"Legs" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... glimpse of a world from which all light, comfort, and society were on the point of vanishing. And the next moment, when she had turned her face to him and the quick smile had enlightened it, the whole face of nature smiled upon him in her smile of welcome. Archie's slow pace was quickened; his legs hasted to her though his heart was hanging back. The girl, upon her side, drew herself together slowly and stood up, expectant; she was all languor, her face was gone white; her arms ached for him, her soul was on tip- toes. But he deceived ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... we do beseech thee check thy ferocity, quell now thy so great anger and swear not to give our flesh for fowls to tear, so shalt thou come down to earth and stand again upon thine own two legs. And thou, most reverend friar, invoke now thy bloody-minded comrade that he swear to harm ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... paper and a stick of charcoal, and everybody had to draw a pig blindfold. The usual fragmentary animals appeared, some so embryonic as to be unrecognizable by their designers, some with tails in their ears, others with too many legs. My own efforts were adjudged the best, which led Bill to express surprise that a man who couldn't draw anything at all with his eyes open should be able to draw a pig blindfold. Tired of this, Mac put on a pair of castanets and danced a Spanish fandango. ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... and it is connected independently of the upper stays by short side lacing and elastic straps to the side or hip parts of the corset. A hernial band extends from the lowermost part of the corset-extension between the legs to the rear, and is attached by adjustable hip straps to ...
— Scientific American, Volume XXXVI., No. 8, February 24, 1877 • Various
... become new friends Should so continue—'t is a point of honour; And I know nothing which could make amends For a return to Hatred: I would shun her Like garlic, howsoever she extends Her hundred arms and legs, and fain outrun her. Old flames, new wives, become our bitterest foes— Converted foes should ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... that followed was all they had expected it would be—and more. Their clothes were whipped about their legs as if about to disengage themselves and fly away from their owners forever. And several times they were forced to stop and turn their backs to catch their breath and gather ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... as he was forced to the ground and his legs firmly locked into the stocks, so that his feet were well nigh as high as his head. He uttered no complaint, and he spoke not a word of supplication, although the commissary lingered for a few moments ...
— For the Faith • Evelyn Everett-Green
... the lapse of time, until Catiline returned, dressed in a suit of splendid armor, of blue Iberian steel, embossed with studs and chasings of pure silver, with a rich scarlet sagum over it, fringed with deep lace. His knees were bare, but his legs were defended by greaves of the same fabric and material with his corslet; and a slave bore behind him his bright helmet, triply crested with crimson horsehair, his oblong shield charged with a silver thunderbolt, and his short broad-sword ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 2 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... a small, frightful figure with horns, and a face partly like a wild boar and partly like a bear, walking along on its hind-legs, which were those of a horse; and in its hand was a strange, hideous weapon, shaped like a hook or a sickle. It was the being who had been wont to trouble him in his dreams; and, alas! it was also the wretched little Master ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... this assertion with more warmth than he often showed. He didn't know any other sort of job that paid a totally untrained girl so well. There were initial requirements, of course. She had to have reasonably presentable arms and legs and a rudimentary sense of rhythm. But it took a really accomplished stenographer, for instance, to earn as much a week as was paid the average chorus-girl. The trouble was that the indispensable assets in the business were not character and intelligence and ambition, ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... alley and round the corner he sped, as fast as his trembling legs could carry him. Just as he was within sight of the goal of his ambition, that is, the chariot aforesaid, he fancied he heard the sound of hurrying feet behind him. To his fevered imagination the tread was like that of an avenging army on the track of the foe. He did not dare to look ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... tall on the second floor of the Wycliff house. The windows of the room looked down into a dirty little court almost surrounded by brick warehouses. The room was furnished with a bed, a chair that vas always threatening to come to pieces and a desk with weak carved legs. ...
— Marching Men • Sherwood Anderson
... must the smaller fry live in! They crowd to the shallows, lie hid among the weeds, and dare not say the river is their own. I relieve them of their apprehensions, and thus become popular with the small shoals. When we see a fish quivering upon dry land, he looks so helpless without arms or legs, and so demure in expression, adding hypocrisy to his other sins, that we naturally pity him; then kill and eat him, with Harvey sauce, perhaps. Our pity is misplaced,—the fish is not. There is an immense trout in Loch Awe in Scotland, which is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... gesture as if to beg her to say no more and at once crossed over to Mr. Travers' side of the Cage. He did not want to give himself time to think about his task. Mr. Travers was sitting up on the camp bedstead with a light cotton sheet over his legs. He stared at nothing, and on approaching him d'Alcacer disregarded the slight sinking of his own heart at this aspect which seemed to be that of extreme terror. "This is awful," he thought. The man kept as still as a hare ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... the ground, leaning forward and letting his long fingers droop between his legs, while each finger moved in succession, as if it were sharing some thought which filled ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... and gold up the sleeves and legs of our suits! You leave that to me, Bunny, and wait till you've tried two pairs of trousers sewn together at the foot! This is only a preliminary reconnoitre. ...
— Raffles - Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... past the pyramids and through the Indian sea, landing them, after forty days and nights of voyaging, upon the low, flat shores that hem Manila Bay, and shoving them out to the hostile front before their sea-legs could reach the swing and stride of the marching step; yet, to all appearance, as unconcernedly at home as though they had been campaigning in the Philippines since the date of their enlistment. This, to be sure, in the case of more ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King
... these troublesome voices, prince Bahman ascended with courage and resolution for some time, but the voices redoubled with so loud a din near him, both behind and before, that at last he was seized with dread, his legs trembled under him, he staggered, and finding that his strength failed him, he forgot the dervish's advice, turned about to run down the hill, and was that instant changed into a black stone; a metamorphosis which had happened to many before him, who had attempted the ascent. His horse likewise ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... in the same way; and the posture is almost as unnatural to the one animal as it is to the other. The largest and most man-like of the apes—the gorilla, chimpanzee, and orang-outang—also walk usually on all-fours; but in these the arms are so long and the legs so short that the body appears half erect when walking; and they have the habit of resting on the knuckles of the hands, not on the palms like the smaller monkeys, whose arms and legs are more nearly of an equal length, which ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... locks, an ellwand-looking cane with a gilt head in his hand, and a bundle in a handkerchief over his shoulder, exciting the cupidity of every Irish raparee who passes him, by his resemblance to a Jew pedlar who has sent forward his pack—Linton, tired of trailing his long legs, exalted in state upon an Irish garron, without stirrups, and a halter on its head, tempting ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... Richard was requested by the "Rump" to resign, and return to Hampton Court, with the promise of a pension and of payment of the debts incurred by his father. While packing for his departure, he sat down on a box containing all the complimentary addresses made to him, and said, "Between my legs lie the lives and fortunes of all the good folk in England!" He then returned to Hursley, where he found himself pursued by those debts of his father which the Long Parliament had engaged to pay, and which swallowed up more than his patrimony, though the manor of Merdon, having been settled ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge
... now the other but happily going clear. The guns under these circumstances could not be used very effectively, and the pump-boat suffered the more from the enemy's fire. Maitland was still piloting her, and when nearly opposite the batteries he was wounded in both legs by a shell. He dropped on his knees, unable to handle the wheel, and the boat ran into the bank on the enemy's side. Another shell struck the pilot-house, wounding him again in several places, and a third cut away ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan
... that hankchiff. 'Pears to me, if she only went on four legs 'sted of two, she would sell ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... of a Buoy, which was plac'd over an Anchor on one of the Ships there riding: I held fast, till the Tide rising stronger and stronger threw me off my Feet; which gave an Opportunity to the poor Fellow, our Lanthorn-bearer, to lay hold of one of my Legs, by which he held as fast as I by the Buoy. We had lain thus lovingly at Hull together, strugling with the increasing Tide, which, well for us, did not break my hold (for if it had, the Ships which lay breast a breast had certainly sucked us under) when ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... make any diff'rence—my tellin' you; you'd ought to have it in for him, too. I was layin' for that houn'-dog 'at walks on his hind legs ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... other public duties. But even then he either gave his assent by a single word, or signified his vote by walking to one side of the house, till the trial of Marcus Livius Macatus, a kinsman of his, whose character was at stake, obliged him to deliver his sentiments in the senate upon his legs. On being heard in the senate on this occasion, after so long an interval, he drew the eyes of all upon him, and gave occasion to conversations to the following effect: "That the people had injuriously disgraced ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... a Light Weight with a gilt sign exposed on Main Street and no Assets except a Suit with a Velvet Collar, a pair of indestructible dancing Legs, and just enough intellectual Acumen to stir ...
— Ade's Fables • George Ade
... of the zest and flavour of the joke. The range had been selected, and their talk of changes had begun with it, Mr Murchison pointing out the new idea in the boiler and Dr Drummond remembering his first kitchen stove that burned wood and stood on its four legs, with nothing behind but the stove pipe, and if you wanted a boiler you took off the front lids and put it on, and how remarkable even that had seemed to his eyes, fresh from the conservative kitchen notions of the old country. He had come, unhappily, a widower to ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... she wuz a talkin' earnest to it a tryin' to soothe it, and Josiah whispered to me, "I'll tell you, Samantha, why them fellers feel above me; it is because I haint dressed up in sech a dressy fashion. Let me once have on a suit like their'n, white legs and yellow trimmin's, and big shinin' buttons sot on in rows, and white gloves, and rosettes in my hat — why I could appear in jest as good company as ...
— Samantha at Saratoga • Marietta Holley
... young women in her situation; her mouth extended nearly from ear to ear; her neck and throat, which were always nearly bare, presented no feminine charms to view; and her short coarse petticoat showed her red legs nearly to the knee; for, except on Sundays, she knew not the use of shoes and stockings. But though Kate was ungainly and ugly, she was useful, and grateful—very fond of the whole family, and particularly ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope
... and sometimes the floor, were finished on the same day of the raising. A third day was commonly spent by a few carpenters in leveling off the floor, making a clapboard door and a table. This last was made of a split slab, and supported by four round legs set in auger-holes. Some three-legged stools were made in the same manner. Some pins stuck in the logs at the back of the house, supported some clapboards which served for shelves for the table furniture. A single fork, placed with its lower end in a hole in the ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... But though to these three and to Cathro, and to Mr. and Mrs. McLean and to others more mildly interested, it seemed a problem beyond solution, there was one in Thrums who rocked her arms at their denseness, a girl growing so long in the legs that twice within the last year she had found it necessary to let down her parramatty frock. As soon as she heard that Tommy had come home vanquished, she put on the quaint blue bonnet with the white strings, in which she fondly believed she looked ever so old (her period ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... seat, Grandfather happened to look at the great chair. The rays of fire-light were flickering upon it in such a manner that it really seemed as if its oaken frame were all alive. What! Did it not move its elbow? There, too! It certainly lifted one of its ponderous fore-legs, as if it had a notion of drawing itself a little nearer to the fire. Meanwhile, the lion's head nodded at Grandfather, with as polite and sociable a look as a lion's visage, carved in oak, could possibly be expected to assume. Well, this ...
— True Stories from History and Biography • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... I have seen in the countenance of a general of brigade, neither was the stranger's dress at all martial. It consisted of a uniform suit of iron-gray clothes, cut in rather an old-fashioned form. His legs were defended with strong leathern gambadoes, which, according to an antiquarian contrivance, opened at the sides, and were secured by steel clasps. His countenance was worn as much by toil and sorrow as by age, for it intimated that he had seen and endured much. His address was ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... fire was burning, and the fire was a huge heap of roses, and yet it was fire. The smell of the roses filled the air, and the heat of the flames of them glowed upon his face. He turned an inquiring look upon the lady, and saw that she was now seated in an ancient chair, the legs of which were crusted with gems, but the upper part like a nest of daisies and moss and ...
— The Princess and the Curdie • George MacDonald
... of my country readers about this kind of birch. They know it well enough. They have eaten birch bark, many a time; and, for ought I know, some of them have felt a tingling sensation in the region of the back and legs, brought about by the use of birch twigs in the hands of ...
— Mike Marble - His Crotchets and Oddities. • Uncle Frank
... to go to school, just as you do, though they do not study in just the same way. You would be surprised if you were to step into a Korean schoolroom. All the boys sit upon the floor with their legs curled up beneath them. Instead of the quiet, silent scholars, you would hear a loud and deafening buzz. All the pupils study out loud. They not only do their studying aloud, but they talk very loud, as if each one were trying to make more noise ...
— Our Little Korean Cousin • H. Lee M. Pike
... was timid, and started so much upon his touching the bridle, that, rising on her hind legs, she threw her rider over the crupper to the ground. A lacquey that came on foot, seeing the man in white fall, began to revile Don Quixote, whose choler being now raised, he couched his spear, and immediately attacking one of the mourners, laid him on the ground grievously wounded; ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... last letter you will receive from me, for we are on our last legs, owing to the delay of the expedition. However, God rules all, and, as He will rule to His glory and our welfare, His will be done. I fear, owing to circumstances, that my affairs pecuniarily are not over-bright....—Your ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... Boncour to bed, saved. I went to my house, a wreck. Since then I have not left this bed. With my legs paralyzed I lie here, expecting each hour to ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... instinct. It is what we should expect from our knowledge of their lives. Not so with man; he must learn to swim as he learns so many other things. The stimulus of the water does not at once set in motion his legs and arms in the right way, as it does the animal's legs; his powers of reason and reflection paralyze him—his brain carries him down. Not until he has learned to resign himself to the water as the animal does, and ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... back, but eight men sat around it. I can count the faint traces made by the chairs in the polish of the floor. They were heavy men—most of the men of Albany are heavy, and now and then they moved restlessly, as they talked. That was why they ground the chair legs against the polish, leaving there little traces which will be gone in another hour, but which are enough while they last ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... in my room, some years ago, a male black snake (Bascanion constrictor). Whenever this creature became hungry, he would follow me about the room like a dog or a cat. He would wind his way up my legs and body, until his head was on a level with my own; he would then bow repeatedly, darting out his tongue with ...
— The Dawn of Reason - or, Mental Traits in the Lower Animals • James Weir
... replied to it and hurried out from the shade where they were hidden, to find the doctor half-way down to the raft with his gun over his shoulder and a brace of huge crowned pigeons hanging from the barrel by their tied-together legs. ...
— King o' the Beach - A Tropic Tale • George Manville Fenn
... driven each by a man who sat in the shade of a branching, white umbrella, and suffered with a moody truculence of aspect, and as if he harbored the bitterness of death in his heart for the crowding passengers within, when one of them pulled the strap about his legs, and summoned ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... known the touch of paint, and had grown in the course of years to be of a light brown colour. The room was very bare of furniture, too. A dressing-table, pier-table, or what-not, stood between the windows, but it was only a half-circular top of pine board set upon three very long, bare-looking legs—altogether of a most awkward and unhappy appearance, Ellen thought, and quite too high for her to use with any comfort. No glass hung over it, nor anywhere else. On the north side of the room was a fireplace; ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... thou present thyself before him pinioned and fettered to the end that thou be seen in such plight of the envoys sent by Pharaoh concerning whom and whose master our Monarch standeth in fear." "To hear is to obey!" replied Haykar, and forthwith let pinion his arms and fetter his legs; then, taking with him Nadan, his nephew, he repaired to the presence, where he found the King perusing the other forged letter also sealed with the ministerial signet. When he entered the throne-room ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... trees flat,—great tulips cut off as sharp as pipe-stems, oaks twisted like dandelion-stems, and hickories curled right up in a heap. Presently Lu give a bark, and then such a howl! and there was Simon, dead enough; a big oak had blowed down, with the trunk right acrost his legs above the knees, and smashed them almost off. 'Twas plain it hadn't killed him to once, for the ground all about his head was tore up as though he'd fought with it, and Russell said his teeth and hands was full of grass and grit where he'd bit and tore, a-dyin' ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... men! Always taking fire at the wrong moment! The shot rang out and the bullet broke one of the horse's hind legs. It gave a few fiery leaps forward, stumbled, and fell to its knees. Kazbich sprang off, and then we perceived that it was a woman he was holding in his arms—a woman wrapped in a veil. It was Bela—poor Bela! He shouted something to us in his own language and raised his dagger over ...
— A Hero of Our Time • M. Y. Lermontov
... he sketched the dogs; all the servants from the blear-eyed boot-boy to the rosy-cheeked lass, Mrs. Kean's niece, whom that virtuous housekeeper was always calling to come downstairs. He drew his father in all postures—asleep, on foot, on horseback; and jolly little Mr. Binnie, with his plump legs on a chair, or jumping briskly on the back of the cob which he rode. He should have drawn the pictures for this book, but that he no longer condescends to make sketches. Young Ridley was his daily friend now; and ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... up their individual identity, and neither from myself, nor from them, nor from others does it ever occur to me that half that identity should or could be concealed. I could as soon imagine them without their arms or their legs as without their peculiar moral characteristics, and could no more think of them without their ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... to him if they desire to interrogate him now," replied Luke Hatton; adding, after he had examined the injuries received by the young knight, "He is badly hurt, but not so severely as I expected. I will undertake to set him upon his legs in three days. I did as much for Sir Giles Mompesson, and he was wounded in ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 2 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... he did not see Dolius, nor any of his sons nor of the other bondsmen, for they were all gathering thorns to make a fence for the vineyard, at the place where the old man had told them; he therefore found his father alone, hoeing a vine. He had on a dirty old shirt, patched and very shabby; his legs were bound round with thongs of oxhide to save him from the brambles, and he also wore sleeves of leather; he had a goat skin cap on his head, and was looking very woe-begone. When Ulysses saw him so worn, so old and full of sorrow, he stood still under a tall pear ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... the artist never failed to bring out his idea in the most striking manner,—as, for instance, Satan, under the guise of a lion, devouring a sinner bodily; and again in the figure of a dragon, with a man halfway down his gullet, the legs hanging out. The carver may not have seen anything grotesque in this, nor intended it at all by way of joke; but certainly there would appear to be a grim mirthfulness in some of the designs. One ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... with dust, and one hole of a window let in some light, enough to reveal the nakedness of the place. In one corner, upon the dirty floor, was an old bed; a piece of a mirror was fastened against the wall, which looked quite innocent of the whitewash brush; and a stool, which had lost one of its legs, was lying in a very dejected attitude near the door. "Here you are to lodge," said Smith, with a sardonic grin, as he noticed the child's dismay at the announcement. "You can stay up here till I want you, and when ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins
... laughter and admiration by his marvelous gift as a story-teller," was Captain Stephen Burchmore, the public storekeeper. The stories of themselves were generally extravagant and grotesque. It was "the marvelous gift" of narration that carried people off their legs. I have known the company present to roar with laughter, and not one more convulsed than Mr. Hawthorne. ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... unless you lay its works open. His hard-sun-baked protections run up the tree stems or wherever he goes and conceals and protects his soft, white, fleshy body, and if you prise this casing open you may see him getting away as fast as his little legs will take him; really he is a termite you know, like a "wood louse or worm," and not an ant. A wonder of the world is how he gets the liquid secretion to fasten the grains of sand together to make his earthen tunnels. If he goes to the top of a house to remove furniture or the like, ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... sensitive this worthy man was to kind attentions, and how pleased by politeness, began by offering him a seat, and asking after his health. Clergeot went into details. His teeth were still good; but his sight was beginning to fail. His legs were no longer so steady, and his hearing was not all that could be desired. The chapter of complaints ended—"You know," said he, "why I have called. Your bills fall due to-day; and I am devilishly in need of money. I have one of ten, one of seven, and a third ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... of it, we have said that Jack Easy in six months was in shorts. He soon afterwards began to crawl and show his legs; indeed, so indecorously, that it was evident that he had imbibed no modesty with Sarah's milk, neither did he appear to have gained veneration or benevolence, for he snatched at everything, squeezed the ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... his eyebrows, and looked thoughtful. "The doctor is over-anxious, my dear," said he: "he exaggerates your weakness. Our little angel there is already three weeks old, and will be standing on his legs before long." ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... option to shoot any of them! Mine they were without money or without price; yet, knowing this, twice I dropped my rifle, loth to wound the royal beasts, but—crack! and a royal one was on his back battling the air with his legs. Ah, it was such a pity! but, hasten, draw the keen sharp-edged knife across the beautiful stripes which fold around the throat; and—what an ugly gash! it is done, and 1 have a superb animal at my feet. Hurrah! I shall taste of Ukonongo ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... when his father apprenticed him to a firm of cabinet- makers. For the first year, he worked away contentedly at legs and mouldings; but as soon as he had learnt the rudiments of the trade he persuaded his masters to change his indentures, and let him take the more suitable employment of carving woodwork for ornamental furniture. He must have been a good ...
— Biographies of Working Men • Grant Allen
... home early, though the weather was warm, for he was beginning to be a little rheumatic, and he established himself in the sunny room which he used as his study. He had not been seated ten minutes in his high-backed chair, with a red cotton quilt spread over his knees and tucked in round his legs, dictating letters to his secretary, when word was brought him that a Venetian gentleman desired to be received, in order to present a letter of introduction ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... Fred Morris's country cousins, and the old man-servant—half groom, half gardener—who was driving the pony chaise with Harry Inglis by his side, while Fred's other cousin Philip was cantering along upon his donkey close behind— such a donkey! with thin legs, and a thin tail that he kept closely tucked in between the hind pair, as if he was afraid the crupper would pull it off. He wanted no beating, although he could be obstinate enough when he liked, and refuse to pass the ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn
... to us, fearing that if I changed my position the horse might fall over. Faye came running, and finding a tuft of grass and solid ground to stand upon, pulled Pete by the bridle and encouraged him until the poor beast finally struggled out, his legs and stomach covered with the black slime up to the flaps of my saddle, so one can see what danger we were in. There was no way of relieving the horse of my weight, as it was impossible for me to jump and not get stuck in the mud ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... expression when telling of it afterward, was "all taken aback." She and Mrs. Miller had between them planned that Mr. McLean should walk over with the latter, early in the afternoon, just as though out for a little airing and to try his legs after their unaccustomed rest. Nellie and Miss Bruce were to happen out on the piazza at the moment (and the details of this portion of the plan were left to the ingenuity of "Bonnie Jean" herself, who well knew that it must be accomplished without a germ of suspicion on the part of her shy ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... I've shot a million of 'em!" cried the boy, exultingly; and in another instant he plunged into the water up to his middle, gathering the ducks by the legs and bringing them to the bank, where Charlie and Oscar, discreetly keeping out of the oozy creek, received them, counting the birds as they ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... off all my fingers. I am I. The spirit is entire. Cut off both hands. Cut off both arms at the shoulder-sockets. Cut off both legs at the hip-sockets. And I, the unconquerable and indestructible I, survive. Am I any the less for these mutilations, for these subtractions of the flesh? Certainly not. Clip my hair. Shave from me with sharp razors my lips, my nose, ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... exclaimed his master, seizing him by the collar, and pushing him out into the yard. Then catching him by one arm, he set him in the centre of the snow-bank, his naked feet and legs going down into it ...
— Lizzy Glenn - or, The Trials of a Seamstress • T. S. Arthur
... in the shape of a toy-shop (from a London bazaar to a village window, with Dutch dolls, leather balls, and wooden battledores) quite unnerves me, so to speak. When I see one of those boxes containing a jar, a churn, a kettle, a pan, a coffee-pot, a cauldron on three legs, and sundry dishes, all of the smoothest wood, and with the immemorial red flower on one side of each vessel, I fairly long for an excuse for playing with them, and for trying (positively for the last time) if the lids do come off, and whether the kettle ...
— The Brownies and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... came through the side of the boat, low down. It struck me in the back—the spine. I cannot move my legs. But I have stopped the water from coming in. I have my finger in the hole the bullet made below the water-line. I can hold on till we have ...
— The Vultures • Henry Seton Merriman
... words which came from her served to create an atmosphere of merriment at dinner. A little later at the music hall she insisted upon talking to Adams in exaggerated whispers, until the pointless jokes she made about the arms or the legs of the dancers, sent her into convulsions of noiseless hysterical laughter. Through it all Adams sat patiently wondering whether he suffered more from the boredom of the ballet or from the neuralgia ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow
... woolly-headed, like Negroes, but have not the flat nose and thick lips; and we thought them much the same people as the inhabitants of Egmont's Island: Like them, they were all stark naked, except a few ornaments made of shells upon their arms and legs. They had, however, adopted a practice without which none of our belles and beaux are supposed to be completely drest, for the hair, or rather the wool, upon their heads, was very abundantly powdered with white powder; the fashion of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... beautifully blue,"[266] As some one somewhere sings about the sky, And I, ye learned ladies, say of you; They say your stockings are so—(Heaven knows why, I have examined few pair of that hue); Blue as the garters which serenely lie Round the Patrician left-legs, which adorn The festal midnight, and ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... before him, Mr Birdsey had played football. Once a footballer, always a potential footballer, even to the grave. Time had removed the flying tackle as a factor in Mr Birdsey's life. Wrath brought it back. He dived at young Mr Waterall's neatly trousered legs as he had dived at other legs, less neatly trousered, thirty years ago. They crashed to the floor together; and with the ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... clutched her arm, and with much excitement asked about the Highland costume which he had seen for the first time. Having thus got the word "Ecossais" into his head, and afterwards seeing Beust with his legs in pink silk stockings, he again clutched her, and exclaimed: "Trop nu—plus ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... little in their Heads, are the impatients Creatures living, 'till they have enough to make 'em quite drunk; and the most miserable Spectacles when they are so, some falling into the Fires, burn their Legs or Arms, contracting the Sinews, and become Cripples all their Life-time; others from Precipices break their Bones and Joints, with abundance of Instances, yet none are so great to deter them from that accurs'd Practice of Drunkenness, though sensible how many of them (are by it) ...
— A New Voyage to Carolina • John Lawson
... jangling wire, and the green door in the crumbling wall opened, and I saw an undersized woman—I saw Alphonsine! And her portrait, a life-sized caricature drawn by Octave, faced me from the white-washed wall of the hen-coop. He had drawn her two cats purring about her legs, and had written under it, "Ils viennent apres le mou." Her garden was a gravelled space; I think there was one tree in it. A tent had been stretched from wall to wall; and a seedy-looking waiter laid the tables (there were two), placing ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... nursed and fed and tended that pig. In time the legs grew strong. Mephibosheth was as brisk as any pig need be. Romeo Augustus rejoiced over him, and loved him more and more. So the days went on, until a certain ...
— Harper's Young People, March 23, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... wounded men were left in care of an officer and four men of the rebel prisoners, with a scanty supply of food, which was the best we could do for them. In person I visited this house while the surgeons were at work, with arms and legs lying around loose, in the yard and on the porch; and in a room on a bed lay a pale, handsome young fellow, whose left arm had just been cut off near the shoulder. Some one used my name, when he asked, in a feeble voice, if I were General Sherman. ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... sorry, my dear fellow? Now you get upon your treadmill of business, and you must keep going, or break your legs. Think, too, of the jolly little rascals you have left! The beggars are the only aristocracy we have,—the only people who enjoy their dolce far niente. Look on the Common: who are there amusing themselves on a fine day, unless it be your Duke Do-nothing, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various
... on the couch and he protested with legs and arms and voice against being again laid upon his back. Drusilla took him up ...
— Drusilla with a Million • Elizabeth Cooper
... they were the principal propagators of these opinions, and the great expounders of their own prophecies; so that of course there could be no further doubt upon the subject. Several of them had seen him, a red-haired man with broad shoulders, stout legs, exactly such as a miller ought to have, and two thumbs on his right hand; all precisely as the prophecy had stated. Then there was Beal-derg, and several others of the fierce old Milesian chiefs, who along with their armies lay in an enchanted sleep, all ready to awake and take ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... also animals which are called elks. The shape of these, and the varied color of their skins, is much like roes, but in size they surpass them a little and are destitute of horns, and have legs without joints and ligatures; nor do they lie down for the purpose of rest, nor if they have been thrown down by any accident, can they raise or lift themselves up. Trees serve as beds to them; they ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... called Sarah forward and made her show her back, which bore no traces of recent whipping. He then turned upon me and told me that the blows intended for Sarah should be laid on my back. That night the overseer, with the help of three of the hands, tied me up to a large tree—my arms and legs being clasped round it, and my body drawn up hard against it by two men pulling at my arms and one pushing against my back. The agony occasioned by this alone was almost intolerable. I felt a sense of painful suffocation, and could ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... to persons who are in their graves, and must exclusively apply to those who are living at the beginning of the Messianic reign. Furthermore, when the dead are raised up, they will not come forth from the graves minus arms, or legs, or other parts of the body; but 'God will give to each a body as it pleaseth him' (1 Corinthians 15:38)—a reasonably sound body. And as a man renders himself in obedience to righteousness, his body will develop toward perfection. ...
— The Harp of God • J. F. Rutherford
... large, powerfully-built fellow, had been wounded in both legs by the explosion of a shell, but yet not so ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... another; sixteen lay dead before the cannonade ceased. Through the midst of the storm of screaming and exploding shells an ambulance driven at full speed by its frenzied conductor presented the marvelous spectacle of a horse going rapidly on three legs, a hind one had been shot off at the hock. A shell tore up the little step at the headquarters cottage and ripped bags of oats as with a knife. Another shell soon carried off one of its two pillars. Soon a spherical case burst opposite ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... evidence now preponderates that Ewell and Jackson are still about Winchester. Assuming this, it is for you a question of legs. Put in all the speed you can. I have told Fremont as much, and directed him to drive at them as fast as possible. By the way, I suppose you know Fremont has got up to Moorefield, instead of going ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... home he was all out of breath, and his legs trembled so he could scarcely stand. Nan had just arrived and the family were preparing to sit ...
— The Bobbsey Twins - Or, Merry Days Indoors and Out • Laura Lee Hope
... force in 1900 than in 1850, although the amount of force controlled by society had enormously increased. The secret of education still hid itself somewhere behind ignorance, and one fumbled over it as feebly as ever. In such labyrinths, the staff is a force almost more necessary than the legs; the pen becomes a sort of blind-man's dog, to keep him from falling into the gutters. The pen works for itself, and acts like a hand, modelling the plastic material over and over again to the form that suits it best. The form is never arbitrary, ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... a trick on their professor. They took the head of one beetle, the body of another of a totally different species, the wings of a third, the legs of a fourth. These members they carefully pasted together. Then they asked the professor what kind of bug the creature was. He answered promptly, "A humbug." Just such a monstrosity is trouble—especially future trouble. Some things about it are real, but the whole combined ...
— It Can Be Done - Poems of Inspiration • Joseph Morris
... the most efficient of the troops, and partly English, having been brought from Ireland by the deputy. They were clad in shirts of chain mail, with wide sleeves, over which was a small vest of red cloth, laced in front. They had tight hose on their legs, and braces on their left arms. Behind them, and on each side, were part of the infantry, consisting of billmen and halberdiers; but the most formidable-looking soldiers were the Flemish gunners, or harquebusiers, so named from the barbarous Latin word arcusbusus, ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... a heap of trouble, mister man. Throw your rope around the snubbin' post. Then get on your hind legs an' do some explainin'. What you chasin' this ...
— 'Drag' Harlan • Charles Alden Seltzer
... till at length they once more reached the drawbridge. Then, as the sun was sinking, they returned again towards their sepulchre, and luridly his light shone in the sockets of their empty eyes, throwing gigantic shadows of their bones, that stretched away, and crept and crept like huge spiders' legs as their armies wound across the plain. Then they came to the cave, and once more one by one flung themselves in unending files through the hole into the pit of bones, and I awoke, shuddering, to see She, who had evidently been standing between my couch ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... Nidderdale as the kail-pot. "This was formerly in common use," says Mr. Lucas; "a round iron pan, about ten inches deep and eighteen inches across, with a tight-fitting, convex lid. It was provided with three legs. The kail-pot, as it was called, was used for cooking pies, and was buried bodily in burning peat. As the lower peats became red-hot, they drew them from underneath, and placed them on the top. The kail-pot may still be seen on a few ...
— Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine • William Carew Hazlitt
... admiringly as she flew across the grass, her long, thin, black legs flinging out ...
— Marjorie's Maytime • Carolyn Wells
... Hogan turned his arm-chair sideways towards the fire. Then, filling himself a pipe—for in his foreign campaigning he had acquired the habit of tobacco-smoking—he stretched his sinewy legs across a second chair, and composed himself for meditation. An hour went by; the host looked in to see if the captain required anything. Another hour sped ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... everything; I have even been a soldier. But I have never taken up arms except when obliged to do so, and I have known as little of war as possible. No weapon or missile could kill me, but I have a great regard for my arms and legs. I have been a ruler of men, but I have trembled in my high estate, for I feared the populace. They could do everything except take my life. Therefore I made it a point to abdicate when the skies were clear. In such cases I set out on journeys ...
— The Vizier of the Two-Horned Alexander • Frank R. Stockton
... two on 'em treed. See the dogs tear away at the foot of yon maple! Let's slash down the trees, and give the dogs a little more fun. Old Spank's ready to jump out of his skin, he's so fairse. And see Nig on his hind legs, and Watch jump up and nip the bark from the tree. Down with them, and give the dogs ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... opened with a quake. The sun was darkened, and a hot blast fanned the upturned faces. In the sky, through the film of shattered clay, little black dots scurried, poised, and fell again as arms and legs and head less trunks and shapeless bits of wood and iron. Scarcely had the dust settled when the sun caught the light of fifty thousand bayonets, and a hundred shells were shrieking across the crater's edge. Earth to earth, alas, and dust ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... yard. Johnson led the pony to the entrance of a green lane which ran at the back of Silverbel. Here the little girl mounted. She jumped lightly into her seat. She was like a feather on the back of the forest pony. Johnson arranged her skirts according to her satisfaction, and, with her long legs dangling, her head erect, and the reins in her hands, she started forward. The basket was securely fastened; and the pony, well pleased at having a little exercise, for he had been in his stable for nearly two days, started off at a ...
— Daddy's Girl • L. T. Meade
... your father a message this minute. I'm delighted at the privilege of being the first to advise him of your safety and to relieve his mental anguish." Mr. Weeks rocked toward the desk, adjusted a chair behind him, spread his legs apart, and sat down sidewise so that he could reach the inkwell. He overhung his chair so generously that from the front he appeared to be perched precariously upon its edge or to be holding some one in his lap. "Where are those cable blanks!" he cried, ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... complaint had rendered an operation necessary in September; but though the result of the operation, aided by the effects of medicine, removed the constitutional complaint, its partial influence on the frame was followed by a mortification in the legs, which, assuming sometimes a more favourable, and sometimes a more alarming appearance, gradually weakened the whole system. His constitution sunk beneath the power of art which was intended to revive it: nature gave up the struggle on the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... summer he drags a hay-cart, and he has to keep halting for the hay to be piled on; then in the fall we use him for working on the road, and he has to wait while we pick up stones and spread gravel; in the spring he makes the rounds of the sugar orchard every morning and stands round on three legs while we empty the sap buckets into the cask on the sledge. Poor soul, he never seems to get going that he ain't hauled up. He's so used to it now that he'd rather stop than go, ...
— The Story of Sugar • Sara Ware Bassett
... talked with the lower officers frankly, but to the higher officers more blandly and precisely. When the sovereign was present he used to be respectful but easy, solemn yet self-possessed. When the sovereign bade him receive visitors his countenance changed, and his legs appeared to bend. Bowing to those beside him, he straightened his robes in front and behind, hastening forward with his elbows extended like a bird's wings. When the guest had retired he used to report to the prince, saying, "The guest does not any more look back." ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various
... what would never be whole, he was well again. True, confinement and poor food had kept him weak and white. His legs had a way of going shaky at nightfall. But once he knocked down an insolent Russian with his left hand, and began to feel his own man again. That the Russian was weak from starvation did not matter. The point to the boy was that he ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... the legs, Mrs. Lascelles," I explained; "and you see I didn't lose either, so I've no cause to complain. I had hardly a ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung
... by Caramansa, the king of the country, who came, surrounded by a great guard of blacks armed with assegais, their bodies scantily decorated with monkey fur and palm leaves. The black monarch must have presented a handsome appearance, for his arms and legs were decked with gold bracelets and rings, he had a kind of dog-collar fitted with bells round his neck, and some pieces of gold were daintily twisted into his beard. With these aids to diplomacy, and doubtless also with the help ...
— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young
... yes—about the Round Table. On three legs. Hasn't even as much stability as the Canada First minority—most of whom are not in Quebec. These are the ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino
... short, burly man, as a boatswain always is and always ought to be, with, of course, a terrific bass voice, a body outrageously long, and legs ridiculously short—replied, "Ay, ay, sir," and gave some directions to his mates, who stood by ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... Willis," rejoined Jack, "who acts like a prince, and gives legs of mutton gratis to hyenas and tigers. The discharges of electricity from one cloud to another are the flashes of lightning, and it is to be observed that the thunder is nothing more than the noise made by the fluid rushing through ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... exclamation came as one of his horses stumbled. But he kept the straining beast on its legs by the sheer physical strength of his hands upon the reins. The check was barely an instant, but he picked up the rawhide whip lying in the wagon ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... became too intolerable, he could endure it no longer. Let it make or break, certainty, at all risks, was at least preferable to this sickening suspense. That he loved her, he could no longer doubt; let his parents foam and fret as much as they pleased; for once he was going to stand on his own legs. And in the end, he thought, they would have to yield, for they had no ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... the other's heels with a swing to his shoulders, and his legs spread unwittingly, as if the level floors were tilting up and sinking down to the heave and lunge of the sea. The wide rooms seemed too narrow for his rolling gait, and to himself he was in terror lest his broad ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... in his arms as he leaned against the wall, and his legs trembled. From that moment he passed from headlong, daring, lovable youth, to manhood; understanding, fearful, conscientious, and morally strong. Just as abject as was his sudden fear, so triumphant was his reassertion ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... Image mused, "'tisn't hard to guess what he's thinking about. I wonder if I could fix it for him to take her home. It might set him on his legs again, and he's come low enough, Lord knows. If I hadn't given him a room in the first-class for old times' sake, he'd have had to go home, after his trouble on the West Coast, as a distressed seaman, and touch his cap to ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... horse rode up confidently, and opened their ranks very wide, that they might surround the Fight wing of Caesar. But before they engaged, Caesar's cohorts rushed out and attacked them, and did not dart their javelins at a distance, nor strike at the thighs and legs, as they usually did in close battle, but aimed at their faces. For thus Caesar had instructed them, in hopes that young gentlemen, who had not known much of battles and wounds, but came wearing their hair long, in the flower of their age and height of their beauty, would be ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... house. By the feeble light of some lamps the black coats of the stage managers mix themselves with the gauze skirts. Here the draughtsman joins the great colourist: the petticoats of pink or white tulle, the graceful legs covered with flesh-coloured silk, the arms and the shoulders, and the hair crowned with flowers, offer motives of exquisite colour and of a tone of living flowers. But the psychologist does not ...
— The French Impressionists (1860-1900) • Camille Mauclair
... and well dressed, must be well off. He appeared a comfortable owner of something, a man from whom the common run of mortals could well expect gratuities. Being now forty-three years of age, and comfortably built, walking was not easy. He had not been used to exercise for many years. His legs tired, his shoulders ached, and his feet pained him at the close of the day, even when he took street cars in almost every direction. The mere getting up and down, if long ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... arrow sped through the air and pierced the legs and arms of the martyr boy, for it was the cruel amusement of the Danes to avoid the vital parts in their living target. The frame of the sufferer quivered with agony, while the lip seemed striving to form the holy name, which has given strength to thousands ...
— Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... deep in slumber, moved occasionally,—grunted, sighed, or twitched his legs in dreams. Smoke lay on his knees, a pool of warm, black fur, only the closest observation detecting the movement of his sleek sides. It was difficult to distinguish exactly where his head and body joined in that circle of glistening hair; only a black satin nose and ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... And because he was born in an island, he was called Dwaipayana (Dwaipa or islandborn). And the learned Dwaipayana, beholding that virtue is destined to become lame by one leg each yuga (she having four legs in all) and that the period of life and the strength of men followed the yugas, and moved by the desire of obtaining the favour of Brahman and the Brahmanas, arranged the Vedas. And for this he came to be ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... G.L. of Mo. for 1823, p. 5. The report and resolution were on the petitions of two candidates to be initiated, one with only one arm, and the other much deformed in his legs. ...
— The Principles of Masonic Law - A Treatise on the Constitutional Laws, Usages And Landmarks of - Freemasonry • Albert G. Mackey
... doctor was quite at his ease. He stirred the fire, and warmed his legs in the blaze of the dry wood that Katrina had thrown on before going to supper. He talked about old times, and old friends; those who had disappeared, and those who remained, about the changes that had ...
— The Waif of the "Cynthia" • Andre Laurie and Jules Verne
... himself, he could give us no detailed account of it. The thing seemed to have happened like this: when the marshal's wife was driving Liza and Mavriky Nikolaevitch from the matinee to the house of Praskovya Ivanovna (whose legs were still bad) they saw a carriage waiting a short distance, about twenty-five paces, to one side of the front door. When Liza jumped out, she ran straight to this carriage; the door was flung open and shut again; Liza called to Mavriky Nikolaevitch, "Spare me," and the carriage ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... aches of all kinds stand out prominently; headache, backache, pains in the shoulders and arms, pains in the feet and legs, pains that flit here and there, dull weary pains, disagreeable feelings rather than true pains. These pains are frequently related to disagreeable experiences and thoughts, but it is probable that fatigue plays the ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson
... human institution; for it is made aware also of the absurdity of the whole fantastic scheme of this portentous universe. We regard the world in these high speculative moods much as children do when they suddenly enquire of their bewildered parents why it is that human beings have two legs and why it is that little girls are ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... Chard, rifle in hand, the Manhikian launched a curse at the groaning man, who heard him not in his agony. Leaping from pool to pool over the rough, jagged coral, which cut and tore his feet and legs, the seaman sprang to Harvey's aid, and a hoarse sob of joy burst from him when he saw ...
— Tessa - 1901 • Louis Becke
... rouge; the women were in a large majority, Cardailhac having reflected that, where a bey was concerned, the performance was of little consequence, that one need only emit false notes from pretty lips, show lovely arms and well-turned legs in the free-and-easy neglige of the operetta. All the plastic celebrities of his theatre were on hand, therefore, Amy Ferat at their head, a hussy who had already tried her eye-teeth on the gold of several crowns; ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... up an almost perpendicular sandy bluff. As Merrifield, who was in the lead, turned off the ledge, his horse, plunging in his attempt to clamber up the steep bluff, overbalanced himself, and for a second stood erect on his hind legs trying to recover his equilibrium. As Roosevelt, who was directly beneath him, made a frantic leap with his horse to one side, Merrifield's pony rolled over backwards, turned two complete somersaults and landed with a crash at the bottom ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn |
