"Piece of ground" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... The Bushreens here live apart from the Kafirs, and have built their huts in a scattered manner, at a short distance from the town. They have a place set apart for performing their devotions in, to which they give the name of missura, or mosque; but it is in fact nothing more than a square piece of ground made level, and surrounded with the trunks of trees, having a small projection towards the east, where the Marraboo, or priest, stands, when he calls the people to prayers. Mosques of this construction are very ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... profitable, in the year 1837 or '38, he decided to take a partner, and offered the situation to my brother Henry, which was gladly accepted. After this, (I do not know exactly how long), he purchased a valuable piece of ground in the city, upon a part of which "the firm" determined to build an oil and lead factory. This proved to be a very expensive and arduous undertaking; and, although it promised, after being fairly established, to be a most profitable investment, ...
— A Biographical Sketch of the Life and Character of Joseph Charless - In a Series of Letters to his Grandchildren • Charlotte Taylor Blow Charless
... the brother-in-law of the officer who had been killed called on me and asked me to go and see the Town Major and secure a piece of ground which might be used for the Canadian Cemetery. The Town Major gave us permission to mark off a plot in the new British cemetery. It was in an open field near the jail, known by the name of the Plain d'Amour, and by it was a branch ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... great satisfaction in their kitchen-garden near the house in which they were tenants; for when Younkins lived there, he had ploughed and spaded the patch, and planted it two seasons, so now it was an old piece of ground compared with the wild land that had just been broken up around it. In their garden-spot they had planted a variety of vegetables for the table, and in the glorious Kansas sunshine, watered by frequent showers, they were thriving wonderfully. They promised themselves ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... Marster's cyarpenter could git de coffin made up. Dere warn't no embalmers dem days and us had to bury folks de next day atter dey died. De coffins was jus' de same for white folks and deir slaves. On evvy plantation dere was a piece of ground fenced in for a graveyard whar dey buried white folks and slaves too. My old Daddy is buried down yonder on Marse ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... beans so that the plants may have plenty of moisture to fill the pods, then let them dry and die. Gather the dry plants before the pods open much, and let them dry on a clean, smooth piece of ground or on the barn floor. When they are well dried, thresh with a flail, rake off the straw, sweep up the beans and clean by winnowing in the wind or with a fanning mill ...
— One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered • E.J. Wickson
... d'Abraham, which is a continuation of the same hill, that begins at Quebec and ends at Cap Rouge, diminishing gradually in height in the space of these three leagues. The Lower Town is a narrow piece of ground, from a hundred to four or five paces[A] broad, between the foot of the rock and the ...
— The Campaign of 1760 in Canada - A Narrative Attributed to Chevalier Johnstone • Chevalier Johnstone
... found occasion to satisfy equally the appetites of his body and intellect. After having given me, during a succulent repast, some profitable lesson, he indulged in a stroll to the Little Bacchus and the Image of St Catherine, finding in that narrow piece of ground that which was ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... a very rough piece of ground is shown in Fig. 3. The sides of the place are high, and it becomes necessary to carry a walk through the middle area; and on either side of the front, it skirts the banks. Such a plan is usually unsightly on paper, ...
— Manual of Gardening (Second Edition) • L. H. Bailey
... sunset, the air at Preservation Island used to be darkened with their numbers; and it was generally an hour before their squabblings ceased, and every one had found its own retreat. The people of the Sydney Cove had a strong example of perseverance in these birds. The tents were pitched close to a piece of ground full of their burrows, many of which were necessarily filled up from walking constantly over them; yet, notwithstanding this interruption, and the thousands of birds destroyed, for they constituted a great part of their food during more than ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... This is colloquial, it really means "chance" or "haphazard." In other words, it was the piece of ground that fell to ...
— The Old Franciscan Missions Of California • George Wharton James
... HAVE to build," said Polly, after threatening to write privately to Miss Amelia, to reassure her. Why not move over west, and take up a piece of ground in the same road as themselves? But from this he excused himself, with a laugh and a spit, on the score that no land-sales had yet been held in their neighbourhood: when he DID turn out of his present four walls, which had always been plenty good ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... the monastic buildings were, contrary to the usual custom, on the north, for having only a narrow space between the south side of their church and the wall which Lanfranc built to secure the whole monastery, they naturally built on their extensive piece of ground running right up to the city wall to the north. Rounding the east end of the Cathedral, therefore, one finds under its ample shadow the remains of many of the domestic offices of the great priory. The great hall, with its kitchen and offices, is now part of the house of one ...
— Beautiful Britain • Gordon Home
... in a tea-garden than a place where one slept. The garden called urgently for the services of gardener. Bushes waved their branches across the paths, and the blades of grass, with spaces of earth between them, could be counted. In the circular piece of ground in front of the verandah were two cracked vases, from which red flowers drooped, with a stone fountain between them, now parched in the sun. The circular garden led to a long garden, where the gardener's shears had scarcely been, unless now and then, when he cut a bough of blossom ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... black consort, and many snuff-coloured princes and princesses. He was in other respects a perfect Robinson Crusoe; he had a few head of cattle, and some pigs; these latter have greatly multiplied on the island. Domestic fowls were numerous, and he had a large piece of ground planted with potatoes, the only place south of the Equator which produces them in their native perfection; the land is rich and susceptible of great improvement; and the soil is intersected with numerous running springs over its surface. But it was ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... got into some green lanes, where a dilapidated finger-post directed him to Rood. Late at noon, having ridden fifteen miles in the desire to reduce ten to seven, he came suddenly upon a wild and primitive piece of ground, that seemed half chase, half common, with crazy tumbledown cottages of villanous aspect scattered about in odd nooks and corners. Idle, dirty children were making mud-pies on the road; slovenly-looking women ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the world. But these are partial and insufficient proofs of fertility. Every person who has attempted to make a garden of any kind nor Fort Marlborough must well know how ineffectual a labour it would prove to turn up with the spade a piece of ground adopted at random. It becomes necessary for this purpose to form an artificial soil of dung, ashes, rubbish, and such other materials as can be procured. From these alone he can expect to raise the smallest supply of vegetables for the table. I have seen many extensive plantations ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... seat the large committee was engaged in a warm debate over a certain piece of ground occupying a space midway between the King's Highway and the Broad Highway. This eligible site had been used for holding church-festivals to raise funds for the maintenance of gospel work. A few wealthy friends of Satan wanted this location to erect on it a club-house ...
— Mr. World and Miss Church-Member • W. S. Harris
... the Kolm where our citadels stood, on the side facing the institute, each boy had a piece of ground where he might build, dig, or plant, as he chose. They descended from one to another: Ludo's and mine had come down from Martin and another pupil who left the school at the same time. But I was not satisfied ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Count on bended knee: 'Sire, for just a little season set my toiling brethren free! Let them leave awhile their labour, let them roam the country fair, Quit the close and crowded city for a breath of purer air; Or, perchance, their faithful service you will graciously repay, And a piece of ground assign them from your gardens vast ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... see some large field, or open piece of ground, in every outskirt of London, exhibiting each Sunday evening on a larger scale, the scene of the little country meadow. I should like to see the time arrive, when a man's attendance to his religious duties might be left to that religious ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens
... superstitious peoples. They have prevailed even in Europe, not only among people of low mental power, but also among the cultured Greeks. Among our own Saxon ancestors the following modes of trial are known to have been used: A person accused of crime was required to walk blindfolded and barefoot over a piece of ground on which hot ploughshares lay at unequal distances, or to plunge his arm into hot water. If in either case he escaped unhurt he was declared innocent. This was called Trial by Ordeal. The theory was that ...
— Studies in Civics • James T. McCleary
... the surrounding buildings. The amount of debris which had accumulated above the floor of these buildings was 10 to 20 feet in depth. To remove this mass of earth has required much time and labor, and the work is not yet completed. The piece of ground in question has about 60 yards of frontage on the main road, and extends, so far as the excavations go, about the same distance back from the road, that is, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 415, December 15, 1883 • Various
... "till the cows came home." Many of the policies that had seemed so easy to write up came back for total cancellation. This man had buried a father, another had married a wife, a third had bought a piece of ground—the excuses were all valid, and they came from friends, so there was nothing to do but smile and assure them that ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... heart of old Rome. When Gibbon conceived the idea of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, listening to the vespers of the Franciscan friars in the dim church of Ara Coeli in the neighbourhood, the Forum was an unsightly piece of ground, covered with rubbish-heaps, with only a pillar or two emerging from the general filth. When Byron stood beside the "nameless column with the buried base," commemorated in Childe Harold, he little dreamt what a rich collection of the relics of imperial times lay under his feet, ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan
... little disorderly in comparison with the garden, was a real old house with settles in the chimney of the brick-floored kitchen and great beams across the ceilings. On one side of it was the terrible piece of ground in dispute, where Mr. Boythorn maintained a sentry in a smock-frock day and night, whose duty was supposed to be, in cases of aggression, immediately to ring a large bell hung up there for the purpose, to unchain a great bull-dog established ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... the Indians that we would have to take this piece of ground for the blockhouse. They demurred at first, for there is nothing more painful to an Indian than disturbing his dead, but they finally consented to hold a council next day on the beach, and thus come ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 1 • Philip H. Sheridan
... on. (12) As soon as the nets are posted, up he must go and start her. If she contrive to extricate herself from the nets, (13) he must after her, following her tracks; and presently he will find himself at a second similar piece of ground (unless, as is not improbable, she smothers herself in the snow beforehand). (14) Accordingly he must discover where she is and spread his toils once more; and, if she has energy still left, pursue the chase. Even without the nets, caught she will be, from sheer ...
— The Sportsman - On Hunting, A Sportsman's Manual, Commonly Called Cynegeticus • Xenophon
... six months ago Signor John Smitthe, an American gentleman now some years a resident of Rome, purchased for a trifle a small piece of ground in the Campagna, just beyond the tomb of the Scipio family, from the owner, a bankrupt relative of the Princess Borghese. Mr. Smitthe afterward went to the Minister of the Public Records and had the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... him now," said Coquenil to Tignol in a low tone. Then to the man: "There's a bad piece of ground in the yard; you'd better have this," and, without warning, he flashed his electric lantern ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett
... not the only one Dickon worked in. Round the cottage on the moor there was a piece of ground enclosed by a low wall of rough stones. Early in the morning and late in the fading twilight and on all the days Colin and Mary did not see him, Dickon worked there planting or tending potatoes and cabbages, turnips and ...
— The Secret Garden • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... archness crept upon Miss Landale's lips; and with as genteel an amble as the somewhat precipitate nature of the small piece of ground that yet divided her from the graveyard would allow, ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... some cultivation from Plataea to Thebes, but strangely alternating with wilderness. We were told that the people have plenty of spare land, and not caring to labour for its artificial improvement, till a piece of ground once, and then let it lie fallow for a season or two. The natural richness of the Boeotian soil thus supplies them with ample crops. But it is strange to think how impossible it is, even in these rich and favoured plains, ...
— On The Structure of Greek Tribal Society: An Essay • Hugh E. Seebohm
... one of their own rivers in flood on his right flank, and roll the whole line up into the Garry. On one of the hills overlooking his position stood what is now known as Urrard House, but was then called by its proper name of Renrorie.[99] Immediately below this stretched a piece of ground large and level enough in Mackay's judgment for his army to receive, though not to give, the attack. He made no change in his line, but wheeling it as it stood upon the right wing, he marched it up the slope on ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... sand-bars and shoals—that the boats fell aground. There was nothing now for Timur to do but to abandon the boats and escape with his men to the land. This he succeeded in doing; and, after reaching the shore, he was able to form his men in array, on an elevated piece of ground, before Elak could bring up a sufficient number ...
— Genghis Khan, Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... in a large square piece of ground in one of the suburbs, set apart for that purpose; and on each of its four sides a long low building, or rather roof, supported on massy white columns, extended about six hundred yards in length, and was thirty ...
— A Voyage to the Moon • George Tucker
... roots of the bushes growing protruded. My brother and I never touched these. We believed that if we pulled one of them, a bell would ring and the devil would appear. So we never pulled them. In a ploughed field near by was a large piece of ground at one end, with a pond in the middle of it, and with many wild cherry-trees near it. I can remember now how pretty they were with their covering of white blossoms, and the grass below full of flowers—primroses, cowslips, ...
— Two Suffolk Friends • Francis Hindes Groome
... Keilhau play of all kinds had an honoured place. We read of excursions for all kinds of purposes, of Indian games out of Fenimore Cooper, and of "Homeric battles." It was "part of Froebel's plan to have us work with spade and pick-axe," and every boy had his own piece of ground where he might do what he pleased. Ebers, being literary, constructed in his plot a bed of heather on which he lay and read or made verses. The boys built their own stage, painted their own scenery, and in winter once a week they acted classic dramas. Besides ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... was rather a pitiful thing to walk through the camps on a fine afternoon and to see every waste piece of ground occupied by House players. There is no skill whatever in the game, and the players get no exercise. They sit on the ground with a pile of small pebbles before them, while one of them calls out a series of numbers. The ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham
... and the play continued as if no interruption had taken place. They were accustomed to such occurrences in Pine Tree Gulch, and the piece of ground at the top of the hill, that had been set aside as a burial place, was already dotted thickly with graves, filled in almost every instance by men who had died, in the local phraseology, "with their ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... walk up the hill to see how the building was getting on, all the children with us; then, as we sat on the timber, I used to draw the letters of the alphabet on the white sand, and the little ones learnt them. We went home through a piece of ground we called our garden. In it grew plenty of pine-apples and sugar-cane, and the gardener always supplied us with pieces of the latter to eat—very refreshing and nice, but the juice ran all over your hands. ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... what speed we could, and gained that little wood, the Tartars, or thieves, for we knew not what to call them, keeping their stand, and not attempting to hinder us. When we came thither, we found, to our great satisfaction, that it was a swampy, springy piece of ground, and, on the other side, a great spring of water, which, running out in a little rill or brook, was a little farther joined by another of the like bigness; and was, in short, the head or source of a considerable ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... his parishioners. To him the intendant of the province might apply for information concerning the state of his village, and the losses of the peasants by fire, or by epidemics among their cattle. His sympathy with his fellow-villagers was the warmer, that like them he had a piece of ground to till, were it only a garden, an orchard, or a bit of vineyard. Round his door, as round theirs, a few hens were scratching; perhaps a cow lowed from her shed, or followed the village herd to the common. The priest's servant, a stout lass, did the milking and the weeding. In 1788, ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell
... is nothing nearer than my cottage half a mile away; and this short grass and flat piece of ground are entirely natural. Nothing has been touched, except here and there a tree cut out to keep the borders straight. The late Lady Ashiel, the wife of my unfortunate cousin, was very fond of this place. Although it is farther, she always walked round by it when she came to see me at the cottage. ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... earlier days of barrack construction, barracks were, for political reasons, usually built in large towns, where troops would be at hand for putting down disturbances, and cramped and inconvenient buildings of many storeys, were erected on a small piece of ground often surrounded by the worst slums of the city; such, for example, were the Ship Street barracks in Dublin, and the cavalry barracks at Hulme, Manchester. Worse still were cases where an existing building, such as the Linen Hall in Dublin, was purchased, and converted into barracks ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... the Duck, the Goose, and the Donkey joined company and agreed to live together. Then they took counsel about their means of living, and said, how long shall we continue in such distress for our necessary food? Come let us plough a piece of ground, and plant each one such seeds as are suited to his taste. So they ploughed a piece of ground and sowed the seed. The Goose planted rice, the Duck planted wheat, the Dove planted pulse, and the Donkey planted barley, and they stationed the Donkey on guard ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup
... has become so hard, obstructed and cold, as that it hath lost its vegetable functions. Now, both these may be remedy'd, in a great measure, by one and the same physick.... The watering of soils with cold hungray springs doth little good; whereas muddy saline waters brought to overflow a piece of ground enrich it much. But above all, well-digested dew makes all plants luxuriate and prosper most. Now what may it be that endues these liquors with such prolifick virtue? The meer water which is common to them all, cannot be it; there must be ...
— Manures and the principles of manuring • Charles Morton Aikman
... to climb over; but each time these efforts were repulsed. The little force, however, was unable successfully to defend the hospital, which, after desperate fighting, was carried by the Zulus and burnt, the garrison then being concentrated in the storehouse and a small piece of ground enclosed by meal-bags in front. For twelve hours the fight continued, and then the Zulus, after suffering a loss which they themselves admit to exceed 1000, fell back, and ...
— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... here a small adventure which was very surprising to me on this journey; passing this plain country, we came to an open piece of ground where a neighbouring gentleman had at a great expense laid out a proper piece of land for a decoy, or duck-coy, as some call it. The works were but newly done, the planting young, the ponds very large and well made; but the proper places for shelter of the ...
— From London to Land's End - and Two Letters from the "Journey through England by a Gentleman" • Daniel Defoe
... the students and a number of young men who possessed some education, usually enjoying their recreations in this spot, but certainly not in the most innocent manner, in fact, the disorders committed in this privileged piece of ground, which the students considered as their own, were such as to be often named in history, and to have formed the subject of a favourite Melo Drama; it retained its character as being the scene of turbulence and disorder even to the time of ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve
... distance from this relic of primeval grandeur. These people were but little indebted to fortune, and the size of their potato-patch did not exactly correspond with the number of rosy-cheeks within doors. So the loan of a piece of ground was a small thing to ask or to grant. Upon this piece of lent land stood our favorite oak. The potatoes were scarcely peeping green above the soil, when we observed that the great boughs which we looked at admiringly a dozen times a day, as they towered far above the puny race around them, remained ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... admirably adapted to the climate and soil. The lowest average produce of wheat, as far as we can at present know, is thirty-five fanegas for one sown; but, as an instance of its fertility, it may be mentioned that Senor Valejo obtained, on a piece of ground where sheep had been pastured, 800 fanegas for eight sown. The produce being different in various places, a very correct ...
— The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, Oregon and California • Brevet Col. J.C. Fremont
... secure. But there were outhouses belonging to it: a stall, in which White Billy, the pony, lived during the winter; a shed and pigsty rudely constructed, with an inclosed yard attached to them; and it had, moreover, a piece of ground of more than an acre, well fenced in to keep out the deer and game, the largest portion of which was cultivated as a garden and potato-ground, and the other, which remained in grass, contained some fine old apple and pear-trees. Such was the domicile; the pony, a few fowls, a sow and two young ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... another piece of ground is laid out and divided into four plots. When I first began to prepare for forcing I waited four years, and had one plot planted with divided heads each year. Clumps are taken up from the reserve bed and then shaken out and the heads ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 803, May 23, 1891 • Various
... erected; but it was of brick, and the walls still so damp that they did not dare occupy it. She says, "We had but one alternative, and that was to remain in the boat till they could build a small house on the piece of ground which the king gave to Mr. J. last year. And you will hardly believe it possible, for I almost doubt my senses, that in just a fortnight from our arrival, we moved into a house built in that time, which is large enough to make us comfortable. ...
— Lives of the Three Mrs. Judsons • Arabella W. Stuart
... inland country, while those of the shepherds' dogs are no less conspicuous. The excellency of these animals renders sheep-pens in a great degree unnecessary. If a shepherd wishes to inspect his flock in a cursory way, he places himself in the middle of the field, or the piece of ground they are depasturing, and giving a whistle or a shout, the dogs and the sheep are equally obedient to the sound, and draw towards the shepherd, and are kept within reach by one or more dogs, until the ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... discrimination box of Chapter X was arranged so that the light at the entrance to each electric-box had a value of 20 candle meters, less the diminution caused by a piece of ground glass which was placed over the end of the electric-boxes to diffuse the light. The windows through which the light entered the electric-boxes were covered with pieces of black cardboard; in one of these cardboards I had cut a circular opening 4 cm. in diameter, ...
— The Dancing Mouse - A Study in Animal Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes
... forwards, transporting the telescope, etc., breaking up his establishment at Bath and forming a new one near the court, all this, even leaving such personal conveniences as he had for many years been used to, out of the question, could not be obtained for a trifle; a good large piece of ground was required for the use of the instruments, and a habitation in which he could receive and offer a bed to an astronomical friend, was necessary ...
— Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works • Edward Singleton Holden
... given M. d'Arblay a piece of ground in his beautiful park-, upon which we shall build a little neat and plain habitation. We shall continue, meanwhile, in his neighbourhood, to superintend the little edifice, and enjoy the Society of his exquisite ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... made the Jackal feel rather mean, so he answered loftily, 'Exactly so! I always plant my bones for the same reason.' And he carefully dug up a piece of ground, and sowed the bones of the kid ...
— Tales Of The Punjab • Flora Annie Steel
... difficult for me, on Peggotty's solicitation, to resolve to stay where I was, until after the remains of the poor carrier should have made their last journey to Blunderstone. She had long ago bought, out of her own savings, a little piece of ground in our old churchyard near the grave of 'her sweet girl', as she always called my mother; and ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... were there not his specific statement that he explained his discoveries and showed one of his charts to illustrate them, it would be incredible that while the French and English ships lay together for some weeks at Port Jackson, with tents erected on the same piece of ground, the officers frequently meeting on friendly terms, Freycinet and Peron should not have learnt what the Investigator had been doing. Both the French authors are individually mentioned by Flinders as having been present on one or other of ...
— Terre Napoleon - A history of French explorations and projects in Australia • Ernest Scott
... Lesseps's grand undertaking. It was not long, however, before the highest masts disappeared like phantoms behind the sandy waves through which our path lay. After passing a small hillock on our right, called Gerba—"water skin," we reached an undulating piece of ground commanding a view of the mountains above referred to, and of the group of palms known as Zaega—"the Beautiful." At the same time the scene was agreeably relieved by one of those phenomena so common ...
— The Caravan Route between Egypt and Syria • Ludwig Salvator
... Gerhard Rohlfs and his pretty, fair-haired wife, was blithe and gay. The brave desert wanderer and bird of passage has now built himself a little wigwam or nest near the railway-station: the grand duke of Weimar gave him for the purpose a charming piece of ground with a delightful view. On the 25th of March a light veil of snow still rested on the ground, but two days later we were listening to the notes of the lark and gathering violets to take to Schiller's house ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... sense of the beauties of architecture; and he suffering it to fall to ruin, builds another at no less charge. But among the Utopians, all things are so regulated that men very seldom build upon a new piece of ground; and are not only very quick in repairing their houses, but show their foresight in preventing their decay: so that their buildings are preserved very long, with but little labour; and thus the builders to whom that care ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... the noble squire, "I hate the very name, To have two thousand pounds a-year—O 'tis a burning shame! Two thousand pounds a-year! good lord! And I to have but five!" And under him no tenant yet was ever known to thrive: Now from his lordship's grace I hold a little piece of ground, And all the rent I pay is scarce five shillings in the pound. Then master steward takes my rent, and tells me, "Honest Jo, Come, you must take a cup of sack or two before you go." He bids me then to hold my tongue, and up the money locks, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... had a piece of hand, and never shall have, I suppose," said my father. "I wonder how a man must feel who can stand on a piece of ground and say, ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... kings of Ulster, the remains of which, under the name of the Navan, still exist about two miles west of Armagh. Here he was cordially received by Daire, a wealthy chief, who made over to him a pleasant piece of ground on an eminence, Druim-sailch, or "Hill of the Willows." The spot pleased St. Patrick, and here he determined to erect a church. The foundations were accordingly laid, and around it rose by degrees the city of Armagh, the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... dozen christening parties, all well dressed, and the babies in the finest white muslin and embroidery. A very large proportion of the artisans here are Catholics, and as one instance among others of the liberality prevailing here, I mention that one of the latest donations of M. Dollfus is the piece of ground, close to the cite ouvriere, on which now stands ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... freehold property was extremely scarce at Helpston, the ground being, as in most agricultural counties, the property of a few large landowners. The more Clare thought upon the subject, the more anxious did he become to enter upon the proposed arrangement, and, in settling on this little piece of ground, shape his whole future career into a more fixed direction. But his boundless anxiety met with no assistance on the part of those who called themselves his friends. Though it was for the first time in his life that he claimed help for himself, he, to his immense distress, ...
— The Life of John Clare • Frederick Martin
... stump burning, which usually followed upon the clearing of a new piece of ground. More than a year before Jonas Harding had begun on this lot, with the intention of clearing it entirely and in the end having a handsome piece of grass-land along the edge of the creek. In the fall a fire had run over the piece and now the stumps were mostly dead, ...
— With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga • W. Bert Foster
... with it, and the Liberals said that they hated it. Already three or four of them had taken Drone aside and explained that what was needed in the town was a straight, clean, non-partisan post-office, built on a piece of ground of a strictly non-partisan character, and constructed under contracts that were not tainted and smirched with party affiliation. Two or three men were willing to show to Drone just where a piece of ground of this character could be bought. ...
— Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town • Stephen Leacock
... soldier was stationed there. All the forces seemed directed upon the north of Perpignan, upon the most difficult side, against a brick fort called the Castillet, which surmounted the gate of Notre-Dame. He discovered that a piece of ground, apparently marshy, but in reality very solid, led up to the very foot of the Spanish bastion; that this post was guarded with true Castilian negligence, although its sole strength lay entirely in its defenders; for its battlements, almost in ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... put the spade in the soil on a slant and only about half the length of the blade, and then flop the soil over in the hole from which it came, often covering the edge of the unspaded soil. The good spader works from side to side across his piece of ground, keeping a narrow trench or furrow between the spaded and unspaded soil, into which weeds and trash and manure may be drawn and thoroughly covered, and also to prevent covering the unspaded soil. If this work has been well done with the ...
— The First Book of Farming • Charles L. Goodrich
... and, through my attendant, ask her various questions about her history. She was married to a man much older than herself, with whom she lived very happily; and her brother, a youth of eighteen, dwelt with them. They had a good boat and a little piece of ground, and she was skilful at the loom; so they managed to live well. In summer the fishermen fish at night: when all the fleet is out, it is pretty to see the line of torch-fires in the offing, two or three miles away, like a string of stars. They do not go ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... under particular circumstances, be regulated by the nature of the ground over which it passes: thus, though eight, ten, or even twelve miles may be considered as a short day's march, yet if at the end of that space an advantageous position occur (that is, a piece of ground well defended by natural or accidental barriers, and at the same time calculated for the operations of that species of force of which the army may be composed), it would be the height of imprudence to push forward, merely because a greater extent of country might ...
— The Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans 1814-1815 • G. R. Gleig
... once, and was emptied to buy a little piece of ground where the home could be built when the ...
— Mother Stories • Maud Lindsay
... statue of Queen Anne in an enclosed piece of ground in the west front of the church is something of an ornament to ...
— Travels in England in 1782 • Charles P. Moritz
... to a piece of ground which belonged to him, found that a strange ox had got into the enclosure. The Khoja took a thick stick to beat it with, but the beast, seeing him coming, ...
— Miscellanea • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... shore, would lie so high, and the other sink lower, as before, that it would endanger my cargo again. All that I could do was to wait till the tide was at the highest, keeping the raft with my oar like an anchor, to hold the side of it fast to the shore, near a flat piece of ground, which I expected the water would flow over; and so it did. As soon as I found water enough—for my raft drew about a foot of water—I thrust her upon that flat piece of ground, and there fastened or moored her, by sticking my ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... still remembers with tenderness the sacred scene of youth, could scarcely do better than build a Gothic apartment for the reception of the collection. It cannot be doubted that the Provost and fellows would be gratified in granting a piece of ground for the purpose. ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... shouldn't have done it without asking permission; you see you might do considerable damage by taking a piece of ground like that, not knowing whether there is anything in it or not. As it is, you see, you have spoilt all my turnips. If we hadn't found it out in good time, we should have been left without any for the whole season. Don't you see, ...
— The Carroll Girls • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... to see in Christiania, the most conspicuous object being the palace, which stands, like a manufactory, on the top of a rising piece of ground. It is an enormous pile of building, painted uniformly white; and I do not believe the interior is more commodious than the exterior is monotonous and void of architectural taste, since the late King, Bernadotte, once observed, when he entered it, that he saw a multitude of rooms, but ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... camp on a solid, dry piece of ground beyond the range of the Southern works, and the men, veterans now, prepared for their comfort. The comrades ate supper to the slow booming of great guns, where the advanced cannon of either side engaged in ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler
... a biscuit manufactory. A lot of red brick pill-box looking buildings scattered over a flat piece of ground. We shan't see the town. It is a mile from here. ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... dynasty, however, re-transferred the metropolis to the older situation; but, instead of attempting to revive any of the pristine localities, fixed their palace and its environs upon a new—and a preferablepiece of ground. ...
— The Fall of the Moghul Empire of Hindustan • H. G. Keene
... mouldered into common dust. To the lovers of genius, this little garden-house might have been a place to visit as a chosen shrine; nor will they learn without regret that the walls of it, yielding to the hand of time, have already crumbled into ruin, and are now no longer to be traced. The piece of ground that it stood on is itself hallowed with a glory that is bright, pure and abiding; but the literary pilgrim could not have surveyed, without peculiar emotion, the simple chamber, in which Schiller wrote the Reich der Schatten, the Spaziergang, ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... were those of an ancient monastery, one of the most ancient in Germany, I believe. They covered a very large piece of ground, and had they been in somewhat better preservation, they would have greatly impressed us; as it was they were undoubtedly, even to the unlearned in archaeological lore, very interesting. The position of the monastery had been well and carefully chosen, for on one side it commanded a ...
— Four Ghost Stories • Mrs. Molesworth
... Southern Manitoba. When I was walking from the church to the farmhouse where I lodged, after morning service, one perfect day in June, I passed a man called Edward Hare, sitting at the edge of a little bluff, on a rising piece of ground. I had felt drawn toward this man. He was a Londoner, and, in his first two years, had had a tough fight. But he had won through, and now had just succeeded in adding a hundred and sixty acres to his little farm, which was one of the ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... the visitors to the ship was Koah, a little, old, emaciated, shifty-eyed priest with a wry neck and a scaly, leprous skin, who at once led the small boats ashore, driving the throngs back with a magic wand and drawing a mystic circle with his wizard stick round a piece of ground near the Morai, or burying-place, where the white men could erect their tents beside the cocoanut groves. The magic line was called a taboo. Past the tabooed line of the magic wand not a native would dare ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... across ground swept by the enemy's shot and shell. A horse had been killed under him, but he had not received even a scratch; and now, mounted upon the horse of one of the officers, who was killed, he was returning from carrying an order across a very open piece of ground, at full gallop. Suddenly he came upon a sight which—hurried as he was, and exposed as was the position—caused him instantly to draw his rein, and come to ...
— The Young Franc Tireurs - And Their Adventures in the Franco-Prussian War • G. A. Henty
... 'chungke', which, with propriety of language may be called 'Running hard labour.' They have near their state house [Footnote: Consult E G Squire—Aboriginal Monuments of N.Y. Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, Vol. II, pp. 1356 and note p. 136.] a square piece of ground well cleaned, and fine sand is carefully strewed over it, when requisite, to promote a swifter motion to what they throw along the surface. Only one or two on a side play at this ancient game. They have a stone about two fingers broad at the edge and two spans round; each party has a pole of about ...
— Indian Games • Andrew McFarland Davis
... afternoon something was noticed that enabled us to get a little further with our studies. The rain water ran down a sloping piece of ground in a tiny channel it had made; the streamlet was very muddy, and at first it was thought that all the soil was washed away. But we soon saw that the channel was lined {6} with grit, some of which was moving slowly down and some not at all. Grit can therefore be separated from the ...
— Lessons on Soil • E. J. Russell
... should cultivate a piece of ground with corn, while the soldiers should be employed in a similar manner in another position. The sailors were all Nubians, or the natives of Dongola, Berber, and the countries bordering the Nile in the Soudan. These people ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... the leasing of the Vavasour, and ran upon the knight without a word. The knight could do no less than avenge himself. They hurtled together so sore that their horses fell under them and their spears passed either through other's heart. Thus were both twain killed on this very piece of ground." ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... went their way, one to his farm, and another to his merchandise." Luke is more large in this, and saith, "I have bought a piece of ground, and must needs go see it;" another said, "I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to prove them;" and the third said, "I have married a wife and therefore I cannot come." 1. We learn here, that ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various
... bean requires and deserves more attention. I have always succeeded with it, and this has been my method: I take a warm, rich, but not dry piece of ground, work it deeply early in spring, again the first of May, so that the sun's rays may penetrate and sweeten the ground. About the tenth of May I set the poles firmly in the ground. Rough cedar-poles, with the stubs of the branches ...
— The Home Acre • E. P. Roe
... where I live. When I got them, they were worthless. I could build as good a mansion as this or any of your ante-bellum Alabama houses for what I can get out of that little tract. What is that value? Merely the expression in terms of money of the power of excluding the rest of mankind from that little piece of ground. I make people give me the fruits of their labor, myself doing nothing. That's what builds this house and all these great houses, and breeds the luxury we are beginning to see around us; and the consciousness that this slavery exists, and is increasing, and bids fair to grow ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... cow, he was in no danger of being unable to feed it; and so important was this privilege considered, that when the commons began to be largely enclosed, parliament insisted that the working man should not be without some piece of ground on which he could employ his own and his family's industry.[32] By the 7th of the 31st of Elizabeth, it was ordered that no cottage should be built for residence without four acres of land at lowest being attached to it for the sole use of ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... country during the winter. Undoubtedly this is true in a measure; but I have seen things which lead me to suspect that the statement is sometimes made too sweeping. Last winter, for example, a flock took up their quarters in a certain neglected piece of ground on the side of Beacon Street, close upon the boundary between Boston and Brookline, and remained there nearly or quite the whole season. Week after week I saw them in the same place, accompanied always by half a ...
— Birds in the Bush • Bradford Torrey
... set her down on a solid piece of ground near one of the oceans." There was a pause and Brandon could almost see Colonel Towers drawing up to his full height. "I'm going to be the first man to set foot on a planet of another solar system. ...
— The Quantum Jump • Robert Wicks
... level of the water were in a constant state of humidity; from which issued a noxious vapour, which more than once extinguished the candles. Since the destruction of the building many subterraneous cells have been discovered under a piece of ground, which seemed only a bank of solid earth before the horrid secrets of this prison-house were disclosed. Some skeletons were found in these recesses with irons still fastened to their decayed bones." Letters from France, ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... During that dreadful march to overtake Cronje, the officers of the Guards had as their mess-table on one occasion a rectangular ditch about eighteen inches wide and as many deep. It was dug so as to enclose an oblong piece of ground about sixteen feet by eight, which, flattened as much as possible, served as table. At this earth table, with their feet in the muddy ditch, sat several representatives of England's nobility, but as our soldier lad said, 'Still smiling.' When the rain came down ...
— From Aldershot to Pretoria - A Story of Christian Work among Our Troops in South Africa • W. E. Sellers
... extensive. A recently constructed road for vehicular traffic leads into the camp, all the appointments of which give the impression that everything has been done to make the prisoners as comfortable as possible. A kitchen garden has just been laid out in a sheltered place, and a flat piece of ground surrounded by palm trees prepared ...
— Turkish Prisoners in Egypt - A Report By The Delegates Of The International Committee - Of The Red Cross • Various
... far as you can and get down as lightly as possible on to a firm piece of ground. It rises rapidly here and is, I expect, a dry soil where the upper end of ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... Rome, seated in the heart of Italy, was no longer a convenient capital for his empire, and he therefore resolved to build a new city on the site of ancient Byzantium. The Bosphorus, a narrow strait, connects the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmora; and here, on a triangular piece of ground, inclosing on one side an excellent harbor, Constantine laid the foundations of his capital. It was situated in the forty-first degree of latitude, possessed a temperate climate, and a fertile territory around ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... the house, the owner had built a stable for two cows. In front of this erection of old boards, a sunken piece of ground served as a yard where, in a corner, was a huge manure-heap. On the other side of the house and the arbor stood a thatched shed, supported on trunks of trees, under which the various outdoor properties of the peasantry were put away,—the utensils of the vine-dressers, ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... of the sisters. "We shall all meet for a great coffee-drinking in the garden, and during this we shall lead the conversation in a natural sort of way to the piece of ground on the other side the fence, and then peep through the cracks in it, and then express that usual wish that this fence might come down. And then, at this signal, your eight boys, Louise, are to fall on ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... from the houses to the waste piece of ground on which the houses stood, or rather did not altogether tumble down, unfenced, undrained, unlighted, and bordered by a sluggish ditch; from that, to the sloping line of arches, part of some neighbouring viaduct or bridge with which it was surrounded, and which lessened gradually towards them, ...
— The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargin • Charles Dickens
... days gone by) which lay moored in the deep sea-water below. He had always kept his boat there, because it was the nearest available spot to the house; but before he could reach the place—unless, indeed, he crossed a broad sun-lighted piece of ground in full view of the windows on that side of the house, and without the shadow of a single sheltering tree or shrub—he had to skirt round a rude semicircle of underwood, which would have been considered as a shrubbery ...
— The Doom of the Griffiths • Elizabeth Gaskell
... his boat for a nominal sum to some one in need of cheap firewood, and purchasing lower-deck tickets for Cairo, or Pittsburgh, at from four to six dollars per head, places his family upon an up-river steamer, and returns with the spring birds to the Ohio River, to rent a small piece of ground for the season, where he can "make a crop of corn," and raise some cabbage and potatoes, upon which to subsist until it be time to repeat his ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... apparently well supplied with water),[39] to the main road out to the north. Then, along a track to the north-west, we passed the 13th Brigade camp (the 13th Brigade had been a day ahead from Tel esh Sherif), and bivouacked at 14.45 on a nice piece of ground on the banks of the Orontes, against the village ...
— Through Palestine with the 20th Machine Gun Squadron • Unknown
... is a big match on at Cheltenham or any other neighbouring town, a large number invariably go to see it. There is some difficulty in finding suitable sites for your ground in these parts, for the hill turf is very stony and shallow; it is not always easy to find a flat piece of ground handy to the villages. A cricket ground is useless to the villagers if it is perched up on the hill half a mile away. It must be at their doors; and even then, though they may occasionally play, they will never by ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... mind. I've been anxious to come and confide it to your ladyship and to solicit your guidance, but I've been in fear and dread lest you should give way to suspicion. For not only would then all my disclosures have been in vain, but I would have deprived myself of even a piece of ground wherein my remains could ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... one of them. Then our men with their muskets killed three or foure more of them.[10] So they went their way; within a mile after wee got downe two leagues beyond that place, and anchored in a bay, cleere from all danger of them on the other side of the river, where we saw a very good piece of ground: and hard by it there was a cliffe, that looked of the colour of a white greene, as though it were either copper or silver myne: and I thinke it to be one of them, by the trees that grow upon it. For they be all burned, and the other places are greene as grasse; ...
— Great Epochs in American History, Volume I. - Voyages Of Discovery And Early Explorations: 1000 A.D.-1682 • Various
... for so kindly taking the trouble of writing to me, on naturalised plants. I did not know of, or had forgotten, the clover case. How I wish I knew what plants the clover took the place of; but that would require more accurate knowledge of any one piece of ground than I suppose any one has. In the case of trees being so long-lived, I should think it would be extremely difficult to distinguish between true and new spreading of a species, and a rotation of crop. With respect to your idea of plants travelling west, I was ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin |
