Corsica had not contemplated without pride and exultation the triumphs of their countryman. His seizure of Leghorn, by cutting off the supplies from England, greatly distressed the opposite party in the island, and an expedition of Corsican exiles, which he now despatched from Tuscany, was successful in finally reconquering the country. To Napoleon this acquisition was due; nor were the Directory insensible to ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... personal safety, but also of personal situation and character, in the hopes of averting the calamities which seem to threaten us. But if the attempt should be unsuccessful (and who shall say it will be otherwise?), it would plunge the Government into greater difficulties, by cutting off from the King his ...
— Memoirs of the Courts and Cabinets of George the Third - From the Original Family Documents, Volume 1 (of 2) • The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... two-directions—longitudinally and transversely. Between these and the intestine is a cavity—the perivisceral cavity—like that of our own bodies, but filled with a nutritive fluid like our lymph. This cavity seems to have developed by the expansion and cutting off of the paired lateral outgrowths of the digestive system of some old flat worm. But other modes of development are quite possible. The intestine has now an anal opening at or near the rear end of the body. The food moves only from front to rear, and reaches ...
— The Whence and the Whither of Man • John Mason Tyler
... down there; they are too fond of cutting off heads, and a white man himself would be looked ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... still more miserable, after having seen the Norwegian farms. The trees likewise appeared of me growth of yesterday, compared with those Nestors of the forest I have frequently mentioned. The women and children were cutting off branches from the beech, birch, oak, &c, and leaving them to dry. This way of helping out their fodder injures the trees. But the winters are so long that the poor cannot afford to lay in a sufficient ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... of all these blunders Necker was liked by the nation. He recognized the need of economy and honestly tried to reduce expenses. He succeeded in cutting off a little of the extravagance of the court and in simplifying the collection of the revenue. He tried to establish provincial assemblies and to equalize the incidence of the salt-tax. And above all, in order to sustain the royal credit, he took ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell
... like cutting off your husband's hands, my dear," said Miss Baker. "And you two were so happy. When I first saw you together I ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... kopjes in our front. Then the Colonel told us that there were supposed to be a good many Boers on ahead, and that the General had gone off with a portion of the column to attack them, while we were to advance and seize and hold a nek, with a view to cutting off the retreating Boers, or threatening their left flank, or reinforcing our right, or some obscure purpose. It was the same in so many of our days of scrapping and trekking. Talk about the fog of war: we who were actually in the battle knew nothing about it. Doubtless the Commanding ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... off a piece of tubing to an angle of 45 degrees, cutting off roughly in the first instance and finishing up carefully with a file till the angle is exact. Solder to the end a piece of tin, and cut and file this to the precise shape of the elliptical end. Detach by heating, scribe a line along its longest ...
— Things To Make • Archibald Williams
... falchion from side to side, cutting off the tops of the young firs, just as if they had been men's heads; but no Scotchman made his appearance. The whole bells of Berwick now began to swing and ring as if the town had been invaded; and messengers, breathless and panting, arrived at ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 17 • Alexander Leighton
... her to look unusual," declared Grace; "to make her so, is at present the object of my being. I shall hesitate at nothing short of cutting off her nose to secure that desirable result. To be admired, a woman must stand out distinctly from the throng; and I've set my heart on Princess's being the belle of the ball. Have you plenty of flowers, dear? As flowers are to be your sole garniture, you must have a profusion. I can't ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... to, lasted some two or three hours. The Indians were disheartened at their loss in the morning, and the failure of all their stratagems, even to cutting off the reinforcements of the enemy. They were sufficiently convinced they could not carry the fort by storm; and they also believed it unsafe to longer remain where they were; as the alarm of their presence had spread far and wide, and there was no telling at what moment ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... complained of the cruelty of her master in cutting off her ears, and was so ashamed of her appearance that she resolved to stay in her kennel with her family. A friendly hunting dog said to her: "If you had been peaceful, and not always fighting, you would have saved your ears and your good looks. If you will fight, it is a kindness to crop your ...
— Aesop's Fables - A New Revised Version From Original Sources • Aesop
... during the morning, and in the afternoon took the deer home, and skinned and dressed it. Most of the carcass was hung up in the milk-room, but Jacques carried a hind quarter in and suspended it beside the closed fireplace, later cutting off steaks for ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... of the Language, consider Milton's Numbers, in which he has made use of several Elisions, which are not customary among other English Poets, as may be particularly observed in his cutting off the Letter Y, when it precedes a Vowel. [10] This, and some other Innovation in the Measure of his Verse, has varied his Numbers in such a manner, as makes them incapable of satiating the Ear, and cloying the Reader, which the same uniform Measure would certainly have ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... spoke, to a small tree, the bark of which was long, tough, and stringy. Cutting off a quantity of this, he took it to his sister, and showed her how to twist some of it into stout cordage. Leaving her busily at work on this, he went down to the nearest bamboo thicket and cut a stout ...
— The Island Queen • R.M. Ballantyne
... Hollabrunn for Brno in Moravia, in order to join the second army which was led by the Emperor Alexander in person; but on approaching Hollabrunn, he was alarmed to discover that the troops of Lannes and Murat were already occupying the town and cutting off his means of retreat. To get out of this fix, the aged marshal, making use, in his turn, of trickery, sent General Prince Bagration as an envoy to Marshal Murat, whom he assured that an aide-de-camp of the Emperor was on his way to Napoleon in order to conclude ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... of dirt struck the refuse-can with violence, and Gipsy beheld the advance of overwhelming forces. They rushed upon him from two directions, cutting off the steps of the porch. Undaunted, the formidable cat raked Duke's nose again, somewhat more lingeringly, and prepared to depart with his fishbone. He had little fear for himself, because he was inclined ...
— Lords of the Housetops - Thirteen Cat Tales • Various
... genius built a bridge of boats Over the stream, and Ahmed's zealots filed Across, upon a mission to (cut throats And) spread religion pure and undefiled; 220 They sowed the propagandist's wildest oats, Cutting off all, down to the smallest child, And came back, giving thanks for such fat mercies, To find their harvest ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... Spaniards and their allies so far from the city, and thus the opportunity went by to return no more. It was an evil fortune like the rest, for in the end these brigantines brought about the fall of Tenoctitlan by cutting off the supply of food, which was carried in canoes across the lake. Alas! the bravest can do nothing against the power of famine. Hunger is a very great man, as ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... modern European reapers have been wont to lay hold of a passing stranger and tie him up in a sheaf. It is not to be expected that they should complete the parallel by cutting off his head; but if they do not take such a strong step, their language and gestures are at least indicative of a desire to do so. For instance, in Mecklenburg on the first day of reaping, if the master or mistress ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... feigned attack on Port-en-Bessin would allow of their surprising the islands of Tahitou and Saint-Marcouf as well as Port-Bail on the western slope of the Cotentin. The destruction of the roads, which protect the lower part of the peninsula, would insure the success of the undertaking by cutting off Cherbourg which, attacked from behind, would easily be carried, resistance being impossible. The invading army, concentrating under the forts of the town, in which they would have a safe retreat, would descend by Carenton ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... the separate States. Such license would have been destructive to the very idea of a great nationality. Where would New England have been, as a part of the United States, if New York, which stretches from the Atlantic to the borders of Canada, had been endowed with the power of cutting off the six Northern States from the rest of the Union? No one will for a moment doubt that the movement was revolutionary, and yet infinite pains are taken to prove a fact that ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... condition that the barons spared his life, but Warwick said he never agreed to that, and as Gaveston had greatly offended him by nicknaming him the "Black Hound" or the "Black Dog," he took him to Warwick Castle and wreaked his venegance upon him by cutting off his head. ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... seated, the head-woman told one of the men to knock down some cocoa-nuts from the trees close by, and after cutting off the ends she offered us a drink of the fresh cool milk, which was all the sweeter and better for the fact that the nuts were not nearly ripe. While this was going on, the natives brought piles of cocoa-nuts, fish, and fowls, ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... own quarters. Mr. Hammond heard him draw the bolts of the swing door, thus cutting off all communication with ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... dancing so gaily (Fig. 122) is turned into "Little Jack Horner" eating his Christmas pie (Fig. 121), by merely cutting off his legs and substituting a dress skirt and pair of feet clipped from another card. The Christmas pie in his lap is from ...
— Little Folks' Handy Book • Lina Beard
... solar surface, however, is not the only means of solar observation. We have a satellite, and that satellite from time to time acts most opportunely as a screen, cutting off a part or the whole of those dazzling rays in which the master-orb of our system veils himself from over-curious regards. The importance of eclipses to the study of the solar surroundings is of comparatively recent recognition; nevertheless, much of what we know concerning them has been snatched, ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke
... making Barine's beautiful, symmetrical figure resemble the hunch-backed Nubian's, or to dip her fingers into the pomade intended for Cleopatra; and it grieved her to mar the beauty of Barine's luxuriant tresses by cutting off part of ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... know?" he asked, with a calm not to be thrust aside. "How do you know it's not that? You can't be sure," he pursued, and there was fairly cunning in forcing his friend upon it, cutting off all escape, "but there are just fifty chances out of a hundred that it is that. And if it is," with a cold, impersonal sort of smile—"would you give very much for my chances ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... young ladies too, who can be as cynical as other people in these times, such speeches as, 'Well, I suppose he has proved Anne Boleyn to be a bad creature; but that does not make that horrid Henry any more right in cutting off her head.' Thus two people will be despised where only one was before, and the fact still ignored, that it is just as senseless to say that Henry cut off Anne Boleyn's head as that Queen Victoria hanged Palmer. Death, and death of a far more horrible ...
— Froude's History of England • Charles Kingsley
... Hendrikhovna," replied the officer, "one must look after the doctor. Perhaps he'll take pity on me someday, when it comes to cutting off a leg or ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... deep; and advancing further, it took a direction more southward, and to our very agreeable surprise, brought us to the head of Port Curtis; forming thus a channel of communication from Keppel Bay, and cutting off Cape Capricorn with a piece of land twenty-five miles in length, ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... to have their black sack coats or old black diagonal cutaways or old evening coat changed into a Tuxedo by the cutting off of tails, the substitution of a silk collar, or some other alteration. A sack coat is easily arranged, and any little tailor around the corner will make the metamorphosis for three dollars. Suppose you have had one of your old coats transformed into a Tuxedo. You ...
— The Complete Bachelor - Manners for Men • Walter Germain
... contract more and more, and to take the shape of a star with curved rays, alone sent us its pale light. When we attained the very bottom of the cistern, we found a superb sight was to be had of all those steps, lighted from above and cutting off their shadows with marvelous precision. I then heard the hum of which I have already spoken: the immense granite conch had as many echoes ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... moving about and running away, he took a large arquebuse which he had ready at hand, and, calling out incessantly: Kill, kill! fired a great many shots at them, but in vain; for the piece did not carry so far."—This prince, according to Masson, piqued himself on his dexterity in cutting off at a single blow the head of the asses and pigs which he met with on his way. Lansac, one of his favourites, having found him one day with his sword drawn and ready to strike his mule, asked him seriously: ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... wounded I was taken to the bombproof in the fort. I shall never forget this first and last visit to the hospital department. To witness the rough handling of the wounded patients, to see them thrown on a table as one would a piece of beef, and to see the doctor use his knife and saw, cutting off a leg, or arm, and sometimes both, with as much indifference as if he were simply cutting up beef, and to hear the doctor say, of almost every other one of these victims, after a leg or an arm was amputated, "Put that fellow ...
— My Life In The South • Jacob Stroyer
... the best and gentlest of human beings; but let the European meet them in any of their own campongs, and a very different character they will appear. The character and treacherous proceeding narrated above, and the manner of cutting off vessels and butchering their crews, apply equally to all the pirates of the East India Islands, by which many hundred European and American vessels have been surprised and ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... used to be suspended over the entrance of churches and houses, and no wizard or witch could brave it.[145] 'Scoring above the breath' is omnipotent in Scotland, where the witch was cut or 'scotched' on the face and forehead. Cutting off secretly a lock of the hair of the accused, burning the thatch of her roof and the thing bewitched; these are a few of the least offensive or obscene practices in counter-charming.[146] In what degree or kind the Fetish-charms of the African savages are more ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... two pontoon bridges constructed below that village the Germans poured their troops before dawn of September 1, and as the morning fog of that day slowly lifted, their columns were seen working round the north of the deep loop of the Meuse, thus cutting off escape on the west and north-west. Meanwhile, on the other side of the town, von der Tann's Bavarians had begun the fight. Pressing in on Bazeilles so as to hinder the retreat of the enemy (as had been so effectively done at Colombey, on the east of Metz), they at first surprised ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... home, and the lonely places called me. The broad, rapid sweep of the river up which we won our slow passage, the great beetling cliffs dark in shadows, and crowned by trees, the jutting rocks whitened by spray, the headlands cutting off all view ahead, then suddenly receding to permit of our circling on into the unknown—here extended a panorama of which I could ...
— Beyond the Frontier • Randall Parrish
... without the unnatural custom of maiming or lopping off some part of the human body, as boring the lips and the cartilege of the nose, drawing or colouring the teeth, cutting off a joint from the fingers or toes, and otherwise practising, as they must suppose, improvements on nature. But on this consideration it would scarcely be fair to conclude, that maiming the feet of the Chinese ladies derived its origin from a period of time when they ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... There is but one way to force a Hindu priest, unless it be by cutting off his revenues—he must be hurt! This dog is unhurt as yet—see! The fire has ...
— Told in the East • Talbot Mundy
... why your face changed so abruptly when you recognized the handwriting, Mr. Verty," said the poet; gently brandishing the ruler, and directing imaginary orchestras; "you expected a note from your friend, Miss Redbud—horrid habit you have, that of cutting off the Miss—and ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... the correspondence and influenced its result. It affected him not at all, but in the midst of many such little affairs he found opportunity for really aggressive work. Once he was well fortified, the next step was to vex and disturb the enemy by cutting off supplies by sea, and making the approach to Boston difficult. For the latter purpose a detachment went boldly in broad daylight and burned the lighthouse at the harbor's mouth. Since the first attempt was not satisfactory, the same men went again, and finished the job. Other little ...
— The Siege of Boston • Allen French
... were protected by strong fortifications mounting upwards of fifty guns, with an unlimited supply of artillery and munitions of war, and that with their vast numbers they had ample opportunities of harassing our right flank and rear and cutting off communications up-country. ...
— A Narrative Of The Siege Of Delhi - With An Account Of The Mutiny At Ferozepore In 1857 • Charles John Griffiths
... and daring; he conceived the hope of cutting off the army of General Moreau, and imprudently crossing the Inn, the difficult passage of which the French dreaded, he advanced immediately towards the Isar, intending to reascend the river in our rear. But ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... invested with the mystery which belongs to untrodden spaces, and with enough of terror to give it dignity, it had yet closer relations with the town over which it brooded than the passing stranger knew of. Thus, it made a local climate by cutting off the northern winds and holding the sun's heat like a garden-wall. Peach-trees, which, on the northern side of the mountain, hardly ever came to fruit, ripened abundant ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... and saw that a mound had arisen across the river nearer than the distance named by our companion, completely cutting off retreat by the way we had come. The bank on the west side of the Hudson was high at the point where we were, and looking intensely at it, I saw by the manner in which the trees disappeared, the more distant behind those ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... answer now. Besides his age which pleads for him, your father has not allowed greatness and power to shade the love he gave you heartily the hour he first took you in his arms. Nature protests against his cutting off, and in this instance, O Prince, the voice of Nature is the voice of Allah. So say I ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... through deserts, and over mountains, driven, like cattle, with a pint of meal each night for food, and a single blanket to cover us in the bitterest cold. Strong men fell down dead at my side, or, being too exhausted to move, were shot and left to the wolves and carrion; our guard merely cutting off the poor fellows' ears, as evidence that they had not escaped. The horrors of ...
— The Hallam Succession • Amelia Edith Barr
... midst of the assembly; but Agamemnon rose up; and Talthybius, like unto a god in his voice, stood beside the shepherd of the people, holding a boar in his hands. Then the son of Atreus, drawing the knife with his hands, which always hung by the great scabbard of his sword, cutting off the forelock of the boar, prayed, lifting up his hands to Jove; but all the Greeks sat in silence in the same spot, listening in a becoming manner to the king. But praying, he spoke, looking towards the ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... for swords. Very soon the girls on Rosa's side drove their enemies toward the hollyhock bed, where they turned and fled. Seeing the hollyhocks standing guard like soldiers, Rosa thought it would be fun to charge upon them, which she did, cutting off all their heads with her stick. Is it any wonder she ...
— Stories Pictures Tell - Book Four • Flora L. Carpenter
... haste, for he had found out who Limahon was. These soldiers landed in a hostile region, that of a certain people called Zambales; they are very much like the Chichimecos of Nueva Espana, who have no ambition higher than that of cutting off men's heads. They are accustomed to the use of bows and arrows. Consequently three soldiers in a rough country could not have escaped, unless God had kept their boat from being entirely destroyed by ...
— The Philippine Islands 1493-1898, Vol. 4 of 55 - 1576-1582 • Edited by E. H. Blair and J. A. Robertson
... in which Mephistopheles draws wine for the rabble with a gimlet out of the wooden table; and how it changes to fire as they drink it, and how they all go mad, draw their knives, grasp each other by the nose, and think they are cutting off bunches of grapes at every blow, and how foolish they all look when they awake from the spell and see how the Devil has been mocking them? It always seems to me a parable of ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... Ozias unto her, O daughter, blessed art thou of the most high God above all the women upon the earth; and blessed be the Lord God, which hath created the heavens and the earth, which hath directed thee to the cutting off of the head of the chief of ...
— Deuteronomical Books of the Bible - Apocrypha • Anonymous
... which Herod makes upon this, is very affecting. The poet has drawn him so tortured with his passion, that he seems almost sufficiently punished, for the barbarity of cutting off the ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. IV • Theophilus Cibber
... inhabitants were herded in and about the garrison towns, their lands laid waste and their dwellings destroyed. This policy the late cabinet of Spain justified as a necessary measure of war and as a means of cutting off supplies from the insurgents. It has utterly failed as a war measure. It was not civilized ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • William McKinley
... can be seen by cutting off the cap, and laying it gills downward, on a sheet of paper, two or three hours or more. The impression will remain on the paper. It is better to use blue paper, so that the white spores can be seen more clearly. The Agarics are divided into classes according to the color of the spores, ...
— Among the Mushrooms - A Guide For Beginners • Ellen M. Dallas and Caroline A. Burgin
... different qualifications for electors for representatives in Congress, than for members of Assembly, then must the first clause make it equally imperative for the national government to interfere with the States, and forbid them from arbitrarily cutting off the right of one-half of the people to become electors altogether. ...
— An Account of the Proceedings on the Trial of Susan B. Anthony • Anonymous
... a curee takes place at the spot where the animal is actually killed the French sporting term for the ceremony is "force et abattu." This, however, is usually preceded by another called "le pied," which consists in cutting off one of the feet of the dead animal and offering it to the person in whose honor the hunt ...
— Royal Palaces and Parks of France • Milburg Francisco Mansfield
... suffering. The little fellows obeyed them, and ran for safety to some hazel brush near by, where, of course, the Indians soon found them, but their thirst for blood being somewhat allayed, and their object attained, they contented themselves with cutting off a piece of John's scalp, tearing it most brutally from the quivering flesh, when the squaws from some tepees near by, hearing his heartrending screams, came to the rescue, and begged that they might keep the children. And there they had remained, ...
— 'Three Score Years and Ten' - Life-Long Memories of Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and Other - Parts of the West • Charlotte Ouisconsin Van Cleve
... wasn't time to finish cutting off the stake. What could he do? He made a frightened jump just as he had when he first felt the wire tugging at his leg. Just as before, he was thrown flat on his face. He scrambled to his feet and jumped again, only to be thrown just as before. Just then Bowser the Hound saw ...
— The Adventures of Danny Meadow Mouse • Thornton W. Burgess
... Mr. Tilbody said, closing more doors than one, and cutting off two kinds of light, "have agreed that ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... the Captain hastened to continue, cutting off the mate's hard words. "Oh, yes, she looks old and dirty—no mistake. But time was when no ship afloat could match her for either looks or speed. Aye, she was a beauty. Remember how she looked in ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... cudgels for 'Free Trade'; but still without a resort to arms. His chosen means of warfare was an Embargo Act, forbidding the departure of vessels from United States ports. This, although nominally aimed against France as well, was designed to make Great Britain submit by cutting off both her and her colonies from all intercourse with the United States. But its actual effect was to hurt Americans, and even Jefferson's own party, far more than it hurt the British. The Yankee skipper ...
— The War With the United States - A Chronicle of 1812 - Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • William Wood
... Sherman's campaign of the Carolinas was essential to this great result, or proved to be more important than his march through Georgia. Each was a great raid, inflicting immense damage upon the enemy's country and resources, demoralizing to the people at home and the army in Virginia, cutting off supplies necessary to the support of the latter, possibly expediting somewhat the final crisis at Richmond, and certainly making the subjugation more complete of those of the Southern people who were thus made to "feel the weight of war." Considered as ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... a small church, built with a great choir for the nuns behind the high altar; from each side of the latter a high wooden screen extended to the walls, completely cutting off the space. It was dark, too, especially in such weather, and almost deserted, save for a number of old women who knelt on the damp marble pavement, some leaning against the backs of chairs, some resting one arm upon the plastered bases of the yellow marble columns. There were ...
— Casa Braccio, Volumes 1 and 2 (of 2) • F. Marion Crawford
... mouth; his ears were muffled as if he were under water, but he came to his feet with a leg of the broken table in his hand. Swan threw the fork at him as he rose from his knees; it struck the lantern, breaking the globe, cutting off more than half the dim light in which ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... proprietor of Castringham Hall—Sir Matthew Fell. He deposed to having watched her on three different occasions from his window, at the full of the moon, gathering sprigs 'from the ash-tree near my house'. She had climbed into the branches, clad only in her shift, and was cutting off small twigs with a peculiarly curved knife, and as she did so she seemed to be talking to herself. On each occasion Sir Matthew had done his best to capture the woman, but she had always taken alarm at some accidental noise he had made, and all he could see when ...
— Ghost Stories of an Antiquary • Montague Rhodes James
... "each medal represents a human life, a head. We have these given us for every head we bring back in war. Do you think I am proud of them, and there are more than fifty? No, I weep when I see them. When I had seized my foe by his hair preparatory to cutting off his head, a vision of his mother, his wife, and his sisters appeared before me, and I could have wept as I struck off his head. Why should I kill this man? I asked myself. I know him not, he has done me no harm, yet because it is war, arranged by princes and kings, ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... It is very desirable that this be done when the branches are small, as there is then less danger of seriously disturbing the balance of the growing forces of the plant, and also because there is less danger of careless workmen cutting off the main shoot in place of a lateral, which would seriously check the ripening of the fruit. It is especially important that any shoots springing from the fruit cluster be removed as early as possible. For these reasons it is important that, if the ...
— Tomato Culture: A Practical Treatise on the Tomato • William Warner Tracy
... sold to Mr. Riddle and united with his weekly, thus extending its circulation, and cutting off the ruinous expense of its publication. The Journal was thoroughly Republican, and would be ably conducted. No further need of a page devoted to freedom, when every page was consecrated ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... the absence of the legate and the army on a remote expedition, provoked all the tribes of the Britons, provincials, allies, enemies, to a general insurrection. The command of this confederacy was conferred on Boadicea, as the first in rank, and resentment of injuries. They began by cutting off a Roman legion; then they fell upon the colonies of Camelodunum and Verulam, and with a barbarous fury butchered the Romans and their adherents to the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... Astier-Rehu, which had brought this upon them. The Academie has not been accustomed to such attacks, since it has prudently opened its doors to 'gentlemen of the Press.' The fiery Laniboire, familiar with every kind of 'sport.' talked of cutting off the gentleman's ears, and it took two or three colleagues to ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... tried the effects of cutting off a very thin slice parallel to one of the sloping sides of the apex, as we thought that the wound would cause prolonged irritation, which might induce bending towards the opposite side, as in the case ...
— The Power of Movement in Plants • Charles Darwin
... Charles, breaking the stick with which he was playing tennis with the Duke of Guise and Teligny, the admiral's son-in-law; and he immediately returned to his room. The Duke of Guise took himself off without a word. Teligny speedily joined his father-in-law. Ambrose Pare had already attended to him, cutting off the two broken fingers; somebody expressed a fear that the balls might have been poisoned. "It will be as God pleases as to that," said Coligny; and, turning towards the minister, Merlin, who had ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... to another he passed unweariedly, cutting off portions of torn flesh, extracting bullets, setting broken bones, taking up and tying severed arteries, sewing together the edges of gaping wounds, and completing the amputation of limbs, in regard to which the operation had been begun—sometimes ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... of a sudden I had become such an unsainted lion.[70] The fact is, the example of others always had the strongest influence over my mind and actions; and I now lived in such an atmosphere of violence and cruelty, I heard of nothing but of slitting noses, cutting off ears, putting out eyes, blowing up in mortars, chopping men in two, and baking them in ovens, that, in truth, I am persuaded, with a proper example before me, I could almost have ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... Cutting off a haunch he cached it in a nearby tree, and throwing the balance of the carcass across his shoulder trotted back toward the spot at which he had left the gryf. The great beast was just emerging from the river when Tarzan, seeing it, issued the weird cry of the ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... you that the Virginia Cavalier first challenged France on this continent— that Cavalier, John Smith, gave New England its very name, and was so pleased with the job that he has been handing his own name around ever since—and that while Miles Standish was cutting off men's ears for courting a girl without her parents' consent, and forbade men to kiss their wives on Sunday, the Cavalier was courting everything in sight, and that the Almighty had vouchsafed great increase to the Cavalier colonies, ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter
... (so interpreting his orders), and the Grand Vizier, calling him Dog of a Giaour: spat in his face, not far from hanging him; and the Kaiser and Vienna people, on his coming home, threw him into prison, and were near cutting off his head. And again, after such sleety marchings through the Mountains, he has had to dissolve at Mollwitz; float away in military deluge in the manner we saw. And now, next winter, here is he lodged among the upland bogs at Budweis, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... sacrifice, my dear child, all your romantic notions, and all your taste for love, to the grand object. The Czar must not have the slightest cause for jealousy. These Czars make nothing, you know, of cutting off their mistresses' pretty heads upon the bare suspicion of an intrigue. But you must do what is still more difficult than to be constant, you must yield your will, and, what is more, you must never let this Czar guess ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... of the enemy, or by common accident. Accordingly, on the 6th of April, I issued a general order, limiting the use of the railroad-cars to transporting only the essential articles of food, ammunition, and supplies for the army proper, forbidding any further issues to citizens, and cutting off all civil traffic; requiring the commanders of posts within thirty miles of Nashville to haul out their own stores in wagons; requiring all troops destined for the front to march, and all beef-cattle to be driven on their own legs. This was a great help, but of ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... melancholy beast, standing immovable for hours at a time and employing an Italian to feed him hay and cabbages. As well proceed to a study of the psychology of a juris-consult by first immersing him in Sing Sing, or of a juggler by first cutting off his hands. Knowledge so gained is inaccurate and imbecile knowledge. Not even a college professor, if sober, would give it any ...
— Damn! - A Book of Calumny • Henry Louis Mencken
... been difficult for the government to have reduced these risings by cutting off supplies of food. But now South Africa was suddenly swept into the great whirlpool of European politics, and events were at hand which made these petty local movements insignificant, save in so far as they were evidences of the independent spirit of ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce
... her go by without interfering, then the little fleet was put to sea and followed the Armada, harassing her in the rear and cutting off a vessel here ...
— Stories from English History • Hilda T. Skae
... rest and wipe the blood from his hands and garments, and then, cutting off the claws of the animal as a trophy, he left it there for a time. Having now far more than it was possible for him to drag to the hut, he resolved to proceed thither with the rabbits, and bring Nelly back to help him ...
— Silver Lake • R.M. Ballantyne
... peculiarity that I can perceive. They keep each to their own territory, except on the occasion of a grand "corroborie," when the whole assemble. They are at present on terms of peace nominally. Should a safe opportunity of cutting off a straggler offer, I have no doubt it would be taken advantage of. They are cowardly and treacherous in the extreme. The "Gudang" tribe, claiming the land from Cape York to Fly Point, at the entrance of Albany Pass, is small ...
— The Overland Expedition of The Messrs. Jardine • Frank Jardine and Alexander Jardine
... incriminating. What is it that the author called the platitudes of marriage? That monotony which Emma had dreaded, which she had wished to escape from but had found continually in adultery, which was precisely the disillusion. You now see clearly that when, in the place of cutting off the members of certain phrases and cutting out some words, we read what precedes and what follows, nothing remains for incrimination; and you can well comprehend that my client, who knew what he wished to say, must be a little in ...
— The Public vs. M. Gustave Flaubert • Various
... while to a gorge, through which a torrent rushed, cutting off their way. It was midnight now. They saw that the stream was very muddy and that it bore ...
— The Texan Star - The Story of a Great Fight for Liberty • Joseph A. Altsheler
... bread and of meat. The light troops of the French had preceded then and burned or destroyed everything that could be of use. Now also for the first time the Prince and his men became aware that a great army was moving upon the eastern side of them, streaming southward in the hope of cutting off their retreat to the sea. The sky glowed with their fires at night, and the autumn sun twinkled and gleamed from one end of the horizon to the other upon the steel caps and flashing weapons of a ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... power over their lives and fortunes, which are as much as possible to be preserved; but a power to make laws, and annex such penalties to them, as may tend to the preservation of the whole, by cutting off those parts, and those only, which are so corrupt, that they threaten the sound and healthy, without which no severity is lawful. And this power has its original only from compact and agreement, and the mutual consent ...
— Two Treatises of Government • John Locke
... the usual manner; and the expansion valves are of the well known Meyer type, consisting of two plates on the back of the main valve, driven by a third eccentric, and connected by a right and left handed screw, the turning of which alters the distance between the plates and the point of cutting off. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 415, December 15, 1883 • Various
... had laid his carabine near him, and betaken himself to rest as usual, when his partner arose from his side, and ere he became sensible she had done so, she seized [his carabine], and discharging [it] in his bosom, ended at once his life and crimes. She finished her work by cutting off the brigand's head, and carrying it to the principal town of the province, where she delivered it to the police, and claimed the reward attached to his head, which was paid accordingly. This female still lives, a stately, dangerous-looking ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... of the straits; and soon the retreat became general. As the Phoenicians withdrew, the Athenians and the AEginetans fell upon the center of the Persian line, and the rout became general with the Greeks in full pursuit. The latter pressed their enemy as far as the island of Psyttaleia, thus cutting off the Persian force on the island from their communications. Whereupon Aristides, the Athenian, led a force in boats from Salamis to the island and put to death every man of the Persian garrison. The Persian ships fled to their ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... cutting off a couple of the hated infidels who had forced themselves into the peaceful country, where their rajah, like many another, had been free to carry on a happy lawless existence, cutting throats, selling slaves, committing acts of piracy, and indulging ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... greatly shocked Her Majesty's Touarghee Consul, and he asked, "Whether the Queen cut off heads?" I told Her Majesty's Consul, the servants of Government hanged murderers. The Touaricks have acquired these sanguinary notions of cutting off heads, from the reports of the Turkish and Moorish administration of justice. Such barbarous practices do not exist amongst these barbarians. He then demanded, "Should I go to England, would the English seize me and beat me?" This question from the English Consul really surprised me, whatever ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... Old and deformed women they gave for daily sustenance to their cannibals: The young and beautiful they devoured hot, but smothered them shrieking and lamenting under their forced and unnatural ravishments; and cutting off the breasts of tender virgins to present as dainties to their leaders, they fed themselves ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... code. Excommunication inflicts three penalties: First, an interdict against eating with the fellow members of the caste; second, an interdict against marriage within the caste. This practically amounts to debarring the delinquent and his family from respectable marriages of any sort; third, cutting off the delinquent from the general community by forbidding him the use of the village barber and washerman, and of the priestly adviser. Except in very serious cases, excommunication is withdrawn upon the submission of the ...
— Crime and Its Causes • William Douglas Morrison
... good in mind to do. Then he said to my mother: "Did you bring your youngster into the world in order to let him eat the very nose and ears off your head?" I felt ashamed and put the loaf of bread, from which I was just on the point of cutting off a piece, back into the cupboard again. My mother took offense at his well-meant words; she stopped her wheel and replied vehemently that her son was a fine good fellow. "Well, we will see about that," said the Master. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... with, H'Emma had received a whipping, which, however undeserved, was probably the most judicious course, by inspiring fortitude, and cutting off all hopes ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... comfort. Window curtains act as an equalizer in bringing the very best out of both light and dark rooms, serving at the same time as a partial background for their contents; while portieres are not only aesthetic but useful in deadening sounds, cutting off draughts, and screening one room from another. "Drapes," those flimsy, go-as-you-please looking bunches of poor taste knotted, cascaded, and festooned over mantels, pictures, and chair backs, we have outgrown, ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... head of the meadow a steep dry wash climbed straight up to intersect the road. The recollection came to the surface of his mind now. If he could make his way up this wash, he would gain three advantages: he would materially shorten his journey by cutting off a mile or so of the road-grade's twists and doublings; he would avoid the necessity of showing himself so near the Cove in the bright moonlight; and he would leave no tracks where the road touched the valley. Accordingly he turned sharp to the left and began to pick his way upstream, keeping ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... the wrong done to his father, and determined to take his own revenge. His father, seeing of how good heart he was, gave him his sword and his blessing. Rodrigo went out, defied the Count, fought with and killed him, and cutting off his head carried it home. The old man was sitting at table, the food lying before him untasted, when Rodrigo returned, and, pointing to the head which hung from the horse's collar, dropping blood, bade him look up, saying, "Here is the herb which will restore to you your appetite. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... The last time I saw him he said I was incorrigible and a dunce. I admit the former, but I'm going to make him take the other back. I told him so. He replied that he was from Missouri. He gave me an opportunity to make good by cutting off my allowance. There was a girl. When my allowance was cut off she made me feel cold as an Eskimo. Told me straight that she had never liked me in the way she'd led me to believe she did, and that she was engaged to a real man. She made the mistake of telling me his name, ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... then she had The dagger close at hand, which made it awkward; For Eastern stays are little made to pad, So that a poniard pierces if 't is struck hard: She thought of killing Juan—but, poor lad! Though he deserved it well for being so backward, The cutting off his head was not the art Most likely to attain her ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... bow to the company and walked away, cutting off the heads of the dandelions with his whip as he went. All followed with their eyes his firm, graceful figure, as he strode over the grass in his ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... state that, provided anything he said should not commit him, he had no objection to answer the question hypothetically. The Aboriginal Inhabitant said that he would have no hypotheses or Jacobins; that he did not approve of cutting off kings' heads; and that the Vraibleusians were the most monarchical people in the world. So saying, he walked up, without any ceremony, to the chief Manager, and taking him by the button, conversed with him some time in an earnest manner, which made the stocks ...
— The Voyage of Captain Popanilla • Benjamin Disraeli |
