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Rub   /rəb/   Listen
Rub

verb
(past & past part. rubbed; pres. part. rubbing)
1.
Move over something with pressure.  "Rub oil into her skin"
2.
Cause friction.  Synonyms: chafe, fray, fret, scratch.
3.
Scrape or rub as if to relieve itching.  Synonyms: itch, scratch.



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"Rub" Quotes from Famous Books



... into such minute and careful details about the size, weight, and beauty of the carvings on the golden tablets, and strange characters and the ancient adornments, that I confess he made some of the smartest men in Palmyra rub their ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn

... the child, with a thoughtful glance at Miss Susan Jemima across the table, "tell him, if he ever marches along this way, I'll come over to his tent and rub his head, like I do yours—if he'll let me—till he goes to sleep." She clasped her fingers and looked into her father's eyes, hopefully, appealingly. "Do you think he would, if—if ...
— The Littlest Rebel • Edward Peple

... in all England in the Local Examinations, get my degree of M.A., and be a teacher in a large High School," said Esther solemnly. "At Christmas and Easter I would come home and see my friends, and in summer-time I'd go abroad and travel, and rub up my languages. Of course, what I should like best would be to be headmistress of Girton, but I could not expect that to come for a good many years. I must be content to work my way up, and I shall be quite happy wherever I am, so ...
— About Peggy Saville • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey

... the telephone against the wall in the old hallway at Sabine Farm. I could see the soiled patch of plaster where Andrew rests his elbow when he talks into the 'phone, and the place where he jots numbers down in pencil and I rub them off with bread crumbs. I could see Andrew coming out of the sitting-room to answer the bell. And then the operator said carelessly, "Doesn't answer." My forehead was wet as I came out ...
— Parnassus on Wheels • Christopher Morley

... Butterwick attended the funeral. Smith was nearly wild with grief. As the remains were put into their last resting-place he cried as if his heart would break, and his friends began to get uneasy about his nervous system. Presently he took his handkerchief from his eyes for a moment to rub his nose, and as he did so he saw Butterwick looking at him. A thought seemed to strike Smith. He dashed away a couple of tears; and stepping over a heap of loose earth as they began to shovel it in, he grasped Butterwick by the hand. Butterwick gave ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)

... answered. "To-day, it comes jolly near being the worst. The fellows in other houses are decent; they don't rub it in; but, between ourselves, the Manor has gone to pot ever since Dirty Dick took hold of it. Damer's is the ...
— The Hill - A Romance of Friendship • Horace Annesley Vachell

... killing you. Certain people in China, Mr. Moore, are conducting practises that you of the western world frown upon. And blundering upon these practices, as perhaps you have, you believe you are very bold and daring, and you are thrilled as you rub elbows with death, in tracing the dragons ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts

... from door to door. Stopping wherever they saw a pair of boots, they would at once proceed to business. The helper would seize a boot and give a tremendous "hawk," which would cause the sleeping inmate of the room to start up in his bed and rub his eyes. He would then apply the blacking and hand the boot to Tom, who stood ready to artistically apply the polishing brush. During the whole of this latter operation the little negro would dance a breakdown, while Tom, seated on the chair ...
— The Expressman and the Detective • Allan Pinkerton

... for his own match-box, but Hewitt had gone, and was lighting his cigar with a match from a box handed him by the groom. A smart little terrier was trotting about by the coach-house, and Hewitt stooped to rub its head. Then he made some observation about the dog, which enlisted the groom's interest, and was soon absorbed in a chat with the man. Sir James, waiting a little way off, tapped the stones rather impatiently with his ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison

... throwing me down branches of a sort of fruit of a dark purple colour, large as a plum, with a skin like the mulberry. 'I have been tasting them, they are very nauseous, and they have stained my fingers black; rub yourself well with the juice of this fruit, and you will be ...
— The Swiss Family Robinson; or Adventures in a Desert Island • Johann David Wyss

... Mary sat, the Mediterranean sighed upon its ancient rocks. A faint breath of the mysteriously perfumed air stirred the exotic palms over her head and made their fronds rub against each other gratingly, as if some secret signal were being carried on from one to another. Turning to right, to left, or to look behind her, dimly seen mountains soared toward a sky that deepened from asphodel to the dark indigo of a ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... though sloping, was not a particularly bad place; moreover, on it were little hummocks of ice, resulting from snow that had melted and frozen again, against one of which Godfrey was able to rest his left shoulder, and even to pass his arm round it. But here came the rub. He could not get sufficient grip of the thin rope with his right hand beyond the point where it was cut, to enable him to support even half the weight that hung below. Should it sever, as it must do very shortly, it would be torn from ...
— Love Eternal • H. Rider Haggard

... curious-shaped piece of iron hanging up. I asked the man what it was. He said it was a magnet, that he kept to touch needles. Then he gave me a nail, and let me see how the magnet would attract it. He told me, too, that if I had a knife, and would rub my knife on the magnet, the knife would attract, too; and so I did rub it, and I found that my knife would attract the nail, though not very strong. Then I asked him if any piece of iron would attract, after it was rubbed upon the magnet; and he said that iron would not, but that ...
— Rollo's Experiments • Jacob Abbott

... choir was accidentally discovered during the restoration. A workman was cleaning one of the panels, which was coarsely painted, and happened to rub off the surface paint, disclosing other work below. The upper paint was then cleared away from all the other panels. Two, in the centre, bore a Scripture subject. The others bore, alternately, coats of arms and the monogram IHS, with wreaths of vine-leaves. The arms ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Saint Albans - With an Account of the Fabric & a Short History of the Abbey • Thomas Perkins

... pretty close work. That gives six feet scant in the head of Murderer's Chute. We can just barely rub through if we hit it exactly right. But it's worth trying. She don't ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... to the hips. The married women wear their hair all of a length, but tied behind as that of maids is. And the women scratch on their bodies and limbs, with a sharp iron, pictures of fowls, fish, and beasts, and rub into the 'drawings' lively colors which dry into the flesh and are permanent." The "Relatyon" says the people are witty and ingenious and allows them many good qualities, but makes this exception: "The people steal anything comes near ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... soft. Time you git it dug down right it'll take you about a year, I reckon, and then you ain't done. You got to git brains—buffalo brains is best—and smear all over it, and let 'em dry in. Then you got to take your hide up and rub it till it's plum soft. That'll take you a couple of weeks, I reckon. Then you kin smoke it, if you have got any place to smoke it, an' that'll take you a week, it you don't burn it up. Sometimes you kin whiten a hide by rubbin' it with white clay, if you can git any clay. That might take you a ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough

... But however varied the mode of creation may be, an almost unvarying characteristic of the production of really precious and lasting artwork is ungrudging painstaking, such as we find described in William Hunt's "Talks about Art":—"If you could see me dig and groan, rub it out and start again, hate myself and feel dreadfully! The people who do things easily, their things you look at easily, and give away easily." Lastly and briefly, it is not the mode of working, but the result of this working which ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... That ain't the name! Why, Cora, for ten years that child has lifted me on my bad days and carried me and babied me like I was a queen. It's nothing for her to rub me two hours straight. Not a day before she leaves for work that she ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst

... angel. Tell 'er I said so—that's if you can, you twig? And say that when I 'eard that nearly all the gay old crowd o' pupils 'ad gone away, day before yesterday, I could 'a blooming well cut me throat, thinkin' she'd gone too. Becos' when I swore in for the Town Guard, it was with the idear—mind you rub that in!—of strikin' a blow for Beauty as well as for Britanniar, twig?" The thin elbow in the tweed sleeve nudged her, provoking a ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... heart failed her when she thought of sitting down night after night to such an interminable meal. Worse still, she had taken a dislike to her host. Her likes and dislikes were always characterized by Highland intensity, and something in her aunt's husband seemed to rub her the wrong way. Mr. Fane-Smith was a retired Indian judge, a man much respected in the religious world, and in his way a really good man; but undoubtedly his sympathies were narrow and his creed hard. Closely intwined with much true and active Christianity, he had allowed ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall

... bouncing Junos were never weary of sitting in the chairs and contemplating in the glass their own bland images; and I have seen one lady strip up her dress, and, with cries of wonder and delight, rub herself bare-breeched upon ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... bathed and sent back for inspection to the C.O., with a chit from O.C. "A" Company, pointing out that, as he couldn't initial her, he had put his office stamp on her tummy and hoped it wouldn't rub off. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug. 22, 1917 • Various

... to grate slowly along the sides of the piles. The attempt was desperate, but it seemed to be the only chance for escaping torture and death, and it suited the reckless daring of the man's character. Waiting to the last moment, in order that the stern of the scow might fairly rub against the platform, he began to writhe again, as if in intolerable suffering, execrating all Indians in general, and the Hurons in particular, and then he suddenly and rapidly rolled over and over, taking the direction of the stern of the scow. Unfortunately, Hurry's shoulders ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper

... that off for the articles to dry. The application of solvents to window cleaning, also, would be a possible thing but for the primitive construction of our windows, which prevents anything but a painful rub, rub, rub, with the leather. A friend of mine in domestic service tells me that this rubbing is to get the window dry, and this seems to be the general impression, but I think it incorrect. The water is not an adequate solvent, and enough cannot be used under existing conditions. ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells

... feet for use as food, scrub the feet well and pour boiling water over them. After a minute or two, remove them from the water and rub them with a clean cloth to peel off the scaly skin, as shown in Fig. 23. Finally remove the nails ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 3 - Volume 3: Soup; Meat; Poultry and Game; Fish and Shell Fish • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences

... the hostess, turning to a woman who was engaged in dragging in a feather bed and deluging the room with feathers. "Take this coat and this vest, and, after drying them before the fire—just as we used to do for your late master—give them a good rub, and ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

... at the pier, then separated, two going aboard, and the others disappearing into sundry streets and reappearing presently at the water-front with other figures. The human form cannot be distinctly seen, at a distance of three miles, to rub its eyes; neither can it be heard to curse; but there was that in the newer figures which suggested a sudden and reluctant surrender of sleeping privileges. Had our supposititious watcher possessed an intimate and contemptuous knowledge of Caracuna ...
— The Unspeakable Perk • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... into a realm of disembodied thinking which his mind was not sufficiently disciplined to summarize. It is quite plain, he said to himself, that I must rub up my vanished mathematics. For certainly the mathematician comes closer to God than any other, since his mind is trained to conceive and formulate the magnificent phantoms of legality. He smiled to think that any one should presume to become a ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley

... Voice differs as much from a Simple Breath, as doth that hoarse Sound, which we excite, by rubbing the tops of our Fingers hard upon some Glass or Table, which is quite differing from that same soft whistling Sound, which is heard when we lightly rub with the Hand the ...
— The Talking Deaf Man - A Method Proposed, Whereby He Who is Born Deaf, May Learn to Speak, 1692 • John Conrade Amman

... the cabin as fast as you can," said Dick. "Take off those wet things, rub yourself down before the fire; then put on dry clothes and come back here and ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler

... O Lord, what's here to do? I in unlawful doings with my master's worship— why, did you ever hear the like now? Sir, did ever I do anything of your midnight concerns but warm your bed, and tuck you up, and set the candle and your tobacco-box and your urinal by you, and now and then rub the soles of your feet? O ...
— Love for Love • William Congreve

... else, which at first caused him to rub his eyes in the belief that he must have fallen asleep and dreamt; nothing less, indeed, than the sound of a woman's voice. He began to reason with himself. What was there strange in this? He was told, or had inferred, that a woman had been left upon ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard

... and shook his head. "Oh, he's worse than that, Fred. It isn't polite to mention what he is, outside of the Arabian Nights. I guessed you'd come to rub ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather

... that our genteel felon was not only refined in manners but shy towards his new companions; nor, for several weeks, could all our efforts rub off his reserve. I was not surprised that he kept aloof from the coarser inmates, but I was not prepared to find that all my own advances to confidence and companionship, were repulsed with even more decision than those of my officers. At last, some passing ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer

... a month from now," explained Old Mother Nature, smiling down at Whitefoot. "That which you call fur will come off. He will rub it off against the trees until his antlers are polished, and there is not a trace of it left. You see Lightfoot has just grown ...
— The Burgess Animal Book for Children • Thornton W. Burgess

... conform to, conform to rule; accommodate oneself to, adapt oneself to; rub off corners. be regular &c. adj.; move in a groove; follow observe the rules, go by the rules, bend to the rules ,obey the rules, obey the precedents; comply with, tally with, chime in with, fall in with; be guided by, be regulated by; fall into a custom,fall into a usage; follow the fashion, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... but one wish left, to rejoin the flock, rub himself against the human animals, his brothers, feel with them, act with them.... Though exhausted by sleeplessness, he started, in spite of his wife, to take the train for Paris with Maxime. They had to ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain

... forefinger, and the middle and third fingers; their hands being pressed together—and, still with closed eyes, they retired behind the high altar, where an officiating priest made use of the bread to rub off the holy oil. The Bishop is an elderly man, about three score and ten; he has the usual sallow tint of his countrymen, but his eye, somewhat sunk or retired, beneath black and overhanging eyebrows, is sharp and expressive. His whole mien has the indication ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume One • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... room: Dis nigger couldn't tell what dey was after; Dey took off all my clothes, And den what does you suppose? Dey put me in a tub of boilin' water! And den dey got around, And some scrubbin'-brushes found, And said dey'd wash me whiter dan paper. Oh! dey got me in a tub, And dey all began to rub: I tell you it was a pretty sight! For, some put on de soap. And de oders dey did scrub, But dey found dey couldn't wash de ...
— Slavery's Passed Away and Other Songs • Various

... sleep with our own faces toward our village. No two men must lie covered by the same robe. He must not ride or walk in a beaten path lest the spirit of the path go running on ahead of us to warn the enemy, and if by chance we do, we must come to the big medicine and rub it on the horses' legs to ward off the danger." This said, Iron Horn said much more to his young braves—all the demon fears which the savage mind conjures up in its contact with the supernatural, together with stated forms ...
— The Way of an Indian • Frederic Remington

... should think one look would be enough," said Morvyth. "She has a 'Come here, my good man, and let me argue the matter out with you' expression on her face this last day or two that should daunt the most foolhardy. If she caught a burglar she'd certainly sit him down and rub social reform and political economy into him before ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil

... And he remains sleeping all alone, while the lady goes to fetch the ointment. The lady opens a case of hers, and, taking out a box, gives it to the damsel, and charges her not to be too prodigal in its use: she should rub only his temples with it, for there is no use of applying it elsewhere; she should anoint only his temples with it, and the remainder she should carefully keep, for there is nothing the matter with him except in his brain. She sends him also a robe ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes

... to gently rub my clitoris with her finger, while she kissed my breasts and lips passionately. I soon began again to experience the delicious sensation I have spoken of before; rivers of pleasure permeated through my system. My breasts bounded up and down—my buttocks were set in motion ...
— The Life and Amours of the Beautiful, Gay and Dashing Kate Percival - The Belle of the Delaware • Kate Percival

... coat, taking them for sovereigns, though how he could have seen a sovereign at that time in Scotland I can only conjecture. But Robert caught him by the shoulders, and shook him awake with no gentle hands, upon which he began to rub ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald

... in America," laughed Magsie, "who got his 'answers to correspondents' mixed up, and in reply to 'how to kill a plague of crickets' put 'rub their gums gently with a thimble, and if feverish, administer Perry's Teething Powders'; while to 'Anxious Mother of Twins', he gave the advice: 'Burn tobacco on a hot shovel, and the little pests will hop about and ...
— A harum-scarum schoolgirl • Angela Brazil

... Amy, in the tone of resignation that never failed to rub Mollie the wrong way. "Something ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope

... and the consequent deference which they exact from others: the over-valuation of worldly possessions and of worldly honours, and in consequence, a too eager competition for them. The rough edges of one man rub against those of another, if the expression may be allowed; and the friction is often such as to injure the works, and disturb the just arrangements and regular motions of the social machine. But by Christianity all these roughnesses ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce

... certain personal interest, her delicate face, her figure, slim and gracefully curved, as her evening dress fully revealed it. Yes, a charming, most ladylike figure. And the skin of her face, of neck and shoulders, was beautifully white, and of the texture suggesting that it will rub if too impetuously caressed. Yes, a man would hesitate to kiss her unless he were well shaved. At the very thought of kissing her Grant felt a thrill and a glow she had never before roused in him. She had an abundance of blue-black hair, and it ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips

... they wander over that brow, where the furrows seem torn as the thunder scars, as if to wipe from it a stain, or charm from it a pang; sometimes they gather up the hem of that sordid robe, and seem, for hours together, striving to rub from it a soil. Then, out from prolonged silence, without cause or warning, will ring, peal after peal (till the frame, exhausted with the effort sinks senseless into stupor), the frightful laugh. But speech, intelligible and coherent, those lips rarely yield. There ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... tablespoons of butter, one tablespoon of flour, one teaspoon of salt and a dash of pepper, one half teaspoon of sugar, one quart of milk or half milk and half cream. Rinse the peas, add some water and boil until soft, then rub through a colander. Add Armour's Extract of Beef to hot water and peas, making one quart in all. Melt the butter and add the flour, then gradually the hot soup. Cook until smooth, add the seasoning, and the milk ...
— Armour's Monthly Cook Book, Volume 2, No. 12, October 1913 - A Monthly Magazine of Household Interest • Various

... artist replied, commencing a dissertation on the style and beauty of the young girl, all of which was lost upon the doctor, who, in a kind of maze, quitted the room, and returning to Jessie, said to her carelessly: "He hasn't it. You know they rub out those they do not use. So you'll have to do without; and, Jessie, I wouldn't tell Guy I tried ...
— Aikenside • Mary J. Holmes

... shawl, for it was getting chilly out on the porch. Significantly the first thing Rebecca Mary did after she began to grow up was to get the shawl and lay it over Aunt Olivia's spare shoulders. The second thing was to bend to the scant gray hair and lightly rub it with her cheek. It was a ...
— Rebecca Mary • Annie Hamilton Donnell

... butterflies. Others are ant-lions or caddis-flies. The curve of the fragment of wing also suggested its probable size when unbroken. It was perhaps two inches long. As there are little horny rings round the wing base like those which crickets have, on which they rub their legs and so "chirp," it is also quite likely that this insect of hoary antiquity did the same, and enlivened the silence of Devonian fern groves with a prehistoric hum. It is quite in keeping with modern ideas that in that age of fishes one of the most remarkable insects should ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish

... Tommy. "He's the only person who knows anything of what's going on, and he evidently wants to find out who sent him that note, or he wouldn't have answered it as he did. He'll have to give me some sort of explanation if I go and see him. I shall rub it into him that my supposed pal is a perfectly sensible, unimaginative sort of chap—and anyway people don't invent a ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges

... here. He refused to shake hands with me, and muttered something about its being his turn next time. Till then he had not been considered a first-rate hand at anything; he was one of those fellows who saunter through school, get up just enough lessons to rub along comfortably, never take any prominent part in games, but have a little set of their own, and hold themselves aloof ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty

... have to tell you, but the French are going to shoot me for a spy. The fool man in command here, who was probably a successful pork butcher before the war started, declines to communicate with headquarters, and I rather hope you'll rub it into him when you learn all. It seems I speak German too well, and I should not be surprised if the sham English 'brass hat' who upset them last night were that scoundrel, Van ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry

... and gave his face a rub. In his indignation, his carelessness, he would have done nothing of the sort, had he not been reminded by the ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood

... may be solved by means of electricity. Take a goblet like the one that supports the pipe, and rub it briskly against your coat sleeve, so as to electrify the glass through friction. Having done this, bring the goblet to within about a centimeter of the pipe stem. The latter will then be seen to be strongly attracted, and will follow the glass around ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 363, December 16, 1882 • Various

... have dried (in shade, not sun), go over them with a rag dampened in light oil. This insures preservation and restores their natural luster. Every three months or so, rub them with oil again—their most delicate colors will remain brilliant for years. Don't ever use shellac, lacquer or varnish. Get a reference book from your library and identify your shells. Keep an account of when ...
— Let's collect rocks & shells • Shell Oil Company

... rub oil and soot into the hated coat industriously. The dogs leaped the ditch, and the instant they struck the woods broke away baying over fresh tracks. The men yelled like mad. Jimmy struggled into his overcoat, and helped ...
— At the Foot of the Rainbow • Gene Stratton-Porter

... amateur would rub up against those beasts, so I guess it's all right. They ain't but two lions; bill says ten; man that wrote the bill was the other eight, I reckon." The show-girl was fastened in the central cage. The clowns raised the inner doors, and the lions shot from their cramped quarters ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis

... Tom. "Well, I suppose we may as well give it up, fellows. The only way we could worm it out of Dick would be to rub his nose in the dirt. And he might fight if we did. This is where I have to leave you. So long! I'll meet the army at ...
— The Grammar School Boys in Summer Athletics • H. Irving Hancock

... with a steam roller and had a signpost set to mark it. Never think, child, of the ocean as a lonely, uncharted waste of water. It is a nice quiet place with as much sociability on it as a man wants. You don't, to be sure, rub elbows with your neighbors as you do ashore; but on the other hand you don't have to put up with their racket. Pleasant as it is to be on land the hum of it gets on my nerves in time, and I am always thankful to be ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett

... There was the rub. He was haunted by what might have happened. Soon he became a timid, shrinking lad, utterly lacking confidence in the strength of his arms and his skill with an oar and a sail; and after that came to pass, his life was ...
— Billy Topsail & Company - A Story for Boys • Norman Duncan

... Shirley. Your note came, and I followed your instructions. Let me present to you your new star, Miss Helene Marigold, who just disembarked on the steamer from England this morning. You have secured a young lady who is making all Europe sit up and rub its eyes. I believe I have at last found a match for ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball

... in cartridge paper, lay it down, on the wrong side, upon a board thinly spread with embroidery paste. Let it get thoroughly impregnated with the paste and then transfer it carefully to its proper place on the stuff; press it closely down with the large presser, and with the little convex one rub the stuff firmly, from beneath, to make it adhere closely to the pasted pattern; small, pointed leaves and flowers will be found to need sewing down besides, as you will observe in fig. 242, where each point is secured by stitches. The embroidery should not be begun until the paste is ...
— Encyclopedia of Needlework • Therese de Dillmont

... put in, "one year isn't much! The laying out of this garden occupied a whole year; and to paint a picture of it now will certainly need two years' time. She'll have to rub the ink, to moisten the pencils, to stretch the paper, to ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... rub it in, Julia: it's not kind. No man is quite himself when he's crossed in love. (To Charteris.) Now listen to me, Charteris. When I was a young fellow, Cuthbertson and I fell in love with the same woman. She preferred Cuthbertson. ...
— The Philanderer • George Bernard Shaw

... Mrs. Jason Vandervelde called on Mrs. Peter Champneys, and at sight of Nancy in her black frock experienced something of the emotion that had moved her husband. She felt inclined to rub her eyes. And then she wished to smile, remembering how unnecessarily sorry she and Jason had been for young ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler

... fixing pins so that they pressed against the radicles of beans suspended vertically in damp air, we saw this kind of curvature; but rubbing the part with a twig or needle for a few minutes produced no effect. Haberlandt remarks,*** that these radicles in breaking through the seed-coats often rub and press against the ruptured edges, and consequently bend round them. As little squares of the card-like paper affixed with shellac to the tips were highly efficient in causing the radicles to bend away from them, ...
— The Power of Movement in Plants • Charles Darwin

... readily rub down to a beautiful green powder, which weighs something less than one-fifth of the original weight of the leaves. Care must be taken that the leaves be not scorched in drying, and they should not be dried more than what is requisite to allow of ...
— An Account of the Foxglove and some of its Medical Uses - With Practical Remarks on Dropsy and Other Diseases • William Withering

... Orlando. Let them put a large black cross on all the Croat houses of Rieka—well, on second thoughts, next morning, that was not a very brilliant idea, because the crosses were too numerous; so let the soldiers rub them out again. And where the Croat names on banks and shops and elsewhere had been effaced, demolished—one could hide them by long strips of paper which they were so busy printing: "Either Italy ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein

... however, it worked splendidly, for I had only to turn to the word 'Toothache' to discover that the fairy remedy was to 'rub the other side of the face with a stinging nettle, and the pain and swelling ...
— The Mysterious Shin Shira • George Edward Farrow

... was fixed for Wednesday or Thursday—so much I knew. But no more. There was the rub. I really could not toil up to Town ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates

... There was the rub. The truth is, the performance of the stove, at that hour of the night, too, was so wholly out of the ordinary that she and Elmer had not so much as stirred out of their tracks for the fraction of a second it took the thing ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... study wound his brain too tight, Or that his fancy play'd him tricks, He could not on the lady fix. He look'd around, And often found, A damsel passing fair; "She's good enough," he then would cry, And rub his hands, and wink his eye, "I'll ...
— Vignettes in Verse • Matilda Betham

... sharp jokes. Nearly every man had a nickname. Murch was called 'Captain Snarl'; a tall, fierce-looking man, who just filled my idea of a Spanish freebooter, was 'Dr. Coddle.' I think his real name was Wood. The rum seems to make them crazy, for one, who was called 'Rub-a-dub,' pitched 'Dr. Coddle' head and heels into the water. A gentlemanly man named Thompson, who acted as master of ceremonies, or Grand Turk, interfered and put a stop to what was becoming something like a fight. Mr. Thompson said that the wind would go down ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop

... returned Fergus with alacrity before his aunt could answer. He had to put down the carver to rub his hands, he was so pleased with the way things were turning out—Mrs. St. Clair safely at the falls, where they knew exactly where to find her; Jean, with the boy and her basket of eggs comfortably occupied all the afternoon; and Aunt Jeanie obliged to stay with Uncle Donald. Why, he would have ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... grand bustle, and Ellen was well enough now to come in for her share. The kitchen, parlour, hall, shed, and lower kitchen, must all be thoroughly swept and dusted; this was given to her, and a morning's work pretty near she found it. Then she had to rub bright all the brass handles of the doors, and the big brass andirons in the parlour, and the brass candlesticks on the parlour mantel- piece. When at last she got through, and came to the fire to warm herself, ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell

... her head and gave him a long, peculiar look; then, without any sort of expostulation, started singing. Her voice was low and weird. The song was so extraordinary that he had to rub his eyes to ascertain whether he was awake or dreaming. The slow surprises of the grotesque melody began to agitate him in a horrible fashion; the words were pure nonsense—or else their significance was ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay

... the wall stand the wrestling shoes of Eric Brighteyes. Haste thee now and take grease, and rub the soles with it, then hold them in the heat of the fire, so that the fat sinks in. Do this swiftly and secretly, and I will give thee ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard

... rub shoulders with others, keep them from highly exciting tales, let them read but little, and train them to be observant of external objects ...
— Epilepsy, Hysteria, and Neurasthenia • Isaac G. Briggs

... Uncle Jack, he want to git free. He find de way Norf by de moss on de tree. He cross dat [52]river a-floatin' in a tub. Dem [53]Patterollers give 'im a mighty close rub. ...
— Negro Folk Rhymes - Wise and Otherwise: With a Study • Thomas W. Talley

... and by. Just picture to yourself, if you can, that fond, foolish old man seeking to teach this lesson to that wan-eyed, pinched-face little cripple! But little Abel took it all very seriously, and was so apt a pupil that Old Growly made great joy and was wont to rub his bony hands gleefully and say to himself, "He has great genius,—this boy of mine,—great genius ...
— The Holy Cross and Other Tales • Eugene Field

... event that woke China from her dream of solitary grandeur was the war with England, which broke out in 1839 and was closed three years later by the Treaty of Nanking. It was not, however, all that was needed to effect that object. It made the giant rub her eyes and give a reluctant assent to terms imposed by superior force. But many a rude lesson was still required before she came to perceive her true position, as on the lower side of an inclined plane. To bring her to this discovery four more foreign wars were to follow ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord

... volumes to Corpus Christi College at Cambridge. Among these is the oldest copy of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. John Bale, once a friar, afterwards, alas! a Protestant Bishop, says that some of the books from the monasteries were used to scour candlesticks or to rub boots; some were sold to grocers and soap-vendors; ...
— Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days • Emily Hickey

... when fresh and good. It is, however, inferior to the flag as a coloring or dyeing agent. The seeds from which the substance is obtained are red on the outside, and two methods are followed in order to obtain it. One is to rub or wash off the coloring matter with water, allow it to subside, and to expose it to spontaneous evaporation till it acquires a pasty consistence. The other is to bruise the seeds, mix them with water, and allow fermentation to ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XXI., No. 531, March 6, 1886 • Various

... groped his way back through the halls to the beautiful garden of shining fruits, but he could find no way of escape. For two days, he cried and shouted for help. At last, as he clasped his hands in despair, he happened to rub the magic ring which the Magician had placed ...
— Story Hour Readers Book Three • Ida Coe and Alice J. Christie

... that when I was upholstered. They put applebutter on me—and coal oil and white-of-an-egg and starch and anything else the neighbors could think of. They would bring it over and rub it on the little joy and sunshine of the family, who had gotten ...
— The University of Hard Knocks • Ralph Parlette

... Your minde is all as youthfull as your blood. Now heare me speake with a propheticke spirit: For euen the breath of what I meane to speake, Shall blow each dust, each straw, each little rub Out of the path which shall directly lead Thy foote to Englands Throne. And therefore marke: Iohn hath seiz'd Arthur, and it cannot be, That whiles warme life playes in that infants veines, The mis-plac'dIohn should entertaine ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... in the lap Of THETIS, taken out his nap, 30 And, like a lobster boil'd, the morn From black to red began to turn, When HUDIBRAS, whom thoughts and aking, 'Twixt sleeping kept all night and waking, Began to rub his drowsy eyes, 35 And from his couch prepar'd to rise, Resolving to dispatch the deed He vow'd to do with trusty speed. But first, with knocking loud, and bawling, He rouz'd the Squire, in truckle lolling; 40 And, ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler

... he been more contrary, as his old nurse was wont to call it. No one could please him, and Guy was not allowed to do anything for him. Whatever he said was intended to rub on some sore place in Guy's mind. His mother and Laura's signs made him worse, for he had the pleasure of teasing them, also; but Guy endured it all with perfect temper, and he grew more cross at his failure; yet, from force of habit, at bed-time, he found himself on the stairs ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge

... "Ah, that's the rub," said Michael. "He's been in possession of the desired article, let me see—since Wednesday, about four o'clock, and is now, I should imagine, on his way to the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... had at some time been badly sprung, so that the armourers had made shift to strengthen it with a stout iron fillet some six inches wide. Now it so happened that my grasp came upon this fillet, and, with every stroke of the oar, day after day, week in and week out, it had become my wont to rub the links of my chain to and fro across this iron band, whereby they had ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol

... delight all the way down per rail, and it shortened the rapid flight of that velocipede. You may depend upon it that the book will sell, which, after all, is the rub. It is the antipodes of Lord Carnarvon, and yet how they tally in what they have in common, and that is much—the people, the scenery of Galicia, and the suspicions and absurdities of Spanish Jacks-in-office, who yield not ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles

... her life. Amidst the press and cares of her later reign we find Ascham recording how "after dinner I went up to read with the Queen's majesty that noble oration of Demosthenes against AEschines." At a later time her Latin served her to rebuke the insolence of a Polish ambassador, and she could "rub up her rusty Greek" at need to bandy pedantry with a Vice-Chancellor. But Elizabeth was far as yet from being a mere pedant. She could already speak French and Italian as fluently as her mother-tongue. In later days we find her familiar ...
— History of the English People - Volume 4 (of 8) • John Richard Green

... who believes that on every traveling man's head should rest a dunce cap will some fine day get badly fooled if he continues to rub up against the drummer. The road is the biggest college in the world. Its classrooms are not confined within a few gray stone buildings with red slate roofs; they are the nooks and corners of the earth. Its teachers ...
— Tales of the Road • Charles N. Crewdson

... freshening up Tom with the sponges for the next round, and has set two other boys to rub his hands. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester

... sandal and other perfumed pastes as from the entertainment of guests. Therefore, do thou strive to entertain guests, O son of Pandu! O king, they that give unto guests water to wash their feet, butter to rub over their (tired) legs, light during the hours of darkness, food, and shelter, have not to go before Yama. The removal (after worship) of the flowery offerings unto the gods, the removal of the remnants of a Brahmana's feast, waiting (upon a Brahmana) with perfumed pastes, and ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 2 • Translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... he snatched the tints instinctively, without premeditation. Ah! that marvellous hand, those thick fingers holding the brush so firmly-somewhat heavily; how malleable, how obedient, that most rebellious material, oil-colour, was to his touch. He did with it what he liked. I believe he could rub a picture over with Prussian blue without experiencing any inconvenience; half-an-hour after the colour ...
— Modern Painting • George Moore

... and the clasp had flecks of rust upon it. What it contained Lone did not know. Virginia had taught him that a man must not be curious about the personal belongings of a woman. Now he turned the purse over, tried to rub out the stiffness of the leather, and smiled a little as he dropped it back into ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower

... to escape; but utterly exhausted, it sank down again almost immediately, resigned to this unknown doom which stole upon it out of the tempest and the dark. Pete's hand was on it again the moment it was still. He felt it quiver and shrink beneath his touch. Instinctively he began to stroke and rub the stiff hair as he slipped his treacherous hand forward along the heaving flank. The heavings grew quieter, the frightened snortings ceased. The exhausted animal seemed to feel a reassurance ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts

... striking pair repaired to the Bowhead saloon to discuss the situation over a glass of beer. However, Mr. Gibney's spirits never dropped below zero while he had one nickel to rub against another; hence such slight depression as he felt was due to a feeling that Captain Scraggs had basely swindled him and McGuffey. He was disappointed in Scraggs and said as much. "However, Bart," he concluded, "we'll never say 'die' while our money holds out, and in the meantime our ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne

... her dressing-room with her maid, who had come to the theatre to help her, and he had a thrill of disgust as he watched her rub the cleansing grease over her painted cheeks. It now struck him as horrible—this pollution of the human face night after night with filthy cosmetics that could only be removed by a filthier grease. ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill

... be fulfilled as quickly as that of Laura's there would be few unsatisfied people in the world, for before it was out of her mouth Billie uttered a sharp cry of pain, and, lifting a smarting ankle in her hand, began to rub it gently. ...
— Billie Bradley on Lighthouse Island - The Mystery of the Wreck • Janet D. Wheeler

... matter which way we fire then, we shall be sure to bring some one down. Glad you think the Spanish King ain't run away though. If I was a king I know what I should do, comrade," continued Punch, nursing his musket and giving it an affectionate rub and pat here and there. "Leg ...
— !Tention - A Story of Boy-Life during the Peninsular War • George Manville Fenn

... Heinrich. "Miss Whitney, did you not attempt to rub off with your handkerchief from Spencer's blood-stained shirt, ...
— I Spy • Natalie Sumner Lincoln

... the darkness. Slyboots went on for some distance, till he came to a door. He looked through a crack, and saw three young girls[122] sitting with the old man, whose head was resting on the lap of one of them. The girl was saying, "If I only rub the bruise a few times more with the bell,[123] the pain and swelling will disappear." Slyboots thought, "That is certainly the place where I struck the old man with the back of the axe three weeks ago." He decided to wait behind the door ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby

... at brother Ambrose, and, as desk and monk clattered on to the floor together, he sprang through the open door and down the winding stair. Sleepy old brother Athanasius, at the porter's cell, had a fleeting vision of twinkling feet and flying skirts; but before he had time to rub his eyes the recreant had passed the lodge, and was speeding as fast as his sandals could patter ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle

... demonstrations. No gladness was in his face. His speech, as hurried as theirs, answered no queries. He asked loftily for air, soap, water and the privacy of his own room, and when they had followed him there and seen him scour face, arms, neck, and head, rub dry and resume his jacket and belt, he had grown only more careworn and had not yet let his sister's ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable

... if I had moved mountains, and at least I have been very happy on many different occasions, and that is always something. I can read nothing, write nothing; but a little while ago and I could eat nothing either; but now that is changed. This is a long letter for me; rub your hands, boy, for 'tis an ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... it for F to rub her hands smugly and say, "We're on the right track, all right"? Weve been on the right track for months, but ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore

... for just the flash of one instant, exactly how her boy or girl really would look. How much easier that would make it to hold fast to the consciousness that she was not merely in pain, but was laboring to bring forth a warm flesh-and-blood child. There was the rub—in spite of her eagerness, the little one, so priceless, wasn't as yet quite definite, real. She recalled the rosy-checked, curly-haired youngster her fancy had created a moment ago. She would cling to that picture; yes, ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius

... turned an empty barrel with its head upward, banged the loaf down upon it, drew a knife from its sheath in his belt, and counted the prisoners over with the point of the blade. He then drew a few imaginary lines upon the top of the loaf, paused to rub his woolly head with the haft, looking puzzled and as if cutting the loaf into as many pieces as there were prisoners bothered him, and ended by making a dash ...
— Nic Revel - A White Slave's Adventures in Alligator Land • George Manville Fenn

... lordship lolls at his ease, enjoying his estate, without concerning himself any further about it. Just so will I do, and give myself no more trouble than needs mast, but enjoy myself like any duke, and let the world rub." ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... have seen in print—for making metheglin or hydromel. He does not object to furmety or junket, or indeed to custards, if they are eaten at the proper seasons, and in the middle or at the end of meals. But he dislikes mushrooms, and advises you to wash out your mouth, and rub your teeth and gums with a dry ...
— Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine • William Carew Hazlitt

... thing of the kind in the State. I've been scrambling along here as best I might for three months, but as soon as I get a resident head worker, we'll get everything straightened out." She gave her nose a sudden rub with her hand, frowned in a ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris

... brush the bulb of the thumb with a well-soaked badger-hair nail-brush, and, having rinsed it in water, dried it with a silk handkerchief, and gave it a final rub on a piece of chamois leather. The thumb having been thus prepared, he squeezed out a drop of the thick ink on to the copper plate and spread it out with the roller, testing the condition of the film from time to time by touching the plate with the tip of his ...
— The Red Thumb Mark • R. Austin Freeman

... "Rub it in, if you like to. You can't make me mad. Just the same, if it wasn't for what you've done ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... me to take the mustang round to the stable, to rub him down, and feed him well, and to bring the minister's saddle-bags into the house. When I returned, after having obeyed these orders, I found the stranger seated at table—on which Aunt Hannah and Lily had spread supper—talking cheerfully; and from what he said ...
— Afar in the Forest • W.H.G. Kingston

... of Cut Loaf Sugar and rub the lumps on the skins of 4 Lemons and 2 Oranges until the Sugar becomes well saturated with the oil from the skins. Then put the Sugar thus prepared into a large porcelain-lined or ...
— The Ideal Bartender • Tom Bullock

... Stone which naturally resists the Fire, not so soft as to rub away easily, nor so hard as to endure polishing. They cut it from 16 to 18 Inches broad, and about 27 or 30 long, and 3 in thickness, and hollowed in the middle about an Inch and a half deep. This ...
— The Natural History of Chocolate • D. de Quelus

... estimation. This, I remember, was wildly irritating to me. I knew myself infinitely superior to them; I knew the long creature's novel was worthless; I knew that I had fifty books in me immeasurably better than it, and savagely and sullenly I desired to trample upon them, to rub their noses in their feebleness; but oh, it was I who was feeble! and full of visions of a wider world I raged up and down the cold walls of impassable mental limitations. Above me there was a barred window, and, but for my manacles, I would have sprung ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore

... sewing-machine will find no difficulty in accomplishing this. Several thicknesses of paper can be perforated at the same time, if required, by any ordinary machine. To transfer the traced and perforated design to the fabric to be embroidered, it is only necessary to rub a small quantity of ...
— Beeton's Book of Needlework • Isabella Beeton

... make his meaning clear. In the course of many years' faithful attention to business he had become rheumatic, and this paw, in particular was swollen and stiff at the joint. Lilac had found that it gave him ease to rub it, and Sober had got into the habit of calling her attention to it in this way at all times and seasons. Now as she took it in her hand and looked into his wise affectionate eyes, it suddenly struck her that here were two people who would really miss her, and want her if she were ...
— White Lilac; or the Queen of the May • Amy Walton



Words linked to "Rub" :   physical contact, adjoin, guide, draw, meet, chafe, grate, pass, touch, scrape, sponge off, pumice, rub down, abrade, fret, contact, scuff, scour, pass over, smudge, blur, rosin, sponge down, smutch, worry, rub along, obstruction, puree, brush, irritate, obstacle, smear, strain, rub off, run, gauge, scrub



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