"For dear life" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the band, playing for dear life "Hail the Conquering Hero" and after the band, two and two a great line of citizens with kerosene torches. After the torches came the transparencies: "Levine Wins!" "The Reservation is Ours." "Back to the land, boys!" "We've ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... World. The agencies which two Jewish charity organizations now maintain at the Immigrant Station had not yet been established. Gitelson, who like myself had no friends in New York, never left my side. He was even more timid than I. It seemed as though he were holding on to me for dear life. This had the effect of putting ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... note of alarm, put the trunk of a large tree quickly between himself and the enemy, and went away like the wind. With the speed of thought the warning note was sounded along the whole line and in a moment the woods seemed alive with turkeys, running for dear life. In less time than it takes to tell it, that gallinaceous army had passed out of sight, forever. And the like of it will never again be possible ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears
... screamed Joel, hanging on for dear life; "so there, now! you go right away. Polly dug 'em, Polly dug 'em," he kept saying. But the scuffle was short, as the other boy raced up, and pulled too, so that pretty soon Joel was tumbled heels over head, ...
— The Adventures of Joel Pepper • Margaret Sidney
... lifted to higher possibilities of brotherhood and concord, by the peaceful close of the bloody and hideous struggle of centuries? Think of it all, I say, and then go also in imagination to the door of the House of Commons, and see a Scotch Liberal fighting for dear life to bring into the Tory lobby the necessary number of misguided and ignorant neophytes to bring down ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... than any hound that ever mortal eye has rested upon. And even as they looked the thing tore the throat out of Hugo Baskerville, on which, as it turned its blazing eyes and dripping jaws upon them, the three shrieked with fear and rode for dear life, still screaming, across the moor. One, it is said, died that very night of what he had seen, and the other twain were but broken men for ...
— The Hound of the Baskervilles • A. Conan Doyle
... I began committing the Book of Job to memory, and worked for dear life and reason. I became interested, and my interest in that wondrous poem deepened until the study became a passion. Thus I turned the whole current of my thoughts into a new channel. Reason came back, and with it resolution and courage ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell
... aloft to the HOWDAH or saddle, which is silk-cushioned and boxlike; and then for a rolling, tossing, swaying, and heaving down into a gully, too much thrilled to worry or exclaim, but hanging on for dear life!" ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... poor—young infants abandoned by their unnatural parents. All these were under twelve months old, and were pale, thin, and famished-looking. Some were sleeping, and seemingly, ah! so aged and care-worn in their sleep; some were clasping nursery-bottles in their skeleton hands, and sucking away for dear life; one little miserable was wailing in restless pain, and sending its anguished eyes around in ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... moving one of our show-windows up there bodily for a white-goods sale in February; date a trifle late for Kendrick & Company, but advance trade for Eastman, undoubtedly. Says he knows they can start every mother's daughter of 'em sewing for dear life, if they can get their eye on that sewing-room scene. Well"—he paused to chuckle again—"he says Carson says that window cost us five hundred dollars; but if it did it's cheap at the price, and I'll make the new firm a present of it. Benson & ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond
... davits three men who seemed to be merely stunned. These, with the chief officer, and perhaps four survivers of the explosion, made up the list of living but non-effective members of the ship's company. There was one other, Gulielmo Frascuelo, who was bawling for dear life in his bunk in the forecastle, but in that dark hour no one chanced to remember him, and it needed more than a human voice to pit itself against the hurricane which roared over the vessel. The unhappy wretch knew that something out of the ordinary had taken place, and he was scared ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... fighting for dear life. The Tuileries and Luxembourg Gardens are transformed into a township of gigantic smithies; and Anne Mie, with scared eyes, and clinging to Blakeney's arm, cast furtive, terrified glances at the huge furnaces and the begrimed, darkly scowling ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... always afraid of ghosts but I never saw one. There was a graveyard beside de road from our house to town and I always was afraid to go by it. I'd shut my eyes and run for dear life till I was past de grave yard. I had heard dat there was a headless man dat stayed there on cold rainy days or foggy nights he'd hide by de fence and throw his head at you. Once a man got hit and he fell right down dead. ...
— Slave Narratives, Oklahoma - A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From - Interviews with Former Slaves • Various
... a dark and silent street by night, little used, a mere link between two main thoroughfares. Sofia, running for dear life, was still far from the nearest corner. Karslake doubled nimbly across the street to the only vehicle in sight, an impressive Rolls-Royce town-car. Jumping on the running-board he pointed out the fleeing shadow ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... don't know anything about it only what they say. Anyhow, he's brought a pianner with him, and they say he bangs away on it like all possessed, and then stops short and scolds. I went past there, one day, when the windows was open, and I heard him thumpin' and tiddlin' away for dear life. It didn't seem to me there was much tune to it, nor time neither; you couldn't so much as tell where one line left ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... a cell for the punishment of lazy prisoners. In one corner of this cell was a pump, and in another, an opening through which a steady stream of water was admitted. The prisoner could take his choice, either to stand still and be drowned or to work for dear life at the pump and keep the flood down until his jailer chose to relieve him. Now it seems to me that, throughout Holland, nature has introduced this little diversion on a grand scale. The Dutch have always been forced to pump for their very existence and probably ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... Verity understood him at once. "Hepsy is back," she said composedly; "please take Miss Sheldon upstairs, and then Amias will go on with his work, and I will send up tea as soon as possible;" but before they were out of the studio Goliath was back at his easel and painting away for dear life. ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... littered with papers in the middle of the room, and behind it, in a gray riding-habit, with a gray soldier-cap on her red hair, writing for dear life, sat the girl. She lifted her head quick, as the door swung open, and then made a jump to get between me and the table. I took off ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... barrack safe and sound but fearfully scared. Only the wild shooting of the sentry had saved him from being riddled. The guard itself, upon turning out, evidently thought that a rebellion had broken out or at least that a prisoner had escaped. Seizing their rifles they blazed away for dear life. They did not aim at anything in particular but shot haphazardly at the stars, haystacks, and trees in the most frantic manner imaginable and as rapidly as their magazine arms would let them. Undoubtedly ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney
... keep your horses' heads to the stream," shouted a voice, and with a scramble we were down the bank, and the nags were swimming for dear life. I confess now, that at that moment I thought my last hour had come, for the swirling water was within an inch of my toes, and I clung to Red Rowan's coat with all the strength I had, and shut my eyes, and tried to think of my prayers. ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... peering between the legs of my superior officers, I saw the boat glide away from the frigate's side. Our friends lay piled on the bottom-boards and under the thwarts like a catch of fish. One or two lifted clenched fists: and the boatmen, eyeing them nervously, fell to their oars for dear life. ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... and began hacking at the chevaux de frise with his axe. "That's av ut, bhoys," yelled the Irish sergeant again. "Lave them spoikes an' go for the stockade. Good for you, little man—whirro!" Nat by this time was on a comrade's back, and using his axe for dear life; one of twenty men hacking, ripping, tearing down the wooden stakes. But it was Teddy who wriggled through first with Dave at his heels. The man beneath Nat gave a heave with his shoulders and shot him through his gap, a splinter tearing his cheek open. He fell head foremost sprawling ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... in his place and was studying away for dear life. He was naturally a studious boy, and he was anxious to prepare himself to enter a certain school the ...
— Patty Fairfield • Carolyn Wells
... straws; there came a shrill uproar from inside the building as the sleeping occupants poured forth, but without a pause the Yankee machine whizzed on up the street, its gong clanging, its occupants holding on for dear life, the peaceful inhabitants of Colon fleeing from its path like quail before the ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... have been in a ragged old dirt-coloured gingham, Father's boots, and his old straw hat jammed down to my ears; I'd have been hot and in a surly temper, rebelling because I had the berries to pick. He would have taken one look at me, jumped the fence, and run to Lang's for dear life. Better cut ...
— A Daughter of the Land • Gene Stratton-Porter
... team mates were in a fair way to be lionized. A packed gallery, much jubilant singing and frantic applause of every move they made, spurred the black and scarlet girls to doughty deeds, and, although it was a hard-fought battle, in which the freshmen played for dear life, ...
— Marjorie Dean - High School Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... yell—'smallpox!'—and lit out for home. Folks was tur'ble afraid of it then an' he had seven children of his own an' nobody for 'em to look to if he died, so you couldn't blame him none. They was all like that then, every fam'ly just barely holdin' on, an' scratchin' for dear life. ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... popped in and out of his door in the clock twelve times. Emma blinked at him in terror, and Mark pulled off all the bedclothes to convince the old woman that he was not playing a practical joke. Then he rushed back to his own room and began to dress for dear life. ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... that I, Frona, in the flesh, am here, in a Peterborough, paddling for dear life with two men; year of our Lord eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, Alaska, Yukon River; this is water, that is ice; my arms are tired, my heart up a few beats, and I am sweating,—and yet it seems all a dream. ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... stayed to hear. At the sound of Archelaus's voice he fetched a yell, jumped clean over the side of the boat and swam for dear life. He swam and swam, till by the bit of the moon he saw the Gull Rock close ahead. There were lashin's of rats on the Gull Rock, as he knew: but he was a good deal surprised at the way they were behaving: for ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... to suck furiously at the little pink spot on the ball of his thumb—sucking for dear life. Presently he felt a strange aching pain in his arms and shoulders, and his fingers seemed difficult to bend. Then he knew that ...
— The Stolen Bacillus and Other Incidents • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... says he. 'No extra charge!' and he shut his eyes, and smoked away for dear life. Presently he opened his eyes, and looked at ...
— Geoffrey Strong • Laura E. Richards
... bean pole for dear life, the Scarecrow slid rapidly downward, Everything was dark, but at times a confused ...
— The Royal Book of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... the grip in which his life was held. He must somehow deaden this sense, this bitter sense of loss, if it were only by postponing the last renunciation. He would go back to his work and force himself not to hate it. It was his only refuge, and he must cling to it for dear life. And he would not see her again till the night of the first performance of Elvira. She would be in London in a month's time, but he would take care to be out of reach. He would not meet those glorious eyes or touch that hand again ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... to something else. She had found a glass of preserved fruit, had opened it, taken a long-handled spoon, dived into it, put the spoon to her mouth, and was licking away for dear life. "Tastes good," she said, "tastes like lemon. Try it, Philippin'." She held the spoon to Philippina's lips so that she could try it. Philippina thrust the spoon rudely ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... months of the rebellion were a fight for dear life, a constant struggle to avert entire annihilation, for to all who were there it seemed as though no power on earth could save them. But Providence willed it otherwise, and after the full extent of the danger was realized, gloomy forebodings gave way to stern endeavours. Men arose, great ...
— A Narrative Of The Siege Of Delhi - With An Account Of The Mutiny At Ferozepore In 1857 • Charles John Griffiths
... sapped it up and burned it out in faint, trembling light to confuse the men who sometimes came plodding down the galleries to and from the main bottom. At nine o'clock Grant Adams had been twice over the mine, on the three levels and had thirty men hammering away for dear life. He sent a car of lumber down to the mule barn, while he went to the third level to direct the division of an air shaft into an emergency escape. On one side of this air shaft the air came down and there was a temporary hoist for the men on the third level ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... sipping the beverage, we will glance at our surroundings. Back of the hall—we are sitting at a table near the centre of the apartment—on a raised platform, is an asthmatic pianoforte, upon which an individual with threadbare coat, colorless vest and faded nankeen pantaloons, is thrumming away for dear life. Out of tune himself, he tortures the poor instrument in a way that threatens its instant dissolution, rending its heartstrings, and causing it to shriek with agony, wailing out the tune that the old cow died to! This is the only piece of music the performer is acquainted with, judging ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... David's one stroke was enough. They were as sure as Nathan and Bathsheba had been that the declaration of his wish would carry all Israel with it, and so they saw that the game was up, and there was a rush for dear life. The empty banqueting-hall proclaimed the collapse of a rebellion which had no brains to guide it, and no reason to justify it. Let us learn that, though 'the race is not always to the swift,' promptitude of action, when we are sure of God's will, is usually a condition of success. ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... to have told Wentworth that nothing was to be expected from the Longworths. However, he resolved not to shirk the interview, so passed up the steps and into the outer office. He found the establishment much larger than he had expected. At numerous desks there were numerous clerks writing away for dear life. He approached the inquiry counter, and a man came forward to hear what he had ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... fire in the face of the company, when he would laugh at the joke as well as any man there. It was a delight to put him on a high-mettled horse, and send him after the hounds,—pale, sweating, calling on us, for Heaven's sake, to stop, and holding on for dear life by the mane and the crupper. How it happened that the fellow was never killed I know not; but I suppose hanging is the way in which HIS neck will be broke. He never met with any accident, to speak of, in our hunting-matches: but you were pretty sure to find him at dinner ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... standing so high above the decks, and he clung to the ropes which were all about him, for dear life. He heartily wished that he was once more with his comrades, but it was too late now. He must go through with it, and he was determined, if possible, ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and the Treasure Cave • Ross Kay
... shout he dashed away. He circled the oncoming female and got above her. Anak hurled one of his crippled spears. It struck her full in the chest, but made only a flesh wound as the handle dropped away. The female roared with rage and hurled herself at the hunter. Anak leaped to one side and ran for dear life. The clumsy female checked her rush and turned after him. He rapidly gained on her. A ...
— B. C. 30,000 • Sterner St. Paul Meek
... quirt, which he then raised slowly above the pony's side for the purpose of drawing the enemy's fire. He did these things quickly and without heroics, because he was a plainsman. Hardly had the bullets from three Winchesters spatted against the clay before he was up and climbing for dear life. ...
— Blazed Trail Stories - and Stories of the Wild Life • Stewart Edward White
... Bird and friendly House People!" drummed the Downy Woodpecker, beating away for dear life on a telegraph pole. ...
— Citizen Bird • Mabel Osgood Wright and Elliott Coues
... the precarious position of sitting upon a limb in a rather complicated network of small branches and foliage, hanging onto his motorcycle for dear life, while the buoyant float went swirling and ...
— Tom Slade Motorcycle Dispatch Bearer • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... tide should turn, but whereas it never did, he must needs get a fresh partner into the whirlpool, a Yankee damsel out of a boarding-house. By the time she had had a couple of children, he died, and the whole weight remains bound about young Randolf's neck, tying him down to work for dear life in this doleful spot, without a farthing of capital, no stock, no anything. I came upon the clearing one day in the course of my surveying, and never did I see Gone to the Dogs more clearly written on any spot; the half-burnt or overthrown trees lying about overgrown with wild vines and raspberries, ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the war," said Kinney to the captain, as the body was being lifted over the Little Horn. "They know he's killed, and they've all quit. I was up by the tepees near the agency just now, and I could see the hostiles jamming back home for dear life. They was chucking their rifles to the squaws, and jumping in the river—ha! ha!—to wash off their war-paint, and each —— —— would crawl out and sit innercint in the family blanket his squaw had ready. If you was to go there now, cap'n, you'd find just a ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... I suppose it was that, appeared before us suddenly. One moment we were crawling like insects between the trunks of great jungle trees that shot upwards seventy feet or more without a branch, as if they were racing for dear life skyward, and then everything fell away and there was the old building. It startled the both of us. We got the sensation that you get when you see a really good play. You forget your bodily presence and you are only a bundle ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... scattering the people right and left. Before reaching the bonfire, to which someone had added several bushels of shavings, Jack Harris and Phil Adams, who were steering, dropped on the ground, and allowed the vehicle to pass over them, which it did without injuring them; but the boys who were clinging for dear life to the trunk-rack behind fell over the prostrate steersman, and there we all lay in a heap, two or three of us ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... mass of snow struggling with bowed head against the storm, wading deep in the loose drifts, wading seemingly at haphazard—and trailing after it an indefinable bundle of white—dead white. Behind, a human being drags along, holding on for dear life to the rings on the sleigh. It is the post-boy from ...
— The Great Hunger • Johan Bojer
... drawing-room are two ladies. One, the mistress of the house, is seated at the writing-table with her back to the room, scribbling off invitations for dear life, cards for an afternoon "at-home," at the rate of six per minute; the other sits idle in a low basket-chair ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... yesterday, and many more, came alongside, but only persons of distinction were admitted on board. Nevertheless, they suffice to crowd the deck. A war-canoe, with a king in it, paddled round the ship twice, all the men working for dear life, by way, I suppose, of contrasting their naval force with our own. All our guests, of whatever rank, come to trade or to beg; and it is curious to see how essentially their estimation of money differs from our own. Coin is almost unknown in the traffic of the coast, and it is only those ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... I should!—yes, I certainly should call 'this chill sentiment' love! And tell me—have you never got out of your depth in the water of this 'chill sentiment,' or found yourself battling for dear life against an outbreak of ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... thoughts were altogether in another direction. In fact, I was thinking of the great 'bread and butter' struggle in which ninety-nine out of every hundred are for dear life engaged; and none more earnestly, and few with less success, ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... the stones. Hissing and obviously terrified, the second dinosaur watched the dying struggles of its mate; then, obedient to a terrified shout from its keepers, wheeled about to join in a frantic rout of the spearmen, who, casting aside shield, spear and brass coil, fled for dear life in the direction of those invisible passages ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... like a ball, pegging away for dear life, but losing ground at every jump. In that half-mile stretch he would have lost Thor altogether if the grizzly had not stopped near the bottom of the first slope to take fresh reckonings. When he started up the slope Muskwa could see him, and with a yelping cry for him to ...
— The Grizzly King • James Oliver Curwood
... task with a far better will than he had shown where live Masai were concerned. Indeed, for each body that he handled he found an appropriate sarcasm. Alphonse throwing Masai into the Tana was a very different creature from Alphonse flying for dear life from the spear of a live Masai. He was quite merry and gay, he clapped his hands and warbled snatches of French songs as the grim dead warriors went 'splash' into the running waters to carry a message of death and defiance to their kindred a hundred miles below. In short, thinking that he wanted ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard
... to padlock the chickens. Seems, Mrs. Lathrop, as they're really havin' no end o' trouble over the new paper an' Elijah's real put out. He says Hiram had a idea as the more the speed the better the paper an' was just wringin' for dear life, an' the first thing he knew the first issue begin to slide a little cornerways an' slid off into a crank as Elijah never knowed was there, an' him an' Mr. Kimball spent the whole of yesterday runnin' ...
— Susan Clegg and a Man in the House • Anne Warner
... death, misery, starvation, it behoves the rule-makers to be more scrupulously particular as to fairness and equity than in any other game like cricket or tennis. It behoves them to see that all start fair, and that no hapless beginner is unduly handicapped. To compel men to take part in a match for dear life, whether they wish it or not, and then to insist that some of them shall wield bats and some mere broom-sticks, irrespective of height, weight, age, or bodily infirmity, is surely not fair. It justifies the committee in ...
— Post-Prandial Philosophy • Grant Allen
... precipice. The tremendous force of it not only sent all our loose impedimenta flying down the road, which turned to the left, but it threw Ferdinand sideways; and, although he had gone over, he fell, as the newspapers have told you, just where the sheer wall bulged; and here, holding for dear life to the shrubs, he waited for me to save him. Such a torture I have never known, or shall know again. The sight of my friend, not ten feet away from me, the precipice forbidding me to go down, for it was ...
— The Man Who Drove the Car • Max Pemberton
... as soon as my head touched the sweet-smelling pillow; and I must have slept the round of the clock before I opened my eyes, for the room was now bright with candles, and in the arm-chair by the fire sat the Breton lady sewing as if for dear life. ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... For life, for dear life, nearly suffocated amidst—the hissing spray, we reached the cutter, the dog and his ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... them down to the landing," he said. "They had just shoved off in their dugout and were headed back for their old camp and paddling away for dear life. ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... and the suggestion finding an echo in the popular breast, a three-cornered fence rail was thrust between his legs, and lifted on men's shoulders. Astride of this sharp-backed steed, holding on with his hands for dear life, lest he should fall off and break his neck, he was carried, through the main streets of the village, followed by a howling crowd, and pelted with apples by the boys, while the windows of the houses along the ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... which Pee-wee sat trembled and creaked with each enormous bite that he took. The bright morning sunlight, wriggling through the foliage overhead, picked out the round face and curly hair of our young hero and showed him in all his pristine glory, frowning a terrible frown, clinging for dear life with one hand and engaged in ...
— Pee-wee Harris • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... plane rose from the ground, Hal grabbed the side of the seat and hung on for dear life. Looking down and seeing the ground dropping rapidly away, he experienced a choking sensation in ...
— The boy Allies at Liege • Clair W. Hayes
... the hand and dragged her along with him, and in this way they crossed the open together, side by side, running for dear life, with head and shoulders down. When they were safely ensconced behind a stack that opportunely offered its protection at the end of their course and turned to look behind them, they beheld another shell come rushing through the air and ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... interest, paying special attention to the people who were on board. They were greatly interested in the talk and gestures of the Frenchmen that composed the crew and most of the passengers. A little old Frenchman with a fiddle also attracted their attention. A few pennies soon had him playing away for dear life and calling off the figures in French in a ...
— Bob Hunt in Canada • George W. Orton
... hearing that he was very near and coming after me, I opened my eyes, and to my surprise there was a beautiful silver ladder before me. As quick as thought, I sprang with hands and feet upon it, and began to climb for dear life. 'Ha!' said master, 'I'll teach you to climb.' Then I felt the ladder shaking under me, and knew that he was coming up. I expected every moment to be seized and dragged back, so I climbed all the faster, and looked up to see how much farther I had to go. Oh, it was such a long way, and there ...
— From Death into Life - or, twenty years of my ministry • William Haslam
... three yards in, was a grey-haired bloke in a Norfolk jacket and flannel trousers, digging like a fiend, and crying like a baby—blowing, and gasping and sobbing, tears and sweat rolling down into his beard like rivers. He'd plunge his pick in, scratch, and shovel, and hack at the roots as if for dear life—he was making the hole too close to the hedge, of course—and all the time carrying on like that. I thought he must be digging his own grave at least. Suddenly he put his pick down, and there just under the hedge ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... for a quiet canter round the course. The old racer no sooner finds himself on the familiar track than he is off with the speed of flames, and our young friend, being powerless to check him, with his feet out of the stirrups and hanging on to the back of the saddle for dear life, is carried a mile or so before a sudden swerve at the exit rail ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready
... stones and gulleys, the tools clanging and banging fit to leap from the wagon, the men clinging to the side-boards for dear life. ...
— The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch • Henry Wallace Phillips
... sudden, a brave gave the warning, and we scattered in an instant over the little plain between the den and our village. Everybody seemed to be running for dear life, and I soon found myself some yards behind the rest. I had gone in boldly, partly because of conversations with certain boys who proposed to participate, and whom I usually outdistanced in foot races. But it seemed that they had not carried out their intentions ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... only this morning, after I had been forced to relinquish my surveillance for a brief half hour he was entirely missing upon my return. And, bless me, sir, where do you imagine I discovered him? A half mile out in the ocean, sir, in one of the lifeboats, rowing away for dear life. I do not know how he attained even that magnificent distance from shore, for he had but a single oar, with which he was blissfully ...
— The Return of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the man and his acquaintance fly, As Ruso's debtors hide from Ruso's eye; Poor victims, doomed, when that black pay-day's come, Unless by hook or crook they raise the sum, To stretch their necks, like captives to the knife, And listen to dull histories for dear life. Say, he has drunk too much, or smashed some ware, Evander's once, inestimably rare, Or stretched before me, in his zeal to dine, To snatch a chicken I had meant for mine; What then? is that a reason he should seem Less pleasant, less ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... her whole weight on the line and pulled away; again with only temporary success, for the dolphin only shook himself and struggled, but suddenly darting forward, he as suddenly slackened the line and Pancha, who had been pulling for dear life with set teeth and straining muscles, fell suddenly back and was spared a hard tumble only by a pair of strong, clasping arms that quickly righted, if they did not as quickly release, her, and Pancha, furiously blushing, excitedly panting, could only show her white teeth one ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... Alackaday! Woe betide us all! It will be next within our very walls. Holy St. Catherine protect us! May all the Saints have mercy upon us! In Guildford! why, that is scarce five short miles away! And all the men and the wenches are flying as for dear life, though if what men say be true there be few enough places left to fly to! Why, Joan, why answerest thou not? I might as well speak to a block as to thee. Dost understand, girl, that the Black Death is at our very doors — that all our people are flying ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... with our horizon on either hand bounded by a hissing crest that was rearing itself as high as our maintop, and the barque taking a weather roll of such portentous extent that both of us instinctively made a dash for the mizzen shrouds and clung to them for dear life in anticipation of the coming—and correspondingly abnormal—lee roll; while the roar of the bow wave and the wind aloft created such a din that I could not have made myself heard even had I been foolish enough to have attempted it. But I was confident that I had seen something; ...
— The Cruise of the "Esmeralda" • Harry Collingwood
... could tell he had been drinking. He staggered toward the body, but he was staring at the house and shaking his fist at it. He reeled off the cement path and almost stumbled over Simon before he saw him. He gave a cry, and stooped to look closer—then turned and bolted for dear life and vanished down the trail. He ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... had made a leap, just as the horse reached him. It was a leap to one side, but not to get out of the way. It was only to escape the flying hoofs, for, an instant later, Roy had the plunging horse by the bridle, and was hanging on for dear life. ...
— The Boy from the Ranch - Or Roy Bradner's City Experiences • Frank V. Webster
... at an unusually early hour, even before the scrub-women made their exit. In the corridors, in the parlors, everywhere blonde and dark percherons, cleaning away for dear life and courting housemaid's knee! ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer
... as cheerful as a cricket and heartily glad to see him. Billy Jordan had looked out as Jocelyn and her two escorts came by, and now was back at his typewriter, pounding the keys for dear life, the ticking and clicking of his machine keeping time to "Yankee Doodle," which he was whistling softly. He, too, shook hands, but his cheerfulness was of a grade noticeably inferior to Garton's. And immediately he went back to his machine and his ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory
... by his orderly, and while continuing his investigations found himself confronted with the enemy. A shower of bullets greeted him. His horse was shot and he was brought to the ground. It was neck or nothing now, and he ran for dear life pursued by a horde of mounted Boers. Fortunately he came to a wire fence, vaulted it, and was for a moment safe. The enemy's ponies could not follow. But the Boers sent shots after his retreating form, shots which luckily missed him, and he was enabled to reach two troops of the 9th Lancers ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... original Richard, step by step drove Richmond off the stage and through the wings, and it was not until the police seized the great tragedian, two blocks away, that the terrified duke, who had dropped his sword and was running for dear life, was sure he would ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... the first two lines of this strain Horatio was sitting up straight and fiddling for dear life. ...
— The Arkansaw Bear - A Tale of Fanciful Adventure • Albert Bigelow Paine
... by Hayle at midnight. Ever since they had made the ghastly discovery in the jungle, the latter had been more silent even than the gravity of the situation demanded. Now he sat, nursing his rifle, listening to the mysterious voices of the jungle, and thinking as if for dear life. Meanwhile his companions slept soundly on, secure in the fact that he was watching ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... her, a moment, then he sauntered off, with both hands in his pockets, up the road towards, the shoemaker's old house. There sat Jost before the door, hammering away at something as if for dear life. Blasi drew near, and stood watching the busy hands of his friend, who presently ...
— Veronica And Other Friends - Two Stories For Children • Johanna (Heusser) Spyri
... the days of close scrimmage play, when nine men on each side put their heads down with the ball between them, and shove for dear life. Picking out, heeling out, or kicking out is strictly forbidden and ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... "Fancy us in the balcony looking down on the giddy crowd; and the orchestra sawing off the sextet from Lucia for dear life!" ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... peculiar to the natives, a crocodile rose suddenly from the bottom, and caught him by the hand. The limb of a tree was fortunately within reach, and he had presence of mind to lay hold of it. Both tugged and pulled; the crocodile for his dinner, and the man for dear life. For a time it appeared doubtful whether a dinner or a life was to be sacrificed; but the man held on, and the monster let the hand go, leaving the deep marks of ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... It was fun to hear those teachers tugging at their doors for dear life, and I have it from an eyewitness, when Johnson cut Miss Craigis loose she keeled over in the most undignified manner!" laughed a pert young miss, who was one of the giddiest in the class. "And, oh!" she went on, breathlessly, "did you see ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... up from his score, and there, to be sure, was the leader, his baton going from left to right—there were the violins busy with their bows; the wind instruments were blowing for dear life; the harpists were tugging at their strings; the drumsticks were going with all their might—and not a sound! The musicians might just as well have been so ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... it seems almost like a complex maneuver and soon you find yourself riding for dear life—perhaps to escape, perhaps after the Germans. You then realize that you have been whipped and that the charge has failed, or you see the backs of the fleeing enemy, feel your horse straining in pursuit and know that you have ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... red, flat-bottomed boat out in midstream, with Billie standing, barelegged to his knees, straddling from the stem seat to the rear middle one, while he strove persuasively with a big pickerel. Kit was half kneeling in the other end of the boat, bailing for dear life, dressed in an old middy and wash skirt, with a boy's farm hat pulled low ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester
... thoroughly used to the work. They ceased paddling when they reached the edge of the breakers, until a wave larger than usual came up behind them. Then, with a yell, they struck their paddles into the water, and worked for dear life. Higher and higher rose the wave behind them, till it seemed that they must be submerged by it. For a moment the boat stood almost upright. Then, when it rose to the crest of the wave, the boatmen paddled ...
— Through Three Campaigns - A Story of Chitral, Tirah and Ashanti • G. A. Henty
... his penance for sins committed on earth is ended; or perhaps it is that against railways, and drainage, and modern scoffings, he and his like cannot stand. He is gone; but even yet, about the scene where once as a man the old minstrel fled for dear life, there hangs at the dead time of night a sense of mystery and awe. As the chilly wind comes wailing across the everlasting hills, blending its voice with the melancholy dirge of the river, one may almost believe that through the gloom there passes swiftly a bent, hurrying figure. ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... side of the castle to that by which the pirates approached. A horse was brought round under the window of the room, and, in her night-dress with nothing but a shawl wrapped around her, was Julia Gonzaga lowered out of her window on to the back of her horse. As she galloped for dear life down the avenue of her home she heard the shrieks of her miserable household murdered in cold blood by the furious pirates who had thus been balked ...
— Sea-Wolves of the Mediterranean • E. Hamilton Currey
... for the yacht careened over from the pressure on the three great sails, and it seemed to the lad that the next moment they would be lying flat upon the water, so he clung to the hatchway fittings for dear life. But the next moment the Silver Star rose from the wave in front, and literally rushed on, quivering from stem to stern like a live creature, the waves parting and hissing to form an ever-widening path of ...
— Jack at Sea - All Work and no Play made him a Dull Boy • George Manville Fenn
... Lindsay's horse was a racer. No other animal was going to pass it. The legs of the dark horse stretched for the road. It flew past the cowpony as though the latter had been trotting. The Reverend Melancthon stuck to the saddle for dear life. ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine
... killed me that night, but I wrenched myself away after he had given me the first blows; he pursued me, catching at my coat, which at the best of times was only rags; he tore part of the coat away, which was left in his hand, and I ran for dear life. The man was mad and didn't know what he was doing, maybe, but the only thing he could lay his hands upon was a broken brandy bottle; he hurled this at my head. It struck me as I reached the street ...
— The Tale of Lal - A Fantasy • Raymond Paton
... fringe now stretches far up the sky from the south, and there is a constant long-drawn-out groan of distant thunder. This storm is no loiterer; it is coming on at a rapid pace, and it will be a fierce one. Still, the haymakers keep in the meadow hard by the road, working for dear life to fill the waggon, to which a pair of oxen are harnessed, and to get it safely to the village on yonder hill before the floodgates of heaven are opened. I hasten on to this village, and reach it just before the rain begins to fall. It is ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... an eternity, they were ready to start once more. Peggy lost no time in taking to the air. With her every cylinder developing its full horse power, the aeroplane sky-rocketed upward at a rate that made Wandering William hold on for dear life. ...
— The Girl Aviators on Golden Wings • Margaret Burnham
... but said nothing. A second later the carriage was tearing down the road, and the little groom hanging on for dear life. ...
— Dolly Dialogues • Anthony Hope
... spared me, nor will I in my turn spare," she said. "You shall know what it means to plead for dear life and ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay
... toward him, the boy ran for dear life, trying to make the school door before Billy could overtake him. He did, but that was all. Billy had gotten a good whiff of the apples, and that settled it. He would have one of those apples, even if he had to chase the boy all over the school. He was hoping the boy would be so afraid ...
— Billy Whiskers' Adventures • Frances Trego Montgomery
... road," he said, quietly; "you can let the pony go. I will follow you." He swung in behind the pony, who was now running for dear life and snorting ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education
... situation? he continued, looking at me piercingly above Williams' cropped head. I had run away for dear life from Cuba (taking with me what was best in it, to be sure, he interjected, with a faint smile towards Seraphina). I had no money, no friends (except my friends in this cabin, he was good enough to say); warrants out against me in Jamaica; no means to get to England; no safety in the ship. ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... and behind us, but divil a man did they hit, though the air seemed thick with them. At last our exhilarating gallop was finished, and as our small party advanced to the attack, all they saw was the last few Boers scuttling off for dear life. Colonel Pilcher, who was with Mahon, sent round and thanked our ...
— A Yeoman's Letters - Third Edition • P. T. Ross
... think he would have known better. But instead of thinking, he dropped his bone and sprang at the Dog in the river, only to find himself swimming for dear life to reach the shore. At last he managed to scramble out, and as he stood sadly thinking about the good bone he had lost, he realized what a stupid Dog ...
— The AEsop for Children - With pictures by Milo Winter • AEsop
... with two pairs of gloves on, I caught the double line, and as I pulled and Dan reeled the fish came up nearer. But I could not see him. Then I reached the leader and held on as for dear life. ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey
... head, and into the mire, his head and three-cornered hat only remaining above the surface. Having served his master this shabby trick, old Battle took to his heels, and dashing down the enemy's lines, sent such a thrill of terror to the hearts of the superstitious Kaloramas as made them scamper for dear life. In truth they fancied him the pale horse of the devil, so often described to them by the priests. Dashing onward with increased speed and wildness, the bewildered animal ran with great force upon the ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... moments of cosmic consciousness are rare. They come with love, sometimes with pain, music may bring them too, but above all—landscape and the beauty of Nature! Men are too petty, conceited, egoistic to welcome them, clinging for dear life ...
— The Centaur • Algernon Blackwood
... Rowland, 'and I am sorry that we are obliged to lay aback here, when we should be trying to get the weather-gauge of her. But there is no help for it, for I observe that the earl and his companions have left the shore, and they are now pulling for dear life in order to reach ...
— Blackbeard - Or, The Pirate of Roanoke. • B. Barker
... themselves in a big room that looked like a forest of sewing machines, humming and clicking so fast that at first the twins were fairly bewildered. Girls who, it seemed, could hardly be older than Betty were bending over their machines, sewing away as if for dear life. Most of them did not even look up from their work as the visitors ...
— Sure Pop and the Safety Scouts • Roy Rutherford Bailey
... followed her out of the gate and said she would wait there for her return. Half a mile or so from the gate the horse, a high-spirited animal, took fright at something and bolted with its rider. The sister waiting and looking out saw them coming, the horse at a furious pace, the rider clinging for dear life to the pummel of the saddle. It flashed on her mind that unless the horse could be stopped before he came crashing through the gate her sister would be killed, and running out to a distance of thirty yards ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson
... distinguish the heads of the two swimmers was fruitless, for a thin haze, the smoke from the ship's funnel, spread far in her wake, completely obliterating the spot where Ross Trefusis and Vernon Haye were swimming for dear life. ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... have been that while I on the one hand exorcised the baleful association, I succeeded in rousing on nobody's part a sense of any other association whatever, or of my having cast myself into any conceivable or calculable form. My private inspiration had been in the Gyp plan (artfully dissimulated, for dear life, and applied with the very subtlest consistency, but none the less kept in secret view); yet I was to fail to make out in the event that the book succeeded in producing the impression of ANY plan on any person. No hint of that sort of success, or of any critical perception ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James
... in the darkness of the tree shadows behind the jail, was already out of sight. He caught a glimpse of Arizona sprinting ahead of him for dear life. They reached the cottonwoods together and were greeted by a low shout from the girl; she was running out from the shelter, dragging the ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand
... were really guilty or not of the offence for which they suffered, I of course have no means of knowing. Common sense tells one that a nation, fighting for dear life against foes abroad and traitors within, is obliged to deal out very rough and summary justice, and can hardly be expected to waste much time in deliberation. At any rate, when the Papal authority was restored, ...
— Rome in 1860 • Edward Dicey
... ghostly three evidently considering discretion the better part of valor, left the drive and took to their heels across the lawn. But Grace, who was well in the lead, caught the last fleeing ghost by its robe and held on for dear life. There was a sound of rending cloth as the apparition bounded forward, then it caught its spectre toe on a tuft of long grass and fell forward with ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... as the balloon was struggling furiously, but I shrieked to Phillip that Kenneth Moore had tried to carry me off, and implored him to save me from that man. But before I could make myself understood, Kenneth, who like myself had been holding on for dear life, threw himself suddenly upon Phillip, who, to ward off a shower of savage blows, let go ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 26, February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... farmhouse, instead of being in bed, were over there on the beach," the speaker waved his hand toward the shining white sand, distant, but in plain sight, "they might see countless billows working for dear life to dig a trench through the hard sand. The wind sends one tremendous wave after another to help them, and as a great roller breaks and recedes, all the little crested waves scrabble with might and main, pulling at the softened sand, until, after hours of this labor, the cut is made completely ...
— Jewel's Story Book • Clara Louise Burnham
... and chase his body round for hours within a few inches of the surface; and all at a speed of fifteen to eighteen miles an hour, with never an instant's pause between sight and stroke. The Indian in the stern took his cue from Dominique; now paddling for dear life, now flinging his body back as with a turn of the wrist he checked ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... replied, "I guess the woods folks are waking up. You can hear crickets a fiddling away for dear life, and other sorts of insects besides. Then there's a pair of screech owls calling to each other; a whip-poor-will whooping things up; and most of all the frogs have started in to get busy with their chorus. And say, I'm going to promise ...
— Phil Bradley's Mountain Boys - The Birch Bark Lodge • Silas K. Boone
... somewhere in the mirk ahead and suddenly and quite horribly the Vaterland lurched, and Bert and the sentinel were clinging to the rail for dear life. "Bang!" came a vast impact out of the zenith, followed by another huge roll, and all about him the tumbled clouds flashed red and lurid in response to flashes unseen, revealing immense gulfs. The rail went right overhead, ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... of his clumsy feet. Already Dorothy had almost gained the farther corner; as she whisked round it with a flutter of skirts, Kirkwood dodged hastily behind a gate-post. A thought later, Hobbs appeared, head down, chest out, eyes straining for sight of his quarry, pelting along for dear life. ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... t'other side of the creek, where; the path comes down under the loom of the trees, and, next moment, a voice as if some person was drowning and guggling for help. So I fit and unmoored again, and pushed across for dear life, just in time to see a man scrambling ashore. He was as drunk as a fly, sir, even after his wetting. Said he was a retired seaman living at Penzance, had come round to Falmouth on a lime-barge bound for the Truro river, and must get along to St. Austell in time to attend his sister's ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... and would soon have caught him only Jack had a start and dodged him a bit and knew where he was going. When he got to the beanstalk the ogre was not more than twenty yards away when suddenly he saw Jack disappear-like, and when he came to the end of the road he saw Jack underneath climbing down for dear life. Well, the ogre didn't like trusting himself to such a ladder, and he stood and waited, so Jack got another start. But just then the harp cried out: "Master! Master!" and the ogre swung himself down on to the beanstalk, which shook ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... our weapons. All this time the wolves, as is their way when attracted by firelight, were closing in, clamouring like a legion of fiends. If Nick had known that a single pistol-shot would have sent them scampering away for dear life, I presume he would have fired one; as it was, he had Indian on the brain, and just stood by his horse, quaking till his teeth rattled like dice in ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... receded—vanished, Leaving the wave-tossed three All valiantly contending With the belated sea. The swimmer battled fiercely, With ocean's maddening strife, As the frail women bravely Contended for dear life. ...
— Home Lyrics • Hannah. S. Battersby
... sorr, jist let him run away wid it as far as he likes, but the minit he turns to swallow it, an' says to himself, 'What an illigant breakfast this is, to be sure!' that minit slap the hook into his jaw, an' hould on to him for dear life." ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various
... than ours; every man fought for dear life, but we were no match for the assailants. They were double our number and armed to the teeth. At length we were overpowered and bound. The vessel was no longer in our possession, and the company to which she belonged would have to suffer ...
— Roger Trewinion • Joseph Hocking
... feet from the pond and Billy gave Nanny the signal call, and with one accord both goats put down their heads and commenced to pull and run for dear life. At first the boys thought it great fun going so fast and neither suspected what the goats were up to, until Billy gave a quick turn and into the water they went before either ...
— Billy Whiskers - The Autobiography of a Goat • Frances Trego Montgomery
... clerk). When this occurred, the latter, with an Indian war-whoop, leaped off the sledge, flourished and cracked his big "black snake" whip in air to encourage the animal to run faster, and I, sitting with the driver on the front seat, gripped for dear life the board upon which I sat. No Jehu, I feel sure, ever drove as did our driver tonight, assisted by the whooping footman with his black snake. Through drifts and over the pond, which was frozen, down steep banks to the beach, through snow deep and still deeper, helter-skelter ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... As though a changeling could be reformed! She has been asking you to reform me, hasn't she? I know her little ways, dear, good old Mumsy-pums. But she can't reform a changeling. Now the boat is ready, and Betty is toiling for dear life with our tea-tray. I darted into the kitchen, where she was having a Sunday doze. I sprang upon her back, and she gave such a shriek as though something awful had happened; and I said, 'Tea in a twinkling, or I'll dress up and frighten you when you are in bed to-night.' Oh, didn't ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... hear no more. He knew that to attack one of Samaniego's outfits there must be at least a hundred Indians in the neighborhood. Unhitching his horse, he jumped on its back and rode for dear life in the direction of Eureka Springs. Indians sighted him as he swept into the open and followed, firing as they rode. By luck, however, and the fact that his horse was fresher than those of his pursuers, Beck ...
— Arizona's Yesterday - Being the Narrative of John H. Cady, Pioneer • John H. Cady
... stocking was much more than grazed, and her dress was cut by the same stone which had attended to the knee and the stocking. Of course the others were not such sneaks as to abandon a comrade in misfortune, so they all sat on the grass-plot round the sun-dial, and Jane darned away for dear life. The Lamb was still in the hands of Martha having its clothes changed, so conversation ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit
... before him, shrugged his shoulders and sighed wearily. "It's useless," he answered finally. "I give it up. I haven't succeeded in getting within ten yards of a nigger woman to-day. If I went in at the front door, every occupant in a house would bolt out at the back one, and run for dear life. They will listen to no overtures of friendship. Our very faces fill them with abject terror. We had just as well throw up the insurance business and quit, as far as Wilmington is concerned. God's curse ...
— Hanover; Or The Persecution of the Lowly - A Story of the Wilmington Massacre. • David Bryant Fulton
... road they would come, on the dead gallop, drivers standing in their stirrups, waving their whips and shouting at the horses, while the limbers bounded crazily over the shell-torn road, the men holding on for dear life and the shells bursting with a continuous roar all about them. It was the sight of a lifetime, and whenever they came past our men would spring out of the trenches and cheer as though mad. Time after time they made the trip and ...
— The Emma Gees • Herbert Wes McBride
... deeply their view of life was coloured by years of incessant preoccupation with pecuniary difficulties. The hideous conception of existence which regards each individual as fighting for his own hand, striving for dear life against every other individual, was ingrained in their minds by the inveterate bitterness of their own experience; when Emily had become a woman, and was gone forth to wrest from the adverse world her own subsistence, her right to what she earned was indefeasible, and affection ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing
... at eleven and four; and there was croquet on the square of cement fenced about by poles and clothes-lines at all hours. Besides all this there were driving parties to the villages nearby; dancing parties at night with the band in the large room playing away for dear life, with all the guests except the very young and very old tucked away in twos in the dark corners of the piazzas out of reach of the lights and the inquisitive—in short, all the diversions known to such retreats, so necessary ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... the same time somewhat fearful squeals from the girls, as the wind whistled past their ears while the sled flew on at a speed that quickly reached a mile a minute. They held on to each other for dear life, but Nan had no eyes or thought for anything except that ...
— Nan Sherwood at Palm Beach - Or Strange Adventures Among The Orange Groves • Annie Roe Carr
... over the long rent, and kneeled down upon it to keep it in place. The man in the front of the canoe put down his paddle, and, taking up the kettle, baled as rapidly as he could, while the Indian in the stern, and myself in the middle, plied our paddles for dear life. We turned towards the Spider Islands, which were over a mile away, and by vigorous work succeeded in reaching one of them, although our canoe was half full of water. Then could we enter into David's ...
— By Canoe and Dog-Train • Egerton Ryerson Young
... once seen taking out a tooth for one of his patients, and nothing appeared more amusing. He got the poor fellow down on his back, and then getting astride of his chest, he applied the turnkeys and pulled away for dear life. Unfortunately, he had got hold of the wrong tooth, and the poor man screamed as loud as he could; but it was to no purpose, for Sam had him fast, and after a pretty severe tussle out came the sound grinder. The young doctor now saw his mistake, ...
— Clotelle - The Colored Heroine • William Wells Brown
... give him the round-up, and THIN, the fun begins. He leps clear of the water and I see he's tin pound. If he rins from me, I give him rope, and if he rins to, I dig in, workin' me little machane for dear life to take up the thrid before it slacks. Whin he sees me, he makes a dash back, and I just got to relase me line and let him go, because he'd bust this little silk thrid all to thunder if I tried to force him onpleasant to his intintions, ...
— At the Foot of the Rainbow • Gene Stratton-Porter
... agog with movement and bustle on the days when rations were being made up and packed. Starting from the earliest stage in the process, there would be two men in the outer Hut grinding plasmon biscuit into powder. One would turn away for dear life and the other smash the biscuit with a hammer on a metal slab and feed continuously into the grinder. The atmosphere would be full of the nauseous vapours of blubber arising from dishes on the stove where seal meat was drying for the dogs. Ninnis and Mertz superintended ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... side of the window, hanging with all my weight from the other, which clutched the sill. My groping fingers came in contact with a twisted rope of creepers; bare of leaves for winter, and serviceable for the use I wished to put it to. I grasped the thick stems for dear life, and went down hand over hand, dimly hearing voices from below cheering me in ...
— The House by the Lock • C. N. Williamson
... gained upon him, and was just about to seize him when the force of his flight carried the Tunny on to a sandbank. In the heat of the chase the Dolphin followed him, and there they both lay out of the water, gasping for dear life. When the Tunny saw that his enemy was doomed like himself, he said, "I don't mind having to die now: for I see that he who is the cause of my death is about to share ...
— Aesop's Fables • Aesop
... dear," said I to her, one morning after breakfast, as we took our work and retired from the dining-room to one of the parlors, where I was occasionally in the habit of sitting,—"we must sew for dear life until dinner time, so as to finish these two frocks for the children to wear this evening. It isn't right, I know, to impose on you in this way. But you sew so quick and neatly; and then it will help me through, and leave ...
— Trials and Confessions of a Housekeeper • T. S. Arthur
... hear, And the loud burst of breakers on the shore; High from the shallows leap the surges hoar, And surf and sand mix eddying. 'Behold Charybdis!' cries Anchises, ''tis the shore, The dreaded rocks that Helenus foretold. Row, comrades, for dear life, and let the oars ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... straight ahead, nine knots an hour, in the very wind's eye, and a great streak of smoke arter her as long as the tail of a comet. I believe they thought it was Old Nick alive, a-treatin' himself to a swim. You could see the niggers a-clippin' it away from the shore, for dear life, and the soldiers a-movin' about as if they thought that we were a-goin' to take the whole country. Presently a little half-starved orange-coloured lookin' Spanish officer, all dressed off in his livery, as fine as a fiddle, came off with two men in a boat to board us. Well, we yawed once or ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... itself to his eyes was anything hut a cheerful one, for every man in the large number assembled there was at work upon a coffin. Coffins in every stage of construction stood everywhere, and the carpenters were toiling away at them as if for dear life. Nothing but coffins was to be seen; and scarcely was one finished, in never so rude a fashion, but it was borne hurriedly away by some waiting messenger, and the master kept coming into the yard to see if his men could ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green
... swelled and waxed gross till it was big as a buffalo, and spoke to me words that entered my ears. Then he left me here and went away, Allah curse the bride and him who married me to her!" The Wazir walked up to him and lifted his head out of the cesspool hole; and he fared forth running for dear life and hardly crediting that the sun had risen; and repaired to the Sultan to whom he told all that had befallen him with the Ifrit. But the Wazir returned to the bride's private chamber, sore troubled in spirit about her, and said to her, "O my daughter, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... unhappy scarecrow had nothing for it but to puff away for dear life. As need was, therefore, it applied itself lustily to the pipe, and sent forth such abundant volleys of tobacco smoke that the small cottage kitchen became all vaporous. The one sunbeam struggled mistily through, and could ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... side and help the dogs haul it up with much labor on the other; and on the level, through the rough ice hummocks or amongst the rocks, the drivers were kept busy steering to prevent collisions with the obstructions, while the dogs rushed madly ahead, and we, on the komatik, clung on for dear life and watched our legs that they might not get crushed. Once or twice we turned over, but the drivers never lost their hold of the komatik or control of ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... and others finishing. They were hollow-cheeked and cadaverous. Trousers and undershirts were their only apparel. In the rear room, 9x14, were six other men, almost identical in appearance with those in the front. All were working as if for dear life. ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks
... afternoon we held service in the main street. The singing attracted a very large and noisy crowd but when our old friend began to pray it was as if a bomb-shell had exploded, men, women, and children running as for dear life to their homes. Another hymn brought them back, armed and unarmed. We had a long talk on peace, and they wished I would go with them to Moveave, and make peace. One division of these villages they have simply wiped out. I asked ...
— Adventures in New Guinea • James Chalmers
... three hundred thousand who had started the day before in obedience to the order of the Tsar; and these were split up into formless squads and ragged companies fighting desperately amidst heaps of corpses for dear life, without any ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... rough cartoon in one of the local journals which was greeted with huge merriment in the family circle, because it represented Tom as "Ye Press of Newcastle"—a mere boy in a short jacket perched on a stool, scribbling for dear life at the foot of a platform on which some local orator was denouncing the tyranny of the existing Government. He must then have been about seventeen, certainly not more, and he was even at that time somewhat of a youthful prodigy. Then ...
— Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 • Stuart J. Reid, ed.
... makin' shore on him. When he got to the pond he rid right in, the Injuns a'ter him, but his critter soon began to gin out. When he see that he jist gethered up his kit and jumped into the water, and swum for dear life. Two mile good that feller swum, and saved his kit and musket. The Injuns got his critter, but you never see nothin' so mad as they was to see him git off that a-way. The soldiers at the fort was a-watchin' all the time. They ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... running for dear life down the spoil bank. On the opposite side his companions were in full flight. Payne did not follow. He stood and watched them, outraged to the marrow. "And keep off, too!" he shouted grimly. "Tell your lawyer, tell your sheriff, ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... made a dash at Meyers with his bow and arrow in hand, so I charged after him and made a slash at him with my knife, but he saw me in time to slide off on the opposite side of his horse. I could not stop the blow so I struck his horse in the back and brought him to the ground, and the Indian ran for dear life. ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... was fighting with a sharp sword against the blunt one in his antagonist's hand, who probably had forgotten in the stable how to wield the sword as he had done of yore. But the German was the son of a chief, and had followed arms from his earliest youth. Here it was defense for dear life, however glorious it might be to die under the eyes of the man whom he had learned to honor as the conqueror and tyrant of many nations, among them his own. So the strong and practiced ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... and miles, with Harry clinging for dear life to his neck and mane. At last they approached a large town, and Lightfoot stopped of his own accord at ...
— The Big Nightcap Letters - Being the Fifth Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... Still he fought for dear life, and as long as he held his pistol no Redman dared come near to take him. But at length, chilled and wet, and half dead-with cold, unable to go further, he saw it was useless to resist longer. So he ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall |
