"Jerking" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at my line, and swept off with it into deep water. Jerking it up, I saw a fine pickerel wriggling in the sun. "Uncle!" I cried, looking back in uncontrollable excitement, "I've got a fish!" "Not yet," said my uncle. As he spoke there was a plash in the water; I caught ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... so that he might not be observed from the outside, watched the stranger's approach in anxious silence. Nearer and nearer he came, till in that still air it was possible to hear the panting of his huskies as they lunged forward in the traces, jerking their bodies to right and left as they desperately strove to escape the descending lash of the punishing whip. The man himself tottered as he ran, stubbing the toes of his snowshoes every now and then as he took a new step. Once from sheer ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... running-boards loaded with canvas-covered suitcases. Three goggled, sunburned women in ugly khaki suits were disconsolately drinking soda water from bottles without straws, and a goggled, red-faced, angry-looking man was jerking impatiently at the hood of the machine. Lorraine and her suitcase apparently excited no interest whatever ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... his hands across the chest, with the tips of the middle fingers touching and the elbows extending on each side like a jug handle. Another player tries to pull the arms apart, either by working at them separately or together. Jerking is not permissible; the pull must ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft
... the inquirer, jerking his flies off the water, and throwing again with a heavy, sullen ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... thrusting its long lean head straight out, so Vaughan pulled hard. But the harder the boy pulled the faster the horse moved. And it could move. Vaughan had never had such an uncomfortable few minutes in his life. Every part of the horse seemed to be moving by itself, and jerking him in all directions. He couldn't possibly sit in the saddle. He let the stirrups take all his weight and just hung on. The horse ...
— In the Musgrave Ranges • Jim Bushman
... by the cherry-tree," said Myles, jerking his head in that direction. "An I may go get it, I will trouble ye no more." As he spoke he made a ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... quickly as it went. It bustled back into the hut, hopping nervously, and jerking its head with excitement. In a moment it was perched again on the man's shoulder. It carefully kept its bushy tail out of the way of his nose and eyes. And then it whispered what it had seen into ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... ignite; then waving a scornful and abjuring hand toward the staircase—the unhappy Tansey, erstwhile champion in the prophetic lists of fortune, ingloriously ascending to his just and certain doom, while (let us imagine) half within the wings stands the imminent figure of Fate jerking wildly at the wrong strings, and mixing things up in ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... chewing action—one which, joined with his habitual silence, gave him an almost malignant expression. His grey hair hung in tufts over a low forehead. His very small and immobile eyes glowed dully, like coals in which the flame has just been extinguished by water. He walked heavily, jerking his clumsy frame at every step. Some of his movements called to mind the awkward shuffling of an owl in a cage, when it feels that it is being stared at, but can scarcely see anything itself out of its large yellow eyes, blinking between sleep and fear. An ancient ...
— Liza - "A nest of nobles" • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... beset that he could not think of anything but himself. One day, while sauntering along a campus path, with his hands in his pockets, he met two students coming toward him. They went to right and left, and, jerking his hands from his pockets, roared in each ear, "How dare you walk with ...
— The Young Pitcher • Zane Grey
... were left alone with the two Jivros, who stood beside the nude figure of the alien Croen. They eyed us, their eyes jerking nervously from our faces to the body of the Croen. Quite calmly the Prince tugged a vibro-gun, very like the weapon Holaf had worn at his waist, from his belt and trained it upon ...
— Valley of the Croen • Lee Tarbell
... talk it all out with Allan, and I do not think I ever missed him so much as I did that day. I am afraid I was rather impatient with Jack that morning; to be sure she was terribly awkward and inattentive; she would put her elbows on the table, and ink her fingers, and then she had a way of jerking her hair out of her eyes, which drove me nearly frantic. I began to think we really must send her to school. We had done away with the folding doors, they always creaked so, and had hung up some curtains in their stead; through the folds I could catch glimpses of dear ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... all waggs that divulge the secrets of Priscian and make merry with their teachers. This stuck so with Triplet that all his life-time he never forgave the doctor, but sent him every New Year's tide an anniversary ballad to a new tune, and so in his turn avenged himself of his jerking pedagogue."[168:2] ...
— Andrew Marvell • Augustine Birrell
... running race when the horses have got half a mile away and look like a covey of swift birds, but it is still a fine sight. I became very fastidious as to which moment of it was the finest, whether when the horse rose in profile, or when his aerial hoof touched the ground (with the effect of half jerking his rider's head half off), or when he showed a flying heel in perspective; and I do not know to this hour which I prefer. But I suppose I was becoming gradually spoiled by my pleasure, for as time went on I noticed ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... not over spry; and the consequence was that our big main-course was slatting and flying out overhead with a might that shook the ship from stem to stern. The flaps of the mad canvas were like successive thumps of a giant's fist upon a mighty drum. The sheets were jerking at the belaying-pins, the blocks rattling in sharp snappings like castanets. You could hear the hiss and seething of the sea alongside, and see it flash by in sudden white patches of phosphorescent foam, while all overhead was black with the flying scud. The English second-mate was stamping ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various
... perfectly murderous hatred if you were always on the watch, always suspecting me, if you taunted me as you did a while ago. I'm just as much a savage at heart as you are, Jack Fyfe. I could gladly have killed you when you were jerking me about ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... love," he greeted me, smiling and jerking his head in the direction of Giuliana. "We ever return to it in the end, they say; yet you had best have a care. It is not well to cross my Lord Pier Luigi in such matters; he can be a very ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... poor Indian women, trotting across the square, their black hair plaited with dirty red ribbon, a piece of woollen cloth wrapped about them, and a little mahogany baby hanging behind, its face upturned to the sky, and its head going jerking along, somehow without its neck being dislocated. The most resigned expression on earth is that of an Indian baby. All the groups we had seen promenading the streets the day before were here collected by hundreds; ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... falling as fast and as hard as he otherwise would have done, because being spread out so flat that way, the air held him up a little. And then there was his tail, that funny little tail he is so fond of jerking when he scolds. This helped him too. It helped him keep his balance and keep ...
— The Adventures of Buster Bear • Thornton W. Burgess
... back to his seat amid a chorus of happy screams. The grubby boy was just too astonished to cry, just too proud of travelling in a carriage. He screwed up his face—and unscrewed it again. Every now and then Tommy sat back as far as he could from the disorder, the collection of jerking arms and legs, in order to adjust the Plymouth spectacles, of which he is so proud, on his small pug nose. As we passed the cross-roads, Straighty was trying to snatch a kiss. While we drove along the Front, the children waved their hands over the sides of the drosky, ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... with the words, jerking his meagre body upright with a slight, fierce movement, and stood in front of ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... astonishing to see how little musical talent is exhibited by these little ones, whose natures are drawn from the land of music. We have repeatedly seen them sawing away patiently at a violin, or jerking the strings of a harp, but could detect no semblance of melody in the noise they made. Not a few of the little ones endeavor to make up in dancing what they lack in musical skill. Their parents or proprietors ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... on that train, bumping, stopping, jerking ahead, and sometimes sliding back. At three stations we stopped long enough to make some tea, but were unable to wash, so when we arrived at B—, where we were to embark for Blighty, we were as black as Turcos and, with our unshaven faces, we looked like a lot of tramps. Though tired ...
— Over The Top • Arthur Guy Empey
... orders to the division commanders"; how "General Wood left Camp Funston in advance of his division and without waiting to receive his orders"; how General March sent these orders to New York; how "in consequence there was an appearance of eleventh-hour action, an effect of jerking General Wood from the very deck of the transport"; how "General Wood carried his complaint to the President and was told plainly that the list would not be revised in the personal interest of any soldier ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty
... the old Mission garden stood staring at Ignacio Chavez a long time, seeming compelled by a force greater than her own to watch him tugging and jerking at his bells. Plainly enough she understood that this was an alarm being sounded; a man dead through violence, and the bell-ringer stirring the town with it. But when presently he let two of the ropes slip out of his hands and began a slow, mournful tolling of ...
— The Bells of San Juan • Jackson Gregory
... instant his feet struck bottom he saw the pocket-miner's arm leap out, and his own legs knew a swift, jerking grip that overthrew him. In the nature of the jump his revolver-hand was above his head. Swiftly as the grip had flashed about his legs, just as swiftly he brought the revolver down. He was still in the air, his fall ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... blackness of a narrow alley into the silent street beyond. And on up this we passed, until at last we paused at the gateway of a cottage on our left. On to the door of that we went, my friend first violently jerking the bell, then opening the door with a night-key, and with me lifting the still senseless woman through the hall into a dimly lighted room upon the right, and laying her upon a clean white bed that glimmered in the corner. He reached and turned the gas on in a flaring jet, and ...
— Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley • James Whitcomb Riley
... started timidly forward and then hesitated and trembled. A wave hit her, and she rocked like a cork. The jump had all gone out of her. Another wave struck her and almost hove her down, and then another wave snapped her back again, jerking out the funnel, which hissed overside into the sea. Half on her side, she clanked into the trough. She struggled to right herself and had partly succeeded, when a mighty wave smote her viciously on her listed side. She went over to ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... have I watched the formation of these pits, and will try to describe the process. The insect begins describing a small circle on the surface of the sand by jerking himself backwards and flinging the sand away with his flat head and closed forceps, which form a kind of shovel. Each circle is smaller than the last, until the pit is like an inverted cone, and the ant-lion ...
— Wild Nature Won By Kindness • Elizabeth Brightwen
... body was vibrating, traversed by a jerking and a trembling; he got up and approached the ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... asked Berry, jerking his head in the direction of the inn, which stood at the corner between two roads, its sign hanging under a bare horse-chestnut ...
— England, My England • D.H. Lawrence
... get his head out of his own light, the bird would startle him by a queer kind of puffing sound. She would not leave her nest like most birds, but really tried to blow or scare the intruder away; and after repeated experiments I could hardly refrain from jerking my head back when that little explosion of sound came up from the dark interior. One night, when incubation was about half finished, the nest was harried. A slight trace of hair or fur at the entrance led me to infer that some small animal was the robber. A weasel might have done it, as they sometimes ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs
... distinct movements. This, however, is not the correct idea. The inhalation is continuous, the entire chest cavity from the lower diaphragm to the highest point of the chest in the region of the collar-bone being expanded with a uniform movement. Avoid a jerking series of inhalations, and strive to attain a steady, continuous action. Practice will soon overcome the tendency to divide the inhalation into three movements, and will result in a uniform continuous breath. You ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... extended his left hand for the piece of lighted stick; with his right hand he held his line. Suddenly that hand received an amazing tug. Peegwish unintentionally scattered the firebrand, dropped his pipe from his lips, and uttered a shout, while with both hands he held on to the jerking line. ...
— The Red Man's Revenge - A Tale of The Red River Flood • R.M. Ballantyne
... bullet missed me, while mine struck him in the breast. He reeled and fell, but before he had fairly touched the ground I was upon him, knife in hand, and had driven the keen-edged weapon to its hilt in his heart. Jerking his war-bonnet off, I scientifically scalped him in ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... Merry, almost jerking out her words in excitement: "Father and mother have been obliged to ...
— The School Queens • L. T. Meade
... the tillers of the neighbouring lands let empty the jakes, to manure their fields withal; whereto whenas Buffalmacco came nigh, he went up to the brink of one of them and taking the opportunity, laid hold of one of the physician's legs and jerking him off his back, pitched him clean in, head foremost. Then he fell a-snorting and snarling and capering and raged about awhile; after which he made off alongside Santa Maria della Scala till he came to Allhallows Fields. There he found Bruno, ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... the oldest of all in point of wits. I had a claim on Eddy: one day he was amusing himself by jerking a cat at the end of a string, in and out of Frau Belgarde's well. She was stealthily approaching him with a piece of fence rail when I arrived and possibly prevented some broken bones. "Kaiser" was nearly twelve; he too had been in a reform school—he ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine
... is Quinny!" Ninian said, jerking his thumb in Henry's direction. "His real name is Quinn, Henry Quinn, but we call him 'Quinny.' At least, Gilbert does, so, of course we do too. And he's Irish, but he isn't a Catholic, and he says Irish people don't keep pigs in their houses, ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... to find the leak, he was alarmed to discover a quantity of codfish and porpoises swimming about in the hold, because he knew that the hole in the hull must be very large indeed to admit the fish. And still the water rose steadily all the time, although Bradley's pump was jerking away at it in a terrific manner and all the other pumps were ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)
... noticing anything beyond her own household, had not as yet noticed this. "And she's got the twins with her, . . . yes, there's Davy leaning over the dashboard grabbing at the pony's tail and Marilla jerking him back. Dora's sitting up on the seat as prim as you please. She always looks as if she'd just been starched and ironed. Well, poor Marilla is going to have her hands full this winter and no mistake. Still, I don't see that she ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... of two pieces of hard wood, suitably worked, and forming an angle frame. On the bottom side the stretcher poles rest, and the sides of the L formed by the carrier proper prevent most effectually any jerking or turning of the stretcher when once it has been laid in the carrier. The carrier is about thirty inches long, but can be increased to any length desired. It has been found that this length is admirably ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins
... from nether hell and filled with ice, Roaring and crashing on the jerking stage, An utter bridle given to utter vice, Limitless power mad with endless rage Withering the soul; a minute seemed an age. He clutched and hacked at ropes, at rags of sail, Thinking that comfort was ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... he keeps moderately near the wall, but after a time you find that the circle described by his footsteps has grown smaller, and that he apparently fancies himself walking around a rather small tree. Your master rides up as you are pulling and jerking your left rein in the endeavor to come nearer to the wall, and says, "Try Billy's canter. I'll take a round with you. Strike him on the shoulder, and when you want him to trot, shorten your reins and touch him on the flank. Those ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... This wants looking into. For, if Stanton called me that, it must be true!—for he is nearly every time right!" He took his seat, and excused himself, jerking out as he stalked forth, glad to be quit ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... fact it has waited. I have not yet made another holiday to visit it. Whether or no the market-women and the local policeman had beheld, I know not. I hope not, but now shall never know. . . . The engine-driver, leaning in converse with the station-master, and jerking a thumb backward, had certainly beheld. But I passed him with averted eyes, gave up my ticket, and struck straight across country for ...
— News from the Duchy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... stood poised, one foot on the ground, the other on the stool, both hands gripping the high shelf, she felt the reptile whipping, writhing, jerking, lashing, flogging at her ankle and instep, coiling round her leg.... And in the fraction of a second the thought flashed through her mind: "If its head is under my foot, or too close to my foot for its fangs to reach me, I am safe while I remain as I am. If its head is free ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... light shone eerily overhead. He bent his stiffened, jerking neck till he could look—till he could see, with eyes that were filled with flashing fires of their own, other ripping blue flashes from the ends of outstanding wires, and above him a thousand feet, the ...
— The Hammer of Thor • Charles Willard Diffin
... I'll just tell mamma of you," exclaimed Enna, passionately, jerking her hand away ...
— Elsie Dinsmore • Martha Finley
... was dancing, and the shadow of Ansell, who stood close up to it, seemed to dominate the little room. He was still talking, or rather jerking, and he was still lighting matches and dropping their ends upon the carpet. Now and then he would make a motion with his feet as if he were running quickly backward upstairs, and would tread on the edge of the fender, so that the fire-irons ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster
... but I suppose I must humour her this once. Good-afternoon!" And, having given me her hand in her demure, old-fashioned way, Dorothy hurried off, the kitten still perched upon her shoulder, its tail jerking spasmodically ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... Stillman, "may remind us that it is time to splice the 'main brace.' There's a bottle of whisky and some water just behind you," he added to Deepwaters, "while three minutes after I ring this bell," he said, pressing a button and jerking a handle marked '8,' "the champagne cocktails will be on ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... door was the man against whom Maggie had collided. She saw that he was young, thick-set and restless. She noticed even then his eyes, bright and laughing as though he were immensely amused. His mouth opened and closed again, his eyes were never still, and he made fierce dumb protests with his body, jerking it forward pulling it back, as a rider strives to restrain an unruly horse. Maggie was able to notice these things, because during the first moments her Aunt Anne entirely held the stage. She advanced to the fireplace with her halting movement, embraced ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... up, from the opposite direction, yet another car, jerking to a standstill at the door. It caught the girl's notice; her vague thought was that it was William, come a little early. But she saw at once that this was a strange vehicle, a hired one by the look of it, and consciousness dreamed out ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... voice shouting dropped down to him. Jerking his head up he made out the form of Lieutenant Max at the top of this devil's stairway down which he had just come. Drennen laughed shortly and turned northward along the lake shore. He had lost time but he would lose no more. He still had two hours the best of it; it would take Max ...
— Wolf Breed • Jackson Gregory
... Mr. Pat had severely punished him, revealing him humiliatingly to himself as a physical incompetent. He had dismissed Buck Klinker as a faintly amusing brother to the ox, and now Buck Klinker was giving him valuable advice about his editorial work, to say nothing of jerking him by the ears toward physical competency. He had thought to honor the Post by contributing of his wisdom to it, and the Post had replied by contemptuously kicking him out. He had laughed at Colonel Cowles's editorials, and now he was staying out of bed of nights ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... end of any given period, the child's mind would be a mere tabula rasa. Suppose, on the other hand, we failed to wipe out each other's teaching, the unfortunate youth would be launched upon life with half his guns pointed inboard and his needle jerking from one pole to the other. Consider the ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... upon the senses again, was this trombone note of the big machine. The floor never felt steady and quiet beneath one's feet, but quivered and jarred. It was a confusing, unsteady place, and enough to send anyone's thoughts jerking into odd zigzags. And for three months, while the big strike of the engineers was in progress, Holroyd, who was a blackleg, and Azuma-zi, who was a mere black, were never out of the stir and eddy of it, but slept and fed in the little wooden shanty between the ...
— The Stolen Bacillus and Other Incidents • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... under the roof. The Sons of the Egg screamed and panicked. Jerking horribly, the monstrous thing moved again. For part of a second, it hovered over the empty camp. Then it ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... still kept on through gales, with creaking cordage and jerking tiller ropes, until on the 11th of March the Cape was sighted, off which they were knocked about until the 20th instant; lying in the track of vessels bounding before the gale at the rate of ten or twelve knots an hour, and only ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... a peal of chimes arose from the city as he found to be "maddening." All Genoa lay beneath him, and up from it, with some sudden set of the wind, came in one fell sound the clang and clash of all its steeples, pouring into his ears, again and again, in a tuneless, grating, discordant, jerking, hideous vibration that made his ideas "spin round and round till they lost themselves in a whirl of vexation and giddiness, and dropped down dead." He had never before so suffered, nor did he again; but this ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... men talked together, disputing about the pilots at first, and then about matters of local importance, in which Mary would have taken no interest at any time, and she gradually became drowsy; irrepressibly so, indeed, for in spite of her jerking efforts to keep awake, she sank away to the bottom of the boat, and there lay crouched on a rough heap of sails, rope, ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... her mouth all to the finest sort of kindling-wood, if she doesn't get up this very instant," said Sewell, jerking the reins so wildly that the mare leaped into a galvanic canter, and continued without further urging for twenty paces. "Of course, Lucy," he resumed, profiting by the opportunity for conversation which the mare's temporary activity afforded, "I should feel ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... man, tall and well-looking, dressed as an Oriental, but with an affected, jerking air, more French than Syrian, moved jauntily about the room, speaking to several persons for a short time, shrugging his shoulders and uttering commonplaces as if they were poignant originalities. This was Hillel Besso, the ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... closed, except the thumb and little finger, which are extended, and point straight toward the front, hands horizontal, backs upward, are held in front of their respective sides near the body, and then moved directly forward with, short, sharp jerking motions. (Dakota I.) "From the motion of the bear in running." This is also reported as an Arapaho sign. (Dakota IV.) The ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... wouldn't understan',' he said, jerking his thumb towards the barrel, 'but the ole man's such a dashed nuisance when he's on we gotter do somethin' with ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... anything else in life, get rid of worry. There are no greater enemies of harmony than little anxieties and petty cares. Do not flies aggravate a nervous horse more than his work? Do not little naggings, constantly touching him with the whip, or jerking at the reins, fret and worry him much more than the labor ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... Ortez fell from him like a mask. He seized the cord with his own hand, jerking me prone upon the floor and commenced to drag me from the hall. A dozen willing hands lent aid. I clutched instinctively at everything which came in my way, being torn from each hold by the ruthless villains ...
— 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
... he replied, jerking his hand towards the cab. 'But we mustn't start right here. This thing has got to be kept dark, don't you see, till the ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... assume when he had left his opponent without a move. On the top of the box beside him sat a very ascetic-faced, yellow, hollow-eyed man of fifty, with prim lips and a shrunken skin, which hung loosely over the long jerking tendons under his prominent chin. He was dressed in snuff-coloured clothes, and his legs under his knee-breeches were of a ludicrous thinness. He shook his head at me with an air of sad wisdom, and I could read little comfort in his inhuman ...
— Uncle Bernac - A Memory of the Empire • Arthur Conan Doyle
... afear'd, nuthin's goin' ter happen to yer," he said, jerking her savagely, and almost breaking into a run at ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa
... while the groom stood at Ginger's head. He drew my head back and fixed the rein so tight that it was almost intolerable; then he went to Ginger, who was impatiently jerking her head up and down against the bit, as was her way now. She had a good idea of what was coming, and the moment York took the rein off the turret in order to shorten it, she took her opportunity, and reared up so suddenly that York had his nose roughly hit and his hat knocked off; the groom ...
— Black Beauty, Young Folks' Edition • Anna Sewell
... Elfreda. "Well, I like your impudence." Jerking herself from the girls' embrace she stood up and walked to the other side of the room. Stumbling over one of her shoes she kicked it viciously aside, then, leaning her head against the door, her ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... up with a start, rubbed his eyes and looked at the sun, then at the pile of fish beside him. The continued jerking of the line at his leg seemed to bring him out of his drowsiness. With a broad grin he began pulling in the line, ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... half prancing, with his hands high, his elbows out, his face red, and his straw jerking about like a steam- engine. It might be showy form, I thought, but from the very little I knew of boxing it was not good. And the closer we approached the more convinced of this I was, and the more hope I seemed to have of coming out of ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... disturbed by the report of a gun, swept to leeward by the impetuosity of the gale, which hurled it with violence against the door and front windows of his cottage, for some moments causing them to vibrate with the concussion. Forster started up, dropping his book upon the hearth, and jerking the table with his elbow, so as to dash out the larger proportion of the contents of his tumbler. The sooty coronal of the wick also fell with the shock, and the candle, relieved from its burden, poured ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... to the jerking movement of my hand every time I try to reach for anything? This arises from a terrible experience which I had. Just imagine, this daughter of mine ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... give up anything easy, and so he brought the Scarboro into hailing distance and we told him what had happened. We had caught a Tartar; the whale wouldn't come to the surface and we couldn't let go without losing our line and iron. It was no use jerking on that line. One can't play a ...
— Swept Out to Sea - Clint Webb Among the Whalers • W. Bertram Foster
... in every direction, two lights left D'Aulnay's camp and approached him, jerking and flaring in the hands of men who were evidently walking over irregular ground. They might be coming directly to take possession of the trench. But why should they proclaim their intention with ...
— The Lady of Fort St. John • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... the devil's got into you? What business have you got with me, old fellow? What are you pounding me for? What are you jerking me along for? What do ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius
... What the deuce! thought Glover. A woman passenger in a dead sleeper? He balanced himself to the dizzy wheel of the truck under him, and waited for her to look his way—since she must be looking for the porter—but the head did not move. The curtains swayed with the jerking of the car, but the woman in Eleven looked intently into the dark stateroom. What did it mean? Glover determined ...
— The Daughter of a Magnate • Frank H. Spearman
... she cried angrily, stamping her foot and jerking at the necklace. But the string broke, and the beads went rolling away in the darkness in every direction and were lost—all but one, which she held ...
— The Legend of the Bleeding-heart • Annie Fellows Johnston
... tight, and at that loyal understanding pressure Cosgrave began to cry, shaking from head to foot, jerking out his ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... waitress with whom she had had no previous word, sprang to her succor, a big, red hand of mercy jerking ...
— Gaslight Sonatas • Fannie Hurst
... nothing. Immediately I flashed the light at the camera, and along the aisle, but again there was nothing visible. I wheeled 'round, shooting the beam of light in a great circle about the place; to and fro I shone it, jerking it here and there, ...
— Carnacki, The Ghost Finder • William Hope Hodgson
... had found it possible immediately to join her at her home. Shelby had assented to this plan, and directly set about escorting her to her destination. No dread of Ludlow prompted this vigilance. He discerned that that glamour had forever waned. The woman's jerking nerves made him fear a collapse. Stripped of shams for once, ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther
... the world like a cross between a theatrical Aminadab Sleek and Sir John Falstaff, with the stuffing omitted. When our hostess caught sight of me in this new garb, she rubbed her hands together in great glee, and, springing to her feet, gave vent to a perfect storm of laughter—jerking out between the explosions: ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... clear, but I did not heed the friendly advice. Three shots had missed me, and I knew that the canoe was jerking about too much with the current to admit of a ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon
... from the pickets, jerking his head toward the road behind him. For the first time Mark noticed that he had a basket on his arm, containing a ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... said, jerking his thumb in the direction of the court of mystery. "Eleven devils. Plenty ...
— The Monster Men • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... on a sudden (blinded doubtless by his inner flaw, or 'evil genius' as some name it), That King Henry is killed, That all is lost,—and flings down his Standard to shift for itself there! And, certainly enough, all had been lost, had all men been as he;—had not brave men, without such miserable jerking tic-douloureux in the souls of them, come dashing up, with blazing swords and looks, and asserted, That nothing was lost yet, that all must be regained yet. In this manner King Henry and his force got safely retreated, Parthian-like, from the pass of Coleshill and the ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle
... The distance was less than ten feet, and the loop spread, quick and true, over the head of the Japanese. But, swift though the action was, the Japanese had an instant to prepare himself. His right arm shot up. As Orme, jerking at the rope, tried to tighten the noose, the hand of the Japanese pushed it over his head and it slid over the side into the water. In a few seconds the swift boat had ...
— The Girl and The Bill - An American Story of Mystery, Romance and Adventure • Bannister Merwin
... up in her new rocking-chair, set her mouth in a very prim fashion, leaned her head on one side, and began to rock with all her might, jerking her feet from ...
— Queer Stories for Boys and Girls • Edward Eggleston
... warmed up by this time. He moved swiftly over to it, his body jerking in a peculiar, off-beat cadence as ...
— The Best Made Plans • Everett B. Cole
... mossy place in the woods, I am amused with the golden-crowned thrush,—which, however, is no thrush at all, but a warbler. He walks on the ground ahead of me with such an easy, gliding motion, and with such an unconscious, preoccupied air, jerking his head like a hen or a partridge, now hurrying, now slackening his pace, that I pause to observe him. I sit down, he pauses to observe me, and extends his pretty ramblings on all sides, apparently very much engrossed with his own affairs, but never losing sight of me. But ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... parts of the hay-loading machine, the things that lived in his mind until his hand had made them into facts, were blown away like dust. For a moment he watched the living riotous things and then, as though jerking himself back into a path from which his feet had wandered, hurried onward to the shop, looking as he went not into the branches of trees, but downward at the dust ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson
... jerking limbs, the broad, rolling body, and the mixture of expletives and frantic apologies poured forth by the prostrate knight turned the Queen's first ready alarm to irrepressible laughter, in which ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... the sleep of a healthy woman, with her child on her arm, until at dawn the closed flap of the tent yielded to a bounding shape. She opened her startled eyes to see Jim the blood-hound at the foot of the bed, jerking the mosquito-netting. He growled at the interlopers, not being able in his canine mind to reconcile their presence with his customary duty of waking his masters in that tent. A call and a whistle at the other side of the camp drew him away ...
— The Cursed Patois - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... clothing which at all interferes with the freedom of the waist. Lie down flat on your back. Place one hand lightly on the abdomen and the other upon the lower ribs. Inhale, through the nostrils, slowly, deeply, and evenly, without interruption or jerking. If this is done properly the abdomen will, gradually and without any trembling movement, increase in size, and the lower ribs will expand sideways, while the upper part of the chest and the collar-bones remain undisturbed. Now hold the breath, not by shutting the glottis, ...
— The Mechanism of the Human Voice • Emil Behnke
... and found the men feasting, as he thought, rather than jerking the meat, he reprimanded them, in his accustomed tones of severity. The men chanced to be the very worst and most desperate in the camp. Moranget accompanied his denunciations with still more irritating actions. He took from them the delicious morsels ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... withdrew her hand, and, whilst she waited, betrayed her impatience by a little jerking motion of the body, that threw her breast against the table, as if she would ...
— Fanny, the Flower-Girl • Selina Bunbury
... a new plan. Instead of cutting the meat in strips, and drying it, (or jerking it, as the lumberers term it,) she roasted it before the fire, and hung it up, wrapping it in thin sheets of birch bark. The juices, instead of being dried up, were preserved, and the meat was more palatable. ...
— Canadian Crusoes - A Tale of The Rice Lake Plains • Catharine Parr Traill
... was clear-headed enough. I even went to the miners' lavatory and, jerking down the metal mirror, scrutinized my own reflection and reassured myself of the closeness of the resemblance. My purpose framed in my mind as I did this. Clearly I was in German quarters and was likely to remain there. Sooner or later there must ...
— City of Endless Night • Milo Hastings
... pricking the sides of the oxen with a long, light stick, the end of which was armed with a dull goad. The proud beasts quivered under the child's small hand, and made the yokes and the straps about their foreheads groan, jerking the plough violently forward. When the ploughshare struck a root, the driver shouted in a resonant voice, calling each beast by his name, but rather to soothe than to excite them; for the oxen, annoyed by the sudden resistance, started forward, digging their broad forked feet into ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... the throng of spectators. Two of the players, one from each side, chosen for strength and dexterity, advanced. They hooked the ball together in their united bats and thus raised it aloft, until the bats were absolutely perpendicular. Then with a quick, jerking motion they shot it upward. Much might be gained by this first shot or stroke, but on this occasion the two players were equal, and it shot almost absolutely straight into the air. The nearest groups made a rush for ...
— The Scouts of the Valley • Joseph A. Altsheler
... silent rumination and jerking of peanut shells upon the track, the group broke up its session, and adjourned by tacit understanding till the next ...
— Hooking Watermelons - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... an adequate idea of the intonation and pronunciation which Uncle Remus brought to bear upon this wonderful word. Those who can recall to mind the peculiar gurgling, jerking, liquid sound made by pouring water from a large jug, or the sound produced by throwing several stones in rapid succession into a pond of deep water, may be able to form a very faint idea of the sound, but it can not be reproduced in print. The ...
— Uncle Remus • Joel Chandler Harris
... middle, where a gully had opened in the hill. Water flowed through the gap, and in order to get across one must pick a way carefully over the steep, wet slope. This, however, would save a toilsome climb, and Charnock, jerking the bag higher on his ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... least two hours long, and many a hitch did the Squire give me before it was over; that was the beginning of the little trick, which you see I have now, of jerking up a ...
— The Talkative Wig • Eliza Lee Follen
... geyser. Soon the flaccid organ began to slowly expand and show such a tendency to upward movements that Challenger fastened the cords which held it to the trunks of the surrounding trees. In half an hour a good-sized gas-bag had been formed, and the jerking and straining upon the thongs showed that it was capable of considerable lift. Challenger, like a glad father in the presence of his first-born, stood smiling and stroking his beard, in silent, self-satisfied content as he gazed at the creation of his brain. It was ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
... in a nasal tone, came from the steps at his back. He started up, jerking sidewise to get out of reach of the hands that belonged to the voice, and clutching his book to him. But as he faced the speaker, who was peering down at him from the top of the steps, wonder took the place ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... and above them, eminent in majesty, the lion. Surely, he sat as 'twere on a high seat, and they like suppliants thronging the presence: this I saw, the heart on my ribs beating for Shagpat. And there appeared among the beasts a monkey all ajoint with tricks, jerking with malice, he looking as 'twere hungry for the doing of things detestable; and the lion scorned him, and I marked him ridicule the lion: 'twas so. And the lion began to scowl, and the other beasts marked the displeasure of the lion. Then chased ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... where he sank on the floor, shivering and cringing. Nearer and nearer roared the thunder, and the wind seemed as anxious to get into the house as he was eager to get out of it. Gradually his arms and legs ceased jerking, his head relaxed against an empty box, he laid his hand against the cheek that had been patted and ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... downward and I looked! I distinctly saw a lady's hand reached out toward my robe in the darkness, and this hand took hold of it and jerked it lightly just like this." The "Reverend Swami" here illustrated, by slightly jerking his coat downward. It was very amusing to hear him, in great seriousness, relate this in his low and measured accents to his ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... by the hearth," he answered, masking his own voice with hoarseness and jerking his thumb towards the settle. The girl's eyes followed the signal and saw for the first time the huddled figure on the bench. "I thank you," she said simply, and moved away into the background, her eyes fixed on the crouching form, her fingers clasped nervously, waiting ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... the pipe from his mouth and spat once at the woodpile. Then, jerking his thumb toward the little window, ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... had already done him such good service, and he went through a preliminary drill, consisting of placing it inside his waistcoat, a couple of buttons being left carelessly unfastened; next thrusting his hand within, in an indifferent manner, then instantly jerking out and pointing the weapon at an imaginary foe in front of him. This maneuver he repeated scores of times, narrowly escaping the firing of the weapon, until he satisfied himself that he could ...
— Through Apache Lands • R. H. Jayne
... then a sour, severe reserve, full of angry and terrified suspicion of imaginary improprieties. Tittering shyness, all giggle-goggle and blush; stony and stolid stupidity, impenetrable to a ray of perception; awkward, angular postures and gestures, and jerking saltatory motions; Brobdingnag strides and straddles, and kittenish frolics and friskings; sharp, shrill little whinnying squeals and squeaks, followed by lengthened, sepulchral "O-h's"—all formed together such an irresistibly ludicrous picture as made "Les Anglaises pour Rire" ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... was evidently exerting himself to the utmost. Every now and then one might catch a glimpse of the scoundrel through the smoke. There he sat in the belfry upon the belfry-man, who was lying flat upon his back. In his teeth the villain held the bell-rope, which he kept jerking about with his head, raising such a clatter that my ears ring again even to think of it. On his lap lay the big fiddle, at which he was scraping, out of all time and tune, with both hands, making a great show, the nincompoop! of playing ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 4 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... what she is talking about!" he said, jerking certain boxes out of their places on the shelves, and then banging them back again, seeming to suppose that he was by this process putting his department in order for closing. "Little bit of a dressed-up doll! They will tear her into ribbons, ...
— Ester Ried Yet Speaking • Isabella Alden
... river, where they remained all the next day, sheltering themselves as well as they could from the rain and snow—a sharp foretaste of the impending winter. During their encampment, they employed themselves in jerking a part of the elk for future supply. In cutting up the carcass, they found that the animal had been wounded by hunters, about a week previously, an arrow head and a musket ball remaining in the wounds. In the wilderness, every trivial circumstance ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving
... studied weather-cocks. I take note that when one of them so-called fickle-minded inanimates goes jerking around the four cardinal points and feeling of what's between, it's just responding to the fore-running snorts of a pull-up and come-along cyclone. That's why I'm bobbing up and down like an ant looking for its long-lost brother. There's a cyclone on its ...
— Blue Goose • Frank Lewis Nason
... "Yours," said Mr. Parrott, jerking a stiff nod to the Cap'n, "is a morgidge on house and stable and land. Yours," he continued, with another nod at Hiram, "is a bill o' sale of all the furniture, dishes, liv'ry critters and stable outfit. Take it all and git what ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... close palkee, with a passenger; the bearers, with elbows sharply crooked, and calves all varicose, trotting to a monotonous, jerking ditty, which the sirdar, or leader, is impudently improvising, to the refrain of Putterum, ("Easy now!") at the expense ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... dark-brown wisps of hair which had been blown from beneath her cap straying about equally dark-brown, snapping eyes and caressing the corners of tightly pressed, momentarily impatient lips. Only a second she hesitated, then dived for the tonneau, jerking with all her strength at the heavy seat cushion, as he stepped to the running board ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... Latin blood. It was Beauregard, the victor of Bull Run, now second in command here, and he made a striking contrast to the stern and motionless Kentuckian who sat beside him and who was his chief. There was no uneasy play of Johnston's hands, no shrugging of the shoulders, no jerking of the head. He sat silent, his features a mask, while ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler
... speech and kiss had certainly appeared to impute suppressed insight, or penetration, or sly-pussness, or something of that sort to her young friend. But with an implied claim to rights of insight, on her own account, from seniority. Sally is froissee at this, but not beyond jerking the topic ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... him with a light rein," Keith cautioned, clinging to the subject. "He's tenderbitted, and nervous. He won't stand for any jerking, you see." ...
— Her Prairie Knight • B.M. Sinclair, AKA B. M. Bower
... the rod such a jerk that the line flew back against me, and when I was getting ready to throw it out again, I found that one of the little hooks had stuck fast in my thumb. I tried to take it out with the other hand, but it was awfully awkward to do, because the rod wobbled and kept jerking on it. The gilly asked me if there was anything the matter with the flies, but I didn't want him to know what had happened, and so I said, "Oh, no," and turning my back on him I tried my best to get the ...
— Pomona's Travels - A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former - Handmaiden • Frank R. Stockton
... shovels at the tips of their claws, powerful backs, capable of creating a little earthquake: the diggers need nothing more for the practice of their profession. Let us add—for this is an essential point—the art of continually jerking the body, so as to pack it into a lesser volume and make it glide through difficult passages. We shall soon see that this art plays a leading part in ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre
... Fitzpiers, and obliquely to the men, who had heard them often before. Marty, who poured out tea, was just saying, "I think I'll take out a cup to Miss Grace," when they heard a clashing of the gig-harness, and turning round Melbury saw that the horse had become restless, and was jerking about the vehicle in a way which alarmed its occupant, though she refrained from screaming. Melbury jumped up immediately, but not more quickly than Fitzpiers; and while her father ran to the horse's head and speedily began to control him, Fitzpiers was alongside ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... i got a fishhook in my leg today. me and Fatty Melcher was a fishing when we got our lines tangled, i hollered first cut, but i dident have enny nife and Fatty woodent let me have his nife. So we got jerking our lines kinder mad like and all of a suddin the hook got into my leg. gosh you bet it hurt. me and Fatty got the hook out but it bled some. the worst of it was there was a wirm on the hook and when we got the hook out they wasent enny wirm there. Fatty ...
— The Real Diary of a Real Boy • Henry A. Shute
... jerking his thumb over his shoulder, "If you keep on to the river and that clump of cedars, you will find ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... a child!" snapped Rosa, jerking her shoulder angrily away; "and you can never be my ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill
... protruding, and he was bleeding profusely. Some men were apparently trying to get him off the street. They had hold of his arms and the other leg, but were jumping and dodging at every shell that exploded, jerking and twisting this dangling leg to his horrible torture. I remember hearing him beseeching them to lay him down and let him die. They were probably a trio of cowards trying to get back from the front, and were using this wounded man to get away with, a not infrequent occurrence ...
— War from the Inside • Frederick L. (Frederick Lyman) Hitchcock
... minister's astonishment was so genuine that in jerking back his head his glasses slipped from his nose and dangled on ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... the man. "Glad to see a new customer, sir." He pocketed the money, and showed them, out, standing to look after them with a malicious leer as they disappeared, and jerking his left ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... red thread he thrust the chain into it, holding his hands as far apart as possible in the attitude of a player about to catch a bounced ball. But immediately the pain of that grew unendurable too, and he leaped back, jerking his hands away. He had succeeded only in blackening the steel and putting a big water blister on one of his wrists right where the shackle bolt would press ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... "Each man had about a dozen huge ostrich feathers in his helmet, a leopard or monkey-skin hung from his shoulders, while a large iron bell was strapped to his loins like a woman's bustle. This he rang during the dance, by jerking the hinder part of his body in the most absurd manner. All the time a hubbub was kept up by the shouting of the crowd, the blowing of horns, and the beating of seven nogaras, or drums, all of different notes, while each dancer also ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... are the following: he jerks the arm of the lady next him, the result being that she pours her cup of scalding hot tea over the knees of her neighbour, a testy old gentleman, who in his fright and pain raises his arms, jerking off with his cane the wig of a person standing at the back of his chair, who in the attempt to save his wig upsets his own cup and saucer upon the pate of his antagonist Another guest, with his mouth full of tea, witnessing this absurd contretemps is unable to restrain his laughter, the ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... to his fallen companion, who still lay where the lariat had thrown him. He was half stunned and covered with dust. After jerking him from his pony, however, the cowboys, though continuing their shouts of glee, had made no further effort to ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Montana • Frank Gee Patchin
... by many signals and many whistlings, but no train came in. The locomotive had given out and the train had stopped a good way out of the station. The carpet not reaching so far, their Majesties were obliged to walk quite a distance on the wet platform. By means of shunting and jerking the royal train was brought in under the station roof, but nowhere near the carpet. The small steps were put up to the carriage door, and the King and Queen descended. The Emperor kissed the King on both cheeks. The Empress received the Queen affectionately and gave her a ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone
... in high-spirited distemper and flounced through the doorway. He rose from his mound of pillows, jerking his daring waistcoat into place, flinging each knee outward to adjust the knifelike trouser creases, swept backward a black, pomaded forelock and straightened an ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... observed Miss Twexby, affably, as she cut up the lemon; 'par's gone to sleep in the other room,' jerking her head in the direction of the parlour, 'but Mr Villiers went out in all the heat, and it ain't no wonder if he ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... should have some fitting relation to what he is at the moment saying. These movements will then be varied. When certain repeated actions, without this proper relation, are acquired, they are called mannerisms. They have no meaning, and are obtrusive and annoying. Repeated jerking or bobbing of the head, for a supposed emphasis; regularly turning the head from side to side, for addressing all the audience; nervous shaking of the head, as of one greatly in earnest; repeated, meaningless punching or pounding of the air, always in the same way; shifting ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter
... state, I wouldn't put in every one's 'ands, for, in the fust place, he's wery walueous, and in the second, he requires an ossman to ride; howsomever, as I knows that you can ride, and if you doesn't mind taking my 'ead man,' jerking his elbow at Leather, 'to look arter him, I wouldn't mind 'commodatin' on you, prowided we can 'gree ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... like a jockey finishing a race, and the big stock horses went through the long grass like hawks swooping down on a flock of pigeons. The men carried their carbines loaded, holding them straight up over the shoulder so as to lessen the jerking of the wrist caused by ...
— An Outback Marriage • Andrew Barton Paterson
... stalwart youths of about twenty-two or-three years of age, who at this moment came up the street with their instruments,—"These are our two sons. He is mine,"—indicating one with his reversed thumb; "and that other is his,"—jerking his head towards his companion. "And they, too, are going to play in company, as ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various
... that most schoolroom work, till it has become habitual and automatic, is repulsive, and cannot be done without voluntarily jerking back the attention to it every now and then. This is inevitable, let the teacher do ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... it funny?" cried Vanessa, jerking Sir Joseph's arm in which hers was locked. "Of course the Tribes are on our side too, but they stayed ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... rocking. Horace says, that he had a soul of brass who first ventured to sea; I think a body of iron very necessary to the outfit. My cot is swinging and jerking up to the beams, as if the lively scoundrel was some metamorphosed imp mocking at me. "Sarve you right—what did you list for?"—Very true—Why did I?—Well, anxious as I am to close this chapter, and to close my eyes, I will tell you, ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... with fright, Tess jumped from the porch and ran down the hill to the scene of the accident. When she arrived Waldstricker was jerking his steed savagely. ...
— The Secret of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... only son has hit him with a brick, jumped on his stomach, and then gone off with all his money, you have a pretty good notion of how poor old Izzy looked. He was staring at me across the room, and talking to himself and jerking his hands about. Whether he thought he was talking to me, or whether he was rehearsing the scene where he broke it to the boss that a mere stranger had got away with his Love-r-ly Silver Cup, I don't know. Whichever it was, he was ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... which looked out into the yard he could see the woodshed and everything that happened in the yard. Standing at the window, Skvortsov saw the cook and the beggar come by the back way into the yard and go through the muddy snow to the woodshed. Olga scrutinized her companion angrily, and jerking her elbow unlocked the woodshed and angrily ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... the bed of the river six men clamped their peaveys into the soft pine; jerking, pulling, lifting, sliding the great logs from their places. Thirty feet below, under the threatening face, six other men coolly picked out and set adrift one by one, the timbers not inextricably imbedded. From time to time the mass creaked, settled, perhaps even moved a foot or two; but always ...
— Handwork in Wood • William Noyes
... seemed, could come between the knife and Dick Bellamy—Dick who had come to her. And then she saw his left arm dart forward—an arm that seemed, on the floor, to shoot out to twice its natural length—and its fingers gripped Fridji's left ankle, jerking ...
— Ambrotox and Limping Dick • Oliver Fleming
... marked off, depending midway from the shadow crossing it at right angles at the top, appeared a filmy, fine line, which undoubtedly was the shadow of a cord, and at the end of the cord dangled a veritable jumping-jack of a silhouette, turning and writhing and jerking, with a shape which in one breath grotesquely lengthened and in the next shrank up to half its former dimensions, which kicked out with indistinct movements of its lower extremities, which flapped with foreshortened strokes of the shadowy upper limbs, which altogether so contorted ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... Justitiarius," replied the old man, grinning all over his face, "but three days ago the heavy wainscot ceiling of the justice-hall fell in with a tremendous crash." "Then may the"—— My uncle was about to rip out a terrific oath in his violent passionate manner, but jerking up his right arm above his head and taking off his fox-skin cap with his left, he suddenly checked himself; and turning to me, he said with a hearty laugh, "By my troth, cousin, we must hold our tongues; we mustn't ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... jerking his thumb at the chief, "that we orter git the Tree-with-Wings in out'er the wet. The question is, where ...
— The Cruise of the Kawa • Walter E. Traprock
... flight of steps, they cluster like bees. Meanwhile (and especially on festa-days) the bells of the churches ring incessantly; not in peals, or any known form of sound, but in a horrible, irregular, jerking, dingle, dingle, dingle: with a sudden stop at every fifteenth dingle or so, which is maddening. This performance is usually achieved by a boy up in the steeple, who takes hold of the clapper, or a little rope attached to it, and tries to dingle ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens |
