"Driest" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... be more desired for this quality than that of plumbers! They are the most agreeable men I know; and the boys in the business begin to be agreeable very early. I suspect the secret of it is, that they are agreeable by the hour. In the driest days, my fountain became disabled: the pipe was stopped up. A couple of plumbers, with the implements of their craft, came out to view the situation. There was a good deal of difference of opinion about where the stoppage was. I found the plumbers perfectly willing to sit down and talk ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various
... a big stock of papers, I had an accident in which they were all spoiled. I dropped them in a pool of water—and I was penniless again! That night, late, I went up the white stone steps of a big house in Westminster and went to sleep. I had saved a few of the driest papers and used them ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine
... their mouths without dropping some provocation to a smile. An ecclesiastical meeting was always a merry season; for there never were wanting quaint images, humorous anecdotes, and sharp flashes of wit, and even the driest and most metaphysical points of doctrine were often lit up ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... large and shining leaves, raise their branches vertically towards the sky; while those of the Courbaril and the Erythrina form, as they extend themselves, a thick vault of verdure. Plants of the family of Pothos with succulent stems, Oxalises, and Orchideae of a singular construction, rise in the driest clefts of the rocks; while creeping plants waving in the winds are interwoven in festoons before the opening of the cavern. We distinguished in these festoons a Bignonia of a violet blue, the purple Dolichos, and, for the first time, that magnificent Solandra, the orange flower of which ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... and follow me: but, sell not all thou hast, except thou come and follow me; that is, except thou have a vocation, wherein thou mayest do as much good, with little means as with great; for otherwise, in feeding the streams, thou driest the fountain. Neither is there only a habit of goodness, directed by right reason; but there is in some men, even in nature, a disposition towards it; as on the other side, there is a natural malignity. For there be, that in their nature do not affect the good of others. ...
— Essays - The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. - Verulam Viscount St. Albans • Francis Bacon
... Duplessis, habitually the driest of men, rose with a moistened eye and flushing cheek—"Monsieur le Marquis, vouchsafe me the honour to shake hands with you. I, too, am by descent gentilhomme, by profession a speculator on the Bourse. In both capacities ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... in his arms and seated her on the highest and driest of the tombs, then sat beside her. He kept his arm about her, but he did not kiss her. "Come now," he said, "let us have it out. We must not quarrel. I humble myself to the dust. I vow to be a saint. I will not exchange two consecutive sentences with your friend in ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... shallows of the world, And vile hands gather it? My song shall rise, Although none heed or hear it: rise it shall, And swell along the wastes of Nineveh And Babylon, until it reach to thee, Layard! who raisest cities from the dust, Who driest Lethe up amid her shades, And pourest a fresh stream on arid sands, And rescuest thrones and nations, fanes and gods, From conquering Time: he sees thee, and turns back. The weak and slow Power pushes past the wise, And lifts them up ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... be colder than the atmosphere and yet derive no moisture from it; while at the same time the driest atmosphere is not devoid of moisture, but will part with it ...
— American Handbook of the Daguerrotype • Samuel D. Humphrey
... Europe; its proper colour an exquisitely clear purple in the upper petals, gradated into deep blue in the lower ones; the centre, gold. Not larger than a violet, but perfectly formed, and firmly set in all its petals. Able to live in the driest ground; beautiful in the coast sand-hills of Cumberland, following the wild geranium and burnet rose: and distinguished thus by its power of life, in waste and dry places, from the violet, which needs ...
— Proserpina, Volume 2 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... had once been a railing. The water, swollen by the melting snow, was overflowing the stone curb, and reached out in a thin sheet as it started down hill. The countess stopped, afraid of wetting her feet. The painter went ahead, putting his feet in the driest places, taking her hand to guide her, and she followed him, laughing at the obstacle and ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... tiest, To the curtain string, Though the things thou driest Gird me while I sing, Hankies and inventions Of the lacy tribe— Things I may not mention, Let ...
— Tobogganing On Parnassus • Franklin P. Adams
... that all men stood ready and eager to gaze on the pictures he drew. He chose too often to inflict upon them, instead of it, the most commonplace of moralizing, the stalest (p. 170) disquisitions upon manners and customs, and the driest ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... In the driest parts of the wood, here the ground is thickly carpeted with dead leaves, you may some day notice a little bunch of them, that look as if a plant, in pushing its way up through the ground, had raised the leaves, ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan
... leaped to Josie's side. Cornish had seized her by the arm, and seemed about to devote himself to her safety, when Jim, without a word, lifted her in his arms, and leaped lightly upon the forward deck, the highest and driest place on the sinking craft. Then, as everything pointed to a speedy baptism in the lake for all of us, we saw that the very speed of the wind had saved us, and felt the gondola bump broadside upon the dam. Jim sprang to the abutment with Josie, and Cecil Barr-Smith half ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... night when the Bible was the driest and darkest book in the universe to me. The next day it became entirely different. I thought I had the key to it. I had been born of the Spirit. But before I knew anything of the mind of God I had to give ...
— The Way to God and How to Find It • Dwight Moody
... the moat must have been very effective; but when I was there, only about a quarter of it contained water. The other three-quarters was a sort of bog, or marsh, its surface broken up by large shell holes. On the driest part of this I discovered a row of graves, their rough crosses all battered and bent down. I just managed to discern the names inscribed; they were all French. Names of former heroes who had participated in some action or other months before. Going ...
— Bullets & Billets • Bruce Bairnsfather
... the Pacific coast districts they continue about 80 per cent the year round. In the Atlantic coast districts, and generally east from the Mississippi River, the variation from month to month is not great. April is probably the driest ...
— Dry-Farming • John A. Widtsoe
... last came on a shallow cave on the lee side of a rock. The sand inside was dry, and after being exposed so long to the cold wind we thought the air warm, so we helped the old man into it, and placed him in the warmest and driest spot we could find out. He did not seem to care about eating, but complained bitterly of thirst. Charley could no longer move, so I went out to try and find some water. As I was groping about, almost giving up the search in despair, I felt my foot splash ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... with his right hand, but his hearers received them with their left; so awkward people frequently take in a clumsy manner the favours of fortune; but men of sense, as bees extract honey from thyme which is the strongest and driest of herbs,[725] so from the least auspicious circumstances frequently derive advantage ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... I know," said Jimmy. "Give me a cocktail. A telephone's the driest thing in the world to talk into. But, as I ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... plantations in the island; one, my little fortification or tent, with the wall about it, under the rock, with the cave behind me, which, by this time, I had enlarged into several apartments or caves, one within another. One of these, which was the driest and largest, and had a door out beyond my wall or fortification, that is to say, beyond where my wall joined to the rock, was all filled up with the large earthen pots, of which I have given an account, ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan
... September are the driest months in Ireland. Tourists will find the Royal Irish Constabulary the best source of information, and they cannot do better than inquire at the various police barracks on the way for advice as to places of interest to be visited, and the condition of the roads. ...
— The Sunny Side of Ireland - How to see it by the Great Southern and Western Railway • John O'Mahony and R. Lloyd Praeger
... inquiries as to the reputation of intending members. If he could have risen every day at 4 A.M. and stayed up working every night till 4 A.M. he might have got through most of the labour. He did, as a fact, come very near to this ideal. So near that one morning his mother said to him, at her driest: ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... know the Egyptians say the water will be too low for the boats to go up. That may be true enough as to the native boats, but ours draw so little water that I believe there must always be depth enough for them, for there is always a good lot of water coming down here even at the driest season." ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... come. My lord connected our day of trial with India. Mrs. Pagnell assumed an air of studious interest; she struck in to give her niece a lead, that Lord Ormont might know his countess capable of joining the driest of subjects occupying exalted minds. Aminta did not follow her; and she was extricated gallantly by ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... useful. The ground on which they grow should be only moderately fertile, or else there is too great a growth of vine at the expense of fruit. This is especially true if we desire an early yield, and in this case the warmest, driest soil ...
— The Home Acre • E. P. Roe
... with an important air. "Are you all ready? This is the driest thing I know. Silence all 'round, if you please! 'William the Conqueror, whose cause was favored by the pope, was soon submitted to by the English, who wanted leaders, and had been of late much accustomed to usurpation and conquest. Edwin and Morcar, the ...
— Alice in Wonderland • Lewis Carroll
... In the driest of tones Gregory asked Karen for some tea, and while he stood above her Herr Lippheim's beam continued to include ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... which brought others a yield of fifteen or twenty bushels to the acre, Martin averaged thirty-three, without buying a ton of commercial fertilizer. His corn was higher than anybody's else; the ears longer, the stalks juicier, because of his careful, intelligent cultivating. In the driest season, it resisted the hot winds; this, he explained, was the result of his knowing how to prepare his seed bed and when to plant—moisture could be retained if the soil was handled scientifically. He bought the spoiled ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius
... defined as the degree of its approach to saturation. Air completely saturated is represented by 100, and that absolutely free of vapour by 0. As a matter of fact, however, the latter never occurs; even in the driest regions of Arabia a humidity of 10 per cent. is almost unknown. For its estimation the Wet and Dry Bulb thermometers are employed. These consist of two ordinary thermometers. One has its bulb exposed so as to register the temperature of the ...
— The Art of Living in Australia • Philip E. Muskett (?-1909)
... where the continuity is broken by a slough or other unfavorable condition. They are found everywhere—on high, well-drained levels; on sloping ground, sometimes so steep that it may well be called a hillside; in low "crawfish land"; in swamps where, in the driest weather, even after a prolonged drought, they can be reached only by wading through water or muck. The last, however, may have been more easily accessible when built, their present condition being due to the general subsidence ...
— Archeological Investigations - Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 76 • Gerard Fowke
... is easy to understand," says Mr. Van Dyke, making his observations from the summit of the Cuyamaca, in San Diego County, 6500 feet above the sea-level, "how land thus rising a mile or more in fifty or sixty miles, rising away from the coast, and falling off abruptly a mile deep into the driest and hottest of American deserts, could have a great variety of climates.... Only ten miles away on the east the summers are the hottest, and only sixty miles on the west the coolest known in the United States (except on this coast), and between them is every combination ...
— Our Italy • Charles Dudley Warner
... the addition of Iyok-ok to their party. From that hour they had wanted nothing of food or shelter. Reared as he apparently had been in such wilds as these, the native skillfully had sought out the best of game, the driest, most sheltered of camping spots, in fact, had done everything that tended to make life easy in such ...
— Triple Spies • Roy J. Snell
... Miltoun, was that your class is the driest and most practical in the State—it's odd if it doesn't save you from a poet's dreams. Good-night!" He passed out on to the lawn, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Iagoensis), which tamely sits on the branches of the castor-oil plant, and thence darts on grasshoppers and lizards. It is brightly coloured, but not so beautiful as the European species: in its flight, manners, and place of habitation, which is generally in the driest valley, there is ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin
... Ormuz is twenty-five or thirty miles in circuit, being the driest and most barren island in the world, producing nothing but salt-water and wood. All things necessary for the life of man are brought here from Persia, which is twelve miles off, and from islands adjoining to Persia, and in such abundance that the city has ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... the coldest, windiest, highest (on average), and driest continent; during summer, more solar radiation reaches the surface at the South Pole than is received at the Equator in an equivalent ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... take up the most abstract of these questions of belief first, the metaphysical questions. It may be that to many readers the opening sections may seem the driest and least attractive. But I would ask them to begin at the beginning and read straight on, because much that follows this metaphysical book cannot be appreciated at its proper value without a ...
— First and Last Things • H. G. Wells
... Willamette Valley, which at a certain season of the year becomes semi-arid, fully justifies the statement that trees not having a tap root are annually checked in their growth when irrigation is not used; while those that do have a tap root, as do walnuts, continue to grow and thrive even in the driest weather. The walnut should be planted, however, in soil having a subsoil free from any hard substance that will permit the tap root to grow downward into ...
— Walnut Growing in Oregon • Various
... probably followed that river to its head, and crossing the main watershed regained and re-pursued his track of 1845, as far as the Roper, of which river Elsey Creek is a tributary. When he left the camp seen by Gregory, he would, going either south-west or west, find himself in the driest of dry country, which is even now but sparsely settled. And there ...
— The Explorers of Australia and their Life-work • Ernest Favenc
... well supplied with clean, soft running water, even in the driest of the season. There are no marshes, swamps, or bogs, no still water—not even a "puddle" for long—for the soil is of such a character, that surface water quickly filters away into the sands and mingles with the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 433, April 19, 1884 • Various
... the very commonplace but obstreperous moon into harmony with his law of falling bodies;—the story of Darwin, with his twenty-odd years of the most patient and persistent kind of toil; delving into the most unpromising materials, reading the driest books, always on the lookout for the facts that would point the way to the explanation of species;—the story of Morse and his bitter struggle against poverty, and sickness, and innumerable disappointments up to the time when, in advancing ...
— Craftsmanship in Teaching • William Chandler Bagley
... mastery of the Report on the Lords' Journals (1794), which Philip Francis, no mean judge, declared on the whole to be the "most eminent and extraordinary" of all his productions. But even in the coolest and driest of his pieces there is the mark of greatness, of grasp, of comprehension. In all its varieties Burke's style is noble, earnest, deep-flowing, because his sentiment was lofty and fervid, and went with sincerity and ardent disciplined travail of judgment. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... rarely— never certainly in later years—heard such an advocate. The secret of his great success at the bar, beyond his intellectual power, lay, I think, in a peculiar charm and fascination of manner—a manner which could invest the driest and most technical matters with interest, and compelled the attention of the hearers to the subject under discussion. The melody of his voice was, to me, one of his greatest attractions. Then, again, what a noble presence! ...
— Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott, Volume 2 • Robert Ornsby
... exclusive study of the police reports in the Times. Perhaps, there was not much more crime committed then than now. Certainly there were atonements made for offending against God and man, which we do not hear of at the present day. Even a cursory glance through the driest annals, will show that it was not all evil—that there was something besides crime and misery. On almost every page we find some incident which tells us that faith was not extinct. In the Annals of the Four Masters, the obituaries ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... be impossible, or, if possible, only at the cost of mental and spiritual dislocation. But, with all this, there was not in her a trace of the assumption of a religious superiority which I have so often found in the driest non-conformist, or the putting me apart with the creatures that perish and are doomed which I have oftener found in Catholic friends, with whom I have felt that they regarded me with a sort of pitiful friendship, as one certain to be damned, ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... and a broomstick; also a cow and a yearling calf; also one bay heifer; also 8400 lbs. of hay, minus what the above-named stock have consumed during the winter; also 64 bushels of oats, subject to the above-mentioned diminution. If sold, we shall have left on our hands one of the driest and ugliest-looking old bachelors this side of the grave, which we will cheerfully throw in if at all acceptable to the purchaser. Old maids and rich widows are requested to give their particular attention to this special offer. Don't pass by ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff
... cramped condition inside the smokebox, there would seem to be little space for the addition of the throttle valve; hence its present location. The dry pipe projects up into the steam dome to gather the hottest, driest steam for the cylinders. The inverted, funnel-like cap on the top of the dry pipe is to prevent priming, as drops of water may travel up the sides of the pipe and then to the cylinders, with the possibility of great damage. After ...
— The 'Pioneer': Light Passenger Locomotive of 1851 • John H. White
... On lowering our eyes to the ground, however, we perceived at once what had set the jay to scolding. Slowly drawing itself along the earth, gliding through the grass and over the dry leaves—without causing even the driest of them to rustle—went a hideous reptile—a snake. Its yellowish body, dappled with black blotches, glittered as the sun glanced from its lubricated scales; while it rose and fell in wavy undulations as it moved. It moved slowly—by vertical ...
— The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... borne. I had left the door open, a moment before, in the bosom of a gentle declivity, and, when I turned to shut it, it was on the summit of a lofty eminence. Now every plank and timber creaked, as if the ship were made of wicker-work; and now crackled, like an enormous fire of the driest possible twigs. There was nothing for it but bed; so I went ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... houses. She thought these should be as simple as possible, and semi-native in style; such, she believed, to be the driest and most healthy. In any case disease could come into a house costing L200, as into one costing L20, and "there was such a thing as God's providence." Still, she recognised the importance of preserving the health of newcomers, and admitted that ...
— Mary Slessor of Calabar: Pioneer Missionary • W. P. Livingstone
... while thus talking over what she was to see and do. She read every scrap she could lay her hand on which related to Rome or Florence or Venice or London. The driest details had a charm for her now that she was likely to see the real places. She went about with scraps of paper in her pocket, on which were written such things as these: "Forum. When built? By whom built? More than one?" "What does Cenacola mean?" "Cecilia Metella. ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... accordingly stalked into the drawing-room, pettishly refused to accept either tea or coffee, tucked his daughter under his arm, and, having said the driest of good-byes to the company at large, off ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... said Henry huskily, as with the driest of throats, and a perceptible shudder, he turned to go away; the Doctor pausing to caress little Mab, and say, 'I had better take home this poor little thing. She may come to harm here, and may be a ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... clover growing once, and they could go dry with shoes only in summer. Now there is nothing but blue-joint and sedge and cut-grass there, standing in water all the year round. For a long time, they made the most of the driest season to get their hay, working sometimes till nine o'clock at night, sedulously paring with their scythes in the twilight round the hummocks left by the ice; but now it is not worth the getting when they can come at it, and they look ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... climate of Fashoda is pestilential, and the malarial fever attacks every European or Egyptian, breaking down the strongest constitutions, and in many cases causing death. [The place is most unhealthy, and in March 1899 (the driest season of the year) out of a garrison of 317 men only 37 were fit for duty.—Sir William Garstin's ...
— The River War • Winston S. Churchill
... coldest, windiest, highest, and driest continent; during summer more solar radiation reaches the surface at the South Pole than is received at the Equator in ...
— The 1995 CIA World Factbook • United States Central Intelligence Agency
... last paper. But its rich red marls, wherever they come to the surface, are one of God's most precious gifts to this favoured land. On them, one finds oneself at once in a garden; amid the noblest of timber, wheat, roots, grass which is green through the driest summers, and, in the western counties, cider-orchards laden with red and golden fruit. I know, throughout northern Europe, no such charming scenery, for quiet beauty and solid wealth, as that of the New Red marls; and if I wished to show ...
— Town Geology • Charles Kingsley
... is, the greater is its loss of savoury constituents. In order to obtain well-flavoured and eatable meat, we must relinquish the idea of making good soup from it, as that mode of boiling which yields the best soup gives the driest, toughest, and most vapid meat. Slow boiling whitens the meat; and, we suspect, that it is on this account that it is in such favour with the cooks. The wholesomeness of food is, however, a matter of much ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... Sappokanikee. Like other redmen they had a gift for picking out good locations for their huts or wigwams—whatever they were in those days. On this island of Manhattan they had appropriated the finest, richest, yet driest piece of ground to be had. There were woods and fields; there was a marvellous trout stream (Minetta Water); there was a game preserve, second to none, presented to them by the Great Spirit (in the vicinity of Washington Square). There was pure ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... throttle valve located in the highest part of the dome in order to get the driest steam, then passes through the standpipe and dry pipe out of the boiler to the steam pipe tee or nigger-head located in the front end, then through steam pipes to the steam chest. A steam valve in each steam chest distributes the ...
— The Traveling Engineers' Association - To Improve The Locomotive Engine Service of American Railroads • Anonymous
... Mr. Mallory," said Mrs. Randolph, lifting her hand with her driest deprecation and her most desiccating smile, "I'm not passing judgment or criticism. I am of a foreign race, and consequently do not understand the freedom of American young ladies, and their familiarity with the opposite sex. I make ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte
... fire, and broil his fish. The smell of the smallest quantity of burnt weed would be intolerable in so confined a place: so he cleared away every sprout of it, and laid some of the drift-wood on a spot above high-water mark, picking out the driest pieces of fire-wood he could find for kindling ...
— Feats on the Fiord - The third book in "The Playfellow" • Harriet Martineau
... chooses a soft place in a bank, where, at first, it can dig up, so that it will not be disturbed by water. Its home has several entrances, so that, if pursued, it can escape by running in or out. In one of its driest rooms it makes its nest of dried grass; and here it stays in stormy weather, only coming out on ...
— Friends in Feathers and Fur, and Other Neighbors - For Young Folks • James Johonnot
... collections of compositions necessarily ran to many volumes. They were not easy to refer to as they had to be unrolled and then rolled up again whenever any passage was to be consulted. They were made of a material which was not durable in any but the very driest of climates. The book on the other hand, while heavy, could contain a very great amount of material in a single volume, could be easily referred to, and was made of much more durable material. For this reason the book form ...
— Books Before Typography - Typographic Technical Series for Apprentices #49 • Frederick W. Hamilton
... objected to making pie, if they furnished the stuff. Why, for gosh sake, had they planted him in the very middle of their string of claims, then? With a dandy spring too, that never went dry except in the driest years, and not more than seventy-five yards, at the outside, to carry water. Up hill? Well, what of that? Look at Pink—had to haul water half a mile from One Man Creek, and no trail. Look at Weary—had to pack water twice ...
— The Flying U's Last Stand • B. M. Bower
... the length of the voyage. For want of metallic sheathing below the waterline the ship was liable to be sunk by the terrible worm which, in Hakluyt's phrase, "many times pearceth and eateth through the strongest oake." For want of vegetable food in the larder, or anything save the driest of bread and beef stiffened with brine, the sailors were sure to be attacked by scurvy, and in a very long voyage the crew was deemed fortunate that did not lose half its number from that foul disease. Often in traversing unknown seas the sturdy men who survived all other perils ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... was his manner, for he was the driest of men. That night when all had retired and I had been in bed some fifteen minutes I heard a knock at my door. I supposed it was some one of my friends who could not sleep ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset
... upon a flat stone, and then, as before, moss and oil, and oil and moss, were added, each time in larger and larger quantities,—no longer gently, gently, but with a careless hand, and in less, perhaps, than half an hour we had a great, smoking, fluttering blaze; and then we threw on some of the driest leaves and twigs of the Andromeda, and some dead willow-stems and dry grass, and then we had a roaring, sputtering, ...
— Cast Away in the Cold - An Old Man's Story of a Young Man's Adventures, as Related by Captain John Hardy, Mariner • Isaac I. Hayes
... regularity with which they made their voyages with such surprisingly small consumption of coal. They were not, however, what "Jack" had been accustomed to consider "dry ships." The ship built Dutchman fashion, with her bluff ends, is the driest of all ships, but the least steady, because she rises to every sea. But the new ships, because of their length and sharpness, precluded this; for, though they rose sufficiently to an approaching wave for all purposes ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... he picked up some of the driest of the grass and palm leaves and applied a match to the stuff. It blazed up readily, and he threw the mass in with the other stuff about the edge of ...
— The Campaign of the Jungle - or, Under Lawton through Luzon • Edward Stratemeyer
... and Lucy, and the negress set to work collecting leaves and dry sticks. Vincent had still in his pocket the newspaper he had bought in the streets of Nashville, and he always carried lights. A piece of the paper was crumpled up and lighted, a few of the driest leaves they could find dropped upon it, then a few twigs, until at last a good fire ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... as generally used ignores most of the continent out of sight of Melbourne and Sydney, though both Victoria and New South Wales could be stowed away in little more than half the area of Queensland. Do we reflect that Australia includes some of the driest tracts in the world, as well as areas in which the rainfall approaches the phenomenal—that not very much more than half of the territory of the Commonwealth lies within the temperate zone—that there are as marked differences between Tasmania and North ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... the long valleys of the Ebro, Douro, Tagus, Guadalquivir, and other lesser rivers, all of which are rapid, and only a few navigable; climate varies considerably according as one proceeds to the central plains, where extremes of heat and cold are experienced, but over all is the driest in Europe; agriculture, although less than a half of the land is under cultivation, is by far the most important industry, and Valencia and Catalonia the provinces where it is most successfully carried out, wheat and other cereals, the olive and the vine, being the chief products; other ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... much more violently than it had been the day before. He did not waste much time in consideration, having made up his mind on the previous visit as to which part of the rock he would drive the hole through. Sticking his last candle, therefore, against the driest part of the wall that could be found, he seized his tools and ...
— Deep Down, a Tale of the Cornish Mines • R.M. Ballantyne
... The driest of the wood was selected, and they built a new fire with care, in the shelter of the largest of the overhanging rocks. Soon the appetizing odor of freshly made coffee filled the air and all drew close, to have a cup, and to partake ...
— Dave Porter in the Gold Fields - The Search for the Landslide Mine • Edward Stratemeyer
... him there would be nothing wanting in my life," she thought regretfully. "I should have felt much a pride in a husband's fame, I should have worked so gladly to assist him in his career. The driest blue-books would not have been too weary for me—the dullest drudgery of parliamentary detail would have been pleasant work, if it could have helped him in his progress to ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon
... there first. He accordingly announced that he should remain during the night; so the men employed themselves in cooking their supper, rubbing down their horses, and in other ways, until they lay down to sleep in the driest spot they could find. The officers occupied one of the rooms ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston
... and that his breath was remarkably sweet. This was possibly caused by the hot and fiery constitution of his body; for sweet scents are produced, according to Theophrastus, by heat acting upon moisture. For this reason the hottest and driest regions of the earth produce the most aromatic perfumes, because the sun dries up that moisture which causes most substances ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... with freezing and thawing weather, is seen in the early springtime without a corresponding increase of quittor. Furthermore, the serious outbreaks of this disease in the mountainous regions of Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana are seen in the fall and winter seasons, when the weather is the driest. It may be claimed, and perhaps with justice, that during these seasons, when the water is low, animals are compelled to wade through more mud to drink from lakes and pools than is necessary at other seasons of the year, when these lakes and pools are full. ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... species, inhabiting even the driest portions of the western prairies. It is 9 inches in length, and has a plumage of a pale buffy tone. It seems to be less aquatic than any other American Plover and is rarely found in the vicinity of bodies of ...
— The Bird Book • Chester A. Reed
... on the trees begin to rattle and break into pieces as the wind blows against them. Although they keep their greenness, they act like the driest ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne
... up the long walls of the cavern; slowly the warmth crept round on all sides. The rock where Beppo laid his hand was no longer damp and cold; he made himself a bed of the driest litter in a niche close to the fire, laid his head on a smooth knob of stone, and slept. But even in his sleep he remembered his fire, dreading to awake and find himself in darkness. Every time the warmth of it diminished he raised himself ...
— The Blue Moon • Laurence Housman
... providence of God towards this country, who sends at a fixed season such great quantities of rain in Ethiopia, in order to water Egypt, where a shower of rain scarce ever falls; and who, by that means, causes the driest and most sandy soil to become the richest and most fruitful country ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... anatomical study surely lies in a consideration of the function of the organ or structure in relation to its anatomical form. Bare descriptions cannot and should not inspire interest, whereas the driest anatomical facts, if seen in their broader relationships, at once assume a significance in the student's mind which may be attained in no ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10
... without system, and showing no signs of a plateau. They are parted by creek-valleys, gulches, and gullies, thick with tangled vegetation and varying in depth from a few feet to two and even three hundred. Many of them carry water even in the driest season. The country is remarkably like that behind Cape Coast Castle, where the Home Government, during the last Ashanti war (1873-74), proposed to ...
— To The Gold Coast for Gold, Vol. II - A Personal Narrative • Richard Francis Burton and Verney Lovett Cameron
... penetrated the canvas, and made it nearly as uncomfortable inside, as it would have been out. We were not prepared to catch water, having nothing to put it in. Our next object was to get fire, and after gathering some of the driest fuel to be found, and having a small piece of cotton wick-yarn, with flint and steel, we kindled a fire, which was never afterwards suffered to be extinguished. The night was very dark, but we found a piece of old rope, which when well ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... circuit about fiue and twentie or thirtie miles, and is the driest Island in the world: for there is nothing growing in it but onely salte; for their water, wood, or victuals, and all things necessary came but of Persia, which is about twelue miles from thence. All the Illands ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, - and Discoveries of The English Nation, Volume 10 - Asia, Part III • Richard Hakluyt
... of the common people rush in, wildly asking one another what the row is about; Raimondo, the pope's legate, comes on, and in the name of holy mother church begs for peace; Rienzi, waked by this time, sees what has occurred, and in a speech—uttered mainly in the driest of dry recitative—taunts the patricians with their bad conduct and their reckless readiness to break all the vows they have made. The nobles announce their intention of going elsewhere to fight out their quarrel to the bitter end, and they go. Rienzi beseeches the crowd to wait their time, ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... earth looked but to the future, and that the study of the classics, however essential, is but the ground work for combining and working out the problems of the future. He was epigrammatic, terse, and gifted with a quaint humour, with which he was apt, even when in the driest philosophy, to drive in and clinch ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... as one, the Parson amused himself, between sermons of powerful doctrine and parochial duties of a more human interest, with educating Lucinda, whose intellect was more like his own than her mother's. A strange training it was for a young girl,—mathematics, metaphysics, Latin, theology of the driest sort; and after an utter failure at Greek and Hebrew, though she had toiled patiently through seven books of the "Aeneid," Parson Manners mildly sniffed at the inferiority of the female mind, and betook himself to teaching her French, which ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... famine the population of this and six other small towns, which are situated near its borders, and have their lands irrigated from it. Besides water for their fields, this lake yielded the people abundance of water-chestnuts[3] and fish. In the driest season the water has been found sufficient to supply the wants of all the people of those towns and villages, and those of all the country around, as far as the people can ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... quite different, and perhaps even more beautiful than under a burning cloudless sky, no soft gradations between the greens and the blues. The little pools or perforations breaking the surface of the broad platform, acres of rocks, are, I believe, unexplained phenomena. In the driest season these openings contain water, presumably forced upwards from hidden springs. The pools, just now covered with green slime, curiously spot the grey surface ...
— East of Paris - Sketches in the Gatinais, Bourbonnais, and Champagne • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... deliquesced rapidly in any but the driest atmosphere, by its affinity for damp, and, consequently, often caused mildew in cases of birds, etc, into which it had been introduced. The fumes of sulphur during combustion are, on the contrary, really of service in destroying ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... ridge along the coast, which afforded the only tolerable walking, the snow being very deep on the lower parts of the land. We halted at half past seven A.M., on a fine sandy ground, which gave us the softest, as well as the driest bed which we had yet experienced on our journey, and which was situated close to a little hillock of earth and moss, so full of the burrows of hares as to resemble a warren. We tried to smoke them out by burning port-fire, but none appeared; ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... Soon after rain fell, a sort of advance agent of the rainy season, a sudden tropical downpour that ran in rivulets down across the pink card-boards and my victims. Yet strange to note, the writing of the medium soft pencil remained as clear and unsmudged as in the driest weather, and so clean a rain was it that it did not even soil my white cotton shirt. I continued unheeding, only to note with surprise a few minutes later that the sun was shining on the dense green jungle about me as brilliantly as ever and that I was dry again as ...
— Zone Policeman 88 - A Close Range Study of the Panama Canal and its Workers • Harry A. Franck
... a fondness for long, large, grown-up words; doubtless, in some measure, a result of my constant practice of reading grown-up people's books. It was a mere verbal memory, the driest of all the intellectual faculties. Scarcely a faint perfume of meaning lingered about the rattling piles of husks that ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... by a general officer, who lost his life in the late war. Never was situation more inconvenient, unpleasant, and unhealthy. It stands on the edge of an ugly morass formed by the stagnant water left by the tide in its retreat: the very walks of the garden are so moist, that, in the driest weather, no person can make a tour of it, without danger of the rheumatism. Besides, the house is altogether inaccessible, except at low water, and even then the carriage must cross the harbour, the wheels up to the axle-tree in mud: nay, the tide ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... there, and capable men went up and down the land, sensible of its charm, its wonder, its remoteness from themselves, and yet not discerning truly. At last, when a thousand feet have trodden upon a thing of inestimable price, there comes along a newspaper man, doing the driest kind of hackwork, bound to a drudgery as stale and dreary as any in life, and he sees what no man has ever seen before him, though it has been plain in view for years and years. Through scorn and discouragement and contumely he polishes his treasure, in painful hours snatched from distasteful ...
— My Contemporaries In Fiction • David Christie Murray |
