"Scuttle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "You scuttle off like a rabbit into its burrow," said Beatrice indignantly on one occasion; "and if you're caught, you behave in such a silly, awkward way that I'm ashamed of you. People will think you haven't been properly ...
— The Youngest Girl in the Fifth - A School Story • Angela Brazil
... only with pistols and cutlasses; nevertheless this was their one and their only chance, and they determined to take the Spanish ship or to die in the attempt. Down upon the Spaniard they bore through the dusk of the night, and giving orders to the "chirurgeon" to scuttle their craft under them as they were leaving it, they swarmed up the side of the unsuspecting ship and upon its decks in a torrent—pistol in one hand and cutlass in the other. A part of them ran to the gun room and secured the arms and ammunition, ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... enough the boys did their part. It was fine to see them starting out in the wrong direction, and twisting and doubling through the crooked lanes till they worked round to the Mission Hall, and then in with a rush and a scuttle, that as few as possible might see. The doings of the Fenton crowd, as they were known locally, were the talk of the town in those first days after Roger departed. Would they meet? Would they keep it up? Would they ...
— The Comrade In White • W. H. Leathem
... liberally toward me, for I pledge you my word that if I see any disposition to evade my requirements I will blow out the bottom of everything," and a snaky glitter in his small black eyes showed how remorselessly he could scuttle the ship ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... was on a level with the deck still hidden by the sides of the scuttle at the top of the ladder. And there he poised himself; for the last steps to the deck must be made in a single rush, so quickly ...
— All the Brothers Were Valiant • Ben Ames Williams
... flew down and tried to pull out the last [needle]. Grandma saw him, and called Jack. [Jack] looked in the [coal scuttle], he crawled under the [couch], he climbed on a [chair] and reached into the [vases] on the [mantel]. Jimmy Crow hopped about him and chuckled ...
— Jimmy Crow • Edith Francis Foster
... the trap door to let the inspector and his interpreter in. Tai Yau exclaimed to Mrs. Lau, "He is coming to arrest women for keeping an unlicensed brothel, let us flee!" Tai-Yau ran up a ladder through a scuttle out upon the flat roof of the house, her old servant following and Mrs. Lau behind. The inspector and interpreter followed, while the informer escaped from the house. Mrs. Lau managed to reach the hatch of the next house, No. 44, and ran down ...
— Heathen Slaves and Christian Rulers • Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew and Katharine Caroline Bushnell
... china cupboard, and a door leading into the hall where the main front entrance to the house and the stairs to the floor above are situated. On the right, to the rear, a door opening on to the dining room. Further forward, the kitchen range with scuttle, wood box, etc. In the centre of the room, a table with a red and white cloth. Four cane-bottomed chairs are pushed under the table. In front of the stove, two battered wicker rocking chairs. The floor is partly covered by linoleum ...
— The Straw • Eugene O'Neill
... and gangrene, supporting the strength of the men by proper food, and keeping the air as pure as possible. I got our beef into the way of being boiled, and would have some good substantial broth made around it. I went on a foraging expedition—found a coal-scuttle which would do for a slop-pail, and confiscated it, got two bits of board, by which it could be converted into a stool, and so bring the great rest of a change of position to such men as could sit up; had a little drain made with a bit of board for a shovel, ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... buckets, covered with signal flags, and with their clean frocks and faces. To-day is so cold that I dare not go on deck, and am writing in my black-hole of a cabin, in a green light, with the sun blinking through the waves as they rush over my port and scuttle. The captain is much vexed at the loss of time. I persist in thinking it a very pleasant, but utterly lazy life. I sleep a great deal, but don't eat much, and my cough has been bad; but, considering the real hardship ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon
... opera bandits and are very picturesque in appearance, and while they look like Lord Byron's corsairs, they never cut a throat nor scuttle a ship under any circumstances; they are the mildest of men. While strolling in the public market I noticed a bit of local color: one of the fierce looking pirates had for sale half a dozen little red pigs with big, black, polka dots on them. I stopped to look at ...
— A Fantasy of Mediterranean Travel • S. G. Bayne
... meean as the King 'ull put a stop to 't, for them say it as knows it, as there's to be a Rinform, and them landlords as never done the right thing by their tenants 'ull be treated i' that way as they'll hev to scuttle off. An' there's them i' Middlemarch knows what the Rinform is—an' as knows who'll hev to scuttle. Says they, 'I know who your landlord is.' An' says I, 'I hope you're the better for knowin' him, I arn't.' Says they, ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... cat-head, crooning over some interminable "love-song about murder," suddenly surceased his singing, raised himself up, and cast an eager and hurried glance ahead of the ship, shouted "Fish ho!" at the very top of his lungs, sprang from the cat-head, and ran down the fore-scuttle. In an instant all was commotion and hurry. Captain Williams threw down his bible with most anti-christian and unorthodox carelessness, and hurried to the forecastle, shouting, "A bottle of rum for the first fish;" the ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... into the cellar of the next with a crash, rousing the occupants of the house by a noise that seemed to their frightened ears like the explosion of a mine. In Issoudun, as in many country towns, the cellar is entered by an opening near the door of the house, covered with a wooden scuttle, secured by strong iron hinges and ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... was bare and gaunt, with blotched walls and a stained uneven floor. On a divan lay a pile of "properties"—limp draperies, an Algerian scarf, a moth-eaten fan of peacock feathers. The janitor had forgotten to fill the coal-scuttle over-night, and the cast-iron stove projected its cold flanks into the room like a black iceberg. Ned Stanwell, who had just added his hat and great-coat to the miscellaneous heap on the divan, turned from the ...
— The Hermit and the Wild Woman and Other Stories • Edith Wharton
... Squeaknibble speak so disrespectfully of Santa Claus, her wicked eyes glowed with joy, her sharp teeth watered, and her bristling fur emitted electric sparks as big as marrowfat peas. Then what did that bloodthirsty monster do but scuttle as fast as she could into Dear-my-Soul's room, leap up into Dear-my-Soul's crib, and walk off with the pretty little white muff which Dear-my-Soul used to wear when she went for a visit to the little girl in the next block! What upon earth did the horrid old cat want with Dear-my-Soul's pretty ...
— A Little Book of Profitable Tales • Eugene Field
... income, and might, one would think, under such circumstances be accorded a welcome by his family. But his wife and his mother-in-law, on the contrary, take a violent dislike to her, and the lawyer has to put her in the coal-scuttle or lock her up in the safe whenever he hears either of these female relatives of his coming ...
— Stage-Land • Jerome K. Jerome
... bit of fish or to open the cellar door. You recognized her right to appear at night on your bed with one of her long-suffering kittens, which she had brought in the rain, out of a cellar window and up a lofty ladder, over the wet, steep roofs and down through a scuttle into the garret, and still down into warm shelter. Here she would leave it and with one or two loud, admonishing purrs would scurry away upon some errand that must have been like one of the ...
— Concerning Cats - My Own and Some Others • Helen M. Winslow
... can tell by the sound what sail is coming in; and in a short time we heard the top-gallant-sails come in, one after another, and then the flying jib. This seemed to ease her a good deal, and we were fast going off to the land of Nod, when—bang, bang, bang on the scuttle, and "All hands, reef topsails, ahoy!" started us out of our berths, and it not being very cold weather, we had nothing extra to put on, and were soon on deck. I shall never forget the fineness ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... always dissipate a mob. A whole block of houses may become a fortress, which it is necessary to storm before a permanent victory is gained. Half-disciplined men, unaccustomed, and unskilled to such work, make poor headway with their muskets through narrow halls, up stairways, and through scuttle-holes. ...
— The Great Riots of New York 1712 to 1873 • J.T. Headley
... mixture for a week, by which time other symptoms, extremely disquieting to an ease-loving man, had manifested themselves. Going upstairs deprived her of breath; carrying a loaded tea-tray produced a long and alarming stitch in the side. The last time she ever filled the coal-scuttle she was discovered sitting beside it on the floor in ...
— Night Watches • W.W. Jacobs
... natural to try stunts of the sort under cover of darkness. At this camp, however, the paraffin arc lamps were particularly brilliant, and when star-gazing on several occasions I have seen rats and mice scuttle across the white sand some distance away. Though storms often raged during the day, the wind almost invariably blew itself out towards night, leaving a dead calm, broken only by the tramp of sentries or the distant rattling hum of a nightjar. It is a brave man who, having ...
— 'Brother Bosch', an Airman's Escape from Germany • Gerald Featherstone Knight
... her to think of something, and she thought she would throw things at the intruder; but as there was no earthly chance for her to hit the mouse, while every shot took effect on me, I told her to stop, after she had tried two flat-irons and the coal scuttle. She paused for breath, but I kept bobbing around. Somehow I felt no inclination to sit down anywhere. "Oh, Joshua," she cried, "I wish you had not killed the cat." Now, I submit that the wish was born of the weakness of woman's ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... recklessly partaking of an indiscriminate mixture of egg-flip, sangaree, and cider-cup, he feebly threw his wig at the spectacles of Mr. Verdant Green, and, overbalanced by the exertion, fell back into the coal-scuttle, where he lay, bald-headed and helpless, laughing and weeping by turns, and caressed by Huz and Buz. But the shaving of his head was not the only ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... is blown, there is a cry from Water Lane to Hanging-sword Alley, from Ashen-tree Court to Temple Gardens, of "Tipstaff! An arrest! an arrest!" and in a moment they are "up in the Friars," with a cry of "Fall on." The skulking debtors scuttle into their burrows, the bullies fling down cup and can, lug out their rusty blades, and rush into the melee. From every den and crib red-faced, bloated women hurry with fire-forks, spits, cudgels, pokers, and shovels. They're "up in the Friars," with a vengeance. Pouring into the Temple ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... also used in the chapter "Through the Scuttle with the Tinman" in the equation a(Dx/2T)f(a, b c T3) to indicate that the "3" is ...
— Journeys to Bagdad • Charles S. Brooks
... and rattle of a chain. A face emerged at the edge of the house's shadow; bearded and horned like that of Pan, it seemed to stare at him. And he saw the dim grey form of the garden goat, heard it scuttle round the stake to which it was tethered, as though alarmed at ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... the starving crew and passengers, and then riot in drunken debauchery on the deck. When the imprisoned wretches in the hold become desperate enough—and it is simply a question of time—they will fire the ship or scuttle it, and the fools and their victims will all perish together. True intellect is broad, fore-sighted, wide-ranging, merciful, just. Some one said of old that 'the gods showed what they thought of riches by the ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... rest that were upon the mainland quarterdecks, and began to fasten the hatches, to keep them down that were below; when the other boat and their men entering at the fore-chains, secured the forecastle of the ship, and the scuttle which went down into the cook-room, making three men they found there prisoners. When this was done, and all safe upon deck, the captain ordered the mate, with three men, to break into the round-house, where the new rebel captain lay, who having taken the alarm, had got up, ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe
... other," made an irresistible appeal to two women, pressed men's wives, who had been with singular lack of caution admitted on board. Whilst the younger and prettier of the two cajoled the sentinel from his post, the elder and uglier secured an axe and a hatchet and passed them unobserved through the scuttle to the prisoners below, who on their part made such good use of them that when at length the lieutenant returned he found the cage empty and the birds flown. The shackles strewing the press-room bore eloquent testimony to the manner of their ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... Pete was showing the newcomer about the sloop as though he were a guest. Such affability and charm did he display that 'Frisco Kid, popping his head up through the scuttle to call them to supper, nearly choked in his effort to suppress ...
— The Cruise of the Dazzler • Jack London
... that many men are more kind to everybody else's wives than to their own wives. They will let the wife carry a heavy coal scuttle upstairs, and will at one bound clear the width of a parlor to pick up some other lady's pocket-handkerchief. There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is common among men—namely, ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage
... ejaculated the Cap'n, rubbing his knurly forefinger under his nose, and glancing first at the parrots and then at the lady. "If that ain't as much of an astonisher as when the scuttle-butt danced a jig on the dog-vane! Them two us'ly cusses strangers, no matter what age or sect. They was learnt to do it." He gazed doubtfully at the birds, as though they might possibly be deteriorating in the ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... poles stuck in the ground and joined together at the top, the whole being interlaced with twigs, and this being covered with earth was impervious to cold or rain. The doorway was of the size and shape of the scuttle of a ship, formed in the sloping roof, and served also to allow the escape ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... coming days will have against a single hostile torpedo boat. Why, the captain of a torpedo boat, if he has but one torpedo on board, could sail in under a fleet, pick out his battleship, sink it and then scuttle away, under water, from the rest ...
— The Submarine Boys' Lightning Cruise - The Young Kings of the Deep • Victor G. Durham
... a brass bedstead, a spring mattress, a moderator lamp, or a coal-scuttle in your house," said the captain. "My dear madam, it is all very well to be mediaeval in matters ecclesiastic, but home comforts must not be sacrificed in the pursuit of the aesthetic, or a modern luxury discarded because it ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... out Dermot, and fired with equal success. "We're lucky," he continued. "As a rule they won't break, but scuttle along under the bushes, so that one often has ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly
... "There ain't water enough 'tween here an' Hatt'rus to wash the furrer-mold off'n his boots. He's jest everlastin' farmer. Why, Harve, I've seen thet man hitch up a bucket, long towards sundown, an' set twiddlin' the spigot to the scuttle-butt same's ef 'twas a cow's bag. He's thet much farmer. Well, Penn an' he they ran the farm—up Exeter way 'twur. Uncle Salters he sold it this spring to a jay from Boston as wanted to build a summer-haouse, an' he got a heap for it. Well, them two loonies scratched ...
— "Captains Courageous" • Rudyard Kipling
... and we thought we did perceive some in several places; but the heat of the sun, melting the pitch and tar upon the decks, made it impossible for us to discern it exactly, except in the round-house, where we plainly saw that there had been much blood. We found the scuttle open, by which we supposed that the captain and those that were with him had made their retreat into the great cabin, or those in the cabin had made their escape up into ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe
... having fun. Close to the wash were forty or fifty tiny white sanderlings in a compact band. When the wash receded they followed it with an incredibly rapid twinkling of little legs; and when again the wave rushed, shoreward, scuttle, scuttle, scuttle went they, keeping always just at the edge of the water. Never were they forced to wing; yet never did they permit the distance to widen between themselves and the inrushing or outrushing wave. There were also sundry ducks. These swam just inside the breakers, ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White
... this man Selwyn, whom he had never met, he saw no reason why he should drop business and scuttle uptown in order to welcome him. No doubt he was a good fellow; no doubt he had behaved very decently in a matter which, until a few moments before, he had heard little about. He meant to be civil; he'd look ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... by itself, without the jewel that often lies under it—a bonnet per se—is as bad a thing as a hat; something between a coal-scuttle and a bread-basket; it is only fit to be married to the hat, and, let us add—settled in the country. But it is, nevertheless capricious in its ugliness, just as its possessor is capricious in her prettiness; for, look at it from behind, its lines do not greatly deviate from the circular form of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... more of an autocrat every year. The Committee listen to her, and accept every word she says; the staff know better than to dispute a single order. We'd stand on our head in rows if she made it a rule! The pupils scuttle like rabbits when they see her coming, and cheer themselves hoarse every time she speaks. No human woman can live in that atmosphere for years ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... hastily. Hapley was left alone in the dark. Then in the pause he heard his landlady scuttle upstairs, lock her door, and drag something heavy across the ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... down stairs, and as all the ports and air-holes were shut up, when the steamer began to wallow about, they were nearly smothered, and their nausea was greatly increased. They were compelled to bear it, for they could not force their way on deck and they had nothing with which to scuttle the ship. One western officer declared to me afterward, that he seriously thought, at one time, that he had thrown up ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... Kitty's clothes, the other girl, an ugly little imp in a bonnet as big as a coal-scuttle, and with boots which looked as if they were her mother's, stood and stared with eyes wide open,—they were dark, and her hair nearly black. "Come here my dear." "Come to him," said Kitty. The girl drew near, I took her on my knee. "So you are the friend of Kitty, and we are going to play with ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... fireship, towed by the boats, entered the basin. Her well-shotted guns were pointed so as to keep the enemy in check. The Spaniards had undertaken to scuttle the Iris frigate, which contained several thousand barrels of powder, as also another powder ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... grog, interrupted the steward, his features settling down, with amazing flexibility, into their natural economy. But, dyesee, squire, I kept my hatches chose, and its but little water that ever gets into my scuttle-butt. Harkee, Master Kirby! Ive followed the salt-water for the better part of a mans life, and have seen some navigation on the fresh; but this here matter I will say in your favor, and that is, that youre the awkardest green ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... nothing but a mass of offence when you come up five seconds later. Think of this repeated six or seven—sometimes sixty or seventy—times during the daylight hours, and can you wonder that men should lose their placid manners and scuttle like rats into their holes at the dreaded sound? And all this fear and horror to be borne upon an empty stomach, for the horrors of partial starvation were added to the constant fear of a violent death. Mothers had to see their babies ...
— The Relief of Mafeking • Filson Young
... myself. The rough-and-tumble work in Afghanistan, coming on the top of a natural Bohemianism of disposition, has made me rather more lax than befits a medical man. But with me there is a limit, and when I find a man who keeps his cigars in the coal-scuttle, his tobacco in the toe end of a Persian slipper, and his unanswered correspondence transfixed by a jack-knife into the very centre of his wooden mantelpiece, then I begin to give myself virtuous airs. I have always held, too, that pistol practice should ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 29, May 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... them there. But you can put it under the sideboard, or in the coal-scuttle, or where you like as long as you don't make ...
— A Duet • A. Conan Doyle
... his strange book. On the one hand it is a Titanic defence of the universe against the stage Titanism of Byron's Cain. On the other hand it is a revolt of reality against the empire of proprieties and appearances and shams. In a generation divided between the red cap of France and the coal-scuttle bonnet of England Carlyle stands bareheaded under the stars. Along with him stand Benjamin Disraeli, combining a genuine sympathy for the poor with a most grotesque delight in the aristocracy; and John Henry Newman, fierce against the Liberals, ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... neighboring villages. The ice seemed fairly alive. Men noticed the erect, easy carriage of women, and their picturesque variety of costume. There were the latest fashions, fresh from Paris, floating past dingy, moth-eaten garments that had seen service through two generations; coal-scuttle bonnets perched over freckled faces bright with holiday smiles; stiff muslin caps with wings at the sides, flapping beside cheeks rosy with health and contentment; furs, too, encircling the whitest of throats; and scanty garments fluttering ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... pieces of roll out over the lattice to the street children, whose black eyes and black fingers appear through the slats. Each piece is received with squeals, a grand rush and protracted squabbling, and finally the more audacious appear at the door. They peep in, throw us a flower and then scuttle away. One tiny beggar brings a small bouquet and puts it in my lap. The Baron gives her a media and says something about "vamos." She flies off, but only to tell the rest of the success of her mission, and the whole horde troop ...
— Under the Southern Cross • Elizabeth Robins
... Hellyer always did on entering the refectory when he returned from church was, as we well knew, to walk up to the fireplace, where he would give the bars a thorough raking out with the poker and then heap a large shovelful of coals on from the adjacent scuttle. In this receptacle, Tom and I now carefully placed about a quarter of a pound of gunpowder with some squibs, the latter blackened over like the shining Wallsend knobs, so as to escape detection; and then, such was our fiendish plan, ...
— On Board the Esmeralda - Martin Leigh's Log - A Sea Story • John Conroy Hutcheson
... when the skipper howled as if he was most scared out of his life," he said. "I got up out of the scuttle just as quick as I could, and there he was crawling round behind the stern-house with an axe in his hand, and the mate flat up ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss
... damask, that he had slept in as a child, and it was here that he had once had a terrible dream—a dream which he had remembered to this day because it was so like a story of Aunt Delisha's, in which the devil comes with a red-hot scuttle to carry off a little boy. On that night he had been the little boy, and he had seen the scuttle with its leaping flames so plainly that in his terror he had struggled up and screamed aloud. A moment later he had awakened ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... or thought it impracticable, so they went away, and night coming on, we had no remedy but to wait till the wind should abate; and, in the meantime, the boatman and I concluded to sleep, if we could; and so crowded into the scuttle, with the Dutchman, who was still wet, and the spray beating over the head of our boat, leaked through to us, so that we were soon almost as wet as he. In this manner we lay all night, with very little ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... keep out of the heavy timber, and the bear sat upon his haunches right in my way. Probably he never saw a man before, for he didn't seem to be in the least disturbed when I hove in sight leading the horse. I supposed he would drop on all fours and scuttle away, but not a bit of it. He had struck something new and was going to see the whole show. There he sat, with his forepaws hanging down and his head cocked on one side, looking at the procession with the liveliest curiosity in his face. There was ...
— Bears I Have Met—and Others • Allen Kelly
... peaceable chap you've ever seen, Mr. Mott. You needn't be alarmed. I'm not going to bite a hole in the ship and scuttle her. Moreover, I am a very meek and lowly individual on board this ship. There's a lot of difference between being in supreme command with all kinds of authority to bolster you up and being a rat in a trap as I am now. ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... toward evening, for the light had grown so dim that I could only indistinctly discern the various objects about the cabin. But there seemed to have been no abatement of the gale, for the ship was rolling and plunging as wildly as ever; the scuttle was frequently being dimmed by the dash of seas against the ship's side; and the screaming of the gale through the rigging still rose ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood
... about eight o'clock, the writer was agreeably surprised to see the scuttle of his cabin skylight removed, and the bright rays of the sun admitted. Although the ship continued to roll excessively, and the sea was still running very high, yet the ordinary business on board seemed to be going forward on deck. It was impossible ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... instead of 8, or, in other words, leaving out the indemnities due by Egypt. If this arrangement failed, then we were to fall back on bankruptcy. Harcourt was much against declaring bankruptcy, and in favour of the policy of "scuttle." Hartington was against bankruptcy, and for paying the differences ourselves; so as to force us into annexation. Spencer, Childers, Chamberlain, and I, were for bankruptcy or for a strong ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... for Mrs. Watson-Watson. I will gladly let my own correspondence go in order to be saved from theirs. But on Sunday last, about tea-time, there came a knock at the front-door and the unmistakable scuttle of a letter being pushed through the slit and dropping into the hall, My senses are now so acute in this matter, that I can almost distinguish the scuffle of a genuine Garcia from that of a Mullins or even a Watson-Watson. There was a novelty about this arrival which was interesting. I went into ...
— If I May • A. A. Milne
... conscious that he held briefly centre stage, folded his wings and dropped like a falling stone; a ground squirrel shrilled its terror through the still afternoon and went racing with jerking tail toward safety; the great bird saw the frantic animal scuttle down a hole and unfolded its wings; again it balanced briefly, close to the ground; then in a wide spiral ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... one daring fellow, and he try anyting; but if he find he no strong enough, he try to burn de ship or to scuttle her. At all events, he try to do ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... a couple of hours, in the cold, dimly-lighted room until her excellency has had enough of it and rises to go to bed, when the parasites all scuttle away and quarrel with each other in the street as they walk home. Night after night, to decades of years, the old lady recounts the little journal of her day to the admiring listeners, whose chorus of approval is performed ...
— Sant' Ilario • F. Marion Crawford
... against the "forward policy" in India. As is usually the case after ministerial changes, the new Prime Minister disappointed the hopes of his most ardent friends and the fears of his bitterest opponents. The policy of "scuttle" was, of course, never thought of; but, as the new Government stood pledged to limit its responsibilities in India as far as possible, one great change took place. Lord Lytton laid down his Viceroyalty when ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... ladders," thought Dick. There was a ladder outside his door, at top of which was a scuttle opening on to the roof. Dickie turned his head to look at the ladder. The scuttle-door stood open; from above, the pink light streamed in and lay on the rungs of ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year! I'll raise your salary, and endeavor to assist your struggling family, and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon. Make up the fires, and buy another coal scuttle before you dot ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... been trampled upon by various emotions which were all jumping about at the same time, I should have had hard work not to laugh when Stan and Mrs. Ess Kay scrambled out from under the lumbering old hood, which was like a great coal scuttle turned over their heads. Their hair was grey with dust, their faces purple with heat, and evidently they ...
— Lady Betty Across the Water • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... blessed thing indeed to open my eyes again upon the daylight, and to find myself in the society of men. The forecastle was a roomy place enough, set all about with berths, in which the men of the watch below were seated smoking, or lying down asleep. The day being calm and the wind fair, the scuttle was open, and not only the good daylight, but from time to time (as the ship rolled) a dusty beam of sunlight shone in, and dazzled and delighted me. I had no sooner moved, moreover, than one of the men brought me a drink of something ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... man who paid cash and exacted cash. Taken at his fullest inventory he had "scalped" a living out of the world for which he had done but little to make happier or better. One calamity might easily scuttle his prospects forever—for instance, a fire, or a bank failure. And without credit it would be difficult to start ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks
... proof of his sagacity was the manner of his getting away. After having been on board the Anna for eight days, the scuttle of the forecastle, where he and his family were locked up every night, happened to be left unnailed, and on the following night, which was extremely dark and stormy, he contrived to convey his wife and children through the scuttle, and then over the ship's side into the yawl, and immediately rowed ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... water"—and all hands pulled madly to get the boat back to the nearest side—of course the side from which it had started. Those who have studied the diplomatic wiles of our hero, are convinced that he had himself opened the sea-cocks—or taken what other steps were necessary to scuttle his craft and ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... Reid, commander of the privateer General Armstong, being attacked in the neutral harbor of Fayal by the British commodore, Lloyd, and his squadron, resisted the onset with such extraordinary courage and energy as to severely cripple his assailants. Captain Reid was obliged to scuttle his ship to prevent her from falling into the hands of the British, but the latter lost one hundred and twenty killed and one hundred and thirty wounded in the unequal battle, and Lloyd's squadron was not able to join the expedition ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann
... thick woollen blanket:—that it is seldom entirely safe to open the doors into an adjoining room—at least without great caution—when the house which we are in is discovered to be on fire; but the best way, as a general rule, is, to escape by the scuttle, if there be one, or by a ladder, or by letting ourselves down to the ground, if the distance is not too great, through the windows. This last is often the best way, though not always the most expeditious one. Many sleep with a rope in their ...
— The Young Woman's Guide • William A. Alcott
... seemed to Anne, had there been so many squeaky pencils as there were that morning; and when Barbara Shaw came up to the desk with a sum she tripped over the coal scuttle with disastrous results. The coal rolled to every part of the room, her slate was broken into fragments, and when she picked herself up, her face, stained with coal dust, sent the boys ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... sides or ends of the house, and contain their spare garments, skins, masks, and other things which they set a value upon. Some of these are double, or one covers the other as a lid, others have a lid fastened with thongs, and some of the very large ones have a square hole, or scuttle, cut in the upper part, by which the things are put in and taken out. They are often painted black, studded with the teeth of different animals, or carved with a kind of freeze-work, and figures of birds or animals, as decorations. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... and receive shot number two from his mother, which sent him headlong into the arms of his father, who gave him the red ink-bottle, and bade him cut away and get it changed as fast as he could scuttle—to do all this, I say, was the work of a ...
— Shifting Winds - A Tough Yarn • R.M. Ballantyne
... "Stand at attention until I give you further orders." And each Gunkus stood perfectly still and straight, holding his coal-scuttle by the handle between his teeth, and dropping his eyes into it. They hit the bottom of the scuttle with a ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker
... roof, upon which I stood. I raised it a little, to obtain a view of the interior; but at that moment I heard the voice of Tom inquiring the way to the roof. While I had been staring at the retreating steamer, he had entered the building in search of me. I closed the scuttle, and retired from its vicinity to the end of the storehouse. Adjoining it there was a one-story building. Throwing the carpet-bag down, I "hung off," and, repeating the operation, reached the ground before Tom had made his way to the roof. Fortunately ...
— Seek and Find - or The Adventures of a Smart Boy • Oliver Optic
... foremast. There was one boat on the house, and another and larger one, in beds on deck, on either hand of it. She had been painted white, with tropical economy, outside and in; and we found, later on, that the stanchions of the rail, hoops of the scuttle-butt, etc., were picked out with green. At that time, however, when we first stepped aboard, all was hidden under the droppings ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... specially placed for them. Lois loved to find herself sitting there. She felt like a little white pigeon, high up on a perch, able to see over the heads of all the people below, and able even to look down on the grave faces of the Ministers opposite. The row of broad-brimmed hats and coal-scuttle bonnets looked entirely different and much more attractive, seen from above, than when she looked up at them in Meeting at home. Then, when some one rose to speak, Lois liked to watch the ripple that passed over the heads beneath her, as all the faces ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... cautious how you act, Mr. Marble. The savages are in possession of the upper deck, and I am their prisoner. The people are all below, with a strong watch at the fore-scuttle." ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... of their golden or purple fruits. All round this garden, in the uncultivated parts, red partridges ran about in conveys among the brambles and tufts of junipers, and at every step of the comte and Raoul a terrified rabbit quitted his thyme and heath to scuttle away to the burrow. In fact, this fortunate isle was uninhabited. Flat, offering nothing but a tiny bay for the convenience of embarkation, and under the protection of the governor, who went shares with them, smugglers ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... From the homely scuttle of coal at the side of the hearth to the gorgeously verdant vegetation of a forest of mammoth trees, might have appeared a somewhat far cry in the eyes of those who lived some fifty years ago. But there are few now who do not know ...
— The Story of a Piece of Coal - What It Is, Whence It Comes, and Whither It Goes • Edward A. Martin
... down and remained a few moments, looking about the wretched room,—one of those where the doctor has to lay his hat on the bed, and where there is barely room to die! It was a small attic room, without a chimney, with a scuttle window in the sloping roof, which admitted the heat of summer and the cold of winter. Old trunks, clothes bags, a foot-bath, and the little iron bedstead on which Germinie's niece had slept, were heaped up in a corner under the sloping ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... in the street thinks that Walt Whitman's stuff is not poetry at all, but just bad prose. He acknowledges that there are splendid lines, phrases, and whole passages. There is that one beginning, "I open my scuttle at night," and that glorious apostrophe to the summer night, "Night of south winds, night of the large, few stars." But, as a whole, his work is tiresome and without art. It is alive, to be sure, but so is protoplasm. Life is the first thing and form is secondary; ...
— Four Americans - Roosevelt, Hawthorne, Emerson, Whitman • Henry A. Beers
... the rude tide-rip, to left and right she rolled, And the skipper sat on the scuttle-butt and ...
— Departmental Ditties and Barrack Room Ballads • Rudyard Kipling
... do you want me to do about it?" said Charles, bunkering his cigar-stump badly to the right of the coal-scuttle. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, August 5th, 1914 • Various
... collocation of apartments may be seen at Haddon Hall, Derbyshire, once a seat of the Vernons, where, in the lady's pew in the chapel, there is a sort of scuttle, which opens into the kitchen, so that the good lady could ever and anon, without much interruption of her religious duties, give an eye that the roast-meat was not permitted to burn, and that the ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... arouse. On our part it would be a disingenuous attempt, under the guise of conferring a benefit on them, to relieve ourselves from the heavy and difficult burden which thus far we have been bravely and consistently sustaining. It would be a disguised policy of scuttle. It would make the helpless Filipino the football of oriental politics, tinder the protection of a guaranty of their independence, which we would be powerless ...
— State of the Union Addresses of William H. Taft • William H. Taft
... a consolation for being deprived of taking a part any longer in the doings of the great world. The Country Mouse—even if the creature were able to scuttle back into the cellars of the great—would still be out of all communion with the mighty, owing to physical infirmity. And now comes the kind Town Mouse and tells him all that he ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... square. A large bed took up one third of it, a table next the only window, two chairs (one easy), little cupboards in the recesses by the fire-place, on which stood china and glasses, a small wash-hand stand, a chest of drawers, with slop-pail, coal-scuttle, and looking-glass completed the furniture. All was scrupulously clean, the ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... you've got to respond. You're picked out. You! One human creature by another human creature. Breathing the same air. Sharing the same mortality. Responsible to the same God. You've got to! You can't help yourself. You're caught. If you hear some one appealing to any one else you can scuttle out of it. Get away. Pass by on the other side. Square it with your conscience any old how. But when that some one comes to you, you're done, you're fixed. You may hate it. You may loathe and detest the position that's been forced on you. ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... buckets, kegs, and open casks, including the scuttle butt, were ranged along the spar-deck, below the break of the poop, to catch the welcome shower, tarpaulins being spread over the open hatchways, where exposed, to prevent the flood from going below: while the ends of the after awning were tied up in a sort of huge bag for the rain to drain off ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... from all accounts, came off second best in this rencontre. There not being enough of water in the nulla to drown the buffalo, the Mugger soon found he had caught a Tartar; and after being well mauled by the buffalo's horns, he was fain to scuttle off and ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... but my imagination had reached that point when he might have said in his coal scuttle ...
— The Club of Queer Trades • G. K. Chesterton
... bituminous coal should have a flue nearly as deep as the grate; and the bars should be round and not close together. The better draught there is, the less coal-dust is made. Every grate should be furnished with a poker, shovel, tongs, blower, coal-scuttle, and holder for the blower. The latter may be made of woolen, covered with old silk; and hung near ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe
... compliment which noisy childhood and industrious boyhood insistently demand from the world about. Even the infant revels in this testimony, preferring crude and noisy playthings of proportion to the innocent nerve-sparing devices which the adult tries to foist upon him. The coal scuttle is made to proclaim causal relation between the self in effort and the not-self in response more satisfactorily than the rag doll; and the manifest glee over the contortions of the playful father whose hand is slapped ...
— The Minister and the Boy • Allan Hoben
... commences with the watch on deck turning-to at daybreak, and washing-down, scrubbing, and swabbing the decks. This, with filling the "scuttle butt" with fresh water, and coiling up the rigging, usually occupies the time until seven bells (half after seven), when all hands get breakfast. At eight the day's work begins, and lasts until sundown, with the exception of an hour for dinner. The discipline of the ship ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... adrift This alien race to face the world alone. Caesar: Sweet Francos, truly thou hast quick discerned The thought which wisdom fathered in my mind. "Be wise as serpent, harmless as the dove," Should be our watchword as we scuttle ship, For there be those who speak with venomed tongues Of serpents, as we cast them helpless off. But if we of politicos make use, And to their clamour lend approving smile, We may while coolly thrusting them aside, Meet with the thoughtless world's approving nod. Francos: Ha! ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)
... after me. There is not a moment to lose. I will therefore stop for an hour and arrange things so as to ensure ARNOLD'S arrest, and will then escape through the scuttle." (He arranges things and then scuttles away. Enter police, after ten minutes of preliminary howling on the staircase, and discovering ARNOLD'S skeleton keys, ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 13, June 25, 1870 • Various
... short months ago nothing remained to-day but ashes and black ruin. Only one building had been left unburned and this, before the war, had been the cabin of an overseer. It had but two rooms, and a shallow attic, which was gained by means of an iron ladder reaching to a closely fitting scuttle in the ceiling. The larger room was furnished meagerly with a rough deal table, several common chairs, and a double-doored cupboard against the wall. In the deep, wide fire-place glowed a heap of raked-up embers, on which, suspended from an iron crane, a kettle simmered, ...
— The Littlest Rebel • Edward Peple
... making a few pleasant remarks about the bedbugs that always swarm in such a building, the centipedes that sometimes crawl into the ears or nostrils of sleepers and the scorpions that occasionally fall from the millet-stalk ceiling on to the bed or scuttle across the floor to bite the person who unwarily walks in his bare feet. Under the influence of such a soporific, I soon fell asleep. The next morning we rose early, and while the cook was preparing our coffee and eggs, we followed the ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN
... excursion of what I have read of the Mammoth Caves; if only I had had a yellow flambeau instead of the pervading blue light, and a solid-looking boatman with an oar instead of a scuttle-faced Selenite working an engine at the back of the canoe, I could have imagined I had suddenly got back to earth. The rocks about us were very various, sometimes black, sometimes pale blue and veined, and once they flashed and glittered as though we had come into a mine of sapphires. ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... who was a very rare church-goer, had been to Mrs. Hackit to beg a bit of old crape, and with this sign of grief pinned on her little coal-scuttle bonnet, was seen dropping her curtsy opposite the reading-desk. This manifestation of respect towards Mr. Gilfil's memory on the part of Dame Fripp had no theological bearing whatever. It was due to an event which had occurred some years back, and which, I am sorry to say, ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... "Scuttle her," said Jack, "and set her on fire. The Arabs shall see that we don't take them for the sake of their craft; it may serve as a slight punishment for them to see ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... of fir trees recently cut down in the mountains, which could not be avoided in the dark, and would certainly come against the boat and sink it. Besides, how could one land on the opposite bank among willows which would scuttle the boat, and with a flood of unknown extent? The leader concluded, then, that the operation was physically impossible. In vain did the emperor tempt them with an offer of 6,000 francs per man; even this could not persuade ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... had promised not to, but the desire persisted to the point of mania. Oh, how he could run if he only hadn't promised not to! His entire being tingled with the latent possibilities of a burst of terrific speed. He wanted to scuttle away like a scared rabbit. The pace of the kangaroo would be slow in comparison. What a record he could make if he hadn't ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers
... and I in a trim white night-gown and slippers, very much out of order, with a very little cold, a message discomposed us all of a sudden, with a service to Mr Walpole from Mr More, and that, if he pleased, he would wait on Mr Walpole. We scuttle upstairs in great confusion, but with no other damage than the flinging down two or three glasses and the dropping a slipper by the way. Having ordered the room to be cleaned out, and sent a very civil response to Mr More, we began ...
— English Travellers of the Renaissance • Clare Howard
... his ships, gathered one hundred exiles around him, and become a trader on his own account. The Saxon requested an interview with Benyowsky. What was the Pole to do? Was this a decoy to test his strength? Was the Saxon planning to scuttle the Pole's vessel, too? Benyowsky's answer was that he would be pleased to meet his Saxon comrade in arms on the south shore, each side to approach with four men only, laying down arms instantly on ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... open my scuttle at night and see the far-sprinkled systems, And all I see, multiplied as high as I can cipher, edge but the rim of the farther systems: Wider and wider they spread, expanding, always expanding, Outward, outward, and forever outward: My sun has his sun, and around ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs
... spoke, for no one could guess what you did to outdoor properly. About all they could think of was hustling out after another chunk for the fireplace or bringing a scuttle of coal up from the cellar. But they soon got the idea. Dulcie said right from this window she could see a corking hill for a toboggan slide, and it would be perfectly darling to be out there with plenty of hot coffee and sandwiches; and there must be some peachy trips for snowshoe parties ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... alternative. After destroying the only organized government in the archipelago, the only security for life and property, native and foreign, in great commercial centers like Manila, Iloilo, and Cebu, against hordes of uncivilized pagans and Mohammedan Malays, should we then scuttle out and leave them to their fate? A band of old-time Norse pirates, used to swooping down on a capital, capturing its rulers, seizing its treasure, burning the town, abandoning the people to domestic disorder ...
— Problems of Expansion - As Considered In Papers and Addresses • Whitelaw Reid
... ill treatment from the first mate of the ship, who, when I found she was a slaver, altogether declined to put me on shore. I was chased—we were chased—by three British frigates and a seventy-four, which we engaged and captured; but were obliged to scuttle and sink, as we could sell them in no African port: and I never shall forget the look of manly resignation, combined with considerable disgust, of the British Admiral as he walked the plank, after cutting off his pigtail, which he handed to me, and which I still have in charge for his family at ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... little dog, and his name was Blue Bell, I gave him some work, and he did it very well; I sent him up stairs to pick up a pin, He stepped into the coal-scuttle up to the chin; I sent him to the garden to pick some sage, He tumbled down and fell in a rage; I sent him to the cellar to draw a pot of beer, He came up again and said there ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... he knew. There were no hills to which he could lift his eyes, but help may hide in the valley as well as come down from the mountain, and he found his under the coal scuttle bonnet of the woman that swept out and dusted the chapel. She was no interesting young widow. A life of labour and vanished children lay behind as well as before her. She was sixty years of age, seamed with the smallpox, and in every seam the dust and smoke of London had ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... and caught the wooden shelf with a grip. "I don't hope—I just"—the voice dropped, and his head fell on his arms again. "I won't say it. I'm not utterly mad yet." He picked up the poker and stirred the fire, and put on coal from a scuttle, and went and sat down again in the chair. "Something has got to be decided," he spoke again to the coals in the grate. "I've got to know if I ought to stay at this job, or if it's an impertinence." For minutes then he was silent, intent, it seemed, on the fire. Then again ...
— August First • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews and Roy Irving Murray
... Hearte telleth me better than y^e Allmanack,) I will goe to Churche; wh. I maye chaunce to see her.—Laste weeke, her Eastre bonnett vastlie pleas'd me, beinge most cunninglie devys'd in y^e mode of oure Grandmothers, and verie lyke to a coales Scuttle, of white satine.— ...
— Stories by American Authors (Volume 4) • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... yet had time to make; looked into the wig-box, the books, and ink-bottle; untied and inspected all the papers; carved a few devices on the table with a sharp blade of Mr Brass's penknife; and wrote his name on the inside of the wooden coal-scuttle. Having, as it were, taken formal possession of his clerkship in virtue of these proceedings, he opened the window and leaned negligently out of it until a beer-boy happened to pass, whom he commanded to set down ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... butchering his prisoners on very little or on no provocation whatever. But even this desperate pirate had an occasional "qualm of conscience come athwart his stomach," for when he captured a Newfoundland vessel and was about to scuttle her, he found out that she was the property of a Mr. Minors of that island, from whom they stole the original vessel in which they went a-pirating, so Phillips, telling his companions "We have done him enough injury already," ordered the vessel to be repaired and returned to the owner. On another ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse
... by hearing them all shout at him at once that he dropped the dog into Von Barwig's coal scuttle, whence it finally issued covered with coal dust and ran yelping into Miss Husted's arms. That lady petted the frightened animal while Pinac pushed the unfortunate ...
— The Music Master - Novelized from the Play • Charles Klein
... occurrence in his boyhood which is not included in the bitter record on a former page. "I was taken home, and there was debt at home as well as death, and we had a sale there. My own little bed was so superciliously looked upon by a power unknown to me hazily called The Trade, that a brass coal-scuttle, a roasting jack, and a bird cage were obliged to be put into it to make a lot of it, and then it went for a song. So I heard mentioned, and I wondered what song, and thought what a dismal song it must have been to sing!" The other subjects will have mention ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... taking a long drink at the scuttle butt, I saw some of the niggers creeping back to the village through the trees, and watching what I was doing. ...
— Yorke The Adventurer - 1901 • Louis Becke
... they go. Up and down the web is plying, And across the woof is flying; What a rattling! What a battling! What a shuffling! What a scuffling! As the weaver makes his shuttle, Hither, thither, scud and scuttle. ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... foremast. There was one boat on the house, and another and larger one, in beds on deck, on either hand of it. She had been painted white, with tropical economy, outside and in; and we found, later on, that the stanchions of the rail, hoops of the scuttle but, etc., were picked out with green. At that time, however, when we first stepped aboard, all was hidden under the droppings ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... language of his native clime, "no less a sum than 7500 ... and I'd pay it again to-morrow!" Saying this, the Australian hit the table with the palm, of his hand in a manner so manly that an aged retainer who was putting coals upon the fire allowed the coal-scuttle ...
— On Something • H. Belloc
... in her hand, laced her cold fingers round it, and hurried across to a cupboard in one of the oak cabinets. She was sipping the water bravely when he returned. He took the glass from her, emptied nearly all the contents away into the coal-scuttle—the first receptacle that came to his hand—and poured ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... things that scuttle and slither and crawl," said Ives. His voice was suddenly womanish. "Don't let ...
— Breaking Point • James E. Gunn
... Rose by name, laughed—a pleasant musical laugh. "I remember," he said, "that when I was a boy at Eton, my excellent but very bluff and rough old tutor called upon us, and was so much taken up with being hearty, that he knocked over the coal-scuttle, and didn't let anyone get a word in; and when he went off in a sort of whirlwind, my old aunt, who was an incisive lady, said in a meditative tone: 'How strange it is that the only thing that the Eton masters seem able to teach their boys is ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... I said it made the girl from the department store scuttle down the corridor. I glared at her back, went into Pheola's apartment ...
— The Right Time • Walter Bupp
... uniform. As for the Quaker, they say he could give points to any able seaman when it comes to swear words (but this may be sheer affectionate exaggeration). His face and his high, hatchet nose, whatever colour they used to be, are now the colour of copper—not an ordinary, Dutch kettle and coal-scuttle, pacifist, arts-and-crafts copper, but a fine old, truculent, damn-disarmament, Krupp-&-Co., bloody, ammunition copper, and battered by the wars of all the world. He is the commander and the owner of an armoured car, one of the unit of five volunteer armoured cars. I do ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair
... scuttle near the center," Ned spoke. "Walk quietly now. It's a tin roof, and they may hear us, in spite of the music. ...
— Frank Roscoe's Secret • Allen Chapman
... beyond that black barn or whatever it was. I hailed him with a loud shout. Got no answer. After making fast my boat just astern, I walked along the bank to have a look at Powell's. Being so much bigger than mine she was aground already. Her sails were furled; the slide of her scuttle hatch was closed and padlocked. Powell was gone. He had walked off into that dark, still marsh somewhere. I had not seen a single house anywhere near; there did not seem to be any human habitation for miles; and now as darkness fell denser over the land I couldn't ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... will have a night of it, like Alexander, when he burnt Persepolis: tuez, tuez, tuez! point de quartier. [He runs in amongst them, and they scuttle about ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... crinkle deepened and widened into a frown, and she walked impatiently to the fireplace, where a black, uninviting fire smouldered in a cheerless sort of way, and took up the poker in rather an aggressive manner, then shook her head, as she glanced at the half-empty coal-scuttle. ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... nose hooked, his face narrow, his forehead very high, the whole elaborately tattooed. I may say I have never entertained a guest so trying. In the least particular he must be waited on; he would not go to the scuttle-butt for water; it must be given him in his hand; if aid were denied him, he would fold his arms, bow his head, and go without; only the work would suffer. Early the first forenoon he called aloud for biscuit and salmon; biscuit and ham ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... from the living-rooms behind the store, the girl heard some faint noises as though the early morning tasks of getting in wood and filling the coal scuttle were under way. Uncle Amazon must be "takin' holt" just as Cap'n Abe ...
— Cap'n Abe, Storekeeper • James A. Cooper
... of rheumatic agonies, that the heart of an intending occupant might well recoil. A plank, by way of flying drawbridge, joined it to the shore. And it was a dreary moment for Jimson when he pulled this after him and found himself alone on this unwholesome fortress. He could hear the rats scuttle and flop in the abhorred interior; the key cried among the wards like a thing in pain; the sitting-room was deep in dust, and smelt strong of bilge-water. It could not be called a cheerful spot, even for a composer absorbed in beloved toil; how much less ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... crowd of men, women, and children, intent on stripping the vines of their luscious-looking fruit. The men are mostly in blue blouses, and the women in closely-fitting neat white caps, or wearing old-fashioned unbleached straw-bonnets of the contemned coal-scuttle type. They detach the grapes with scissors or hooked knives, technically termed "serpettes," and in some vineyards proceed to remove all damaged, decayed, or unripe fruit from the bunches before placing them in the baskets ...
— Facts About Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines • Henry Vizetelly
... sign of fever, after all their melancholy predictions. It would not have been "human natur'" if they had not. When we got to the camp, I called out to Masooku, my Zulu servant, to come and take the horses. Next moment I heard a rush and a scuttle in the tent like the scrimmage in a rabbit-burrow when one puts in the ferrets, and Masooku shouted out in Zulu, "He has come back! by Chaka's head, I swear it! It is his voice, his own voice, that calls me; my ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard
... couples two dramatic ballads. In this form of condensed drama is a too-little occupied field of composition, and Bullard has written some part songs, of which "In the Merry Month of May," "Her Scuttle Hat," and "The Water Song" are worth mentioning. "O Stern Old Land" is a rather bathetic candidate for the national hymnship. But his "War Song of Gamelbar," for male voices, is really a masterwork. Harmonists insist on so much closer compliance with rules for smoothness ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes
... decency, of a moderate amount of clothing. Mrs Waroonga—who had been named Betsy— was therefore presented to the astonished natives of Ratinga in a short calico gown of sunflower pattern with a flounce at the bottom, a bright yellow neckerchief, and a coal-scuttle bonnet, which quivered somewhat in consequence of being too large and of slender build. Decency and propriety not being recognised, apparently, among infants, the brown baby—who had been named Zariffa at baptism—landed in what may be styled ...
— The Madman and the Pirate • R.M. Ballantyne
... pieces, shake to pieces, pull to pieces, pick to pieces; laniate^; nip; tear to rags, tear to tatters; crush to atoms, knock to atoms; ruin; strike out; throw over, knock down over; fell, sink, swamp, scuttle, wreck, shipwreck, engulf, ingulf^, submerge; lay in ashes, lay in ruins; sweep away, erase, wipe out, expunge, raze; level with the dust, level with the ground; waste; atomize, vaporize. deal destruction, desolate, devastate, lay waste, ravage gut; disorganize; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... contortions of a dancing bear, than any other Terpsichorean exhibition with which I was acquainted. Having continued this until he had made himself very 209unnecessarily hot, he wound up the performance by flinging a summerset, in doing which he overturned himself and the coal-scuttle into a box of deeds; whereby becoming embarrassed, he experienced much difficulty in getting right end upwards again. "There," he exclaimed, throwing himself into an arm-chair commonly occupied by his father's portly form—"There! talk of accomplishments—show me a fashionable young lady ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... got up on the roof by climbing the water-spout, and in a dormer-room up there I found an old crippled woman, crying for help, but with no one to hear her until I climbed in from the scuttle-hole. A little old-fashioned stairway runs from the third floor down into the closet in this room. But I can't get her down those narrow stairs, and the other stairway and halls are a mass of fire. I've got to lower her from the ...
— Girl Scouts in the Adirondacks • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... first as judiciously, as any clerk of the kitchen. The other sat and enjoyed himself like a delighted epicure, tickled to the last degree with this new turn of his affairs; when on a sudden, a noise of somebody opening the door made them start from their seats, and scuttle in confusion about the dining-room. Our Country Friend, in particular, was ready to die with fear at the barking of a huge mastiff or two, which opened their throats just about the same time, and made the whole house echo. At last, recovering himself:—"Well," says he, "if ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... inclined to lie on. She was refreshed and strengthened for the many difficulties of the day before her. She got up, dressed and went down to the sick-room. Reilly was just coming out with a scuttle-full of ashes: he had been "doing" the grate and lighting the fire. He had expressed a wish that there might be as few intruders in the sick-room ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... Caron had lived, probably, twenty years. She was of medium height, with straight, dark brows, and dark, long-lashed eyes. The eyes had none of the shyness that was deemed a necessity to beauty in that era of balloon skirts and scuttle bonnets under which beauty of the conventional ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan
... right, then," I said. "He will come in a huge feather coat! Blue-bird feathers it will be made of! With a soft brown breast! When he fluffs himself he will look like the god of all the birds and of next Spring! Hawks and all evil things will scuttle away!" ...
— Fairy Prince and Other Stories • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... the kitchen, but her flighty thoughts were swinging corners in the quadrille with Jeb, and the fried potatoes were gracefully shot into the coal-scuttle as the pan was waved aloft in imitation of dancers she had envied in ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... pounds to five hundred pounds a year, and notwithstanding this additional burden to the rates the vice-Guardians in every case have paid off all debts and left a balance in hand inside of two years. Then they retire, and the honorary Guardians come back to scuttle the ship again. Tell the English people that. Mr. Morley cannot deny it. You have told them? Then tell them again, ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... the speeches, returned home at six o'clock. The portress affirmed that he came in alone and that there was nobody in the house at the time. Nevertheless, a few minutes later, she heard shouts, followed by the sound of a struggle and two pistol-shots; and from her lodge she saw four masked men scuttle down the front steps, carrying Daubrecq the deputy, and hurry toward the gate. They opened the gate. At the same moment, a motor-car arrived outside the house. The four men bundled themselves into it; and the motor-car, which ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... the period, the ladies, and there were naturally more ladies than men, following the vagaries of fashion in 'bishop' sleeves and the 'pretty church-and-state bonnets,' that seemed to Hunt at times, 'to think through all their ribbons.' We call that kind of bonnet 'coal-scuttle' now, but Maclise's portrait of Lady Morgan trying hers on before a glass justifies Hunt's epithet. The lecturer was the lean, wiry type of Scot, within an inch of six feet. In face, he was not the bearded, broken-down Carlyle of ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... comforter. He had lost his voice, or most of it, and croaked; and his cold had got worse in the night. He was shedding tears copiously, and wiping them on a cruet-stand he carried in one hand. The other was engaged by an empty coal-scuttle with a pair of slippers in ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... threshold of another world. Would a beam of light from God, coming in upon your life, be like a light falling upon a gang of conspirators, that would make them huddle all their implements under their cloaks, and scuttle out of the way as fast as possible? Or would it be like a gleam of sunshine upon the flowers, opening out their petals and ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... they had "taken a great deal of drubbing." The captain and crew thought they had done about enough; but Greenville was not of this opinion; he gave orders to the master gunner, whom he knew to be a fellow after his own stamp, to scuttle the REVENGE where she lay. The others, who were not mortally wounded like the Admiral, interfered with some decision, locked the master gunner in his cabin, after having deprived him of his sword, ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... said, 'considering the wind was the other way. I let them come on, and then poured a volley into the thickest part of their ranks—that made them waver, and then I made a sortie, and you should have just seen them scuttle!' ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... destroyed likewise; and even then a third crew was taking over the gun. In the stern cabin a firework expert, who had never been to sea before—one of Captain Brock's employees—was steadily firing great illuminating rockets out of a scuttle to show up the lighthouse on the end of the Mole to the ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... papers, because I'm always afraid I'll find something about myself. They don't describe my costumes, however. They simply say that I am trying to blow up and scuttle the ship of State. But this has nothing to do with your case. It is customary, when you accept an invitation, to let the host know something about it. In other words, why didn't you ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade
... for me; they did, you know—they were rummaging around after me for a long time. But I never dreamed it could be you and Gordon. So I sneaked down to the river and crossed; I was deadly afraid they'd find me, and I thought once I was on the other side I could hear them coming, and scuttle away in the brush. Then about daylight I heard some shooting, and wondered if they had been followed. I didn't dare cross the river and start over the hills with that fire coming, and the smoke so ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair |
