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Polishing   /pˈɑlɪʃɪŋ/   Listen
Polishing

noun
1.
The work of making something smooth and shiny by rubbing or waxing it.  Synonym: shining.  "Every Sunday he gave his car a good polishing"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Polishing" Quotes from Famous Books



... make. You'll have to wait patiently, for a few years, until he can make a home, but it's a happy time, being engaged. I feel defrauded myself to have had so little of it. Storing up things in a bottom drawer, and picking up old furniture at sales, and polishing it up so lovingly, thinking of where it is going, and letters coming and going, and looking forward to the time when he'll come down next—'tis a beautiful time. Three or four years ought to pass ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey

... bread, home-made jams and cakes; home- made pickles and sauces; home-cured tongues and hams, and home-made liqueurs. Cook kept the tweeny busy in the kitchen, while Mary grumbled at having to keep half a dozen unused bedrooms in spick and span perfection, and Mason spent her existence in polishing, and sweeping invisible grains of dust ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... Brown drily; and he pointed to the pigmy, who had been crouching in the sand, nursing his bow, and slowly polishing the handle of his spear. "Pig Illaka," said the horse keeper; and he pointed at the little fellow, who looked up at him quickly and then began to polish his spear handle more energetically with a ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn

... frame of the universe; the just proportion of all its parts; and the bare cast of the eye has sufficed us to find and discover even in an ant, more than in the sun, a wisdom and power that delights to exert itself in the polishing and adorning its vilest works. This is obvious, without any speculative discussion, to the most ignorant of men; but what a world of other wonders should we discover, should we penetrate into the secrets of physics, and dissect the inward ...
— The Existence of God • Francois de Salignac de La Mothe- Fenelon

... iron shelf, fixed in the corner, was our tinware. Although called tinware, it really was zinc, and was susceptible, through much hard work, of a high polish, but this "polishing tinware" was a fearful curse to the poor prisoner. It consisted of a jug for water and a bowl for washing in and a pint dish for gruel. There were strict and imperative orders, rigidly enforced, ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell

... he had been by Bright Sun, he was impressed also by these warriors. Not one of them spoke to him or annoyed him in any manner. They went about their tasks, cleaning and polishing their weapons, or sitting on rough wooden benches, smoking pipes with a certain dignity that belonged to men of strength and courage. All around the lodge were rush mats, on which they slept, and near the door ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler

... times they had their deserued paiments. And many times they gaue good testimonie of their great valour and resolution. To handle them gently, while gentle courses may be found to serue, it will be without comparison the best: but if gentle polishing will not serue, then we shall not want hammerours and rough masons enow, I meane our old soldiours trained vp in the Netherlands, to square and prepare them to our Preachers hands. To conclude, I trust by your Honours and Worships wise instructions to the noble Gouernour, the worthy ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of - the English Nation. Vol. XIII. America. Part II. • Richard Hakluyt

... chapter, the best part of the wheat has been eliminated in the process of milling. Furthermore, to a large extent the mineral salts are removed from our vegetables in the process of boiling; that is to say, when the water in which they were boiled is thrown away. The polishing of rice, the use of white flour in manufacturing macaroni, the refining of our sugar, and many other processes, are directly responsible for the almost universal habit of overeating. Certain elements ...
— Vitality Supreme • Bernarr Macfadden

... little square of glass, and the other side polished in the same way. The sections must not be too thick, nor too thin; they are usually made from a hundredth to a thousandth of an inch thick. Lathes employed in polishing minerals require to be provided with conical spindles, so that the wear, due to grit and emery dust getting on them, may be readily taken up. The grinding wheel may be either horizontal or vertical; the former has the advantage that the mineral ...
— Scientific American, Volume XXXVI., No. 8, February 24, 1877 • Various

... weather, father," said Adolphus, polishing his cheeks on the worn sleeve of his jacket. "What with rain, and sleet, and wind, and snow, and fog, my face gets quite brought out into a rash sometimes. And shines, it does—oh, don't ...
— The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargin • Charles Dickens

... obstinate, refused to reply. The hunter did not repeat the question then, but went back to the fire, whistling gayly a light tune. The three were spending the day in homely toil, polishing their weapons, cleaning their clothing, and making the numerous little repairs, necessary after a prolonged and arduous campaign. They were very cheerful about it, too. Why shouldn't they be? Both Tayoga and the hunter had scouted in wide circles about the camp, and had seen that there ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler

... with an armful of wet clothes. Bursting into the room to which the dominie had been led, he found him on a chair drying himself by detachments. Already his upper man had been rubbed by Pierre, and clothed with a shirt, vest and velveteen coat from his wardrobe. Now he was polishing his nether extremities with a towel, preparatory to adding a pair of gaudy striped trousers to his borrowed gear. Striding up to him with a ferocious air, the lawyer presented the smoking glass, exclaiming: "Drink this down, Wilks, or I'll kill ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell

... is done in a mortar hollowed out of a section of a tree trunk or out of a large stone. One may see a young man or a young woman pounding the rice in the mortar with a heavy wooden beetle or mallet. Often the beetle is fastened to a beam and worked by foot. Or the polishing apparatus may be driven by water, oil or steam power. Constantly in the country there are seen little sheds in each of which a small polishing mill driven by a water wheel is working away by itself. After the polishing, the mangoku doshi is used again to free the rice ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott

... furrows. Across a field, cutting its way through a farmyard, a light railway carried its occasional wobbling, narrow-gauged traffic; and outside half-a-dozen huts soldiers were lolling in the warmth of early afternoon, polishing accoutrements and exchanging the lazy philosophy of men resting after herculean tasks. Elsewhere there was no sign of war. Cattle browsed about the meadows, and the villagers, long since grown used to the presence of foreign soldiers, ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter

... he said. "I've got some polishing and patching to do, anyway." He made his voice sound easy and innocent, but I noticed his eyes were alert and wary, watching me as I struggled back into ...
— The Risk Profession • Donald Edwin Westlake

... away and was with difficulty recovered. She rewarded the poet munificently for this tribute to her son's memory. For three years longer he worked steadily on the poem, and in B.C. 19 he resolved to go to Greece and devote three entire years to polishing and finishing the work. He got as far as Athens, where he met Augustus returning from the East, and determined to go back to Italy in his company. He fell ill, however, during a visit to Megara, the voyage between Greece and Italy did not improve ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne

... heel with the intention of shaming his countrymen by a corrosive remark or two. To his surprise and relief, the two young fellows who had been conversing had their shoulders turned towards him, and were gazing at one of the Louvre attendants who was polishing some brass-work at the other side ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle

... story-tellers. Horses munched their grain just at our rear, and now and then some careful trooper sauntered back to make sure his mount was not neglected. One or two of the men were cleaning their revolvers, and an old corporal was polishing his sabre where a spot of rust disfigured its gleaming blade. You might have dreamed it a picnic, a military review, possibly, were it not for the travel-soiled and ragged uniforms, but a line held there for the stern purpose of deadly conflict—it ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish

... plan, went the next morning to pay a visit to M. de Baisemeaux. It was the cleaning up or tidying day at the Bastille: the cannons were furbished up, the staircases scraped and cleaned; and the jailers seemed to be carefully engaged in polishing even the keys themselves. As for the soldiers belonging to the garrison, they were walking about in the different courtyards, under the pretense that they were clean enough. The governor, Baisemeaux, received D'Artagnan ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... Binder was reading aloud the secret dispatches which had just come in from the Austrian ambassador at Berlin, the young Baron van Swieten. Meanwhile, Kaunitz was busy with a brush of peacock's feathers, dusting the expensive trifles that covered his escritoire, or polishing its ebony surface with a fine silk handkerchief which he kept for the purpose. This furbishing of trinkets and furniture was a private pastime with the all-powerful minister; and many a personage of rank was made to wait in the anteroom, while he finished his dusting ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... amiably, "Look, Joe! We checked everything last night. We checked it again this morning. I even caught Mike polishing the ejection seats, because there wasn't anything else to make ...
— Space Tug • Murray Leinster

... especially of the black ware, show a smooth finish, and may perhaps, without violence to the term, be classed as lustrous. This is not the effect of a varnish or partial glazing, but is a polish, produced generally, if not always, by rubbing with a polishing stone. ...
— Illustrated Catalogue Of The Collections Obtained From The Indians Of New Mexico And Arizona In 1879 • James Stevenson

... or silver usually employ one of two methods—casting or beating, combined with delicacy of finish, chasing, and polishing. The technical processes are interestingly described by the writers of the old treatises on divers arts. In the earliest of these, by the monk Theophilus, in the eleventh century, we have most graphic accounts of processes very similar ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison

... led me to a large room on the second floor. As we neared the door a young interne, so the nurse told me, came out. He was thoughtfully polishing his glasses. ...
— 32 Caliber • Donald McGibeny

... faces—with material to make my tale sure—so sure that the world would hail it as an impudent and vamped fiction. And I—I alone would know that it was absolutely and literally true. I—I alone held this jewel to my hand for the cutting and polishing. Therefore I danced again among the gods till a policeman saw me and took steps in ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling

... years ago. The coincidence of phrase indicates some resemblance in the circumstances, though so wide apart in time and distance. In England, in those old days, men lived in the woods and forests—out-of- doors—and were occupied with manual works. They had no opportunities of polishing their discourse, or their literary compositions. At this hour, in remote parts of the great continent of America, the pioneers of modern civilisation may be said to live amid medieval surroundings. The vast forests and endless ...
— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies

... up short and began polishing the top of the bar vigorously. He was a gossipy soul, and more than once his tongue had got him ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine

... third helping of potatoes and gravy and fourth cup of coffee, the senior scientist contentedly shoved back from the table. Hetty was polishing the last dabs of gravy from her plate with a scrap of bread. The scientist pulled a pipe and tobacco ...
— Make Mine Homogenized • Rick Raphael

... it needs polishing and practice and all that; but I'm sure it is oceans better than half the sentimental twaddle we see in the papers, and I KNOW that some of those pieces ARE paid for, because I have a friend who is in a newspaper ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott

... who was polishing some newly laid tile, who replied, "Mrs. Sturgis? I think she's in her office. It's straight back through the door. She was there a ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton

... if you'd had corn, Bennington," Jim Shirley observed. "I was polishing my crown for a Corn King Festival this fall. I don't believe I'll harvest fifteen bushels to ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter

... very proud of) came into the tent and said: "We have ten minutes for making up our packs before mess." "Lucy," said Knudsen, "there's a chance of showers. Why do up packs that we may have to undo again?" So David is polishing his shoes (likewise a new art with him) and Pickle is sewing on a button, and they all are talking, while elsewhere, chiefly in the street, the men are making up their packs for the morning's work that is sure to require ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French

... annexation, and polishing savages off the face of creation there has been a great deal, and who can deny that humanity has been the gainer? It seems to those who look widely back over history, that all such works have been carried on in obedience to God's laws. When Jacob ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope

... linings and interlinings and the tuftings had been fitted and glued into their proper places, and the bit of leather drawn across the padded cover,—we could raise our eyes for a moment and look out upon a strange, fascinating world. The open windows on one side of the shop looked into the polishing-room of a neighboring goldsmith, and on the other side into a sunshiny workroom filled with swirling black wheels and flying belts among which the workmen kept up a dialogue in a foreign tongue. ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson

... to the fair palace of Paris, and found him in his chamber, polishing his beautiful armor, and proving his curved bow. Then, when Hector saw him, he reproached him with bitter words. "O thou strange man! thou dost not well to nurse thy spite against the Trojans, who are now perishing before the city, and all for thy sake! Rise, then, ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various

... Donovan," said Captain Flanagan, his peg-leg crossed and one hand abstractedly polishing the brass ferrule; "Yessir, the question ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath

... of tepid water were produced, and the company sat eagerly soaking their finger tips for a time, after which much pruning and polishing went on, to the great bewilderment of Puss, who poked her own paws into the cups, as if trying to test the advantages of this ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott

... understand the art of cutting, polishing, and setting their diamonds. Gold and silver filagree works they excel in; gunpowder is manufactured at Pontiana; brass cannon is cast at Borneo Proper; iron-shot is run from their mine. They can manufacture and repair krises, and clean their arms. Their carpentry extends ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel

... use. And to-day my heart is filled with remorse and my head is filled with fears lest you should think your dear godchild is ungrateful, fickle, and flighty. I want to tell you how every detail of your life—from knob-polishing and bug-swallowing to poetry-writing is dear and precious to me. How I wish I could do the same! How I live in eager expectation of your letters; how I gloat and ponder over them when they come; and how deep is the gloom into which I am plunged when they do not come! Mr. Teddy knows ...
— Deer Godchild • Marguerite Bernard and Edith Serrell

... off the stone kitchen. There Thalassa betook himself. Robert Turold disliked the dark, and a great array of lamps awaited him: large ones for the rooms, small ones for the passages and staircase. Thalassa set to work with a will, filling them with oil, trimming the wicks, and polishing the glasses with a ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees

... sides are tolerably thin, but how the tree is felled and fashioned, we had no opportunity to learn. The only tools that we saw among them are an adze, wretchedly made of stone, some small pieces of the same substance in form of a wedge, a wooden mallet, and some shells and fragments of coral. For polishing their throwing-sticks, and the points of their lances, they use the leaves of a kind of wild fig-tree, which bites upon wood almost as keenly as the shave-grass of Europe, which is used by our joiners: With such tools, the making even such a canoe as I have described, must be a most ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr

... Fields were invited to Hanover, he and his beautiful wife were always guests at our home. Their first visit to us was an epoch for me. I worked hard the morning before they were to arrive, sweeping, dusting, polishing silver, and especially brightening the large, brass andirons in father's library. I usually scoured with rotten stone and oil, but on this great occasion, adopting a receipt which I had happened to see in a newspaper, I tried vinegar and powdered ...
— Memories and Anecdotes • Kate Sanborn

... however, be recognized that much of the depth of colour of old oak panelling is really nothing but dirt, though the true dark brown tint of old age can be found underneath, and right to the centre of each piece. Spring-cleaning of the past consisted very much in polishing with beeswax and turpentine, without removing the dirt produced by smoky fires and constant handling, so that extraneous matter became coated with the polish and preserved beneath it. I have had occasion, when restoring old woodwork, to ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory

... top stood as fine a constellation of marine stars as ever sang together of a morning on a King's ship. Every one who could get within earshot found that his work took him aft. I counted eleven able seamen polishing the breechblock of the stern nine-point-two, four marines zealously relieving each other at the life-buoy, six call-boys, nine midshipmen of the watch, exclusive of naval cadets, and the higher ranks past ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling

... sign of discipline he saw was the careful grooming of some horses, which he rightly guessed to be those ridden by the knights, and the equally careful polishing of pieces of armour before the doors of the huts. He wished now to inquire his way to the king's levy, but as the question rose to his lips he checked himself, remembering the caution the friendly carters had given him. He therefore ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies

... a tremendously good fellow every man said. Just a natural animal creature, whom grooming and polishing in the family for some hundred or so of years had made ...
— His Hour • Elinor Glyn

... standing and not a sail to bless it. The maiden who had stood at her post since sundown yielded at last and came down, pale and drenched, to her quarters. The poet too, who had clung all night to the halyards, looking faithfully ahead and polishing his ode inwardly at the same time, also crawled abaft, half frozen and stupid with drowsiness. Indeed, there was little any of us could do, and one by one Ludar ordered us to rest, while he, whom no labour seemed to daunt, clung doggedly to ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed

... the swing door and found himself face to face with Da Souza's one clerk—a youth of unkempt appearance, shabbily but flashily dressed, with sallow complexion and eyes set close together. He was engaged at that particular moment in polishing a large diamond pin upon the sleeve of his coat, which operation he suspended to gaze with much astonishment at this unlocked-for visitor. Trent had come straight from Ascot, straight indeed from his interview with Francis, and was ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... to use a battery in coating the small gray castings, of which you write, with copper. It will be all the more satisfactory in the end. The best polishing material to put in with them in the tumbler we think would be leather cuttings and sweepings. They will not need returning to the tumbler after being coppered. We recommend you to get "Byrne's Practical Metalworkers Assistant," published ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various

... the bits of paper, but he interfered. "Here! I'll do that, Daisy; sit down. Daisy's occupation in the next world, Miss Noel, is going to be sweeping all the dirty clouds out of the sky, and polishing up the harps and crowns, and telling the small angels not to leave the ivory gates ajar, for fear of draughts, and to be sure and put their buckets and spades away tidily when they have done digging in the golden sands, and not to get over-heated and fall ill, because they can't die and have got ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various

... table, he contemplates the preparation for his reception with distaste; then, flinging the match into the ash-tray, he sits, with a set, determined look upon his face. After another short pause, the DUCHESS returns, polishing a tumbler with ...
— The Gay Lord Quex - A Comedy in Four Acts • Arthur W. Pinero

... still. The solid little building looked so quiet and well cared for in the bright sunshine, which shone on the polished window-panes and on the bright red top of the lantern, where he could see the lamp-trimmer going round on his little gallery, polishing the prisms. ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland

... outcropping of limestone that formed a miniature bluff twenty feet high and a hundred in length. Under an overhanging ledge, they found two cushions, a red-and-gray blanket, and some odds and ends of old garments that looked as though they had once been used for polishing rags. There was a broken kitchen spoon, and a cold chisel, and ...
— Little Fuzzy • Henry Beam Piper

... well-behaved sensible man that Mr. Thurnall is," says Lucia to Elsley, an hour after, as she meets him coming in from the garden, where he has been polishing his "Wreck." "I am sure he understands his business; he was so kind and quiet, and yet so ready, and seemed to know all the child's symptoms beforehand, in such a strange way. I do hope he'll stay here. I feel happier ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley

... would do the usual scrubbing and shampooing. This, it seems, is the general practice in Finland, and is but another example of the unembarrassed habits of the people in this part of the world. The poorer families go into their bathing-rooms together—father, mother, and children—and take turns in polishing each other's backs. It would have been ridiculous to have shown any hesitation under the circumstances—in fact, an indignity to the honest simple-hearted, virtuous girl—and so we deliberately undressed also. When at last we stood, like ...
— Northern Travel - Summer and Winter Pictures of Sweden, Denmark and Lapland • Bayard Taylor

... made shift to bore them with stone drills,[4] implements which hardly correspond with the delicacy and exactness exhibited by the specimens of original wampum that have come down to us. The process of polishing and shaping was equally painful and laborious, for rubbing with the hand over a smooth stony surface, was the only method which the rudeness of the Aborigines could devise. Yet the finished beads, whether attached in thick masses to garments, or strung in long flexible rows, ...
— Wampum - A Paper Presented to the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society - of Philadelphia • Ashbel Woodward

... I came abroad to avoid, I found on the very threshold where I came to rest. We had good linguists at the chateau, and every document finally came forth in English dress, which, however, often needed much altering and polishing. This was my part of the work. So, away off in the heart of France, high up in the Black Mountains, surrounded with French-speaking relatives and patois-speaking peasants, I found myself once more putting bad English into the best I could command, just as I had so often done in America, when editor ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... which every where else is the glass wherein the higher orders dress themselves, and which again reflected from them to the classes below, goes far towards polishing, in some degree, a great majority of the population, it is not to be expected that manner should be made so much a study, or should attain an equal degree of elegance; but the deficiency, and the total difference, is greater than this ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope

... passed up from the Refectory, Mary Antony chanced to be polishing the panelling around the picture of Saint Mary Magdalen, beside the door of ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay

... meet a princess," said Patsy, polishing away; "and I intend that you shall do no discredit ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett

... Force as we postulate, the whole development and perfecting of life on this planet, the whole production of man, may seem little more than to any one of us would be the chipping out, the cutting, the carving, and the polishing of a gem; and we should feel as little remorse or pity for the scattered dust and fragments as must the Creative Force of the immeasurably vast universe feel for the DISJECTA MEMBRA of perfected life on this planet. . ...
— God The Invisible King • Herbert George Wells

... since the Romans built it. As we went along that road, leaving the fields, we passed by many men indeed, and many houses, all in movement with the early morning; and the chalked numbers on the doors, and here and there an empty tin of polishing-paste or an order scrawled on paper and tacked to a wall betrayed the passage of soldiers. But of the army there was nothing at all. Scouting on foot (for that was what it was) is a desperate business, and that especially if ...
— First and Last • H. Belloc

... by no means an idle race, and whenever I entered a hut I invariably found even the youngest inmates usefully employed; the women busily engaged cooking and sewing, or cleaning and polishing firearms, while the men were away duck-shooting or hunting the seal or walrus. Sometimes we went seal-hunting with our friends, but this is poor sport, especially in damp, chilly weather. The outfit is very ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt

... Drakmanton with an air of returning illumination; "thank you so much. Of course, I remember now who I am. I'm Ellen Niggle, of the Ladies' Brasspolishing Guild. The Club employs me to come now and then and see to the polishing of the brass fittings. That's how I came to know Lady Drakmanton by sight; she's very often in the Club. And you are the ladies who so kindly asked me out to lunch. Funny how it should all have slipped my memory, all of a sudden. The unaccustomed ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki

... old darky, resplendent in white shirt-sleeves, green baize apron, and never-ceasing smile of welcome, happened to be engaged in this cleansing and polishing process—and it occurred every morning—and saw any friend of his master approaching, he would begin removing his pail and brushes and throwing wide the white door before the visitor reached the house, would there await his coming, bent double in profound salutation. Indeed, ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith

... Ned touched a lever near the motor, and things went whirring. There was a busy hum that made the place delightful to Frank. He was astonished and pleased to observe how deftly his companion handled the knife, putting it through a dozen operations, from grinding to stropping and polishing. Then he adjusted a little drill to a handle ...
— The Boys of Bellwood School • Frank V. Webster

... hobbling on crutches, some with arms in slings, heads bandaged, or patched and mended in some way or other. You feel like some damaged implement tossed aside a moment for repair. "Mend me this lieutenant!" The doctors get to work, deft and quick; a little strengthening, repairing, polishing, and out you are ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps

... tycoons is like. As for this boat, why, she'll be like a bit o' straw in a gale, and I don't want to go to the bottom until I've seed you made a skipper; and besides, we've got lots more waspses' nests to take, beside polishing off those three junks—that is, if they're left to polish ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn

... spectacles, and had a smooth bald head, over which, at the time we introduce him to the reader, fifty summers had passed, with their corresponding autumns, winters, and springs. The passage of so many seasons over him appeared to have exercised a polishing influence on the merchant, for Mr Sudberry's cranium shone like a billiard-ball. In temperament Mr Sudberry was sanguine, and full of energy. He could scarcely have been a successful merchant without these qualities. ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne

... consists of beautiful purplish-black crystals, which are very hard. Carborundum is used as an abrasive, that is, as a material for grinding and polishing very hard substances. Ferrosilicon is a silicide of iron alloyed with an excess of iron, which finds extensive use in the manufacture of certain kinds ...
— An Elementary Study of Chemistry • William McPherson

... his hams on his heels, paused from the rough-polishing of a shell comb designed and cut out by his master, and looked up, eager ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London

... the ash-bucket fainting from the stifling heat of the foul-smelling stoke-hold. We were all supplied with fishing-lines and hooks of three different sizes, and extra grog when getting steam up. The method of cleaning and polishing the engines and all bright work was very effectual, and did the stokers great credit; after having scoured and polished the steel and bright ironwork they were frosted, in imitation of hoar frost. A pot of hot tallow and white lead in which a clean piece of cotton ...
— The Stoker's Catechism • W. J. Connor

... Orderly (SIMPKIN). One hastens to make it clear that the last thing intended or desired is to disparage the usefulness or the stark self-sacrifice of the men who are serving in menial capacities in our war hospitals, but to tell the truth this account of sculleries and laundry-baskets, polishing paste and nigger minstrels, bathrooms and pillow-slips, has not much intrinsic interest about it, nor are the author's general reflections very different from what one could supply oneself without much effort. His notes on war slang are about the best thing in the volume, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 17, 1917 • Various

... he said to Murgatroyd, who was indulging in his usual pastime of cleaning and polishing ...
— A Honeymoon in Space • George Griffith

... Angler', or White's 'Selborne', among those unique gems of literature, too rare in any age, which owe their subtle and imperishable charm primarily to the author's own delightful personality. Savarin spent many years of loving care in polishing his manuscript, often carrying it to court with him, where it was one day mislaid, but—luckily for future generations of epicures—was afterward recovered. The book is a charming badinage, a bizarre ragout of gastronomic precepts and spicy anecdote, doubly piquant for its prevailing ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various

... Cylinder, his stuttering coadjutor, with the clubbed foot. But you will always observe, that the gunner's gang of every man-of-war are invariably ill-tempered, ugly featured, and quarrelsome. Once when I visited an English line-of-battle ship, the gunner's gang were fore and aft, polishing up the batteries, which, according to the Admiral's fancy, had been painted white as snow. Fidgeting round the great thirty-two-pounders, and making stinging remarks at the sailors and each other, they reminded one of a swarm of black wasps, buzzing ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville

... Wark in a new light indeed! If she really wanted any creature on the earth to speak for her. As she stood there in stolid embarrassment polishing the shiny bar, Miss Levering clutched the tray to steady it, and with the other hand she pulled the pillow higher. One had to sit bolt upright, it seemed, and give this matter one's ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins

... slept in the marble forever but for the blasting, the chiseling, and the polishing. The angel of our higher and nobler selves would remain forever unknown in the rough quarries of our lives but for the blastings of affliction, the chiseling of obstacles, and the ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden

... again in spring and early summer before the annual departure of the Hanbury family for the sea, the pleasant yard with its wide shade trees and its shrubbery was a land of enchantment threatened by a genie. Black Bias, the family coachman, polishing the fat carriage horses in the stable yard, was the genie; and George the intrepid knight who, spurred by Honora, would dash in and pinch Bias in a part of his anatomy which the honest darky had never seen. An ideal genie, for he could assume an ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... same old codger. Haven't changed an inch in seven years. You've got to stay here a week, two weeks, a month. I've plenty of sick stock, and some of the boys have horses that need polishing." ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton

... of those enormous piers, roofed over, dim and cool inside, I stood one day looking out on the deck of an East Indian freighter, where two half-naked Malays were polishing the brasswork. One of them was a boy of ten. His small face was uncouth and primitive almost as some little ape's, but I saw him look up again and again with a sudden gleaming expectancy. I grew curious and waited. Now the ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole

... showing two combs, with the teeth interlaced. After separation they were again placed together to harden under pressure, when the final operations consisted of bevelling the teeth on wheels covered with sand-paper, rounding the backs, rounding and pointing the teeth; after which came the polishing, papering and putting ...
— Illustrated Science for Boys and Girls • Anonymous

... higher ranges contains stones of more or less value, and the beds of the rivers flowing southward from the mountain chain are so rich in comminuted fragments of rubies, sapphires, and garnets[1], that their sands in some places are used by lapidaries in polishing the softer stones, and in sawing the elephants' grinders into plates. The cook of a government officer at Galle recently brought to him a ruby about the size of a small pea, which he had taken from the crop ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... little need of correction. He was born with "style"; it was a gift of his genius rather than the result of conscious elaboration. Yet he did use "the file," of which much is now written, especially for the purpose of polishing away the sibilants, so common in our language. In the nine years of silence which followed the little book of 1833 his poems matured, and henceforth it is probable that he altered his verses little, ...
— Alfred Tennyson • Andrew Lang

... class were the potters; and all the processes of mixing the clay, and of turning, baking and polishing the vases are represented in the tombs of Thebes and Beni Hassan, of which ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy

... hungry. In any other condition, the dingy little lunch-room she presently turned into, would hardly have invited her. But the spots on the frayed starchy table-cloth, the streakiness of the glasses, the necessity of polishing knife and fork upon her damp napkin, couldn't prevent her doing ample justice to a small thick platter of ham and eggs, and ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster

... silver, it is best to wash it first in hot water and white soap and then use the polishing cloths. The cloths can be used until they are worn to shreds. Do not wash them. Knives, forks, spoons and other small pieces of silver will keep bright and free from tarnish if they are slipped into cases made from the gray outing flannel ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics

... suggested that they scour the tinware, and the three women put in the spare time of the entire morning polishing and rubbing pans and lids. As they worked, Mrs. Hunter discussed tinware, till not even the shininess of the pans upon which they worked could cover the disappointment of the girl that her mother-in-law should have discovered it ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger

... Isa. liv. 12, said, "The Holy One—blessed be He!—will bring precious stones and pearls, each measuring thirty cubits by thirty, and polishing them down to twenty cubits by ten, will place them in the gates of Jerusalem." A certain disciple contemptuously observed, "No one has ever yet seen a precious stone as large as a small bird's egg, and is it ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various

... was not exactly what you would call young. With an effort he heaved himself up out of the depths of his hickory chair and stood at the edge of his porch, polishing a pink bald dome of forehead as though trying to make up his mind to something. Jefferson Poindexter, resplendent in starchy white jacket and white apron, came ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb

... turned his head inshore. "Nonsense!" he said. "Your friends are making as much noise as ever. You must have seen old Kerick polishing off a drove. He's done ...
— The Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling

... before the Emperor was to hold a review, the soldiers were busily employed polishing their arms and putting everything in order, to conceal as far as possible the destitute condition to which they were reduced. The most imprudent had exchanged their winter clothing for provisions, many had worn out their shoes on the ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... with polishing glasses for all kinds of spectacles, and making mathematical instruments; an employment too closely connected with his studies to ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... been cleaned with the brush it may be allowed to cool and finished to the desired shape, size and surface by filing and polishing. When filed, a very thin line of brass should appear where the crack was at the beginning of the work. If it is desired to avoid a square shoulder and fill in an angle joint to make it rounding, the filling is best accomplished by winding ...
— Oxy-Acetylene Welding and Cutting • Harold P. Manly

... author of "The Purple Slipper" threw herself into her place in the grinding of the machine that was to turn out a perfected play on the following Tuesday night at Atlantic City. Everywhere Mr. Rooney was tightening bolts and polishing surfaces until they glistened while he snapped and tried out ...
— Blue-grass and Broadway • Maria Thompson Daviess

... tongs, scissors, pliers, files, awls, cold-chisels, matrix and die for molding buttons, wooden implement used in grinding buttons, wooden stake, basin, charcoal, tools and materials for soldering (blow-pipe, braid of cotton rags soaked in grease, wire, and borax), materials for polishing (sand-paper, emery-paper, powdered sandstone, sand, ashes, and solid stone), and materials for whitening (a native mineral substance—almogen—salt and water). Fig. 1, taken from a photograph, represents the complete shop of a silversmith, which was set up temporarily in a summer lodge ...
— Navajo Silversmiths • Washington Matthews

... drill were possible, though acquiesced in by the men themselves, were bad for the Battalion's discipline. Much regard was always paid—especially in the 61st Division—to what is called 'turn out.' This meant more than button-polishing. It was that quality of alertness and self-respect which even in the trenches could be maintained. Trench-life bred loafers, and loafers never made the best soldiers. It was a good thing when October 28 came and the Battalion moved back to Arras for a twelve days' spell in rest. Billets were ...
— The Story of the 2/4th Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry • G. K. Rose

... restored his first model and cast it in bronze; but even then he did not finish it entirely, for he caught a chill by overheating himself during the casting, and died in that city within a few days; leaving unfinished not only that work (although there was only a little polishing to be done), which was set up in the place for which it was destined, but also another which he was making in Pistoia, that is, the tomb of Cardinal Forteguerra, with the three Theological Virtues, and a God the Father above; which work was afterwards ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 3 (of 10), Filarete and Simone to Mantegna • Giorgio Vasari

... chivalries," she replied; "I shall be enchanted." And, five minutes later, the Incognita and I were polishing off smoked herring and potato salad, like people who had no time ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick

... trade was fresh enough to enable us to keep up our average rate, or a little more, with the help of the sails alone. The engine was therefore allowed a rest, and the engineers had an opportunity of cleaning and polishing it; this they did early and late, till it seemed as if they could never get it bright enough. Nodtvedt now had a chance of devoting himself to the occupation which is his delight in this world — that of the blacksmith; ...
— The South Pole, Volumes 1 and 2 • Roald Amundsen

... she said at last, "I cannot absolutely promise you; but I think I can get you five hundred pounds." Conolly stopped polishing the cylinder, and stared at her. "If I have not enough, I am sure we could make the rest by a bazaar or something. I should like to begin to invest my money; and if you make some great invention, like the telegraph or steam ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw

... and the workers in metal, and the smelters (?) of gold, and the sculptors in stone, "and the ore-crushers, and the furnace-men (?), and handicraftsmen of every kind whatsoever, who work in hewing, and cutting, and polishing these stones, and in gold, and silver, and copper, and lead, and every worker in wood who shall cut down any tree, or carry on a trade of any kind, or work which is connected with the wood trade, to "pay tithe upon all the natural products (?), and also ...
— Legends Of The Gods - The Egyptian Texts, edited with Translations • E. A. Wallis Budge

... "'As polishing expresses the vein in marble and grain in wood, so music brings out what of heroic lurks anywhere. . . . When we are in health, all sounds fife and drum to us; we hear notes of music in the air, or ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards

... general example. The Cripple hied him to the store, and after breaking down the door abstracted the only blacking-brush in the camp,—putting down a sovereign on the counter in exchange for it,—and set to polishing his high boots as if a fortune depended on their brightness. The Scholar bought Herr Gustav's white shirt for a fiver, threatening to murder its owner if he did not render it up. And Partridge, a good man from Norfolk, with ...
— Stories by English Authors: Africa • Various

... show grounds was practically commandeered by the tired but interested troops. They have a partiality, however, for 'M.T.' lorries. For weeks prior to the event, men would spend every available minute polishing chains, cleaning harness, painting vehicles, and grooming horses. Every unit has its admirers and supporters, and ...
— Over the Top With the Third Australian Division • G. P. Cuttriss

... his business done. The prospect was rich recompense for everything. It came to him, suddenly and for the first time, that he hated his mission in Hunston with a disheartening and sickening hatred. And formulating this thought, polishing it to aphorism and sharpening it to epigram, he slumbered and slept for the last time ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison

... have indirect influence with the American Congress, and presses me to communicate his grievance to the authorities in Washington. I dare not close my ear against such applicants, for in the mass of valueless dross which I receive, I sometimes discover a rough diamond which, after due cutting and polishing, I dispose of to the New ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman

... Explosives Manufacture, File Making, Flint Milling, Floor Cloth Makers, Furriers, Fustian Clothing Making, Galvanised Iron Manufacture, Gassing Process, Gilders, Glass Making, Glass Paper Making, Glass Polishing and Cutting, Grinding Processes, Gunpowder Manufacturing, Gutta-percha Manufacture, Hat Makers, Hemp Manufacture, Horn Goods Making, Horse-hair Making, Hydrochloric Acid Manufacture, India-rubber Manufacture, Iodine Manufacture, Ivory Goods Making, Jewellers, Jute Manufacture, ...
— The Dyeing of Cotton Fabrics - A Practical Handbook for the Dyer and Student • Franklin Beech

... up his stand at the foot of the bed. In the adjoining room sat Lennox Tudor, watching ceaselessly, expectantly, it seemed to Piers. Behind him moved a nurse, noiselessly intent upon polishing something that flashed like silver every time ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell

... solutions, the solid alloy as a whole is often far more like a conglomerate rock than a uniform solution. In fact the uniformity of brass and bell-metal is only superficial; if we adopt the methods described in the article METALLOGRAPHY, and if, after polishing a plane face on a bit of gun-metal, we etch away the surface layer and examine the new surface with a lens or a microscope, we find a complex pattern of at least two materials. Fig. 1 (Plate) is from a photograph of a bronze containing ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... a-smoking his pipe, he says, and he ain't a-goin' to put himself about, he says, for the likes of you. That's what he says! Ti ridde tol rol ro!" and here the youth indulged in a spitefully cheerful carol as he resumed the polishing of the mugs. ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed

... money necessary to give me additional cultivation, I shall thankfully receive it, for Barilli has taught me all of which he is master, and there is no one else in town in whom I have more confidence. It was my desire and determination that the work of my hands should pay for polishing my voice, but embroidery-fees would not suffice to defray the expenses of the professor to whom you allude; and, if Dr. Grey pays for his services, I must in advance assure you and him that I shall decline them, and rely upon Barilli ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson

... But it seems to us that they are misled by the ambiguity of the name. For argumentation signifies two things under one name, because any discussion respecting anything which is either probable or necessary is called argumentation, and so also is the systematic polishing of such ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero

... sky. Some were close enough for us to see the wonderful semi-transparent green of the cracks and fissures in their sides and the vivid emerald at the base that the bursting seas seemed to be eternally polishing anew. ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton

... and about his room early. The odor of baking muffins and frying ham came up the stair-well, and the sound of Mike vigorously polishing the floor in the hall. Mixed with the odor of cooking and of floor wax was the scent of flowers from Lucy's room, and Mrs. Sayre's machine stopped at the door while the chauffeur delivered ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... the lighter superficial lava is brought suddenly into contact with water, as when a lava-stream enters the sea, it becomes still lighter and more porous—forming the well-known substance called pumice, so much used for polishing. It may be regarded as the solidified froth of lava, and is so light that it floats on ...
— Wonders of Creation • Anonymous

... finished, and many only half done. Above this was a workshop, with a turning-lathe, and all necessary instruments for working in wood. Here, while no one knew where the king was, did he spend hours with a footman, named Duret, in cleaning and polishing his tools. Higher up was a library, containing the books the king valued most, and some private papers relating to the history of the royal families of Hanover, England, Austria, and Russia. In the room over this, however, ...
— The Peasant and the Prince • Harriet Martineau

... what kind of people had been staying with Miss Tracy, and to find out, if possible, if it was Alice, and whether she was still in Salisbury; but I felt ashamed of questioning on, and, during the pause that ensued, my informant gave one more general polishing to the table, pushed one or two chairs out of their places, poked the fire, which did not want poking, and with a side bow left the room. My curiosity was so strongly excited, that I could not refrain from asking Mrs. Hatton if she knew anything of the Mrs. Tracy, who, in old times, had been my ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton

... as you may see on Meetinghouse-Hill any day—yes, and mark the scratches on their faces left when the boulder-carrying glaciers planed the surface of the continent with such rough tools that the storms have not worn the marks out of it with all the polishing of ever ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... still polishing away with sand-paper at the elephant's tusks, and who evidently regarded the soldier with great contempt, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various

... be calcined. By means of this enormous engine I was enabled to send a powerful current of electricity continually through my great diamond, which it seemed to me gained in lustre every day. At the expiration of a month I commenced the grinding and polishing of the lens, a work of intense toil and exquisite delicacy. The great density of the stone, and the care required to be taken with the curvatures of the surfaces of the lens, rendered the labor the severest and most harassing ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various

... mummy in a museum. That might have been like this; or the raising of Lazarus. The streams of strength almost visibly trickled through Valentine's veins. And this new life was so vigorous, so alert. It was as if during his strange sleep Valentine had been carpentering his energies, polishing his powers, setting the temple of his soul in order, gaining almost a ruthlessness from rest. He stretched his limbs now as an athlete might stretch them to win the full consciousness of their muscular force. When the doctor took hold of his hand to feel his pulse the ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens

... paw lifted. Venning, who had a fellow-feeling for one in distress, being himself worn out, took the paw, discovered a nasty cut on the pad, washed it out with warm water, treated it with carbolic, bound it up, and gave the animal the pot to dean, which he did, polishing it out ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville

... plate glass warehouse; the concern having been established since 1634; it is carried on to a great degree of perfection. A Frenchman named Thevart first discovered the art of casting glass, that of polishing it was invented by Riviere, and now glasses may be had at this establishment 154 inches by 104. The largest table of iron for polishing glass was made a few months since, weighing twenty-five tons. At No. 121 is ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve

... the furniture was antique and of the neutral tint which comes from age; the weapons and the ornaments of brass, the gilding of the great pictures, were all dim and lack-lustre for want of the cleaning and polishing which require many servants. In the huge fire-place some big logs were burning, and Donald and Bess threw themselves down before it with a sigh of satisfaction. The girl looked round her, just as she ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice

... black, white, and yellow; bulwarks, green; plank-shear, white; waterways, lead color, etc., etc. The anchors and ring-bolts, and other iron work, were blackened with coal-tar; and the steward kept at work, polishing the brass of the wheel, bell, capstan, etc. The cabin, too, was scraped, varnished, and painted; and the forecastle scraped and scrubbed; there being no need of paint and varnish for Jack's quarters. The ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana

... have fried chicken and strawberries—my favorite dinner!" said Belle when Molly was showing her just how she liked the table set. After dinner, cheerfully polishing glasses, she suddenly burst into song as she stood at the open pantry window, some ten feet from the side porch. ...
— Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories • Kathleen Norris

... vitreous substance, with which the wonders of the art are achieved. But inside of the palace are some two hundred artisans at work,—cutting the smalts and glass into the minute fragments of which the mosaics are made, grinding and smoothing these fragments, polishing the completed works, and reproducing, with incredible patience and skill, the lights and shadows of the ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells

... is pasitively a very eccentric bady, and there is a small tincture of a barbarous sart of wit in what he says; but it wants an immensity of correction, an infinitude of polishing; he is a mere son of nature, everything he says is express'd in such a Gathic, uncouth, Anti-Chesterfieldian style; and as for his dress, it is pasitively ...
— The Politician Out-Witted • Samuel Low

... enough also to have abstained from it. It may have been that Cicero knew well enough beforehand what the day was about to produce, so as to have prepared his reply. It may well have been that he himself undertook the polishing of his speech before it was given to the public in the words which we now read. We may, I think, take it for granted that Piso did make an attack upon him, and that Cicero answered him at once with words which crushed him, and which ...
— The Life of Cicero - Volume II. • Anthony Trollope

... rushes to the palace, where, refusing all refreshment, he goes in quest of Paris, whom he finds in the company of Helen and her maids, idly polishing his armor. Indignantly Hector informs his brother the Trojans are perishing without the walls in defence of the quarrel he kindled, but which he is too cowardly to uphold! Although admitting he deserves reproaches, ...
— The Book of the Epic • Helene A. Guerber

... age and hard services had made it scarcely so fit for courtly company, as when it stood in the Earl of Lincoln's hall. Wherefore, as Governor Belcher was fond of splendor, he employed a skilful artist to beautify the chair. This was done by polishing and varnishing it, and by gilding the carved work of the elbows, and likewise the oaken flowers of the back. The lion's head now shone like a veritable lump of gold. Finally, Governor Belcher gave the chair a cushion of blue damask, ...
— True Stories from History and Biography • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... out of the earth; piles of delicate green lettuce buds, golden carrots bursting into feathery tops, ruddy beets, and pink-checked. It was pretty to see the honest joy of her work and the interest of her parted lips, when, after polishing the glass, it shone as crystal clear as her own eyes. A milkman stopping to look at her (and small wonder that he did) poured nearly a quart of cream on the ground, and two children ran squabbling under ...
— Marm Lisa • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... by a good meal, a little exercise, and a deal of kindly petting, it was to find her bed occupied only by the big grey whelp. But she showed no more than momentary surprise and uneasiness, and within the minute was busily engaged in giving Finn his morning tubbing and polishing, after which she disposed herself with great consideration in a position which made nursing an easy delight for Finn, and enabled his assiduous foster-mother to watch the undulations of his fat back, out of the tail of her ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson

... as the present all Terence Reardon asked was good fighting light. Fighting in the dark distressed him, he discovered, for while polishing off the fireman in the black alleyway he had missed one punch at the fellow's head, and had been reminded to his sorrow and the ruin of his knuckles, that the deck of the Narcissus was of good Norway pine. However, H.M.S. Panther was scarcely three cable lengths distant now, and the officer on her ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne

... the deep shades in which their place of concealment lay. Sir Alan roused the fire to a cheerful blaze, and lighting a torch of pine-wood, placed it in an iron bracket projecting from the wall, and amused himself by polishing his arms, and talking in that joyous tone his mother so loved, on every subject that his affection fancied might interest and amuse her. He was wholly unarmed, except his sword, which, secured to his waist by a crimson sash, he never laid aside; ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar

... each man or woman's INDIVIDUAL salvation, regardless of what might happen to the community; till, with the rise of Protestantism and Puritanism, this tendency reached such an extreme that, as some one has said, each man was absorbed in polishing up his own little soul in a corner to himself, in entire disregard to the damnation which might come to his neighbor. Religion, and Morality too, under the commercial regime became, as was natural, perfectly selfish. It was always: "Am I saved? Am I doing the right thing? Am I winning ...
— Pagan & Christian Creeds - Their Origin and Meaning • Edward Carpenter



Words linked to "Polishing" :   shoeshine, work, polish



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