"Bluff" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... up leaped of a sudden the sun, And against him the cattle stood black every one, To stare through the mist at us galloping past, And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last, With resolute shoulders, each butting away The haze, as some bluff ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... Ca'line's goodness tell he ax me, for Gord sake, ter stop, so, in years ter come, he won't have nothin' ter th'ow up ter me. An' you know de reason I done tooken fo' days off, missy? I gwine on a weddin'-trip down ter Pine Bluff, an' I wants time ter pick out a few little weddin'-presents to fetch home ...
— Moriah's Mourning and Other Half-Hour Sketches • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... a big bluff chap with a promising moustache, encouraged by private, tuition. "Come along there, Haviland," he exclaimed, "a nob like you should be one of the 'boys!'" These fellows don't know what life is—but to think of a man of ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair
... beseeching tail And dripping tongue and eager ears belied The assumed indifference of canine pride; The caper homeward, shortened if the cart Of Neighbor Pomeroy, trundling from the mart, O'ertook me,—then, translated to the seat I praised the steed, how stanch he was and fleet, While the bluff farmer, with superior grin, Explained where horses should be thick, where thin, And warned me (joke he always had in store) To shun a beast that four white stockings wore. What a fine natural courtesy was his! His nod was pleasure, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... cried Nellie, exasperated. She was beginning to feel ridiculous, which was much worse than feeling terrified. "You can't bluff me, Harvey, not for ...
— What's-His-Name • George Barr McCutcheon
... but a big bluff and a coward. You would have known that he was a coward, by the lies he had told and by the way he had attacked us. He wilted ...
— Pluck on the Long Trail - Boy Scouts in the Rockies • Edwin L. Sabin
... New England fleet was commanded by Sir William Phips, a bluff, short-tempered sailor. He sailed up the St. Lawrence and ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall
... Upon the bluff of Wreckers' Head was to be dimly seen the sprawling Ball homestead. Tunis pointed ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... or three months in what are called the 'dry shakes of the sand-hills,' a sort of brilliant tremolo movement." The time not required for the "tremolo movement" was spent in building Fort Fischer, until they were ordered to Drewry's Bluff, and then to the Chickahominy, where they took part in ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... that the Brigade would shortly take over the extreme left sector at Fusilier Bluff. After a reconnaissance of the position by Colonel Morrison and the Adjutant, a party of eight officers and sixteen N.C.O.'s went forward on August 6th to spend a night in the new firing line. On the way up, as they were passing along the westmost sector of the Eski line, one of our ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... town in great excitement, hurling stones and endeavoring to get at the Indians, in which they partly succeeded. On the 10th we arrived at Blue Earth River bridge, and camped a little beyond it, on the townsite of Le Hillier (L'Huillier) and immediately south of the isolated bluff at the mouth of the river,—the ...
— History of Company E of the Sixth Minnesota Regiment of Volunteer Infantry • Alfred J. Hill
... she dips in the bows, and what a breadth she 151has; why she's fit for any seas; and if the Arrow ever shoots past her, I'll forfeit every shot in my lockers." "Avast there! master Horace," said our master at the helm, who was an old Cowes pilot, and as bluff as a Deal sea-boat; "the Pearl is a noble sailer; but a bird can't fly without wings, nor a ship run thirteen knots an hour without a good stiff breeze. If the light winds prevail, the Arrow will have the advantage, particularly now she's cutter rigged, and has got the marquis's ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... Paymaster was not even reminded of his own youth by this queer child on whom he leaned. He had never been like this, a shy frightened dreaming child taken up with fancies and finding omens and stories in the piping of a fowl. Oh! no, he had been a bluff, hearty, hungry boy, hot-headed, red-legged, short-kilted, stirring, a bit of a bully, a loud talker, a dour lad with his head and his fists. This boy beside him made him think of neither man nor boy, but of his sister Jennet, who died in the plague year, ...
— Gilian The Dreamer - His Fancy, His Love and Adventure • Neil Munro
... Cook. To the southward again of this magnificent sheet of water, where it will be recollected it was the original intention, though afterwards judiciously abandoned, to found the capital of this colony, you behold the high bluff range of hills that stretch away towards the five islands, and likewise indicate the trending of the coast ...
— Statistical, Historical and Political Description of the Colony of New South Wales and its Dependent Settlements in Van Diemen's Land • William Charles Wentworth
... made a gesture that was like a salute. After all, he was a Rhodesian, and this was his confession of faith. The story of the lamp-posts was only a bluff put up to disguise the hook Africa had put in his heart, the hook by which she drags all those who love her back across the world, denying, reviling, forswearing her even unto seventy times seven, yet panting ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... of the Rhine-mouth were manoeuvring now in the eastward sky. Gresham had astonished the world by producing them and others, and sending them to circle here and there. It was the threat material in the great game of bluff he was playing, and it had taken even me by surprise. He was one of those incredibly stupid energetic people who seem sent by heaven to create disasters. His energy to the first glance seemed so wonderfully like capacity! But he had no imagination, no invention, ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... the grocer, in his usual bluff manner. 'No, none partickler. None that I am much aware of. How d'ye do, gals and boys? Mr. ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... pallone^, polo, water polo; tent pegging; tilting at the ring, quintain [Mediev.]; greasy pole; quoits, horseshoes, discus; rounders, lacrosse; tobogganing, water polo; knurr and spell^. [childrens' games] leapfrog, hop skip and jump; mother may I; French and English, tug of war; blindman's bluff, hunt the slopper^, hide and seek, kiss in the ring; snapdragon; cross questions and crooked answers.; crisscross, hopscotch; jacks, jackstones^, marbles; mumblety-peg, mumble-the-peg, pushball, shinney, shinny, tag &c; billiards, pool, pingpong, pyramids, bagatelle; bowls, skittles, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... bluff sailor took the dainty visitor in his arms and kissed him lovingly on both cheeks. Embrace and kiss were heartily returned, and, arm in arm, the two sought the garden seat, and sat down to gaze on the sunlit waters and exchange tidings. Raleigh—for the visitor was none other than the ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... inconsistency, notwithstanding that the commencement of his journalistic career smelt of sources entirely opposed to the conclusions upon which it broadened. One secret of the belief in his love of his country was the readiness of Rockney's pen to support our nobler patriotic impulses, his relish of the bluff besides. His eye was on our commerce, on our courts of Law, on our streets and alleys, our army and navy, our colonies, the vaster than the island England, and still he would be busy picking up needles and threads in the island. Deeds of valour were noted by ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... consider as only fit to be enslaved. The dwellings of this unfortunate people were visible in clusters upon the sides and tops of the hills which tower above the Mandingo capital. "The fires which were visible in the different nests of these unfortunates, threw a glare upon the bold peaks and bluff promontories of granite rock by which they were surrounded, and produced a picturesque and somewhat awful appearance." The inhabitants of these wild regions were clothed in the spoils of the chace, and subsisted chiefly on wild fruits, honey, and fish. They knew the object ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... Bluff Redoubt and have carried it with a rush! They are absolutely the boys for this class of country and for this class ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton
... was plain they should be landed in the light of day, with a discouraging openness, and even with parade. To sneak ashore by night was to increase the danger of resistance and to minimise the authority of the attack. The thing was a bluff, and it is impossible to bluff with stealth. Yet this was what was tried. A landing-party was to leave the Olga in Apia bay at two in the morning; the landing was to be at four on two parts of the foreshore of Vailele. At eight they were to be joined ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... stray cat at "Chez Nous" is never likely to get into the newspapers. On the other hand, lots of incidents which do get in never deserve to. It's all a question of head-lining, which is the bluff by which the public is induced to read ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, October 20, 1920 • Various
... of the Rajah," he said half-musingly. "In fact, I know him, by sight. He is what the magazinists are fond of calling an 'industry colonel,' a born leader who has fought his way to the front. If the Quartz Creek row is anything more than a stiff bluff on the part of the C. G. R. it will be quite as well for us if Mr. Somerville Darrah is safely at the other side of the continent—and well out of ordinary reach of ...
— A Fool For Love • Francis Lynde
... him not with the female interest he had been accustomed to inspire. They felt instinctively that he could be nothing to them, nor they to him,—a mere London fop, and not half so handsome as Squires Bluff and Chuff. ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... dint of much persuasion, Calabressa got Granaglia to take in a message to Von Zoesch. And, sure enough, his anticipations were correct; the good-natured, bluff old soldier made his appearance, and seemed glad to get a breath of fresh air ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... maybe he really had had business at the Gare de Lyon, and that I'd partly misjudged him. And then it flashed into my head that, on the contrary, he didn't really know Sir Lionel, but had overheard the name, and was doing a "bluff" to get introduced to me. Wasn't that a conceited idea? But neither was true. At least the latter wasn't, I know, and I'm pretty sure the first wasn't. What I think, is this: that he simply followed me to the Gare de Lyon for the "deviltry" of the thing, and because ...
— Set in Silver • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... has more touches of humor than either Evangeline or Hiawatha. Longfellow uses with fine effect the contradiction between the preaching of the bluff old captain, that you must do a thing yourself if you want it well done, and his practice in sending by John Alden an offer of marriage to Priscilla. Her reply has ...
— History of American Literature • Reuben Post Halleck
... sand deposits along high-water mark. [Footnote: There are various reasons why the formation of dunes is confined to low shores, and this law is so universal, that when bluffs are surmounted by them, there is always cause to suspect upheaval, or the removal of a sloping beach in front of the bluff, after the dunes were formed. Bold shores are usually without a sufficient beach for the accumulation of large deposits; they are commonly washed by a sea too deep to bring up sand from its bottom; their abrupt elevation, even if moderate in amount, would ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... boy's name, and Cornelius and I walked along with him till we got off the street—Cornel' was sharp enough not to tackle him near the school. As soon as the crowd thinned out, he asked him if he had that locket, and at first Burt put up a bluff. Finally he admitted that he got it from Greg. Simpson; said he swapped a lot of tops ...
— Polly of the Hospital Staff • Emma C. Dowd
... the eastward, through which we were to find our way home. There I saw a vast extent of open downs and could trace their undulations to where they joined a range of mountains which, judging by their outlines, appeared to be of easy access. Our straightest way homewards passed just under a bluff head about fifty miles distant, and so far I could easily perceive a most favourable line of route by avoiding several large reedy lakes. Between that open country and these lakes on one side and the coast on the other, a low woody ridge extended eastward; and ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... you, Larry," went on Mr. Emberg, hanging up the telephone receiver. "This may be a big thing. Go slow and be careful of what he says. Don't let him bluff you." ...
— Larry Dexter's Great Search - or, The Hunt for the Missing Millionaire • Howard R. Garis
... contradiction of the Apostle's statement is confirmed by his use of the word 'Christian,' which had by no means come into general employment when he spoke; and in itself indicates that he knew a good deal about the people who were so named. Mark the contrast, for instance, between him and the bluff Roman official at his side. To Festus, Paul's talking about a dead man's having risen, and a risen Jew becoming a light to all nations, was such utter nonsense that, with characteristic Roman contempt for men with ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... still more reassured. A reception was given us at the home of one of Brigham Young's daughters, and the receiving-line was graced by the presiding elder of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He was a bluff and jovial gentleman, and when he took my hand he said, warmly, "Well, Sister Shaw, you certainly gave our Mormon friends the biggest dose of Methodism yesterday that they ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw
... if I know; it may be half a mile deep and ten miles across, with a perpendicular bluff a thousand feet high on the ...
— The Young Ranchers - or Fighting the Sioux • Edward S. Ellis
... belonging to a man in the prime of life. His close-shaven crown, surrounded by a circle of stiff curled black hair, had something the appearance of a parish pinfold begirt by its high hedge. The features expressed nothing of monastic austerity, or of ascetic privations; on the contrary, it was a bold bluff countenance, with broad black eyebrows, a well-turned forehead, and cheeks as round and vermilion as those of a trumpeter, from which descended a long and curly black beard. Such a visage, joined to the brawny form of the holy man, spoke rather of sirloins and haunches, ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... increased. I began to believe I could take care of myself. I reasoned out that, as the peaks were snow-capped, I should find water, and very likely game, up higher. Moreover, I might climb a foothill or bluff from which I ...
— The Young Forester • Zane Grey
... other. The curious old man who left them here is, presumably, insane on the subject of religion. He appeared on the mountain early in the summer, with these little ones, and preempted that tumble-down cottage over the bluff beyond our gates. Most of you know ...
— Dorothy's House Party • Evelyn Raymond
... get into the water, and thus leave the dogs at the end of the trail at a point far removed from his real entrance into it. When they had reached the pond, Jack bade the boy head to the boat. This they found moored under a bluff, and Gabe, pointing upward, said ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... left him alone with the dead and the baby. The infant seemed to cling to him from that moment, and the Great Father above alone knows how strangely and rapidly those cords of love were cemented between the bluff, old bachelor sea-captain and the infant. That heart, which he had thought dead to all love since the awful day on board the English merchantman, when he saw the only being he ever loved dying, was suddenly thrilled by the tenderest emotions. Those ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... a narrow strip of turf beyond which the ground drops all at once to another level some thirty feet below. On the right this fall is so abrupt that the only way down to it is by a steep rustic stair. On the left, behind the house, the face of the bluff is broken into narrow terraces, from top to bottom of which, and well out on the lower level, the entire space is mantled with the richly burdened trellises of a small vineyard. At the right on this lower ...
— The Amateur Garden • George W. Cable
... Tim, his mouth drawn with pain, tried to laugh—tried to "bluff it out" so Jeb would not suspect the truth, "I'm thinkin' thot life's wan domn hole after anither! First, mind ye, 'tis the swimmin' hole, thin the shell hole, thin a hole in me leg, an' next we know ...
— Where the Souls of Men are Calling • Credo Harris
... the different temperatures, from boiling, down to a pleasure bath. They contain a combining principle, or the quality of petrifying and uniting various substances that may come in contact with them, such as flint, earth, stone, iron, &c. The bluff from which they flow out is principally of an apparent calcareous substance, formed by the water. In some of the springs a red, in others a green and yellow, sediment is produced. The waters will remove rheumatism, ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... return to 'Pastimes' alone." I spoke shortly. The subject was difficult. So far, I had not thrashed it out even in thought. Mr Thorold shot a quick, keen glance. Instinctively, I knew where his thoughts were wandering. He was thinking of the bluff country Squire who had been so kind to his own little girls, remembering that he came from the same neighbourhood; that Evelyn Wastneys and he ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... bluff overlooking the Hudson, about a mile and one-half north of Fishkill Landing. It is one-story and one-half high, of stone, plastered. The gambrel roof is shingled, descends low and has dormer windows. The house has always been occupied ...
— The American Architect and Building News, Vol. 27, No. 733, January 11, 1890 • Various
... said, facing about toward me. "How do you excuse yourself for your ignorance in matters where you're always professionally making such a bluff of knowledge? After all the marriages you have brought about in literature, can you say positively and specifically how they are brought about ...
— Quaint Courtships • Howells & Alden, Editors
... their boarding-place, they joined a party that had been formed to go to the Cliff, a sandy bluff about a mile north from the town, where they were told was to be found the best still-water bathing on the island. Soon they were all on the yacht "Dauntless," which hourly plied between the two places; in twenty minutes they were landed at ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 3 • Various
... you've just been saying to him is right, and how much is just bluff to cover a place ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Criminologist • John T. McIntyre
... and I consider that for this city to be represented by any one who shows the least indication of being unsafe upon this question would be a national disaster and a local disgrace. I want you to understand, therefore, that I am not playing a game of bluff. The proofs you hold in your hand have been set and corrected. Within a few hours the story will stand out in black and white. Are ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... ever an eye for a fine woman, and he was mightily taken with Monna Vittoria, and made his taking plain in his bluff, simple, soldierly fashion with a fine display of jewels and gold, which only served to move Monna Vittoria to laughter, for she had as much as she cared to have of such trifles, and was not to be purchased so. But she clinched her bargain with him by assuring him, when she paid ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... seen a prettier place than this as we beheld it by the morrow's light. The house stands on a high bluff, worthy the name of hill, which slopes steeply but greenly down to the South Prong of Black Creek, better deserving the name of river than many a stream which boasts the designation. We crossed it upon a boom, pausing midway in sudden astonishment at the lovely view. A long reach of exquisitely ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... After all, he, the Big Man, found it a pleasant place, after the wearisome life from hotel to hotel. He liked the boys; they were kind to him, and looked after his moral and spiritual welfare with bluff but affectionate solicitude. It is true, one was always hungry, and only ten and a half hours' sleep was a refinement of cruelty unworthy of a great institution. But it was pleasant running over to the jigger-shop and doing errands for giants like Reiter and Butcher ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... nearer, I'll sh-sh-shoot you dead!" quavered Ingred, wishing she had at least some semblance of a pistol to bluff with. ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... there shaking his head like a toy in a window. People tried to get past him in all the ways people try to get through life, in the ways that Saint Peter must grow very tired of at the gate of heaven—bluff, whine, bribery, ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... would have to pass, and they had told us the Oude Dorp[150] would be the first one we should come to; but my comrade finding the point very rocky and difficult, and believing the village was inland, and as we discovered no path to follow, we determined to clamber to the top of this steep bluff, through the bushes and thickets, which we accomplished with great difficulty and in a perspiration. We found as little of a road above as below, and nothing but woods, through which one could not see. There appeared to be a little foot-path along the edge ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... about the most severe and dangerous part of the journey yet reached. Up amid the giant bowlders they climbed, at times working around some part of the mountain where there would be a bare bluff on one hand and a ...
— Frank Merriwell's Bravery • Burt L. Standish
... mother described her; and whenever the form of a grown-up girl darkened the doorway, she held her breath to listen if Mrs Blossom called her by that pet name. Mr George also was very good to Meg in his bluff way, and bought her a pair of nearly new shoes with his first week's wages, over and above the threepence a day which he paid her. With Mrs Blossom she held many a conversation about the lost girl, ...
— Little Meg's Children • Hesba Stretton
... could speak both English and Flemish. He took me to the captain of the river barge, a low craft that looked a cross between a tugboat and a Hudson River scow. In less than three minutes my case was disposed of. Verdict: "C'est absolument defendu." It was time for a little "bluff." An hour later I returned with a new proposition, having in the mean time telegraphed Mr. Diederick either to meet me at the pier at Antwerp or to send a military permit. Displaying a copy of this telegram I suggested that I be allowed to board. If there was any one at Antwerp ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... History of Louisiana. Louisiana: Colonial History. Louisiana, as a French Colony. History of the Spanish Dominion in Louisiana. History of Louisiana, to 1861. Phillip II. of Spain. Fernando de Lemos. Aubert Dubayet. School for Politics, [drama]. Dr. Bluff, comedy in ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... said that Violet pranced. Aunt Jane was round-eyed and twittering. Mr. Tubbs wore a look of suppressed astonishment, almost of perturbation. What's his game? was the question in the sophisticated eye of Mr. Tubbs. But the Scotchman had when he chose a perfect poker face. The great game of bluff would have suited him to a nicety. Mr. Tubbs interrogated that ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon
... of lank trees reared its tousled snow-crowned head above the white heart of a wide valley. It was where the gorge of the Bell River opened out upon low banks. It was where the only trail of the region headed westwards. The bowels of the bluff were defended by a meagre undergrowth, which served little better purpose than to partially conceal them. About this bluff a ring of savages had formed. Low-type savages of smallish stature, and of little better intelligence than the predatory ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... was in a high corner of the Alaska building, where the western windows, overtopping other stone and brick blocks of the business center, commanded the harbor, caught like a faceted jewel between Duwamish Head and Magnolia Bluff, and a far sweep of the outer Sound set in wooded islands and the lofty snow peaks of the Olympic peninsula. Next to his summer camp in the open he liked this eyrie, and particularly he liked it at this hour of the ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... standing, as I have said, on its western bank—on the same side with Point Coupee. In front was a lawn, some two hundred yards in length, that stretched toward the river, and ended on the low bluff forming its bank. This lawn was enclosed by high rail-fences, and variegated with clumps of shrubbery and ornamental trees. Most of them were indigenous to the country; but there were exotics as well. Among the trees you could not fail to notice the large-flowered magnolia (Magnolia grandiflora), ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... the town at the bottom of its deep bay, we set out to explore a bluff-headed parallelogramical promontory, bounded by Thurso Bay on the one hand, and Murkle Bay on the other, and which presents to the open sea, in the space that stretches between, an undulating line of iron-bound coast, exposed to the roll of the northern ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... that Judith Barrier says he must come to her at the foot of Foeman's Bluff—on yon side—as soon after dark as he can git there. Tell him to come straight through by the short cut; hit'll be safe; nobody'll ever study about him comin' in this direction. As soon after hit's plumb dark as he can git there—will ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... lay a vessel of about 300 tons burden, with bluff, rounded bows sitting high up out of the water, a long, straight waist, and a bridge and cluster of ...
— The Pit Prop Syndicate • Freeman Wills Crofts
... intelligent because I parade my ignorance so, just as Sophie Mills is considered a paragon of morality because she is always talking about running off with one of the boys in her husband's regiment. It is a gigantic bluff, you know, but it comes off. Most bluffs do come off if one is only ...
— A Prince of Sinners • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... me; and when I tried to pursue him, my horse bolted and nearly broke my neck. I caught the guide at last. After a very rough journey we reached the village of Finisterra, and wound our way up the flinty sides of the huge bluff head which is called the Cape. Certainly in the whole world there is no bolder coast than the Gallegan shore. There is an air of stern and savage grandeur in everything around, which strangely captivates the ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... that the moment Castlereagh stood up and adjusted his waistcoat, there was a thrill in the House of Commons, and his followers bellowed their exultation and delight. In a more recent day, Lord Althorpe was able to bear down the hostility of some of the most powerful orators of his time by a bluff manliness which no rhetoric could withstand. And so also with Jimmy—his sheer audacity carries him along the slow, dull, inept, muddy tide of his ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... up in the hills," said the former, knowing that one bluff was as good as another. Skookum growled and sniffed at the enemy's legs. The prisoner made a quick move ...
— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton
... biggest thing you ever tried—the biggest stunt. And to-morrow morning before the Court meets you come in here and see Mr. Fuller and Uncle Jeb and me. Now don't ask any questions. You came in here all swelled up, regular fellow and all that sort of thing, and I'm calling your bluff." ...
— Tom Slade's Double Dare • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... long to spend my time alone. The old beau, de Virelle, in his bluff and hearty way directed the attention of a party of ladies who were with him to where I hung over a marble balustrade enraptured at the broad expanse of valley, rosy tinted with the hues of ebbing light, boundless as the dim horizon ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson
... manner wholly unusual and startling; relieved of strain, the springs snapped and whined, there was a violent oscillation of the back, a shudder convulsed the thing, and it sprang after him, much as a tame rabbit thumps its feet upon the ground in an effort to bluff a kitten. ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... gentleman. But I cannot help questioning, whether, on the whole, these higher endowments would produce decidedly better results. The Englishman was thoroughly plebeian both in aspect and behavior, a bluff, ruddy-faced, hearty, kindly, yeoman-like personage, with no refinement whatever, nor any superfluous sensibility, but gifted with a native wholesomeness of character which must have been a very beneficial element in the atmosphere of the almshouse. He spoke ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... such circumstances, a bluff and hearty stoicism as remote as possible from Mrs. Peyton's deprecating evasion of facts. It was a bad business; he was sorry Kate should have been mixed up with it; but she would be married soon now, and then she would see that life wasn't exactly a Sunday-school story. Everybody ...
— Sanctuary • Edith Wharton
... For monetary and real-estate Reasons they did not give it out cold that they were making a final Getaway. They planned to have Gusta remain at the dear old Dump as a Caretaker, but it was merely a Bluff. ...
— Ade's Fables • George Ade
... noise like breaking down again. Don't, Peter. I've gone on a bluff all my life. I'm a rotten sentimentalist at heart— soft as smashed grapes. It's my devil. If you break down, ...
— Red Fleece • Will Levington Comfort
... porcelain. At Arita, in Hizen, there is a clay found which contains 783/4 per cent, of silica, and l73/4 per cent, of alumina; from this clay is made the delicate, translucent eggshell ware, without the addition of any other matter. From an adjoining bluff a clay is taken which has 50 per cent, of silica, and 38 per cent, of alumina; from this the common porcelain ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 303 - October 22, 1881 • Various
... clouds in that direction. Every projection on the land seemed now so many fingers anxious to catch a little of the liquid light thrown so prodigally over the sky, and after a fantastic time of lustrous yellows in the east, the higher elevations along the shore were flooded with the same hues. The bluff and bare contours of Start Point caught the brightest, earliest glow of all, and so also did the sides of its white lighthouse, perched upon a shelf in its precipitous front like a mediaeval saint in a niche. Their lofty neighbour Bolt Head on the left remained as yet ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... the straw which had so suddenly been taken away from us, especially myself, as I had experienced so many of the weird tactics which are pursued by the Germans in their vain efforts to maintain their game of bluff. ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney
... fire to that of water. Past low cliffs of ash and volcanic boulder, sloping westward to the sea, which is eating them fast away, the steamer runs in through a deep crack, a pistol-shot in width. On the east side a strange section of gray lava and ash is gnawn into caves. On the right, a bluff rock of black lava dips sheer into water several fathoms deep; and you anchor at once inside an irregular group of craters, having passed through a gap in one of their sides, which has probably been torn out by a lava flow. Whether the land, at the time of the flow, was higher ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... feature of his new life was the friendship of the bluff, cantankerous, but kind-hearted contractor, his sunny daughter, the manly foreman, and the talkative Murphy. Of Tressa he had so many glowing things to write in his letters to his wife that Helen threatened ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... of Ball's Bluff resulted disastrously to the Union forces, and two thousand men were mostly driven into the Potomac, some drowned and others shot. Colonel Baker, United States Senator from ...
— Comic History of the United States • Bill Nye
... found and practised in Nippon. On the beach at Kamakura at times can be found straw chaplets with gaudy cloth attached to the centre; a copper coin, and rice offering are accompaniments. Or such will be found at the crossroads of town or village, or on the Yokohama Bluff. Or in times of epidemic in numbers they are laid on the wayside shrine of the god of measles or other disease. The latter disposition conveys its own warning; the others are majinai or charms by which it is hoped to transfer the disease to some other child, ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... "You can bluff now," Moore retorted, "but that is all you can do. My father is on the lookout for you and that wise guy you call Ned Nestor. When you go back, without the gold, he'll get you good and plenty. You know it! Now lock me up and go ...
— Boy Scouts in a Submarine • G. Harvey Ralphson
... amount of bluff would save us now. Fraser demanded that truth, facts, actual information—and he wouldn't be fooled by anything spurious. Foulet's shoulder touched mine as we peered up through the roof of our cell at our mad ...
— The Floating Island of Madness • Jason Kirby
... by the window in the old house Perched on the bluff, overlooking miles of valley, My days of labor closed, sitting out life's decline, Day by day did I look in my memory, As one who gazes in an enchantress' crystal globe, And I saw the figures of the past As if in a pageant glassed by a shining dream, Move through the incredible sphere of time. And ...
— Spoon River Anthology • Edgar Lee Masters
... most frequently described is that known as the Basket trick, which is in my opinion the chef d'oeuvre of the Indian Jadoo-wallah. It is a wonderful bluff usually wonderfully shewn. ...
— Indian Conjuring • L. H. Branson
... strange about the whole business," said he. "Once or twice I asked Bill or Gabe about it, but I never could get any satisfaction. I sometimes think carrying that message was only a bluff, and that the Germans were merely trying to test out Bill and Gabe, to see if they could not get them to do ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... on his road, a prey to very great disturbance of mind. The patience—humbleness even—of Betts's manner struck a pang to the young man's heart. The farm director was generally a man of bluff, outspoken address, quick-tempered, and not at all accustomed to mince his words. What Newbury perceived was a man only half persuaded by his own position; determined to cling to it, yet unable to justify it, because, in truth, the ideas put up against him by ...
— The Coryston Family • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... knew that their safety depended on playing a tremendous game of bluff, and that before the news of their ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... after Easter they go out toget'er. Colina Gaviller ride on the sledge and Michel he break trail ahead. Come to the bench, leave the dogs in a shelter Michel build in a poplar bluff. Michel go to see his traps, and Colina walk away on her ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... our hearts as Thomas Atkins. Before he had learned from reading stories about himself that he, as an individual, also possessed the above attributes, he was mostly ignorant of the fact. My early recollections of the British soldier are of a bluff, rather surly person, never the least jocose or light-hearted except perhaps when ...
— The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century • William Lyon Phelps
... stuff; You're a fighter from away back, and you won't take a rebuff; Your trouble is that you don't know when you have had enough— Don't give in. If Fate should down you, just get up and take another cuff; You may bank on it that there is no philosophy like bluff And grin. ...
— Songs of a Sourdough • Robert W. Service
... our day go for nothing, after a trudge of some twenty miles, to this out-of-the-way place,—Adad, sirs, it's no joke!" exclaimed a sturdy, bluff-looking man, to our friend little Robin Hays, who sat upon the corner of the bench, one leg tucked under (doubtless for the purpose of enabling him to sit higher than nature had intended,) while the other swung methodically ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... your buff jerkin, I counsel you to say nothing slighting of the Queen of England in my hearing," returned a bluff, broad-shouldered fellow, raising his bludgeon after a menacing fashion. He was an Englishman belonging to the Four Nations, and had a huge bull-dog at ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... at dawn pursuing a south-south-east direction, and at the end of one mile rounded a bluff point; the limestone hills to the eastward gradually decreased in elevation and we ascended one of them to gain a view of the surrounding country. I found that the summit of this range consisted of a terrace about half a ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey
... listened so intently to her mother's glowing descriptions of the beauty and elegance of her old home "Elm Bluff," that she soon began to identify the land-marks along the road, alter passing the cemetery, where so many generations of Darringtons slept in one corner, enclosed by a lofty iron railing; exclusive in death as in life; jealously ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... down to have a talk with my father, and to have my ignorance on nautical affairs somewhat enlightened, though he, I found, knew very little more about them than I did. While I was in the study the footman came to say that Widow Bluff wished to see him. "Let her come in," was his reply. "Well, dame, what is it you want this morning?" he asked, in his cheery encouraging tone as ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... their celebrated meeting at the Field of the Cloth of Gold[2] to plan an alliance and revenge. Henry came, but the silent Charles had already managed to enlist his interests by quieter ways; while Francis, by his ostentation and splendor, offended the bluff Englishman. So Henry kept out of the quarrel; but to Charles and Francis it became the main business of their lives. Their reigns thereafter are the story of one long strife between them, rising to such bitterness that at one time ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... unfortunate," said the admiral, a bluff, harsh-looking old gentleman; "but we were not aware, till we saw Mr. Merton, of the honour Lord Vargrave has done us. I can't think how we missed him ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book IV • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... passed by. Rob's cousin Will was away at school; and Marian's father, who had learned of her friendship with Rob, had sent his daughter to the court of Queen Eleanor. So these years were lonely ones to the orphaned lad. The bluff old Squire was kind to him, but secretly could make nothing of one who went about brooding and as though seeking for something he had lost. The truth is that Rob missed his old life in the forest no less than his mother's ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... for that, thought Bryce. He turned with more interest to the next witness—the Duke of Saxonsteade, the great local magnate, a big, bluff man who had been present in court since the beginning of the proceedings, in which he was manifestly highly interested. It was possible that he might be able to tell something of moment—he might, ...
— The Paradise Mystery • J. S. Fletcher
... they ain't on to you," she assured him. "I wouldn't call you 'Doc' myself if I didn't know you was a good sport back of your bluff." ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... herself. 'You dare?' she cried, confronting him. 'You dare to brazen it out? You miserable sneak! But you can't bluff me now. I have the police outside.' Which I regret to confess was ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... wolf's gray, was clipped all over within an inch of his head, and stood up like the bristles on a wild boar's back. His brows were bushy, and jutted, roof-like, over his deeply-sunken eyes; his nose was bluff as a bull-dog's; his cheek-bones were rough and high; his eyes were wide-set; his mouth was cut square across almost from ear to ear; his chin was square and massy; he had an Adam's apple as large as a gilly-flower ripening on his throat; his hands were large and bony, and ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... wooden house on a slope looking down a bluff at the edge of a great plain, from which you look over ...
— First in the Field - A Story of New South Wales • George Manville Fenn
... possessions, a little silver coin that a parson hard by had given him. He went his way quickly among the pleasant fields, making towards the great bulk of Blackdown beacon, where the hills swelled up into a steep bluff, with a white road, cut in the chalk, winding steeply up their green smooth sides. It was a fresh morning with a few white clouds racing merrily overhead, the shadows of which fell every now and then upon the down and ran swiftly over it, like a flood of shade ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... companions gave expression to their deep gratitude, and Irons continued in his bluff, ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... store; was elected "road commissioner" and bossed the neighbors when they had to work out their poll-tax, and turned his hand to any other affairs that offered a penny's recompense. The "real estate business" was what Seth Davis labeled "a blobbering bluff," for no property had changed hands in the neighborhood in a score of years, except the lot back of the mill, which was traded for a yoke of oxen, and the Wegg farm, which had been sold without the agent's knowledge ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Millville • Edith Van Dyne
... said the little man quietly, "and employ every means that opportunity suggests to that purpose. Make no mistake," he said emphatically; "Cole will stop at nothing. His attitude was one big bluff. He knows that I have beaten him. It was only by luck that I found out about the woman in Holland. I got my agent to examine the hotel register, and there it was, without any attempt at disguise: 'Mr. and Mrs. Cole, ...
— The Man Who Knew • Edgar Wallace
... about that the Chancellor of the Exchequer stood in the Mansion House on a certain momentous day and hurled the defi at the War Lord. It called the Teuton bluff for a while at least. In the light of later events this speech became historic. Not only did Lloyd George declare that "national honour is no party question," but he affirmed that "the peace of the world is much more likely to be secured if all the nations ...
— The War After the War • Isaac Frederick Marcosson
... N.E. point of Bougainville's Passage. At noon the breeze began to slacken. We were at this time between two and three miles from the land, and observed in latitude 15 deg. 23' the Isle of Lepers bearing from E. by N. to S., distance seven leagues; and a high bluff-head, at which the coast we were upon seemed to terminate, N.N.W. 1/2 W., distant ten or eleven leagues; but from the mast-head we could see land to the east. This we judged to be an island, and it bore N. by W. ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... man of forty-odd, a typical product of country politics. His manner was carefully bluff and hearty and characterized by a sort of bonhommie that was useful in impressing voters with the fact that he was a pretty good fellow, his close-set eyes sparkled with intelligence that his low brow defined as cunning ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... added to an anxiety almost painful; for to doubt Monsieur Valmond would have shocked the sense of courtesy so dear to Monsieur the Cure, Monsieur Garon, the Little Chemist, and even Medallion the auctioneer, who had taken into his bluff, odd nature something of the spirit of those old-fashioned gentlemen. Monsieur De la Riviere, the young Seigneur, had to be ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... order to live at all under unfavorable conditions. Now, had her father been a Deptford ox-slaughterer instead of a Chicago pig-sticker she could never have risen to the role of a marchioness at all. This is no new country; it does not need nor comprehend bluff, and so produces no ...
— The Reason Why • Elinor Glyn
... thing he could do. He retreated back across th' river, an' got up ag'in a bluff 'bout three hunderd feet high. Reno Hill, they call it now. An' there we fought for five or six hours, when Benteen, who'd bin fightin' in th' center, heard heavy firin' over on his right where Custer was. An' Benteen, he bein' a honest-t'-God ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... followed him silently, hanging down her head, and refusing to answer the questions he put in his kind, bluff way. Some great sorrow evidently weighed upon her, and she refused to be comforted. When, however, Kariades presented her to his wife, and said, 'This shall be our daughter,' the child opened her mouth ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... to live on the lake shore, the development of bluff and land, the building of study and stable and finally the stone house (a pool of water in the centre, a roof open to the sunlight, the outer walls broken with chimneys for the inner fires), these are but exterior cultivations, the establishment ...
— Child and Country - A Book of the Younger Generation • Will Levington Comfort
... Kranich. He sought the aunt. This lady gave him several interviews, the Lutheran prayer-book for ever in her hand. "Why does the dear girl not come to me?" she would say, weeping, but she refused to hear a word against her precious nephew, the personification of bluff frankness. As if to make crushing him impossible, young Kranich had now withdrawn to America, leaving his reputation in that best possible protection, the chivalry that is extended toward the absent. Fortnoye was baffled. "I will ask the baby at its tomb for its mother's and father's ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... this sad time was the English ambassador, Mitchell; a bluff, shrewd, hearty man, for whom the king had conceived a close friendship. He had accompanied Frederick from the time he left Berlin, and had even been near him on the battlefields; and it was in no small degree due to his despatches and ...
— With Frederick the Great - A Story of the Seven Years' War • G. A. Henty
... Dr. Seward, "Say, Jack, if that man wasn't attempting a bluff, he is about the sanest lunatic I ever saw. I'm not sure, but I believe that he had some serious purpose, and if he had, it was pretty rough on him ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... Bediente. I must be allowed to add, that the head waiter of the Waldhorn, or Hunting Horn, was one of the most respectably looking, and well-mannered, of his species. He spoke French fluently, but with the usual German accent. The master of the inn was coarse and bluff, but bustling and civil. He frequently devoted one of the best rooms in his house to large, roaring, singing, parties—in which he took a decided lead, and kept ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... top of the ridge she rode out to the edge and made the peace-sign to Luck as a signal that she was ready to do his bidding. Incidentally, while she held her hand high over her head, her eyes swept keenly the bowlder-strewn bluff beneath her. A little to one side was a narrow backbone of smoother soil than the rest, and here were printed deep the marks of Jean's horse. Even there it was steep, and there was a bank, down there by the big flat ...
— The Heritage of the Sioux • B.M. Bower
... go in." He turned on his heel to go out, and I followed. When we were on the sidewalk he said: "I don't give it up yet, but I can play bluff as ...
— A Man of Samples • Wm. H. Maher
... for story-telling and pipes. The blizzard, which had been brewing for a week or more, had burst forth in all its fury, and the elements were in frightful commotion. The wind howled mournfully through the branches of the evergreens that covered the bluff behind the cabin; the rain and sleet, freezing as they fell, rattled harshly upon the bark roof over our heads; and the whole aspect of nature, as I caught a momentary glimpse of it when I went out to gather our evening's supply of fire-wood, was ...
— Elam Storm, The Wolfer - The Lost Nugget • Harry Castlemon
... bluff," said he, "caterpillars are past-masters of bluff. Look at the hawkmoths, fat, flabby, bloated things, with curly tails. Most of them fling their heads back, arch their necks, and play at being snakes. Some grow eyes upon them, not real eyes, but markings ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English
... the mistake of connecting Erebus with the mainland Ross was looking at a distance upon the Hut Point Peninsula running out from the S.W. corner of Erebus towards the west. He probably saw Minna Bluff, which juts out from the mainland towards the east. Between them, and in front of the Bluff, lie White Island, Black Island and Brown Island. To suppose them to be part of a line of continuous land was a very ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... crisp, scorched, sparse vesture of vegetation scarce worth the name. As the trees march slowly westward in conquest of the prairies, so also do the prairies, in their verdant turn, become aggressors and push westward upon the plains. These last stretches, extending to the base of that bluff and sudden bulwark, the Rocky Mountains, can go no further. The Rockies hold the plains at bay and break, as it were, the teeth of the desert. As a result of this warfare of vegetations, the plains are to first disappear in favour of the prairies; and the prairies to give way before the ...
— Wolfville Nights • Alfred Lewis
... spoke short, and drew his breath in and puffed it out between his sentences, in his bluff way; but his eyes were kind, as he sat looking at the young girl over his hat ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... was a considerable body of Protestant opinion in agreement with Lord Pirrie, and prepared to support Home Rule on "Liberal," if not on avowedly "Nationalist" principles, and that the policy for which Carson, Londonderry, and the Unionist Council stood was a gigantic piece of bluff which only required to be exposed to disappear in ...
— Ulster's Stand For Union • Ronald McNeill
... up and get your bar," he replied. "My pistol is empty and I don't know how long I can run a bluff on this fellow." ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... that would give you the legal hold on me that is just what you wish. You can't do us any real harm, no matter what you pretend. I don't believe you have anything behind those threats you make to Cousin Jasper, I don't think you believe in your claims yourself. You're a bluff; like this scarecrow here, you're nothing but a ...
— The Windy Hill • Cornelia Meigs
... Abraham Lincoln. The act of Mayor Ruef of San Francisco, even at the time of the earthquake, declaring martial law, or giving troops or vigilance committees summary powers of punishment, was a mere "bluff." Such an order, though in practice obeyed by all good citizens, would in no way protect those acting under it from prosecution in the criminal or ...
— Popular Law-making • Frederic Jesup Stimson
... much attached to my colleagues. The first of these, Senator Wade of Ohio, was bluff, direct, shrewd, and well preserved, though over seventy years of age. He was a rough diamond, kindly in his judgments unless his feeling of justice was injured; then he was implacable. Many sayings of his were current, among them a dry answer to a senator from Texas who, having dwelt ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... for those ships, Each worn and ancient one, With great bluff bows, and broad in the beam; Ay, it was unkindly done. But so they serve the ...
— Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War • Herman Melville
... the useless attempt to bluff it out. She came opposite to where he was sitting, and put her hands on the table. "If you tell that I kill you!" she ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... about one hundred feet high, and on the northeast another, lower. Between them, and also along the north shore, the land is low, and during the season of rains there is a row of ponds parallel to the shore. On the south side a conspicuous white bluff looks to ...
— The Life of Christopher Columbus from his own Letters and Journals • Edward Everett Hale
... up water from the creek, and when he appeared they ordered him off without showing so much as a head. And he went, for the swiftness of the change had confused him; he was whipped before he began. There was no use to fight or to put up a bluff, the men behind the wall were determined; and while, according to law, they held no title the law was far away. It was a weapon for rich men who could afford to pay the price; but how could he, a poor man, hope to win back his claim when it was held by Bible-Back ...
— Silver and Gold - A Story of Luck and Love in a Western Mining Camp • Dane Coolidge
... I've got you, my friend, got you foul!" said Cleek in reply. "All but ruined by the failure of the gold reefs and the milling and mining companies last autumn, weren't you, and have been playing a bluff game and living on your credit ever since? A pretty little scheme you two beauties hatched up between you to get the old duchess into your clutches, to rob her of the Siva stones, and to have Mrs. Glossop and your Hindu ally slip over ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... sentences of the bluff fisherman, as in their racy vernacular they were blithely given utterance to by the manly voice of the Reader, seemed to supply a fitting introduction to the drama, as though from the lips of a Yarmouth Chorus. Scarcely had the social ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent
... ride from the Plaza there is a high bluff with the ocean breaking uninterruptedly along its rocky beach. There are several cottages on the sands, which look as if they had recently been cast up by a heavy sea. The cultivated patch behind each tenement ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... a loud, bluff, rather rich voice; and the next minute Archie was face to face with the fine-looking, white-haired, florid Major in command of the infantry detachment stationed at Campong Dang in support of Her Majesty's Resident, Sir Charles ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... excavation of the Mound-Builders was found near the Waterbury mine. Here, in the face of a vertical bluff, was discovered "an ancient, artificial, cavern-like recess, twenty-five feet in horizontal length, fifteen feet high, and twelve feet deep. In front of it is a pile of excavated rock on which are standing, in full size, the forest trees common to this region." ...
— Ancient America, in Notes on American Archaeology • John D. Baldwin
... also, a little stock of pins, needles, thread, and buttons. These he peddled along the way; and, at last, after fifteen days of slow travel, the emigrants came to the spot picked out for a home. This time it was on a small bluff on the north fork of the Sangamon River, ten miles west of the town of Decatur. The usual log house was built; the boys, with the oxen, "broke up," or cleared, fifteen acres of land, and split enough rails to fence it in. Abraham could swing ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... and would carry her treasure safely enough for a while. Wading waist deep through the drowned fields behind the house, she gained the uplands, and rushed dripping along the ridge to the next farm, where, as she knew, a boat was kept. This farmhouse, perched on a bluff, was safe from all floods; and the farmer was at home, congratulating himself. Before he quite knew what was happening, he found himself being dragged to the boat—for his neighbor was a strenuous woman, whom few in the settlement ...
— Children of the Wild • Charles G. D. Roberts
... talk. Indeed, although I was no saint, I liked them not at all, especially the men with their scented hair, turned-up shoes, and party-coloured clothes. Nor as I thought, did Sir Robert Aleys like them, who, whatever his faults, was a bluff knight of the older sort, who had fought with credit in the French wars. Yet I noted that he seemed to be helpless in their hands, or rather in those of Deleroy, the King's favourite, who was the chief of all the gang. ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard
... thank you most heartily for all your kindness to my son,' said old Mr. Winkle, in a bluff, straightforward way. 'I am a hasty fellow, and when I saw you last, I was vexed and taken by surprise. I have judged for myself now, and am more than satisfied. Shall I make any more apologies, ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... anything done properly. Even when it was more economical to do a thing well, he insisted from force of habit on having it scamped. Then he was almost happy, because he felt that he was doing someone down. If there were an architect superintending the work, Misery would square him or bluff him. If it were not possible to do either, at least he had a try; and in the intervals of watching, driving and bullying the hands, his vulture eye was ever on the look out for fresh jobs. His long red nose was thrust into every estate agent's office in the town in the endeavour to smell out ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... Miss Georgie urged Evadna to her room—it sounded almost as if she dragged her there by force—and he rolled a cigarette with fingers that did not so much as quiver. He scratched a match upon the nearest post, and afterward leaned there and smoked, and stared out over the pond and up at the bluff glowing yellow in the sunlight. His face was set and expressionless except that it was stoically calm, and there was a glitter deep down in his eyes. Evadna was right, to a certain extent the Indian ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... the first on board to see Java Head, a bluff promontory stretching out into the sea that marks the entrance to Sunda. This was how it was: we'd got more to the north of the captain's reckoning, and while up in the mizzen cross-trees, in the afternoon of our eighty-fifth ...
— Afloat at Last - A Sailor Boy's Log of his Life at Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... arrived I went out for a little ride, and about two miles up the river I left the road to follow a narrow trail that leads to a bluff called Crown Butte. I had to go through a large field of wild rosebushes, then across an alkali bed, and then through more bushes. I had passed the first bushes and was more than half way across the alkali, Rollo's feet sinking down in the sticky ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... and yet as unapproachable as if they were located in Ireland. A party of campers, numbering some fifty or seventy-five, who were resting near by, came to our relief. The horses were extricated, and, after we had carried the contents of the wagon to the bluff shore, they drew the wagon out with cow-teams, whose flat, broad hoofs kept them from sinking. Cow-teams were used quite extensively in those days, being very docile ...
— In the Early Days along the Overland Trail in Nebraska Territory, in 1852 • Gilbert L. Cole
... position of attention is "chest lifted; and arched." There should be a stretch upward at the waist. The position should give the impression of a man as proud of himself as he can be. This is a bluff which works, not only by making a good first impression on others, but by causing the man himself ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker
... Confederates held the Mississippi River only from Vicksburg to Port Hudson. The capture of these two towns would complete the opening of the river. Grant, therefore, determined to capture Vicksburg. The town stands on the top of a bluff which rises straight and steep from the river, and had been so strongly fortified on the land side that to take it seemed impossible. Grant, having failed in a direct advance through Mississippi, cut a canal across a bend in the river, on the west bank, hoping ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... too charming. No doubt you'll be modern enough (Though the speed of the world is alarming) To win with a delicate bluff, ...
— More Songs From Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey
... be present. They supposed that they were not half-a-mile from the scene in the pass where Nagen was being forcibly deposed from his authority: Merthyr borrowed Count Karl's glass, and went as they directed him round a bluff of the descending hills, that faced the vale, much like a blown and beaten sea-cliff. Wilfrid and Karl were so certain of Count Ammiani's safety, that their only thought was to get under good cover before nightfall, and haply into good quarters, where the three proper requirements ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Jim. "That's the way I like to hear you talk. And don't you let Sim Dobley, or either of the Lascalla Brothers, bluff you. I'm running this show, not them! If they make any ...
— Joe Strong on the Trapeze - or The Daring Feats of a Young Circus Performer • Vance Barnum
... willows admits a current of air a ripple starts to rush straight across, but is met by another returning, which has been repulsed from the bluff bow of a moored boat, and the two cross and run through each other. As the level of the stream now slightly rises and again falls, the jagged top of a large stone by the shore alternately appears above, or is covered by the surface. The water as it retires leaves for a moment a hollow in itself ...
— Nature Near London • Richard Jefferies
... hospitality, and when meeting socially avoiding all allusion to the proposed bill for taxing the Colonies. All hoped that nothing would be done by Parliament to interrupt friendly relations between the Colonies and the mother country. Doctor Warren made himself agreeable to bluff Admiral Montague. William Molineux cracked jokes with Colonel Dalrymple. Richard Dana and Nathaniel Coffin were friendly neighbors. Mr. Dana could look out from his front windows near Frog Lane,[34] ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... of a rocky basis, covered by a thin layer of sandy soil. On the summit of the bluff east end of the island was observed one of those immense nests that were seen at King George the Third's Sound, the base of which measured seven feet in diameter. Whilst examining the nest, some natives were descried on an adjoining island, and as our ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... and Lady Webling spread their hands and drew up their shoulders in surrender and gave up hope of bluff. ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... increasingly conscious of being, to put it vulgarly "up against something pretty big." Conscious of a personality altogether too secure of its own power to spread itself or, in the smallest degree, bluff or brag. Sir Charles Verity struck him, indeed, as calm to the confines of cynicism. He gave, but gave of his abundance, royally indifferent to the cost. There was plenty more where all this came from, of knowledge, of initiative and of thought. Only once ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... and who had never before required the aid of a physician, was seen by the residents of the village to fall forward from a skiff into the water and go down with uplifted hands. I could not learn that he rose at all after the first submersion. Two men were standing near a bluff which overlooked the bay, and after an instant's delay in deciding that an accident had occurred, they ran over an uneven and undulating pasture for a distance of two hundred and fifty paces to the shore. One of them, after a quick decision not to swim out to where ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 819 - Volume XXXII, Number 819. Issue Date September 12, 1891 • Various
... the governor himself, bluff and rugged, who grasped Jack Bracken's hand as he lay dying, wrapped up, on a bale of cotton, and Margaret Adams, pale, weeping beside him: "Live for me, Jack—I love you. ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... opening, the fog lifted and we saw a schooner's sail over one of the small islets that lay about us. Taking our cue from that we poked into the next narrow channel we came to, and getting some sailing directions from a passing boat, and from the signal man stationed on a bluff to give assistance to strangers, we glided into an almost circular basin, hardly large enough for the vessel to swing in, set among steep rising sides, into which many ring bolts were seen to be fastened, and perfectly sheltered from every wind. The use for the ring bolts we found ...
— Bowdoin Boys in Labrador • Jonathan Prince (Jr.) Cilley
... them. The wind was in the east, and the weather set fair, and but for the sea-mist the power of the sun would have been enough to dazzle all beholders. Already this vapour was beginning to clear off, coiling up in fleecy wisps above the glistening water, but clinging still to any bluff or cliff it could ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... gray-pebbled path wound back to where a house stood, nearly hidden in a grove of trees, upon a bluff directly overlooking ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings |
