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Paw   Listen
verb
Paw  v. i.  To draw the forefoot along the ground; to beat or scrape with the forefoot.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Paw" Quotes from Famous Books



... and the shore rushed a little portion of the great river, in which quite a shoal of white fish seemed to have been spawning. The sharp eyes of the bear having detected them, he had resolved to capture a number of them for his supper. His hand-like paw was all the fishing tackle he needed. He very skilfully thrust it low down into the water under the passing fish, and with a sudden movement sent the finny beauty flying through the air, and out upon the not very distant shore. ...
— On the Indian Trail - Stories of Missionary Work among Cree and Salteaux Indians • Egerton Ryerson Young

... my back brushing against the roof, over many masses of broken brickwork most rough to the palms of my hands. All of a sudden I smelt a pleasant stable-smell. I heard the rattle of a halter drawn across manger bars. I heard a horse paw upon the ground quite close to me. A dim, but regular chink of light showed in front of me, level with my head as crawled. Peering through it, I saw that I was looking into a stable, almost level with the floor; the passage had come to ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield

... and evidently following some imaginary object; but he was quickly recalled from his delirium by my voice or that of his master. In a few moments, however, he was wandering again. He had previously been under my care, and immediately recognised me and offered me his paw. His bark was changed and had a slight mixture of the howl, and there was a husky choking noise in ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt

... think he must add something to his master's speech, for he raised one paw, placed it on Lilac's knee, and gazed with a sort of solemn entreaty into her face. She knew at once what he wanted, for though he could not "use language" any more than Peter, he was quite able to make his meaning clear. In the course of many years' faithful attention to business ...
— White Lilac; or the Queen of the May • Amy Walton

... remains To conquer still; Peace hath her victories No less renowned than War: new foes arise, Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains. Help us to save free conscience from the paw Of hireling wolves, ...
— The Warriors • Lindsay, Anna Robertson Brown

... of keys. Near to these implements of a vocation which the reader will readily surmise, rested a strange superannuated terrier with a wiry back and frosted muzzle; a head minus an ear, and a leg wanting a paw. His master, for such we shall suppose him, was an old man with a lofty forehead, covered with a singularly shaped nightcap, and clothed, as to his lower limbs, with tight, ribbed, gray worsted hose, ascending externally, after ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth

... said, but I've allers noticed afloat that real dangersome squalls comes on still; there's a dumb kind of a time in the air, the storm seems to be waitin' and holdin' its breath, and then a little low whisper of wind,—a cat's paw we call't,—and then you get it real 'arnest. I'd rather she'd have taken on, and cried, and scolded, than have said ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various

... again, also, it licked the bayonet-wound between its shoulders, and rubbed its lacerated nose on its paw. Castine was mixing some tar and oil in a pan by the fire, to apply to the still bleeding wounds of his Michael. He had an ugly ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... in our element as frogs, and hacked away at the enemy, and shot them down as if they had been ducks. The few who struggled through, were struck dead in their flight by the peasant women, armed with hoes and pitchforks. His Gallic majesty was compelled at once to hold out his paw and make peace. And that peace you owe to us, ...
— Egmont - A Tragedy In Five Acts • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... entrance, and consequent dramatic tableau, meant "shop." He therefore dropped Zonela's hand and pattered on his velvety little feet over towards the grim figure of the Wondersmith, holding out his poor little paw for the customary copper. He had but one idea drilled into him,—soulless creature that he was,—and that was, alms, But I have seen creatures that professed to have souls, and that would have been indignant, if you had denied ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various

... with the links clanking and chinking in their wake. Lying stark on the pavement were the bodies of some eight men, dead and uneaten; and though the cave-tigers stopped their prowlings now and again to nuzzle these, and beat them about with playful paw-blows, they made no pretence at commencing a meal. It was clear that this cruel sport had grown common to them, and they knew there were other victims yet to be ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne

... watched the cat slipped out one soft paw after the other and looked about, as if awakened from sleep. Then it moved toward the tree behind which the boys ...
— Boy Scouts in the Canal Zone - The Plot Against Uncle Sam • G. Harvey Ralphson

... lament is broken by a sudden flash of indignation at the dangers around the Church, at the "blind mouths that scarce themselves know how to hold a sheephook," and to whom "the hungry sheep look up, and are not fed," while "the grim wolf" of Rome "with privy paw daily devours apace, and nothing said!" The stern resolve of the people to demand justice on their tyrants spoke in his threat of the axe. Strafford and Laud, and Charles himself, had yet to reckon with "that two-handed engine at the door" which stood "ready to smite once, and smite no more." ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green

... was to bring back with him. Under the first rail near the same gate Mercy would find: a dead frog with its eyes torn out, and across the road in the hollow of a stump Apollo was to look for a muskrat's tail and a weasel's paw. They went off reluctantly, the entire corps de plantation following, and soon they all came scampering back, trampling down the ox-eyed daisies and jamming each other against the corners of the rail fence, for, sure enough, the witch's treasures had been ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various

... the Nort'—from Belfast," Mr. Reardon replied in a deep Kerry brogue, and extended a grimy paw upon the finger of which Mike Murphy observed a gold ring that proclaimed Mr. Terence Reardon—an Irishman, presumably a Catholic—one who had risen to the third ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne

... after all, she seemed easier if he were at hand. I remember, one day, he was tied in front of the house, and she was loose, grazing near by. As long as he could see her, all went well enough, but the moment she sauntered around the fence, he began first to fidget, then to paw and neigh, and finally to struggle, until in the end, he broke loose and rushed after his inamorata. And what a time he made over her! whinnying, and demonstrating his delight in a dozen different ...
— How to Cook Husbands • Elizabeth Strong Worthington

... than the clap of a man's paw on my back to take me by surprise; and, besides, I saw you coming. There is a mirror near, good Sir Rufus, and even in yonder owl-light I could pick you out of the mist. Moreover, ...
— The Lady of Loyalty House - A Novel • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... day at school you will be shown your room; in your room you will find a sad-eyed fat girl. You will be told that this will be your room mate for the year. You will find that you have drawn a blank, that she comes from Topeka, Kan., that her paw made his money in oil, and that she is religious. You will be nice to her for the first week, because you aren't taking any chances at the start; you will tolerate her for the rest of the year, because she will do your lessons ...
— Perfect Behavior - A Guide for Ladies and Gentlemen in all Social Crises • Donald Ogden Stewart

... And flang amang them a', man; The English blades got broken beads, Their crowns were cleav'd in twa then. The durk and door made their last hour, And prov'd their final fa', man; They thought the devil had been there, That play'd them sic a paw then. ...
— A Collection of Ballads • Andrew Lang

... infuriated animal two more shots, and then wheeled her horse and galloped away, making a circuit as she rode, so as to reach the other side of the tree from which the first grizzly had now disengaged himself, and attacking Michael, the remaining guide, had broken his horse's leg with a blow of his paw; the horse fell, and Michael's arm was fractured, and the bear then dashing at Col. Ansley and Mr. Dagget, put them to flight, together with Miss Dagget. The Colonel's horse, stumbling, threw his rider, and leaving him ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler

... strength was telling, when the lamp crashed over, leaving them in darkness, and he felt the blow of a heavy body striking his back. Claws dug through his clothes, deep into his flesh. Something was at his head now, biting and tearing, and the warm blood was trickling down into his eyes. A stealthy paw reached round for his throat. He could feel its silken surface passing over his bare flesh, the unsheathing of its steel to strike, and, as it sank into his throat, he seized it, loosening, to do this, his hold on Mrs. Athelstone, quite careless of her in the ...
— The False Gods • George Horace Lorimer

... any hurt," I assured her. "The trap did not altogether meet on her paw, although ...
— The Story of Bawn • Katharine Tynan

... squall to wind'ard, skipper; 'ta'n't no cat's-paw neither; good no-no-east, ef it's a flaw. And you landlubbers are a-goin' to leeward, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various

... tablet open on the table just as she had found it, and left the bunk house without deigning to fulfill the errand of mercy that had taken her there. Why should she trouble to sew the lining in a coat sleeve for a fellow who pined for a silly flirtation with Venus? Let Johnny Jewel paw and struggle to get into his coat. Better, let Venus ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower

... This peculiar state is probably produced in all animals killed by the carnivora; and if so, is a merciful provision by our benevolent Creator for lessening the pain of death. Turning round to relieve myself of the weight, as he had one paw on the back of my head, I saw his eyes directed to Mabalwe, who was trying to shoot him at a distance of ten or fifteen yards. His gun, a flint one, missed fire in both barrels; the lion immediately left me, and, attacking Mebalwe, bit his thigh. Another man—whose life I had saved before, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne

... of your own getting; where would you be then? What would become of your fine coach and horses? you might stump your feet off before you'd ever get into one. Where would be all this fine crockery work for your breakfast? you might pop your head under a pump, or drink out of your own paw; what would you do for that fine jemmy tye? Where would you get a gold head to your stick?— You might dig long enough in them cold vaults before any of your old grandfathers would pop ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... of the fact that each was already going as fast as its legs could carry it. "It was so unexpected," continues Miss Rogers, "and so funny to see those little bears look around reproachfully at their angry parent every time they felt the weight of her paw, helping them to hurry, that the man sat down ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney

... Perhaps they resent some things in you. I want you to try and be impersonal. They'd paw over anybody who came in new. Didn't you, ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis

... Yes, Charlie!"—this, as he saw his canine foundling's head perk out from under his arm, with a little black nose all a-quiver with anxiety,—"it's just as well for you that you've got a wounded paw and can't run too far for the present! If you had been in the way of that car just now, your little life would have ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli

... the temple gong, would thrust a knife into the heart of Ko-tan, for the price of liberty. Another held personal knowledge of an officer of the palace that he could use to compel the latter to admit a number of Lu-don's warriors to various parts of the palace. With Mo-sar as the cat's paw, the plan seemed scarce possible of failure and so they separated, going upon their immediate errands to palace and ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... attention to him. She went close to the hole and pushed gently against the little door that closed it. It didn't move. Then she noticed that at one edge there was a tiny crack. She tried to push her nose through, but the crack was too narrow. Then she tried a paw. A claw caught on the edge of the door, and it moved ever so little. Then Granny knew that the little door wasn't fastened. Granny stretched herself flat on the ground and went to work, first with one paw, then with the other. By and by she caught her claws in ...
— Old Granny Fox • Thornton W. Burgess

... reckon he has," said the magnanimous Captain Ralph, picking up his hat: then walking up to Nathan, who had taken his dog into his arms, to examine into the little animal's hurts, he cried, with much good-humoured energy,—"Thar's my fo'paw, in token I've had enough of you and want no mo'. But I say, Nathan Slaughter," he added, as he grasped the victor's hand, "it's no thing you can boast of, to be the strongest man in Kentucky, and the most sevagarous ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird

... little Pussy, And then she will purr, And thus show her thanks For my kindness to her; I'll not pinch her ears, Nor tread on her paw, Lest I should provoke her To use her sharp claw; I never will vex her, Nor make her displeased, For Pussy can't bear To ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various

... if it had the pip; the paralytic keys halt, and stammer, and tremble, or else run into each other like ink upon blotting paper, and the pedals are the only part of the instrument which do the work for which they were intended. We should be sorry that our favourite dog had his paw between them and the lady's slipper. The dust which succeeds the concerto proves satisfactorily that it is possible to be frisky without being lively; its vulgarity is so pronounced that it offends you like low conversation. Another concerto follows—ten folio pages! whew!!——Oh, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various

... the kittens had been drowned, a servant had occasion to go to an unfrequented part of the cellar, where, to his great astonishment, he saw the cat lying in one corner, with the chicken hugged close to her body, and one paw laid over it as if ...
— Minnie's Pet Cat • Madeline Leslie

... end of the yard, on the left, on the third story." Andrea went as she directed him, and on the third floor he found a hare's paw, which, by the hasty ringing of the bell, it was evident he pulled with considerable ill-temper. A moment after Caderousse's face appeared at the grating in the door. "Ah, you are punctual," said he, as ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... and a philosopher; though the whirlpool of matter may have, and indeed has, involved my ethereal spark in the body of a porter. Therefore, youth,' continued the little man, starting up upon his baulk like an excited monkey, and stretching out one oratorio paw, 'I bear a treble hatred to the monkish tribe. First, as a man and a husband;.... for as for the smiles of beauty, or otherwise,—such as I have, I have; and the monks, if they had their wicked ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley

... Harry, holding him by the forelock. "Let me introduce you to this young lady, Miss Laura Morris. I want you to make her a bow." He gave the colt some sign, and immediately he began to paw the ground and ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders

... a growl ahead of him, a sudden breaking away of the bushes, and then he was thrown back, stunned and bleeding, because a great paw had smitten him. Whatever the beast might be, it was hungry and had found what seemed easy prey. There was a difference, though, which the animal,—it was doubtless a bear—unfortunately for him, did not comprehend, between the quality of the being he proposed to eat just now and ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo

... became general. From time to time Madame Rabourdin joined in, just as a well-trained cat puts a velvet paw on her mistress's laces with the claws carefully drawn in. The minister, in matters of the heart, had few emotions. There was not another statesman under the Restoration who had so completely done with gallantry as he; even the opposition papers, ...
— Bureaucracy • Honore de Balzac

... bore) 750 That our three heroes should advance And read their comical romance, How rich a feast, what royal fare, We for our readers might prepare! So rich and yet so safe a feast, That no one foreign blatant beast, Within the purlieus of the law, Should dare thereon to lay his paw, And, growling, cry, with surly tone, 'Keep off—this feast is all my own.' 760 Bending to earth the downcast eye, Or planting it against the sky, As one immersed in deepest thought, Or with some holy vision caught, His hands, ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... had burnt the last one—so Joe walked round the room wondering where to put his prize. The cat came out of the bedroom and mewed and followed him for the snake. He told her to go away. She did n't go. She reached for the snake with her paw. It bit her. She spat and sprang in the air and rushed outside with her back up. Joe giggled and wondered how long ...
— On Our Selection • Steele Rudd

... but these could not now be found. In his scramble through the gully he had lost them, and the ground on the side he had just reached was so hard and rocky that it seemed to him doubtful whether it was capable of receiving any visible impression from a bear's paw. It was just possible, too, that the animal had found the descent of the gully as difficult as he himself had; in which case it was highly probable that it had used the course of the ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne

... the low growl was repeated, and upon quietly creeping toward the spot I saw a splendid animal crouched upon the ground amid the withered and broken grass. The lioness lay dying with the bullet wound in the shoulder. Occasionally in her rage she bit her own paw violently, and then struck and clawed the ground. A pool of blood lay by her side. She was about ten yards from us, and I instructed my men to throw a clod of earth at her (there were no stones), to prove whether she could ...
— In the Heart of Africa • Samuel White Baker

... tinkle of the gold, the Fox unconsciously held out his paw that was supposed to be lame, and the Cat opened wide his two eyes till they looked like live coals, but he closed them again so quickly that Pinocchio ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini

... and ran after it. But I could only see a yard or so ahead through the thick undergrowth, and was following the bloodstained track. Seeing the animal I put down my gun and was stepping over the trunk of an old tree; but just as I put my foot down, lo! I saw a terrible monster standing with one paw on the beast's chest. Oh, my eye! I thought my last hour had come, for the lion looked so hard at me, and he roared so awfully. By jove, General, if this had been an Englishman I should just have "hands-upped," you bet! But I veered round ...
— My Reminiscences of the Anglo-Boer War • Ben Viljoen

... tossed our boat rapidly along into the very middle of this forenoon. The fish-hawk sailed and screamed overhead. The chipping or striped squirrel, Sciurus striatus (Tamias Lysteri, Aud.), sat upon the end of some Virginia fence or rider reaching over the stream, twirling a green nut with one paw, as in a lathe, while the other held it fast against its incisors as chisels. Like an independent russet leaf, with a will of its own, rustling whither it could; now under the fence, now over it, now peeping at the voyageurs through a crack with only its ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau

... people. I refused to stay on and smoke after dinner; and when I put my hand into the thickly-cushioned palm of Jacobus, I said to myself that it would be for the last time under his roof. I pressed his bulky paw heartily nevertheless. Hadn't he got me out of a serious difficulty? To the few words of acknowledgment I was bound, and indeed quite willing, to utter, he answered by stretching his closed lips ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad

... Noblemen pressed agen and agen to try my Fortune with an other, I (seeing my Life was in the Lyon's paw, to struggle with whome for safety there was no way but one, and being afrayd to displease them) sayd: That if their Graces and Greatnesses would giue me leave to play at mine owne Countrey Weapon called the Quarter Staffe, I was then ready there an Oposite, against any Commer.' ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote

... old hound howled dismally on the door-step, only stopping occasionally to paw at the iron latch and to whimper for the master whose unsteady footsteps he had ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice

... the Beavers, so called by the Assiniboins. The Indians, though they kill this animal whenever they can, nevertheless esteem him scarcely inferior to man in wisdom. A bit of his skin, or his paw, or any part of him, is esteemed a very ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 2 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones

... this action, of which the consequences were easily foreseen, they were in the utmost consternation. They immediately despatched Paw, pensionary of Holland, as their ambassador extraordinary to London, and ordered him to lay before the parliament the narrative which Tromp had sent of the late rencounter. They entreated them, by all the bands of their common religion ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume

... out her hand, that seemed like a snowflake in the great horny paw of the drover, and said, "Indeed, Mr. Cronk, I will permit no one to claim stronger friendship to ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe

... ballot-box. Walking in Paris one day I was greatly impressed with an emblematic statue in the square Chateau d'Eau, placed there in 1883 in honor of the republic. On one side is a magnificent bronze lion with his fore paw on the electoral urn, which answers to our ballot-box, as if to guard it from all unholy uses.... As I turned away I thought of the American republic and our ballot-box with no guardian or sacred reverence for ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various

... thicket, alighting immediately in front of Prince and Flora. It was as nearly as possible the same colour as the mastiffs, and perhaps hardly stood so high; but he was a much heavier animal, and longer in the back. The dogs sprang upon it. Prince, who was first, received a blow with its paw, which struck him down; but Flora had caught hold. Prince in an instant joined her, and the three were immediately rolling over and over on the ground in a confused mass. Mr. Hardy and Lopez at once leapt from their horses and rushed ...
— Out on the Pampas - The Young Settlers • G. A. Henty

... into the region where he lived, he would lie in wait for him and kill him. One stroke of his mighty paw and the man would fall, to rise no more. He killed so many of them that the hunters began to be afraid to go into that land. As for the beasts and birds, they all feared him and kept as far away from ...
— The Magic Speech Flower - or Little Luke and His Animal Friends • Melvin Hix

... Beauty's bracelet, Fanchette," said Howell. Turning back another fold of the blanket, the maid lifted a little white paw, on which sparkled a tiny diamond bracelet. Lloyd drew a long breath of astonishment. "Some of its teeth are filled with gold," continued Howell. "We had to stay a whole week in New York while Beauty was in the dog hospital, having ...
— The Little Colonel's Hero • Annie Fellows Johnston

... kind, was bound to seal the bargain with a hearty handshake; and Eli, not to be outdone in the matter, also thrust out his broad "paw" as he called it, squeezing that of the other with a strength that ...
— Canoe Mates in Canada - Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan • St. George Rathborne

... hours, and had fraternised with the keepers, and came home loquacious far more than usual on the wonders he had seen. I remember that, instead of being disappointed in the size of the lions and tigers, he dwelt with special admiration on their supple and terrible strength of spine and paw. ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge

... hare. "It is my friend the lion who has heard so much of your charms and good qualities that he has sent me to beg that you will give him your paw in marriage. He regrets deeply that he is unable to make the request in person, but he has been ill and ...
— The Lilac Fairy Book • Andrew Lang

... have overheard Clem scolding the lady with frank irritation in his voice,—as I chanced to do once or twice,—had it beheld his scowl as he raged, "Miss Cahline, yo' sho'ly gittin' old 'nuff to know betteh'n that. I suttinly do wish yo' Paw was alive an' yeh'bouts. Ah git him afteh yo' maghty quick. Now yo' jes' remembeh Ah ain't go'n' a' have no sech doin's!"—if it could have noted the quailing consternation of the mistress at these ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson

... however, were still lying sleeping beside their dead master on the dragon's hill, and there came a great humble-bee and lighted on the hare's nose, but the hare wiped it off with his paw, and went on sleeping. The humble-bee came a second time, but the hare again rubbed it off and slept on. Then it came for the third time, and stung his nose so that he awoke. As soon as the hare was awake, he roused the fox, and the ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers

... kin beat All dey tricks an' git de meat." "Cose I 's wif you," says de bah, "Come on, weasel, show me whah." Well, dey trots erlong ontwell Dat air meat beginned to smell In de trap. Den weasel say: "Now you put yo' paw dis way While I hol' de spring back so, Den you grab de meat an' go." Well, de bah he had to grin Ez he put his big paw in, Den he juked up, but—kerbing! Weasel done let go de spring. "Dah now," says de weasel, "dah, I done cotched ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... appropriate to the occasion. This precisely Donald did in the present instance, to the great amazement and alarm of a very pretty Spanish girl, who was performing the duty of ushering in customers, inclusive of that of subsequently supplying their wants. On feeling the enormous paw of Donald on her shoulder, and looking at the strange attire in which he was arrayed, the girl uttered a scream of terror, and fled into the interior of the house. Unaccustomed to have his rude but hearty greetings received in this way, or to find them producing an effect so contrary to that ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton

... not be disappointed. I kept my eye turning round the horizon in the hopes of seeing the signs of a breeze which might bring up a vessel to our help. I looked in vain. The ocean shone like a sheet of glass—not a cat's-paw even for a moment played over its surface. We ate but little, even the fruit did not take away our thirst. It was water we wanted, and without it the rum, of which we had plenty, was of no use. It tasted like fire when we put ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston

... you, young Jones, was it you I saw (And I think I see you yet) With a live bomb gripped in your grimy paw And your face to the parapet? With your lips asnarl and your eyes gone mad With a fury that thrilled you through. . . . Oh, I look at you now and I think, my lad, Was it you, young Jones, ...
— Ballads of a Bohemian • Robert W. Service

... powerful brute. The huge Himalayan bear roams under the giant trees, feeding on fruit and honey, yet ready to shatter unprovoked the skull of a poor woodcutter. Those savage striped and spotted cats, the tiger and the panther, steal through it on velvet paw and take toll of ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly

... A long many-syllabled word is used by the rude Algonquins and Delawares to express a whole sentence: for example, a woman of the latter nation, playing with a little dog or cat, would perhaps be heard saying, "kuligatschis," meaning, "give me your pretty little paw;" the word, on examination, is found to be made up in this manner: k, the second personal pronoun; uli, part of the word wulet, pretty; gat, part of the word wichgat, signifying a leg or paw; schis, conveying the idea of littleness. In the same tongue, ...
— Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation • Robert Chambers

... the care of providing for his subsistence,' says Paw, 'had so occupied his mind, that all rational ideas were effaced from it. As savage as the animals, and perhaps more so, he had almost entirely forgotten the secret ...
— The Solitary of Juan Fernandez, or The Real Robinson Crusoe • Joseph Xavier Saintine

... The cat's-paw could not read, or the illegible, meaningless ink scrawl upon the sheet within the boldly-addressed envelope would have aroused his suspicions at the outset. So well had Bough, that expert in human frailty, understood his subject, that the letter was a bogus ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... I think of it, Aynesworth, I wish you to remember this. Both Lady Ruth and her husband seem to think it part of the game to try and make a cat's paw of you. I am not suggesting that they are likely to succeed, but I do think it possible that one of them may ask you questions concerning certain investments in which I am interested. I rely upon you ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... hated the unfortunate general manager. She told herself that, had he been possessed of the brains of a chipmunk, he would have pointed out to her the danger of her course; that he had not done so was proof that the craven had feared to compromise himself. He had made a cat's-paw of her, that's what he had done! He had taken advantage of a momentary lack of caution—the result of her impetuous mother love. Ah, what a blockhead the man was, not to have warned her of the diplomatic dangers she was risking! At that moment, placid ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne

... He is the hero of a story told by Aulus Gellius (v. 14), which states that Androclus had taken refuge from the cruelties of his master in a cave in Africa, when a lion entered the cave and showed him his swollen paw, from which Androclus extracted a large thorn. The gratelul animal subsequently recognized him when he had been captured and thrown to the wild beasts in the circus, and, instead of attacking him, began to caress him (Aelian, De ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... absurd and grotesque than armorial bearings, considered in themselves. Certain recollections, certain associations, make them interesting in many cases to an Englishman; but in those recollections and associations the natives of India do not participate. A lion, rampant, with a folio in his paw, with a man standing on each side of him, with a telescope over his head, and with a Persian motto under his feet, must seem to them either very mysterious, or ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan

... landward edge, until it stopped short at a distance of about two miles from the shore, blowing fresh right up to a certain well-defined point, between which and the land all was gleaming, glassy swell, unruffled by even so much as a cat's-paw. But the boundary line which divided breeze from calm was not stationary by any means, on the contrary, it was creeping nearer rapidly. When Bascomb came up on the poop he merely glanced at it for a moment and then called to the seamen to trim the yards in readiness to ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood

... (1873) there has not been a race, and not even a sleigh has been seen. Let us hope that this deplorable state of affairs will not last, and that winter will return to caress Holland with its icy bear's paw, and that the fine art of skating will once more arise with its mantle of snow and its crown of icicles. Let me announce meanwhile the publication of a work called "Skating," upon which a Dutch legislator has been employed ...
— Holland, v. 1 (of 2) • Edmondo de Amicis

... for you alone," said the Red Un. His voice had lost its occasional soprano note; the Red Un was a grown man. "I'm staying!" And after a hesitating moment he put his small, frightened paw on ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... receives with profound reverence a thin, square enclosure, with an immense seal attached to it, and retires to put it in a place of safety. The uniforms disappear over the side of the vessel—the paddles begin to paw the water—we swing round—and in a few seconds our prow points for the Sorrentine coast, and we are on our watery way to Sicily. What, then, had detained us? It is always very provoking to have a miserable solution of a promising mystery! We were on the exact spot for a new edition of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various

... those men who liked to have a clever woman at his beck and call. These literary fellows were often terribly exigent, eaten up with the sense of their own importance. But he, Maurice, was not going to allow himself to be made a cat's-paw of. He would make Artois understand that he was not going to permit his life to be interfered ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens

... and anxious looks, Triss came up, growling and showing his teeth. Frank explained that it was only his manner. Frank took the paw that was extended to him, but Triss's friendliness seemed somewhat dubious, for he still further uncovered his ...
— Spring Days • George Moore

... welcome, Minister,' cried Tam in reply, as he rose up and took him by the hand; '"wag a paw," as we used to say, and take something for a sore throat. Yes,' he continued, as he sat himself down again and took a pull at his own long glass, 'I'm building up a pedigree stock at my new place—gave L500 for a bull t' other day, ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease

... conversation that he had with his nephew, upon which Fethertonge convinced him that there was more in the wind with respect to that step, than either he or his nephew, who he assured him was made a cat's paw of in the business, suspected. "That's a deep move," said the agent, "but we shall defeat them, notwithstanding. Everything, however, depends upon their leaving the country before Chevydale happens to come at the real state of the case; still, ...
— The Emigrants Of Ahadarra - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... fool as to come forward with them so soon after his victim's death! This claimant doesn't know how or where or when they were obtained—he doesn't suspect that murder's in it. Now, then—where did he get them? Who's at the back of him? Who—to be plain—who's making a cat's-paw of him? Find that out, and we shall know ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher

... Come out, General, and give the gentleman your right paw, and tell him that he is forgiven—if only for the sake of Daddy Ben." With these latter words she gave me a gracious nod of understanding. They were all thanking me for the kettle-supporter! She probably knew also the tale of John Mayrant, the ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister

... followed them and shambled to the water's edge. He looked up and down the stream, but he saw nothing and the wind blowing from him toward the boat brought no dread odor to his sensitive nostrils. He drank, wrinkled his face in a comical manner, scratched himself with his left paw, and then shambled away. ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler

... stretch the definition of the class of birds so as to include birds with teeth and birds with paw-like fore-limbs and long tails. There is no evidence that Compsognathus possessed feathers; but, if it did, it would be hard indeed to say whether it should be called a reptilian bird or ...
— American Addresses, with a Lecture on the Study of Biology • Tomas Henry Huxley

... imperialistic ideas. True, there has once before been another Christian conquering and colonising empire like yours, that of Venice—but these Venetians were thinkers compared with you, and smuggled their gospel into the paw of their lion.... Why don't you follow their example, in order not to be unnecessarily embarrassed by it in your enterprises abroad? In this manner you could also reconcile the proper Germans, who invariably act up to their theories, their Christianity, ...
— Thoughts out of Season (Part One) • Friedrich Nietzsche

... would not be moved by his speeches. He gave the ill-disposed creature a blow with his paw, and he lay lifeless ...
— Grimm's Fairy Stories • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm

... a certain conversation, in which I had refused to satisfy her curiosity. Brigit's quick, Irish mind has a way of matching mental jigsaw puzzles, even when vital bits appear to be missing; and if she could make a cat's paw of Cleopatra, the witch would not be above doing it. I bore her no grudge—who could bear soft-eyed, laughing, yet tragic Biddy a grudge? —but I wished that she and Monny were at the ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... to the subject of originality, in W.W. Jacobs's story, "The Monkey's Paw," the thrillingly terrible crisis begins when the father, much against his will, makes use of the second wish granted to him as the possessor of the fatal paw and wishes his dead son alive again. In the night ...
— Writing the Photoplay • J. Berg Esenwein and Arthur Leeds

... a large man, yet it is small and narrow, like the hand of a woman and the paw of a chimpanzee. It is supple and boneless as the hands wrought in pigment by a fashionable portrait painter. The tapering fingers bend backward. Between them burns a scented cigarette. You poise it with infinite daintiness, ...
— Profiles from China • Eunice Tietjens

... on his slim legs, walked after her, then suddenly, for pure excess, he gave her a light cuff with his paw on the side of her face. She ran off a few steps, like a blown leaf along the ground, then crouched unobtrusively, in submissive, wild patience. The Mino pretended to take no notice of her. He blinked his eyes superbly at the landscape. In a minute ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence

... platform into the carriage was a sliding one on wheels, which ran very easily on a brass runner; and as it was probably not quite shut, or at any rate not secured in any way, it was an easy matter for the lion to thrust in a paw and shove it open. But owing to the tilt of the carriage and to his great extra weight on the one side, the door slid to and snapped into the lock the moment he got his body right in, thus leaving him shut up with the three ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson

... about one who used to do it very slyly. I tried to make Topaz, but she did not like the water, and scratched me. She does like tea, and when I play in my kitchen she pats the teapot with her paw, till I give her some. She is a fine cat, she eats apple-pudding and ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott

... Abner. Give us yer paw," said Paul, delighted to find the people working up to his own pitch of bitter and unrelenting animosity against the gentlemen. "That's the talk, but it'll take more'n talk. Look here men, three out ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy

... seized Lund's great paw in both her hands, and, for the first time, the tears overflowed her eyes. The Karluk came about as Rainey reached the deck and gave his orders. Then he returned to the cabin. The captain ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn

... on very tight the first time, he cannot raise his head enough to loosen it, but will bear on it all the time, and paw, sweat and throw himself. Many horses have been killed by falling backward with the bitting on, their heads being drawn up, strike the ground with the whole weight of the body. Horses that have their heads drawn up tightly ...
— The Arabian Art of Taming and Training Wild and Vicious Horses • P. R. Kincaid

... "he's kinder skeert o' most folks, 'cause they've tret him so bad. The way I come to git him was when Annie Flynn an' Han Murphy had him a-swingin' him round by one paw and then flingin' him off ter see if he'd light on his feet; one of his legs has been queer ever since. I give 'em my supper fur lettin' me have him, but I have a time ter keep the boys from gittin' him. Come, let's go to the ...
— A Dear Little Girl • Amy E. Blanchard

... levelled his spear and made a thrust that would probably have killed the beast, if it had not caught the point of the spear and turned it aside. Then with its left paw it caught the youth by the neck, seized his thigh with one of its hind paws, and fixed its ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne

... Spirit, and the grace of his Word? Just none at all; for it cannot be that these things can be the true and natural effects of the workings of the Spirit of God: no, not as a spirit of bondage. These are not his doings. Dost thou not see the very paw of the devil in them; yea, in every one of thy ten confessions? Is there not palpably high wickedness in every one of the effects of this fear? I conclude, then, as I began, that the fear that the spirit of God, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... into the farthest depths of siderial space; he has only very feeble occult powers of communication with his fellows, and yet he can talk around the world and send his voice across mountains and deserts; his hands are weak things beside a lion's paw or an elephant's trunk, and yet he can move mountains and stay rivers and set bounds to the wildest seas. His dog can out-smell him and out-run him and out-bite him, and yet his dog looks up to him as to a god. He has erring reason in place of unerring instinct, and yet he ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs

... Rosamond blush with pleasure. But she remained simply serious, turned her long neck a little, and put up her hand to touch her wondrous hair-plaits—an habitual gesture with her as pretty as any movements of a kitten's paw. Not that Rosamond was in the least like a kitten: she was a sylph caught young and ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot

... city treasury, and that unless he could compel aid there he was going to fail. He already owed the city treasury five hundred thousand dollars. He had already used the city treasurer as a cat's-paw so much, had involved him so deeply, that the latter, because of the staggering size of the debt, was becoming frightened. Did that deter ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser

... off, as that he never does. This hideous apparition, inconceivably drunk, has a terrible power of making a gong-like imitation of the braying of an ass: which feat requires that he should lay his right jaw in his begrimed right paw, double himself up, and shake his bray out of himself, with much staggering on his next-to-no legs, and much twirling of his horrible broom, as if it were a mop. From the present minute, when he comes in sight holding up his cards to the windows, and hoarsely proposing purchase to My Lord, ...
— The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices • Charles Dickens

... doubtless, drew many a purr of approval from her own breast, and many a wag of approbation from the tails of her choice acquaintance, I have preferred leaving out altogether; and I have so curtailed the labours of her paw, and the workings of her brain, as to condense into half-a-dozen pages her little volume of introduction. The autobiography itself, most luckily, required no alteration. It is the work of a simple mind, detailing the events ...
— The Adventures of a Dog, and a Good Dog Too • Alfred Elwes

... to eat muscles and other bivalves; and the racoon, whose fur is esteemed by hatters next in value to that of the beaver, when near the shore lives much on them, more particularly on oysters. We are told that it will watch the opening of the shells, dexterously put in its paw, and tear out the contents. Not, however, without danger, for sometimes, we are assured, by a sudden closure, the oyster will catch the thief, and detain him until he is drowned by the return of the tide. The story, I regret to ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 379, Saturday, July 4, 1829. • Various

... with brass-work. Still there was nothing to awaken curiosity under the panelled and gilded ceiling unless it were the wall-hangings of red damask, on which yellow scutcheons displaying the Keys and the Tiara alternated with armorial lions, each with a paw resting on ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... harm, Baloo; but only that thou art, as it were, like the cocoanut in the husk, and I am the same cocoanut all naked. Now that brown husk of thine——" Mowgli was sitting cross-legged, and explaining things with his forefinger in his usual way, when Bagheera put out a paddy paw and pulled him ...
— The Second Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling

... his paw or tail, he did so in affrighted joy, the mewing of the poor creature giving him vague terror, as though he heard a human cry of pain. Laurent, in fact, was afraid of Francois, particularly since the latter passed his time on the knees of the impotent old lady, as if in the ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola

... sharply, "Strap, Strap, come out of it." The dog took no notice, but ran directly to a clump of gorse and bramble half-way up the down, and stood there in the attitude of a pointer, with uplifted paw, watching the gorse intently, and whining. Mr. Beckwith was by this time dismounted, observing the dog. He watched him for some minutes from the road. The moon was bright, the sky at the moment free ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett

... quietly, yet steadily!—and the whalers were soon astern. Penny, indefatigable, was seen struggling along the shore, with his boats ahead, towing, and every stitch of sail set to catch the lightest cat's paw: him too, however, we soon passed. The water ahead increased as we advanced, and we found, as is well known to be the case, that the pack-edge is always the tightest part ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn

... fluttered,—as were her lilac cap strings,—presided over the silver tea and coffee service, admonished the staid and bulky tom-cat who, jumping on the arm of Dickie's chair, extended a scooping tentative paw towards his plate, and issued gentle though peremptory orders to her husband regarding the material needs of her guest. To Mrs. Chifney such entertainings as the present marked the red-letter days of her calendar. Temporarily she forgave Chifney the doubtful nature of his calling and his occasional ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet

... round him, turning up its fierce eyes as if with laughter. Horror-stricken and with faltering steps he kept on, and the terrible animal still circled about, now rolling over, and now touching him with a paw like a cat playing with a mouse. At last the suspense became too great, and with a loud shout he struck desperately at the creature with his axe. It bounded on one side and crouched snarling and showing its teeth. Just as it was about to spring, ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson



Words linked to "Paw" :   kangaroo's paw, foot, metacarpus, extremity, right, animal foot, pussy's-paw, right hand, fondle, pad, human, pussy-paw, metacarpal vein, feline, kangaroo paw, left hand, bear's-paw fern, hand, arm, clenched fist, fist, touch, hooks, grate, maulers, canid, left, intercapitular vein, palm, scrape, felid, metacarpal artery, arteria metacarpea, cat's-paw, human being, homo, forepaw, manus, pawer, man, ball, bear paw, digital arteries, mitt, canine, vena intercapitalis, finger, thenar



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