"Head over heels" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the Clown, "I tell myself funny stories to make me laugh, and then I have my hand-springs to make; that keeps me pretty busy," and he rolled along the shelf, head over heels. ...
— Kernel Cob And Little Miss Sweetclover • George Mitchel
... that time, incidentally, I might make up my mind, upon the evidence of my reduced standing, that school was, after all, to be preferred. And thus it was that I came to be a working boy helping build her proud father's factory at the time I fell head over heels in love with sweet Elizabeth. Certainly I had taken no easy road to the winning of my way and my bride; so reasoned the town, which presently took note of my infatuation. But, then, it laughed, there was time enough. I was fifteen and she was not thirteen. There was time enough, oh, yes! Only ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis
... quickly, the marionette saw a huge bird running toward him. The next moment a powerful push sent him head over heels upon one of the eggs! As he fell he heard a loud crash, and at almost the same instant found himself carried through the air. What ...
— Pinocchio in Africa • Cherubini
... them narrowly out of her sharp, kindly eyes. This love-affair—if it were a love-affair—had been going on for years now and she was still in the dark as to the outcome. There was no question that the boy was head over heels in love with the girl—she could see that from the way the color mounted to his cheeks when Ruth's voice rang out, and the joy in his eyes when they looked into hers. How Ruth felt toward her new guest was what she wanted to know. This was, perhaps, the only reason why ...
— Peter - A Novel of Which He is Not the Hero • F. Hopkinson Smith
... placing himself within a few feet of the point of junction between the two lines, and then he begged me to pay particular attention to his evolution. When all was ready, the commodore threw himself, as it were, invisibly into the air, again head over heels, so far as I could discover, and alighted on the antagonist line, toeing the mark with a most astonishing particularity. It was a clever gyration, beyond a doubt; and the performer looked towards ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... known ever since I wore knickerbockers, and playing propriety and all that to my prospective father-in-law; and now see Mort! the most precise, deliberate fellow you ever saw, never says or does anything that isn't exactly suited to the occasion, you know; and here he goes and tumbles head over heels in love with a pretty girl the first time he sees her, and when he doesn't know a blessed thing about her, and, by George! engages himself to her before he's known her a week! If that isn't a case of clear-gone lunacy, then I never ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... position for that of universal humanity, or, better, German nationality. His successors intoxicated themselves with deep draughts of the marvelous poetry created by the magic of Goethe and Schiller. They permitted themselves to be rushed along by the liberty doctrines of 1789, they plunged head over heels into the vortex of romanticism, and took an active part in the conspicuous movements of Europe, political, social, and literary, as witness Borne, Heine, and ...
— Jewish History • S. M. Dubnow
... a boy who distributed bills the alleged mesmerised. It was a most preposterous imposition, but more ludicrous than any poor sight I ever saw. The boy is clearly out of pantomime, and when he pretended to be in the mesmeric state, made the company back by going in among them head over heels, backwards, half-a-dozen times, in a most insupportable way. The pianist had struck; and the manner in which the lecturer implored "some lady" to play a "polker," and the manner in which no lady would; and in which the few ladies who were there sat with their ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens
... going to do, Tom-tit dashed at him, and gave him such a peck with his little sharp beak, that the falcon jumped off his perch and stared about him; and then, before he could find out what was the matter, the jackdaw flew up above him, and came down head over heels on his back; the owl shouted "Who-o-who-o" in his ear; the blackbird and thrush stuck their beaks in his stomach; the sparrows poked him in the back; and the martins and swallows darted round and round him, and ...
— Featherland - How the Birds lived at Greenlawn • George Manville Fenn
... killed" the farmer's only son and heir. They had had a row. In one of those sad lapses from the higher Christian standards into which Satan was always egging her, she had pushed him; and he had tumbled head over heels into the horse-pond. The reason, that instead of lying there and drowning he had got up and walked back to the house howling fit to wake the Seven Sleepers, was that God, watching over little children, had arranged for the incident ...
— All Roads Lead to Calvary • Jerome K. Jerome
... fellows have got to do is to hold your tongues, and keep on ringing away till your arms ache; trust me to manage the thing all right. Lawless, keep your eye on ancient Methuselah there, and if he offers to say a word just knock him head over heels by accident, ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... Daniels and I, who were behind, tried to stop it by holding to the rear uprights. All our efforts were vain. The machine rolled over and over. Daniels, who had retained his grip, was carried along with it, and was thrown about head over heels inside of the machine. Fortunately he was not seriously injured, though badly bruised in falling about against the motor, chain guides, etc. The ribs in the surfaces of the machine were broken, the motor injured and the chain guides badly bent, so that all ...
— The Early History of the Airplane • Orville Wright
... the crew, which had already flung itself upon the prey, was seen to spring head over heels into the air, and fall back dead; another lay writhing in agony upon the ground, and uttering strangely human shrieks; whilst the others, terrified by the noise, turned and fled ...
— A Trip to Venus • John Munro
... Sahwah's eyes. Dazzled, she turned her head away, at the same time jerking the steering wheel to the right. The bob swerved sharply to one side and crashed into a tree. The force of the impact threw Dick clear of the sled and he rolled head over heels down the hill, landing in the snow at the bottom badly shaken, but otherwise unhurt. Sahwah lay motionless in the snow beside the wreck of ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at School • Hildegard G. Frey
... old acquaintances, naturally giving me credit for such intelligence as belonged to my age, but which I did not possess. I did not answer them, but they were not baffled, and they at last prevailed upon me to share their innocent pleasures. I had to run, to carry and be carried, to turn head over heels, and I allowed myself to be initiated into those arts with a pretty good grace until we were summoned to dinner. I sat down to the table; but seeing before me a wooden spoon, I pushed it back, asking for my silver spoon and fork to which I was much attached, because they were a gift from my ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... head over heels in love with the pretty cousin from Devonshire. That is to say, he fell in love with his own dreams about her, and they were sweet enough for any lad to fall in love with. She sang and she played, she brimmed over with accomplishment, which was all rustic enough, no doubt, but angel-fine ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... successfully everything had gone off hitherto, and how much pleased we were with Edinburgh, which is an unique town in its way. We left Dalkeith on Monday, and lunched at Dupplin, Lord Kinnoul's, a pretty place with quite a new house, and which poor Lord Kinnoul displayed so well as to fall head over heels down a steep bank, and was proceeding down another, if Albert had not caught him; I did not see it, but Albert and I have nearly died with laughing at the relation of it. From Dalkeith we went through ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... a demon is hurled by an angel's spear, 5 Heels over head, to his proper sphere, Heels over head, and head over heels, Dizzily down the abyss he wheels,— So fell Darius. Upon his crown, In the midst of the barnyard, he came down, 10 In a wonderful whirl of tangled strings, Broken braces and broken springs, Broken tail and broken wings, Shooting stars and various things, Barnyard litter of straw ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... took the gold lantern down from the wall, and went as fast as she could to the well to draw some water. She put the lantern down by the side of the well, and was stooping down to get the water, when the boy ran to her, and, laying hold of her by the feet, threw her head over heels into the well. He seized hold of the golden lantern, ran away as fast as he could to his boat, and rowed across the ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends; Scandinavian • Various
... then off it flew to the locksmith's where it purloined nails and filings and started off again to alight in the midst of the carpenter's shavings, enormous heaps of shavings, which delighted it immensely and in which it rolled head over heels exposing their behinds. ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... Huldy, "they use such big words to cover up their real feelings. Of course, he wouldn't let on to us, but any one with half an eye could see that he's head over heels in love with your sister Alice, and he'd stand on his head ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin
... distinguished by the singular habit of tumbling over backwards during flight. One of the sub-races, the Indian Lotan or Ground tumbler, if slightly shaken and placed on the ground, will immediately begin tumbling head over heels until taken up and soothed. If not taken up, some of them will go on tumbling till they die. Some English tumblers are almost equally persistent. A writer, quoted by Mr. Darwin, says that these birds generally begin to tumble almost as soon as they can fly; "at three months ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... poor affair (Sherif Ali trusted mainly to the inaccessible position); and, anyway, the thing had been already knocked to pieces and only hung together by a miracle. He put his shoulder to it like a little fool and went in head over heels. Jove! If it hadn't been for Dain Waris, a pock-marked tattooed vagabond would have pinned him with his spear to a baulk of timber like one of Stein's beetles. The third man in, it seems, had been Tamb' Itam, Jim's own servant. This was a Malay from the north, a stranger who had wandered ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... he passed troop after troop; and among them, in fellowship, galloped foxes, badgers, hares, rabbits, weasels; even small field-mice were skurrying and entangling themselves in the long grasses, and toppling head over heels ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... for Cuffy. He turned and tumbled down the steep cliff, head over heels, with the eagle ...
— The Tale of Cuffy Bear • Arthur Scott Bailey
... All their rotten chests got burst open. Blamed money skipping all over the place, and they are tumbling after it head over heels—tearing and biting like anything. A ...
— Typhoon • Joseph Conrad
... and cakes, now at a display of pictures on a long line,—the sheets being fastened to the line by pins, like clothes upon a clothes line,—now at a company of singers, singing upon a stage under a canopy, and now again at a little boy, about seven or eight years old, who was tumbling head over heels on a little carpet which he had spread on the ground, and then carrying round his cap to the bystanders, in hopes that some of them would give him a sou. At length their attention was attracted by some large boys, who were engaged at a stand at a little distance in shooting at a mark with ...
— Rollo in Paris • Jacob Abbott
... still, bright November morning; but the bells of Bideford church are still ringing for the daily service two hours after the usual time; and instead of going soberly according to wont, cannot help breaking forth every five minutes into a jocund peal, and tumbling head over heels in ecstasies of joy. Bideford streets are a very flower-garden of all the colors, swarming with seamen and burghers, and burghers' wives and daughters, all in their holiday attire. Garlands are hung across the streets, and tapestries from every window. The ships in the pool are dressed ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... Barb Doubleday," she went on. "He's got too many irons in the fire—head over heels in debt. There's no money now-a-days in cattle, anyway. What are you going up to ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... that is always standing on its head; only "it does it so rapidly that no philosopher has ever found out which is its head." Or if the phrase be felt as more exact, it is an animal that is always turning head over heels and progressing by this principle. Some fish, I think, turn head over heels (supposing them, for the sake of argument, to have heels); I have a dog who nearly did it; and I did it once myself when I was very small. It was an accident, and, as delightful novelist, Mr. De Morgan, would ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton
... the comparison. "Very poetical and very malicious. But you are right enough. I felt the icy breath of this polar star several times myself. It's just as well I did, for it is all that saved me from falling head over heels in love with her. But I think we'd better be starting now, don't you?" He turned to the door to order the groom to bring ...
— The Northern Light • E. Werner
... silently they entered that copse. But nothing appeared until there was a rush in the thickest part and up leaped the buck. This was too much for Skookum. He shot forward like a wolf, fastened on one hind leg, and the buck went crashing head over heels. Before it could rise, another shot ended its troubles. And now a careful study shed the light desired. Rolf's first shot had hit the antler near the base, breaking it, except for the skin on one ...
— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton
... Entry (Mauser), 3/4 of an inch within the margin of hairy scalp above outer extremity of right eyebrow; gutter fracture; exit, 2 inches nearer middle line, at the same distance from the margin of the hairy scalp. The patient was knocked head over heels, his main feeling being a sense of dulness in the right great toe. He sat up and got a first field dressing applied, then lay down, but as he was still under fire, he retired 1,000 yards to the collecting station; here he dressed some ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins
... party, well muffled in furs and woollens, floundered forth into the midst of the snow. Well, what a day of frosty sport was this! They slid down hill into the valley, a hundred times, nobody knows how far; and, to make it all the merrier, upsetting their sledges, and tumbling head over heels, quite as often as they came safely to the bottom. And, once, Eustace Bright took Periwinkle, Sweet Fern, and Squash-blossom, on the sledge with him, by way of insuring a safe passage; and down they went, full speed. But, behold, half-way ...
— The Three Golden Apples - (From: "A Wonder-Book For Girls and Boys") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... my greatest help in life. I go at what I am about as if there were nothing else in the world for the time being. That's the secret of all hard-working men; but most of them can't carry it into their amusements. Luckily for me I can stop from all work, at short notice, and turn head over heels in the sight of all creation, and say, I won't be good or bad, or wise, or anything, ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... Pee-wee to drag poor Joe head over heels into scouting, and then forget all about him. It was exactly like Townsend Ripley to take the poor little hoodlum quietly in hand and be his friend and sponsor. He treated him always as an equal and as a comrade. What ...
— Pee-Wee Harris Adrift • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... there, mother. You're just twenty years too late in raking up that story. If it suits me and Belle to have that girl called 'Mary Gemmell,' Mary Gemmell she shall be, if it turns all Scotland head over heels ...
— The Making of Mary • Jean Forsyth
... the conductors, connected it with the machinery, and, directing it against him, sent through it a very slight apergic current. I was not quite prepared for the result. His Highness was instantly knocked head over heels to a considerable distance. Turning to interrupt the current before going to his assistance, I was startled to perceive that an accident of graver moment, in my estimation at least, than the discomfiture of this exalted official, had resulted ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... giant, and he gave the fairy a touch of his foot that sent the little fellow rolling down head over heels. ...
— The Golden Spears - And Other Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... were not a little crippled by the legs of the Norwegian, which he flung violently about at every possible tangent; and one arm, moving with the rapid oscillating motion of a steam-engine, brought the fist in sharp contact with the other Norwegian's chest, and threw him, head over heels, into the identical pool whence he had himself ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... their playground and call as a sheep calls for a lamb, and wait until she heard Kotick bleat. Then she would take the straightest of straight lines in his direction, striking out with her fore flippers and knocking the youngsters head over heels right and left. There were always a few hundred mothers hunting for their children through the playgrounds, and the babies were kept lively. But, as Matkah told Kotick, "So long as you don't lie in muddy ...
— The Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... if at all, as a something rather comical and domestic. But to see a grown man spanked for the crime of attempted murder is horrible. Farallone's fury got the better of him, and the blows resounded in the desert. I grappled his arm, and the recoil of it flung me head over heels. When Farallone had finished, the groom could not stand. He rolled in the sands, ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... everybody and everything, never minding where he went, shrieking with laughter all the time, but keeping his hands well out before his head, so that he ran no chance of knocking it against the wall. More than once Tom came head over heels down on the ground; but amid the shouts of laughter, in which he himself heartily joined, having stood on his head for a minute, he leaped up, and made a desperate dash at some of the players. At last he caught Buttar, who also ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... on the Coffee-colored Angel and slathered him, drove him hither and thither with terrific blows, knocked him head over heels, caught him by the throat and beat him against a wall, rolled him on the ground and rubbed him in the dust, tore his clothes, blacked his eyes and left him ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... then had a younger brother, named Pemberton Pomeroy. He was an officer in the Guards. He was very dissipated, and soon got head over heels in debt. Neville had done all that he could for his brother, and had paid off his debts three times, each time saving him from ruin. But it was no use. There was the very devil himself in Pemberton. He was by nature one ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... pack'd to the sagging mow. I am there, I help, I came stretch'd atop of the load, I felt its soft jolts, one leg reclined on the other, I jump from the cross-beams and seize the clover and timothy, And roll head over heels and tangle ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... terrific explosion, and then Astro was lifted off his feet and hurled through the mist, head over heels. He ...
— Treachery in Outer Space • Carey Rockwell and Louis Glanzman
... destruction by moving out of the direct line of his headlong rush, his shoulder caught me as he passed and sent me head over heels, stiff and bruised and ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... Moussa was knocked head over heels and sat upon by the overseer in charge of the garden-gang, while the Brahmin twitched convulsively on the ground. He was by no means dead, however, and the sole immediate results, to Moussa, were penal ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren
... ever seen a gorgeous kite, the giant butterfly of childhood, twinkling with gilding, and soaring to the sky? The children forget the string that holds it, some passer-by cuts it, the gaudy toy turns head over heels, as the boys say, and falls with terrific rapidity. Such was Esther as ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... Isobel and Gyp, from thinking that no woman in the world was good enough for Uncle Johnny, had now veered around to the happy conviction that heaven had patterned Barbara Lee especially for Uncle Johnny's pleasure. They beamed upon the engagement with such approval that even Uncle Johnny, head over heels in love as he was, grew a little embarrassed by their enthusiasm. Gyp also became reconciled to the school library as a setting for the proposal and declared that, thereafter, the library at Highacres would be enshrined ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... around the moonbeam and started to slide down. But he found it rather slippery, and in spite of all his efforts to hold on he found himself going faster and faster, so that just before he reached the earth he lost his hold and came tumbling down head over heels and fell plump into ...
— Mother Goose in Prose • L. Frank Baum
... me all right," admitted Mr. Period, as he got to his feet, and crawled in through the window to the shop again. "I went head over heels. I'm glad it was clean snow, and not a mud bank, Tom. What in the world ...
— Tom Swift and his Wizard Camera - or, Thrilling Adventures while taking Moving Pictures • Victor Appleton
... colored wrapper round our waists, and threw a towel over our shoulders, after which we walked down stairs, and put on some wooden clogs at the door of the next apartment. The first thing these did was to send me head over heels, to the great discomfiture of my temporary costume, and equal delight of the bathers there assembled. We remained in this room, which was of an increased temperature, idling upon other couches, until we were pronounced ready to go into the second chamber. I contrived, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... congratulating herself that Becky would be delightfully sleepy after the exercise, when the child made a sudden dive away from the chairs in her excitement, Peter behind her. The next minute she was rolling head over heels down the companion-ladder, down which it had evidently been her intention to go right ...
— Queensland Cousins • Eleanor Luisa Haverfield
... existed; every fibre in my body ached and continued to do so for days afterward; and the moment I would close my eyes to sleep I would see mountainous waves about me and would feel myself being whirled head over heels just as I was in that rapid; but this rapid, strange to say, while exceedingly rough and swift, did not contain any waves that we would have considered large up to this time. In other words, it depended ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb
... sudden, a bad boy, with a bean shooter, shot at the balloon, and "bang!" it burst, with a big hole in it. Down came Uncle Wiggily, head over heels, bursted balloon, ...
— Uncle Wiggily's Adventures • Howard R. Garis
... old words, the fisher speaks with harsh gutturals that make a burring sound in his throat. He calls a wild cherry a "guigne;" he calls a swede turnip a "baygee," a gooseberry a "grozer," mud "clarts," a horse-collar a "brime." If he had to say "I fell head over heels," he would remark, "Aw cowped me creels." The stranger is puzzled by this surprising tongue, but the fisher is proud of it. No words can express his scorn for a boy who learns to talk "Massingem" (which is the fisher's word for ...
— The Romance of the Coast • James Runciman
... seen. Bewildered at the state of affairs, I looked appealingly from one to the other for an explanation. I got it from Abner, who said, laconically, "When yew fired thet ole gun, I guess it mus' have bin loaded fer bear, fer ye jest tumbled clar head over heels backwards outen the boat. Et that very same moment I suspicion the bomb busted in his belly, fer he went clean rampageous loony. He rolled right over an' over to'rds us, n' befo' we c'd rightly see wat wuz comin', we cu'dnt see anythin' 'tall; we wuz all ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... they climbed the eastern point. The sheep, which were feeding on its top, scampered off at their approach, their retreat covered by the ram, with shaking head. Nemo rushed, barking, after the flock, only to be butted ignominiously head over heels and to ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman
... Juon!' cried Mariora despairingly. But her voice was unheard. Both of them were deaf and blind. The next moment Juon gave his adversary a fierce shake and instantly the pair of them plunged head over heels into ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... Everything went head over heels to the devil. I remember a fearful, frantic whirlwind which sent me flying round like a feather. It lasted a long while, and swept from the face of the earth my wife and my aunt herself and my strength. From the little ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... walk prudently and with measured step, I declined to allow him to go alone. We at last, to our great satisfaction, got over about two-thirds without any accident, when l'Encuerado, losing his equilibrium, fell, turning head over heels several times; the basket and its bearer chasing one another down the hill, ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... me. There's no danger," called the guide, shouldering his pack and leaping and sliding down the sharp incline. He was followed by the boys with shouts of glee. They went tumbling head over heels, laughing, whooping, letting off their excess steam. The Professor's grim face relaxed in ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Grand Canyon - The Mystery of Bright Angel Gulch • Frank Gee Patchin
... They were several times boldly interrogated and interesting discoveries arrived at. In 1540, Count Albert the Warrior laid in wait for the apparition, seized it with his powerful arm and flung it head over heels down into the castle court-yard. The next morning the chancellor, Christopher Hass, was found there with his neck broken, and upon his person a dagger and a letter proving him to have had treasonable designs. Notwithstanding the spirit has several times been thus compromised, ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... keep dry. 'Josh,' says he, 'what ye doin' thar? Why ain't ye to work?' ''Fraid o' gittin' wet!' says I. 'Pon that he didn't say a word, but jest come and took me by the collar, and led me to a little run close by, and jest casoused me in the water, head over heels, and then jest pulled me out agin. 'Now,' says he, 'ye can go to work, and you won't be the leastest mite afeard o' gittin' wet. Wal, 'twas about so. I didn't mind the rain, arter that. 'Wal, Deslow,' says I, 'that larnt ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... needn't answer," he made steady reply. "But you've nothing to be ashamed about. Stumpy's an awful ass, you know,—always has been. He's been head over heels in love with you ever since he met you. No, you needn't let that shock you. He's such a bashful knight he'll never tell you so. You'll have to do that part of it." He smiled with faint irony. "But you may take my word for it, it is so. He has thought of nothing ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... thought that in punning and broad-grinning lay his chief strength. Is not there something touching in that simplicity and humility of faith? "To make laugh is my calling," says he; "I must jump, I must grin, I must tumble, I must turn language head over heels, and leap through grammar;" and he goes to his work humbly and courageously, and what he has to do that does he with all his might, through sickness, through sorrow, through exile, poverty, fever, depression—there ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... wonderful sight their eyes had ever seen, there was a soft padding of feet and a hurry-scurry behind them, and from the outside darkness beyond the flame-stalks came a crowd of little brown creatures running, jumping, scrambling, tumbling head over heels and on all fours, and some even walking on their heads. They joined hands as they came near the fires and danced around ...
— The Book of Dragons • Edith Nesbit
... "Time" was called, Harberth swung a great round-arm blow at Dam which would have knocked him head over heels had not he let his knees go just in time and ducked under it, hitting his foe once again on the mark ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... stood and watched them as they walked slowly up the track. "My, my, she's a fine gal, an' no mistake," he mused. "I never saw Eben so taken up with anyone as he is with her. Why, his face brightens the instant she speaks to him. Seems to me he's head over heels in love with her. It's only nat'ral, I s'pose. If I was young meself I'd lose me head an' heart over a gal like that. It'd be great to have her fer a daughter-in-law. Wonder what Martha an' ...
— Jess of the Rebel Trail • H. A. Cody
... came, and the children got up, the Tin Soldier was placed in the window; and whether it was the Goblin or the draught that did it, all at once the window flew open, and the Soldier fell head over heels out of the third story. That was a terrible passage! He put his leg straight up, and stuck with helmet downward and his bayonet ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various
... she said, "do you think it's right to go head over heels in debt to celebrate the ...
— Christmas - A Story • Zona Gale
... with solid ball in his hand, could not resist temptation. Lifting his gun, he let drive at the last, a young cow. By some extraordinary chance the ball struck it full on the back of the neck, shattering the spinal column, and that giraffe went rolling head over heels just like a rabbit. I never saw a more ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... had one bad fault and that was that, every now and again, apparently for no reason whatever, except the same cussedness that held him when he wouldn't go up the hill, he would hit a bank or a wall full hard and turn head over heels into the next field. As the weather, as a rule, was moist, and there was plenty of mud about when Mick Molloy performed his athletic feat and I picked myself up from the soft ground, I generally succeeded in attaching ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... believe that Strickland Morley was ever in love with anyone but himself. Captain Barnabas was well-to-do and had the reputation of being much richer than he really was. And Ardelia WAS beautiful, there is no doubt of that. At all events, Ardelia fell in love, with him, violently, desperately, head over heels in love, the very moment the two were introduced. They danced practically every dance together that evening, met surreptitiously the next day and for five days thereafter, and on the sixth day Captain Barnabas received a letter from his daughter announcing that she and Morley were married and ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... awful mess! Married to Tessibel and engaged to marry Madelene! His mother sick and head over heels in debt to the Waldstrickers! The situation was becoming more complicated by the hour. He sat down by the open window to think. The simple thing, and what he really wanted to do, was to announce ...
— The Secret of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... now walking on thick, damp, cool moss, and that soft carpet under his feet made him feel absurdly inclined to turn head over heels as he used to do when a child, so he took a run, turned a somersault, got up and began over again. And between each time he began ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... raised her foot and kicked off his hat. The feat was greeted with applause, and she went on, making turns and twists, flourishing her skirts, kicking higher and higher, and finally, among a volley of shouts, fell on her hands and turned head over heels in a magnificent catharine-wheel; then scrambling to her feet again, she tumbled into the arms of a young man standing in the front of ...
— Liza of Lambeth • W. Somerset Maugham
... and sent the Brute head over heels on the turf, but he sprang up instantly, and there would certainly have been a battle-royal if Groot Willem, who opportunely appeared, had not seized Considine by the arm, while Hans Marais grasped the Brute by the neck, and rendered further action impossible. A moment sufficed to cool the youths, ...
— The Settler and the Savage • R.M. Ballantyne
... one of the worst bends of the river. We only saved him by dropping an anchor from the stern, and going backwards full speed. The Yangtze was bad enough, but we never used to go on at night, and there was no danger of collisions. This ship looks also as if she would go head over heels much more easily than the 'Furious.' I am waiting for Parkes and the General before I decide as to landing, &c. Is it not strange to be here? Immediately ahead of us is the yamun where Gros and I spent the eventful weeks in 1858, ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... fragments and tore one of the doors bodily from its rusty hinges. Shouts of terror rose from the panic-stricken bullies inside, taken completely by surprise with no idea of what had come upon them. The radio boys scattered them head over heels as they made for the table, and the shack was a pandemonium of shouts, cries, and the crash of overturned chairs. It was the work of only a few seconds for Bob to reach Jimmy's radio set, and having secured this, he whistled twice to signify ...
— The Radio Boys' First Wireless - Or Winning the Ferberton Prize • Allen Chapman
... and left with their fists and the flats of their pikes. Seppi the cowboy (an ancestor, by the way, of Buffalo Bill) went down before a tremendous blow by Friesshardt, and Leuthold knocked Klaus von der Flue head over heels. ...
— William Tell Told Again • P. G. Wodehouse
... to me as if I could see through the solid soil as though it were green glass and the smooth earth were as round as a ball; and within, a multitude of goblins were ranking sport with silver and gold; head over heels they were rolling about, pelting each other in jest with the precious metals, and provokingly blowing the gold-dust in each other's eyes. My hideous companion stood partly within and partly without; he ordered the ...
— Undine - I • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... first, in order to swing him in the right direction. The ground was deep with prairie grass, as dry as tinder, and scattered throughout were innumerable holes in the ground made by the ant-bears and wart-hogs. Any one of these holes was enough to throw a horse head over heels if he went into it. I had no gun, having left it with my gunbearer when I took the picture. So there was nothing to hinder me as we swept ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon
... are your eyes?" she asked. "Sir Lyon's head over heels in love with Helen Brabazon; and I've been wondering these last few days whether that quiet, demure girl is quite as unconscious of his state as ...
— From Out the Vasty Deep • Mrs. Belloc Lowndes
... to pick up the creature and throw it overboard, but as he grasped it he experienced a shock that knocked him head over heels. As he fell backward he collided with the professor and the two sprawled on the deck with the professor ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... was close in the rear, almost touching him so as not to lose him, certainly detected the void and the gust which followed the fall, as with sudden horror the flooring failed beneath them; but force of motion carried him on, he stepped forward in his turn, howled and likewise fell, head over heels. Both were smashed below, both killed at once. True, Morange still breathed for a few seconds. Alexandre, for his part, lay with his skull broken to pieces and his brains scattered on the very spot where Blaise had been ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... light of the flames the rooster was seen to pounce upon the shoulders of the huge bear as the latter came down to "all-fours" and dived at the old hunter. Andy sprang back, collided with a tree-trunk, and went head over heels. In an instant the bear would have been upon him and one stroke of his sabre-like claws would have ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... and he was blind. At last, one day the biggest lion was chasing a hare which was blind, for it ran straight over stock and stone, and the end was, it ran right up against a fir-stump and tumbled head over heels across the field right into a spring; but lo! when it came out of the spring it saw its way quite plain, and so ...
— East of the Sun and West of the Moon - Old Tales from the North • Peter Christen Asbjornsen
... few moments he rejoined us. "She is no better," he continued, as we again started away. "I may as well tell you, Professor Kennedy, just how matters stand here. Samarova is head over heels in love with Kazanovitch - you heard her call for him just now? Before they left Paris, Kazanovitch showed some partiality for Olga, but now Nevsky has captured him. She is indeed a fascinating woman, but as for me, if Olga would consent to become Madame ...
— The Poisoned Pen • Arthur B. Reeve
... This increased his consciousness of responsibility; and though he hadn't reasoned it out and made it clear to himself yet somehow he knew that this responsibility, this trust which he had taken on him without thinking about it, head over heels in fact, was the centre and turning-point of his school-life, that which was to make him or mar him, his appointed work and trial for the time being. And Tom was becoming a new boy, though with frequent tumbles in the dirt and perpetual hard battle with ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... imperceptible as the transition had been, we were, quite insensibly indeed, and unacknowledged, in a very different relation to each other than when we had started out from the Morning Star. In fact, to make no more words about it, I was head over heels in love with Nicolete, and I think, without conceit, I may say that Nicolete was rapidly growing rather fond of me. Apart from anything else, we were such excellent chums. We got along together as if indeed we had been two brothers, ...
— The Quest of the Golden Girl • Richard le Gallienne
... whose explanation of the question led to a complete revelation of the true facts in the case. Everybody knew, he said, that from the moment she had met him Mrs. Van Raffles had set her cap for Colonel Scrappe, and that meeting her for the first time he had fallen head over heels in love with her even in the presence of his fiancee. Of course I hotly denied Digby's insinuations, and we got so warm over the discussion that when I returned home that night I had two badly discolored ...
— Mrs. Raffles - Being the Adventures of an Amateur Crackswoman • John Kendrick Bangs
... brute was as savage as his elders, and would do nothing but walk to the end of the string by which he was attached to a tent peg, roll head over heels, and walk in a contrary direction, when a similar somersault would be performed; and he whined and wailed just like a child; one might have mistaken it for the puling of some villager's brat. Milford was going to give it pure cows' ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... (used affectionately or otherwise of a person). tapsalteerie, head over heels, topsy-turvy. tastin', small quantity. tatties, potatoes. tauld, told. tel't, told. teuch, tough. thae, those. thee, thigh. thocht, thought, worry, care. thole, endure. thowless, thewless, inactive, feeble. thrang, busy. tick, ...
— The Auld Doctor and other Poems and Songs in Scots • David Rorie
... got a lot in him," the Doctor said, "only he is always head over heels in work. He will make a big mark before he has done. He is one of the few men out here who has thoroughly mastered the language; he can talk to the natives like one of themselves, and understands them so thoroughly that ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty
... understand it all. Of course, by the time we got to Calais, I was head over heels in love, and so was she, for that matter. The old man was a jolly old John Bull of a man. I don't believe he had the slightest approach to any designs on me. He didn't know any thing about me, so how could he? He was jolly, and when we got to Calais he was convivial. I attached ...
— The American Baron • James De Mille
... after a good deal of persuasion, he was induced to open one and shut the other, and to peep through the glass. For a second or two he trembled violently, and then groaned heavily—threw down the glass, and commenced rolling down the hill, head over heels, at a most awful pace. The whole batch, some forty, were seized with the same complaint, and down they went after their chief, roaring out, "Hi! ha!" at the top of their voice. Break their necks they could not very easily; but how many of them escaped serious injury I did not stop ...
— Forest & Frontiers • G. A. Henty
... Peter's ears, and a tussle quickly followed, in the middle of which something dreadful happened. The large flat rock they were sitting on gave several queer shakes and heaves and then suddenly rose right up under the three children and threw them head over heels into the air. They were not a bit hurt, but they were very, very much surprised when they scrambled to their feet and saw the rock erect on a long kind of tail it had, glaring at them out of one ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... to tumble down the Boer back stairs head over heels, yelling out excuses as he descended. He publicly denied on the 29th that Great Britain had promised to protect the Reformers, and added that they were not being unfairly treated. I will never make statesmen of my sons. I'd ...
— A Woman's Part in a Revolution • Natalie Harris Hammond
... handkerchief; others that it ought to have been tied clean over his nose, for that when he looked down he could see her feet, wherever she moved; and Charley had often been heard to say that she had the prettiest foot and ankle he had ever seen. But there he goes, head over heels across a chair, tearing off Caroline's gown skirt in his fall, as he clutches it in the hope of saving himself. Now, that is what I call retributive justice; for she threw down the chair for him to stumble over, and, if he has grazed his knees, ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... ordered his boat's crew to make ready for a volley, and after firing to re-load quickly. 'And expect a score or two on ye to go head over heels,' murmured William Boozey; 'for I'm a-looking at ye.' With those words, the derisive though deadly William took ...
— Holiday Romance • Charles Dickens
... win her in the end. One fear alone lurked in his heart, that some young American might come along who would win her interest; and earlier in the summer he had a decided uneasiness lest Bryant prove to be the man. The scoundrelly engineer, however, had fallen head over heels in love with Ruth Gardner, so that Charlie's mind was relieved on that point. To his knowledge, Louise and Bryant had never met—which was as it ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... compare Dian's action with that of a splendid young woman I had known in New York—I mean splendid to look at and to talk to. She had been head over heels in love with a chum of mine—a clean, manly chap—but she had married a broken-down, disreputable old debauchee because he was a count in some dinky little European principality that was not even accorded a distinctive color by ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs |
